#lazarus rerising

[m3l3fic3nt]

“Were they lovers?”

Worse.

She was the gravity that held them both together.

And when she fell, they unraveled beneath the weight of surviving her.

[m3l3fic3nt]

Lazarus ReRising

When Shepard wakes after the Crucible, she’s a shadow of the Commander who saved the galaxy. Her body is broken. Her past is blurred. The people who love her most are strangers to her heart.

But Garrus and Kaidan have never been the type to give up, and neither has the Normandy crew that once followed her into hell. As the galaxy rebuilds, so too does something softer: trust, belonging, and the quiet possibility of love reborn.

“Lazarus ReRising” is about more than Shepard’s survival—it’s about what she chooses to do with the life she never expected to have.

//

Hi there! This is my fanfic “Lazarus ReRising,” set after the destroy ending of Mass Effect 3. Shepard survives the Crucible but wakes up broken and with no memory of her past or the people who love her most.

This story is for those who hold tight to characters long after the final mission ends; for anyone who’s curious about what comes after victory and loss, when healing isn’t straightforward, and love doesn’t follow a straight line.

I’m sharing it here while I wait for my AO3 invite to be accepted—so stay tuned for updates!

~✦M

[m3l3fic3nt]

Lazarus ReRising

Prologue — Priority: Earth

London was a fractured monument beneath a heavy sky, its once-familiar silhouette torn apart by war. The city lay in ruins, skyscrapers shattered into jagged shards of glass and steel, their frames twisted by Reaper artillery. Pockets of smoldering fires cast flickering orange glows across collapsed streets, where chunks of concrete and debris littered the ground like fallen relics. The air was thick with the acrid tang of burnt synthetics and ozone, the fallout of relentless electromagnetic pulses cracking atmosphere and metal alike.

This was the end.

Commander Iris Shepard moved like gravity itself pulled harder with every step. Her N7 armor cracked at the shoulder, her face bruised and cut, grime trailing down her jaw. Every breath was pulled through pain, every step pressed into the fractured concrete like she was leaving the last of her weight behind.

Ahead, the Conduit shimmered, a piercing beam flaring through the wreckage, tugging at her like fate itself.

Behind her came the sound of boots dragging.

Behind her, two figures refused to fall back.

Garrus Vakarian limped, half-dragging one leg, blue blood dripping from a cracked thigh plate. Kaidan Alenko kept pace, jaw tight, his biotic field sputtering erratically from exhaustion. Neither looked ready to keep fighting. Neither had any intention of stopping.

Shepard activated her comm.

"Alliance Medevac, this is Commander Shepard. Coordinates confirmed. Immediate extraction: Vakarian and Alenko. Direct order. Priority one."

Kaidan’s voice cut across the open air. "Negative on that evac!  We’re not leaving."

The medevac’s shriek howled over their heads, engines venting smoke, descending fast.

"You don’t get to make that call," Kaidan snapped, his voice taut and cold. "You said we finish this together!"

She turned to face them. Her expression didn’t waver.

"You’re wounded. You’ve done your part."

"That’s not your decision," Garrus snarled. "We’re not—YOU’RE not doing this alone, Shepard!"

The medevac thudded onto the cracked street behind them. The ramp dropped, metal groaning under its own weight.

Her voice was ice.

"This is not up for debate."

Kaidan stepped forward, shoulders squared. "I’m not leaving you again."

Shepard’s hand went to his chest, not soft, not gentle, but firm. Holding him back. "You are. That’s an order, Alenko."

Medics approached, shouting over the storm of wind and engines. Garrus pushed one off, claws curled, talons twitching as if he could claw his way back to her side.

"Iris," he said,  voice shredded. "Don’t do this!"

She looked at him, just for a second.

And then to Kaidan.

"I love you."

The words fell between them, quiet but unbreakable, a tether in the chaos.

Neither man moved. Neither knew who the confession was meant for, and yet both felt its weight.

The medics seized their moment, hauling them both aboard. The ramp hissed shut behind them.

-----------------------------------------------------

A wave of ancient synthetic energy burst from the Crucible, sweeping across the battlefield in a blinding surge. Reapers shattered into nothingness, their colossal forms undone in an instant. Geth froze mid-stride as neural links snapped, leaving hollow shells in eerie silence. EDI’s AI matrix fractured, her consciousness snuffed out in the surge

The blast hit everything.

Systems across the fleet buckled. Shields failed. Engines died choking. Weapon arrays spun into error before going dark. The purge was clean, devastating. It spared no tech—everything synthetic fractured, everything dependent trembled.

In orbit, starships shook. Consoles sparked, processors glitched in looping panic, and power cycled unpredictably. The Normandy groaned as critical systems failed in bursts of static. Omni-tools flared and shorted out. Cybernetic implants hissed. Biotic fields snapped, their energy fracturing like broken glass.

Below, Earth burned beneath a bruised sky. Ash rained in slow spirals. The air reeked of scorched metal and molten circuits. Fires danced through skeletal ruins, their glow warped by pools of coolant and cracked fusion cores. Wind swept through the broken streets, carrying sparks and silence in equal measure.

-----------------------------------------------------

Above, the Normandy hung battered but unyielding, a sentinel orbiting a broken world. Its hull bore scorch marks and impact scars from the Crucible’s backlash, panels sparking faintly under the strain. Power flickered along conduits and control panels, each electronic beep a reminder of how close they had come to annihilation.

Joker’s hands were white-knuckled around the controls, jaw locked, face drawn into something neither grief nor panic, but the stunned middle ground between. EDI’s console beside him was dead, cold, and silent. Her absence hung in the cockpit like a body not yet removed.

The Reapers were gone.

So was she.

-----------------------------------------------------

Below deck, the medbay was heavy with silence, thick and unyielding like a shroud. The flickering lights cast unsteady shadows that crawled across walls stained with smoke and scarred by static burns. Machines pulsed weakly, caught in broken rhythms, while the vents struggled in vain against the copper-scented air, dense with blood and sorrow.

The floor bore witness in dark stains, crimson merging with cobalt, tracing the desperate path where Kaidan and Garrus had been dragged.

Kaidan sat curled on a cot, ribs wrapped and aching, his fingers twitching like they wanted to fight a war that was already lost. Garrus leaned back against the bulkhead, armor cracked and jagged, claws flexing with the same restless energy that could not find release.

Neither spoke.

Not yet.

Because what could they say?

Because the end came without relief or closure.

Because Shepard was somewhere below, caught in the ruins of a choice no one could undo.

[m3l3fic3nt]

WIP Snippet – CHAPTER 3: Fracture Point Mass Effect | Post-Crucible | Kaidan + Garrus | Sad Space Bros

Slowly, Kaidan shifted his gaze, and their eyes met. In that look, he saw the truth he had long feared but never fully allowed himself to face. Garrus loved her—just as fiercely, just as recklessly, just as agonizingly as he did. Not the commander. Not the savior of the galaxy. But the woman who had claimed their hearts and shattered them both.

I wrote a sad scene and now I’m sad.