A/N: This story is 217k so far, and 57 chapters. It's posted in its entirety (though it's still being updated) on AO3 as Another Piece of the Puzzle (That Doesn't Fit), under the name AkuChibi. I've finally decided to bring it here simply because I'm fond of it.
This is a story about a troubled main character (Tris) who suffers from an abusive family and goes through the ups and downs associated with coming to terms with that. There's a lot of humor because that's Tris's coping mechanism. When originally starting this story I wanted it to be more humorous but halfway through it started getting dark, according to readers, so I'm warning you now about possible future triggers. If you're easily triggered, maybe stop around chapter 23? That's about when the story starts getting a little more depressing, but Tris still has his sense of humor, so, you know, it's whatever.
Tris also calls people 'whores'. Why? Because that's my go-to insult. Someone stole my kill in a game? You whore. Someone cuts me off in traffic? Fucking whore. Boyfriend tickles me? Whore.
This story asks the question: What do you do when you're forced 600 years into the future, into a new galaxy you never asked to see, and the people who did this to you are the only family you have left? How do you cope with that?
Story contains a lot of angst, humor, romance (eventually), and potentially suicidal thoughts. If you're easily triggered - again, this isn't the story for you. That stuff comes later, but it's there, hidden in the text. Tris is a fundamentally broken character struggling to come to terms with the ruins of his life, and the fact his family is abusive, even if the pain isn't physical. I've been told it's taken people to very dark places in their own minds, and felt I should warn you here and now, before you start the story.
You're also going to want to know the basics of the universe; I try to make it so you don't have to know everything about Mass Effect, but you do need to know biotics are a thing, there are various alien races, they're in a new galaxy, there are vaults, etc. I try to explain things but not make it boring for people who do know what's going on.
THIS IS A SLASH M/M STORY, eventually. There's also hints of a past M/M relationship. If that's not your glass of pineapple juice, return to the fridge and try again. No hate, because I warned you.
If you're still willing to read this - ENJOY. Reviews are absolute love and help me improve as a writer and keep me wanting to update. If you read, review :)
Chapter length: 3137
Begin!
CHAPTER ONE: Sir Not Appearing in this Film
When Tris opens his eyes to an icy darkness, his first thought isn't shit or fuck or where am I. No, his first thought is: I'm going to fucking kill them.
The pod chamber opens and light seeps in as icy air flits out. He sits up already scowling, looking around for familiar faces, but all he sees are people in white and blue – nurses, technicians, not the people he's looking for. He shoves away hands trying to help (but steals the coffee pushed at him, because coffee is life and fuck, how long has it been since he had the sweet liquid?) and makes his way across the room, toward the exit, on shaky legs.
I'm gonna fucking kill them, he thinks again, as his legs threaten to give way and send him falling to his ass. He uses the wall for support, gritting his teeth against the wave of nausea slamming into him. Kill them. Slowly, painfully. They will regret making me a popsicle with them.
He has, officially, never been on the Ark Hyperion before. Officially, he's never wandered the halls, he's never tagged along with his father, and he's never met his father's friends. Officially, he should be completely and utterly lost right now. Unofficially, he's read the ship's blueprints, snuck in here at night just to see if he could, and he knows the general direction he needs to go if he wants to kill certain people.
"Mr. Ryder! Please! You're not ready to move yet," a voice shouts behind him, footsteps chasing him. "Scans show you have a mild concussion."
Oh, those assholes. Those whores. I'll kill them. They knocked him over the head then threw him in cryo, probably before he even hit the ground.
"It's a miracle you woke at all," the man behind him continues. "Mr. Ryder, stop! We need to run tests and make sure you're okay!"
"I'm fine," he snaps, glaring at the man over his shoulder. He moves quickly for such a short thing, huffing as he chases Tris down with his omni-tool ready to start scanning as soon as he's within range and Tris stands still. Poor man. He has no intention of slowing down or standing still. Not until he kills a certain someone.
"Mr. Ryder!"
"That's not my fucking name," Tris growls, quickening his pace through the halls of the Ark Hyperion.
There. That door. It has to lead to the bridge, and that's where his father will be, and probably his sister, too. No way would he be woken up if they weren't already mobile.
The door swooshes open and he stomps inside.
Alec Ryder is speaking to a young woman with dark hair – Captain Dunn, if his memory serves correctly, and it usually does.
