"One of the great questions of philosophy is, do we innately have morality, or do we get it from celestial dictation? A study of the Ten Commandments is a very good way of getting into and resolving that issue."

(Christopher Hitchens)

Epilogue: Inestimable Wonders

The crowd of cobbled together off-duty soldiers, roped in civilians and C-Sec Special Response Officers parted for the Commander as she made her way through the assemblage. They murmured wishes of good fortune and others whispered thanks while others still wept and touched her armour as she passed, others still even knelt before her, with something akin to reverence. The embodiment of N7's ideals was doing her best to address each individual that beseeched her as she passed through.

Fires still burned along the length of the Presidium park, littered as it was with the bodies of Husks, Geth platforms and all manner of cadavers of the various races; even those of a non-militant disposition. It would have taken weeks to clean up the damage, but the Keepers were already organising corpses for identification and repairing essential systems to get the daylight holo ceilings activated again.

As the crowd thinned and parted, Aran reached Kaidan where he sat cradling a blood-soaked Ashley Williams in his arms.

She was undeniably quite dead.

"Kaidan, I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry..." She whispered as she crouched down to his level and tenderly brushed a lock of hair back from Ash's face, glass-eyed but peaceful. After a minute's silence, Kaidan relinquished his hold and allowed Aran to close her eyes and place her in a funeral state, hands across her breast.

"I know..." He guttered harshly. "But that doesn't matter anymore."

"What do you want me to say? I begged you both to leave."

"You didn't. You simply - asked. You knew this would happen."

"That's not true."

"You play with so many people's lives. Do you honestly expect me to think you couldn't have saved Jenkins? What about Fredricks? Singh? Craig? Andrews? You were toying with us all, it's all a game to you."

"Kaidan, you're distraught. And because of that, I forgive you for everything you're about to say."

"I don't want – anything from you! You're no hero!"

"I never claimed to be... Kaidan, you've seen that in me more than anyone. Remember Noveria? The Universe doesn't need a saviour. It needs a professional."

"Then they can have you. But our squad... Ash. Me... None of us deserved what you've done. What you did."

"I did what I chose to do, Lieutenant. And I own all the responsibilities and consequences that come of every choice I've ever made and ever will make. How many in this life can say the same?"

"They don't have what you have!"

"You're talking in circles, Alenko. Of course they don't. We are all different. And I should have realised that you require a battery of psychological evaluations and subsequent treatment."

Kaidan punched her in the face.

He truly let loose, well exceeding the power of the kick he'd used to kill his abusive and near-murderous drill-instructor on Gagarin Station.

Samus was flung to the side as her head whipped, a glob of blood flying from between her teeth as she bit her cheek; but she didn't fall. Aran had not been expecting the assault from her quiet, calm, empathetic colleague, especially a man she called friend. That attack had been with the intent to maim, to kill.

Five men immediately jumped the Sentinel before he could draw back his other fist to land a second blow. A Salarian C-Sec officer made to drive his stun baton into the Alliance Soldier's midriff. But Aran grasped his wrist powerfully, nursing her reopened lip with her other hand as Kaidan wrestled and cursed his captors – yet he could only mouth off, his amp was spent.

"No. No chastisement, officers." She commanded, and the bull Turian immediately loosened his sleeper hold enough so that Kaidan's features went from purple to red. "Just restrain him."

"Let me go! Get the hell off of me!"

"Stop struggling, Lieutenant. Please..."

"You're no officer of mine! We were the only two left, now I realise it's just one!"

"We both know what this World of ours needs, Kaidan. You're just too weak to realise. But I'm not... I'm not. Take him away."

And they did so. Aran would remember that look of hate and disavowal on Kaidan's face as they dragged him to the Human Embassy. She'd seen it before, on the faces of those she'd failed. Parents who could not cope with the loss of their sons and daughters in action and held her accountable.

"I hope you find what you're looking for, my friend. I'm sorry I couldn't help you find it." She consigned, terse and disappointed in both of them. Her former Lieutenant. But herself most of all.

"Shepard." She turned to see Ambassador Udina, looking much the worse for wear. His once pristine white suit soot-caked and torn. His face and hands filthy, one arm in an omni sling.

"Udina... You weren't evacuated?"

"Yes, yes, I have been fighting this fine afternoon. Though I'm afraid I made a rather poor performance next to Anderson and your shipmates. My condolences, for Chief Williams."

"Much appreciated. Your service in the Shanxi Colonial Garrison was a long time ago, Ambassador. I'm impressed."

"Press-ganged then, conscripted at the last second now. Hm, hardly an accomplishment. Though I thank you, nonetheless. ... God, what a mess."

"Quite."

