The darkness overcame Quinn so suddenly that it jolted her. A mist hung around her, although perhaps more shadowy than mist-like. Starry portions of sky blinked in and out from complete darkness as if someone created a star shooter that could plummet her into an abyss. Her thoughts were jumbled.

Slowly, in front of her, in those shadows, no, those images flickered through her mind. They were static, with interference, as if she wasn't supposed to remember, or as if there hadn't been enough capacity in her mind at the time to recall the events in detail.

She remembered the day and the house. The house was adorable, a small brick Tudor-style house in the older part of town. It had fake shutters on the outside and a merry little flower garden that her mother tended to all the time. Quinn watched as if outside herself, observing as her mother planted the garden. She wondered, for the first time, why she looked nothing like her parents.

Although she was completely aware of it now, they weren't technically her parents. Her father, with his blonde hair and blue eyes, and her mother, with light brown hair and a smattering of freckles, and brown golden eyes, laughed with her. Her grandmother had grey hair, grey eyes. That's all she remembered, except for the kind smile when she baked cookies. But the flowers, that was something her mother took pride in.

"Quinn, come here, show me your report card," her mother called. Quinn walked over and giggled at her mother. She had to be, what, twelve?

"Mom, it's online, like it always is. What are you talking about?"

"Fine, fine, give me the hard copy anyway." Her mother attempted to smile sternly, but it was, as always, just filled with contentment.

Quinn handed over the hard copy to her mother with a big grin on her face.

"You did it again! All As, I'm so proud of you." The smile her mother gave her showed both love and pride.

"Thanks, Mom."

"Now, do you know what you want for a reward?"

Quinn laughed. It felt beautiful with the sun shining down on her, a memory she hadn't recalled at all, playing out in front of her as if she was watching a television show. "Ice cream, like always." Quinn couldn't remember ever having smiled so big.

How had she forgotten all of this? They always went to the same ice cream shop, the one that mixed the different ingredients into whatever flavor you chose. The place that let her have that tangy, sour taste in something so cold and sweet.

"Okay, Dad will be home soon and we'll head out." Her mother stood up, brushing grass from her skirt, dusting off her hands. She gave Quinn a hug around her shoulders, nice and firm, even if it was quick. And then she walked in the house, and the memory faded.

Quinn felt suddenly cold at the loss of warmth. Shadows swirled in front of her, fragments of memories flickering past again like the static on an 80's television at 3am.

"Well done! You're such a clever kid, Quinn," her father said, as he ushered them all out of the house toward the car. The garage was detached from the house, barely room enough for the larger modern vehicles. Small, but beautiful. Quinn loved the house.

She wondered why she'd never thought for so many years. They piled into the car, her and her grandmother in the back, her parents in the front. It was a small SUV, red in color. But it was that bright red, almost like freshly dripping blood. Not the weird orange-red that always set her teeth on edge. They pulled out and turned on music and began to sing with it, until her father decided that chatting was more fun. The ice cream shop was only about 15 minutes away.

"So, Quinn, tell me, did you cheat?" It was almost like a ritual question, a joke shared among all of them.

"No, Dad, I didn't get caught. Oh, I mean, I didn't cheat." Quinn grinned, completing her part of the tradition.

Dad laughed, her mum laughed, her grandmother laughed. The sounds were like music to her ears.

They headed through the intersection closest to the ice cream shop - they were so close she could practically taste it. The lights were green. They had the right of way.

And then time seemed to slow down for her...

It was as if Quinn could see the truck barrelling toward them. It came from the passenger side, beyond her mother. Quinn always sat behind her father. Her grandmother and her mother were the first ones to be impacted. It happened like in stop motion.

She could see the truck hit them side on, fully plowing into the side, shattering the windows into her grandmother and mother, the glass ripping them to shreds as Quinn's head hit the window next to her. It shattered too. She couldn't see her father just the back of his seat. The sound of the airbags deploying.

All she remembered was the shock that ran through her body and the sudden blinding blue-gold light that shrouded her in what felt like a second skin. When she looked down, her entire body was covered in thick blue-gold scales like armor to protect her.

It emanated out from her, not far, maybe a foot, pushing any debris and anything else away from her suddenly and shielding her inside a cocoon from projectiles.

However, it didn't save her from impact damage.

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When she woke up in the hospital six weeks later, she was an orphan and the room was empty. No relatives... they'd all been in the car with her. No friends, not even a social worker or nurse. Not that that was to be expected. It was the middle of the day when she woke up, so nobody would have been visiting anyway.

She couldn't remember anything, not even from the days leading up. And there was this bone-weary exhaustion that funneled through her as if she could barely even lift her head. She didn't know how long she'd been out until later. In her mind maybe it had been a day, or five, or fifty. There was no memory of how she'd survived, nothing to indicate any type of magical defense like blue scales had saved her.

The accident left her with a sense of foreboding she couldn't shake.

Like maybe, she should have died too.

Like maybe she should have died instead.

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Quinn opened her eyes to see stone walls around her, oddly earth-like.

"You're awake?" Malakai's tone held tightly controlled, his eyes darted wildly, bleeding through some of the illusion that kept them hidden.

She wondered how long she had been unconscious. Those memories felt like they might have taken an age to experience. "How long was I out?"