"You," Tris says through gritted teeth, causing Alec Ryder to turn from the woman and focus on him instead. Tris marches right up to him. "How dare you."
And then he punches his father in the face.
He's promptly tackled to the ground, by… others. He's not sure who they are. But wow, they blend into the shadows. Or maybe he's just a little foggy from that fucking concussion. And the fact he just woke from cryo.
There are suddenly feet in front of his face as he's pinned to the floor. He follows those legs up to find his sister smirking down at him.
"Hello, little brother."
Erin Ryder never let him live down the fact he was born only a minute behind her. He was always 'little brother', and she'd even go so far as to say 'when I was your age' and give him a lecture. He'd laugh and snap back, 'what, a fucking minute ago?'
They were the best of the worst times, he thinks. Before all the chaos. Before all the lies and the shouts and the slap which echoed for days. Before-
"Go to hell," he snaps, struggling mildly. He would like to get up, but honestly, he's not going to waste all his energy fighting these people. He's just testing their strength.
"Only if you come with me."
"I'm here, aren't I?" he drawls, glaring at her. "Except I don't recall agreeing to come on your little trip. I'm pretty sure I said 'have fun in the future'. Yet here I am."
"We couldn't just leave you behind," his sister says, dismissively. "Now, are you going to behave or do I need to throw you back into cryo?"
He sneers up at her. "Do it. At least then I won't have to look at your stupid face."
They glare at each other for a long time.
Alec Ryder clears his throat. "Alright, you two, that's enough."
"Pathfinder, what is going on?" the woman from earlier, Captain Dunn, asks, confused.
The graying-haired man sighs. "This is my son, Tristen. He had a mild concussion prior to entering cryo; he's probably a little uneasy right now, and clearly foggy if he's picking fights like this. I assure you, I taught him better than that."
Tris bristles, growling under his breath.
"Let him up," Alec says. "He won't hurt me."
"He's already assaulted you," one of the people pinning him say.
"He's just filled with adrenaline after being asleep for so long. I'm sure we all felt it."
Alec Ryder is a man manipulation, however you sugar-coat it. He always gets what he wants, even when he doesn't. He is a man of few words, but those words he does say… he uses them to twist everything to his favor, to make you the bad guy, and Tris is so sick of it.
They let him up, because of course they listen to the almighty Pathfinder, and Tris pushes to his feet, glaring at his father as he smooths out his rumpled shirt.
"Put me back in cryo," he says, looking from Erin to Alec and back again, "and shoot me back the other way."
"It would take another 600 years," Erin says, quirking a brow. "You aren't the patient type."
"So it'll be 600 more years," he says, shrugging. "At least I won't be here."
"Sorry, Tristen." Erin shrugs back, shaking her head. "This was a one-way trip."
Tris growls. "I didn't agree to any of this."
"Well, you're here now," his father says.
"Suck it up, buttercup," Erin grins.
He grits his teeth, and fights the urge to punch both of them in their smug faces. Instead, he spins o his heel and stomps out of the room.
xXx
He doesn't look like a 600 year old popsicle. But he feels like one. Everything aches, he's freezing, and there's not enough fucking coffee on this stupid fucking ship.
He glares at his reflection in the mirror, splashing warm water on his face to attempt wake him up and warm him enough for him to function properly. His teeth are still chattering. Maybe that's shock, though. He is 600 years in the future, and he never planned to be.
Everyone's dead, he thinks.
Everyone he knew back there, in the Milky Way – everyone he cared about. They're all dead. They died centuries ago while he slept in cryo on a long voyage to who the fuck cares. The Andromeda Initiative was a fresh start for Alec and Erin – but not for him. He had a shitty life back home but it was his, and there were people he cared about, and now they're all dead and the life he knew is gone and someone else is probably riding his fucking bike around and – it's 600 years into the future. His bike is scrap.
Everything is scrap.
"You are in shock," SAM says.
He wants to punch something every time he hears that stupid AI. His father's baby. As it is, he laughs. "Yeah, no shit."
"Perhaps you should lie down. I will contact Dr. Carlyle, and-"
"No," Tris says, scowling. "I don't need a doctor. I'm fine."
He doesn't need any help. He's done just fine on his own, thank you very much. And the second he accepts help from an AI is the second he breaks down, and he will not give his family the satisfaction of witnessing that.