"I trust I might have earned the whole story and get on the right side of the - adult's table after this debacle you've played me in. Like Hackett and Anderson...?"

"Perhaps... If you can put those old ties to Earth's Conglomerates aside."

"... True. I may have no choice soon. Considering what I'm hearing over the Council's channel..."

"We always have a choice, Ambassador. When it's presented. What is yours going to be?"

Udina gave her a wily look.

The group of six traversed the aisles of gravestones at twilight, each burning with its own renewing candle. They were walking among the premise of the cemetery that accounted for those not belonging to an existing standard or banner.

Aran could not help but notice that the silver birch trees that grew all around Palaven's Faoanta National Burial Ground were a similar breed to those that had been grown around the Conduit on Ilos; the Protheans had left more than what the Reapers had allowed for them to discover, what was necessary for them to merely uplift a race along their guidelines to ensure the continued perpetuation of their insane harvest. They and her family had given them the out that no generation had been afforded for three billion years of endless cycles. The data would have to be shared, carefully, and soon.

But with whom?

Who could be trusted with secrets of such magnitude? But then, the Reapers were not exactly a secret to the shadow community. Aran had only trusted in the beacons after discovering Harper's own life long search for the oldest enemy. He was prey unlike that of which she had usually tailed. But he would be hers; one way or another.

Four waited behind as Aran and her Turian acquaintance, Councillor Walken Sparatus made their way to the central clearing and stopped before one very particular headstone.

Upon the setting sun lit face was etched the words: Nihlus Kryik, born 16th of Branzd 17147, died 2nd of Vadusalam 17182. One Spirit can illuminate the Galaxy.

"He had neither family nor markings when Arterius found him, you know." Sparatus said quietly. "He was an orphan from one of Taetrus' many civil conflicts with the Hierarchy over the centuries... Sixteen. He'd fought alongside his father throughout the insurrection. Until a Blackwatch squad overran their positions; his mother managed to get him accepted into the official tiers before passing away from her injuries... He would fight the system every step of the way. Too much for any three commissars, or the hazings of his fellows, until Saren took him under his wing... Then..."

"An undeserved end." Aran acknowledged.

"He was a great man. I sponsored him every step – "

"He died because of my carelessness you know."

Sparatus stopped abruptly at that bombshell.

"... Shepard, you know as well as I that Nihlus recognised all the risks involved."

"He did. But I didn't. I thought he'd be safe, just as he was on all of our past missions together. Whether we were united or apart, I would have killed for such acumen as he displayed when I was his age... A man of his caliber, of his skill, to be brought low by base treachery... Nothing is more hateful... Than failing to protect the one you love."

"He cared for you a great deal. It was his choice to sponsor you regardless of your manipulations. He saw greatness in your character above and beyond even your skills. And it payed off remarkably."

"Mhm. Yet it takes so much blood, does it not, Councillor?"

"Yes. Yes... Always too much. I lost many fellow Turians in the Widow Nebula."

"Far more than any Human lives, that's for certain... I've always admired that resolve, beyond all others. Your people, dying in droves... Ships disintegrating into the ether against the tide... Even with such catastrophic losses your admirals stood firm and said no. Not now. Not here. The Hierarchy knows what we should do; do they not?"

"Of course. And as for our resolve? With the level you prepared and planned for...? The last of the Chozo's legacy may be in your blood but they chose a Human to entrust it to. What does that say for the potential of your species? A potential we all witnessed? But I'll take the highest compliment for my own people as you well wish..." He chuckled softly, then, to Aran's muffled surprise he said: "as long as you accept that I have come to admire Human ingenuity along the same scale. You were a child of Earth before you became the Entrusted One after all. No matter the short length of time in between the changes. In truth... This is almost too much for me to get my head around... It's... easier to think of a Human accomplishing all you have done; than the avenging progeny of a lost race growing mighty once more."

Samus favoured him with the tiniest of smiles, then removed the orb droplet that composed Nihlus Kryik's ashes from inside a carved box she'd carried and placed it in the memorial flame with fine-tuned biotics. It fanned the candle higher and Aran knew that the life her friend had led was secure; not the man that he was. But everything that he could be. Before his birth and after his death.

"We must discuss a great many things, Councillor."

"... For what is to come?"

Aran could not stop gazing at Kryik's monument but she was the first to turn away with a both a minor sensation of bone-weariness and another of transcendent triumph as Nihlus brushed past her on the wind. "Yes." She sighed.

"Ambassador, Captain, Commander Shepard." Tevos reeled off politely. As if none of them had been responsible for nearly dooming and saving Galactic civilization in their own way. "We have gathered here to recognise the enormous contributions of the Alliance forces in the war against Sovereign and the Geth."

