Standing on the streets of Hightown, it was easy to forget that the entire city was built on skyscrapers. As I fell, there were five seconds per second to take it in — massive blocks of stone, painted, dotted with luminous gems and sometimes lined with diagrams. In a few places there were bridges between the buildings which were set too wide apart and these were large enough that they carried tall houses, between which were streets so people could move from one section to the next.

The lower we fell, the more things changed.

You’re not thinking, a part of me whispered, but the wind rushing past my ears meant I couldn’t hear it.

The luminous gems became sparse the lower we went, the diagrams becoming more jagged and unkempt, and the paint shabbier, duller, surrounded by a darkness that mirrored the one bubbling in my stomach. There were stairs outside of buildings that led to lower levels, guarded by railings in a few places, but mostly not; rock and stone were marred by vines and plant growths, a few glowed, providing meagre light.

I felt cold. Even as I was pressed against Odysseus, feeling his breath, his heartbeat and the warmth of both his body. My back was to the ground, my legs closed around the prince’s waist so he didn’t fly away. He was still unconscious, his body barely manageable as I kept us from spinning.

The wind rushed up, whipping my cape and threatening to take my satchel; one side of my face was cold as air hit a patch of drying blood, not my own, but from Odysseus.

My stomach roiled and my mind became stuck, fixating on the blood.

If you don’t think you’re going to die, the whisper came, and this time it was with a rush of energy.

Below me, approaching at a dizzying speed, was the ground. Above me, cutting through the air like birds, were three people. Seconds or minutes ago we’d passed the bridge the others had crashed into and since then I’d lost sense of them against the greater crowd of people in the skyscrapers.

The trio weren’t allies and they couldn’t be seen as a way out. They had shot us with what I assumed was some sort of aero grenade, throwing us over the edge. Those people had been fully prepared to kill us. They wouldn’t be kind if they caught us.

I couldn’t depend on them for safety.

So what then? Death?

I don’t want to die.

I didn’t want to die and that meant pushing past the panic, thinking through the situation and finding a way out.

Like what? I thought, frustrated at Odysseus and Ally for wanting to come to this fucking city; frustrated at myself for letting down my guard, for the stupid plan that got me here, and for thinking I could make it against these odds.

So just give up.

But giving up meant death and I didn’t want to die.

I let go of my hold on the temporal ring and reached for my gun. Anger ran through me and it was a welcomed reprieve from the terror. I took it and let it fill me up, let it drive me as I screamed — tears in my closed eyes — and pointed using my spatial stone as reference. Light flared against my eyelids as I squeezed the trigger, warmth blooming and disappearing as I continued to fall; a breath left me as I was thrust back and at an angle — because of the recoil.

Thrust, my mind screamed. Above, my pursuers had opened their arms, revealing flaps that increased the distance between us. I couldn’t be sure, especially with magic, but I didn’t think those things would have been able to catch Odysseus and me, and slow us to safety.

They probably would have killed us mid-air, or just waited for us to hit the ground.

Focus, I thought as the terror came back in a rush. Thrust. How can I use it? Get us to a wall?

I was moving too fast and I’d skin myself, and there was no saying I would actually stop. There were the lizard tail gloves and they could sink into stone and rock, but I hadn’t tested how they worked and I didn’t know their properties beyond the basics. Would they sink into stone like clay, offering resistance enough to slow me; or would they sink and lock in, snapping off my shoulder? When I had used them before, it had been to rework it like clay and then let it set. I hadn’t figured out how yet.

Don’t dwell. Other plans. Thrust to slow us down like the Human Torch? Does that even work in real life?

My legs were wrapped around Odysseus’ waist, making the hold tight; with a bit of manoeuvring I pointed the gun down, let out a breath and squeezed. Fire left the gun and the recoil thrust me to the side, taking me closer than I felt comfortable to a wall. I shot again to send me away.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

I had seen the ground, the block below was awash with a low green light, illuminating shabbily built buildings. An image unfolded in my head: Odysseus and me, slamming into and turning into paste on impact.

