A/N: Hi folks. I've had this idea in my head for a while thinking why don't I do a self-insert in Mass Effect. I know what you're thinking. 'Oh god, not another one.' No….this is going to be different from the usual self-inserts. I want to make this challenging by going against conventions of writing in 1st person as most self-inserts have done in fanfiction and somehow without using a silly plot device to throw the protagonist into the Mass Effect by means of using 'Q from star trek' or a 'protean device in some cave'. The challenge of this story is to make this as realistic as humanly possible. To date, I have never seen a self-insert story use 3rd person writing which is interesting. And yes, the character in the story is going to be me J and no Wade isn't my last name.

Chapter 1.

James Wade had been sick in bed for days. His first thought was to grab some chocolate from the local store down the road, but decided against it. He had a figure to watch after all, especially now that his metabolism had begun to dwindle at the healthy age of twenty-five.

Instead, he grabbed a chilled glass of lemonade from the fridge and sat in front of a 32-inch flat screen, wondering what he should do. Connected to the TV was his ancient but trustworthy Xbox 360 which he kept for nostalgic reasons. The Xbox had fought tooth and nail to remain working for many years which had impressed James and he had vowed there and then to treat it as a love-struck car enthusiast would with his classic American car.

Shaking his head in reminiscence, James turned the aging Xbox on and decided to finish the ending and the final mission of Mass Effect 3. The young man had finished playing the first two games several days ago which he had taken to calling a ME marathon. He had been an avid gamer many years ago but like many people, he had to grow up. That was not to say he didn't play a game every now and then, but this occasion was somewhat special, particularly when the new game Mass Effect Andromeda would be out next year. The very thought of it had James salivating and eager to play the critically acclaimed title once it came out on the market, preferably on Steam.

He spent the better part of an hour playing his Vanguard-class Shepard character, fighting his way toward the Citadel where he had to make a choice. Like every other time he had played the game, he couldn't help shaking his head irritably at how the writers wrote the ending. Three choices for John Shepard to choose from, which in James' opinion wasn't much of a choice considering that all possible endings which either had the galaxy in ruin or had Shepard controlling a homicidal, bloodthirsty race of machines known as the Reapers while they in turn, controlled Shepard through indoctrination. Talk about a never ending paradox.

In the end, he decided to go with Synthesis, though the 'victory' felt hollow in his opinion and he ended up shutting off the Xbox and TV in frustration. James sorely hoped that the writers for Mass Effect Andromeda didn't pull the same stunt as they did with the ending of the third game.

Shaking his head, the young man stood up and stretched his limbs to shake the stiffness from sitting in one place for too long. He walked toward the charging station for his phone to check on his messages and sighed as he saw another text from the auto garage up the coast, reminding him that he needed to pick up the parts for his 1969 Mustang Fastback. He still felt ill but he knew that he needed to get the parts before the auto company decided to get frisky with the car parts. So grabbing his keys, James locked the house and walked to his Mustang which looked brand new, sporting a fresh coat of metallic black paint.

James smiled wistfully as he glanced at his Mustang before he jumped into the car and drove off onto the Highway with a baritone rumble from the revamped Mustang engine. It took him hours to reach the outskirts of the next city which he could only make out as a speck in the distance. The countryside looked like the typical Australian outback, with reddish arid soil clumped together with sparse trees allotting the landscape. There were no signs of civilization for miles which suited James just fine as he appreciated the scenery.

Suddenly, there was a loud clap like thunder as a fireball of what looked like a meteorite raining from the sky which broke James out of his thoughts. There was an almighty crash as the flaming object smashed into a large clearing to the left of the road that James was driving on.

"Oh…FUCK," James yelled, as he attempted bring his swerving car to a stop. With a screech of the tires, the Mustang stopped on the side of the road. James took the opportunity to see where the meteorite crashed and gasped as he saw a deep crater several hundred meters from the road. He glanced nervously at both ends of the road and found to his dismay that there were no other cars in the vicinity. It seemed there was a good chance that no one else had seen the falling object except for himself and he pondered what to do.

In the end, curiosity won out and he decided to explore the crash site. James stood out of the car and locked it before cautiously walking toward the deep crater. The crunch of gravel felt somewhat reassuring to James as he made his way through tendrils of smoke rising from the crater. When he got close enough, he could make out the shape of the object which looked oddly metallic for a meteorite.

Jame's eyes bulged and he gasped when he realized that he wasn't looking at a space rock but rather at what appeared to be a silvery-gray ship. A real alien spaceship!

