Evanna stared unseeingly out the window while her mom drove without a word. Silence pervaded the closed space, broken only by the low rumble of the moving car—as if it was venting the annoyance that was simmering under Mary's quiet demeanor.

There's probably a perfectly logical explanation to this. Calm down, Ev. Calm down. Evanna fought down yet another bout of panic, which bubbled to the surface at varying intervals. There was a dull ache behind her eyes that was unsettling given that she very rarely experienced headaches.

Mary's phone rang, piercing the quiet. Evanna flinched.

"Janet, we're on the way now," her mom said with pursed lips. "Yes, she's fine."

The aftermath of the fainting spell sprang up in her mind, making her stomach knot with embarrassment. She had regained consciousness on the sofa at Olympus, Naomi's worried face peering over her. Horton had arrived as well, looking rather flustered. Countless curious glances were thrown her way, while others surrounded her, trying to get a better look. After being fussed about, offered water and fanned, her mom had barged in.

"How are you feeling now?" Mary asked, interrupting her thoughts.

"I—I'm okay."

Mary made no attempt at conversation the rest of the way.

Back at home, her aunt got her to eat some pumpkin soup, which turned out to be soothing. She felt disconnected with the incident at the plant shop—it was just too overwhelming to dwell on it. Numbness descended, accompanied by the persistent headache.

"Eva, we need to talk," Mary began in a tone that made Evanna's insides twist.

Janet sat at the table without a word.

"You can't go on like this." Mary crossed her arms. "You're going to end up in hospital with this silly diet of yours. You're actually fainting in class now!"

Evanna blinked. Oh...of course. If I so much as sneeze now, it's 'cause of my diet. Loads of people actually die of heart disease, but no one brings up their diet. "Mom, this has nothing to do with—"

"You will stop this madness."

"You can't force me to eat what I won't eat," Evanna muttered, tired to the bone.

Mary's forehead creased into an angry frown at her defiance.

Her sister spoke up, "How about you take responsibility for your choice then? Work on not fainting in class for starters."

"I'll do that." Evanna dropped the spoon into the bowl with a plop. "I've decided to do some cooking too."

Her mom snorted.

She sucked in a breath to still her mushrooming temper. Then she spooned lukewarm soup into her mouth, the burnt papillae of her tongue registering it as nothing more than a viscous, insipid mass.

"You can carry on then. We'll have you checked after some time, and if the results are not adequate," Mary said, her face making it clear that she already knew the outcome, but was simply humoring her, "you change your ways."

Evanna made a noise of acquiescence, more to get Mary to leave her alone than anything else.

Her mom made one final attempt at what she saw as appealing to sense. "Eva, listen, you can maybe go meat-free, but this is extreme. You do realize that no harm is done by milking cows and collecting eggs, which are not even fertilized?"

"Extreme for me is eating those things," Evanna said stonily. Did my rant the other day just fly over your head, Mom?

The sisters exchanged a look.

Evanna leaned forward in a sullen slouch and shoveled in the rest of the soup.

When she was about to exit the kitchen, Mary called out, "I couldn't ask you in the morning. Why are you dressed all in black?"

"'Cause I like it."

"Oh, looking like you're attending a funeral is fashion now? I can't believe you went to class like this. And it's awful what you've done to your eyes—"

"Mom, please leave me alone."

Trudging back up to her room, Evanna flung herself on the bed. She curled up into a fetal position and didn't move even as darkness enveloped her.

"Before we get on with our lesson, I wanted to let you know that a career guidance session is coming up this Friday," Inoue said, adjusting her glasses while her gaze swept over her students. "It's not compulsory, but I recommend all of you to make use of the opportunity to fine-tune your future goals."

It was Monday.

The morning assembly had been shorter than the first one Evanna attended. She now had physics class till lunch break.

"This program was compulsory since we were expecting no less than Enrico Solheim—yes, the billionaire entrepreneur himself—to share his journey with us on this occasion," Inoue continued. "Unfortunately, he's had to cancel. Whether you attend this or not, you can talk to me any time if you need advice on your future career."

Under the pretense of looking around the class, Evanna sneaked a glance at Shane.

He sat motionless, eyes fixed idly on his desk. The mop of dark, messy hair was particularly fluffy. She had come to notice that he sported wet hair on most mornings—as if he stepped out of a magazine cover. A morning shower person. He might as well be a different species. Anyways, maybe I'm over-thinking this—he probably dismissed it as nothing.

"To get you inspired, I thought it would be good if we have some of you discuss your goals—and what made you choose science subjects." A smile graced the teacher's angular face. "Who wants to start?"