Ancestors hear me, I thought. If I hit the ground. Make it quick. Please.

But I still didn’t want to die.

I needed to stop.

I needed to stop.

I needed to…

Fuck.

“Odysseus,” I said, slapping him. “Odysseus please. Please fucking wake up. Wake up,” I shouted, slapping him harder. There was movement beneath his eyelids but not enough that he woke up. “Fucking wake up, Odysseus!”

Another slap and nothing but a mumble.

This could not work, I thought, delicately stowing my gun, careful that it didn’t slip from my fingers. Next, I reached for my blade. This is time magic. It’s stopping time. You’re hitching your whole plan on momentum not coming back when someone is stopped in time.

But I didn’t care about logic. There were avenues before me and I wanted to try all of them.

Odysseus wasn’t waking up so I pricked him in the arm. He screamed and convulsed, his eyes opening wide. I pulled the knife back and slapped him, getting his eyes to connect to mine. That only lasted a moment because with how we were positioned, he could see the ground approaching. Odysseus’ eyes opened wide, his mouth in the shape of an ‘O’.

“Stop us. Stop us. Stop us!”

“Parel-Klak!” Odysseus slurred. Blue light erupted out from him, wrapping around us both, everything slowed to a crawl but we didn’t stop. “Fast,” he said, before his eyes closed and his expression twisted in pain.

Fast? I thought.

It took me too long to realise, to put the pieces together. We were fast and thus our fall had slowed down. Odysseus — either because his brain was addled or because of some plan — had chosen that as the course to take.

More time, the thought came, wild, pounding against my head and leaving me with a migraine. Use it.

Instead of coming up with a plan my mind unfolded, trying to work through how temporal magic worked. Messing with time wasn’t possible in my world, at least not unless black holes were involved and thinking about that in practical terms was something that made my head hurt. Here and now I tried to think of how time magic worked in relation to the other fundamental forces, having trouble because it all seemed so crazy.

The temporal ring increased my speed of thought, but things started to get muddy when I moved my body — whatever effect ran through my brain didn’t do the same for my body which meant there was a disconnect, leading to fumbling. Right now, though, Odysseus had quickened us and thus slowed our fall. My friend, Anda, had explained momentum me and though I had forgotten most of it, I knew that our velocity had slowed—

Stolen story; please report.

The world is still going at the same speed, you’re the one who’s out of sync, I thought, which hurt my head even more as my attempts to make sense of the world broke into pieces. How does anything work?

The ground approached.

Focus, I thought. Plan. Survive.

There was a reason that my mind was fixated on momentum and it was because I was gathering speed the more I fell. I needed to counteract that and the sooner the better. The gun trick hadn’t worked before, but things were different now. I was sped up, which meant more shots fired and more opportunity to slow down.

But would there be enough time?

I put my knife away and pulled on the strap of my satchel as it flailed in the air. When it was close, I reached in, pushing through its contents until I reached two leathery gloves bound by cord. I pulled them out and slid them on — they were shabbily sewn together, more mitts than gloves, but they worked and that was enough. Next was my gun and I fired it at an angle, adding angular momentum that propelled us to the side at slight spin.

A building approached, dark now that we were closer to the ground.

My grip tight around the gun, I hugged Odysseus, leaning into the spin. I hit the wall back first, the impact running through me as it cracked my armour.

Guess that answers that, I thought blearily as the impact rocked me. Or maybe it didn’t, just…conversion of force if that was even a thing. A chuckle left me, low and wild, and that cottoned me onto the fact that I was delirious. My thoughts were all over the place and only through happen-stance getting enough traction that they could think of something close to a plan.

Or maybe I wasn’t even planning, but doing the first thing that came to mind. Who even knew if the ‘science’ my mind was grasping at was even true? It could be stuff I was pulling out of my ass so I could think I was smart in my last moments, so I could feel as if I had done enough when I eventually crashed into the ground.