"Damn…you've got to be kidding me," James whispered. He had to pinch himself to make sure he wasn't dreaming as he stared at the spaceship which looked streamlined, with an angular shape eerily familiar to the design of Asgard ship; the "O'Neill" from the Stargate show.

At first appearance, it didn't look too badly damaged but he saw the occasion sparks frizzling from exposed power conduits behind the hull of the ship. Whoever had controlled the ship had to be in bad shape from the force of the impact, judging from the size of the crater it had formed.

The young man gingerly walked toward the ship and began looking for some kind of hatch or airlock in which he could enter the ship but there didn't appear to be any kind of indentation on the hull that would indicate an entrance. Suddenly, there was a buzzing noise as some sort of blue light scanned him from head to toe. He wasn't too alarmed given that he had played enough games to know that this had to be some sort of electron microscopic/microanalysis scanning technology.

He just hoped that whatever scanning technology that the ship was using, wasn't backed up by defensive weapons if the ship thought him hostile. The buzzing ended and there was a hiss as a section of the hull opened up, allowing James to see inside the ship.

He gave a sigh of relief and gathered his courage to walk into the belly of the ship.

"One small step for man…" He muttered, grinning faintly at the thought.

With a leap, he stood in what looked like some futuristic airlock which hissed as the door closed behind him. He was now cut-off from the outside which gave him pause as he looked at the door apprehensively. It took him a minute to convince himself that if the aliens in the ship wanted to kill him, they would have already done so.

James sighed as he made his way toward the door which opened seamlessly and he saw an illuminated passage which looked pristine yet futuristic and very distinctly alien save for the occasion sparks flying from the walls. The young man wandered through the passage that brought him to an elevator and he stepped aboard the platform that began to move upwards.

He took this opportunity to gather his analytical thoughts. The fact he was still breathing suggested that the atmosphere onboard the ship was the same as Earth, which indicated a carbon-based life form with a similar chemical compound structure to humans. The airlock had been opened from the inside rather than the outside which suggested that the life form onboard the ship had allowed him to enter, possibly which indicated that the alien was peaceful and docile.

Before he could continue his observations, the elevator had slowed to a stop. The door opened and he was treated to the sight of a circular room with windows which overlooked the front of the ship outside. There were various monitors and holo….were those holographic projectors? James took this moment to fangirl and salivate over the technology that was displayed around the room. But his eyes were drawn to a figure that was lying on the floor next to what looked like the captain's chair.

Once again drawing his courage, James ambled toward the figure until he was able to make out its features. The alien looked short and skinny with clammy purple skin and behind the fluttering of its eyelids was the most beautiful set of violet eyes three times larger than a normal human, staring back at him. The most prominent feature was the pointed ears which looked elongated, on such a small being.

James suddenly had the image of a snow elf from The Elder Scrolls, cross-bred with a blood elf from the World of Warcraft wafting across his mind. Only, this alien was tiny in comparison and had four fingers instead of the usual five digits. All in all, James was absolutely floored.

He started at the gasp coming from the alien which looked injured, drawing labored breaths. The alien stared at him before muttering in an alien language which had James completely baffled.

"Amae lethalas, Garas quenathra."

"I don't understand," James replied helplessly.

"Dirth ma, harellan. Ma banal enasalin. Mar solas ena mar din." The alien said with a slur. It was obvious to James that talking was beginning to take its toll on the alien. The alien extended his hand toward James which the young man took to be some form of greeting. He matched the alien by extending his own hand, while trying to project a friendly pose.

What happened next, took James completely by surprised as the alien grabbed James' face with its hands and he was forced to stare into its violet bulbous eyes. For a second, nothing happened and then there was complete darkness as James felt himself falling until he landed squarely in a very familiar place. James glanced around, his eyes lighting up in recognition as he realized he was standing his old workspace that he used to have in the shed of his parents' house until he moved out.

"Do you understand me know?"

James whirled around at the sound of the melodious voice. He spied the same alien that he had seen moments ago now standing with him in his old workspace. Confusion was written all over his face but he replied none the less.

"Um…what is going on and why am I doing here? My parents sold this house years ago," James replied. His voice had an echo tang to it which had him pensive.

"We are in your mind young one. I had to initiate a telepathic connection since we did not understand each other's language," the alien replied with a melodious lilt to his voice.

"Um…." James blinked. The feeling that permeated his awareness was one of shock and incredibility. Everything that happened so far, felt like something out of a video game but James knew it was real.

"So this is what my mind looks like," he muttered inquisitively.

"Yes, I am called Yanwe," replied Yanwe. The alien stared around, looking curiously at the various objects hanging from the wall of the shed.

"You have an interesting mind young one," Yanwe stated.

