Shepard pressed his back against the wall and peered around the corner down the red-tinted corridor that stretched off to the left of the terminal chamber. It was empty and quiet. Miranda knelt in front of him, also watching the corridor ahead. Across the hall, Zaeed and Samara took cover in an alcove that formerly housed the geth platforms that now lay crumpled and disconnected on the floor. Garrus dragged one of them to the middle of the corridor and lay prone behind it, propping the bipod of his Mantis on the deck to one side of its head. They had two guns on each side of the hall, with Garrus at the back and Grunt in reserve.

Shepard stared through his rifle's scope. The corridor stretched as far as he could see until it dissolved into a red haze maybe fifty meters away, with side corridors branching off every few meters. Soon, every geth platform on the station would funnel down the main corridor toward them. He glanced across the way to Zaeed and Samara. "Aren't you glad you came back after Dashta?"

Samara's eyes reflected the calm in her voice as she watched the corridor beyond. "I have no regrets at all, Commander. My place is here, with all of you."

"What she said," Zaeed said, standing above and behind the former Justicar, peering around his corner. "Been blowing holes in things all my life. Don't know if it ever counted for anything before."

"Hear, hear," Miranda said, crouched in front of Shepard. The ammo indicator of her Locust glowed white as did all the other weapons in the squad.

Garrus adjusted his sights as he slid closer to the dead geth platform on the deck. "I'd just like to point out you actually had to kick me off the ship."

Shepard rolled his eyes. "That's because you're too stubborn to do what's good for you."

"Look who's talking." Garrus's comment was rewarded with a round of quiet laughter over the squad channel.

"I don't know what you're all complaining about," Grunt said, shifting his weight from foot to foot as he stood in the opening behind Shepard and Miranda. "Dashta was the most fun I've had since the Collector Base."

"That was only like a week ago, Grunt."

"I know," the krogan said. "That, then Dashta, now this? This has been the best week of my life!"

"It's been one for the books," Shepard said. It was obvious Grunt had a short memory when it came to casualties. Bringing that up now might bring him down from his combat high, and they needed it now more than ever.

Miranda shifted from a squatted position to rest on one knee, still keeping her weapon aimed down the corridor. She could hear the change in Shepard's tone. The geth could strike at any moment, and they definitely didn't need him falling apart now. "Commander, did you get a chance to see that vid?"

"Which one?" Shepard smirked beneath his helmet. "Fleet and Flotilla?"

Garrus sighed over the comm, loudly, while the rest of the squad shared yet another laugh at his expense.

"No," Miranda said. "Normandy's Hope. The piece your friend Emily Wong did?"

"Haven't had the chance. What's it about?"

Garrus shook his head. "Mostly how you've been running around saving the galaxy. All by yourself, apparently. I mean, I was mentioned in passing, but otherwise it's just 'Shepard, Shepard, Shepard...'"

Shepard grinned. "Finally, some good, honest reporting." That got him a round of groans and boos, which made him smile more.

"Regardless of it's veracity," Miranda said, "You need to see it,"

"Definitely," Garrus said.

"All right," Shepard kept staring through his scope into the haze opposing them. "It's at the top of my todo list. As soon as we get out of here."

Daro'Xen's marines advanced deeper into the geth installation, weapons raised. As she surmised, the entrance to the geth enclave was empty and undefended. Upon landing, the geth platforms on the surface were still inert with the only potential opposition from the Normandy's shuttle on the platform outside. The lone human occupant couldn't even transmit a warning to Shepard because of the asteroid's thick rock and electromagnetic shielding. She posted a rear-guard at the entrance to the installation not only to prevent the pilot from following, but to warn them when the geth platforms on the surface awakened from dormancy.

As the column progressed, the marines kept glancing down to keep from tripping over the obstructions that littered the metal deck. Though they scanned forward for targets, even the most hardened of them couldn't stop from staring at the human corpses lying on the ground as they passed. Fully armed and armored, the Cerberus operatives had been torn apart, strewn across the floor like broken statues. Some of them weren't even recognizable as human, and many of them still bubbled with blood escaping into vacuum from the holes in their suits. Xen's landing party hadn't missed Shepard's passing by long.

