[A/N] Thank you for the reviews and helpful critiques on grammar. I haven't been at this for a long time, so I'm a bit rusty. If anyone catches more errors, please let me know!
On with the story! [A/N]

"We recording, Arthur?" I brush my short brown hair back and hold the chameleon helmet to my right. I look like an Apollo astronaut getting ready for a photo shoot. Albeit a very reptilian looking astronaut.

"Yep, go ahead," A blinking red record indicator appears in the upper corner of the screen next to the video preview window.

I take a deep breath and step closer to the camera. What could I possibly say that would adequately explain all this? I decide not to over think it and say what's on my mind. I'm only talking to my closest family members, after all.

"Okay…Hi guys," great start, I mentally wince, "uh, if you're seeing this, well, it means you're finally getting the truth on what happens when I go for three hour walks at night," Wow. I'm making this sound bad, "I know it looks like I'm cosplaying or something, but it's not what it looks like!" I chuckle and look down at the suit, suddenly feeling ridiculous for the first time since putting it on.

"Okay…if you're seeing this, it means I wasn't able to make it back for some reason…back to this time period." My eyes fall briefly, "See, I ran into a friend who needed help and I can't even begin to explain what's at stake. He's from the future, he's a non-organic sentient life form, and there's a heart somewhere in those lines of code that I can only aspire to match," My smile grows, "It turns out some of those stories on Stargate had truth to them, Dad," I move closer to the camera, "I want all of you to understand that you're more valuable to me than anything in this universe, or any other universe, for that matter." I continue talking and reminiscing for several minutes, mostly expressing appreciation for every second chance, every forgiven mistake, and every loving memory.

"Arthur, set the message to send ten minutes after we jump."

"Got it."

I sigh deeply and look straight at the camera, "Alright then. This is where we part ways. And who knows, maybe we've just fudged it up and I'll be back before you know it!" I smirk and slide the helmet back over my head. The pressurization process happens again, causing me to wince.

"Ready for your first stream dive, Jason?" The HUD and Arthur's shiny helmet avatar reappear in my mind.

"I'm ready." I whisper, still looking down at the camera. I smile as I offer one final wave. I switch on the exterior sound module so my voice is heard outside the suit. "Farewell."

A feeling like electrostatic currents pulsating through the air wrapped themselves around my entire being. Alternating with the static were jets of cool air which felt as though they were being fired straight through my body.

The cooling jets intensified and my consciousness began slipping away from the world. That was when the shift happened; a sound like crashing waves rose up around me and I could see the water as it swirled about me. It felt like sleep paralysis; the precursor to an astral projection.

Through the wormhole.

I could see outside the vortex through the suit HUD. Somehow, the chameleon systems were still projecting into my mind despite the sheer sensory madness I was experiencing.

Beyond the distortion of the water, I could see the office fading away as it was replaced by the sun and moon chasing each other through the sky. The landscape below me flickered between dark blue and vibrant green. We were moving away from that landscape. I could make out the hills that surrounded my hometown. Only seconds later, the entire North American continent was being swept over by thousands of clouds and day-night cycles.

Through time.

As we began to leave the atmosphere of earth, the racing of the sun and moon gradually slowed and the rotation of the earth increased. Soon, it seemed to be spinning out of control and all the continents and oceans blurred together.

I'm going to be sick.

The sun started to whip around the earth again and again. Years were passing now; at least twelve so far. Before inevitable dizziness could set in, we shot away from the earth as if launched from a canon. This happened just as the sun was passing behind us and we flew past the churning yellow giant much closer than I would have liked.

How do I shut my eyes!

Thankfully, the sun wasn't as blinding as I expected. The HUD must have dimmed to compensate as we hurtled by. In less than ten seconds, the sun was nothing more than a blinking diamond in the distance. We passed through the icy ort cloud and I strained to see behind me if Planet X actually existed. I saw nothing out of the ordinary. It was at that point a simple yet immutable detail entered my thoughts:

Where are we going?