My hand darted out and slid into the stone wall like it was putty; there was a bit of a bounce, but I held on, squeezing Odysseus tighter, and feeling in turn as he hugged me.

Gonna be hard to stow my gun, I thought and almost laughed.

My fingers started to clench into claws and the stone hardened. A scream left me as my shoulder was wrenched and pieces of my armour cracked from the strain. I was whipped around, sending Odysseus and my knees slamming into the wall. Luckily my grip didn’t falter.

We continued down, leaving tracks along the wall.

I pushed the gun between Odysseus and me, then reached out, another hand sinking into the building. A part of me wished I had my feet to add more friction, all the better to slow us down, but our hold was too precarious; with my legs around Odysseus’ waist and his arms clenched around mine. My hands and the gloves would have to do.

Clenching with the gloves made the stone harden, whilst relaxing made them soft. I spent the time getting the correct balance so that it offered the maximal resistance without threatening to wrench my arms off.

We continued to fall, time stretched two times over between Odysseus’ power and my temporal ring.

It felt like an eternity before we were closer to the ground, a landing imminent. I was sure we had slowed, but tracking our descent with that much time magic was hard. I didn’t want to land on the ground and break my legs.

It’ll be Odysseus who brakes something with how you two are sitting, I thought and almost laughed.

My shoulder pounded with pain and so did my head, armour protected me against abrasions where my legs curled around Odysseus’ back, but the fear of it being filed down and my skin being flensed were a constant worry. Adrenaline had come, gone, come again and left once more which left my wiped. Even with the clay-like stone beneath me, my hands still ached.

Delirious, I thought and another laugh almost left me.

But it made the next part easier. Moments from touching the ground I let go of Odysseus, placed my legs against the wall and pushed off. We flew back and slammed into a mossy area, rolling through the muck and picking up mud. Odysseus’ hug vanished and soon after so did his form, the glow of his magic leaving me.

Eventually, half my face covered in mud, I came to a stop, a long breath leaving me.

I was alive, but that didn’t mean this was over.

“Rollo, come!” I said, as I brought up my arm. The goat rippled into existence, sniffing at my hair when it had fully materialised.

I swallowed, then pushed myself to my feet, using Rollo as support.

For a moment — my legs quivering and my right arm held close to my body — I could do nothing but look up, seeing the slight hit of light from above, and taking in that it had been through my work that we had survived the fall.

Pride ran through me, not a happy sort, but one that was able to keep me on my feet when I wanted to do nothing but let myself fall. I was called a coward by a lot of people, and that was true — I didn’t like fighting and half the animals in this place were terrifying — but I could still do stuff like this. When it came to either fighting or dying, then I wouldn’t let myself go gently into the night.

Am I even a coward, then? a part of me thought. Or is that something everyone tells me because I don’t ascribe to their definition of bravery?

I thought about what I’d said to Cybill. People in power had a way of defining hierarchies and making us buy into them. Right now I was realizing that that counted for a whole host of things, the concept of bravery amongst them.

Why was it the pinnacle of bravery to go out hunting crazy scary monsters, while being in a new world and not folding under the pressure wasn’t?

You’re still a little delirious, I thought. You have to find Odysseus and get out of here.

I started to walk and almost fell, my hold on Rollo kept me up both physically and emotionally. He was mine and that wasn’t tainted. He looked up for me in a way that probably no one in this world did.

Odysseus was a bit away, still engulfed in blue light, resting on his back, looking up. Too quickly, he spotted me and the blue around him evaporated, darkening our surroundings.

“Are you alive?” I asked.

Odysseus hummed. He tried to nod but his eyes scrunched shut, his expression warped into a wince. “Head, body, back,” he whispered. “Side. Breathing. Pain.”

Once more I looked around. The area we were in was framed by buildings, the ground was lined with moss — the thing had started to glow the moment the light from Odysseus’ magic disappeared. I could feel and see a few people coming close, they must have seen us falling — which wouldn’t have been too hard with the light show.