Valern took up the pre-prepared narrative; they were all trying to hold onto some measure of normalcy, of due and staid protocol against the events that had torn their world asunder. But Aran was touched by his sincerity and the sincerity of the words that followed nonetheless. "Many human navy soldiers posted on the Citadel aided Special Response during the assault. And many humans lost their lives in the battle above to save the Citadel. Brave and courageous citizens of the Galaxy who willingly gave their lives, so that we, the Council, might live."

"There is no greater sacrifice," Sparatus intoned solemnly. "And we share your grief over the tragic loss of so many noble men and women." Anderson nodded to him respectfully while Udina simply looked ill at the ramifications finally coming home. He'd been in shock and denial for days and he swallowed a lump past his throat quite visibly and for a moment Aran was worried he'd burst into tears.

Tevos stepped in. "The Council also owes you a great personal debt, Commander. One we can never repay. You saved not just our lives but the lives of billions from Sovereign and the Reapers."

"Samus Aran." Valern addressed her as for the first time. "Your heroic and selfless actions serve as a symbol of everything that both Humanity and the Trybondian Republic stand for."

"And though we cannot bring back those valiant soldiers who gave their lives to save ours, we can honour their memories through our actions." Sparatus said.

"You and the crew that stood behind you have proven yourselves true defenders and protectors of the Galaxy," Tevos continued, "but your people showed the greatest faith and trust in you when we could not. As such, Humanity has proved herself worthy to join our ranks and serve beside us on the Citadel Council."

"I'm afraid I'll need far more from you than that, Councillors." Aran interjected as Udina opened his mouth to speak.

Everyone but the Hunter had to hold their breath as the moment of truth arrived. Would the coup be bloodless? Or were they all about to be shuffled off-stage?

"Let us not mince words here. With the forces at my disposal I could defeat the standing armies of every race and nation simultaneously. As we are soon to be an official clandestine client race of the Citadel, that will never happen while I live. The Spectres will still answer to the Council members who appeal to their nationality of course and regarding my own actions under the banner of the Legion you entrusted me with; I will do so as well. But as the representative of my own libertarian civilization I would need equal footing alongside you and the Human representative. I'll not have us at an impasse on policy with an even number of individuals. We'll need five voices in the backrooms. Oh, and throw in hidden seats for Din Korlack and Ambassador Calyn as well."

"The Volus and Elcor?!" Valern spluttered.

"Have a rather large presence in my inter-stellar commune I'll admit but we'll need to rework the economic system before the Reapers arrive if we want the war to last more than a year before your finances give out. A mandatory reformation to crypto-currency can be facilitated by our rotund friends and the Elcor for all their isolationist ways are the finest resource managers and agricultural experts we have. Already I've had those who formed clans in my Trybondian deal with locking down safe-havens for posterity in case we should lose the war. Not to mention stockpiling enough Omega-Class weapons that when the Reapers return to continue the next cycle; they will die to the last."

"Commander – this is – ?! This is a lot to take in! We'd need – "

"Time. I know." She lit a blue root cigar languidly with a biotic spark clicked from her thumb and took a measured draft before blowing a smoke ring up into the burnished orange sky. "Unfortunately we have much less than I'd like. Ever since the Protheans subverted the Keeper signal a contingent of Reaper warships awoke and has made a slow burn to the outer rim of the Milky Way. They will have lost none of their numbers to the perils of Dark Space and even with conservative estimates their auxiliaries will be at least ten thousand strong and that's just their dreadnought's numbers."

"Ten thousand?" Anderson breathed through his nose. "We could barely defeat one at full strength! And that was due to your actions against Saren, not the fleet's bombardment."

"Only for the moment. We had to appear weaker than we were, David. Secrecy is our greatest weapon until we can make a coordinated switch-over. Which will have to be done quickly, quietly. And we must not despair, their processes will be moderately weaker after such taxing exertion. It will have taken them sixty five thousand eight hundred and forty one rotations of our yellow stars, after all, for them to have made such a journey, burning at FTL speeds."

"How can you possibly know all of – ?"

"From an archive of Chozo knowledge entombed on Turvess. Which confirmed many of my own theories and dissections of the Mass Relays. By their, and my scientist's, calculations they will reach the Bahak System in little over three years. I will share my more - extreme counter-measures only with the presence of each head-of-state at the redacted meetings on Thessia at the Temple of Athame."

"Of course you'd know about those as well!" Valern huffed.

"My knowledge of the affairs of state should not concern us, Councillor. But those of Cerberus should."

"Cerberus? Cerberus was destroyed. A black-ops unit gone rogue..." Anderson inputted hopefully.

"No, they are very much at large. While I tend to my people in the interim period that we have and see to the proliferation of new technological avenues, I will also track down, subvert and destroy this organisation."

