((AN: IF YOU DON'T LIKE IT DON'T READ IT! This idea came into my head a few days ago and i couldn't get it out, so here it is. ENJOY!))

A Paragon of Magic

Commander Morgana Shepard was dying. Her body was scorched and bloody, her right arm was mangled, the cybernetics Cerberus implanted within her body glowing bright blue as they were revealed. Her Blood Dragon armor was slagged, parts of it fused to her flesh from the Reaper attack just outside the pillar of light that led up to the Reaper-Controlled Citadel. She knew she was dying, she'd felt it before after the original SSV Normandy was destroyed by the Collectors. However, this time her death might mean something. A chance to destroy the Reapers, once and for all. To do what countless cycles before her couldn't and erase those giant metal bugs from the universe so they wouldn't be able to hurt a single soul ever again.

Countless individuals had often called Commander Shepard of the Systems Alliance a Paragon of Virtue. Always putting the innocent before herself, controlling the hate and anger that built up inside her over the past thirty or so years of her life. From the slaver attack on Mindoir, to the Batarian attack at the Skylian Blitz, to losing Kaiden Alenko on Virmire whilst hunting Saren Arterias, and so on. Always keeping calm and taking the best and least bloody route. Now she had her chance to stop the Reapers, either by becoming one of them and controlling them from the inside, fusing organic and synthetic tissue to bring peace or simply blow the bastards out of the sky. For once, she was going to give into that anger, that hate. And she was going to blast those bastard synthetics to kingdom come.

The emerald-eyed commander turned to the hologram of the child that was the Catalyst. It had claimed that destroying the Reapers would destroy all Synthetics across the galaxy. Not just the Reapers, but the Geth and anyone with Synthetic implants would die. However…the hologram had flickered when it had said that. In her experience dealing with psychotic synthetics such as the Reapers, when a holo of them flickered while speaking, they had just lied about something. A feral grin spread across the Spectre's scared and bloody face. I've got you, you sons-of-bitches. She thought in the recesses of her mind. She looked down at the hologram that had claimed the Reapers were there to keep Synthetics and Organics from destroying one another repeatedly over the cycles. "Tell me something," she rasped, her throat dry and aching from the battles on the planet below. "In the entirety of the Reapers existence, have the synthetics and organics ever made peace?" She pinned the flickering hologram with a glare that could get a Krogan to back down in an instant. "Or did you not even give them the chance?"

The hologram flicker again and spoke. "The cycle has been the same for countless millennia. Organics create synthetics to serve them, and the created races revolted, causing countless deaths." The Spectre scowled. "Not what I asked you stupid piece of machinery. I asked if they had ever made peace." She smirked as the hologram flickered again, knowing the answer immediately. She raised her mangled arm, pointed to the battle around the Citadel, where the combined might of the Asari, Turians, Krogans, Salarians, Quarians, Humans, Batarians, Vorcha, and Geth were fighting as one to push the Reapers back. And winning. "Look out there. Right now, Synthetics and Organics fight as one to stop you from killing us all. You aren't here to protect us from ourselves, you're here because the Leviathans created you to stop a revolt before it even started and you're still stuck with that single line of programming, that one mission. Well you just lost." The Spectre grinned as she unholstered her Carnifex heavy pistol and began to move toward the red canister that contained the energy to destroy the Reapers. "And by the way, if you are going to lie about something like that, do anything to be better than that."

Morgana limped toward the canister, pulling the trigger again and again, each time the faces of her friends flashing before her eyes. Anderson, Ashely, James, Kasumi, Zaeed, Miranda, Jacob, Steve, Joker, Karen, Kelly, Garrus, Grunt, Wrex, Thane, Legion, Samara, Mordin, Javik, Tali, and Liara. Her sweet Liara. Her wife of three weeks. Tears pricked her eyes even as a small smile graced her scraped and bloody face. This is for you Liara. You and our daughter. Raise her well and be happy... for me. Morgana Shepard pulled the trigger one last time, and the world exploded with crimson light.

Emerald eyes snap open as the Commander's body pulses with a dull pain. Confusion flared past the pain. I should be feeling anything, much less be awake…and this doesn't feel like pain from an explosion…more like getting sucker-punched by a very angry Krogan. The commander looked at her surroundings, trying to get a fix on her location in the low lighting. It appeared as though she was currently in a small room possibly under some stairs. Odd. Why am I under stairs? This doesn't make any sense… The commander patted her body to check for injuries but stopped within a few moments. Her body felt…wrong. Smaller than it should have been and with none of the muscle mass she had built up over her years of military service. Not to mention that the wounds from the Reaper attack seemed to be gone, replaced by mid-level bruising and a possibly dislocated shoulder.

Looking around, Morgana spotted what appeared to be a 21st century pull lamp hanging above her head. Reaching up with a hand far to small for her age, she pulled the cord, her eyes narrowing for a moment as the bright light blinded her emerald eyes for a split second. She looked around at the cupboard she was in. She sat upon a small cot with a quilted blanket that needed either repair or replacement, the cot itself taking up a majority of the cupboard she resided in. At the end of the cot was a shelf, upon which was a collection of small toy soldiers; old British Redcoats from the American Revolution if she wasn't mistaken; with their weapons at the ready. Above that shelf was another covered with thick books that had obviously been read quite often from the state of the spines. However, it was the reflecting surface on the far right of the top shelf that caught her emerald gaze. A mirror. Reaching out, Shepard took the mirror and turned the reflective surface toward herself. What she saw knocked the wind out of her lungs.