I looked up again, aware that we were still being chased. They had chosen alternate paths to avoid me shooting them, but I didn’t doubt they were still after us. We needed to get to Hightown and we needed to get there quickly.

Does it seem like people in Lowtown are even able to get to Hightown? the thought came as I spotted the people who lived in this place. There were three kids, two girls and a boy. They looked like how I imagined people in medieval times looked: grungy and dirty, weather-worn and thin in a sickly kind of way; their clothes weren’t fine or silken like I was used to, but the type that looked like it would chafe the moment it touched skin; one of the girls was barefoot from the looks of it.

They looked towards us with wide eyes, prepared to bolt.

Slowly, I reached for my side and was thankful to feel my purse still attached. The boy took a step back, prepared to turn and run. My fingers found cold metal and I pulled them out. It was a silver piece, thick and with a picture that was supposed to be of King Orpheus on it.

Their eyes moved to it.

I flicked it and it spun, hitting the ground not too far away.

One of the girls took a step forward but her friend caught her arm.

“Angela,” she muttered.

Angela pulled her arm free and slowly crept forward. In a second she bolted, ducked, picked up the coin and then back to get some distance. She took in the coin and then turned back to me.

“Do you want more?” I asked.

“What do you want?” Angela asked, her voice loud and lathered with distrust.

“A way to go up,” I said. “Do you know how?”

“No one goes up,” said Angela. “Not even the miners. They get sent away, but they don’t go up. Why’s your skin like that?”

“We’re travellers, me and him,” I said, gesturing towards Odysseus who still lay on the ground. “You must have seen us fall.”

“You were glowing,” said Angela. “How’d you do that?”

“He’s a luminous mage,” I said and snorted. “But he’s a bad one. He can only make the colour blue. Some bandits are chasing us and we’d like a way up or any information you can provide.”

“We can point you in the right direction but it’ll cost you,” she said, sounding more confident.

“What? That wasn’t enough?”

“Is your life worth a half Tahl?” she asked.

“Angela, no,” her friend said, desperate. “Let’s go.”

“One, that’s a full Tahl.” Angela looked down at her hand, feeling out the weight of the coin. “And no, it’s not. He isn't either. We’re offering seven Semp for your trouble, each.”

Money in this world was made out of two metals, gold and silver, but depending on the weight they were valued differently. I wasn’t sure about the measurements, but I knew that the Tahl — silver pieces — could come in full or in half; then the Semp — the gold pieces — could either be a quarter, half, three quarters, or full.

“Okay,” said Angela. “But money first.”

I snorted. “That’s not gonna happen. Point us in the right direction and you’ll get your money. Now come here and help get this guy up this goat.”

They didn’t move. I sighed and pulled Rollo along towards Odysseus. The goat sat and that made the process a little easier. I kept track of the kids, feeling as they moved, trying to get in our blind spot so they could rush us.

“Don’t…trust them,” Odysseus muttered.

“I don’t,” I said. “Not completely.” One of them rushed us and I stood, pulling my — the gun, it wasn’t in its holster. I’d stowed it between me and Odysseus and it must have been thrown during the fall. My finger was next and I pushed the little button in my head that activated the electricity; red light crackled into existence. The boy stopped on, his eyes wide. “That’s not gonna work,” I said, injecting confidence in my false voice. “If you want money, you’ll give me what we want.”

I expected the kids to renegotiate, but they chose to bolt. I let them.

We’d probably been down here too long anyway, and we needed to move, find a way up. There had to be stairs to the higher levels and if there weren’t, then we’d have to climb.

This would be a perfect moment to escape, I thought. You’re already lost and assumed dead.

But the more I thought about it, the more it felt like a bad idea, even if I couldn’t pinpoint why.

It took a bit of looking before I found the gun, a bit muddy but otherwise alright — hopefully. I got on Rollo and randomly I chose a path and we started walking.

If you survive this, then you know you’ll be able to survive the wilds at least.

But between the pain and how tired I felt, the words didn’t make me feel any better.