More unsettling than the dead humans were the red channels of light glowing beneath the walls and decking. Individual geth programs were routing themselves to physical platforms in preparation to defend the installation. In two, maybe three minutes, Xen and her squad of marines might be overrun, and control of the geth lost forever to Cerberus.

The marine at the head of the column halted and crouched when he reached an intersection, and the rest of the squad followed suit. "What is it," Xen asked.

The squad leader kept his voice low over the radio, even though there was no chance of his voice carrying. He retracted the optic cable he'd extended to scout the intersection onto a spool on his belt. "Shepard's team is right around the corner to the left. They're blocking our advance."

"Damn it," Xen said. Her entire plan depended on finding a geth terminal away from Shepard's assault. "Is there any other way around?"

"No ma'am. Not unless we go all the way back out and find another way in."

Xen's heart thumped in her ribcage. At any time, rampaging geth could come pouring in from around the facility. They had even less of a chance surviving the geth than Shepard's band of killers. Turning back was out of the question.

Shepard had cleared a path for Xen by eliminating the Cerberus team. Maybe she could induce him to help again with the right stimulus. She opened the comm panel on her omnitool to broadcast in the open. "Commander Shepard, are you receiving?"

Shepard scowled when he heard the voice in his ear. The translated voice sounded familiar, but who else could be inside the geth asteroid? "Who's this?"

"Admiral Daro'Xen vas Moreh."

"What the hell?" Garrus said. According to the countermeasure suite in his visor, the source of the unencrypted, uncompressed broadcast came from around the first corner of the corridor under ten meters away. He marked the source on the squad tactical display and shifted his aim.

"I beg you, listen to me. We don't have much time. The geth will be here soon."

Shepard adjusted his aim along with the others based on Garrus's mark. "Glad you're going to be here to see it. Come on out. We saved you a seat for the grand finale."

"I can stop them, Shepard!"

Shepard blinked and he looked at the long corridor stretching before him once more. There was still no sign of the geth. "How?"

"Get me to a terminal and I can shut them down. You don't want the Illusive Man to have the geth any more than I. If we fail here, no one will be able to stop Cerberus. Humanity and the entire galaxy will be enslaved by their will. Is that what you want?"

The network traces in the walls and floor pulsed red in earnest. With power fully restored and free from restraint, the geth hub was now processing at full capacity.

"Shepard, there's no time," Xen urged. "The geth will be here any second. I've got a squad of my finest marines with me. We still have a chance if we work together!"

Shepard lowered his rifle. The rest of his squad watched him with a mixture of surprise and incomprehension. He bowed his head, deep in thought. Shepard couldn't ever forgive Xen for the things she'd done, but an appeal for unity was something he could never pass up. "There's a terminal right here, behind us," he said. "Come into the corridor. Keep your hands where we can see them."

"We're coming out," Xen said. "If you don't fire, we won't. You have my word."

"She sticks her head out," Garrus put his crosshairs on the intersection beyond, "I'm taking it off!"

"Hold your fire," Shepard broadcast in the clear as Xen had done. "That's an order! Weapons down!"

"Weapons down," Xen said as she stood at the corner with her squad. She and her marines stepped into the main corridor. To their left, it terminated a short distance down with a wide open door to another chamber at the end on the right. Barrels of weapons poked from behind the corners, but were not aimed at them. However, she could see hate in the eyes of those that held them.

Shepard, in his dark gray battle gear, stood in the open. He took a step toward them, his rifle pointed at the floor. He motioned over his shoulder. "The terminal's back in there. We need to hurry."

"Let's go," Xen said.

Shepard talked as he escorted Xen to the terminal chamber past the shocked stares of his crew. "Have your people cover the intersection. My squad's already in position to cover them."

"Do it," Xen told her squad leader. Her omnitool flared around her wrist. The virus, pre-loaded, was ready for injection. All she needed was an open connection. Her bad leg sent a spasm through her entire body and she stumbled, but Shepard caught her. He actually put his shoulder under hers to help her along.

