Chapter 38: Fragments of the Future
The dreams began three days after the Collector raid, and they were wrong.
I stood in the Council Chambers watching Shepard—except it wasn't Shepard, it was someone else entirely, a woman I'd never seen who spoke with authority about Reaper threats while the Council dismissed her concerns. The dream fragmented, shifting to Eden Prime where Saren arrived too early, or too late, or not at all.
"This isn't how it happened. This isn't how it's supposed to happen."
I woke gasping, my enhanced physiology struggling to process memories that no longer matched reality. The System displayed concerning data that made my blood run cold:
[TIMELINE COHERENCE: 81.2% → 76.4%]
[USER PRECOGNITIVE KNOWLEDGE RELIABILITY: 68% (↓ FROM 94%)]
[WARNING: CONTINUED DEVIATIONS REDUCING PREDICTION ACCURACY]
[ANALYSIS: USER TIMELINE CHANGES CAUSING CASCADE EFFECTS]
My perfect recall of Mass Effect's story was fragmenting like glass under pressure. I remembered Shepard's journey but couldn't place when events happened. Character arcs blurred with the changed versions I'd actually met. Entire plotlines shifted or vanished entirely.
"My greatest advantage is disappearing. Every change I make reduces my ability to predict what comes next."
The panic hit me during breakfast, a crushing realization that the knowledge I'd relied on—my understanding of who lived, who died, which choices mattered—was becoming increasingly unreliable. I couldn't remember if Saren was supposed to attack Eden Prime before or after the events I'd already changed.
Was Shepard even going to become a Spectre on schedule? Did my early interactions with Garrus and Tali alter their paths enough to derail the canonical timeline completely?
"I'm flying blind now. Everything I thought I knew is becoming useless."
Miranda found me hunched over data tablets, frantically trying to record everything I could still remember before it faded further.
"You're having precognitive degradation," she observed with clinical accuracy. "Your ability to predict future events is breaking down as those events change in response to your actions."
"I need to write it all down," I said desperately. "Every detail I can still remember. Character profiles, event timelines, critical decision points. Before I lose it all."
"If I can't rely on game knowledge, how do I navigate what's coming? How do I make the right choices without knowing their consequences?"
The uncertainty was paralyzing. For months, I'd operated with the confidence of someone who knew the script, who could anticipate threats and opportunities. Now I felt like I was stumbling through darkness, my most reliable tool becoming increasingly useless.
I sought out the Patriarch that evening, finding him in his usual corner of Afterlife where he observed Omega's chaos with ancient eyes that had seen too much.
"Boy looks troubled," he rumbled as I approached. "Future-sight failing, yes?"
"He knows. Of course he knows. The Patriarch sees patterns that others miss."
"How did you—"
"Three like you I have watched over my centuries," he interrupted. "All knew 'the pattern' of what comes. Two went mad trying to preserve it exactly, fighting changes like swimmer fights current. One accepted that knowledge creates change, and change creates new knowledge."
His ancient eyes fixed on mine with disturbing intensity. "She saved millions before dying. Which will you be?"
"There were others. Other transmigrants, or people with foreknowledge. And most of them failed."
"I'm terrified," I admitted. "My knowledge was my advantage. Without it, how do I make the right choices?"
The Patriarch's laugh was like grinding stone. "Wrong question, young seer. Right question is: what truths remain constant regardless of timeline?"
I thought about it, sorting through fragmenting memories for core principles that transcended specific events.
"Reapers are coming. Collectors serve them. The cycles must be broken."
"Good. More?"
"Key people matter—Shepard, Garrus, Tali, others. They become important regardless of how their paths change."
"Better. And?"
"The fundamental truth. The reason I'm fighting at all."
"People are worth saving. Individual lives matter more than cosmic patterns."
The Patriarch nodded approvingly. "Now you understand. Your gift was never knowing the future—it was choosing to act despite knowing the cost. That hasn't changed. Knowledge was crutch, not foundation. Time to walk without it."
[CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT: ACCEPTING ROLE AS TIMELINE DISRUPTOR]
[TIMELINE MANAGEMENT SKILL: MAJOR GROWTH OPPORTUNITY]
[NEW PERSPECTIVE: ADAPTIVE STRATEGY OVER RIGID PREDICTION]
I returned to our quarters with a different mindset, gathering Miranda and Dr. Solveli for a planning session that focused on flexibility rather than prediction.
"I'm going to stop trying to remember exact game events," I announced. "Instead, we're building contingency plans for multiple timeline variations."
Miranda activated her tactical display, ready to help create strategic frameworks that didn't depend on prescience.
"If Shepard becomes a Spectre late, we do this," I continued, outlining responses to various scenarios. "If Saren attacks differently, we do that. If the Collectors accelerate further, we adapt accordingly."
"Strategic flexibility instead of rigid prediction. Prepare for multiple possibilities rather than betting everything on one specific future."
It felt liberating and terrifying simultaneously. For the first time since transmigrating, I was accepting that I couldn't control the timeline—only respond to it as it unfolded.
[NEW SKILL DEVELOPMENT: ADAPTIVE STRATEGY (NOVICE 24%)]
[TIMELINE MANAGEMENT: PHILOSOPHY SHIFT DETECTED]
[USER ACCEPTING UNCERTAINTY AS OPERATIONAL PARAMETER]
[SYSTEM ASSESSMENT: EVOLUTION FROM PRESCIENT TO ADAPTIVE]
That night, I gathered my most detailed notes—pages of character analysis, event timelines, critical decision trees that assumed the canonical timeline would proceed as scripted. I looked at the accumulated weight of my game knowledge, then methodically fed the pages into our apartment's recycling unit.
Miranda watched the symbolic act with understanding rather than concern.
"You're sure about this?"
"The timeline I knew, everyone loses," I said, watching years of obsessive documentation disappear. "Maybe the timeline I'm creating has a better ending. I'll never know unless I stop trying to restore what was and start building what could be."
I kept the general information—Reaper invasion schedules, character backgrounds, major threat assessments. But I released my grip on knowing exactly how everything "should" happen, accepting that my presence had already made such knowledge obsolete.
[TIMELINE COHERENCE: 76.4% (MAJOR DIVERGENCE ONGOING)]
[USER ADAPTATION: SUCCESSFUL TRANSITION TO UNCERTAINTY MANAGEMENT]
[RECOMMENDATION: CONTINUE EVOLUTION - ADAPTIVE STRATEGY SUPERIOR TO RIGID PREDICTION]
[SYSTEM PHILOSOPHICAL NOTE: CHANGE IS THE ONLY CONSTANT. EMBRACE CHAOS.]
The System's final comment made me smile despite the weight of approaching uncertainty. Even my artificial intelligence was learning to accept that some things couldn't be controlled, only navigated.
Outside our window, Omega continued its eternal dance around the dying star that gave it light. The station's inhabitants lived their lives without knowing the future, making choices based on immediate circumstances and long-term hopes rather than prophetic certainty.
"Maybe that's what I've been missing. Maybe the strength to face uncertainty is more valuable than the knowledge to avoid it."
Tomorrow would bring new challenges, new choices, new opportunities to prove that adaptation was stronger than prediction. I couldn't know what was coming, but I could prepare to meet it with allies who trusted me, power sufficient to matter, and the wisdom to accept that the future was unwritten.
The fragments of my game knowledge were fading, but something stronger was taking their place—the understanding that creating a better timeline mattered more than preserving the original one.
The real war was still coming. But now I was ready to face it without a script, guided by principles rather than prescience.
And somehow, that felt like the greatest victory of all.
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