No one volunteered.

"Come on now." Inoue's gaze homed in on Sery Kwan. "How about you, Sery?"

Sery looked like the last thing she wanted to do was discuss her career, but when the teacher beckoned her over, she got up reluctantly. Patting down her mousy hair, she shuffled to the front of the class.

"Er, I chose science subjects, 'cause...I don't feel like taking the others, except maybe..." she faltered. "Plus, my parents wanted me to go for science."

"What would you like to do in the future?" Inoue leaned against the teacher's table. "It all depends on what you'd like to do."

"Well, I'm like most people here. I mean, I'd like to just see how well I do and figure out what my options are..."

"You can't share with us what you're interested in doing, at least?"

Sery flashed an awkward smile and shook her head.

"Alright, go back to your seat then."

After Sery scuttled back to her chair, Inoue turned to the class. "You're surprisingly reticent when it comes to this, I see. This is not a test. It's just you sharing with your classmates."

Silence greeted her words, punctuated by birdsong in the sunny plaza outside.

Inoue's eyes skimmed over the upturned faces again and settled on Evanna. "Evie, I'm sure you have something interesting to share with us."

Evanna started—then shook her head, lips edging into a nervous smile. "Um, I don't have much to say. Maybe you should ask someone else..."

"I think you have much to share. Come on up."

Given no choice in the matter, she drifted to the front of the class. Color rose in her cheeks under the scrutiny of many pairs of eyes that were trained on her.

"So tell us about your inspirations." The teacher bestowed a half-smile on her. "And what made you pick science classes."

"Um, I'm really into sci-fi." Evanna crossed her arms behind her back. "I've been reading Animorphs for a while now—you know, this awesome book series."

"What is it about?" Inoue asked in an encouraging tone.

"Alien invasion, sort of."

"Ah...go on."

"Yeah, I'm also a fan of Star Trek, Star Wars, X-Files...Scully's been such as an inspiration to me—she's so cool. I like X-Files so much 'cause it's horror as well. Anyways, I guess, thinking about the possibilities and the unknown kind of appeals to me."

Inoue nodded with a knowing smile. "I got the feeling it certainly does."

Evanna reciprocated her gesture, carefully avoiding all eye contact.

"So now that we know your interest in science, tell us what you'd like to do in the future."

"Oh, no, I'd rather not..."

"Don't be shy. And again, you don't have to tell us any specifics. It can be a dream that is not quite fleshed out."

A heartbeat later, Evanna blurted out, "I, um, want to find aliens."

Okay, that didn't come out well! There was a smattering of laughter.

Inoue rapped on the table to quieten her students. "That's interesting. Any idea what you'll do to find them?"

The inferno in her face steadily intensified. "Um, there's much we don't know, but there could be over a billion planets with life in the Milky Way alone. That's, like, huge—I mean, it'd take thirty years just to count to a billion. Using the Drake equation, we can find the probability for the existence of actual technological civilizations—kinda like ours or more advanced. They say there could be at least thirty alien civilizations in our galaxy right now. So, to find them, we'd have to look for exoplanets that can support life, listen to radio signals they might be emitting—there are other stuff we can be doing too! Like, observe the stars for signs of megastructures. Unless, of course, the aliens don't want to be found—"

She took a deep breath, realizing too late that her nervous babble had caused every face to stare at her like she was an alien herself. Please let the Earth devour me now.

Perhaps it was because she was obsessing about what was in Shane's mind, but she caught his eye for a split second.

He was watching her with a subtle smile hovering on his lips. There wasn't a shred of his usual bored scrutiny—the full intensity of his piercing, dark eyes was on her. Her heart flipped.

Evanna fixated her stare on an illuminated point on the floor, touched with golden bleed from the dichroic glass sections of the window. Her cheeks now burned like a supernova.

Inoue cleared her throat. "You've given it quite some thought. Very good. You may go back to your seat. And thank you for sharing that with us—can all of you give her some applause?"

Amidst clapping and amused laughter, Evanna glided back to her seat in a daze and plopped down. She saw Oleanda mouth "freak", which didn't help matters.

"I hope everyone found that inspiring," the teacher said. "I encourage all of you to develop your own unique interests like Evie has done."

For the rest of the class, Evanna hunkered down in the seat, wishing her uniform came with a hood she could use to obscure her face.

When the bell rang, she waited for the horde of fleeing students to clear before ambling out of the classroom.

Her restless nights over the weekend had been marked with sleeplessness and nightmares. As a result, she had binge-played Arcana Online, the effects of which were now catching up to her. Her eyes were strangely alert, and tiredness weighed her down.