"How long will it take?" Shepard asked.

"Not long," Xen said. She almost felt sorry for the human. His trusting nature had already gotten him into so much trouble with the Citadel, with Cerberus, even his own crew. The fact that he meant well counted for nothing. The universe didn't care about good and evil, right and wrong. All that mattered was survival. If not for the fact that Shepard objected to the quarians re-taking control of their creations, she would have let him and his crew live. But in order to protect her people, the first order she would give the geth when she took control was to eliminate Shepard and his valiant crew. That was the only way to guarantee he wouldn't try to stop her.

They turned the corner at the end of the hall. At the chamber's rear, a pile of wrecked geth platforms and fallen Cerberus soldiers littered the floor along with a giant plate of metal which might have been the chamber's door. Beyond, holo screens formed a halo of light around a geth terminal, bathing Tali'Zorah vas Normandy in a heavenly glow as she manipulated the screens. The terminal was already open. All Xen had to do was get close enough to-

As soon as Xen rounded the corner, Shepard grabbed her shoulder and shoved her face-first into the wall. He pressed the muzzle of his rifle against the seam of the main hose on the back of her neck and pulled the trigger. In the vacuum of the geth base, there was no sound. The front of Xen's mask exploded, sending a spray of blood, bone fragments and glass into the bare metal wall. Her body crumpled to the floor with plumes of gas spewing from the ragged hole and severed hose.

"Betrayal repaid," Garrus said softly.

Shepard took a step back. He could feel the eyes of the squad on him. Everyone held their positions, weapons aimed down the corridor as if nothing had happened. He looked to Tali behind the geth console, and their eyes met as he waited for her reaction. She said nothing, only pausing to gave him a curt nod. Shepard turned away to resume his position behind Miranda at the corner, while Tali went back to work on the console.

Zaeed, like everyone else, kept his rifle aimed downrange so none of the quarian marines would notice anything amiss. "Didn't think you had that in you, Shepard."

"I save it for special occasions."

"Nice of her to bring us reinforcements, though," Garrus said.

Shepard shrugged."As long as they don't call her expecting to answer back."

Flashes of light erupted from the haze at the end of the corridor. "I don't think that's going to be a problem now," Garrus said. "Incoming!"

A ripple-salvo of rockets streaked toward them. The Normandy squad all retreated behind cover. At the same time, the quarian marines in front of them ducked down behind whatever corner was closest.

"They're coming in from the surface!" shouted one of the quarian marines.

"Geth, to the rear!" shouted another as he adjusted his stance. The quarians at the intersection were now under attack from three sides.

"This is it!" Shepard and his squad raised their weapons as the entire corridor filled with explosions and shrapnel, making their barriers sparkle with each impact. Their scopes filled with a shambling mass of mechanical arms and legs advancing slowly through the fog, each topped with a hellish red spotlight.

Shepard let loose with a long burst of disruptor rounds. "Fire at will!"

Tali hunched over the geth terminal, manipulating the Cerberus utilities with both hands to find a suitable path to inject the virus. Her omnitool pulsed and glittered on her wrist as it worked to map out the geth network. Flashes from the corridor marked the geth advance as her friends laid down a steady stream of fire into the approaching horde. The walls behind them glowed orange from a hail of impacts by beam weapons and phasic slugs that silhouetted them in the smoke and haze.

Shepard stayed at his corner, alternately firing and hurling arc grenades around into the corridor. Tali's hands shook as she manipulated the screens in front her and tried not to look at the tactical display in her HUD. She didn't have to. Ranges to targets called by the squad drew closer, close enough now that thrown weapons were being used. She couldn't even send Chik'tikka out to assist. She needed every last bit of processing power in her omni directed at the geth terminal. The virus had been designed to infect a mobile platform, which would in turn infect the hub upon interface. But with no platform available, she needed a way to implant the code manually. After combing through screens of files, she'd finally found a suitable library in which to place references to the infected code. Now, she just had to edit the file... performing brain surgery in the middle of a firefight.

