After losing my lunch, I was completely frozen behind that tree. Never before had I felt so completely overwhelmed by something. My parents were killed in front of me, and I’d felt a great, almost insurmountable loss. I could create a sword and armor out of nothing, just using my thoughts, and I could easily take or save the lives of the innocent with those tools. I saw the ruins of a major American city after they were destroyed by a single man and his sword. I had essentially adopted an orphaned little girl. There had been a lot that my head had to adjust to in only a few months.

Finding myself on an alien planet because a ball sent me there? That went beyond whatever limit I had.

My throat felt like it was trying to swell shut. I found a new tree away from the one I’d puked at and slid down it. Who the hell even knew if what my back was up against was even a tree? I wasn’t so proud that I stopped myself from having a small emotional moment. I sat there and silently cried for a while, feeling completely hopeless and more overwhelmed than I had in a long time. I tried to avoid feeling sorry for myself. I never wanted to burden others with emotional outbursts. But I needed to let it out. I was completely overwhelmed, in physical pain from a stab wound, and I didn’t know if I would ever see the people I loved again because I was stranded on a completely different planet.

I thought I was entitled to have a little bit of a breakdown, as a treat to me.

I knew I couldn’t stay like that forever. I afforded myself just enough time to get some of it out. The Sphere was back on Earth, and it sent me to an unknown, new planet for a reason. If I could find it the help it wanted, it had to think that I was capable of bringing the help back, right? Even if it had misfired and sent me to some random corner of the universe where I couldn’t get the Sphere the help it needed, I still had to try to find help for me. If I could get to the planet, there had to be some way to get back, right?

Peeking back around the tree, I got a good look at the clothes of passersby. None of them were wearing jeans and a bloodstained hoodie like I was. I let out a shaky breath, pleased to see their clothes were more human than I expected. They had shirts and pants, albeit with a lot more lines running through them, almost making them look like pieces of a puzzle rather than normal clothes. They were also taller and leaner than most humans, with most of them beating me out in that department. If it had just come down to clothing, I was reasonably confident I could blend in. With blond human hair and white human skin, the moment someone got a look at my head, they’d know I wasn’t one of them.

I pulled my hair back as much as possible and yanked my hood up as much as it could go, disappointed it couldn’t cover up my entire face. Keeping my head down and my bare hands hidden, I tried to look like a poor street urchin or a drug addict. Both of those things must not have been very common, because it didn’t take long for people—they’d still be considered people even if they weren’t human, right?—to take notice. Some things must have been universal because I had strange looks thrown at me. Hushed whispers in a language that vaguely reminded me of German soon followed. Even in the faint tones, the strength and power of the words carried through. It wasn’t a pretty language, and it wouldn’t be one I’d say romantic things to Rebecca with.

I tried to stay calm and mind my own business as best I could. At the same time, I tried not to look as terrified as I felt. I had passed a few hovering things that I would call cars. Cool, they had floating cars, which meant they had to be advanced. I considered that a good thing, hoping that meant they were developed enough to be reasonable about my presence that I wouldn’t be able to hide forever. Hovering cars being parallel parked on the road were certainly cool, but not knowing exactly how the species would react to seeing an alien kept me on edge. It didn’t help that the streets were so brightly lit that I could barely keep my identifying characteristics hidden. It was like they prided themselves in bathing their streets and buildings in garish neon, the bright, well-lit bastards.

Finally, I came across a darker alleyway in a more subdued part of town. Slipping into the security of the shadows, I barely poked my head out to try and get a better look at where I was. There was a long line ending about fifty feet down the sidewalk where I had been headed. All the foot traffic was going to the line, which just barely moved fast enough to keep up with the influx of people. At the risk of exposing my face, I dared to look up, and sure enough, it was a nightclub. Some things really were universally understood. Gossiping about someone who obviously didn’t belong, loud music with scantily clad attendees, and there was probably something comparable to alcohol in the club. I couldn’t help but grin at the building and eager partiers.

Out of the corner of my eye, something twitched. Across the street in another dark alleyway, there was some kind of movement. I squinted to get a better look. I quietly groaned in frustration. Narrowing my eyes did nothing at all to help me see better. Fortunately, they were eager to make themselves known. Slowly, four figures dressed head to toe in all black crept out of the darkness. They were noticeably short and stout compared to the other inhabitants I had seen up to that point. In their hands were some kind of rifles, futuristic by my standards, yet still unmistakably rifles.

They all aimed at the line going into the nightclub. Somehow, not a single person noticed them. That damn club must have been to die for. Literally.

I could see them start to squeeze the triggers. They did it slowly, maybe because the weapons required it, or maybe because they were relishing thinking of the slaughtering of innocents at a club. Either way, that gave me enough time to make a decision. The planet wasn’t my responsibility. They weren’t my friends or my family. They weren’t even my species. In fact, trying to play hero would immediately put me on the planet’s collective radar.

But Alex’s nobility or something must have rubbed off on me. When I jumped into action, I was thinking about how I was going to give him a piece of my mind when I returned to Earth.

First, I did the usual. I put up a barrier between the attackers and the bystanders. When they fired, the lasers—yep, lasers—harmlessly met my shield. Something was odd about that barrier. It was way stronger than I had anticipated, and I had realistic expectations of my strength. I was surprised by it. It wasn’t like I deliberately put something weak and flimsy up either. I could feel its strength in the back of my head. Given I had just been in a near-death battle, and I was still recovering from my injuries, I had no idea how I conjured something that strong.

