“Oops.”

The single sound leaked from every sidewalk crack and vibrated through every flat surface. It shook the windows of the truck, behind which the driver was frozen in surprise. It rattled the police cars and traveled up the crane parked outside of the building. It caused the straps supporting the injured stag, still mid-air, to warp and dance in harmonic sympathy.

For a moment, the world hung frozen, patiently waiting for the voice to continue. The yellow deer moved its huge head to regard me, still standing many stories below. It radiated emotions of regret and irritation as it’s mighty voice emanated from every direction.

“My bad.” the voice boomed, “that was a total goof, bud! Listen, I got the same treatment, believe me, I know this ain’t gunna be fun, y’know?”

The monstrous deer stepped down from the crane, somehow having always been as tall as the building. It’s antlers rattled the skies and it’s huge eyes burned bright and hot. Blood oozed lazily from its side, shards of what had once been a cargo container lodged in the golden hide.

“Sorry to get you wrapped up in this, fella, I thought that damn raven knew a vet, not some schmuck with a bag of bird food, y’know?”

The air, hot from the truck being so close, shifted like jello against my hand as time stubbornly leaked onwards. I laboriously waved the apology away, shoulders lifting against the weight of the sky as I shrugged. My voice, comically stretched, mumbled out with effort, “It’s a better death than I was hoping for, honestly.”

“Uffda. Things not going so hot for you folk, that’s fer sure. I was thinking about going nova just to put you all outta your misery!”

I smiled at the peculiar spirit’s grim sympathy, once more reminded of Atlas as I shrugged. He wasn’t wrong, things hadn’t been going particularly well for humanity so far. Each small tragedy seemed to push people apart, myself included.

It was a bitter truth, but after so long feeling disconnected from everything and everyone, this outcome was as acceptable as any. I hadn’t planned on dying but in those moments of still consideration I had finished the cycles of grief for the life I was leaving and prepared for the next with grim ambivalence.

“What happens next?” I asked, pushing my head through the heavy air to see if I could spot a reaper approaching for me. Instead, I got an eyeful of dawn, burning the deers huge, luminescent eyes into the back of my own.

“Don’t look right at me, fella, that’s no good fer ya.” The sun chided, then responded quietly, “As for what’s next, well… I don’t really know. This kinda thing didn’t used to happen, I mean, you did me a good turn gettin’ me help and here I am gettin’ you in the same pickle as me! I tell yah, not easy being magic anymore.”

As if to prove the point, time stuttered forwards a few frames. Gouts of potent blood finally reached the Earth and the sharp smell of hot metal pressed closer to where I stood.

“Y’know what, let’s you and me come up with what’s next, eh? If you wanna go, you can go. I’ll contact whoever you pray to and send you off nice and easy.”

Time stuttered once more, the sound of the city crashing into me as the grille of the truck pressed against my outstretched hand.

“Or I send you off to this other project I’ve got goin’ with some friends. You do me one more favor, I keep you fed, my corporeal body gets a minute to recover, we all win.”

“A favor?” I responded, worried what favor I could do for this apparent deity.

“ I need a worshipper down there, at least one just to get the idea into some heads, y’know? My sister’s got all the clout and that can’t stand.”

My arm crumpled painlessly, folding into my shoulder as though the bones were made of paper. Someone started to shout as they noticed.

“Easy gig, just tell me what you want and I’ll make sure you have it when you get there. It’s a nice place, like Italy or Louisiana or whateva.”

It took considerable effort to lean my head back in a meandering nod. While I was still able to, while my head was still connected to my chest, I shouted back a response. My heart raced in panic as though trying to get its last few beats in. I was sure the sights of watching myself explode in slow motion would stay with me regardless of what form of rebirth I chose. The truck creeped closer as I repeated my answer, faster with each inch that it passed further through my body.

Then, suddenly, everything returned to normal. I stood on the sidewalk and watched the crane lower the now quite mundane deer to the ground below. The truck veered back onto the road and came to a stop, the mist where my corporeal form had once been sifting through crisp morning air like powdered sugar. Sound exploded back to life, the honks, screams, and sirens washing through the canyon of buildings.

I was dead.

A hand pressed on my ghostly shoulder as my own severed hand fell at my feet. I suppressed a nauseated sound of dismay and glanced to see what was connected to the one on my shoulder.

Despite the blood soaking his side, the tall man in the golden suit glowed radiantly. He winced as the deer across the street was jostled, maring his perfect smile, and he wrapped a hand around his side to stem a fresh dark stain on the suit. His grip on my shoulder tightened and moments later the Earth and everything I’d known slipped away into the inky dark of space. The void swallowed the sun as we slid away, causing the man to flicker wildly.

