Blam. Blam. Blam.

Nell woke to the sound of a fist beating against her bathroom’s rightmost door. She blinked blearily in the fluorescent light of the room before lifting her head from the back of the tub and letting out a groan.

“What? What do you want?”

The knocking paused for a moment, then redoubled in intensity, the person on the other side giving no audible response.

Bringing a hand to her face, Nell dragged it down with a long, suffering sigh. Peace and quiet — two words that were altogether too rare in execution over the last couple of days. There were just too many people getting themselves into trouble, all one after the other.

Or perhaps there were just more being sent to her.

Grabbing hold of the lip of the tub, Nell heaved herself onto its side. Then, carefully, she stepped out onto the tile floor, ignoring the continued hammering of her door. She’d slipped before, trying to stand more quickly than her body could adjust.

Nell shook her head at the memory, pulling down at her shirt before giving herself a cursory check in the mirror. Her hair was a mess, her shirt remained askew, and the dark circles under her eyes had only grown worse. She snorted, then went to open the door; she was decent, and she doubted anyone on the other side would care.

Releasing the lock, Nell twisted open the door and blasted herself with a face full of light. She winced, raising a hand in muted exasperation. A massive, orangish-red sun faced her, crested just over the distant horizon. Early-morning. They always seemed to need help right as the sun began to rise.

Still blinking the spots from her eyes, Nell scowled around at the immediate space beyond the door’s frame. Two strangers stood before her. The first was young and clad in leathered armor, while the second was old, covered almost entirely by a robe. They gaped at her, then at the brightly lit room behind her frame.

Nell took the opportunity to look past them in turn. The wind that blew in from the open door was chill, and beyond the two individuals lay swaths of sand. Hills of it, actually. Nell could see a couple of different plants – short, scraggly things, with shoots more brown than green -- and a half-dozen rocks in the region beyond, but for the most part, everything beyond the door was sand.

“A desert. Yeah, that would figure. Never been a fan of those.” Flicking her eyes back down to the two people in front of her, Nell waved a hand. “Anywho — hey! What do you need? Food, water, or —” She cut off as the one in armor tried to dart past her and into the bathroom, only to be stopped cold at the doorway.

There was a flash of blue, and Nell cringed as the man’s armor-clad body was flung back against the sand. She never remembered to warn them first. “Fuck, you okay? The door thing got me too, the first time.” Her foot tapped against the ground in tired embarrassment. In all fairness, they were unlikely to have understood a warning either way, but the point remained; being slapped back by the doorway was an unpleasant experience.

Sputtering out a series of words Nel didn’t understand, the armored man pushed himself back onto his feet. He scrambled forwards, then skid to a stop in front of the door again, causing a small wave of sand to overflow onto the bathroom’s tile floor. Nell made another face at the mess.

“Nope. Still don’t know the language.”

She shrugged, then went through the motions, pretending to have missed the small flash of flames that’d briefly appeared in the robed figure’s palm. Holding up a hand, Nel gestured for both the armored man and the robed woman to wait. Then, making sure she had their full attention, she pointed towards the flask at the man’s waist and mimed drinking.

His face went red, and he started yelling again.

Somewhat annoyed now, Nell ran a hand through her hair and let out a frustrated sigh. The hotheaded ones were always the most troublesome, but she was glad, at least, that he hadn’t tried unsheathing his sword. Ignoring him for the time being, she pivoted to the older woman and repeated the same set of actions.

To her credit, the woman in the robes seemed to make an effort to understand. After a moment, however, she appeared to make the same mistake her companion had. Frowning from beneath the slight shadows of her hood, she unwrapped a water flask’s strap from around her neck and uncorked the bottle. She shrugged helplessly, then tilted it so that the mouth faced the sand.

Empty. No water to share. No water to pay with.

Nell slumped in relief. “Oh, thank gods.” She’d expected it, given the desert behind them, but water issues were always of the easier ones to address. Sometimes it’d be food or specific tools, and her house really wasn’t stocked for that right now. Flipping around, she continued to ignore the armored man’s still-ongoing yelling and reached across to the bathroom sink. She gestured from the flask in the robed woman’s hand back to the tap with deliberate pointedness.

