I couldn’t sleep.

Even after everything that happened, even though I was exhausted beyond belief, I just lay there, mind racing. Whenever I closed my eyes all I could see was the void. Not just see it, but also taste it, smell it, feel it. The cold, clammy skin-crawling creepiness of that vast abyss. It ate at my psyche. My leg still throbbed and burned where the tentacular suckers had eaten into my flesh. As soon as my eyelids closed I was back in the Void Dungeon. Even though I had actually been killed that very day, the thing that haunted me more was the endless, soul-chilling void.

There was no way I was going to fall asleep like that. I figured I may as well take a bath. Maybe it’d help my leg, too.

I liked that big, communal bath, but after slipping into the hot water, just me and the rising steam, I decided I really liked having it all to myself.

That’s when I heard the singing. A sweet, melodic voice as clear as though it was coming from right beside me. It wasn’t, though. It was coming to me filtered through the wall that separated me from the women’s bath on the other side.

Wow, you really could hear everything on the other side.

It was Jane, of course. She must’ve had the same idea I did, of escaping her memories of the void in the soothing warmth of the bath. I waited until her song was over.

“That was really beautiful, Jane,” I said.

I heard a splash and a splutter through the wall. “Jesus! Daniel, is that you? Don’t do that.”

“You deserve worse,” I said.

“That’s a fair point,” she said, “but you scared the crap out of me, and I’m jumpy enough already.” I was sitting with my back to the wall between us, and it sounded like she was doing the same, right behind me.

“Can’t sleep?”

“I can’t stop thinking about that place. What about you?”

“Same.”

“Talk to me,” she said “Take my mind off it.”

“Okay, what do you want me to talk about?”

“Anything. Tell me about how you ended up in Toronto.”

“How do you know I’m not from the city originally?”

“Please,” she said, “you’ve got bumpkin written all over you. Let me guess, you came because of a girl.”

“I hate that you’re right,” I said.

She laughed. “Get used to it.”

“Right. Well, it was only about five or six months ago. My then-girlfriend surprised me by saying she wanted to move to the city. She’d always said she hated Toronto, but all of a sudden she wanted to go. I went first, alone, to find us an apartment, then she came after I got everything set up. And after I’d paid for it all. Mostly on my credit card.”

“Ouch.”

“Yeah, yeah, I am well aware that I am an idiot.”

“Good, saves me from having to say it,” Jane said.

“So anyway, she shows up, stays with me for a few weeks, then she breaks up with me and asks me to move out.”

“No.”

“Which I did.”

“No.”

“Because I am a motherloving idiot.”

Although I couldn’t see her, I could clearly picture the look on Jane’s face when I heard her sigh. “Yes.”

“You could at least have the decency to disagree, you know.”

She laughed.

“Yeah, well, it gets worse,” I said.

“Oh dear.”

“It wasn’t until I went back to the apartment a couple of days later to get a few things I forgot to take with me that I saw the new guy. He’d already moved in. It was someone she’d apparently met online a few months before.”

“Ah,” Jane said. “The interest in moving to Toronto suddenly makes sense.”

“I’m not bitter, honest. I mean, bullet dodged, am I right?”

“That’s a healthy way of looking at it,” Jane said. “Better than beating yourself up over it, anyway.”

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

“Oh, I still do that. Pretty much daily.”

“I can see that. What do you do for work?”

“I’m a teacher. Well, sort of. When we moved, I applied for teaching positions in the city — high school, I can’t handle the younger kids, they scare me — but any vacant position had already been scooped up by teachers with seniority. I only just graduated from teacher’s college in the spring. I’ve been getting by as a supply teacher, never knowing each morning if I’m going in to work, let alone where.”

“What subjects?”

“Pretty much all of them. I took a bit of a meandering route through undergrad — some might call it indecisive, but I prefer to think of it as cultivating versatility — so I’ve got credentials in a bunch of subjects.”

“So smart at school but dumb at life, then,” she said.

“Ouch.”

“It only hurts because it’s true.”

“What about you?” I said.

“I’m a city girl, born and raised. Average family. A mom and a dad and a big brother. I’ve always known what I wanted to do ever since I was a little girl.”

“Actress, right?”