"Um yeah, so what happens now?" James asked.

Yanwe blinked and tilted his head to the side. It was a very alien gesture which had James reminding himself that he was still conversing with an alien.

"Well, I am dying. My ship crashed on your planet as a result of an accidental overload from my time device and –"

"Whoa whoa…time out buddy. Start from the beginning," James blurted out before he realized he had interrupted an alien…a real live alien.

"Um please don't er…smite me for interrupting your lordship but you probably should explain from the beginning," he said half-meekly, half-jokingly.

Yanwe tilted his head once more and looked amused. "Very well James Wade"

James glanced sharply at Yanwe at the sound of his name and was about to ask how the alien new but it seemed Yanwe had anticipated his question.

"Peace. I know your name because I am reading your memories as we speak. Forgive me, my people value privacy very much but this is necessary since I am dying. I am judging your worth to see if you're a worthy."

"Um great…"

"From the start then. My people come from a different reality and we are at war with a very advanced aggressive foe who is relentless. Our race spanned the stars and colonized thousands of planets until one day we encountered an enemy the likes which we have never seen before. We have been at war ever since for hundreds of years, slowly loosing. We became desperate and designed an experimental time device that in theory could allow anyone to travel back and forth in time."

Yanwe paused as his face scrunched up in agony. There was a momentary flicker as the shed went out of focus, like the effects of a camera.

"We do not have much time….the time device was installed on my ship and I was to travel back in time to the events of our first contact of that enemy. My mission was to warn my race of the danger and we were to be prepared for any eventuality but something went terribly wrong. Somehow, the enemy discovered what we were doing and sent a fleet to the shipyard where my ship was. The battle over one of our last shipyards was fierce and desperate. I activated my time device, ready to travel back in time but my ship was hit by weapons fire which caused a feedback surge in the time device which ripped a hole in space and sent me to this dimension."

As Yanwe continued to explain what happened, the flickers in the shed become more pronounced and frequent. James came to the conclusion that Yanwe's telepathic connection was breaking down because he was dying.

"I'm guessing this time device was never meant to hop realities?" James asked.

"No it was not. The tear in the fabric of space caused some damage to my ship including my sub-light engines which is why I crashed landed on your planet," Yanwe replied, tilting his head to the side.

"I see. I wish that I can help but I don't know what to do and my fellow humans…" replied James, unable to finish the sentence. In the likelihood of Yanwe surviving, every government around the world would probably impound his ship and lock the alien away in some dark secret cell for study.

"You do not need to explain. I can read your mind so I know what to expect. It does not matter at this point since I am dying."

"I'm sorry," James said, his face cringing. He had a sudden thought and couldn't help voicing it out aloud.

"Um, this enemy wouldn't happen to be the Reapers?"

Yanwe tiled his head to the side and blinked. "No… ah I see from your mind, that you are talking about fictional enemies. No our enemy is actually a parasitic race known as the Zedripa'foralcus."

"Um…let's call them Zeds' shall we," James replied derisively, almost gagging at the name. Who the hell would call themselves that?

The world span out of focus and for a moment James was sure that Yanwe would lose the connection, but his fears were unfounded as the shed went back into focus.

"My time is almost up. Even if I survived it would still take me decades or even centuries to find a way back to my dimension. My people's time have come and gone I am afraid. All we can do, all I can do now…. is pass on the legacy of my race. I have read your mind and find you worthy."

"Come again?" James blinked in confusion. "Worthy for what?"

"You are worthy of inheriting all of our knowledge. The entire repository of knowledge of our race."

"That means—"

"Everything we know and have. That includes how to build ships, weapons and energy shields. As you would say, 'big space-honkin guns'," Yanwe replied, smiling with amusement.

James drew a sharp gasp as the implications of what Yanwe said sunk in. He felt sad, that for him to gain that knowledge, Yanwe had to die.

"Please do not be sad. I know you will not abuse the power and knowledge of our race and from our brief interaction, I might have shared my knowledge with you even if I survived," Yanwe said.

"I promise I won't abuse this knowledge Yanwe," James replied, feeling hollow on the inside.

"Very well…." Yanwe walked toward James and placed his four digit hand on the young man's head. For a second nothing happened, and then James began to feel the transfer of knowledge as it was absorbed into his mind. Suddenly, he understood how to build new power generators vastly more powerful than fusion reactors. He knew how to build ships, how to cure diseases and how to augment his body to superhuman levels. The knowledge continued to flow into his mind until he started to feel sharp stabbing pains.

