Sixteen-year-old Allison Lars shot up in bed, gasping for air, sheets damp with sweat. Out of habit, she lowered her frantic breathing. The last thing she needed was her parents to hear her. If they thought she was having more “night terrors” they’d send her back to the psychiatrist and she’d be on meds again.

Rubbing her eyes with the palms of her hands, she struggled to remember the dream. This one hadn’t been like the others. The various nightmares of the ritual chamber and her time with Ubira’s slavers had only subsided in the last year. For three years, she’d only gotten any rest at night with the aid of heavy sleeping pills. Thinking about the money her parents had poured into therapists and treatments for her “condition” made her stomach tighten.

There was nothing wrong with her, well nothing aside from the trauma born from appearing in another reality and spending several weeks as a captive, all culminating in a violent battle, where she’d been reunited with her brother moments before reappearing in the same spot on Earth with no time having passed. But none of that was what her parents thought was wrong with her. It was this whole “invention” of a made-up world as a reason that Kellen had apparently abandoned her that late summer morning and walked away from their harvester, never to be seen again. When she’d returned to Earth, the glowing blue rock was gone, leaving no proof of the whole ordeal except the story of a twelve-year-old girl.

She’d lost count of the times her parents and various “professionals” had asked her what happened with Kellen. By the time she turned thirteen, Allison had given up trying to convince them of the truth. Instead, she gave them the same scripted response: “Kellen pulled over the harvester and told me to wait there. He never came back. No. I don’t know. I don’t know.”

Eventually, they stopped asking and chalked it up to a coping mechanism she’d adopted to deal with her brother vanishing without a trace. Realizing she’d end up in a facility if she didn’t give up trying to convince her parents of the real version of events, Allison withdrew. Her friends at school stopped talking to her. She’d never told anyone but her parents and the psychiatrist what had happened. Word still got around. But she never stopped believing. Never doubted her mind, though everyone else thought it was cracked.

Around fourteen, she’d started researching ancient mythologies, listening to podcasts, reading history books. Her one string of hope came from Professor Gates’s belief that all life in Oras had originated from earth. Certainly, you didn’t have to dive very deep to find some strange similarities in origin stories and accounts of early explorers. The mythologies were rife with parallels. When her parents had found out how she was spending her spare time, the treatments, the lecture and the pleading started all over again. They’d taken her books, started monitoring her phone, and burned all of her notes.

So now Allison focused on being as normal as she could, saving her money and waiting for the day she graduated high school so she could leave Idaho behind. There had to be a way to get back to Oras. It was the sole belief that kept her going through the ridicule and disbelief.

Lying back down, Allison stared at her ceiling, recalling the events of the dream. When her eyes had opened, she’d been standing in the rain. It had felt like an out-of-body experience, but her vision responded to her desire to look around. She’d seen dead cultists and several other people and Mana Beasts. Then she spotted Kellen.

He was lying on the ground. The Mana Beast with him was different, too. He looked hurt and shaken but alive, not much older, just different. Changed.

Their eyes had met. She’d tried to call out to him but found she couldn’t speak. When she’d tried to approach him, something pulled her away. No matter how she fought to free herself or scream out to him, Allison could only watch as he grew farther away and eventually faded into white. Then she’d woken up.

It had been real. She was sure of it. And that had to mean there was a way back.

I’ll find you, Kellen.