Chapter Text
“Elaine, would you please see me in my office?”
I guess it's happening now.
Elaine knew that the complaint was coming, but it was still upsetting to get an official reprimand. She joined her supervisor and he closed the door behind her.
“You've always had an impeccable work ethic, and I'm not going to let this adversely affect your career.” He smiled comfortingly. “We are always going to make people upset, that's part of the job.”
“Thanks, Rick.” He really was an excellent supervisor and had been a mentor as she worked her way through law school. “Could I see the wording of the complaint?”
He hesitated. “We don't usually share those, it's not considered a breach of confidentiality, but there is an expectation of privacy when an official complaint is lodged.”
“I understand.” She pulled out a small card she had been keeping in her back pocket all week, waiting for this meeting. “It's just that depending on the wording of his complaint, I'm hoping we can catch him violating the court order to separate from all of his business operations during discovery.”
She handed over a list of places and times, secretly enjoying the surprise on Rick's face.
“Those are all the places and times where I met with CompTech employees. If the complaint came from their interim CIO then I'll go pack my bags, but if Mr. Edison was the one who filed the complaint, we can subpoena their communications to see how he's still getting inside information.”
She savored that thrilling feeling of seeing her boss's eyes sparkling as he cross referenced her list with what was sure to be a complaint that she was harassing their staff. After months of mind-numbingly boring paperwork and set-up, these thirty seconds were going to be the most excitement she'd get out of this case.
“Elaine, you took a huge risk and acted without authorization. Expect a raise upon the successful litigation of this case, which of course you can no longer be a part of. Take the rest of the week off. With pay. Now get out of here and please consider yourself officially reprimanded.”
Several minutes later, walking down the street with a milkshake that everyone pretended was actually coffee, Elaine didn't know it was the last time she'd spend on Earth.
It was a world-wide event with an unknown epicenter that blurred the lines between fantasy and reality. In the aftermath, scholars probably advanced their understanding of a multiverse, with alternate realities and fantastical realms which have somehow bled through into our imaginations. They probably have research that shows how artists and writers were subconsciously influenced by these alternate realms, resulting in stories that mirrored real events elsewhere.
That’s all well and good for those scholars and the people remaining on modern “normal” Earth. For the people who happened to be caught in the folds between universes while they collided, there was no explanation.
Elaine felt the indescribable sensation of being squeezed between two colanders while bright lights exploded behind her eyelids. Crashing backwards and down, she gasped a lungful of ocean water and opened her eyes to see sunlight filtered through shallow water.
Survival instinct took over well before actual thought. Choking and coughing the moment her head breached the surface, she managed to paddle towards some nearby rocks and hold herself still while she gagged salty water out of her lungs.
Vision blurry, the transition from walking on the sidewalk to ocean swim was so nonsensical that the first several minutes of gaping was spent in sensory overload, not understanding the sights and sounds around her. Slowly some comprehension filtered in. There was shouting nearby, and she could see in the middle distance a boatyard swarming with people.
She wasn’t far, but there were rocks and rough terrain between her and the docks. So as she carefully swam and picked her way towards what seemed to count as civilization, her relative invisibility saved her life.
“Demons!” People were screaming. “Abomination!” The clash of violence and confusion engulfed the docks. Elaine watched from the water as someone in a business suit was run through with a sword.
Protestations of the victims went unheard, as a population raised to fear magic and demons appearing from the fade were suddenly faced with strangely dressed people appearing out of thin air. Anyone who had been ignobly tossed into this realm with the bad luck to be seen popping into existence was attacked on sight.
All of this was something Elaine would realize later. At the time, her thoughts had gone something like: What? WHAT? What? Okay, water…. sand… oh, thank goodness, people! Move towards people! People good! Rocks and water… Swords and killing… oh no… people bad! People very bad!
Elaine was an intelligent and well educated young woman working as a paralegal while advancing a career in law. Or at least, she had been. Between the sudden shock and violent arrival into a different world, she was struggling to achieve “Me Tarzan, You Jane” levels of coherence.
But she was well hidden in the water and rocks, slowly coming to terms with her surroundings and quietly getting the panic out of her system as she observed the pier. She listened as sailors and guardsmen yelled and demanded explanations. She waited as the sun slowly set and the crowds started to thin.
And then she pulled herself onto the docks in a quiet moment between shifts. She stole a tunic someone had left soaking in a laundry bucket. It was just as wet as the button down blouse she quickly shucked and tossed into the ocean. Her sneakers and socks followed shortly thereafter, but at the very least the slacks didn’t look too out of place. Not wanting to stay still and risk getting caught, Elaine shuffled herself into a dark corner further down the street and crouched there.
Barefoot. Sopping wet. Traumatized. But alive.