"They're breaking through!" one of Xen's marines called out over the comm.

Shepard maintained his fire. "Fall back! Stay to our right and fall back to the control room!"

More shadows appeared in the entrance to the corridor, quarian in shape, taking cover where they could and joining the squad in firing into the geth. Heatsinks and arc grenades were passed freely to the quarian soldiers who put them to immediate use.

Shepard pulled back around his corner and yanked an irregular, angular weapon from the mount on his back. With a touch on its trigger, the arc projector sparked to life. Shepard wheeled around the corner and a massive bolt of fuzzy lightning spewed forth, turning the entire corridor a bright-blue white. Light rippled and flickered as electrical bolts jumped between what had to be dozens of targets. Before it faded, Shepard fired again, and again, with the entire squad joining in.

"I'm out!" someone shouted, followed by a scream.

"They're still coming! Keelah-"

Shepard threw down the arc projector, now powerless, and picked up his rifle. "Tali, hurry! They're right on top of us!" Shepard and Miranda both recoiled and fell back as a giant red appendage swept around the corner, followed by the rest of the geth platform. Tall enough to touch the ceiling with its head, the geth prime raised an enormous machinegun to its shoulder.

With a mighty roar, Grunt threw itself at the behemoth and wrenched its arm. The huge machine lost its balance and fell across the corridor. Grunt fired his claymore point blank into its head, then started stuffing grenades beneath it's armor plates.

Muzzle flashes and and kinetic barriers lit up the corridor beyond. As much as Tali wanted to grab her shotgun and join the battle, she did not look away from her displays. She double checked the location of her copied files and verified the paths in the libraries. There was no time to do any real debugging. There was no time to do anything at all except compile the updated code. She started the process. It would either work, or not.

"Fall back!" Shepard shouted again. This time Tali did look up. Fall back to where? Now that the squad was in the terminal chamber with her, there was nowhere else to retreat. Backlit by explosions, Garrus leapt over the downed geth prime to take a position behind one of the columns at the end of the room. To the right, Samara staggered through surrounded by a shimmering bubble, held up by Zaeed as he sprayed his rifle into the geth with his free hand. Debris from demolished geth platforms began to pile up in the opening, bouncing as explosions detonated all around.

A progress bar marched across the screen in front of Tali, marking time until the code compilation completed. "Come on!" Tali gripped the side of the console as if squeezing it would make it run faster.

"Tali!" Shepard shouted over the comm. "How long?"

"Almost there!" The Cerberus console signaled that the compilation was 99% complete, and her omnitool pinged, indicating a connection had been established. In a few seconds, consciousness of the entire geth collective would be at her mercy. She keyed in the sequence to load the virus into the substation so it would be ready when the compiler finished. But she had two files that she could load. The first, a copy of Xen's virus that would revert the geth to quarian control. The other she had edited on the ride down to restore consensus to control of geth.

For a split second, Tali looked up from the console. Xen's body lay on the floor where Shepard had executed her. She died doing what any self-respecting quarian was expected to do: defending the fleet. Xen believed taking control of the geth was the only way the quarian species could survive. Left to their own consensus, what would the geth do? How would the geth react to the quarian invasion which was underway even now? Would they listen to reason after being deceived and betrayed so many times?

In orbit around Ammut, the Illusive Man said the geth had already marked the entire quarian species for extermination. Was he telling the truth? Had the geth had already decided the fate of their creators even before Cerberus took over?

Maybe she should use Xen's virus, just to be on the safe side. That was the safe move, regardless. Xen was fanatic coding, and it would have undergone many rounds of inspection and revision. Once the quarians had control and had returned safely to Rannoch, they could find a way to free the geth after, couldn't they? Once the quarian people were safe and stable?

But then she thought of Legion, killed on the Xenophon to cover her escape, entrusting her with the very future of its kind. Back on the Normandy, before anyone knew Cerberus had stolen the virus from the Littano, Legion had asked her what they would do if they arrived at Ma-at and found the quarians already had control of the geth. When she couldn't answer, she felt lower than she did even at her own trial for treason.