She trailed down the corridor, absent-mindedly checking her nails. Without warning, a hand closed around her arm.

She could only gasp as the hand proceeded to pull her into what turned out to be a darkened storeroom. A shriek built up in her chest—but she was shocked into silence by the sight of Shane Evans towering over her in the cramped space.

He shut the door in one swift motion, cutting off the bright corridor.

Evanna stared up at him and struggled to calm her racing heart. His eyes bored down into hers—pools of unfathomable blackness in the twilight glow of an automatic lamp.

"Sorry if I startled you," he began to say in a quiet voice.

She finally found her voice, which came out in a high-pitched squawk, "You almost gave me a heart attack! What are you doing!"

He sighed and murmured, "I didn't exactly have a choice but to—"

"I'm off," she cut in icily and glowered at him. Okay, you definitely haven't dismissed it. But you don't get to interrogate me—not when I'm pulling my own hair out trying to make heads or tails of this situation. 

She made to move towards the door, but his arm calmly reached out and barred the way, palm flat on the wall right next to her head.

Jolted by his proximity, she hastened to back up—only to bump against the wall.

In the silence that ensued, she inhaled his distinct woodsy scent—salient notes of mossy woods tinged with citrus. It somehow soothed her heart that now thudded against her ribcage with renewed vigor. Holy cowsies, if it wasn't for...stuff, this could've been viewed as...romantic. 

Her eyes fluttered over his chiseled features in the semi-darkness while her breaths puffed out loudly in the stillness. The heck, Ev. Get a grip! He's just a cute boy! You've seen cute boys before. Except...he belongs in an anime. He's dark and gorgeous. Just my type of gorgeous—focus! The farther you are from him, the safer it is!

"How did you do it?" he asked in a muted rumble.

Despite the nonchalance he tried to maintain, a note of urgency crept into his voice.

"I dunno what you're talking about," she said, steadying her voice.

Suddenly, the door opened with a clink.

Evanna jumped violently, while Shane stiffened. His intense gaze shifted slowly to take in the figure at the door.

A thin guy clad in overalls and a cap stood stock still and blinked at them. His face morphed from a puzzled frown to a comical gawk. He hastily shut the door.

Shane turned back to her. "So?"

Her mouth fell open, and her poor heart tried to recover for the third time. "So? So? We're going to get expelled! Holy crap, my mom's gonna kill me! As if I don't have enough stuff to deal with right now, and it's all because—"

"Calm down," he interrupted.

"Are you bloody insane! Holy cowsies, you are insane—"

"Evanna, he's with the janitorial staff—not a teacher," he said, inexplicably calm in contrast to her agitation. "They don't care. But he might go get a teacher, which is why we have to make this fast."

She wrested her eyes from his with a stubborn pout. Maybe you scared him off for good with those eyes of yours. "I don't care! I'm not talking to you!"

"Can I, at least, say thank you..."

A puff of air escaped her, but before she could figure out what to say, panic set in.

She threw a frantic glance at the door. "Shane, let me go."

He hesitated.

Okay, that's it. She raised her leg and stomped on his foot hard, though her sneaker only made an unsatisfactorily muffled thump upon impact.

He withdrew—though if it was out of pain or more out of surprise, she had no idea.

Evanna lunged towards the door, swung it open and ran out.

Throughout lunch break, she was preoccupied with the dreadful possibility of her expulsion. Maybe I'd be sent to Lycurgus or end up directly at the principal's office. Maybe Inoue would call my mom!

The sense of impending danger receded from her mind with the passing of time. She ended up dwelling on the actual encounter with Shane. She finally gave her head a little shake. Stop, Ev! You have other stuff to think about!

After lunch, Evanna had Chemistry—another class she had started to dislike.

The teacher, Todd Trelowarn, was a thin man with big glasses. He was quiet except for snide remarks he let slip on a regular basis. The brunt of his hostility was directed at students he felt were slacking or too unintelligent to study science. He was in a bad mood now, since a dozen people had not finished homework—including Evanna, who had forgotten about it altogether.

She was even more jumpy in Biology. The prospect of calling Ed Morken jostled to the forefront of her brain. It gave rise to a wild concoction of emotions—from fear to elation.

Evanna twirled a lock of hair again and again until it resembled a corkscrew. She avoided looking in the direction of Shane and Ash, though she couldn't help the occasional glance.

As she sneaked yet another look at the boys' section, her eyes briefly rested on Armel Meriton, who appeared completely down in the dumps. It was a notable contrast to the boisterous manner she associated with most in the rugby team. See, Ev? You're not the only one with problems.