Gone was the scarred and beaten face of a seasoned veteran who had gone through hell and high water. Staring back at the Spectre was the face she hadn't seen since she was eight years old. The round and elegant features of an eight-year-old Morgana Lillian Shepard stared with wide eyes at the girl holding the mirror. Shoulder-length crimson hair sat above almost elf-like emerald eyes. A cute button nose, soft lips and strong jaw sat upon her face, bringing tears to the Spectre's eyes. She hadn't seen herself as a child since just before the slaver raid on Mindoir. Morgana touched her face all over, trying to understand how such a transformation was even possible, when pain exploded behind her eyes, causing her to cry out and drop the mirror upon the bed spread.

With a sensation not unlike the Prothean beacons on Eden Prime and Virmire, a life she hadn't lived flashed before her eyes. Her mother and father smiling at her from her spot in a white crib, a woman screaming, a high-cold laughter that reminded her of Kai Leng's laugh and that ass Harkon's fused into one, a flash of green light, the sensation a being struck in the head with a crowbar, being picked up by something- no someone- massive, a fat boy that reminded her of a baby Krogan pushing her about, a horse-like woman screaming at her, calling her a freak, a man that looked extraordinarily like a walrus turning an impressive shade of purple as he screamed at her while beating her with a belt. That explained the bruising. Name began to attach themselves to the images. Her mother and father, Lily and James. The baby Krogan boy was Dudley, the horse woman was Petunia, that walrus man was Vernon. Cousin, Aunt, Uncle. Dursley. Her own youthful face stopped behind her eyes and a name attached itself to her face. Morgana Lily Potter.

The pain thumping in her skull slowly began to subside, leaving the former-Spectre gasping for breath on the mattress. After what felt like an eternity of being unable to breath, Morgana finally caught her breath and pushed herself up from the mattress. Her mind was racing a thousand light-years a second, how was this even possible. She was supposed to be dead from the explosion of Dark Energy from Project Crucible, not de-aged and shot backwards through time to live a life she never had. Dark Energy…oh no… The young girl jolted as a thought came to mind. Raising her hand, Morgana searched for the familiar tingle of her Biotics. She sighed in relief as the tingle sprung forth, her hand engulfed in purple-black energy. At least I still have that, thought Morgana. She smirked as she remembered that apparently her…relatives were a bit abusive. Oh I'm going to have a ball with this. Now all I need is my Omni-Tool, my weapons and my armor and I'll be good to go… provided that I grow up again and build up some muscle. No time like that present. She let her biotics fade away just as the door to the cupboard was yanked open, and a great meaty hand grabbed her by the arm.

Vernon

Vernon Dursley yanked his freak of a niece out of her cupboard, throwing her down the hall into the living room, ignoring her yelp of surprise and pain as she landed harshly on her right arm. The little freak had neglected to do the morning chores before everyone was up. And since it was his son's birthday, he'd have to teach the brat a lesson. However, he was quite surprised when the red-haired girl rolled with the impact and sprung to her feet with the grace of one of those jungle cats he'd seen on the telly. What surprised him more was the intense look of rage in her emerald eyes, a look he had never seen on her face before. For whatever reason, his blood turned cold at the burning rage in her eyes, for it was a glare that promised pain and suffering. Shaking himself, the large man strode over to her, plucking up his courage as he reminded himself that even if she was acting differently, she was still much smaller than himself.

"So little freak, you thought you could skip Dudley's birthday, did you? Well it seems as though you need another lesson." Said Vernon as he swung his and to strike her across the face. However, his anger was replaced by shock as the diminutive girl's good arm lashed out and latched onto his own with a steel grip. The strength of her arm was so intense and so sudden that it forced Vernon to his knees right then and there. The overweight man glared at her with as much hate as he could, however that hate was instantly replaced by fear as his niece's body became wreathed in purple-black energy. She opened her mouth and spoke with the authority and determination of a seasoned soldier, not an eight-year-old child who had been beaten down continuously for years.

"If you EVER strike me again, Uncle," She hissed the word as though it was a curse. "I will break every bone in your body. I am NOT your slave, I am your niece. And from here on out, you will treat me as such or so help me I will show you the true meaning of pain. Do you understand me?" The girl narrowed her emerald eyes at Vernon even as the purple-black energy pouring off of her increased in volume, a burning sensation settling deep within his bones. Out of fear, Vernon Dursley nodded quickly in agreement, causing the little freak to release him and the purple-black energy pouring off of her to recede. Turning on her heel just as a soldier would, she turned and headed back to her cupboard. Vernon pushed himself up and watched from the living room as the girl cleared out her cupboard and began to carry her possessions up the stairs. Before today, if she had tried that, she would have been beaten within an inch of her life. But now, he would let her do as she would. After all, Vernon Dursley was many things, but suicidal was not one of them.