As the knowledge flowed, so did the increasing level of pain which sequestered in various areas of his brain. James' understood why the pains were occurring after absorbing some of the medical information of Yanwe's race. It seemed that a human brain was never meant to absorb or contain that much information, especially considering how advanced the mind of Yanwe's race were.

James felt some surprise radiating off Yanwe as he was able to continue absorbing information through the pain and the transfer did not slow down. Before this day, James had an intimate knowledge and understanding of science and physics which he had put to good use in the shed building things. But the knowledge he was absorbing from Yanwe, both amazed and shocked him as some of the knowledge challenged the theories of several reputable scientists.

Suddenly, the transfer completed and the world spun as the telepathic connection finally ended. James staggered on the floor of the bridge and felt incredibly dizzy. He felt the familiar tuggings of unconsciousness pull on him and fought desperately against it.

His mind felt like a sledgehammer had hit it at full speed and wondered why he didn't welcome the embrace of sweet bliss unconsciousness to escape the pain. Then he remembered that Yanwe was on the floor of the bridge dying.

"Yanwe!"

"I go now…to my forefathers. Amun du wheven," Yanwe whispered, as the light of his eyes dimmed. The alien slumped in the throes of death.

"No…" James whispered hoarsely. He swayed back and forth until he could no longer fight back the darkness and he collapsed sideways, out cold.

James woke up with a start, then immediately regretted his rapid movement as his rampaging headache doubled in strength. He groaned, and slowly stood up though he almost keeled over when the world spun dizzily in his peripheral vision.

It took moments to clear the dizziness but when it did, James capitalized on it by glancing at his watch. From the time on his watch, he guessed he had only been unconscious for fourteen minutes but that was too long in his opinion. It wouldn't take long for the militaries in Australia to mobilize and move in to impound Yanwe's…his ship.

He had to find a way to get this ship off the ground and prevent anyone from claiming the ship. He could only think of the repercussions of anyone getting their hands on advanced technology that could unwind and destroy societies. Unbidden memories flittered in and out of Jame's mind which showed entire civilizations destroyed as Yanwe's race attempted to uplift them with advanced technology.

It seemed that the transfer not only gave him knowledge of technology but also memories of Yanwe's race, who called themselves Masodians. James sighed and walked to the various consoles with monitors arrayed in the bridge. Using the memories he had gained, he was able to navigate the ships computers and began reading various read-outs.

The prognosis however was not good as the ships sub-light engines appeared to be completely shot judging from the sensors. The ship was running on auxiliary power as the main power seemed to be offline.

James ran through his options and shook his head in frustration. He couldn't get the ship off the ground and he couldn't use the ships cloak that would have otherwise made his ship completely invisible as the auxiliary power didn't have enough power to supply it. Not that it would do any good considering the large crater on the ground formed from the impact of the ship which would render the cloak useless.

Got to get this ship off the ground…There's got to be a way. James contemplated desperately. He cracked his knuckles in thought and glanced to Yanwe's body.

Maybe I can…no don't have enough power….but if I got the main power online then maybe…

With a sudden brainwave, he ran to the elevator and activated the display panel on the wall. Using the panel, he ordered the lift to the engineering level of the ship. The ride down was mercifully short, and James ambled out of the elevator and toward the engineering room where the main power generator was stationed.

The room was loitered with the occasional sparks flying from panels and the flickering of lights overhead but James ignored all that and strode toward the central control panel that regulated the Ion Neutrino Generator. As he read from the ships logs, it appeared that the generator had initiated an automatic shutdown from the overload as the ship entered the tear in the fabric of space.

It took him a few moments to re-initialize the generator for which he was immensely grateful it hadn't been damaged in the crash. His next step was to check that the power conduits running from the generator to the time device were still feeding power unhindered. The panel chirped a confirmation and James felt elated, knowing that his plan could work.

"Alright its go time," James hollered. The young man re-entered the elevator and headed toward the bridge.

As the door opened to the bridge, James heard alarms beeping from the tactical station and he ran toward it, the feeling of dread creeping upward. He glanced at the display which was showing him several rotary crafts heading toward the ship. The military had obviously sent helicopters jam-packed with troops to discover what was going, though they were still at least sixteen miles away.

With a sigh, James headed toward the engineering station and began drawing power away from non-essential systems and toward the time device. If everything went according to plan, he should travel back in time one year, at midnight to avoid unwanted attention and find a way to tow the ship into some warehouse or something. He wasn't sure how he was going to move the ship but he would cross that bridge in the future….in the past.

The alarms from the tactical station started beeping again which James knew to mean that his time was up. He needed to activate the time device now.

"Come on…come on," he muttered.

