Author's note: Greetings, this is my first story, based on one scenario that I find interests me quite a lot. I am not too sure how it will turn out, so please review.

Disclaimer: I do not own anything from either Final Fantasy 13 or Mass effect. This is a fictional piece of writing done by a fan.

Chapter 1: Before the tragedy.

Somewhere, deep within the unforgiving Terminus Systems, were 2 uncharted worlds. These planets were completely cut off from the greater galaxy. Names like "turian hierarchy", "asari Consort", "genophage" and "Citadel Council" meant absolutely nothing to whatever lived on these worlds. In fact, to the creatures of the first world (which had the name "Gran Pulse") even words like "politician" and "scandal" meant absolutely nothing, due to the fact that they were mostly savage beasts. The second world, called Cocoon, could be found in orbit around Gran Pulse, was populated by humans and featured a big hole punched into the side by something. According to these people, the "something" was the beast Ragnarok, although to someone from another part of the galaxy, it would have to be a mystery (If said someone was one Commander Shepard, however, there would probably be a theory that maybe a Reaper was involved, possibly Sovereign, or maybe even Harbinger, as only a Reaper could possibly possess the firepower needed to puncture a planet's surface.)

The planets Gran Pulse and Cocoon would remain hidden from the wider galaxy until the crash-landing of a mysterious ship on the surface of the latter, about 6 months before a catastrophic event called "the Purge" would happen. The ship was unlike any the inhabitants of Cocoon had seen. It had almost no color to it, just a dark grey color with black areas that seemed to outline the individual pieces of the hull that had been used to construct the ship. It didn't seem to have any visible mechanism that enabled flight, and the ship itself looked disturbingly like some sort of living creature.

The ship crashed in the Felix Heights area of Palumpolum and that area was quarantined for a month by the Sanctum. Even after that, the people were afraid to go anywhere near it, save for one married couple: Bartholomew and Nora Estheim, who went there after another month. They were the first people to go to the crash site to actually study what fell from the sky. At the same time, after confirming that the quarantine was over, the passengers of that wreck decided to investigate outside. When the Estheims were right next to the wreck, what appeared to be a strange circular door started turning and then opened. The first figure to emerge was a small boy with silver hair and blue-green eyes who seemed to be intrigued by the strange environment around him, and fainted a minute after exiting his transport. The second and final figure to emerge was quite an unnerving one. A neck that seemed to be bent at an angle, an eye that shone a bright blue, hands with only 3 fingers, feet with only 3 toes, arms and legs that seemed too unnatural to possibly be real, with one arm accommodating part of a set of armor and, worst of all, was this creature's torso. It had a big hole in it and what looked like glowing tubes could be seen inside. It seemed to look at its companion, then at Bartholomew and Nora, and then it spoke. The voice sounded quite eerie as well, it completely lacked any emotion at all. "We require temporary accommodation at your place of residence. Co-operation is highly recommended!" it said. Not knowing what else to do, Bartholomew and Nora agreed to let the confusing child and the mysterious machine stay at their house, which was just bordering the crash site.

Bartholomew felt a very strong urge to alert PSICOM to these strange new presences, but who knew what they were capable of, so better to play it safe. He did demand an introduction and explanation when the 4 of them got home and the child regained consciousness. When this happened, he introduced himself as "Hope" from the human colony of Eden Prime, which confused the married couple. The only Edens they knew of was the capital city of Eden and the fal'Cie Eden, so what in Cocoon was Eden Prime? Hope himself seemed pretty confused. What was a fal'Cie? How come these people don't know about the rest of the galaxy, especially one of the most successful human colonies? He never even thought that just one inhabited Terminus Systems world could be so isolated. He wondered how humans could have even managed to colonize Cocoon if they didn't even know some of the other colonies like Eden Prime, Mindoir, and Feros, or places like the Citadel, or at very least Omega, considering the region of space. His companion also seemed confused, although you could never tell with it. The companion identified itself as "Legion, a terminal of the geth", and, when asked why they couldn't use their ship, stated that they cannot stay in the ship as the amount of food is dangerously low. Questions became even more questions as each party wanted to know something relating to the other one. "What is a fal'Cie?", "What are the geth?", "What is this Morning War?", "What is this War of Transgression?" and so on. Eventually, a bit of an understanding was reached, that went along the lines of "They are different to us, we will just have to deal with it."

Bartholomew and Nora, to try and avoid arousing suspicion, took Hope under their wing and claimed ownership of Legion until a point in time when they could repair their ship and leave Cocoon. Bartholomew had a job at the Sanctum, what appeared to be the only major form of leadership on the planet, so he could keep them off the backs of the little family they had formed. Nora could help Hope and Legion with any of the strange concepts of Cocoon. Hope got a bit of a job fixing mechanical problems in a variety of appliances, vehicles and other things to try and acquire some money with which to pay rent for him and Legion staying and at the same time use the job to acquire unwanted parts to get their ship working. Legion dealt with any problems relating to housework (although it seemed to object, saying its talents were better suited elsewhere) and actually repairing the spaceship with the spare parts Hope could bring home.

After 4 months of acquiring spare parts and the occasional research project into an alien aspect of this planet, the crashed ship was nearly completely repaired. To celebrate, Nora offered to take Hope to a city called Bodhum because it had a nice fireworks festival at this particular time of year, and witnessing such a spectacle would surely be an appropriate reward for someone that has undergone a period of such long hard work. In case anyone asked, she, Nora Estheim, was taking her son, Hope Estheim, to see the fireworks. Legion, uninterested in the concept of observing a display of colorful lights created by gunpowder explosions, remained behind with Bartholomew, and it was probably better that way, as having him in a crowd would surely create confusion at best, panic at worst.

Little would Hope know that the trip would result in epic failure until it was too late…