Two words blared over the tactical net that she'd never thought she'd hear in her life.

"Grunt's down!"

"Cover me!" Shepard hurled himself headlong into the corridor and disappeared into blinding fire. Garrus, Miranda, Zaeed and Samara all fired around him.

A brilliant flash filled the room. Garrus staggered back behind cover, head tilted down, enveloped in blinding light. The crab legs of a geth armature extended and slammed down, separating the squad from Shepard. The head and legs of the hulking platform hung low, allowing it to squeeze through the door of the room. Garrus raised his rifle and fired point blank as a writhing mass of geth platforms spilled in around it, crawling along the ceiling and walls.

Tali's mind flashed to vids she'd seen of the fall of Rannoch three hundred years before, of armies of machines storming through city streets, eradicating every living thing in their path. It faded and she found herself facing a wall of burning red eyes. In the midst of the sea of red, her omnitool flashed green. There was only one choice, logical or not. She slapped the execute button and without even looking for the result dropped her hand to yank her shotgun from her leg holster. She got off precisely one shot before her vision filled with muzzle flashes and everything went dark.

Quarian runners flowed through Anba's command and control center like a river, delivering updates that could no longer be relayed by the ship's overloaded comm systems. The civilian ships of the flotilla continued to stream toward Dholen from Raheel-Leyya as they would for days to come, as expected. But what no one in the Migrant Fleet predicted was that the Migrant Fleet Navy would come screaming back from Dholen in retreat, colliding with the advancing civilians at Nariph, resulting in the greatest traffic jam in galactic history.

Nariph was home to a lone human fuel depot, now under quarian control to sustain the invasion. In addition to bleeding the depot dry, ships of the fleet pulled hydrogen and helium directly from Nariph's gas giants, processing fuel as quickly as they could to get it to the front line. But it soon became apparent that there wouldn't be many ships to refuel after all.

Reports from the Navy continued to trickle in with each returning ship, scattered and separated from their battle groups, each telling the same story: the geth collective deactivated en masse, presumably as a result of Admiral Xen's virus. The entire Migrant Fleet Navy Heavy Fleet, some six thousand ships, seized the opportunity and jumped to Tikkun to systematically annihilate every geth ship within range. But there were far more geth ships than Fleet intelligence estimated, or could even imagine. Even with the geth deactivated, it would take the fleet hours to destroy them all.

Then in the midst of the offensive, the geth re-awakened. What started as a turkey shoot for the quarians turned into a massacre by the geth as the networked machines coordinated a counterattack that left the quarian battle groups scrambling for their lives. Acting as one, outnumbering the Navy by a factor no one could even calculate, the geth decimated the quarian ranks in minutes.

Their lines shattered, their communications disrupted and their leaders killed, the quarian ships at the rear broke formation and fought their way back to the Tikkun relay. When when they reached presumed safety Dholen to regroup, a second geth fleet was waiting for them.

Less than half the Heavy Fleet ships escaped Rannoch, and so far, fewer than a hundred made it back to Nariph. If the geth decided to press the attack, the civilian fleet would be slaughtered.

High Captain Wylo stood in front of a giant display board at the front of Anba's Command and Control center, his hands gripping the console in front of him in despair. He and the other captains of the conclave managed to spread the word back up the line to Sahrabarik to halt, but some ships didn't receive the warning and rushed on to Dholen, and death, instead.

Many ships that did stop only did so because one of the fleet's two remaining liveships had done so. The third liveship was still at the rear, supplying the back end of the convoy at Sahrabarik. A disorganized swarm of quarian ships now clustered around the fuel station and the gas giants and swirled around the Nariph relay awaiting instructions.

"We've got to position ourselves for retreat," Wylo said over the command net. "If the geth attack, we're finished."

Captain Fasha asked the question on all of the minds of the Conclave. "Retreat to where? Omega? We're finished no matter where we run! Without protection, if the geth don't end us, the Terminus will! We have to move forward!"