"But they are only Human supremacists." Udina countered. "How much damage could they do? In the highest circles on Earth they are little more than an embarrassment."

"This goes far beyond mere Human concerns, Ambassador. The Illusive Man has agents and factions within each and every government. They're less of a guard dog and more of a Lernaean Hydra; which also, incidentally, guarded another entrance into Hades."

"Then how can we stop them?" Valern inquired. "According to STG they've been active since just after the 314 Incident and can even challenge the Shadow Broker's network."

Aran crossed her arms and flashed her unique approximation of a wry smile. "From within of course." Then she addressed the Turian and Salarian statesmen. "I have experience in these matters. Both the Integra Dominion and Urtragian High Command encompassed the resources of multiple galaxies and I reduced them to nothing without an army at my back. Though it earned me the ever-lasting enmity of the Fascist Federation I once upheld. I'll also ensure my men help with the cleanup of the Vanguard's remains. We'll see what will prove useful in our hands - and in the hands of others..."

Udina was nodding thoughtfully as the Councillors quickly agreed: "so it seems I did have a use to you when I acted how you knew I would after Virmire..."

"Arterius still had his people dotted through the embassies. You played your part whether you knew it or not, Ambassador. Thanks to you, he never saw us coming."

"And now...?"

"They've been... Reassigned."

"Commander," Tevos tried to get the conversation back to a place where they were on relatively equal footing. "I'm afraid we are not as used to considering matters of galactic salvation on the same level as you are. Perhaps the matter of Humanity's place on the Council should be resolved before you step forth with your own representatives for the Trybondian; as I'm sure you would be far too busy with your admirable goals to fill the post yourself."

"Gladly," Aran acknowledged. "My counterpart will fill you in on what I left out for expediency's sake. Donnel? I think this is your moment now."

Udina stepped up to the plate. "Councillor, on behalf of Humanity and the Alliance, we thank you for this prestigious honour and humbly accept."

"We will need a list of potential candidates to fill Humanity's seat on the Council." Valern said.

Tevos continued: "given all that has happened, I am sure your recommendation would carry a great deal of weight, Commander. Do you support any particular candidate."

Aran stood at ease as Sparatus, Valern and Tevos all looked to her and she realised they probably wanted the icon of the Eden Prime Wars to take both seats; with the populace at large treating her as the messiah after Sovereign's destruction, she could take every iota of power from them right now if she so wished and the people would support their hero and deliverer. All she had to do was reach out and take it...

Or she could screw around with poor Udina for a bit more before giving him his just desserts... Yes, of the two the latter seemed infinitely preferable.

"We need some one with the courage to stand up for what he believes in." She said and Udina puffed himself up proudly at her words. "Someone like Captain Anderson."

Udina instantly deflated.

"Him?! You must be joking! Anderson prefers to let his fists do the talking!"

"Only with you, Ambassador. Only with you." David replied with the utmost military reserve and dignity, though Aran knew him too well to know that he would be happy on the Council. He was a man born to lead on the battlefield; not a bureaucrat. One picked the requisite tool for the appropriate task...

"I was jesting, David. I wouldn't subject you to that after your years of service. What kind of reward would that be?"

"Thanks for the save, Sam." He replied warmly.

"But in all seriousness, Councillors, it is not my place to decide Humanity's appointed when I will gain my own voice regardless. I think for the time being, Ambassador Udina will be able to put forth an advocate who will represent Humanity to her fullest."

Tevos picked up the thread and damned the Scotsman with faint praise. "Well, the Ambassador has worked with us in the past and we are familiar with his style and methods..."

"A little too familiar, you could say." Sparatus ventured cooly.

"Oh, you haven't seen anything yet, Councillor." Udina crowed, undaunted. "I've been holding back!"

"Easy, Donnel. You're not Councillor yet." Aran chided and the group chuckled with a new surge of enthusiasm.

"I am sure we will all learn to work together as never before seen in our history." Tevos proclaimed.

"Sovereign's defeat marks the beginning of a new era, for both the Council and the unified races of the Galaxy." Announced Sparatus just as grandly.

But Aran had to put out the festival fires and confiscate the champagne bottles before the corks could be popped.

"Now then... that was refreshing. Good day, Councillors, Udina, Anderson. As much as I'd like to dally around a bit longer; we shouldn't start patting ourselves on the back just yet. I've got some work to do. The Reaper Fleet is still out there and enough enemies remain within to sell us out to the only enemy that matters. And I'm going to foil them all."

And with that Aran turned her back on who was believed to be the three most powerful individuals in the Galaxy and her two Human colleagues and walked down the path to a date with destiny.

The Councillors were still too shocked to stop their Agent from doing as she pleased but Sparatus and Anderson were pensive and plotting while Udina was whipping himself up into a frenzy.

