Chapter 1-Somnium

Everything was blue. Blue and bright and it hurt her eyes.

Her vision blurred, and her body was numb. For a moment, she wondered if she still existed. She could not move her limbs, but her vision was returning.

A midday sun hung in the sky, fanatically shining without a single cloud in sight. It was too bright, and she blinked. In the moment of darkness, she felt herself inhale. Then exhale. Did dead people breath?

She became aware of a soft surface underneath her, cool and slightly numbness had gone, but her limbs felt like lead. She was afraid to move—if she tried, could she? And if not, what then?

A wispy breeze stumbled upon her, picking up a stray hair and depositing it onto her eye. Absentmindedly, she drew up her hand and pushed it away. Her eyes widened in shock, and she inhaled heavily as the action registered. If she had still been uncertain about her existence, the accelerated heart rate proved her fears unwarranted.

Memory was an oily, hazy mess. She forced and pried, but whatever tendrils she had caught simply slipped through her fingertips. When she tried too hard, she was overcome by nausea and a feeling of dread. In the end, all she could recall was blue, and some sort of turmoil. Mostly just blue.

She rubbed her face. She was scared, confused, and lost. Words and theories bounced around her head, none of them comforting.

She needed answers, she decided, and with all her strength pushed herself out of a lying position, settling half-slumped over her knees and respiring heavily. She took a moment to look around. The sky was blue, as it had been before. Beneath the sky sat green trees, and on the ground there lay the verdant grass. Ahead of her, the land sloped into a hill, and atop the hill stood a figure, eclipsing the midday sun.

She squinted against the brightness. The figure was tall; thin legs curved up into a bulky torso and a fringe of spikes jutted out from its head. It faced her, standing stock still against the sunlight.

She waited several seconds for it to move, but it just stood there staring down at her. Was it even alive? Perhaps it was a statue of some sort. But then it shifted its weight to its other leg and folded its arms, decidedly looking impatient.

Her curiosity trumped her confusion, and she forced herself to her feet, taking a few slow, shaky steps. Blood rushed to her head and she stumbled, black spots clouding her vision.

She cautiously made her way over to the figure, for which her mind had given a word: turian. However, the word did not sit right, and she wondered whether it was the figure's name or a term to describe it. It eyed her and she swayed toward it, neither moving away nor coming forward.

The moment she reached it, her mouth open and ready to form a question, it turned and strode away. She bit her lip in frustration before rushing to catch up.
When she reached the top of the slope, she paused, looking around in surprise.

A long and narrow field lay ahead of them, bordered by dense trees to her left and right. Far in the distance was a bluff of some sort, overlooking an endless expanse of blue sky.

Scattered across the field were people, some like her, some like the turian, and done completely alien. They formed small groups, isolating themselves from each other as if the others did not exist.

The turian continued to walk as she looked around. It cleared its throat, snapping her back to attention and she stumbled to join him.

The first group they came across was a pair of the ones that looked like her, and one more on the ground she could not see clearly. The ones she could see wore suits decorated with intricate designs over every inch of their bodies, and masks covered their faces.

One was pacing, carrying a rifle in his hands as if on the lookout. It-or he, she realized- wore a golden suit, adorned with pieces of red armor. He nodded his head at her as she walked past, and she could see his glowing eyes through the dark visor.

The other faced away from her, crouching over an inert figure. She focused her attention on some sort of device on her forearm, which cast bright orange light onto her purple suit.

The female tapped on it a few more times before the device withdrew, and the creature beneath her began to move. It made odd noises, clicks and growls, as it gathered its bearings.

She straightened, offering a hand as it tried to stand. This one was shaped like the others, but had a curved neck that ended in a bright light. As it stood, a hole in its metal torso revealed itself.

Both of them turned to face her and the turian, nodding as the red one had. She raised a hand in return as she walked away.

Next were two of her kind, without the fullbody suits. The female wore blue armor, various rifles slung across her back. She gave a plump-lipped smile as she and the turian approached, and tucked some brown hair behind her ear.