There is an image, in his head – of simpler times. Of a young girl with sunlit blonde hair, and a young boy with dirty blond hair, and laughter for days. Of a mother smiling warmly. Of a father with a hand on the boy's shoulder, squeezing comfortably.
He blinks, and the image shatters. All he can see is the rage in his father's face, the young girl turned into a young woman the spitting image of her father, of pain and rainy days for years. All he can hear are the words no one should have said, the shouts like thunder crackling violently, and a single handprint across his face from a slap heard for days.
He exhales shakily, his reflection blurring. He blinks back the burning wetness of betrayal, and splashes more water on his face.
"SAM," he says, ashamed of how weak his voice sounds. He clears his throat. "Tell me where I'll find the coffee."
"That will be in the kitchen, on your left. If I may, I have some questions."
Of course you do. He sighs. "Alright – hit me."
"I assume you mean to ask my question. Very well. You are Alec Ryder's son, yet I have no record of you. I find that… odd."
"It's not that odd, really," Tris says, shrugging as he makes his way toward the kitchen. "Alec Ryder had two kids – fraternal twins, myself and Erin. We're nothing alike. You might even say we can't stand each other. Alec loves Erin. I think he hates me."
"You are his child," SAM says. "He does not hate you."
"If he doesn't hate me, then why are you just now learning about me?" Tris asks, finally locating the kitchen. It's massive. He hurries toward the left hand side of the room and starts rifling through cabinets, but there are a lot of them. "Fuck me. SAM, which cabinet?"
"Unknown," SAM replies. "Why are there no records of you in any of my databases or files?"
"What can I say, I'm just that good," Tris mutters, opening another cabinet. He grins when he sees the coffee beans, carefully pushed to the back and partially behind a box of Blast-Os. "Fuck yeah. Jackpot." He pulls out the Blast-Os and the coffee beans, spinning to look for the coffee maker. He finds it across the room, and in need of cleaning.
"Why would your files not be located anywhere, and why would your father not tell me he had another child?" Is it just him, or does SAM seem… confused?
He shrugs, rinsing out the pot. "I don't know, SAM. You'd know him better than me."
"… Alec has memory blocks in place," the AI tells him, almost hesitantly like that's private information. It probably is.
Juicy secrets on dear old Dad. "Oh? So even though you're in his head, you can't see everything?"
"That is accurate."
"Sorry. That must be weird for you."
"Are you one of his memory blocks?"
Tris exhales slowly, looking down at the countertop for one moment. "I guess." He knew he and his father didn't get along, but for Alec to go so far as to put in memory blocks regarding him… well. It shouldn't sting at this point. "We've never been fond of each other."
"And yet you are here, apparently unwillingly."
"Yeah… my family isn't exactly the gentle sort. And they don't really take no for an answer."
"You said they. Does that exclude yourself?"
"You ask a lot of questions," Tris says, scowling, watching the coffee brew. "You know that?"
"I apologize if my line of questioning is making you uneasy. That was not my intention."
He sighs, exhaling loudly through his nose. "It's fine. Just… let me get some coffee in me."
Footsteps echo behind him. His first, initial reaction is to hunker against the wall, make himself a small target, and then attack when the person passes him. He shoves those thoughts away, though, because this is an exploration ship in a new galaxy, and these people aren't here to hurt him.
Unless they're his family. Then all bets are off.
"Oh, good," the guy entering behind him chimes, "someone's already making coffee. I'm still shivering from cryo."
Tris nods, keeping his gaze focused on the coffee maker. It's almost ready, thankfully.
"Not the chatty type, I take it?" the person asks, stopping next to him. Tris briefly glances over and smiles at the dark-skinned man with the afro-like black hair. "I haven't seen you around before. What division are you?"
I have no fucking clue. "You ask a lot of questions," Tris says, smirking disarmingly. He holds his hand out. "I'm Tris."
If the name is familiar to this man, he doesn't show it. He clasps Tris' hand in a firm handshake. "Liam Kosta. I'm from the Pathfinder team. What about you?"
No idea, buddy. "Why spoil all the fun?" he asks, shrugging. It's not like my dad is going to put me on his team. Why am I here? Why did they wake me? He has so many questions, but too few answers.
"You are both wanted on the bridge," SAM says. "The Pathfinder team needs to be ready in thirty minutes."
Tris almost chokes on his coffee. It burns. "Well," he hums, using his hand to wipe at his mouth as he throws a smirk at the guy, Liam, "guess that answers your question."