"Shepard's right! Humanity is ready to do its part. United with the rest of the Council, we have the strength to overcome any challenge! When the Reapers come, we must stand side by side. We must fight against them as one! And together, we will drive them back into Dark Space!" He clamoured charismatically, pulling out the 'gloved fist of doom' fist gesture that all military dictators were fond of when riling the troops up for some rapine.

David could barely resist the urge to put his face in his hands. Sparatus cut across Udina's impressive zeal with a cold dose of reality.

"You realise of course, that the public cannot know a trace of what we plan here today... Or of any details surrounding the origins of what led to that fateful day and more importantly, why, during the Battle of the Citadel."

"We can still support her from behind the scenes." Anderson affirmed.

Tevos looked to Valern then shook her head sadly. "I'm afraid not, Captain. If infiltrators of the Reapers and Cerberus are as deeply ingrained as Agent Shepard believes... Then her wishes are clear."

"What do you mean?"

"Shepard's indictment of the Reaper menace must be publicly quashed, destroyed, vilified even. She must be held up as an icon of progress for Humanity while her ideals and suspicions concerning the Reapers are torn to shreds as the ramblings of a PTSD-stricken soldier who lost too many men during her mission to cope with the pressure." Udina explained. "The blame will rest on Saren and the Geth."

"But that's not true!" Anderson defended voraciously and he tore off after Aran, catching her on the gravel road as she strolled, whistling some unknown pretty little tune.

"You know what they're going to do?" He demanded.

She smiled, that same infuriating facial tic that wasn't joy or disdain but something unidentifiable.

"Why?" he asked finally, choked.

"Because I'm not a hero, David. Not like you. I'm a Spectre, a beast wearing a civilized skin who does what they dare not. I'll use the most underhanded diplomacy and I'll use the most reprehensible force. I'm neither a paragon of virtue or an uncaring renegade. I'm just an old killer with a code."

"No, no! You're not!"

"I'm whatever they need me to be. While I never forget who I really am. The girl who kills the monsters. Now go back to them, David."

"But they'll think you're vulnerable! They'll hunt you!"

Now she really laughed. "Not just them. You'll hunt me, condemn me, set the dogs on me. They have more power than you'd ever believe, David. If you want to stay alive to fight when the time comes for the scales to drop from their eyes, then you won't support me. You'll spit on me. That's what needs to happen. All that matters is what we know to be true, even when the world is howling that we're both wrong."

She strode away with a back-palmed wave over her shoulder and Anderson stood motionless as her figure shrunk away along the long boulevard and Sparatus joined him.

"Off she goes to right more wrongs..." The Turian mused. "Why does she do it at all? You must wonder, Captain? When this remarkable being made herself known to you..."

"... Because she's the hero the Universe deserves. Both the good and the bad. So we'll hunt her. Because she can take it. Because she's not our hero... She's a silent guardian, a watchful protector... The Ultimate Warrior."

A/N: The following is my personal continuation of what happened after the end of Mild Guy's Mature-rated (and very old) Metroid fan fiction called 'Heirloom'. It's on my favourites list if you want to give it a read as it is a concise little novella, and is a great little side-story in my mind even if there are some minor contradictions to my interpretation of Metroid lore but hey, it's earlier in the time-line, when Aran was a more dysfunctional character and less of the super-hero she becomes in the Samus and Joey manga and the memetic badass that she is in my story.

Aran lay in the frozen wastes of Tearus VIII, her battle-suit clad back, shoulders, neck and dissolving skull leaning heavily against a curved cliff. Below, a facility that had been both above and beneath ground lay in ruins, by a detonation that had doomed it only a few scant minutes ago and already its traces were disappearing under the wind grit snows swept along by the white dwarf hanging aloft; for the sky was clear with countless stars. But while they burned with life, she was near comatose and dying as her body temperature plummeted.

Her armour was cracked, tarnished and scored with battle, its inhabitant even worse for wear. Decrepit, tortured and now cold as the life bled from her form. Her triumphs forgotten due to her own longevity, put out to pasture by a government that would use but never honour her. Only discard.

The Hunter's head drooped to rest on her chest and a trickle of blood passed down her temple as her breathing stilled and her heart stopped beating. One might perhaps see her left eye frozen open through the shattered glass of her helmet's visor.

From across the barren dunes they came. Her people. Her guardians. Her family.

The Chozo had gifted many civilizations with the technology of the gods. To the Bryyonians, they had held out the palm that contained knowledge of how to animate inorganic matter; so that constructs of stone towered free to the bronzen sky and artificial moons could be chained to the earth, the ecosystem fine-tune manipulated. To the Luminoth, how to bolster and channel the untapped potential of any kind of planetary core; so that their settled home-world needed no sun of its own as it wandered the void and its light was unrivaled in the dark. To the N'kren, the power to observe and quantify the mysteries of both black and white holes, to the Ylla, or Æsir, as they were known on Earth and through the Yggdrasil, the secrets of how to construct and travel along Einstein–Rosen Bridges.

