an arrival

When you wake up, you don’t know where you are. You’re laying splayed across an uncomfortable, tattered bed inside a ruined building in the midst of being reclaimed by nature. The last thing you remember was trying to walk home, seeing a flash of headlights before things went dark.

Your entire body hurts and you’re pretty sure you can’t move at least one of your legs.

It occurs to you that you could have died, right then and there, and your sister would have gone absolutely berserk. But now you don’t know if you’re even on Earth anymore. It’s dark enough you can see every star in the sky, but they aren’t your stars at all. You can’t count the constellations or find the north star to guide you home. A mote of light suspended in the air dances around you, just bright enough to hurt your light-sensitive eyes.

You are definitely not on Earth anymore.

But where are you? A dying dream? No, this feels too real. Everything is too sharp, and nothing hurts in a dream anyway.

You sit up as best you can, bruised and battered as you are. You reach into the bag you were carrying on you and pull out your trusted Magic deck. White, Blue and Red, your favorite combination. Sitting on the top of the pile is a card colored red and blue depicting a man with graying hair standing on a rooftop, a thunderstorm blazing behind him.

… Have you planeswalked?

Of all the things that could be real, could it be that? You focus your thoughts and try to tear into the Blind Eternities to find your way home, but you doubt you can get home that way to a planet with no mana to speak of, not even colorless.

No dice, anyway. You’re stuck here. You guess it can’t be planeswalking.

Have you crossed the Void? Did you fall through an errant book of ages? It occurs to you your weird and niche interests as you try to make your clearly broken leg move.

It’s hard to breathe, your chest hurts. You manage to stand, and you only barely can keep yourself upright. You figure you’ll shrug off the pain eventually, and try to find your way out of the ruined building.

When you find your way out of what you assume to be the back of it, you’re standing before a glimmering moonlit lake, with those same points of light dancing over the top of it. There’s a strangeness in the air, that feels like what you’ve always assumed magic felt like. You can see across it, to a cave with lanterns hanging just outside it, and decide you can probably make your way there. Probably.

It’s a long walk, and it hurts like hell. By the time you get there, your leg has completely given out, and you fall to the dirt below. Not much knowing what else you can do, you call into the cave for help. The lanterns on either side are lit, surely there must be something to that.

You hear footsteps from within, and rest your head against the cold, cold earth. Your head is spinning and you’re starting to get spots in your vision and the coolness of the dirt at night eases you. You feel as if you could pass out on the spot.

In fact, you don’t end up seeing who picks you up. You can feel them, though, and you’re confused. You feel patches of scales against the parts of your skin that are bare. You see the shadow of horns and wings in the lantern-light against the wall. Your first thought is that this is a demon and it’s your own damn fault for calling into a cave when you don’t know where you are. If this is how you die, your sister will never know.

A surge of panic races into you as you remember your sister.

Oh no.

If you never come back, she’ll tear apart the earth looking for you. Well, that’s a mess, isn’t it. But somehow, some way, you can feel her. In your mind, in your soul. You know you can. You aren’t sure how.

Whoever’s got you carries you into a tunnel full of ancient ruins, each of which assure you that you are definitely not on earth anymore. You wonder if this is how those game theories about the main character being in a coma start. She brings you into one in particular, with a symbol you don’t recognize carved into it. She places you before something you never thought you’d see in front of you, not in real life.

A dragon.

With obsidian scales speckled with deep reds, the dragon regards you with what you assume to be curiosity, and speaks in a low rumble that resonates through the cave.

“Where did you find this, Tempest?”

“I think she came from the ruins across the lake. I heard her calling for help. I’ve never seen her before.”

You, bleary-eyed, turn your head to look at this ‘Tempest’ character. You’re shocked to look upon her – a tawny-skined woman covered in patches of dark red scales, with a thrashing tail and broad wings at her back, and raked back horns. That isn’t a demon at all, she’s half dragon.

“Hmmm. I cannot smell the traces of ether on her. Intriguing.”

“That’s… odd.”

You finally find your voice again, and you use it to ask what exactly ether is.

“And there is my answer.” The dragon laughs. “A new little shadowling arrives on our world of Divixus! I don’t know how much you’re willing to let an old sack of scales like me talk at you, but I suppose a briefing is in order. Fetch the doctors, if you would, my child. This one is wounded.”

You briefly think about your sister again. You’ve landed on a completely new world. She would absolutely lose her shit if she was here. Magic! Dragons! And they’re all technically aliens!

The dragon begins to speak, telling you tales of the angels, of gem-beings, and of sealed off demons. Of vampires and of the races raised from animals. You learn of ether, of magic, of the power of the soul. You learn of the kingdoms of elements…

… and you learn that getting hit by a car makes one very very tired.

Somewhere in his sea of words, you fall right asleep, still unsure if you’re dreaming this or not. You guess you’ll find out.