As if in answer to my mental banter, a brief flash of piercing light exploded through my mind's eye and then there was an eerie blackness. All of the sensations and sounds from before were gone. The black world I was in somehow felt three dimensional and completely different from the blackness behind one's eyelids. I could feel subtle movement as I floated through the impenetrable ink.

Is this supposed to happen?

it's what you wanted, isn't it? A very different voice from mine replied in my mind. It was feminine, soft, teasing, and strangely familiar. It shouldn't have been, but all of this felt familiar.

What is this place? I inquired through my thoughts. Speaking orally had no audible effect upon this strange void-like environment.

This is a void, The voice explained.

Ah. Thanks for clearing that up for me, I smirked. The darkness before me began to oscillate in different shades of black and grey. Very quickly, the form of a woman materialized three feet in front of me. She had a somewhat amused expression toying at the soft features of her countenance. Her hair was very long and dark brown with bangs that stopped just above her eyes. She wore a simple white long-sleeve shirt that did wonders for my increasing partiality towards her. Fitted olive green capris and bare feet only made my staring worse. She looked GOOD; better than I felt comfortable admitting. And the legs… good grief, don't get me started!

God damn, you're familiar! I've seen you somewhere, but I can't pin it down. I thought, still staring like a kid who just realized he liked girls for the first time.

starting to remember, are we? She had the slightest hint of a German accent. Her lips did not move as she spoke. I decided we must have been communicating telepathically.

She moved closer to me and both hands reached out to my face, one resting under my jaw and the other gently holding the left side of my face, her thumb lightly caressing my temple. The touch was bordering on electric, but it was pleasant and cool. It felt as though some fingers were permeating my skin and messaging every underlying cell.

jog any memories for you? Her thought voice whispered. I didn't reply. I didn't want it to stop. I realized in that moment how long it had been since I'd felt anything like that. I also realized who she was the moment her hands touched my face. It was the manner of the touch that triggered a sudden explosion of memories. And not just memories, emotion welled up in me at the same time. I suddenly felt an overwhelming fondness and comfort with this woman. I knew, without a doubt, who she was.

Catherine, With that mental utterance, I was literally snapped back into the swirling vortex, the rushing water, and the repetitive blasting of cold air.

I remember.

The shifting and piercing blasts of icy air finally stopped. I had completely lost track of where our sun had been. Instead, countless stars met my gaze. There were tens of thousands of them. I had never seen stars so clearly before and I doubt many people bound to earth had either.

For the first time since I found the bunker in the woods, I stopped to reflect. Something truly remarkable had just happened. Having just experienced my first temporal jump felt insignificant by comparison.

I remember… I remember you, Catherine! Then another thought instinctively occurred to me: I've lived before this life.

I looked beneath where I was floating in space. There was a new planet. This one seemed to be covered in ice and snow, unless I was mistaking it for cloud cover. Directly behind me, a new sun accompanied this new planet. Its radiance was much more piercing and intense than our own. I pivoted back so I could get a proper look at the planet. So this is what it feels like to be weightless.

"That was quite the trip." I challenged the silence.

"Ah, you're still here! I was starting to think we might've left some parts of you behind," Arthur's voice gradually filtered in from the right side of the helmet, "Jason, have you been listening to anything I've been saying?"

I shake my head, "I was kinda zoning out there. Sorry,"

The non-organic sighed in exasperation, "Okay, from the top: We missed our destination by one month-"

"Okay," I cut in, "Firstly, what WAS our destination, exactly?" I'm still baffled that major detail slipped my mind in the first place.

"Right, we didn't exactly cover that, did we?" The little helmet blinks, "The original itinerary had us making our first stop at a massive space station called The Citadel about one month before this date. My intention was to get a closer look at a Reaper, maybe even get on-board one."

"So you planned for us to head straight for the belly of the beast, huh?" I cross my arms, starting to feel a bit testy.

