Chapter Text
1 - Only in madness do you find beautiful death
If shooting stars granted every wish there was, there would be madness in our world.
I quickly walk down the street but look up from time to time. At the city sky that’s much too bright and much too dirty to see anything at all from what’s happening in out there. Sometimes I am not convinced that outer space exists. Because I’m stuck down here, I’m stuck in this city and in a life that’s not really a life at all – not a hopeful one at least.
How can anything else exist when I can neither see it nor get there?
This reminds me of a shooting star that I saw when I was about eight years old. Must have been the only one I ever saw.
When life was still good and warm and sweet.
I remember lying in the grass with dad who explained the constellations and showed me the Milky Way. Somewhere out there in the middle of nowhere where everything was free, and everything was safe.
That one evening when I was excited about this shooting star. I remember wishing for all of us to travel through space someday. Together as a family. Happy and looking for adventure.
Didn’t I also want to become an astronaut?
I can’t even remember now. That was way half a life ago. Might as well have been the life of another person.
I look back at the streets and away from the sad excuse of a sky, and chuckle bitterly.
Oh, sweet little girl. If you had only known where you would end up. You would have wished for a better wish. You would have wished much more important things.
I check my phone while taking in my surroundings, carefully assessing that everything is alright, even though it's much too late at night to walk home alone. The streetlights are flickering from time to time in this run-down part of the city. No new messages, no missed calls, nobody missing me. Which is fine, totally fine. With so many girls living in the same group home it’s not hard to lose track. Or to simply not care. I know there are more important issues going on, I know there are way too many kids needing a lot more attention. I’d like to think they know I’m not going to do anything stupid while I’m staying with them. I have seen way too many of the others go down the wrong roads, so drugs are out of question for me, and right now I’m way too close to end up in juvie anyways. One wrong step and I’m done for.
This means I stay away from trouble now whenever I can.
Luckily being invisible is kind of my superpower.
Being invisible is also my biggest weakness.
It was way too easy to steal from my last asshole foster parents. They might have never found out if I would have just been more careful. I’m always careful. Quiet and tiny as I am. But that one time I really fucked up. Who could have known that they were rich enough to install an alarm system on their stupid jewelry?
I push the phone back into my pocket.
Just two more years. Then hopefully I can escape to whatever college. If I keep up the grades, keep pushing for a scholarship I can finally show them. Show them that I’m way more than a fucked-up kid in the system.
I can do it.
Strolling down the street I think about getting myself another energy drink at that kiosk on the way. But I barely even have a dollar left which means I have to admit that staying up tonight to get the rest of my schoolwork done will be hard. Goddammit. I need to get myself a job, even if it means less time for schoolwork, just to get energy drinks to keep myself awake for more schoolwork – wait what?
I sigh quietly and turn left the next corner down an alley which isn't even a good idea on a nice day but it's the fastest route to get home. Automatically, I feel myself jogging, take out my earphones and listen in to every sound around me.
I clench my hand around the phone in my pocket and keep going.
Ready for anything. And nothing.
That’s when I get startled by a flashing light in the middle of the street. I stop when the flashes turn into a kind of blue-ish big round flatscreen that flickers. It’s floating in the middle of the street, not connected to anything.
What the hell?
I frown and take a step back. Is this done with lasers or something? Swallowing I turn around, expect people showing up. Maybe this is part of a weird party, even though this part of the town isn’t known for its great nightlife.
I hesitate and wait for a minute, but nobody comes which makes me take in more details of the circle of light. I carefully sneak up closer to it, try to understand how it works. It’s so thin I can see through it, but it’s seemingly not projected from anywhere.
I press my lips together, look around when curiosity gets the better of me.
While holding my breath I reach for electric light slowly with my right hand, not sure what to expect. Will this prickle? Or will this electrocute me?
I’m not quite touching it yet when an arm pops out from inside the flickering screen and grabs me.
The next moment I’m being pulled directly into the light, shut my eyes, suck in air but I’m not able so scream.
I try to push those arms away, push whoever the hell got a hold of me off me. I know the tricks, I learned how to escape those situations. But the hands grabbing at me are way too strong. I want to curse but I just can’t get a damn sound out of my mouth. Fuck!
Suddenly it’s like an electric current is running through my whole body.
There’s light all around me. Light and silence, before I hit the hard ground with my body.
I gasp, fight to catch my breath while my heart is racing.
I try to open my eyes but it’s too bright.
Oh god …
I hear a frantic breathing sound before realizing it’s my own. Panicky I’m feeling around on the floor below me that is cold and even like glass or porcelain. Now and then it’s like I’m getting a slight electric shock. Like there is static all around me.
Where the hell am I?
I feel sick, desperately struggle to open my eyes again but can only make out silhouettes and if I’m not wrong there are two figures moving around in front of me.
