Celia was going to be late. The tram, packed like a barrel full of fishes, was moving too slow. It honestly might’ve been faster to walk at this point. But she had made her bed and she was going to lay in it - for better or worse. And right now it was looking like a whole lot of worse.
It was normal for Celia to be late. Too normal, really. And Harold had begun to notice. If she didn’t pick up her act fast then there was no doubt in her mind that he was going to fire her. He might just do it today, because she wasn’t just going to be fashionably late. She was going to be actually late, late.
If she stuck with the tram, that is.
Fortunately it’s next stop was only a few minutes away. Pulling into an old station house. Old wood and dreamers plastic going crunch under her heels as she stepped off. From there it was a walk. Path taking her through all the little shortcuts she knew. Alleys, very condemned streets, and right through the heart of Glome itself. The new glaive district, as mysterious as it was prosperous.
Which was very. The buildings, all of them black, rose into the sky like they were towers ripped right out of a mark touched storybook. Each of them casting their long shadows over her, reminding Celia of just how small she was. Which if she had to guess was why they were so big in the first place. To remind everyone else, who wasn’t marked or part of a guild in some way, what they were in the grand scheme of things. Insects.
It was a good thing then that being an insect had stopped bothering Celia years ago.
She heard something crack. It was a sound like thunder, too loud to be ignored and utterly deafening from so close. Rendering her temporarily blind to all sound around her. And when her ears could once again register sound, all she heard was screaming and something that sounded an awful lot like an earthquake.
It was the last thing she heard before a wave of translucent blue energy washed over her. The world contorting as it did. Space ripping itself apart before her very eyes. Spots of black and red and blue blooming into existence only to vanish in flashes of right that seared her eyes from just looking. All of it happening in the frame of seconds. One two three…
And then she was somewhere else. Flat on her back and body aching just about everywhere it could. The sky above her a flat grey. Like concrete mixed with mud, and missing all the clouds. It was like she was inside one of those black and white paintings that people paid so much money to see sometimes. Which was wrong on several levels.
Were her eyes broken? Was she colorblind now? Is that what that blast of energy did?
Her answer came in the form of a bird passing overhead. Shaped like a swan, blue like the sky was supposed to be, and in possession of two too many heads. Which told her that her eyes "were" working at the very least. It also told her she was somewhere with freaky mutant birds.
And that was a terrifying enough thought to prompt her to get up. Dusting herself off as she did so, before giving her surroundings an actual proper look. Unfortunately for her, she didn’t like what she saw.
She was was next to some sort of forest. Except all the trees looked like they were made out of vomit green mold and their branches, overburdened with long leaves, fell to the ground like hair. In the other direction there was, honestly, a whole lot. From a river that rose into the air and looped into itself, to a hill covered in orange eyes balefully glaring at the world around it. There were fish flying through the skies in schools numbering in the 50s. Insects and little critters far removed from what she knew. Possessing limbs she’d never seen, as well as wings and tails varying in every way she could imagine.
Then there was the sun. A gaping wound in the sky vaguely circular in shape and whirling in on itself. A cyclical thing of both devouring itself and recreating itself. At least, based off what Celia thought she was seeing. Which was, again, a lot.
Enough to make her question if someone had laced her somehow.
Sadly, that made even less sense.
She really was in what looked like, as far as the eye could see, another world. Another realm. And the only thing she could think of like that was the veil. A world that supposedly existed beyond their own, and was the source of every Marked’s powers. It was also a nightmare realm that had birthed some of the worst monstrosities and atrocities to date.
Which was bad.
"Okay, okay. So I’m in a monster generating realm made out of nightmares… um. Okay yeah that’s pretty bad."
And then it got worse. A cry like a howl tearing through the area. Causing literally every living thing in sight to flee. Either outright vanishing through what Celia could only assume was magic, or hiding somewhere. Not to mention the ones that just ran.
It was, all things considered, a very bad sign. It was also a few seconds too late.
The source of the howl bursted out of the woods like a meteor given life and leg. Six of them to be exact. Each a thing of red fur peaking up from beneath dark green scales. The body above similar to a wolf from the neck down, but it had the head of a snake and the tail of a lion. She was also pretty sure it was drooling acid. But before Celia could confirm if that really was the case, she started running as fast as she could.
The chimera of a wolf gave chase immediately. All six of its legs launching it towards her and sending it practically flying through the air. The distance between them already gone by half before Celia could make more than seven steps. And by the ninth it was all but on her. Mouth opened wide and fangs bared as it came hurling down like a guillotine.
And then Celia tripped.
Foot connecting with and failing to go over a rock. Causing her to fall face forward to the ground. Ground that gave way in a burst of green clumps of what looked like moss. It sealed up just as fast, leaving her suddenly alone in what looked like a damp cave.
She fell on her hands and chest, and nearly blacked out. Sadly, she didn’t and was left alone with her thoughts. Her very, very spiraling thoughts.
"Oh, this is, this is so bad." She finally said, sitting up just as she realized just how bad her situation was.
Which was far worse than she thought. Like, worse than living in the bad part of Glome 'bad'. And they had cannibals there.
But Celia also realized that sitting here panicking wasn’t gonna do her any good either. Despite how tempting an option it was. So, ignoring the panic that was very much threatening to consume, she got up on her feet and started pacing. If only because she’d seen other, smarter than her, people do the same.
It didn’t really help.
All she ended up with was a bit more anxiety and sore feet from walking over all the rocks on the ground. And maybe something close to approximating an idea of sorts.
She forgot it a second later, when something stung her neck. Prompting the instinctive response to swat it.
It was followed shortly after by her falling to the ground.