"I never claimed to be the ideal person for this job. I'm actually an artist recently turned historian. Maybe it wasn't the best idea, but I figured we had to start somewhere." He explained.

"Why didn't you tell me about it?"

"I forgot." He blinks, not sounding the least bit remorseful about it.

"Really now?" My tone rises, "How can YOU, of all people, forget anyth-"

"Hey, can we argue about this later?" The AI interjects, "We've got a sizable payload of bigger fish to fry at the moment."

I take one deep breath, fully aware that the magnitude of events that are unfolding around me are making me numb to the situation. I'm starting to feel the dull throb of a migraine just beginning its assault. It takes a great deal of effort to keep my thoughts from turning completely inward.

I've got to stay focused! No time for "Oh, woe is me!"

"Okay," I sigh, "You mentioned that we missed our stop by one month. Is there something wrong with the suit?" I begin to unintentionally roll back to face the dark side of the planet.

"Hold on," A few block paragraphs of code scrolled vertically over my field of view and then two graphical windows spring up from the bottom of the HUD, "As a matter of fact, there is something amazingly wrong! While you were 'zoned out', I believe I mentioned that we've managed to use every last drop of the time displacement core." One of the windows displays a bar graph with three readings on it. One bar, labeled "APC", is fairly close to the highest possible value. The other two bars, "TDC" and "PDC", register either very low or naught.

"So we're stuck?" Now I'm genuinely nervous.

Don't panic!

"As for any sort of temporal displacement, yes. Both of those cores are shot. Thankfully, we've still got the all purpose core at nearly one hundred percent." The low opacity blocks of text start to scroll over the HUD again. "There is absolutely no reason for that single jump to wipe out the entire time displacement core! Jason, I swear to you, this has never happened before!"

"Okay, okay…" I try to calm him down, attempting a similar outcome for myself. "Let's just take a breather here." I take in a deep breath, "and let it all out." I exhale. Arthur's avatar stares at me unblinking.

"You realize I would need lungs to do that, right?" The helmet blinks once.

"Right," I pivot the suit away from the dark side of the planet, just in time to see a massive spaceship come hurtling towards me.

I have just enough time to scream, "SHIT!" as the burning frigate closes the distance. With only seconds from being smeared all over the windshield, a massive CRACK! and BOOOM! nearly blow the fillings out of my teeth! The blast forces me upward and I twirl like a ragdoll. I catch passing glimpses of the ship that is now below me as I spin. One whole section of the hull is completely sheared off! I can see the interior of the ship through the massive breach. Other sections of the ship are leaving long smoke trails in their wake.

"Oh, shit!" My spiraling path continues, but the force of the explosion has me moving in the same direction as the imperiled ship instead of against it. "Arthur, can you keep us upright!" Instantly, I feel several small bursts, each exerting force on a flailing extremity. Pressurized cryogen bipropellant spits out of the suit in precise intervals to halt my demonstration of ragdoll physics.

"What was that?" I gasp, the breathing exercise long forgotten.

"Looks like that ship's on fire." Arthur casually observes the spectacle below along with me. "Or this is very true-to-life film shoot for airline safety."

"Arthur, stay focused! Is there something we can do?" I shout, in no mood for jokes.

Several dialogue prompts appear on Arthur's side of the HUD, but I'm too busy freaking out to really notice what they say. "They've already sent out a distress beacon. Hmmm. It sounds like the pilot is still trying to save that ship! Listen to this!"

"…this is the SSV Normandy! Mayday, Mayday! We've suffered damage from an unknown enemy!" The radio transmission plays and then cuts to static.

"Hey! I think it's time to abandon ship, pal!" Arthur exclaims, sending a transmission back to the floundering ship.

"Looks like we're not the only ones celebrating Really Bad Luck Day." The moment the words were out of his inorganic mouth, a blindingly bright beam of energy blasted through the already exposed section of the ship! My eyes grew wide with the realization of what was about to happen.