After school, she headed home for her first class with her new physics tutor Nigel Park—an ambitious young graduate from the University of Komoreby. Her aunt had arrived home early to meet him and make sure the first class went smoothly.

Park looked like the classic nerd with large glasses and an awkward manner. His teaching style appealed to Evanna, but her distracted, sleep-deprived brain refused to concentrate. Eventually, her eyelids drooped—at which point, she excused herself to go to the bathroom and splash water on her face.

By the time the class ended at six, the sun sank in a fiery ball, driven away by the approaching darkness. Just one more hour.

Her jittery nerves acted up despite the exhaustion. She hurried to her quiet room, ears involuntarily picking up night calls of frogs and crickets.

Then she plopped down at her computer and logged into Arcana Online.

Artemisia found herself at the city's main bank—where she left off. She barely finished her transaction when another elf arrived through the archway, turquoise robes swishing.

Serafina came to a stop right next to her. "Hey!"

"Hey!" She grinned. "You're online all the time."

"I just leave it open sometimes and happened to see you're there. And I see you've leveled up! That's crazy fast."

"Couldn't have done it without your help! Plus, I played a lot last night."

"Don't you sleep?" Serafina asked.

"Life has been a bit insane for me lately." Artemisia closed the bank vault tab that was hovering in her vision. "I'm just here for around an hour."

"Well, we better get you some good gear. Let's head to a dungeon!"

"Before that, can you check if Croizar and Santuin are around, by any chance?" Artemisia smiled. "Maybe we can go with them!"

"Oh, the two people you wanted to find that day?" the tall mage nodded. "Okay, hang on."

Artemisia's owl-wraith, Kaminari, flapped idly next to her while she waited.

"Yeah, they're online," Serafina said, finishing the last tracking spell. "They're in Gallenea again. You wanna head there now?"

Junho and Max, here I come! She felt like breaking into a dance. "Yep, let's go!"

They took off at a casual run and arrived at the portal that would take them to the barrens of Monkshood Deep. Both elves sprinted into the amorphous surface, which rippled in a moiré pattern.

A nanosecond later, they teleported to a dark tower.

"This is so not my favorite place," Artemisia said as they summoned their flying mounts.

"I know it sucks," the other elf replied. "There's a ship that would take you to Gallenea, but that means running to the harbor, and I'm too lazy to do that."

Artemisia nodded as if it were news to her.

They soared into the leaden sky, stained a rusty red hue. Artemisia flew on a manta ray with bioluminescent markings, while Serafina's mount was a turquoise dragon. 

The castle behind them receded into invisibility, swallowed up by the haze. A desolate expanse spread out beneath—rugged terrain overlaid with reddish sand. A gigantic gorge cleaved the monotonous landscape. At that height, Artemisia could not detect the ravenous ghouls she knew were prowling there.

After passing several small settlements, they caught sight of the coast in the distance. As they approached the ocean, the atmosphere changed, along with the background music. They were now in a different zone.

They flew over the water, which turned from aqua to deep blue. With each elapsing second, the island city of Gallenea became more discernible. It gleamed white under sunbeams that filtered down through puffy clouds. Grand ships lay docked at its port, and a tall lighthouse stood to one side.

This was a neutral hub where both factions mingled and traded—from lunar elves to sirens.

The two elves touched down onto a landing area and switched to their land mounts.

Within minutes, they rode along a cobbled street that led to the center of the city. Quaint, whitewashed buildings stood on either side, and quest icons popped up next to various NPCs they passed along the way.

As Artemisia stepped into the inn allocated to their faction, her mount disappeared, and Kaminari materialized by her side. There was an air of homeliness about the place with a cheery fire burning in the fireplace.

Then her gaze fell on Croizar and Santuin.

The two lycans were seated at a round table, clad in heavy plates of armor. They made a grand sight in shining silver and formidable weapons. They had a sturdy build about them and coarse hair—both of which were lycan features.

It was hard to believe that she was finally going to play with them. Some things never change, I guess—even in a parallel world!

"They're idle," Serafina said in a whisper.

"Let's see if they respond," Artemisia whispered back and trotted up to them.

They made no indication that they noticed her presence.

"Hey, I was wondering if you'd like to go to a dungeon with us." Artemisia smiled. That can't sound odd, right? "We'd still need to find a healer though."

There was no response.

Her chat bubble slowly faded. She cast a glance at Serafina, who just shrugged. C'mon, guys!

Then Croizar moved, and his words appeared after a moment's delay. "Sure, why not. Give me a minute."

"Cool!" Artemisia grinned.