Suddenly, the panels chirped and James pumped his fist in success. He was really starting to like the sound of that chirp. He walked toward the captain's seat and sat down, though not without a parting glance at Yanwe's form on the floor.

"Alright, here we go," he muttered, jabbing at the panel on the armrest of his chair. Suddenly there was a surge which caused sparks to fly and James ducked his head under his arm protectively.

He glanced at the display and did a double take. The readings showed that the time device had taken damage from the surge that caused it to enter this dimension which the sensors hadn't registered earlier.

Cursing repeatedly, James stood up and ran to the science station. He didn't stop cursing as he tried to fix the time device from the science panels. Before he could finish, the ship was surrounded by an unstable vortex that enveloped the ship. James had only a second to admire the vortex until there was a major tremor throughout the ship that jerked him off the floor.

As quickly as it began, the vortex faded and there was absolute silence save for the occasion sparks from panels. James moaned groggily, feeling like he had gone through the wringer and came out the other side looking like paste. The young man looked around the bridge, noticing that some of the monitors and holographic projectors had fizzled out giving the room a dim look.

The dark…wait, James pondered. He turned to stare out of the windows of the bridge and yelped in surprise as he saw a beautiful, mesmerizing sight before him. Space in its infinite glory, displaying twinkling stars that filtered through the windows. He could only gape in wonder at the sight before realizing that he must be the first human in the 21st Century to be in space….on an alien space ship.

"Wait…I'm in space!" James whispered in confusion. "How is that possible?"

His scientific mind backed by the knowledge of the Masodians allowed him to think of lightning fast scenarios and explanations for how he ended up in space. In moments he had drawn the conclusion that if the ship had travelled far enough in time, there would have been a stellar drift which meant that Earth was no longer in that original position he had left from.

Then the implications hit him like a freight train. He tapped away on the panels with urgency and asked the ship's computer to calculate how far in time he had travelled. The computer gave a chirp as it spat out data, and James balked at the results. According to the data, it seemed he had travelled 159 years…into the future.

James could feel his mind becoming slush from the shock but he knew he needed to get a grip on himself long enough to ensure that there was no danger to his ship. If he had travelled 159 years into the future, there was a good chance that Humanity had uplifted itself and travelled amongst the stars. For all he knew, there could be a fleet of human ships on their way toward his ship right now if he was still within the solar system.

With that in mind, he went over to the science station and set a scan of the solar system. His suspicions were confirmed a moment later as the data recorded dozens of ships travelling back and forth from Earth to what looked like a superstructure near Pluto. Suddenly, there was a beep from the console and James stared at the monitor which showed a group of ships breaking off from the main body and veering toward his ship.

"Oh shit," James muttered. "Ok…let's see, main power is still online and pumping power so that means I can use the cloak."

He didn't hesitate to activate the cloak which fizzled before enveloping his ship, turning it invisible to all visible spectrum wavelengths as well as hiding his ship's emissions of energy from sensors.

James gave a sigh of relief. He rubbed the bridge of his nose in exhaustion and stumbled back into the captain's…his chair. He needed information of the timeline he was in before capitalizing on the advantages of being in the future, namely getting replacement parts to repair the ship which wouldn't have been possible in 2016.

He briefly wondered how he even ended up in the future before a fleeting glance from the display showed him why. It seemed that the time device had been badly damaged and the sensors hadn't detected it. It had malfunctioned, causing him to be flung into the future rather than back in time. Unfortunately, the second trip had completely burnt out the device and James had a feeling that he wasn't going to be able to fix it, even with the knowledge of the Masodians in his head.

The human ships moving toward his position slowed until they were floating in a loose formation, scanning the space around James' ship. He held his breath, silently hoping that the human ships were not advanced enough to detect his ship under the cloak however his worries were for naught.

"Damn those ships look familiar…alrighty time to get some information," James muttered. He had the advanced computers hack into one of the human ships with alarming ease. He wondered at the strange lax in cyber security but shrugged as he continued rifling through the database on the human ship.

The words, mass effect….systems alliance…first contact war…biotics….turians…asari…salarians,all stood out as James stared agape at the mountain of information that should not have existed in reality.

"This is impossible…this has to be. No fucking way," James whispered, looking completely stunned.

And yet, the offending monitor was showing him mountains of information that couldn't possibly be faked by an internet troll let alone a professional con artist. According to the data, he seemed to have landed in the year 2175 CE in the Mass Effect universe, eight years before the events the first game.

There was something nagging at the back of James' mind, like he had forgotten something. Moments later, his eyes were wide open in comprehension.

"My baby…my beautiful car," he moaned.

End Chapter