Falling

Pain.

Tri-layered ocean of colours.

PAIN.

Blue and green orb with 2 dots and a ring around it.

PAIN!

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I jerked awake, my nerves feeling like someone had poured acid on them all at once. I screamed and writhed as pain wracked through every part of my body.

“Deaden Pain.” Somebody whispered beside me. The abrupt release of the agony plunged me back into blissful unconsciousness.

I slowly came back to consciousness expecting the pain to return at any moment. When it didn’t, I gently opened my eyes to take a look. At first, the light was blinding, but my eyes gradually adapted to it, and I could finally see where I was.

I was lying, tucked into a soft, what looked to be linen bed. I looked around at the room I was in and immediately noticed a couple of things that were a bit off. First, although there were lines of other beds in the room, all of them were empty. Second, there was no one else in the room. And lastly, why did it look like this whole place was made of stone?

As I searched for answers, I looked upwards to see what kind of lights there were on the ceiling. At first, I was confused by what I was looking at. The lights looked like someone had taken a neon light and made it into a sphere about the size of a fist without the glass. I decided not to question it for the moment and figure out where I was and how I got here. I tried to think back to the events leading up to this.

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I was walking to the physics building from the maths building when I saw it. There was no other way to describe it but as a crack in space. The way light bent around it, the black void inside and its shape made what it was undeniable. It looked like someone had taken a hammer to the glass of space at that point and shattered it.

I stood there frozen in shock as my mind reeled at something that looked so out of place. Every hair on my body stood up as chills went down my spine at the sight of the crack. The fracture exuded this feeling of wrongness on a visceral level such that even though I was curious, I did not want to get near it.

But just as I was starting to move again, the crack pulsed. I froze again but relaxed when nothing else happened. I got about halfway to the door of the next building over when I felt it pulse again. This time I started running, foolishly thinking I could outrun whatever it was doing.

The next thing I could remember was the pain. I didn’t want to dwell on that any longer, so I decided to compartmentalise it for later. The next problem was the lights. I had been avoiding thinking about them because I didn’t want to think about the implications that came along with them. They were all roughly spherical but not perfectly. All of them were slightly lumpy, but the problem was this: a) they weren’t visibly connected to a power source. b) they were floating in the air. c) all they really were was just balls of light. Nothing more and nothing less. The were only two explanations, and one was far more plausible given the circumstances. Either it was magic or sufficiently advanced technology such that it was indistinguishable from magic.

Either way, I was not on Earth. My first thoughts went to my family. Did they know what had happened to me? Do they think I am dead? Can I get back home? Do I even want to get back home?

That last thought made my mind grind to a stop as I realised that even though I would never see my friends or family again, I didn’t feel too upset over it. I began to feel guilty about my lack of care until I thought back to why I didn’t still live with them. My parents were manipulative, while my brothers never liked me. I didn’t have any close friends that would miss me either, as I was reclusive most of the time, preferring to study over going to the park or something like that.

If I wanted to find out where I was, I needed to find some people first. It took a bit of wriggling to get out of the covers as they were tucked in quite tight. After I had hopped off the bed, I started to make my way to the closest door. Which was on the other side of the room. After I had made my way almost to the door, it was suddenly opened by a middle-aged-looking man nearly hitting me in the face.

“Looks like he’s already up.” The man shouted behind him while I stood there frozen, unsure of what to do now. I didn’t recognise the language the man spoke either. It didn’t sound anything like any language that I knew of. While I was still frozen in place, the man started talking again, but this time to me.

“Now that your up, we can get your story out of you.” The man spoke while gesturing for me to follow him. As I followed him out that door, I realised that after I had crossed that threshold, my life was never going to be the same again. I didn’t hesitate for a moment, as the lure of magic was too strong for me. And thus began my journey in the world of Itinera.