Then she turned on the water.

There was a brief pause, then finally silence, as the armored man’s mouth closed with a decided click. Nell watched as he straightened, flushed, and stepped away from the door’s frame, seeming to realize what she’d actually been attempting to communicate. Nell did her best to muffle her snort.

Things proceeded more quickly from there. With minimum poking and prodding from his older companion, the armored man was convinced to pass his water flask through the door with hers. They nudged the flasks over with their boots, and Nell picked them on the other side, observing the two as she did so.

Turning away with both in hand, Nell walked back to the bathroom sink. She twisted the tap, placed the canteen beneath the spout, and crossed her arms to wait. It’d take a minute to fill— drawbacks of the house’s low water pressure.

From the corner of her eye, Nell could see the robed woman shuffling around the frame of the door to peer into the bathroom. There wasn’t much to see given its size, but she seemed fairly enthralled by what was there, with the fluorescent lighting and full-length mirror holding the brunt of her attention. Shrugging to herself, Nell tried to avoid blocking the woman’s sight while the two’s flasks filled. Others had had much the same reaction.

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

For her own interests, however, Nell took the time to observe the two travelers. It was an activity she’d grown to enjoy. While the man in the armor was an evident variation of a soldier or knight, the older woman was something of a mystery. Or, if not a mystery, she was at least a bit of a challenge.

Cocking her head to the side, Nell squinted at the other woman’s robe. Were she to hazard a guess, she’d assume the woman to be a mage rather than a priestess. Her sleeves’ ends were burnt, and while that wasn’t a sure thing, it was usually a pretty reliable tell. The mages had a thing about fire.

Still, other possibilities included the woman being a shaman or a weaver, but Nell figured those options to be less likely by more than a few degrees. Shamans didn’t usually have issues in conjuring up a bit of water, and compared to the few weavers she’d had the chance to help or see, the woman here was more... contained. More put together and sane, one might say.

Nell nodded sagely to herself as the first flask began to overflow. Switching it for the second one, she corked the top and brought it back to the door, holding it carefully to ensure that the leather strap dangled past the door frame without actually moving past it herself. The barrier didn’t tend to react as strongly when she brushed against it, but it still hurt like hell.

Taking hold of the canteen’s strap, the robed woman clapped her hands together and smiled, spitting out a stream of words Nell didn’t understand. Nell returned her smile and threw a quick thumbs-up. As much as she could assume their thanks, the language barrier still made things somewhat awkward.

Frankly speaking, Nell wasn’t sure if the different people she’d helped spoke the same language. Or even if any two languages had been shared. She’d been spoken to often and in similar ways, but the words never quite lined up, with their meaning warped before she could make sense of them.

Still, it hardly mattered. Verbal communication would make Nell’s work easier, but it was rarely an issue for things as simple as this. More than anything else, the real lifeblood of her activities with these people was pantomime, gestures, and—

Nell blinked, spinning around.

And her journal, which she’d put… there!

Keeping an eye on the second water flask, still only a third full in the sink, Nell picked her journal off the floor and flipped to an ear-marked page. After procuring a pen from one of her pockets, she scribbled down the main points of the encounter so far.

Early Morning. Desert Hills. Two travelers in need of water. Knight and Mage(?) – unclear but likely.

Conflict encountered: …

Nell paused at that, tapping the pen in thought before shooting a quick glance at the armored individual still standing in front of her door.

Conflict encountered: None.

It hadn’t been anything serious: an accident and some blustering from the man.

Difficulty of request: Trivial.

Resupply necessary: None.

Familiar territory? No.

There. Nell put down the pen and shut the book. They weren’t intended to be much, just short notes to help her remember—brief descriptions of who she’d helped, for whatever reason she was able to do so. Though it had to be said, not many were as easy and straightforward as this.

Nell grinned toothily, then shook her head back into focus. The second flask was overflowing in her sink. Plucking the bag of treated leather out and turning off the tap, she corked the container before passing it to the man on the other side.

He was careful, this time, not to pass by the boundary of the door.

