Disclaimer: The material here is owned by Bioware and EA, not me.

Outsider Effect

Chapter 1

It's late at night, ITunes is blasting Rise Against in the background and I'm typing frantically, trying to finish up a last minute assignment that's due in half an hour.

I'd like to say that it was just a normal, average Tuesday night, but that's not entirely true.

For the past several hours everything in our apartment from the microwave to the overhead lighting had been acting up, either refusing to start, or suddenly turn on without any input. My roommate and I had quickly gotten over the initial jokes about our place being haunted and quickly become irritated with the widespread mechanical screw-ups. Especially when it began interfering with my, admittedly procrastinated, homework assignment. A lightning storm had been building all day long, sending power outages all over the city. From what little TV reception we'd been able to get, it was being called the worst storm of the year, and from the way the sky is lighting up outside I believe it. This had been a particularly bad year for weather in the southern United States, this latest storm not helping matters any.

It was like electricity as a whole had stood up and decided that it was going to be a real pain in the ass today.

At least we'd gotten the power working again. Which leaves me trying to rush to finish this essay on a laptop that's still not working entirely correctly. All of my hate, technology.

"It's been happening all over the building, apparently!" My roommate, Jon, calls from the other room. He's been trying to call the landlord about the problem, but apparently the lines of communication are amongst the things that refuse to work properly today, because he's only just now getting through.

"Not all that surprising." I yell back absently, more focused on the task at hand. I really need to finish this soon so I can get to bed. I have to wake up early tomorrow for classes and Atlanta traffic is not something I relish.

I type a few more frantic lines into the computer and mutter to myself, "Almost…just about-"

And then the room goes black as the power shuts off again. I can hear Jon in the other room swear loudly. I just stare wearily at the blank screen in front of me. "…done." I finish.

With a heavy sigh I stand up and get ready for bed as best I can in the blackness. There's nothing else I can do about it now and maybe the power will be fixed by morning. I can only hope. After brushing my teeth and turning off all the lights I collapse into my bed, not even bothering to shed any of my clothing. It's been one of those days.

I can feel myself waking up and I blink my eyes open, groaning as the sun hits them and nearly blinds me from the brightness. Funny, usually my curtains take care of that. I sit up and now really open my eyes, and looking around the room. I freeze. Blink again a few more times.

This isn't the same room I went to sleep in.

"What." Is all I can say.

After overcoming a brief moment of instinctual panic at the sudden unfamiliar surroundings I force myself to actually look around the room. At second glance I make a disturbing discovery. The room wasn't as unfamiliar as I first thought. It's still my room, but all of my things were gone. So was all the furniture, save the bed I am laying on, which upon inspection is nothing more than a rusted old bed frame with a ratty mattress on top. Definitely not the same bed I fell into last night. The room itself looked as if it had lain abandoned for years, possibly even decades. The carpet was all but gone, and a few of the floor-boards beneath it were missing. The paint had long peeled away and two windows were both busted out at some point.

"Okay," I mutter, forcing myself out of the bed. "Try not to freak out. There's an explanation for this." This has to be Jon's fucked up idea of a prank. I don't know how he did it all without waking me, but it's impressive that's for sure. I'll make sure to tell him how impressed I am after I beat the ever loving hell out of him.

I take a step forward and freeze as the whole floor seems to shift. After a moment of ominous creaking, I hesitantly take a slow step towards the door. Okay…so this place doesn't just look derelict. It actually is about to fall apart around me. Lovely.

I'm starting think that this isn't actually a prank by my roommate. Just to be sure I call out, "Jon! You there man? A little over the top don't you think?"

Silence answers back. I gulp, again fighting back a sudden surge of panic. "Seriously, what the hell did you do with all of my stuff?" I try again in vain hope. Still nothing.

Well shit.

I make my way over to the door and am suddenly very thankful that I didn't bother to undress before I fell asleep last night.

Was it last night? The state of my room seemed to say that I had been asleep for way longer than that. Like, be several centuries or something. Was that even possible? I couldn't have just fallen asleep and not woken up. My train of thought temporarily derails as I open the door to my room and the rest of my apartment gone. Apparently my room was the last hold-out of a building that had almost completely fallen apart.

The flooring outside of my room had collapsed in completely, along with the far wall. I spend the next ten minutes working my way down to the floor below me without breaking anything. Accomplishing this I manage to pick my way through the broken remains of the room below mine –and idly wonder what happened to my neighbors as I do so- until I manage to work my way out of the building and into the street.

I stare up at the buildings around me. This part of town had never been the safest or the most well kept, but it certainly wasn't a complete slum, like the one I found myself in now. There are maybe one or two buildings on this street that look even remotely safe to live in. There are no cars that I can see on the roads, which themselves are pitted and broken.

