"That was really fucking weird," I told the ground, which was for some strange reason lodged against my face.

I strained my memory for details pertaining to this peculiar situation I'd found myself in, but only got vague flashes.

The world collapsing in on itself.

Falling through an intense, ancient darkness.

The sensation of movement fading into the endless, motionless void.

The sensation of everything else disappearing into the cold, vast nothingness.

Slamming into something extremely solid.

Aha! So that's how I'd ended up here. Time to get up.

...

Arms? Legs?

A brief flash of panic whipped through my mind. Had I lost them?

A prickly sensation nudged my panicking consciousness, and quickly got worse.

I twitched my hand, and the pain shot through me like an electric discharge. Alrighty - better stay still for now.

***

The sensation of waking limbs - which I figured out pretty swiftly after that - lasted for about a minute, probably. I had no way to count time, and was too focused on the not-quite-pain to actually care all that much.

After my limbs had sufficiently awakened, I dared trying to push myself up with them, managing a few inches before flopping back down. It felt as though I'd run a marathon or something.

I eventually managed to roll over onto my back, and wiped the dirt from my face. Where were we again?

Ah, right, dlutch-something-magoch.

"Did it work?" I asked the empty air.

I heard a muffled voice, and turned my head toward it. We were apparently still inside a circle of stones, but these appeared much newer. Curious.

My attention was soon grabbed by the motionless black shape lying on the ground in that general direction.

For a terrible moment, I felt only panic - then the shape twitched, violently. It did again and again, before trying to roll over with the aid of its wings. It, too, flopped down again.

Not dead then, thank god

"What was that?"

"I -aid, -es!"

The voice was still muffled, but I understood more of it now.

Some strength returning to my arms, I sat up, and froze.

The world around us was not at all as it should be.

First, there was the obvious fact that it was not a forest anymore. No, this circle was apparently situated on a hill.

Second, were the clouds. They did not exist only above, as they should, but also off to the sides, and, straining my neck, downwards.

Third, of course, were the floating rocks.

Hmmm. Perhaps rocks was too small a word, no, they were more like islands. massive boulders. gigantic masses of land?

I stretched my newly woke legs, and managed to sit up entirely while crossing them.

All around us was stuff. Clothes, pieces of fabric, was that a jagged chunk of metal?

No, wait, not just stuff, our stuff!

I looked over to the source of the voice again, ignoring for now the titanic rock hovering in the background, and saw a shard of glass lodged in the ground, with a black shape sitting near it. The bird poked the shard with its beak, and a muffled noise was heard.

Somehow managing to stand up with shaky legs, I wandered over, and plucked the shard from the ground it had been stuck in. My own face was looking back, seemingly annoyed.

"Took you long enough!"

I was taken aback, before some of the fog in my mind dispersed.

"Just what the hell were you thinking? Were you trying to kill us?"

I strained the cogs of my mind, but couldn't find the answer.

"...no? Why?"

The face looked appalled.

"Because that wasn't supposed to happen! These trips are normally smooth as butter! It's like you ripped the door from its frame instead of using the knob! AAAARGH!"

The figure the face had belonged to stomped off, away from the mirror surface on her end.

I shrugged, and started collecting stuff.

***

Sadly, few things had survived our transference.

Nothing truly important was lost, though. Sure, everything electronic was fried, and almost every piece of fabric had caught fire somewhere (and thus carried either black splotches or straight-out holes), but everything vital was still there.

While the duffle bag had been shredded, and all the supplies inside (save for some especially sturdy cans) had exploded rather violently (and now adorned the surrounding landscape), I was not foolish enough to centralize my food and water so. I still had the two canteens from back home with me, and the shoulder-bag had survived as well. I noted with a small sense of sadness that my phone, which I'd been carrying out of hope for repair, had the entire back panel blown away. Glancing inside, I saw that the battery had exploded.

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Whatever happened during the teleport had created insane levels of induction inside everything based on electricity. The better-looking devices were like my phone, already deactivated and "only" explosive - the worse-off pieces were melted hunks of metal and plastic. I discarded them.

In the end, not much had survived the trip, and even less survived my scrutiny.

I was left with my original bag and all it contained, as well as some food and water - and some of the better-looking pieces of melted plastic.

I also found my staff lodged in the ground a good distance away.

When everything necessary was collected, I pulled the mirror shard from where I stuck it in the ground, Raven settling on my shoulder as usual.

"Alright, where to?"

***

Finding the right way had, in the end, been relatively simple. After mirror-me calmed down and stopped grumbling about 'fucking humans, I swear', she explained where we actually were.

"'dùthaich nan dìochuimhne', or 'The Land of The Forgotten', is the colloquial name for this place. In the past, humans would sometimes find their way here through the hidden places of the world above, stumbling blindly into the dark, only to emerge in crystalline mountains, unnatural forests, or ancient cities. You people only tell the tales of heroes, but they aren't the only ones who went here - they are mostly the ones that survived."

"I've only been here once before, and it wasn't in this particular part, so I won't be able to produce a map or anything. Do you have a compass? put it in your pocket for me."

I did so, and she pulled it out of hers. We'd been walking for a while, and there was really only one path. The circle was situated on the blade of a cliff, one side a bottomless drop. I felt a bit queasy when considering the seemingly endless drop.