But all these paled next to the children of Gallifrey. To them went the paradox of absolute freedom and total control. The Lore of Arcadia. And the terrors of the Untempered Schism.

Over hundreds of millions of years, until relativity ran out, the Gallifreyans adopted the traits of their benefactors, absorbing and incorporating biogenic matter from the oldest and most powerful race in the Universe, until they could control stars and eventually even time itself. Yet the now departed Eagles' might kept the Ancient Time Lords and the rest of their empowered progeny in check; until the unending conflicts of expansion and reset led them into exile, abstinence of greater power and the self-cultivation of the higher spirit.

For their time had long since ended. As was the fate of every great civilization.

But these same powers, though forgotten and diluted, lived on in their blood and so too in their last child.

The Shaman and his fellow priests and priestesses surrounded her in a semi-circle and as one they began to sing.

Snow was swept up as nine blazing white currents of energy wisped along the frozen earth, coalesced together and inspired past Aran's bloodied lips.

A/N: Soundtrack choice: Infinite Potential – Murray Gold

An electric shock jolted her form back to the land of the living. She gasped, one long shuddering breath that rattled over the dune. Song was reverberating through her bones. Her suit was wisping away in motes of cyan, turquoise and golden light, streams that were one second a confluence, the next second separate, and constantly switching back and forth were shooting from her fingertips as they atomised away.

Aran inhaled deep as she felt her every myeloblast and mitochondrion reverberate through her being, shaking away the pain and numbness of her ordeal. Her biochemistry was doing the Kundalini dance as she gazed at her transparent blazing hands, every pathway highlighted.

It was then that she noticed that she had been effortlessly transported to the Northern Pole of the planet, twelve of her forbears now standing in a circle around her; their chorus pulsating along with the heavens.

Temporal platelets bubbled and fizzed into being, infusing phagocyte cells, flooding into her renewing arteries, subdural and subcutaneous layers both burgeoned with crackling energy, both that from within and what was being drawn around and without.

She was a woman of five hundred and eighty four cycles old and she burned with the cold of an ice star. Her three cubed DNA strands unraveled and twined back together as wisps of rainbow light played under her flesh and over her wounds, rapidly countering and smoothing out all of the damage and cares, old and new alike. From Drooga's fresh teeth marks to her twisted reattached knee that had never healed properly following the wetland battle on Echo Pip-62, even after months of physical therapy.

But it didn't stop there.

Artron Radiation shed off of her form in an aurora borealis that switched through colours no Human eye could comprehend and several others that would blind, her skin pulled back tight, renewing the taut suppleness of a twenty seven year old, wrinkles melted away, liver spots faded, her hair thickened and regained its luster, blessed warmth was shooting through her limbs, as if she were sinking into a hot bath.

This was the lindo hormone pumping from her pituitary and rushing through her veins.

She was regenerating.

Gelatin shone through muscle fiber and other tissues as an unquantified amount of free-riding tachyons were pulled from the annihilated facility, the magnetosphere, the boiling center of the world and from the Lost Plane of the Chozo. Wst-ruq's teachings and Aba-ven's genetic heritage, his very building blocks as the predecessor of the Ultimate Warrior slotted together more neatly than ever as her own Human ancestry adapted and filtered, casting off the extraneous and keeping what served, including the developing threads of the infant.

Aran laughed to the sky as she felt her sense of self and identity die, the howling deep belly laugh of wild abandonment and utter joy of a child. The nexus of energies was gathering, accelerating in speed, reaching a fever-pitch crescendo as the entire night-side of the planet rejoiced.

Her hands fell to her sides, palms open and upturned, arms at her sides as she left the ground to float forty feet above. Helpless. Free.

The intangibility of her physical body was no longer in doubt, though her trans-humanist stance seemed to be the same, her phantom limbs were rolling seamlessly between the states of Leonardo's Vitruvian Man until there was nothing left but her mouth clinging to the seam of existence.

As her head snapped back to look to the sky, and her eyes blazed with the power of lost gods, her atoms split apart and her mind exploded out in a fusion reaction that bled the vibrancy of the world and lit the upper hemisphere. The impact horizon wave spread out five times across the radius of the planet even as a jet of funneling energies churned upwards from the detonation point and joined with the skin of gases covering the planet, igniting them.

