As they worked to help her, the woman groaned weakly. She was fluttering in and out of consciousness, her breathing shallow and pained. That worried him. How long had she been stuck here? How long had she been trapped? A few days at minimum, by the state of the demon’s rotting corpse and the stench in the air.

When Doneil’s magic began to work, putting a vibrating hum in the air, part of him relaxed with relief.

She was in good hands now.

He and Catrin pulled books away at a feverish pace, Nales taking them farther away. Then, they started clearing the shelves. Doneil reached in, protecting her head as they lifted one set of shelves off her, hissing in frustration as more books slipped out.

God, it stank. He was practically wading through demon guts. By the time he and Catrin had cleared the first few layers of books, there hands were grimy with rotted, dead blood. The drone of flies was ever-present. They kept crawling on him, trying to zip up his nose.

Five minutes later, Doneil gave a signal, and Matteo and Catrin lifted the fallen table that had been pinning her waist.

The woman yelled once, then fell unconscious.

Good. She wouldn’t feel this next part, then.

Golden light flooded from Doneil. His expression was a mask of focus.

Seconds passed. Then:

“She’s stable. Go!”

Moving as one, the three of them pulled her away from the shelf, picked her up, and carried her down the hall and into another room, where the floor was clean and sunlight filled the frosted windows.

Doneil kept holding her hand, pouring the healing into her. When they set her down, he sat next to her.

Matteo glanced over the pair of them, hesitating.

Catrin eyed him. “What?”

“She’ll need food,” he said. “Water. We’ll need water, too.” He made a clawed gesture with his hands, indicating the gross demon rot slicked to both his and Catrin’s skin. “We need to wash. But—”

“Go now,” Doneil said, interrupting them. “But come back quickly. She’ll wake soon, but you have a few minutes.”

When they got back, she was starting to stir.

Matteo crouched nearby, where she could see him. He’d fetched the American flag from where he’d left it in the other room. Catrin stood behind him, holding it open.

It looked a bit silly, but after everything she’d gone through, he figured that either seeing something familiar would help her relax, or that the very oddity of the sight might confuse her enough to go with it.

Nales stood in the background. They didn’t want to crowd her.

Her eyelids fluttered a few times, then visibly winced, opening into slits. A sharp intake of breath whistled past her teeth.

Then, she looked up, saw Catrin and the flag, and frowned.

“What the fuck?”

Matteo smiled. “Easy there, soldier. My names Matteo. Behind me is Catrin and Nales, and that’s Doneil holding your hand. We just found you. You’re going to be all right.”

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She stared at him hard. Then, with a start, she apparently noticed Doneil’s grip around her hand—and, more likely, the weird sensation of his healing magic knitting her body back together—because her attention snapped to him and she tried to jerk her hand away.

“Whoa! Don’t do that.” Matteo reached out and gripped her shoulder—the one opposite to arm Doneil was feeding magic through—and squeezed it to distract you. “I know it feels fucking freaky, but he’s healing you. Let him work. It’ll only take…” He paused, brows furrowing, then switched to Janessi to talk to Doneil. “How long?”

“Not long.” The elf paused, concentrating. “A few minutes.”

“A few minutes,” he translated back to her. “What’s your name?”

Her eyes had focused back on him. Not trusting, nor relaxed. Heck, her expression reminded her more of Catrin than anything else, like she was at once trying to figure him out while also thinking about the best possible moment to stab him.

Her gun was in the other room still, thank God.

“Mal Dunlin.” Her voice rasped, weak and dry. “Who are you?”

“Matteo,” he said again. He let go of her shoulder and reached for the water they’d brought up. Nales handed him a bottle of juice. He unscrewed the cap and put it in her hand. “Drink up, soldier. We’ve got a lot to talk about.”

***

Mal Dunlin was from California. She’d lived in the United States her entire life, born and raised, except for the frequent times her tours took her abroad. France, Japan, Algeria… Joint training ops, mostly, but she’d served in several missions he’d never heard of—one in Brazil, and one somewhere off the coast of India in a place he had no idea how to pronounce, much less spell.

She was also definitely from a different version of Earth. If the unknown ops hadn’t been enough of a giveaway, her rank as a colonel in the U.S. Marine Corps sealed it.

In his world, the Marines had been disbanded almost thirty years ago, thanks to a slew of fuckups and politics that caused the US Military to undergo a mass rebrand and reform. Departments and divisions got shifted. People got shuffled. Everyone got new names. Apartments and divisions got shuffled.

It was a masterpiece of mess ups.

Not as bad as the mess a certain Dr. Newton had caused, however. That fucker was from Dunlin’s world, apparently. She’d been aware of the project and had been watching the broadcast while they counted down to the gate’s activation—she’d been on leave, hanging out at her grandpa’s old place in Millerville, watching the countdown, when, just like Matteo, her entire world had exploded in a glow of light. She found herself in the middle of a marsh, nearly crushed by a piece of the other Millerville, the one from Matteo’s world. Then some glowing naked asshole had started chasing her down.

Thank God she’d been cleaning her gun at the time.

This library building was from her world. It didn’t exist in his. He’d suspected as much when he’d read the name, but it was good to have confirmation. He’d been through Millerville himself roughly twice, both times just driving through, and hadn’t really been on the lookout for universities.

She spoke with him warily, the relief of her rescue taut with a tension that only grew as she regained her strength. Her eyes kept darting to the others, particularly the two elves, and then back to him. He could tell she was having some trouble believing his words.

Fair enough. This was all extremely far-fetched.

But she’d seen enough to keep giving him the time of day.

When he offered to share his translation program with her, she hesitated.

“I appreciate the rescue,” she said, eyebrows drawing up. “But I’m not letting foreign software inside my tech.”

“Do you have a sandbox?” he asked.

Sandbox programs cut off a space from the rest of a device’s operating system, giving an isolated place to load potentially infected programs without risking the equipment’s security.

They came fairly standard on HUDs.

She eyed him for a beat. Then:

“Fine. Just a moment.”

She stared into the space between them, her eyes flicking from side to side, similar to how his did when he read his HUD. After about thirty seconds, he received a request for a new connection titled ‘M_Dunlin_Sandbox.’

He started dumping files into it.

“Here’s the translation program, along with the dictionary. I’m also loading in some videos and documents that were sent to me. Please, take your time.”

She nodded. After one last glance at the rest of the room, she leaned back against the shelf behind her, closed her eyes, and started reading.

She took about ten minutes, occasionally break the silence to ask a terse question. Most of the time, her eyes were closed, but he could tell she was still engaging—he could see her eyes moving beneath her eyelids.

He leaned back as well, stretching out his hands and wrists to prevent them from getting stiff. After a few minutes, he stood up and did the same for the rest of his body.

Eventually, Dunlin spoke again.

“All right. I will go with you. When do we leave?”