Dear old Dad has me as part of the Pathfinder team, probably along with Erin. This can only end in disaster.
He frowns. "SAM, is it possible for me to have a private chat with… Erin and Alec Ryder."
"I have alerted them. They will meet you in the Pathfinder's quarters, in 3.4 minutes."
Liam looks at him oddly, probably wondering how, and why, he has that high of clearance to just call a random meeting with the Ryder family. Oh well. The less he knows about this whole family mess, the better.
Tris puts down his cup of life and makes his way out of the kitchen. Again, he's not officially supposed to know where the Pathfinder's quarters are, but SAM didn't give him directions so his family must know he looked at the blueprints for the ship. Either that or they want him to get lost. Honestly, he wouldn't put it past them.
It takes him three minutes to reach the Pathfinder's quarters, with only one misstep he quickly realized and corrected. He's rather proud of himself, honestly. The doors whoosh open, allowing him entrance, and Erin and Alec are already there, waiting for him. Erin smirks.
"Thirty seconds faster than I pegged you for," she says. "Nice."
It's not a compliment. It's never a compliment, coming from her. He looks at his father. "You put me on the Pathfinder team."
"This is supposed to be about new beginnings," Alec says, nodding at him. "And, you have certain skills we could use."
He bristles. "You want me as cannon fodder," he says, shrugging. "Alright, fine. You two do your little hush-hush Pathfinder thing, and I'll make some noise when it's needed and draw the fire. Whatever, I'm expendable." He huffs out a sigh. "One condition."
"You're not expendable," Erin says, scowling at him. "You have certain abilities which come in handy."
"Yeah, yeah – you're still jealous I got more exposure than you in the womb. Duly noted." He looks back at Alec. "I do have other abilities, you know. Ones that aren't so loud."
"You're a half-rate hacker," Alec Ryder says bluntly. "We have better ones. We just need your usual brash nature."
"I think you have me mixed up with Erin, which is tragic. We look nothing alike. And you call yourself our father," Tris says, smirking. "But alright. Still, on one condition."
"You're not really in a position to be demanding things," Erin says. "Besides, we're family." Her blue eyes narrow. "That's unconditional."
"We'll hug later. But seriously – you want me to play my part, and want me on your little team, then I have conditions."
"You said just one."
"It's a bit of an extended one."
Alec sighs. "Just say it, Tristen."
He bristles again. "You call me Tris. My files are all deleted – SAM has no record of me, and I'm sure no one else does, either. I don't know if that was your doing or if I have an angel looking out for me, but either way – that's great. I'm just Tris. Not Tristen, not Ryder, just Tris."
"Is that the condition? We just call you Tris?" Erin asks, brows rising. "Rather weak conditions, brother."
"I'm not finished, am I?"
"I don't know, are you?"
"I'm not related to you," Tris says.
"The womb doesn't lie, little brother."
He scowls. "No. I mean here, in Andromeda – I'm not Tristen Ryder, I'm just Tris. No one can know I'm related to you, or I'm off the team. You think I can't sneak away from your little party, think again. I'm the master of escape, and this is a prison. But I'll stay willingly if you agree I'm just Tris." He smiles. "Do we have a deal?"
"I don't understand what's so wrong about being a part of our family," Erin says, frowning at him.
"Do we have a deal?" Tris repeats, smile hardening.
Erin scowls. "What if someone finds out?"
"You better hope they don't, or I'm out of here."
"Fine," Alec says, nodding, causing Tris and Erin to look back at him. "I thought you might want it that way – that's why I told no one about you."
Tris scoffs. "I'm sure you only had altruistic intentions," he says dryly. Not because I'm the disappointment and you'd rather not be associated with me. I mean, the feeling is pretty mutual. "But good, at least we're on the same page. If that's all – I'll join you guys with the others, on the bridge. I do have stuff here, right? Weapons, clothes, my omni-blade?"
"You have weapons," Erin says.
"My omni-blade?" he asks again.
"An omni-blade is an omni-blade."
He swallows back the nasty words on his tongue. I fucking modified that blade my fucking self and put so much fucking time into it and it was perfect, you whore, and-
He smiles. "Sure. I guess I'll go find my stuff and meet you on the bridge. As your teammate."
He quickly leaves the room, keeping his gait and posture steady.
Playing nice with his family is going to be fun. Can anyone hear his sarcasm?
That's okay, though.
He always did enjoy the theater.