And with that, Nell’s job was done. She smiled brightly as the robed woman offered her a coin through the doorframe, then proceeded to wince as the two bowed in thanks. Nell bobbed her head by way of reply.

Of all the customs these people had, bowing was still not something she was particularly used to.

Finally, though, Nell watched the two as they walked away. They were heading... North, judging by the sun. Not that that meant much to her. For all that she was used to the situation, she was pretty sure the door had never landed here before.

She’d acted as a signal at the top of mountains, passed people candles deep underground, handed out food aboard numerous different ships, and appeared in quite a few other deserts. This one specifically, though? No, probably not.

Stretching and then cracking her neck, Nell eyed the coin the two had given her. It was silvery — probably a coating — and had an engraving of a tree that sprouted from its center, only to curl around to the opposite side. She smiled briefly, then stacked it onto a pile with the others, all lined up across the bathroom’s counter. They were friendly people, generally speaking. Some were a bit rash, like the man in armor, but by and large, she enjoyed the opportunity to help those who found the door when it moved.

Rocking against the back of her heels, Nell let her eyes roam the desert outside again. It looked nice out there. Sand-swept dunes, rocky outcroppings, and – now that she had the time to look for them -- several flourishing plants beyond the scraggles she’d already identified. Foreign. Interesting.

And cold.

Nell shivered and shut the door. She needed to turn up the house’s temperature. Probably grab a couple of Tylenol too. Her neck hurt from falling asleep while she waited in the tub; she’d be sure to bring a pillow the next time that seemed like a good idea.

Shaking herself loose, Nell looked around at the bathroom and sighed. The tile floor was covered in sand again. It was better than the few instances of when she’d appeared in a swamp but altogether equally painful to clean.

Slouching in on herself, Nell left the bathroom to grab a broom. Next time, perhaps, the door would show up in another flower field, where all the people needed was a shovel. Or maybe a greenwood forest — for those had been particularly nice.

Nell bent back her head and let out a contented sigh. Trips to places outside the norm, with interesting people and things to see. It wasn’t always pretty, and there wasn’t a whole lot she could actually do to interact with the places, but things were impressive nonetheless.

After walking down the main hallway, Nell passed by the kitchen and opened a closet near the front door. She peeked outside as she fumbled with a dustpan.

Things in the neighborhood were normal. Very, very, normal. There were no knights in armor, no mages in robes, and really... not a lot going on. Children were biking down the block, and there were more than a few different joggers and at least one dog, but still. It was tamer and plain in a way that almost felt… disappointing.

But perhaps that was a good thing. Nell frowned as she made her way back to the bathroom, kneeling to begin sweeping up the sand. The world beyond the door wasn’t so safe as she liked to imagine, whether the magic barrier was there to separate it from her or not. Everyday objects still passed through the doorway, letting her provide her help, but so did weapons, liquids, projectiles…

Nell shivered and relaxed her grip on the dustpan, rubbing at her shoulder.

Not everyone on the other side was open to communication, and she’d had her fair share of negative encounters to go with the good. Tilting her head towards the journal on the counter, Nell winced, thinking back to one of the first entries on the list.

Midday. Open plains. City in the background. Three men, two injured and bleeding. Merchant Class—on edge and desperate.

Offered support. Threatened for additional help. Unable to supply more than what I had on hand.

Shot by crossbow before the door could close.

She’d written the entry a few days after the fact, with it being one of the first things she’d done after being released from the hospital, but for a while, the experience had put her off responding to the door. She had turned her back to check below the sink for additional medical supplies, and one of the men had taken the opportunity to shoot her, perhaps thinking they’d be able to get inside the room if she died.

They’d missed their shot, fortunately, and only hit her upper shoulder. She’d managed to kick closed the door after that, and while the arrow had been difficult to explain when paramedics arrived, it ultimately hadn’t been life-threatening.

Nell snorted, returning to the sand on the floor.

There were dangers, helping out people from another world-- not exactly unexpected. Still, her situation was a good one, and she enjoyed what she did. She’d leave to buy food in another hour or two. Just in case the next group to find the door needed the supplies.