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I didn’t waste more time thinking about the strength of my barrier. I didn’t waste any extra time thinking about much else. I used the surprise that overtook the shooters to my advantage. I created four Shimmer-Javelins and sent them speeding toward the bad guys. At least I hoped they were the bad guys. I took some small comfort in the fact that no one firing their guns at a nightclub line was being nominated for a community hero award.

My javelins were stronger too, flying with so much force that I heard them enter the shooters, ripping through flesh like wet pieces of paper. I didn’t outright intend to kill them, though I didn’t hesitate either. I still thought about how bad I felt when I killed Eric. I used that to keep myself grounded. I wouldn’t get desensitized to the killing by taking away the lives of others. Every action like that carried monumental consequences, be it legally or emotionally, even if I was in the right.

The four figures fell and didn’t rise again, their rifles clattering uselessly to the street.

By then, the crowd had picked up on something being wrong. They all started screaming and running. Some must not have noticed my barrier, so I took it down. Having people running face first into it and fall down, only to get trampled underfoot was not how I wanted to start my time on a new planet. I had already killed four people there within an hour. No need to make everything worse.

There was a strange, shrill screech in the distance. With just a little despair, I guessed that the awful, shrill noise was the siren of the local police force. What scared me more than the fact that the police were on the way and I had nowhere to run was that the siren was the norm for the poor people there. It was like nails on a chalkboard. People just took that and had to live with it each day of their lives. I already missed Earth so much.

I walked out into the street, keeping my hands up in the air, palms facing the officers who were emerging from their floating vehicles. Blue, pink, and green figures, all taller than myself, just stared at me. My hood must have been knocked down at some point because the looks in their eyes were a mix of terror, rage, confusion, and a little curiosity. They took out slender, yet blocky handguns and trained them right on me. They didn’t shoot right away, mercifully, but they were barking things at me in their language.

“I’m sorry, I don’t understand what you’re saying!” I yelled back, trying to appear as cooperative as possible. Slowly, I got down on my knees, keeping my hands where I could see them. They didn’t lower their guns. I let myself breathe as they seemed to lose some of the tension in their bodies. That worked well for me, so I put my hands behind my head and sort of flopped over, landing on the street. “You can arrest me!”

Which they did. They used some futuristic handcuffs that didn’t bind together with a chain. They were meant for people with vastly thinner wrists than my own, so they dug harshly into my skin. The officer who put them on me pulled them closer together behind me, sending pain through my shoulders and causing me to yelp. They must have had a vague idea of what was going on because a pink-skinned officer slapped the one who bound me on the back of the head. Sheepishly, they muttered something to me I couldn’t understand. As far as being arrested went, it felt like a mixed bag. Not being shot was a plus, so I had that going for me.

Seeing the officers discuss me in a language I couldn’t comprehend was enjoyable. They kept looking back at me, saying things that made no sense. When I still couldn’t understand them, they tried talking slower. You know, that thing that never works and is never the issue when someone can’t understand what another person is saying. When they sighed and gave up, I found myself smiling, trying my best not to look like I was enjoying being arrested. Maybe humans and these guys had more social mannerisms in common than I had been expecting.

The ride in the cop car wasn’t bad. The floating vehicle thing was weird. I was so used to physical feedback when riding in a vehicle that I thought I was going to get sick again. Weird how the human brain handles things. I get sick because I end up on a brand new planet, unable to handle everything that entails. One step behind it? A pleasant ride in a floating cop car. It was silly enough that I nearly burst out laughing in the back. The police had been pleasant to that point. I didn’t need them thinking I was off my rocker to make it worse.

I stared at the blurring neon and unfamiliar fashion as we drifted by. I did what I always liked to do when I was on a car ride. I looked at all the people and tried to remember they all had their own stories. Even if I was on the other side of an infinite universe, the people in front of me were just going about their own lives and business, unaware that a nightclub nearby was almost shot up by...terrorists? I had no idea who they were, so terrorists made the most sense in my head. Earth or not, people were just trying to get through their days and have a little fun at the end of them.

The police station was rounded, like most of the architecture I’d seen up to that point. The police didn’t yank me out of the car. They didn’t offer me a hand either. Getting out of the back of the car without my hands freed up was harder than I had been expecting. When I stumbled, a hand was there to catch me from falling face-first onto the sidewalk. I smiled gratefully at the cop who returned it. Maybe there were some shared facial expressions between the two of us after all.

Carefully, almost lackadaisically, the cops guided me inside. I took it as a good sign that they weren’t throwing me around or taking any liberties with me. They didn’t think I was a threat, they thought I was a threat they could handle, or they were just so unaccustomed to crime that they didn’t know what to do with me. I didn’t care much for the reason as long as I wasn’t a victim of police brutality on a planet that might not have had any rights for me.

I didn’t even know what it was called when they took your prints and stuff. I assumed I had been arrested, at least in the legal sense. When they took my print, I grinned at another similarity between humans and the new species I’d met. It was neat to know we shared some ways to identify people. The one taking my fingerprints looked annoyed, talking loudly and excitedly to the officers who brought me in. I could see them telling the officers off because I was clearly a unique species on the planet. What good would taking my prints do? Only one of me could have committed a crime.

They even took my cuffs off, really throwing me for a loop. Did they not have any idea what I was capable of? Not that I was that strong. I wasn’t a mean person either. Was it an olive branch of some kind? What equivalent to olive branches did they have? What if they somehow had actual olives? I’d never liked the things, but for the chance to eat something familiar, I would have downed a whole jar of them if they’d put one in front of me.

If there was ever an indication that I didn’t mean anyone any harm, it was that. I was arrested, left uncuffed, and I was thinking about what I would do to a jar of olives if given the opportunity.