***
"The paths are open," the Catalyst said. "But you have to choose."
Shepard looked at the three options which the Catalyst presented. She stared at the controls. At the cost of her life, she could send the Reapers away. If what the Catalyst said were true, she could end this war right then and there. Shepard remembered the Illusive Man's incessant drive for dominance: not only the control of technology, or the supremacy of the human race, but the subjugation of other people to his will. And the Reapers, masters of deceit, had turned the minds of so many good people before. Who was to say Shepard was not already under their influence again?
No, Shepard concluded. The price of control was too high - the outcome too insecure.
Her eyes wandered over to the series of tubes which the Catalyst had acknowledged would destroy the Citadel - the tubes whch could destroy the Reapers. Shepard paused. This was why she had fought. This was what she had hoped for, what allowed her to wake up from the nightmares and to send good people to early graves: destruction of the Reapers. And the path to that goal was laid out plainly before her. She could save the galaxy.
But could she? And who lived in that galaxy? The Catalyst assured her that destroying the Citadel would destroy the Reapers, yes. But what about EDI? What about the Geth? What about Legion? Trillions of lives might be spared whatever fate the Reapers imagined, but only at the cost of trillions more. And though she could not know for certain, she believed - she hoped - that the poor souls who had sought refuge in the Citadel after their homes were taken from them might still live.
Murder the Geth, murder EDI, to wipe out all the Reapers? No. She couldn't bring herself to do it. If the Illusive Man's goal for conquest of the Reapers were misguided, so too was their destruction at any price. The Geth and EDI had as much right to live as any organic ever had.
So what of synthesis? Shepard wondered. This might be the only true path forward - could the Reapers continue to harvest a new kind of life, of which they too were a part? Perhaps not. And if all life were of the same kind, maybe wars would end. Poverty. Famine. The stupid politicking that had blocked Shepard's path forward so many times. Maybe the galaxy would truly be a better place.
Shepard checked herself. That was her pride talking. The Catalyst had told her that the only way to forge this new DNA, as he called it, was to add her being to the Crucible's energy. She would accomplish what even the Illusive Man could not even dream - make all life her. All disagreement would end. All struggle. All would serve the other, because the other was the self. But that was the problem. The disagreement, the struggle, the selfishness - for all the evils organics and synthetics could perpetuate, they were the struggles of unique beings trying to forge a place for themselves in the universe. And that was more beautiful than any peace purchased through forcing all new life, from here forever forward, to bend to Shepard's design.
Thus Shepard realized how hopeless these options all were. No matter her choice, she had no guarantees save this: the relays would be gone. Galactic civilization, as Shepard and her squad and the Victory Fleet knew it, would be devastated. Perhaps they could rebuild the relays. But Tali would never see home again. Wrex would never see his firstborn. Garrus would never see his father. And Thane, Mordin, Legion, Ashley - all would have died in vain.
Anyway, who gave her the right to decide? The alliances she had built? No. Her rank? No. The only being in the universe who would trust Shepard with this decision was standing next to her. And she had only his, her, its word that these choices were the only path forward.
"No," Shepard said. "I refuse these choices. None of them will work. I know, I know. My people will die out. You'll win this round. But you said it yourself: your solution no longer works. You'll try to wipe out all traces of our existence, but we'll flee. We'll remember the truth. We'll bury it on every world we find. We'll pass it on to the next generation of organics. And they'll build a new Crucible.
"I know it may not work," Shepard continued. "You've seen our ace in the hole, and you know what we tried to do. So you may change the way everything works in the next fifty millenia, render the Crucible useless. The way I see it, the Crucible already is. These choices don't make sense. But if that Crucible does work, and if a new representative of organics stands here, before you, I suggest you have a fourth option. Because the people of my time choose to go out fighting, and that's what I'm going to do."
Shepard raised her pistol. The Crucible exploded. Everything went black.
Modifié par brian_breed, 24 mars 2012 - 03:38 .
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