Santuin came alive and got to his feet. "Where do you wanna go?"

They discussed dungeon options and queued up for one in the same zone. While waiting for a healer to join, Croizar burst into dance—soon joined by Santuin.

Artemisia and Serafina cracked up in unison, their tinkling laughter overlapping.

The dance moves were surprisingly in sync with the uptempo background music of the inn, heavy armor rendering the spectacle even more comical.

"Nice moves," Serafina said.

"Thanks." Croizar waved. "Join us."

All four of them were dancing when they were whisked off to the dungeon.

Evanna logged out of Arcana Online.

She'd been so lost in the game that it was easy to imagine that she was back in her reality. Junho and Max were fun to play with, and together, they breezed through the final boss battle. Both of them were now in her friend list, as well as Serafina's.

For the first time since awakening in this universe, she experienced a sliver of home. A flame sputtered to existence within, helping her hold onto sanity.

It was now time to make the long-awaited phone call.

The nerves returned with a vengeance, making her skin prickle, while anxiety and excitement cycled in her head like turbulent storm clouds.

She dialed Ed Morken's number and waited with bated breath as the call went through.

"Hello?" a male voice said.

"Hi." Evanna cleared her throat. "Am I speaking to Mr. Morken?"

"Yes."

"Um, I'm Evie Zeller. I emailed you about—"

"Oh, yeah. Right." There was a pause. "Can you give me a minute?"

"Yeah, sure!"

Evanna mused at the utter lack of familiarity in his voice, though it was polite enough.

"Hello, yes, what would you like to know?" Morken asked. "You said you were working on a school project?"

"Yeah, I won't take up much of your time." Evanna took a deep breath while the icy mass in her gut solidified. "I just have a few things to discuss with you."

"Sure."

"The work done at HEPLOK is to answer some of the, um, fundamental questions about the universe, yes?"

"Yes. Correct."

"So what sort of weird stuff do you expect to find with your experiments?" she asked in a rush.

He let out an amused chuckle. "That's a broad question."

"Like, do you hope to find...parallel universes?"

"We're not currently conducting such an experiment," Morken said, his tone still amused. "We do try to find hypothetical particles, which would be evidence for or against various theories."

Evanna gripped the phone tighter. Well, the CHC does not even bloody exist, so your capabilities must be way less. "Suppose you happened to have a particle collider that is super big—say, eighty kilometers long. So, that means way more energy."

A silence stretched out.

"In that case, we might find some interesting things," he finally replied. "We might find dark matter particles. Do you know what that is? Okay, so, all visible matter like planets, stars and galaxies make up only five percent of the content in our universe. It's like when you look at a city at night—you only see the lights without seeing the buildings. The lights can't just float, so we know the buildings are there—just hidden from view. Dark matter is like those buildings. We know it's there, but we don't know anything else about it."

"What...else?" Evanna whispered.

"We might create mini black holes, which would be evidence to support the string theory—a promising candidate for the theory of everything. With high energies reached by such a collider, we might find particles that would suggest the existence of extra dimensions. This would explain why gravity is so weak—a small magnet has a greater electromagnetic force than the gravity of Earth, you see. So gravity could be spread over those extra dimensions. Do these qualify as weird stuff?"

As she sat frozen, she experienced what could only be described as mind-boggled. Inoue's words on parallel universes wafted into her mind. She realized with a jolt that all the wild sci-fi scenarios weren't so far-fetched. It wasn't about aliens out there. Her whole reality was now alien—including herself.

She resisted the urge to clutch her head and curl into a ball.

Morken's voice broke the quiet, "You found out about the new collider that is currently being built? And you just wanted to know what we can do with it?"

Evanna sat up straighter, eyes widening. "Um, yeah..."

"It's certainly exciting," he said with a note of enthusiasm. "The CRC is the most ambitious project we've ever undertaken here at HEPLOK."

Her heart thumped against her chest. CRC? That's what they call it here? Then if the experiment that day is replicated...maybe, we can set things right!

She swallowed and steadied her cold, trembling hand. "When?"

"Pardon?" Morken asked.

Evanna pressed the phone to her ear. "When would it be completed?"

"Next year."

The world came crashing down—or that was what it felt like.

"Towards the latter part of next year, actually," he continued. "If everything goes as planned."

A long silence elapsed.

"Hello?"

"Thank you very much for your time, Mr. Morken," Evanna intoned. "I really appreciate this."

"Oh, no problem. Good luck with your project."

The call ended.

For a long time, Evanna sat in her darkened room and stared into space—trying to stop herself from hyperventilating.