The comm channel burst with thousands of captains in the Conclave trying to speak at once. Once more, protocol failed, with those who had legitimate authority trampled over by the faction and clan leaders who could shout the loudest. The channel fell silent, however, when a deep, authoritative voice broke over the line.

"This is the Shellen. We are declaring Liveship Priority. As soon as our tenders have completed refueling at Jonus we will begin transit to Balor at the Caleston Rift."

"You can't do that," said another voice. "Your cargo belongs to the entire fleet. The liveships must remain in bastion until the heavy fleet re-constitutes and-"

"There is no heavy fleet! The survival of the liveships is of the highest priority. Any captain interested in survival will rendezvous with the Shellen at the fuel station and form up for transit!"

Wylo lowered his head. That was it. With one statement, what little semblance of order the Conclave had over the fleet vanished with the declaration that one of the two remaining liveships was was venturing off on its own. The rest of the fleet could either join them, or go hungry, depending on what each captain and crew would decide to do.

"High Captain?" Captain Mirron pushed her frail body as hard as it could to reach Wylo. As they watched, the fleet organizational display showed ships begin to clump into distinct groups, all headed in different directions.

Wylo closed his eyes and shook his head. "It's over for us, Sanul. This is the end."

A loud, harsh buzz sounded in CNC. Wylo and everyone else looked immediately to the main sensor display. The Dholen relay registered a mass effect field building that indicated hundreds of thousands of tonnes transiting through. Unless the Heavy Fleet had made a remarkable recovery, it could only mean one thing.

The geth were coming. The comms board came to life with shouted orders as panicked captains ordered their ships away from the relay. Remaining Navy ships, battered and exhausted, tried to form a defense to screen the retreating civilians. In the midst of it all, a single, giant contact now dominated the threat screen. A geth dreadnought, larger than any vessel in or ever encountered by the Migrant Fleet had jumped in at the edge of the fleet.

But it did not maneuver or fire, nor did it arrive with an escort. Instead, the giant cylinder of a ship spun like a spindle in space, illuminated by scores of flashing beacons and running lights. And instead of attempting to jam their transmissions or otherwise invade their computer networks as geth ships had always done, a lone transponder squawk echoed throughout the Migrant Fleet using Migrant Fleet standard protocols. A name appeared on the screen of every vessel now targeting the intruder:

Liveship-04.

It took all her strength, but Tali opened her eyes. Whatever room she was in was dim, had a lower ceiling than the geth hub, and had a single light fixture hanging over directly over her head. Or so she thought, until the light turned and looked at her.

"Creator-Tali'Zorah?" it said with a familiar, mechanical affectation.

Tali blinked and slowly, painfully, sat upright and the light moved out of the way. She didn't remember lying down, but then she didn't remember an entire geth hub crashing down on her, either. Her entire body ached. Tali's vision sharpened from a gray haze to a soft blur, and when it cleared, she found herself again staring into a bright blue-white circle of light. It pulled back again and she instantly recognized the geth platform scrutinizing her. Its exoskeleton, once-pristine and glossy, was marred with soot and pockmarked with bullet holes and burn marks.

"Blue?"

"Affirmative," Platform Two said. "We are extremely gratified that you are operational. What is your status?"

The HUD on the inside of Tali's mask told her the entire story. She had taken a severe blow to the head, had possibly suffered and recovered from a concussion. More worrying was the log detailing the dozen or so penetrations of her suit across her torso, arms and abdomen. After having been shot so many times, her biometrics all looked remarkably normal. She looked down at herself, amazed to see many patches all across her body, each expertly and precisely applied. She squinted when she saw her chronometer. Was it out of sync? It couldn't be right... "I'm... okay, I think. How long have I been out?"

"Twenty-seven hours, fifty-one minutes, eleven seconds."

In spite of her dizziness, Tali turned her head to find out where she was. She sat on a metallic deck of a featureless room similar in size and shape to the shuttle of the MV Pollus Maskawa, the geth ship disguised as a volus transport to infiltrate organic space. Unlike the shuttle, there was no cargo. But she wasn't alone. Behind Platform Two's legs, Tali could make out someone else lying down on the deck next to her in the dim light. She pushed around the geth to see.

