The final conflict has been resolved. Commander Shepard is victorious, and the galaxy is saved. It is a moment of great triumph that is over all too quickly. And then it all starts over from the beginning.
By some unknown phenomena, be it the crossing of cosmic strings creating a loop of space-time, her mind being trapped in a limited simulation, or the whim of some higher being, Commander Shepard has been living the last three years of her life over, and over, and over again. Sometimes the exact variables, like exactly how far she gets before looping back, and exactly when it is she returns to, but she has never gotten farther than the firing of the Crucible, and has never gone further back than the the Normandy’s shakedown run. The exact events of a loop sometimes slightly differ, even changing drastically based on Shepard’s choices, but never seem to change beyond a certain set of variables. Despite having gone through it countless times, the loop continues: no matter what choices she makes, no matter how evil or benevolent she is, it has always reset. Naturally, this would be enough to drive anyone mad, but Shepard has managed to cling tight (or maybe, only barely hang onto) her sanity (ignoring the occasional slight lapses into utter lunacy), though admittedly not through the most healthy of coping mechanisms…
Every time she reaches the end of the loop, she arrives back at one of three ‘beginnings’: the shakedown run of the Normandy, the destruction of the SR-1 and her death at the hands of the Collectors, or the arrival of the Reapers in the Sol system. She always comes back with all her memories, skills, and usually even some amount of the equipment and resources she’s accumulated through multiple loops. Despite have spent many decades, perhaps even centuries in these loops, she begins each loop at the exact age she was when the loop began. This didn’t mean there were no physical holdovers, however. Ant scars she gained that went unhealed by the end of a loop were still etched into her flesh, at the beginning of the next one. Her hair grew, and would never shorten unless cut. Her muscles may have been small and lean at the beginning of a loop, but if she spent her time exercising, she would begin the next with the rippling muscles she had gained, and similarly if she skipped the gym but not her meals, the pounds she put on would not magically be shed.
Which brings us back to those aforementioned unhealthy coping mechanisms. For the last several loops, what care Shepard had once possessed had… slipped. Resigned to this fate, she reasoned that is she was stuck on this ever looping roller coaster, she may as well throw her arms up and enjoy the ride. A bit of hedonism slipped in to her usual routines, after all, what other purpose can be found in a repeating existence, where there is no change but the sensations you experience? This has expectedly had an effect on the Commander’s figure. An effect that only compounds on itself with each loop. Fortunately, her equipment has changed to fit her at the start of each loop, and nobody remembers her ever being any different, as history changes to conform around any changes between loops.
And another loop comes to an end with Shepard shooting at the Catalyst, she closes her eyes to mentally prepare herself for starting all over again…
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