Shepard sits in the Captain's quarters on the Normandy's crew deck, looking over her report on the events on Terra Nova. Or rather, the asteroid that was hurtling for the main settlement of the colony. She grits her teeth as she reads the final part describing Balak's escape. There's nothing she hates more than a batarian terrorist, even more so one that is smart enough to slip through her fingers. But she has more important things to deal with now.

She's been tasked with rounding up the rest of the rogue geth that were responsible for the assault on the Citadel, going as far as the Terminus Systems to complete the objective. She still remembers being issued the orders—Tevos' calm deliverance, as is her custom, Valern's level countenance, Sparatus' perpetual scowl, and Udina's haughtiness bolstered by his new position on the Council. He's become more insufferable than Shepard thought possible. Again, she grits her teeth.

Her assignment is pointless. Rounding up the vestiges of the geth's forces isn't going to do anything to stop the Reapers when they arrive. They should be preparing the galaxy for war, but it seems everyone but her and her crew—and Captain Anderson—are more than happy to just stick their heads in the sand.

She files her report, then rises from her seat at her desk, stretching liberally. She sighs with the delicious crack of her spine, then shakes herself loose as she heads for the door.

"We've arrived in the Amada system, Commander. On approach to Alchera," Joker says over comms.

"Thank you, Joker."

Shepard steps out onto the crew deck to find Kaiden at his station just outside her quarters. She nods to him in greeting. "Kaiden."

"Commander. Any luck with that report?"

She chuckles, but there's no joy in it. "I've submitted it. Finally. It's been hard trying to fit it in with all the geth making so much trouble in the galaxy."

The Lieutenant mirrors her joyless laugh. "Yeah. You'd think after everything we've done, they'd at least give us a better assignment."

"There's nothing for it, I'm afraid. Let's just hope we find something interesting out here."

Shepard frowns as she hears the characteristic whirr of the Normandy's engines grow louder and louder, and its pitch increases to a pitiful whine. She's accelerating. She looks at Kaiden to find he's wearing a similar expression, and a horrible feeling settles in her gut.

Bang! Pop! Whum whuumm whuuuummm...

Shepard falls into Kaiden and he catches her as the ship rocks violently. Sparks fly from fried circuits and panels clatter to the floor, and the lights flicker as they try to steady themselves.

"Joker, give me a sit-rep!" Shepard says, pushing herself off Kaiden and rushing back to her quarters.

"We're under fire from an unknown vessel, Commander!" Joker says, frantic. "It's forward guns are insane, we're not going to survive a straight fight with that thing!"

"Evasive manoeuvres! Hold out for as long as you can, I'm going to send out a distress call," Shepard says, snatching her helmet from her desk. She reemerges from her quarters to find Kaiden helping fellow crewmates to their feet.

"Commander!"

"Kaiden, get the crew into the escape pods. I need to deploy the distress beacon," Shepard says, fastening her helmet to her hardsuit.

"Let me help you," he says, stubbornly following her to the terminal at the far end of the rows of sleep pods.

She doesn't have time to argue with him as she opens a ship-wide channel and says, "All hands abandon stations! I repeat: all hands abandon stations! This ship is under attack. You're ordered to evacuate to the escape pods immediately."

She begins to prepare the distress beacon for launch. She glances over her shoulder to find that Kaiden is still there. "Lieutenant, that order applies to you, too. You need to leave."

"I'm not leaving you here, Shepard."

"The distress beacon is ready for launch," Shepard says.

"Do you think the Alliance will get here in time?"

"I don't know, Kaiden. We can only hope. Your best bet is to get to an escape pod," Shepard says, trying to urge him on his way with a gentle touch. "I need to get to Joker. He's too stubborn to leave the helm, never mind his Vrolik's."

Kaiden sighs, defeated. "You two better be right behind me."

"We'll be there. Now go, or we'll both die here," Shepard says, pushing Kaiden more forcefully this time. He relents and runs to the escape pods, even as panels fall from the ceiling and fires spark.

She turns back to the terminal and finalises the launch of the distress beacon, slamming her fist into the large holographic button. It flashes as the ship's computer confirms the beacon's deployment and she gives the numbers on the screen a cursory glance. When she turns around again, there is no sign of Kaiden on the crew deck, which is barely recognisable for all the damage it's taken. She sways as the Normandy is repeatedly struck by this unknown assailant, barely able to walk in a straight line as she holds her hands up to brace against the growing fires. She winces as she hears her beloved ship's engines whine in its death throes. Joker is pushing the Normandy past her limits.

Shepard bats away billowing clouds of smoke as small explosions erupt around her, their sparks igniting new fires in a terrible chain reaction, and she eventually reaches the stairs to the command deck where she almost trips on the first step—her visibility is so poor. She pushes away cables hanging loosely from the ceiling as she makes the march to the CIC.

"Mayday, mayday, mayday! This is the SSV Normandy," Joker says over crackling comms. "We've suffered heavy damage from an unknown enemy. Come on, baby. Hold together. Hold together!"

Shepard reaches the door, but it doesn't open. Looking closely, a warning light signals that the environment beyond is depressurised. Shepard's heart sinks, but her adrenaline propels her to action as she activates her grav boots and bypasses the lock on the door.

