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She despised her family name. Maybe once it meant exactly what it promised - fun, a good time, at least in her eyes. But when people called her ‘Ryder’, just Ryder, it didn’t feel like they were calling her. They wanted the war hero she had to live up to despite him doing the bare minimum to live up to being a father and husband. They wanted her mother, whose death was only due to the fact that she was trying to help biotics like her brother on such a massive scale - in other words, heroic. Who knows how many other Ryders preceded them with their own noteworthy deeds - she never cared enough to know. She’d never done anything heroic before the Pathfinder title was thrust upon her - she was lucky to get through the day without having to resort to violence.
So whenever someone called her Ryder, she was quick to suggest alternatives - Pathfinder (if begrudgingly), ma’am or miss, her own damn name as if it was a taboo thing. Or she grit her teeth, but said nothing.
Vetra, though… Vetra could call her anything she wanted as long as she kept using that tone, that ‘I’m happy to see you stay and talk to me I enjoy talking to you as you, just you’ way. All she’d done was listen to bits and pieces of her own tumultuous family history, why she’d come to Andromeda, her work, flirted with her a few times. Nothing out of the ordinary, but Vetra clearly didn’t deal with people that friendly if all her bashful responses to the come ons and now this was any indication.
That’s what their friendship - well, whatever it was becoming - was based off of. The little things making all the difference. Ryder knew well how she affected Vetra - for a turian, she sure was expressive - but was it obvious enough that the feelings were mutual? Sure, Ryder got silent and maybe a little pink whenever that ‘hey Ryder’ hit her ears, but that may not have directly spelled out ‘that simple thing makes me feel better than anything else you’re cute and wonderful please go out with me’. Or maybe she did know, but was privately reveling in having that effect on her. She wouldn’t put it past her.
All that was certain was that after barely outrunning a vault purification, or dealing with Exile bullshit, or making one of those pragmatic decisions that earned the ire of anyone with short sight and a conscience, that ‘hey Ryder’ made the tension bleed from her shoulders almost instantly. Selfish as it was, it was the main reason she was still going. Trying to feel like she earned that fond inflection.
She couldn’t help but think of all that as they laid on top of each other overlooking the springs of Kadara, breathless from several first kisses. All because Vetra asked, “So, should I be calling you something special now?”
“Honestly? Ryder’s fine.” She pressed their foreheads together, revelling in the feel of her plates. “Just fine.”