The entire mantle of Tearus VIII cracked and was smote asunder as the energies of The Void, The Dark Dimension, The Time Vortex and The Infraworld seeped through the fissures in reality; easily tearing apart physical matter and restarting the iron core. Nothing on the surface remained the same as mountains were heaved up and seas melted free, leaving one island of ice alone among the primordial reawakening.

Unlike the Gallifreyans, the Chozo had developed their regeneration for war. To annihilate fleets and overturn worlds, or even put out stars with a single warrior child. And they possessed enough power in just one of their cells to complete this process and once it began, it could not be stopped by exterior intervention. Yet the culmination of deepest spirit had only been achieved by two others before Aran and only one of these came close to the level of destruction and reformation she was causing; for she had saved the energy deep within her thrumming cells. On Zebes, within Phaaze, striding along the contra trails of SN 185 and flying unaided through countless Rifts. She had more than enough excess to regenerate for eternity and gone. And that wasn't even the best of it.

Any superficial changes that came of the process were entirely reversible; stored if you will through memory, as her appearance had undergone transformations throughout her life due to exposure from countless different radiation fields.

The temporary distortions of reality coalesced into a whirling orb of light and fixed that very moment, that very point in Time; forever.

Blizzards and firestorm fronts carried across the earth one after the other, snap-freezing then boiling continents over in a sea of lava.

A second fusion detonation petrified the molten mountain ranges to stand immobile as the regeneration wound down.

The glowing cyan figure descended as the pool whirled underneath, turning solid, forming a cold ice garden of fantastic shapes, the figure was one of them. Encased in a shell of gilded armour somewhere between hard packed hoarfrost and a gel cocoon.

A cape of crystalline mist wreathed her massive broad shoulders even as the shell began to crack and splinter and the limbs broke from their confines to peel, chip away and tear the rest off, until Samus Aran stood on the tundra, looking not a day over twenty four, with long hair of fiery auburn and eyes that were acid green, wide and staring as she breathed in pure oxygen that would have been impossible to absorb for an ordinary Human.

"Alive! I'm alive!" She gasped in Chozodian, examining her hands frantically. "Morphological transmutation permeation processes?!" She grabbed her foot and examined her toes up at eye level. There were four instead of five. No pinky. "Evolutionary tailoring?! Cellular renewal?! Oh, YES, LISTENER! YEP YEP YEP! NOW THIS IS THE WAY TO LIVE!"

She laughed like a lunatic when she pulled her tresses of hair into view and saw the colour, reminding her of how she had dyed it during Emergency Order M510 all those years ago. She shook her hair out and it changed back to the bronze flaxen she had been born with and her irises swam with every colour of the rainbow before settling back to deep indicolite shot with evergreen.

Aran spent several moments pacing around and performing various leaps and bounds; rejoicing in her renewed youth and vitality; while a storm front of volcanic ash thirty thousand feet tall headed for her.

"Ah." She muttered dryly, noticing the problem. "Escape plan. That ship I sent off-world is too far away to call back... What to do... What to do... Aha! Let's utilize some of this ambient energy."

And just like that, Aran gathered enough residue in order to affect a one-time seamless plane transference of near infinite range, slipping through the fissures in space and time to teleport wherever she willed before the storm front engulfed the spot where she'd stood.

"Now do you think I would ever leave?" Aran murmured as she lay back with Liara sprawled atop her. The bed-sheets wrapped around them.

"I suppose you make a - very compelling argument..." T'Soni whispered back, kissing her lover deeply. That shared memory of death and rebirth had been particularly... potent.

"But you are spoiling me quite a bit, Commander. Whatever will our friends think if we keep them waiting?"

"Till tonight then, Dr."

Aran played with Yenna, the ship's cat, who was lying in her upside-down fedora while she watched Liara dress hungrily. The Normandy was set to land at an SA refueling station in the Skyllian Verge. It hung above the striking brown gas giant, Borr, that was swept by super hurricanes every hour of every day and was mined for precious hydrogen and hellium-3 fuels that were shipped to Terra Nova, Eden Prime and of course, Earth. And within three years it would become obsolete except for functioning as a tourist attraction.

There had been much ceremony and political posturing for the media in the week following the Battle of the Citadel. Aran had been more concerned with the isolation of all Reaper debris to prevent even the most subliminal affects of indoctrination but had shown up to except a System's Alliance Medal of Honour along with the highest recognition ribbons of several different alien nations. She'd done her best to have her squad mates honoured as well but the public only had eyes for her much to her chagrin. Though her crew were relieved not to have been caught in that same sordid spotlight.

Wrex, Tali, Garrus, Liara and Samus all congregated on the quay where Normandy had docked and was now being refilled and where they could all catch a view of the formidable planet through the ME pocket overlay that covered the platform. The team, after much deliberation, was starting to split off and part ways.