However, before he could vanish completely, we emerged into a new solar system. I barely had time to worry about being stranded in the vacuum when a completely alien set of planets presented themselves to me from around a pair of fat yellow stars.

“Aren’t they the coolest?” the deer-man said proudly, releasing my shoulder to point at the smaller of the two. “That’s me, the other is my sister. She loafs about here mostly, I’m sure you’ll meet her down there.”

I nodded, doing my best to take in everything he said. He glanced at me, an eyebrow arched intensely. “You’re taking this awful well. Wish I had your zen.”

The words were slow to come and I resorted to shaking my head as though to clear the confusion.

“This isn’t zen, it’s shock. It’s… it’s a lot to process.” I finally croaked out.

“You’ll get the hang of it, I’ll make sure of that.” He nodded reassuringly, though I remained thoroughly un-assured. “What is it you want? What did you lack before, what can I give you to make this next life good?”

I widened my eyes at the broad question and tried to come up with some equally broad answers so that nothing was missed.

“I guess… time to figure everything out? Room to grow? Useable skills? Friends or some connections to others?” I threw out in a hurried jumble, “Opportunity, or the opportunity to create opportunity, or… or…”

A raised hand stopped the rambling short and a beatific, if pained, smile lit up across his face.

“Say no more,” he announced, “time, growth, skills, connections, whatever that last thing is, checkarooni, bud. I got just the thing. Trust me, you’ll make this great.”

Before I could respond a hand was at my shoulder and I was already hurtling towards a blue-green globe. The globe stretched into a map, displaying several unfamiliar continents spattered across a vast ocean. I zoomed closer to a coast, the beach huddled up against a vast plains that grew ever more detailed, and disorientingly segmented, by the moment. A trail cutting through the tall grasses became visible, then a series of wagons following a river. I had a brief moment to appreciate the line of settlers before I impacted something and the world once again went dark.

A cheer flowed, wavelike, up the line of settlers as each crested the last hill and caught their first sight of the western ocean. It had been a grueling walk over many months from the distant capital to this far shore. The sight of their destination, though, eased grim faces into glowing grins. The river that had darted near, and rarely across, their route had drawn close once more when a brilliant light filled the sky for a moment. Like a condensed ray of sun, a yellow-green bolt lanced through a wagon in the lead before fading away, as quick as it had come.

The train came to a crashing stop at the presence of such strong magic. Scarcely a moment could pass before the Stadtmeister was on his horse and charging to the front. He barely bothered to stop his mount before leaping into the wagon bed. He pushed past the throng that had already formed, gesturing with irritation at his resplendent blue robes set with the circular pattern iconic of the church. The crowd pressed to the walls, clutching matching sigils hanging from twine about their throats.

At the center was a small girl with dirty blonde hair and pointed ears and teeth. She clutched a willow sapling in her thin arms, one of many that rested against the tarp siding, half dead from the hardships of the road. The young elf growled at him and he quickly struck her across the face, causing the dirt-flecked child to cry out and scramble away.

The noble crouched down, steadying the tree at the base of the trunk as he pushed the thin foliage aside and smiled, letting out a sigh that carried through each member of the crowd.

“We’ve arrived!” He announced proudly, eliciting a cry of jubilation that echoed once more up the train. In mere minutes a few elves had wrestled the tree from the wagon. Under the instructions of the Stadtmeister, they carefully planted it between the river and the trail, equidistant from the delta into the ocean as it was from the marshlands upriver.

Hours passed as the train moved up to form a layered semi-circle of wagons with the tree at the center and the river at its back. After parking and unhitching, the various families moved to join the blue-robed human in prayer about the trunk. The people naturally filtered themselves into layers about the tree, the human nobles closest, nobility of other races behind them. Still further out were the rest of the Humans, Dwarves, Goblins, Brownies, Blooded, and most distant and numerous, the Elves. Each knelt with hands clasped in an O and held to their eyes so that the tree was at the center of their vision.

As the last to join, a young blue sphynx who sat among the nobility, a rustling was heard. From behind a leaf, a small person emerged. Dressed in willow leaves, the cherubic green child floated through the air with a dazed expression. It hovered barely a few inches from the branches, yellow eyes darting from face to face to face.

Fuck me. The dryad thought. What did I get myself into?

The blue-robed human got to his feet, arms held wide and a glowing smile plastered across his round face. He bowed his head and began to speak in grand tones, his arms sweeping with each statement, beetle-black eyes locked on the Dryad’s. As he spoke, many in the crowd nodded or whooped in agreement.

