Excellent story! Can't wait to move onto #2!

In regards to your note, you're right: you don't need to justify a thing. This chapter is beautifully written and emotionally charged with a quality I don't see very often. And this is your storyyou make the choices here. Bioware isn't going to step in a smack you over the head. That's what I always loved about the Mass Effect games; Shepard is who you want him to be. And that is uniquely yours.

For something that didn't happen in the games to draw from, the end of this chapter is fantastic. I'm loving the connections being drawn and the emotion that is injected into these original scenes. Stellar stuff!

Reading this now in 2020, I can't help but think about the recent manned SpaceX launch in the US (where I live) and what this means to reinvigorating that spacefaring feeling. I hope to see us as a world take a more ambitious look at the stars and bodies beyond our planetthere's too much out there to discover to not take action!

Appreciate the bits of love for Ashley. Yeah, she's space hitler at first, but it's easy to miss (or forget) the moments where she grows as a person.

Now I'm worried for Virmire though...

Excellent use of the World War Z tactic (love that book). If only your actual in-game squad mates could pull that off... would've saved me a lot of Medi-gel

Fantastic job! I always found writing "fight a big thing" difficult, but this kept the tension high. Thoroughly enjoyed forgetting to breathe as I read it!

So good

Kind of stopped reading Mass Effect for a while but with the possibility of a remastered coming out I figured I’d get back in and read a couple of my favorites

loved it, quite a fresh perspective. thank you

Myyyy goood this two... honestly rrrghhhh

i love the slow build of their relationship

I love this story so much, i read quite few fanfic of mass effect, you managed to introduce new points of view and interesting things. thank you

Why do writers always think "they had no idea what they were dealing with" is an indictment? Experimentation and study is how you learn. "I have no idea what that is, I shouldn't touch it" is how you promote ignorance and stupidity.

That's not a missile launcher. It's a cannon. It fires a metal slug a meter and a half wide. Why does everyone keep calling it a missile launcher?