Arthur sees it, "That energy weapon is about to hit the ships reactor-!"

A terrible and massive shockwave slammed into my suit, but I was somehow spared what normally would have torn unprotected armor to shreds. Shrapnel from successive blasts flew by me like upside-down rainfall. By some miracle, it all streamed by without causing damage. I watched as the superstructure of the ship was razed in seconds. One final sharp explosion later and the shockwaves finally ceased. All I can hear is my rapid breathing and blood pounding through my head.

"We're still alive…" I gasp. That was when she slammed into me.

"Good grief!" I cough into the helmet as I try to get air back into my lungs. I look down at the unfortunate person who got themselves ejected from the exploding vessel. She looked at me and then back down at the ship she just flew up from and then back to me. I could readily tell she was female; the armor she wore looked uncomfortably tight.

"Well, now this isn't so bad!" Arthur chimes in, "Even in the midst of such chaos, women throw themselves at us!"

"Arthur, please shut up for a second!" Then I noticed the precious oxygen rapidly leaving her suit. She noticed it as well and started writhing around, trying to find the breach with her hands.

"We have to do something now!" I reach out for one of her flailing limbs and manage to catch her ankle. I pull her back towards me.

"There's a sticky patch system built into the right gauntlet of your suit! It's ready to go!" I feel a small clink on the anterior of my right wrist as I move myself behind the still struggling woman. Reaching around her neck so I don't lose her, I pull a strip of the sticky patch out of the dispenser just below my palm. Reaching back around to find the gapping crack in one of the suit hoses, I hastily cover the first breach with the sticky patch while trying to avoid being kicked or punched. I'm not so successful at avoiding the blows that inevitably strike my helmet. Thankfully, the first patch took care of most of the leakage.

"There's also a corded multi-tool on your belt. The blunt end will be superheated so you can seal the patch." Arthur helpfully projects a visual of the chameleon suit and the location of the multi-tool flashes. Still hanging on to the struggling spacewoman, I snatch the multi-tool from the belt and a length of wrapped spring-loaded cord comes along with it. I stretch it out so it's not trying to rush back into the suit and poise the blunt end above the sticky patch. It's already beginning to ripple against the pressure difference. I apply pressure with the multi-tool and the superheated metal begins to fuse the sticky patch with the hose.

"Got the first break sealed!" I shout after ten seconds of work. My heart is hammering away wildly as I address other small suit breaches highlighted by the chameleon HUD. My patient has finally stopped trying to resist my attempts to help and I can vaguely make out a muffled voice coming from her helmet. I'm still applying sticky patches when Arthur picks up on her suit radio.

"C-cold-d-d" Her first word reaches my ears. Her teeth are definitely chattering. I try to focus on sealing the remaining sticky patches. From what the HUD was telling me, all the breaks in her suit were now covered over in the futuristic gaff tape. I dutifully continued to work away on the posterior sections of the suit.

"Kinda like patching a bicycle tube…" I think out loud.

"Cold-d-d-d." The additional voice in my head replies.

"It means you're still alive." I offer, just finishing the seal on the final patch.

"N-not enjoy-ing it…much." She chatters again.

"Ah, we've gotta little bombshell here," Arthur pipes in, "What luck!"

"Done!" I pull the multi-tool out some and let it snake back into its place on my belt. I'm still behind the woman, grasping just under her left shoulder so we don't drift apart. I twist her around to face me and get a quick glimpse of the "N7" badge on her armor. I look into the thin visor like strip on her helmet where her eyes would be.

"How are you holding up, ma'am?" I surprise myself with how calm I sound; especially after nearly being run over and blown up by a spaceship.

"Cold-d-d." She replies again. I shake my head and grasp both of her shoulders.

"Yeah, we've got that. You were just exposed to vacuum, lady! Are you sure you don't have the bends? Bleeding out your eyes or anything like that?" She looks back at me blankly for a moment and then shakes her head.