Oh god. This can’t be happening!
Awkwardly and unsteady I get up on my knees, reach for the little knife in my pocket. But before I can get it, a hand grabs my shoulder roughly.
“Don’t even try,” somebody behind me says then takes both my upper arms and drags me to my feet. “Just do as we say and you’re gonna be fine.”
No way.
I swallow, want to fight the dude, just kick him in the balls and run. But here I am, shaking, not able to move at all. Like an idiot. My lips are trembling like I’m a coward.
“So?” The guy behind me sounds impatient. “Can we go?”
“What the hell, dude? You just grabbed a random girl?” One of the others groans. “She’s still a kid! Are you stupid?”
I blink some more, try to make out the men but the light is still so bright, I can barely open my eyes.
“The portal was collapsing, what was I supposed to do? He said just get a human from the other side. Right?” The guy behind me shrugs. “Here is a random human from the other side. And just in time. Look at the portal. Getting it up and running again will take some time.”
“Yeah, I’m pretty sure we should hurry up to get back to the other side.” This is the second guy in front of me, talking for the first time, sounding calmer than the other one. “Who knows how long this is gonna hold up.”
“Yeah, let’s hurry.” The guy pushes me which almost makes me fall over my own feet, but I catch myself, hold my breath.
“Where am I?” My voice is barely more than a whisper.
“Come on, guys, hurry up!” One of the others calls.
“Where are you taking me?” My voice is shaking, stupidly scared.
“Hurry, girl. We gotta get out of here.”
“Out of where?”
Nobody answers me. Instead, I’m being rushed so much, I have to start running. The patterns around me start taking a little more shape, but they don’t make much more sense than the brightness itself. It’s just light in different shapes and like scattered lanterns and clouds floats in the air. Below us is a floor that seems to be made out of glass, spreading into infinity around us.
“There!” Somebody shouts and we run even faster. “Quick! It’s flickering!”
I see enough now to spot a blue circle like I saw in the alley. We’re running right into it and … through it.
Little electric shocks hit my body. Then suddenly it’s like I’m floating but there is no air, so I can’t breathe. Until I hit the floor again, roll a few feet on dusty ground. I cough, almost wheezing, and sit up in a cloud of dust from the ground. The brightness is suddenly gone. Instead, I see cloudy daylight. The blue screen shortly flickers in front of us before it disappears completely.
The first thing that really throws me off, is the air. It’s dry and hot and smelly. But not smelly like the alley I was just in, more like a dusty, muddy kind of smell. And it’s all dry.
None of which makes sense.
I was just in the middle of a city that basically has drizzling weather all day every day.
Where the hell am I?
Quickly, I get up on my feet. The guys that brought me here are groaning on the ground. And all I have is this one split second before they get up.
That’s when I run. The only thing I’m good at.
I run and I don’t stop.
Everything looks strange and unfamiliar. The ground is black and grey dusty sand almost like a desert. The buildings are made of stone, one beside the next, as if they were part of each other, part of the surrounding rock formations. I must be far, so far from my hometown.
How could we have travelled so far in such a short amount of time?
When I spot the first group of people, I head straight for them but before I can ask for help, my voice gets stuck in my throat, and I stop suddenly. My eyes go wide, and I feel dizzy. For a moment, the world just stops.
What the … ?
These are not people. They are … I swallow hard when I spot beings, I can only describe as alien lifeforms. Aliens?
Some of them have, uhm … weird animal heads? Some of them have red or green skin colors with or without horns. Some of them wear amor or hide their faces below helmets.
They remind me of something I have seen before. A movie or something.
Suddenly the world seems to turn sideways all around me, and I feel sick to the stomach. Because I understand: I am not really here. This is my unconsciousness. This is something my mind is making up based on a childhood memory. My thoughts are stumbling all over each other and I feel sicker every second. Either I got electrocuted from that electric field or they drugged me.
This must be some kind of dream or hallucination. Because this cannot be reality. I hold on to the wall of a building beside me, nod to convince myself.
“This isn’t real, this isn’t real, this isn’t real.” As if saying it out loud would help.
It’s strange to know this is not real. I mean, sometimes this happens with dreams, but it’s rare. No wonder I couldn’t really see earlier. No wonder I feel so exhausted. I take a deep breath.
Does this mean I don’t have to run anymore? I mean, I could wake up any minute, right?
Still, my stomach drops when I hear people running and voices calling out. Them.
The thing is: Even is this isn’t real, I don’t wanna get caught. I don’t want this to turn in a nightmare if it isn’t already one.
Quickly, I slip into the next alley, run down the path, noticing people … beings … watch me curiously – because it seems that here, I’m the odd one out. I swallow, don’t feel like I have time to care.
I keep running down a path that doesn’t seem to end. Until it does. Which is when I freeze, feeling the fear creep up by body.
No, no, no.