Unfortunately, he did not speak English, or indeed any language the Dryad had once known on Earth. She nodded along politely, though her brow was furrowed in concerned concentration. It was a strangely adult expression on the face of a baby even the Goblins would consider small. Each serious nod elicited a giggle from the less faithful in the crowd, each time slightly louder. After a dozen such moments the priest cut himself off to wheel on the crowd.

Though the Dryad did not understand his words, his tone crossed cultures perfectly fine. This priest and his equally loud mumu were plenty clear in their repromands of the crowd and each moment of the display made the other-worlder’s cheeks warm with second hand embarrassment.

“It’s fine, seriously!” She exclaimed after a moment, tiny hands waving wildly to grab his attention. She paused, an amused expression on her face as she realized how much her voice matched her new form. A trio of singing rodents flashed through her mind for a moment and let out a snort of laughter.

The moon-faced meister turned back, his expression enraged before he figured out who had laughed. He looked ready to snap, but his face relaxed into a simpering smile. He spoke a few more patronizing sentences in his language before gesturing for the rest to rise. At once, the congregation stood, locked arms with one another within their same layer, and dipped down in a quick bow towards the center before filtering out to their wagons to unload.

Where a congregation had once been, a sickly tree and a pinprick of green light stood alone amongst dry, trampled grasses. A strong breeze washed up the coast, rustling like a wave through the plains and, the Dryad noted with surprise, the land itself. The Dryad watched as long chunks of the land floated lazily through the air, tethered to the ground by thick knotted vines.

“If you cut the vines…” She pondered aloud, “Do they just… float away?”

Each floating mass was at most a half mile long at its largest end to end or furthest from the ground. They clumped in tiered structures, sometimes forming thin cliffs that drifted like seaweed or wobbling mountains like platters of jello.

A shadow flitted over The Dryad’s head and she glanced up, a small hand shading her eyes from the glare of the twin suns, which were already low on the horizon. She shrank back against the tree, branches reaching out to pull her towards the trunk. The shadow zoomed past once more, emitting a terrible cry.

“MUSTARD!”

The shadow landed a little too fast, tumbling several feet and colliding with the trunk of the sapling. It croaked and rolled to its feet only to be tackled back into the earth by a small green bullet.

“Poe!” The Dryad exclaimed, floating away from the impulsive embrace as the raven fluttered upright once more.

“Food?” the ungainly bird replied

“Close enough,” The Dryad laughed, rubbing the back of her head, then furrowing her brow as realization set in. “How did you get here?”

“Same as you di-”

“Holy shit you talk!” She interrupted.

“Well, I was trying to, yeah.” He snapped in a low drawl, then croaked out a soft chuckle. “b‘sides, I always talked. I just get out of breath fast in that city. All that smog does a number on one’s throat.”

The Dryad opened her mouth to argue but the persistent bird pushed on.

“Like I was saying, our dear friend brought me here just like you. I am his guide when he visits Earth.” His chest puffed up with pride, then deflated just as quickly. “Well, WAS his guide. Guess ‘I panicked’ wasn’t an acceptable explanation.”

“Yeah, what did happen last night?”

“I panicked.”

The Dryad crossed her arms, staring daggers into the suddenly eloquent avian.

“It was worth a try.” he chuckled, “I was gonna have you meet him under different circumstances, as a thank you for your hospitality. When that damn truck came out of nowhere I thought dawn would never come again! He was shoutin’ and hollerin’ like the end had come and I panicked! I ain’t meant to get you killed!”

A tense silence filled the air for a moment, each sizing the other up. Soon, however, the stronger will won out and the raven shrunk his head into his body, feathers puffing up defensively with each second that passed.

“I am sorry, for what it’s worth. If you don’t mind me makin’ amends, lil green, I can help you get settled in. I’ve been here a few times, learned the language and a few customs. I can be your guide!”

“You can teach me the language?” The Dryad ventured.

“Fluent as hell.”

“And help me navigate these people?”

“Like a GPS.”

“And if I get hit by a wagon?”

“Panic and drag you to a restaurant.”

The dryad let out a snort of laughter and the bird relaxed, beginning to preen his feathers flat again. Another cool breeze washed across the land as the first sun, the larger of the two, dipped behind the horizon.

“I’d appreciate the help.” She relented with a tired sigh and the raven nodded in agreement.

An awkward silence fell over the two and raven began high-stepping around the trampled grass. The Dryad settled against a branch to watch the bird pluck lengths of the stuff from the ground to build a cave-like nest at the base of the trunk. By the time he had finished, the last sun had faded beyond the horizon and The Dryad had fallen fast asleep.