"Alright, so this is where it gets fucky. The world doesn't have as much persuasion down here as it does up there. As a result, things just become slightly more ...unnatural over time."

My feet hit the patches of grass in between the sporadic cobblestones that appeared to form a 'path' from the circle to somewhere else.

"Just follow the path for now. It'll lead us somewhere."

That made sense, so I did. My legs were still wobbly, and my mind was still slightly cloudy, but I could walk. It didn't require that much thought.

"As I was saying, unnatural. Plants become more vibrant, like you saw on the surface. It's here too, but more diffuse, you can see it if you strain your eyes."

I did strain them, but didn't really have that good of a grasp on how normal plants looked anymore. Either they never really interested me, the trees were always this green, or I'd become numb because of overexposure in the forest.

"Humans generally become more eccentric, but their inner being can't ever be fully converted, here. They never become inhabitants of this place."

My head felt light. Was it always this blue everywhere?.

"Speaking of which, those are probably all gone, else we'd been swarmed already."

I stepped through the knee-high grass, following the 'path'. It had obviously not been used in a long time.

"Our destination probably lies between that mountain and the forest."

I looked up from the path, almost stumbled, but caught myself. That mountain?

"That looks really far. I don't know if I can make that."

"Don't worry about it, it'll be over before you know it. Just keep walking."

I did keep walking, but found myself losing focus and stumbling over my own feet.

"I've noticed you refer to Earth as 'above' and 'surface'," I said, "Why do you do that?"

The words came out slowly, I had to concentrate on my breathing and how they tasted in my mind.

"I'm speaking mostly in terms of mythology, so take everything I say now with a grain of salt. It's not literally above us, of course. This world, it works in layers. Your home, Earth, Terra, Gaia, whatever you want to call it, rests at the very top. It is the most stable, the most unyielding. Beneath it is this place. It exists as a shadow of your world, made from the Things that fell through the cracks while yours was created. Beneath this place, there exists another. and another. and another. All the way down."

"You have to keep in mind that Things does not equal things. A thing is an object, made of matter and energy, interacting with your world. A Thing is more. Light is a Thing. A Ray of Light is a thing. Your language lacks the concepts needed to convey the significance."

"What's at the very bottom?"

My breathing had become heavy, and my legs felt as though they were made of lead. Still, I moved on, my eyes fixed on the path.

"Nobody knows - or rather, nobody wants to know. Look around you. If only this much survived the creation of Earth, how much do you think survived this place? how much the next? Keep in mind that we're talking about Things here, not things."

I understood.

"Heads up, we're almost there."

My head shot up, popping my neck. I winced at the sound, as well as the growing stiffness in my muscles. Then I saw it.

The mountain was closer. much closer. In fact, we were standing on its roots already. It should not have been possible, but it clearly was.

And there, before us, the path winding towards it, was our salvation. A small patch of land cleared of grass, but populated by buildings. They seemed strange, somehow, but I didn't object. I felt a burning necessity to reach that place before exhaustion took me.

***

Wandering into the small village, I immediately noticed the cause of the strangeness I'd felt earlier.

It was the buildings. Or rather their openings. The doors were too tall, the windows too narrow. That's what it felt like.

"You never told me who lives in this place, Ref."

One of the windows rippled, and I fell backwards.

"What the fuck."

The mirror decided to pipe up then.

"Yes. I'd almost forgotten. That happens too. When I told you that space is malleable, I meant that. That's also what brought us to the mountain so quickly. And it will be what brings us across the Atlantic. Or at least the space the Atlantic would occupy here."

"Is it dangerous? What if that ripple goes through my head while I'm sleeping?"

"Don't panic, Amy. Deep breaths."

Despite my logical mind's ever more sinister predictions concerning the warping of bloody space-time, I obliged.

"Imagine for me a piece of paper. Draw on it whatever you like, but it's important that the shape only makes sense as one. Now bend it. crumple it. fold it a couple of times. Then, unfold it, smooth out the wrinkles, the folds, and the knicks. Is the picture still there? Is it still intact?"

"Yes."

"There you have your answer."

I shook my head, and stood up. It took longer than I'd like to admit, that, but I managed it eventually. Raven was flying concerned circles above me, but even I could see how she favored one wing over the other. I hoped it was nothing serious.

Eventually, I found a house with the best windows and door I was going to find, and entered. The furniture was no less bizarre, and made of the same odd wood the rest of the town was.

It was the strangest thing, but the wood didn't look dead to me, not like most other wood used in construction.

Which was weird, as these were obviously not the stereotypical tree-buildings, carved or somehow grown into a live tree, but very clearly cut and milled. Still, it felt as though life had never truly left the wood, even in this form.

After closing the way too crooked door and shoving a heavy box of strange alive wood in front of it, I sat down on the only bed inside this dwelling.

It was strange also, but in a more stereotypical sense, because the bed's surface was made of leaves. Peeking underneath, I saw moss - no creepy insects or the like, so I assumed it safe.

Outside, the world was beginning to be tinted in a verdant purple, but my head had already met the still-packed bedroll I was planning to use as a blanket, and I was out like a light.