I look around breathing much too short breaths, until I spot a small space between two of the houses. In between there is a big metal kind of box, something like a trashcan I assume. I squeeze behind it, hold my breath when I notice the stench and hold it as long as I can, only to almost puke when I can’t anymore. I press a hand onto my nose and mouth and try to relax for a second, take deep breaths while focusing hard to ignore the smell.
I slide down at the wall behind me, lean my head on my legs. Then I take a deep breath, fight the sour feeling in my throat and stomach. How do I wake myself up now?
I need to wake up!
Especially, if they are still with me back in the awake-world. The real world. I need to wake up and get away. Or am I in a hospital? In a coma even? Well shit, that definitely won’t be covered by the joke of an insurance.
I press my lips and eyes together, try to dream myself away from here, try to dream myself awake. But when I open my eyes again, I’m still here.
“She must be around here.”
The voice startles me. It’s way too close. I get up again, dare to glance back to the street. Shit. They are coming this way! I make myself as small as possible, listen to their steps to their talking, hold my breath until there is only static and the loud thumping of my heart left to listen to.
Then it gets quiet.
And when I hear them push the big metal box away, my heart sinks.
“We’re professionals, girl. You didn’t think it would be that easy, did you?” In front of me appears a bearded guy, face full of scars and an eye patch. I swallow. What are they supposed to be?
Before I can jump or run or whatever, he grabs me by the arm and drags me out of the little hideout. I push to get myself out of his grip, wiggle around and finally do the only thing my desperation leaves me to do: I spit at him.
“What the hell?!” He shouts and just a second later his hand slaps my face.
I press my eyes and lips together, swallow the scream, swallow the pain that’s spreading through the right side of my face. I’m not gonna give that to him.
That’s when somebody else pulls at my other arm.
“Shit, are you stupid? We’re supposed to leave her unharmed.” The person sounds annoyed and helps me to stand up. “Now what if we don’t get the full amount, shithead?”
“That bitch fucking spat at me!” The other guy retorts angrily but the other guy grunts annoyed.
“So what? People spit at you all the time. Hell, you spit in people’s faces. So shut the fuck up and watch our backs before somebody interferes.”
His grip is tight and when I don’t move fast enough, he almost drags me.
“Come on, girl, just move and this all will be over in the blink of an eyes, will ya?” He looks at me and I look at him defiantly. His face isn’t as old and covered in scars, but his gaze is piercing.
“Why am I here?” I try once more which makes him smile.
“You’ll see.” Then he shrugs. “We’re just the delivery guys. So even if I wanted to, I wouldn’t be able to tell you.”
I swallow.
So, they are what? Mercenaries?
I want to do more but I barely put up a fight when he drags me through town. I’m just stupefied. What can I do? Where can I run to? This dream is going on way too long and I really want out. I don’t wanna find out where they are taking me. They abducted me. Me. Of all people. Why? I’m a nobody.
I’m starting to feel fear creep up my spine. Usually you know when you’re awake, right? And I feel so awake. But I can’t. This can’t be real. Right? Right. No need to feel scared.
I take a deep breath.
The guy leads me into one of the alley ways, down some stairs. We stop in front of a metal door where a robot camera thingy looks at us and says something in a weird language. The guy holds up some kind of token and not even a minute later we get inside.
A bulky robot leads us through a dark hallway. I frown and from one moment to the next I feel a sense of insecurity. I feel dizzy, realizing I won’t get out of here. Oh god. Even if I somehow free myself from these guys. I won’t get out of here. Will I?
The door in front of us opens and out come – holy shit! – two real life stormtroopers.
Stormtroopers!!!
What.
I can’t …
Suddenly I can’t breathe.
Stormtroopers ... No, no, no, no. I’m going crazy. Why? How would my brain even come up with this? I haven’t even paid attention when I watched those movies. They were always way too long, way too slow paced to keep up. Is it because that girl showed me this other show the other day? With the guy in the full body armor? No way. This is … okay, this is a dream. It’s okay. I breathe, keep breathing. Not real, not real, not real.
“Finally!” one of them grumbles. “Took you long enough.”
A stormtrooper takes me by the arm and pushes me to the door. The other looks at the mercenaries.
“She was supposed to be unharmed,” he notes before handing them a sack of what I assume is money.
“Oh, come on. It was just a little slap. She was being a bitch. Needed to a learn a lesson,” the eyepatch dude complains.
The stormtrooper shakes his head but gives him the money anyways. So much for “unharmed”, huh? Fuck those people.
So, that’s it.
They get their money and leave me here. Wow.
When the stormtrooper pushes me through the door, when the door closes behind us, I feel like my knees will give in. It’s cold inside and more stormtroopers are looking at me. All in exactly the same suit. I try to stall, but they keep pushing me to the other side of the room, where a science-y guy with big round glasses is looking me up and down, curiously.