The door opens and she feels as though she's about to be ripped off the deck as the air behind her pushes out into the vacuum of space. She's gobsmacked by the sight that confronts her. The beautiful blue sphere of Alchera acts as the sky above her, visible only because the top of the Normandy's hull over the CIC is almost completely sheared off. Debris floats above her, as well as officers' datapads, their torn-off chairs... and their frozen bodies. Her sigh is thick with regret as she watches them drift above her, but she has to continue without them.

There's nothing but Alchera's reflected light to guide her way through her decimated CIC. She wills her feet to move faster, but she's restricted to a plodding walk by her grav boots. She circles the ruin of the galaxy map and reaches the corridor that leads to the cockpit to find Joker still sitting in his seat, the madman.

He doesn't even hear her as she passes through the forcefield that keeps him alive. She grabs the back of his chair. "Joker! We need to leave!"

He doesn't even turn around. He just keeps flying the ship, trying to maintain a disintegrating orbit over Alchera. There's not much else he can do with the Normandy in this state.

"No!," he says, "I won't abandon the Normandy. I can still save her!"

"The Normandy is lost. Going down with the ship isn't going to change that," Shepard says.

Joker hesitates for a brief moment, then hangs his head low. His voice cracks as he says, "Yeah... okay. Help me up—wait! They're coming around for another attack!"

Shepard looks ahead at the loose debris in front of the ship as it reflects ever-intensifying light until it threatens to blind her. Then she feels impossible heat at her back as the ship is rocked violently and begins to split apart. She turns to witness the blinding beam cutting through her ship like a knife through warm butter, and tears well within her eyes as she turns away again to shield them. The beam eventually fizzles and dies, and Shepard grabs Joker, lifting him to his feet.

"Ah! Watch the arm," he says.

She hauls him out of the cockpit and helps him hobble to the nearby escape pod reserved for the crew stationed there. That it's still there tells her that none of them made it. She looks down at her feet to find Navigator Pressley's limp corpse, his face horribly burned, but she doesn't have time to pity him.

Shepard slams a button on the scarred wall beside the escape pod and the door slides open. She guides Joker as gently as she can into the escape pod, and when he's inside, she moves in after him, demagnetising one foot and putting it into the tiny vessel.

Bang! Boom!

Shepard is thrown back, stumbling away from Joker, who reaches out to her, but she doesn't hear what he says.

She feels like she's on fire. The Normandy's attackers have hit her with another bright beam that pours into the fractured vessel like molten gold, this time completely shearing the cockpit from the rest of the ship. She looks on as she inches away from the rest of the decimated ship, unable to wrap her head around what she's seeing.

Another explosion brings her out of her stupor as she's thrown back against the wall of the cockpit, and in an instant she is winded. She realises her grav boots have failed as she begins to float, and she tries in futility to guide herself back to Joker in microgravity. She feels the oncoming wave of rising panic as her heart begins to hammer in her chest, and she reaches out for anything she can find purchase on.

Anything.

"Commander!" Joker cries.

Shepard manages to hold onto a tiny ledge on the cockpit wall, her fingers straining to hold on as she wills herself to stay anchored to it, even as she threatens to float away. She looks back at Joker to see the desperation on his face—the same desperation she feels to get back to him.

And then another beam hits the Normandy. Shepard can't hold on for much longer and tears begin to fall from her eyes, both borne of intense pain and the realisation that she won't make it.

"Shepard!" Joker says, reaching out for her.

But Shepard loses her grip as the ship rocks violently once more. She's floating free now, but she's just in reach of the escape pod release. She strains with all her might, and with a feather-light touch of her middle finger, she manages to press the holographic button, sealing the escape pod door shut and jettisoning it from the ship.

In saving Joker, she has condemned herself to death. There's nothing but the ringing in her ears as she struggles to understand what she's just done.

But even now the enemy harries her. Another beam of energy slices through the metal of the cockpit, blasting it apart, and the force of the explosion flings her back toward the ruinous main body of the Normandy. She smashes into the jagged edge where the cockpit had been sheared off and screams with such force as to make her hack and cough. Hot pain blooms from her left hip as she floats just above the shattered hull of her ship, spinning gently. Sobs wrack her body as her hands move to the site of her injury in a futile attempt to ease her suffering.

Shepard is completely disorientated by her spinning until her momentum carries her back to the massive hole above the CIC, where she gently collides with debris and the bodies of her crew. There, she becomes tangled in the floating cables attached to the hull of the ship, coming to a gentle stop, but that doesn't stop her from groaning in pain from her injuries.

It's quiet now. The attackers seem to have ceased their assault. Shepard waits for the inevitable in silence, although, curiously, she can still hear the sound of escaping gas.

Her chest tightens as she realises she's struggling to breathe.

Her hands grip the cables to her oxygen supply at the back of her hardsuit, only to find they've been partially severed. She tries in vain to squeeze them shut, her will to survive not completely subdued by the knowledge that she's destined to die. Even as her eyelids become heavy and her chest burns, she still fights. She fights until her world turns black at the edges. Until she drifts into a slumber she knows she'll never wake from.