Somehow I've woken up in a run-down abandoned version of old home. Being a huge geek I can see a few possible explanations for this situation occurring. "Please don't let it be zombies." I beg the Universe aloud. I've seen it in movie before and I really don't want to live through the experience. I begin eyeing the darkened alleyways suspiciously, just waiting for legions of the undead to come spilling forth to feed.

Another twenty minutes of exploring and still no zombies, so I think I can put that theory to rest. Phew. I begin to see skyscrapers in the distance as I make my way through the streets. Being in a city, this isn't exactly a surprise, but these were seriously huge, white-washed buildings. Taller than most of the buildings that had been in the city before I had made this mysterious trip.

And as I draw closer I can make out strange specks flying through the air between the skyline. Downtown is still a fair ways from here, at least a half an hour's walk from what I remember, but it looks like the metropolis has grown, because I can already see larger buildings begin to blend with the smaller and more decrepit buildings.

And now I can see people. Where the street I had been on was completely abandoned, I can see people moving in buildings, or gathering in alleys, a few brave few walking out on the sidewalks past me. This still isn't the best part of town, from the looks of it and I unconsciously begin to quicken my pace. Really wish I had my knife with me right now, if just for the sake of assurance.

It's then that I freeze, as several things happen at once, and the pieces come together. I am now close enough that I can see those flying specks in the distance aren't actually specks. They're cars. Flying cars. As in, actually flying. Full on futuristic flying. As if to confirm that, one flies directly overhead, emitting a strange yet oddly familiar warble as it glides past. I stare up after it for a long moment while my brain tries to process what I just saw.

Then I look of to my side as another pedestrian walks past me, just in time to see him raise his left arm which is suddenly encased in a bright orange glowing device.

A familiar glowing orange device.

I'm a pretty big video gamer, and the Mass Effect series is one of my all-time favorites, so needless to say I know and recognize a great related to it. And that man walking away from me is definitely using an omni-tool.

An omni-tool.

Sweet Jesus on a pogo-stick just what have I gotten into here?

Without thinking about it I break into a run, closing the distance between me and the retreating man. I reach out and grab his shoulder. "Excuse me!" I try to keep the panic out of my voice as the man spins around, but I don't think I'm all that successful as the man's face goes from an irritated scowl to mild concern in an instant.

"You need something pal?" He asks, still sounding rather irritated at the sudden contact.

"What year is it?" the question comes quickly before I have time to really appreciate how absurd that sounds. I really need to know though. Just to confirm the truth that seems to be staring me in the face. My eyes drift down to the omni-tool still active on the man's arm. It looks exactly like one out of the games. Sweet Jesus…

"What?" The man asks incredulously. He gives me an odd look. I realize how completely strange I must appear with my obviously out of date clothes, scruffy appearance and odd question. As in, a complete lunatic.

"What year is it?" I ask again. After a second the guy finally answers, I guess figuring there wasn't any real harm in humoring my craziness.

"Same as it's been all year pal. It's 2176."

I take a shocked step backwards, feeling that panic beginning to surge up again. I need to sit down. I back up until I hit the brick wall of a nearby building and slide down to the ground. I sit there for…well I have no idea how long. The man with the omni-tool leaves without me noticing, probably to get as far away from me as possible.

'Don't break down' I order myself. I can deal with this. Becoming a blubbering mess won't help me here. I give a snort of laughter. I've always been a go-with-the-flow kind of guy, but this is pushing the bounds of that mentality.

I take a deep breath stand up again, collecting my thoughts. Okay, so through some strange means I went to sleep last night and woke up not only in the future, but in a different universe entirely. The Mass Effect universe entirely. I'm sure that if I wasn't so completely freaked out my inner geek would be squee-ing with joy at the prospect of that.

And now the question of where to go from here? I'm in the Mass Effect universe, but I'm still on Earth. I'm still in Atlanta. Not to mention that it's about seven years before the events of Mass Effect 1. What exactly could I do? A nineteen year old kid with nothing but the clothes on his back in the slums of a big city.

I don't think there's an instruction manual for this kind of situation but boy do I wish there was.

I really should have read more self-insert fics.

Oh good, the panic is back.

Author's note: Firstly, a disclaimer here. I own none of the material presented in this story.

It's been years since I have been written anything fanfiction related. Truthfully I didn't expect to get back into it at all. This is pretty much just a creative outlet for me at the moment so I won't promise an update schedule or anything. Mass Effect is one of my favorite game series of all time, and I found myself needing to blow off some steam, thus this little foray into writing. I've never written a Self-Insert fic before, so this is sort of an experiment for me. We'll see how it goes. Truth be told Self-Inserts never really appealed to me (and generally still don't) but I've read one or two that inspired me to try my hand, and I'm hoping to avoid a lot of the typical clichés and pitfalls that come with a Self-Insert story.