"Maybe ten minutes. It was barely anything, but I was getting worried." He spoke softly, his breathing began to calm and he was still patting her shoulder absent-mindedly. His eyes reverted back to the human illusion again.

"I didn't mean to worry you," she said, trying to gain her bearings. "Where exactly am I?"

"You're in the storage room. I just put your boxes in my storage and you kind of pulsed blue and gold and blacked out. I caught you before you hit the floor." Malakai said, his gaze now intense as he studied her. "You look really pale right now."

That's when Quinn realized she was resting against his thigh. She sat up quickly. Her head spun as she did so and she had to lean forward and rest her hands on her knees until the vertigo slowed down. Maybe that's what all her vertigo episodes had been. Perhaps her subconscious attempted to retrieve her memories frequently and sent her balance spiraling. Admittedly, she was probably reaching with that. "Sorry, I... " She tried to figure out how best to articulate what had happened.

"What was it? Did you see something?" Malakai asked, and his concern was still obvious. From the way his brow furrowed to the ever so slight tremor in his voice. Then he paused as if a switch had been flicked. "Wait. Did you get a vision in a non-magical world?"

"No, no, nothing like that. Not a vision or communication or anything like that." Quinn sighed and pushed her hand through her unruly ponytail. "I just had to dig up some very painful memories that my brain managed to block out until now. Memories about my parents and the accident we were in."

"Really?" Malakai asked, raising an eyebrow as he stood back up. "You remember now?"

"I mean, I knew they died." Quinn said, taking his offered hand as she climbed to her feet. "I knew they died in an accident, but I was there, Mal. I was in the car at the time. They were pulverized. I don't... I never understood how I survived if I was in that wreck with them. No one understood. It was a miracle. And yet, now I know, I wish I didn't."

"What?" he asked as he leaned against the wall and watched her.

She could tell he was bracing himself. She didn't blame him. Hell, she wasn't even sure how she could come out and say the thoughts that were floating around in her head. "In the split second that the impact happened, my power manifested somehow. It threw a shield of scales over me and protected me, but only me, no one else."

Malakai just blinked at her.

The silence grew deafening, so bad that Quinn wished she hadn't said anything at all, except all the images were still playing in her mind. The crash, every detail, the glass breaking, splintering, slicing through flesh. She shuddered.

"Sorry, Quinn," Malakai said, "I didn't mean to..."

"It's okay," she cut him off. It was suddenly far too cold in here, in this basement room made of concrete. It was almost suffocating. "I get it. There was kind of a lot."

"No, it's a lot to digest," He held up a hand. "Just hear me out. I had to think back to what I know about you and who you are."

"Oh?" she asked, not confident that he had anything she wanted to listen to, but it couldn't hurt.

"Let's just say, this wasn't your fault." There was a steely determination in his eyes now. It hadn't been there but five minutes earlier. Not before she told him of the memory.

"What do you know?" she asked, crossing her arms to fend off the chill she felt crawling all over her skin.

Malakai sighed. "Look. Right now I only have supposition, and that's not going to help either one of us. This isn't my area of study or expertise, but I've been around my grandfather enough to pick up a few things here and there."

"You're beating that bush you're dancing around to death." She deadpanned.

Malakai chuckled and flashed her a grin. "That may very well be. But what you have to realize is that none of it was your fault. We need to get back to the Library and you need to speak to the Core. And you need to talk to my grandfather. Because if my hunch is right, then I think this is all way more than you realize."

It was the first time that she'd seen Malakai unsure of himself in a way that he felt the need to get others to reinforce his own knowledge. No matter what, he'd always been decisive and knew precisely what to do. This new side of him wasn't helping her confidence any. The fact that he wouldn't tell her until he'd had his information confirmed scared her more than she wanted to admit.

Quinn nodded, trying to push the images back down in her mind. But now they were recalled, it was like her mind was trying to bring back all of the detail and more. Perhaps that was a good thing? But it really didn't feel like it. "Okay, give me a few while I go and hand the key back to Gary. I'll be back and maybe we'll just use this door to get home, hey?"

"Sounds like a plan, Librarian," Malakai said, but he paused and reached out to her arm, gently touching her wrist. "Don't get too in your head. I just don't want to tell you my theory and have it be wrong. Okay?"

Quinn smiled, a portion of her tension releasing. "Yeah. I know. But it feels better to have you say it out loud."

He grinned and her phone dinged. A message from her brother.

Just promise you won't be a stranger. I know we never saw eye to eye all the time, but you're still my little sister.

Quinn tried her best not to choke up. Jordan was the only big brother she'd ever really connected with. She hoped he would be okay. All she sent back was a heart emoji. Words were too difficult right now with how much her mind was spinning.

Once she dropped the key back with Gary and returned to Mal, they closed the storeroom door and stood in the room. It was easier this way too. No one would see them walking into a strange pocket dimension Library.

Quinn pulled the door key out of her bag, placed it in the center of the door, where it clicked on like a magnet, and fit her hand in the slot.

“Library, I need you.” she muttered under her breath, aware of how very true those words were.

All of her energy whooshed out of her so fast she felt like she was about to pass out.

The key thrummed and glowed and finally activated.