"Oh, thank God!" I sigh, relieved to have the worst of our dilemma behind us. "I think we've had enough fun for one day." She nods in agreement. I let go of her shoulders and grab hold of her left wrist. My attention turns back to the massive planet beneath us, or above us, it's all pretty relative in space. I'm surprised when I feel something click into the belt of my suit. Looking down, I see the woman securing a sort of karabiner to one of the loops. An orange nylon strap extends from it and attaches to her own utility belt.

"Wow. You recover quick!" I smile and release her wrist.

"Part of the job description. Medi-gel doesn't hurt either." She looks up at me, her tone very serious now, "You saved my life back there, and I appreciate that, but you've got some fast talking to do. You're not part of the Normandy crew. Who are you?"

I remain silent, completely uncertain about what I should say.

"Hold that thought," I switch off her radio link, "Arthur, how should we go about this?" I look back at her and hope she's not getting too angry or suspicious about me stalling.

"Well, she's already seen the chameleon suit. Traditionally, we use time displacement techniques to rectify issues like this. However, as you're keenly aware, the suit can't help us with THAT anymore."

"So I guess I've got to tell her the truth then." I decide.

"I agree. But be ready for anything. This is a situation I've never faced before."

"I'll try and be tactful." I finish and turn the woman's radio link back on.

"Okay, this might take awhile to explain,"

"Then you might want to save it until we get planetside. The world's getting awfully big down there." She motions to the planet beneath us and it really has grown quite a bit in just the last few minutes.

"She's right, Jason. At the rate we're falling, we'll be visiting this planet in less than four minutes," Arthur clarifies over an isolated channel, audible only to me. "Not sure how we're going to survive the landing, though."

"Huh," I look down at the snow covered surface as it rushes towards us, "Can't say I've ever skydived from space before." It's already getting to be night fall over the section of the atmosphere we're falling through. I look up and notice the horizon is gradually turning a brilliant sunset orange as we fall. The thicker air of the upper atmosphere is audible through the muffling material of the chameleon helmet. An airspeed indicator on the left side of my HUD quickly drops from sound barrier speeds to around 150 MPH. "Arthur, you're so damn helpful with this suit HUD," I chuckle.

"Thanks," He sounds genuinely pleased, "but you'll probably change your tune once we've pancaked on that mountain of ice down there."

"Fair enough," I turn my attention back to the woman I just met in possibly the most ridiculous circumstance ever faced by man.

"Okay, we're definitely in the atmosphere now!" I shout over the roar of air rushing past us. "I hope you've gotta parachute in that suit somewhere, cause we're going to need it real quick!" Both of us have taken up the traditional freefall position synonymous with skydiving.

The woman across from me shrugs, "No parachutes, but I'm a biotic. I should be able to slow us down!"

"What's a biotic?" I shout.

"You new to this galaxy?" She replies incredulously.

"You could say that!"

She doesn't reply. She just looks at me with what I can only guess is a surprised expression.

An altitude indicator next to the airspeed readout appears and we're already at 5,000 feet.

"5,000 feet!" I shout, "We're getting close!" For reasons I don't fully understand, I'm stupid excited about watching the ground race towards us at 130 MPH. Must be the redneck American in me. "WHOOOOOOO!" I scream, deciding to embrace the rush.

I glance at the spacewoman, "2,400 feet! If you're going to do something, you'd better do it quick!"

"Here! Hold on!" She commands and reaches out to grasp my wrists. 1,200 feet and we're locked together.

This is going to hurt.

An electrified sensation began at my wrists around 900 feet and quickly engulfed my entire body at 700. The woman in front of me looked as though she were on fire! A blue fire!

"Oh, shit!" The electrical pulses begin to ripple all over me and the chameleon HUD is suddenly really hard to read. At 200 feet, a massive surge of energy exploded through me. Several warnings flashed all over the HUD and then the chameleon suit shut down entirely.

Everything went black.