As the two younger women said their goodbyes to the crotchety Krogan Battlemaster, Aran took Vakarian aside.

"Boss, I wanted to thank you."

"What for, Garrus?"

"For everything. For taking me with you, letting me join your team. I've learned a lot. I've thought on all you've told me. I thought I'd found my reason to fight; now I know I've only just begun that search. I'll live as a man first, not just a man with a gun."

Aran nodded slowly, impassive, but Garrus could tell she was pleased.

"Where will you go?" She asked.

"Back to C-Sec... Maybe apply for Spectre training... With how you've taught me to live, no amount of red tape is going to stop me from saving lives."

"Whatever the cost?"

"Whatever the cost... To those who've struck first." He added with an amused twitch of his mandibles.

Aran's stone mask crumbled and she embraced the man, ensuring to expand her physique halfway between a point when she had once been 6'7 inches tall after a regeneration prelude to the BSL incident; much to his stunned surprise as he hugged her back almost desperately but he was the one to first relinquish the solidarity squeeze.

"Now that would be useful in a scrap, Sam. And we have the biggest one of all coming for us."

"Too true. But we'll be ready. I'll have to disappear on you, little brother. It's undercover work from here on out. But whatever you hear from those fools in the shadows... Know that I'll come back. To all of you, in time."

"The old 'faking the death' routine? Considering the character's of most of your admirers, I'd be tempted too."

"It won't go that far, my friend. Just a sojourn into the black, ostensibly to wipe out Geth pockets but I'll be searching for those who won't step into the light as easily as Arterius did."

It was Garrus who initiated the farewell embrace this time.

"Until we meet again." He almost choked.

"Until we meet again. But for now; well... There's only now."

Garrus smiled.

Tali came next as Vakarian went to say goodbye to Liara.

"I want to stay." She said without preamble as Aran said at the same time: "I want you to stay."

They laughed at that.

"I wouldn't dare question you again, Captain." The pilgrim continued.

"Promise that and I'll send you back to the fleet and your father by force."

"What? But I – "

"Never stop questioning those in authority, Tali. You were right to question me. It could have gone either way against Sovereign. I'll always listen to every side. It would be a poor leader who could not shift her paradigms when the evidence proves them to be contrary ... We'll be operating deep in the Terminus so I'm sure we could rendevouz with the Flotilla whenever you wish."

"Thank you, Sam. I'll go home in time but, well..."

"Say no more, Tal." Aran grinned happily, welcoming her into her arms with another poignant embrace.

"Shepard."

"Wrex."

"It's back to Tuchanka for me. I've got clans to unite and my people to save." The huge alien shuffled awkwardly then clapped his hands on both her shoulders. "May your enemies prove worthy of you, Sam."

"And you. And if not... And you feel like war-mongering... Know that I'll be the first person to step onto that pile of rubble to annihilate you to the last."

Wrex had never smiled so broadly or so truly as he did then and she would never see him repeat the expression.

"You honour me beyond what my race has ever been worth."

"No. You will show the Galaxy what you can be again."

"Godspeed, my friend."

They indulged in the biggest bear-hug they could manage, both trying to out crush the other but in the end they parted as battle-siblings and equals.

The Urdnot Chieftain watched as Aran and T'Soni exchanged sweet nothings as they boarded with Tali almost skipping after them to jump on her Commander's back, who gamely spun her around until she faced her squad mates for a final wave goodbye from the three women; which the two males returned. Ten seconds after the airlock sealed shut and the SR-1 was already hovering from her birth above them.

"Who thought I'd be standing here with a Turian at my side, all while watching my allies go into darkness without me?"

"... How about standing side by side with a friend?"

"Hmm... Yeah... I suppose I could do that." Wrex acceded grumpily.

With that, the two friends stood and watched as the Normandy swung across the white event-horizon of the brown gas-giant and crested over into the black of space, her contra trail jets blazed as brightly as the surrounding stars and for a moment she shone more vibrantly than any other of the innumerable orbs in the endless constellations against the misty portion of the spiral arm. Before being lost to the endless ever ocean.

FINI

A/N: Well everyone, it's been quite a ride. This first published fan fiction of mine may have taken me over three years, nearly four, to finish but I hope the quality speaks for itself. A big thank you to everyone who's made it a success and made contributions both big and small; but it doesn't end here! I'm still going to proof-read this baby as often as I can, so if you spot any errors, whether they're grammar, punctuation, spelling or continuity, point them out so I can correct them and make the first of what will eventually be three volumes that much better! I am currently going to be binge playing the Witcher III after having upgraded my rig, so the prologue of 'Ambuscade Over Alchera' may be a few months in the awaiting but I'll still be responding to reviews so don't fret. And crossovers may abound... Stay zen, boys and girls. Snake out.