“Partly right. I want to do it all: sing, dance, act, write, direct, produce, the whole shebang. I did a bit of child acting, commercials mostly, and some amateur stage stuff, so I’ve sort of got a foot in the door. But it’s mostly been bit parts here and there, nothing big. Well, that is, I was...”

She was about to say something else, but trailed off, like she’d changed her mind. If I was a pushier person I might have asked about it. It’s not that I lack curiosity, I just don’t like making people uncomfortable. If someone looks like they don’t want to talk about something, I’m not gonna pressure them. So I switched topics.

“How’d you end up as a booth babe at a nerd convention?”

“Through the modeling agency, same as Sigrid.”

“Have you known her for long?”

“We met through the agency, years ago. We did some kid catalog shoots together and clicked. Been best buds ever since.”

“That’s cool,” I said.

There was a short lull in the conversation.

“Aren’t you going to ask?” Jane said eventually.

“Ask what?”

“About my boyfriend.”

“Am I supposed to?”

“Most guys do.”

“Fine. Please tell me about your boyfriend.”

“I don’t have one.”

“So why did you...? Argh.”

She laughed. “Aren’t you going to ask me why?”

“Nope. I already know why.”

“Do you now?”

“Uh huh.” There were lots of things I could’ve said there, any number of jokes I could’ve made at her expense. I’m sure that’s what she was expecting. I decided to go with the truth instead. “You don’t need one,” I said.

That was met with a long silence.

“Maybe you’re not a complete idiot after all,” she said finally.

“Jane?”

“Yeah?”

“I’m sorry.”

“Why?”

“That you’re here.”

“Don’t be. It’s not like it’s your fault.”

I felt a stabbing sensation deep in my soul. If there was a time to come clean about my complicity in her and Sigrid being isekai’d, that was the time. I chickened out, of course.

“You must be keen to get home,” I said.

“Trying to get rid of me so soon? I’m hurt.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“I know.”

It was on the tip of my tongue to say that I was glad she was there, but again, I chickened out.

“Hey Daniel? Do you have any idea why we’re here?”

“You mean besides to play games?”

“This seems like an awful lot of effort for a bunch of aliens to go through just to set up some games for a couple hundred humans. What’s really going on?”

“Do you know what an isekai is, Jane?”

“Besides being the name for the convention? Nope. It’s Japanese, right?”

“Right. This might help you make a bit more sense of things.” I went on to tell her about isekai stories, trying not to get too pedantic and gloss over the nerdy details. I focused on how a lot of them start with people being summoned to another world against their will, for obvious reasons.

“Are there really all these stories about this stuff?”

“A lot of people complain about the glut of isekai stories flooding the market, but they’re still crazy popular.”

“And you think this whole place is based on those stories?”

“I know it. Everything here is based on a game or a book or a comic or a movie or a series back home.”

“But...why?”

“That’s the big question, isn’t it?”

“What do you think?”

I thought carefully before answering. “I have some ideas, but nothing I can prove yet.”

“Humor me.”

“Usually when people are summoned to another world it’s because that world needs heroes to rescue it from some threat. I don’t think that’s the case here, things just don’t add up. I think we’re being tested.”

“Tested? Why? By who?”

I almost corrected her grammar, but caught myself.

“That part I haven’t figured out yet.”

“You will,” she said. “I have faith.”

I honestly didn’t know what to say to that, so I stayed quiet, thankful for the wall that separated us and prevented her from seeing how happy I was.

We didn’t talk much after that, but sat in companionable quiet for a while, each on our own side of the bath. I forgot the wall was even there. Eventually, I was woken up by someone thumping on it from the other side.

“Don’t fall asleep in the bath you dolt,” Jane shouted. “How many times do you intend to die in one day?”

I took my time getting out and drying off. Jane was waiting for me outside, wrapped in a white towel, long red hair pinned up, pale skin still flushed pink from the heat of the bath.

“For the record,” she said, “I could have a boyfriend if I wanted one.”

“I have absolutely no doubt that’s true,” I said.

“It’s just that some people are better when they’re not in a relationship.”

“I suspect you may be right about that too, but I like to believe that has more to do with finding the right person.”

“Someone like Siobhan?”

“I’ll see you in the morning, Jane. Sweet dreams.”

“You too, Daniel.”

It was with an unfamiliar sense of optimism that I finally fell asleep in my bed. It felt strange, but I was actually looking forward to waking up in the morning. I just didn’t expect it to come so quickly.