It was inevitable really. The multiverse was huge, but a lot of it had the same patterns because some patterns worked no matter where you were. It was only a matter of time before one of them wound up somewhere with the same technology as the Handlers. Anti-magic. This world brimmed with it. A blocky metropolis of hindrance. Everywhere Kaia looked there was another incarnation of that eerie black material. In necklaces, in cufflinks, in the hard soles of people’s shoes. Even in the architecture. It was everywhere, and if ever it touched her skin—or fur if she were in fox form—she knew she’d be unable to shapeshift until she broke off the contact. She had the feeling there would be a lot of jumping involved if she got into a scuffle here.

Also, Kits wasn’t with her. No backup.

Kaia resolved not to get involved in any scuffles, which is exactly what one does before a scuffle bowls them over, but she squashed that cynicism under practicality. She was good at practicality. The best. She prided herself on being a survivor. So.

When you find yourself on an unfamiliar world without your kindred, there are steps to follow.

Step one: locate someone who can get you directions.

Ugly as it was, the fact this place was a metropolis meant it had a dense population, and although the people clopping up and down the streets weren’t human—Kaia had grown fond of humans after running into them in a surprising variety of locales—they were clearly sentient. Duh. They couldn’t have built or conquered a metropolis otherwise.

Nobody could understand her.

Of course. Another duh. The translation spell Crystal had fixed for her and Kits was still a spell. It was magic. In case the streets were paved with an anti-magic compound that might be interfering with the spell’s effects, Kaia tried hopping while she conversed, which wasn’t the local custom and earned her universally-recognized expressions of bafflement. People began avoiding her, taking wide arcs around what they must’ve seen as a helplessly strange foreign blue lady, and it occurred to Kaia that even if she could prevent herself from being affected by whatever anti-magic was around, most of the inhabitants of this world were wearing it on their person. There wouldn’t be any input for Crystal’s spell to calibrate.

Okay, so no talking to people. No big deal. She could skip step one. Wouldn’t be the first time.

Step two: find transportation, the higher the tech or magi-tech the better. Obviously, magi-tech was out of the question, so Kaia hoped to find pure technology that could get her as far away from here as possible. Anything that reminded her of the Handlers was a source of extreme stress, given how she and Kits were raised, and all this anti-magic was making her jumpy. Pun very intended. At the very least she tried not to yelp at anyone.

Navigation without the help of a guide was impossible. The transportation tech in immediate view didn’t seem like the kind that could get Kaia off world either.

In a last ditch effort to orient herself before she’d resign to aimlessly wandering the metropolis, she attempted to decipher the language on what seemed like shop display windows and street signs when a scuffle crossed her path.

A male with catlike ears, leonine hair, and a long feline tail—biological traits unlike the rest of the people here, though his bipedal gait matched everyone else’s—ran past her, glancing at her in panicked haste. The moment their gazes met, an unquantifiable feeling clicked between them and Kaia knew she had to help him, whoever he was. Another oddity about him compared to the rest of the locals was that he wasn’t wearing any anti-magic that Kaia could see. Or smell.

But y’know what she did smell? Magic.

So she chased after him. It soon became apparent he was running away from something rather than toward, which meant now Kaia was fleeing pursuers too. Those in pursuit were dressed in a manner that implied authority and had what could only be weapons at their belts. As they gave chase through alleys and buildings and even windows, they shouted in a language Kaia had no hopes of grammatically understanding. But she knew what the words must mean. She was officially on the run from some kind of law, already a fugitive after less than an hour on this new world. Oops.

Wasn’t the first time, and worse things had happened. She’d managed not to touch any anti-magic or get hit with any projectiles, and she ran astride the male, keeping pace pretty easily. She had a lot of practice when it came to escapes.

“I don’t suppose you can understand me?” said Kaia between breaths. “Or would be willing to say something so my translation spell could calibrate.”

At a junction the male shot out his arm, caught Kaia’s, and dragged her into a tight space. They both ducked down, and Kaia had the good sense to keep her mouth shut, breathing as softly as possible under the circumstances.

Their pursuers approached. It was dark in the space since she and the male were making use of a building’s shadow, but Kaia could hear and smell the pursuers as they came closer. Perk of being a shapeshifter. Some of the fox senses became automatic after a while, so automatic that even anti-magic couldn’t dilute them. You can’t really get rid of someone’s hearing unless you block it or blow it out, nor their sense of smell unless you plug their nose. The male was shielding her with his body as they hid. She could hear his apprehension in the way he breathed, smell his sweat.

Kaia didn’t sweat. She and Kits never had to regulate their own temperature. That didn’t mean she wasn’t nervous.

She and the male stayed there for heartbeats upon heartbeats, neither daring to move. A bin that must’ve been for waste kept the pursuers from spotting them, and eventually the danger passed.

The male spewed something in the metropolis’ language. He was still leaned over her, his hand braced against an anti-magic protrusion of the building.

Kaia reached up and gently pulled on his wrist.

He blinked and stepped away from her, looking sheepish the way he rubbed the back of his neck. His tail swished low, back and forth.

“Wanna repeat that?” asked Kaia.

He did, and this time Kaia’s translation spell did its job.

“One more time,” said Kaia, cupping her ear. “Sorry.”

“I said thank you.” He paused. All of him, even his tail. “Um.”

“Kaia.”

“Venlyn.”

“Any chance you know where I can find interplanar transport?”

“Where you can find a what?”

Kaia sighed. Since when were things ever that easy?