The male by her side wore a dark uniform, a smile and some stubble gracing his face. Blue light danced along his fingertips as he gave her a salute. His eyes were sad, however, and it frightened her as she walked past them.

In the same, silent manner she passed by two more of her kind. One, a dark-skinned man who sent her the same kind smile as the rest had. The other was a woman, a black and white jumpsuit covering her shapely figure. She gave a smirk, before it softened into a genuine smile.

The next three beings looked nothing like her or the turian. They were massively built, with large crests over their triangular heads (she assumed, as one was covered in elegant robes).

The smaller one, with bright eyes and brighter armor, pounded his fist against his chest in greeting. The robed one gave her a solemn nod. The largest one, with a red crest, walked in front of her, eyed her for a few moments, and then headbutted her.

She fell backwards, leaning over her knees and clutching her forehead as pain blossomed from behind her eyes. She looked up at the creature in shock.

It chuckled, and held out a hand for her. Tentatively, she offered her own, and it pulled her up with immense strength.

They continued this throughout their entire walk. A blue woman and another creature with a large head and green skin seemed to be caught in a silent argument somewhere to her left. Beyond them were two men and a large vehicle of sorts, one man tinkering with the engines in the back, and the other on top doing push-ups.

They passed a heavily tattooed woman, a blue woman in a red costume, and an unshaven man with a cap pointing excitedly at the datapad to a woman with an orange visor and lustrous metal skin. There were many more, all stopping their activities to acknowledge her in some way or other.

For the first time, she noticed how eerily silent the field was. Not a single person spoke, and the wind had died down to a whisper. She could not drive herself to break this silence, afraid she would be breaching some unspoken rule.

Who were all those people anyways? They all seemed to know her, yet she could not fabricate a single memory of any of them.

She and the turian approached the bluff. Privately, she wondered what would happen now that she was at the end of her brief journey. Would this be the beginning or the end of her experience?

The turian stopped somewhere behind her, and she walked on to edge of the cliff. The sky was blue. Blue and bright and utterly empty.

A thunderous, grating roar erupted from the earth itself. She recoiled, flinching, and when her eyes opened again the sky was no longer empty or blue.

A cityscape in the final stages of destruction lay in the far distance. Monsters of immense size picked their way through on spindly limbs. Red lights blazed from their angular carapaces. Guns fired from below, a futile attempt to halt the wraiths.

"No," she whispered, "no."

The clothing she wore earlier had transformed into a suit of black armor, displaying a red and white stripe down her arm and an N7 logo on her breastplate.

She heard gun shots right behind her, and whipped around. Blue blood stained the turian's armor, and he looked far too fatigued for a fight that had just begun. He held his assault rifle, picking off husks one by one.

The entire field had devolved into chaos, the reapers' many thralls threw themselves against her people. Dozens more poured in, two replacing each one that had been taken down. Soon, the husks were not the only ones who were falling. She could only watch. With no weapon she had no way of fighting back.

"Shepard!" Yelled the turian as the husks began to overwhelm him. Her memory broke free like water from a dam, crushing her and for a moment she felt as if she were drowning.

"Hold on, Garrus!" She cried. The thralls charged him and he slammed the butt of his rifle against them, trying to pry them off. One slashed against his face, shredding his visor and ripping a gash beside his eye. Blue blood spilled onto his colony marks, where it resided in disturbing harmony. Shepard sprinted to him, throwing her fist at the nearest husk.

The moment her fist made contact, all of the husks fell. The fighting behind them ceased, and she looked around.

The sounds of combat and the thralls' ghastly moans were no more, leaving the field silent once again. The bodies of both her adversaries and her comrades littered the green grass. "Oh, God," she whimpered.

She could still hear the reapers in the distance, though the heavy gunfire had ceased and no more explosions could be heard.

A gun cocked behind her, breaking her focus. "Garrus?" she turned,"what are you doing?" He had his rifle trained on her forehead. She held up her hands placatingly. "Stand down, it's me!" she entreated.

"You're not Shepard," he stated simply, and pulled the trigger.

Apologies in advance for any formatting errors; I typed most of this up on my phone.