“This is her?” he wants to know.
“Yes,” the trooper confirms.
“Where did they take her from?” he wants to know, makes eye contact with me. I feel like there’s sympathy in his eyes, but at the same time I feel trapped, and I know, I just know being here isn’t a good thing. At all.
Even worse: It might be better to run for my life. But the room barely has windows, the doors are closed.
“We didn’t ask. I think is was random,” one of the troopers admits.
“Alright.” The big glasses guy nods, sighs slightly then sizes me up and down.
I swallow, want to take a step back but the trooper doesn’t let me.
“What is this?” I want to know, lick my lips nervously while scanning the room for any ways to escape.
“I’m sorry. Uh … we didn’t mean for you to be taken like that. We just didn’t have the time and we just want to run some tests. Because …” He sighs. “Well. This is a little complicated. But please believe me, nothing bad will happen to you. We just need to find out if you being here will help us in any way.” He reaches out to me with his hand, his expression full of warmth and kindness. Which could all be completely fake. “Also, I specifically wanted them to not harm you. Sorry for that.”
I swallow. “Guess, I had it coming. But I want to know why the hell I am here! Why did you kidnap me? What is this place?” My voice sounds shakier and angrier than I want to admit. This isn’t real. But being pushed around and feeling helpless seems damn real right now.
The big glasses guy nods understandingly.
“Let’s get you a glass of water and something to eat first, huh? And then I can explain. Is that okay?” He points to the door he is standing in front of and looks at me patiently.
Once again, I don’t feel like I have much of a choice.
“Dr. Pershing!” One of the troopers wants to follow us, but the guy shakes his head.
“It’s okay,” he says. “Let me talk to her.”
When he leads me inside the other room and the stormtroopers stay back, I feel a little less tense.
Dr. Pershing – that’s the name the other guy just said, right? – leads me to a table and offers a glass of water. He does not remove my cuffs, which makes me uncomfortable. I only take a sip that feels like heaven but don’t want to show him how desperate I am.
I keep my head held high instead.
“So?” I demand.
He walks around, nods, prepares something on a table. I wait more patiently than I want to, until he comes back and puts some cut up fruits in front of me.
“Do you want to eat first?” he asks with an encouraging smile.
I bite my lips but after a long day and this chase I do feel like I’m starving. So, I give in. Might as well treat myself in this madness. The fruits seem odd but taste nice and sweet, like pears and apples. Delicious. And way too good. Way too real.
I close my eyes for a moment, take a deep breath.
“Why am I here? And where is here?” I demand again.
He crosses his arms behind his back, walks a few steps and then looks at me again.
“We have taken you to our world, to-”
“What do you mean with ‘our world’?” I want to know, feeling my hands go colder.
“Well, I think the easiest construct to understand this best would be something like … hm, say, dimensional travel?” The doctor frowns a little, seems deep in thought for a few seconds. Then he smiles at me. “We live in this galaxy that might or might not be far away from yours. But at the same time so close we can almost walk into each other. Not through space or time, but through the layers of the multiple dimensions that are intertwining everywhere and at any time. This has only been discovered a short while ago and hasn’t been fully researched or developed. So, the portal we created to connect our worlds couldn’t hold up for more than a few minutes. Which is why this might feel very random to you. And it truthfully is.” He looks at me more closely. “But we are looking for something that has become sparse in our galaxy. And we need to find out, if the right conditions might be given in the DNA of this other dimension. In your DNA.”
I just stare at him for a moment. For a few moments. Somehow, I understand and somehow, I don’t. My head is spinning. My breaths are growing shorter, faster.
This is … this still isn’t real. This is like super creative. My mind must be super creative. This is crazy. Crazy enough to come from a fucked-up youth like me I suppose.
That’s why I laugh. Because this has been going on far too long. I look up to the ceiling.
“Okay, time to wake up. Come on, Jess. Wake the fuck up!” I shake my head. “I got it. This was fun. But I’m done now. This is it.” I keep laughing.
“I’m sorry, I know this is a lot to take in …” The doctor tries to get my attention, but I just roll my eyes, keep looking at the ceiling.
“I get it, okay? Wake the fuck up now, Jess!”
“Sorry, Jess. That’s your name, right? I …” He touches my arm, which makes me jump back from him.
“Don’t touch me!” I shout. “You’re not real! None of this is! This isn’t reality! I’m just stuck in some kind of stupid dream. This is bullshit!” I keep going backwards, keep looking up, until I reach a wall. I shake my head and suddenly I feel dizzy.
The world is spinning around me. Is this me waking up? Come on, this must be me finally waking up, right?
The spinning won’t stop. I might be falling. Or not?
Somebody is pulling me by the arm.
There is something cold at my neck. Pinching me.
For a moment I can’t breathe. And then everything goes dark.