All in all, it’s a fruitless idea, Shepard knows that. But he set course anyway – the Council is reluctant to deny him anything so soon after he saved them, so getting permission was easy. Shepard knows that it won’t last forever. Rather than going rounds that ultimately won’t help with the threat of the coming invasion, he should focus on the next step. It isn’t over, no matter what the Council likes to think. But instead of doing something about it, he’s here.
He let the team decide if they wanted to join him on this. Once he’s done here he’ll make the trip back to the Citadel, so any crew member who didn’t want to see the place again so soon afterwards, or ever, is on extended shore leave. If you can call it shore leave. Shepard knows that Tali, for example, is doing her best to help with the repair efforts on the Citadel.
Now Shepard is here, only Alenko with him. The rest of those who came to see the place are content to do so from orbit. Shepard isn’t sure if Alenko wanted to see the ground for himself or if he somehow sensed that Shepard would need someone like him by his side. Both, perhaps, Shepard wouldn’t put it past him. Shepard has gotten the impression that Alenko is quite good at this kind of stuff.
The place looks fundamentally different than the last time. The biggest change, obviously, is the big crater, or rather, the edges of the crater pushing through the sea. There is no mistaking the perfect circle of stone and rubble they saw while flying in as anything else than a bomb crater. The murky water inside doesn’t look much like the tropical sea Shepard somehow still expected in this place, and the ground around it is barren, just so above sea level, and covered in a thick layer of mud.
They can’t leave the Mako, the radiation levels are too high for their suits to manage for an extended period, but Shepard doesn’t know why they would do that anyway. He doesn’t recognise the place and he’s not sure if that’s good or bad. He says as much to Alenko as the push through the mud towards the edge of the crater.
“Why are you here?” Aleko asks in response.
Shepard is a marine. He’s trained for quick thinking and working out solutions for impossible to solve situations. He’s trained to protect his people, he’s trained to kill the enemy. He’s less prepared to handle death. Akuze still follows him into the present, and he doesn’t need Corporal Tooms with his stories about Cerberus for that. It’s always there, somewhere in the background. But on Akuze, they all fought together against an enemy that came looking for them. They went where they were sent, but they didn’t pick the fight. He didn’t send his team to their death like he did this time. “To make it real,” he says. “And you?”
The rocks that used to sculpture the landscape are gone, blast somewhere else or straight up melted, Shepard doesn’t know. There are no trees, no debris. Nothing that reminds him of Saren’s breeding facility. Seeing the barren landscape really drives the point home: There is no way Williams could have magically survived the blast.
“Survivor’s guilt,” Alenko says. “I’m trying to deal with it, you know, to make my peace.”
Shepard has always admired Alenko’s ability to put what he’s dealing with into words. Plain and simple. Honest.
“I didn’t choose you over her,” Shepard says. He pushes the Mako up the slope of the crater. “I chose the known combat area about the unknown. I chose the less defended area over the one that had an entire team of salarian infiltrators on site.” He glances sideways at Alenko, who is looking out the window. “Before, I needed the soldier to go with the team that expected heavy fighting, and the engineer to go with the bomb.” It feels unexpectedly good to put it into words. “It was not about you or her.”
He doesn’t know if that helps. Alenko is silent for a couple moments.
“Thanks, Shepard.”
Shepard is glad Alenko didn’t went for ‘Commander.’ They are Commander and Lieutenant, of course, but … not here. Here, at the place where they lost Williams, they’re just Shepard and Alenko.
The Mako pushes up the last few meters and Shepard jams on the brakes just at the right moment. They stand still at the ridge of the crater. The sun is burning down around them and makes the murky water sparkle. The contrast is exactly how Shepard feels.
“I miss her,” Shepard says. He can’t put into words how much. It’s not just that he lost a soldier, or even that he sent a soldier to their death. He lost a friend.
From the corner of his eye, Shepard sees Alenko nod. “Yeah. I feel like we didn’t get to know her half as well as she deserves.”
Shepard thinks of the conversation he’s had with her. About religion, about family, about duty. About finding humanity’s place in the wider galaxy. She’s always cared to much, and while he didn’t agree with her conclusions, he’s valued her input and opinions all the same, or perhaps even more: he’s always liked to surround himself with diverse viewpoints, and getting to hear her reasoning has always been interesting.
It’s really not the same without her, and here atop the place where she died, under the tropical sun of a planet that could have been a paradise but instead is a place of loss and tragedy, Shepard lets himself feel that.
He looks at Alenko and nods, an acknowledgement, a silent thank you for coming with me. Alenko looks back, returns the nod.
Shepard drives the Mako back down and tells Joker they’re ready for pickup.