Garrus lay on his back, eyes closed, stripped of his armor. Neat bandages covered his torso, legs and head, and a thick coiled tube projected from his open mouth to a device next to his head that looked like some sort of respirator. They were obviously in a pressurized, oxygen rich environment and no longer on the geth asteroid. She shook his shoulder. "Garrus? Garrus!"

Platform Two pulled Tali's hand away. "Vakarian-Garrus is in a medically induced coma. He is stable, but his prognosis is uncertain at this point. Physical stimulation is not desirable."

Tali stood and looked around the compartment. Somehow, she managed to keep her balance. Other than Garrus and a few scattered piles of geth manufactured equipment, the room was empty. As concerned as she was for Garrus, there was something more important she had to know. "Where's everyone else? Where's Shepard?"

"There are no other survivors."

Tali fell backwards and put her arm out against the wall to steady herself. What Platform Two said wasn't possible. It couldn't be.

"Creator-Tali'Zorah, your current physical condition requires rest and restricted physical activity. We urgently recommend you resume a prone position to prevent-"

Tali looked for an exit hatch. The gravity was much stronger than it was on the hub. The geth shuttle must have landed somewhere, and it wasn't on a geth ship, which required neither an atmosphere or gravity. She had to be back on the Normandy, in the hangar deck. The rest of the crew was outside, repairing damage to the ship. But what was Garrus doing here instead of being taken to the infirmary? "Open the door."

"Creator-Tali'Zorah, you must restrict your movements. You have sustained severe injuries to-"

Tali screamed at the geth. "Open it!"

"Acknowledged," Platform Two said.

The door slid open in front of Tali and bright light stung her eyes even through her mask. She raised her arm to shield them from the direct light. Instead of connecting with the hard metal of Normandy's hangar deck, she stepped onto an equally solid, but somehow softer surface. She staggered forward, now completely enveloped in light.

"Shepard? Shepard!" Shouting made Tail's lungs hurt, and she doubled over. Metallic hands grabbed her from behind, steadying her, holding her up. Slowly, her eyes adjusted. At first, all she could see were browns and grays, but eventually shapes and more colors took form.

Cracked concrete crumbled to gravel beneath her feet. A swollen yellow sun illuminated a purple colored sky above. Skyscrapers, some hundreds of stories tall, surrounded her in all directions with great elevated thoroughfares for ground vehicles winding between them. But they were unusable, and had been for a long time. Entire spans had collapsed to rubble. The windows of the giant buildings were either masked by dirt or missing completely. Thick brown vines crept up their sides, their tendrils now permanently intertwined with the supporting structures. Far above, avians spiraled about the higher floors, roosting in the abandoned buildings.

Tali took a step forward, her mind blank, unable to process any more. A gust of wind caused her lavender cowl to flap against her faceplate. Her eyes fell on an old-style billboard beside the highway ramp in front of her. There were dozens of other advertising panels around, alongside the roads and on the sides of buildings, but the digital ones had long been deprived of power. A few printed ones still proudly displayed their original, if somewhat faded messages. The one that caught Tail's attention, though, told her everything she needed to know. It was the size of the Normandy's entire hangar deck, badly faded from sun and the elements, but enough of it was still visible that its message was clear.

A quarian family, their hair flowing freely and faces unshielded by any kind of infernal headgear sat around a table filled with fruits, meats and bread. They all beamed happily at one another while a shiny white geth platform refilled the glass of the smiling mother. In the background another platform stood at a kitchen sink full of dirty pots and pans. Above them all, in printed Khelish read the words "Let us do the work for you!"

Tali slid from Blue's hands and collapsed on the ground, her legs tangled beneath her.

The geth platform looked at the immobile creator sitting on the dusty ground at its feet and queried the entire collective on how it should react. Her vital signs were all at extreme levels, but readings of cognitive activity had dropped to next to nothing. Lacking input from either Tali or the collective, it sat on the ground next to the quarian to await consensus as the wind blew swirls of dust around them and through the streets of the dead city.