Not Your Average World

The Strange Light

Lizzie pulls into my driveway.

There's a weird light coming from my room and the shadow of a person.  Someones in my house. I think anxiously.

"Lizzie."

"Yeah?"

"I think there's someone in my house."

"Dear God!  Should we call the police?"

"No, look at the light, its not right.  I don't think its normal..,"  I open the door, and stick my foot out.  I turn to Lizzy, "Want to investigate with me?"

She looks scared out of her mind, the freakiest thing shes gone through is Bath and Body Works not having her favorite hand sanitizer.  We get out of the car and I unlock the front door.  My house is two stories tall, and I'm quite certain the person up there didn't see us pull in the driveway.  We walk in, slowly, pushing the door open and hoping it doesn't creak.  We search the bottom floor together because Lizzie doen't want to leave my side.  If it was up to me, we'd split up.

There's a loud crash from upstairs and a large intake of breath follows it.  "Shit" an unknown voice whispers harshly.  We take one stair at a time, slowly, carrying knives from off the kitchen counter.  We stop at the top stair.  The staircase leads to a small hallway, with 2 doors on the left, my room and the bathroom, and 1 door on the right, my parents' bedroom.  The eiree light is still coming out from my room, though there isn't any noise.  I wonder what made that crash.

I wait a few seconds, and then jump into my room my arm holding the knife fully outstretched.  A lady lies in my bed, and the mirror on my closet door has transformed into a swirly gray thing.  The lady is in full armor, but she's not the girl from my dreams.  She has dirty blonde hair that escapes in bits from around her helmet.  She glances at me from the corner of her eye without tilting her head and I see her eyes are hazel.  She must only be about five five but when she stands she looks much taller. 

I falter.  My arm shakes and lowers a bit, Lizzie is whimpering behind me.  The lady in armor has a very noticable sword on her waist, and my small knife used for cutting steaks is not going to do me much good.  She stands with her arms crossed and eyebrows raised, like she is annoyed with me.  Is she here to kill me?  If so, why?  I didn't do anything! It's not my time-

She extends her arm to me. 

"Hello," she says with a British accent, "I am Reminick, and I was sent here to, like, get you."  She put the hand I neglected to shake to her face.  "Goddamn, that sounded unprofessional let me try again."

"Hi, I am Reminick.  I was sent here with orders to retrieve Vivian Bimsridge, and whoever would like to accompany her."  She smiled, she has perfectly straight, white teeth. 

"Well, I'm, uhh, Vivian." I say, pointing at my chest. 

"I assumed. I was certain Grelathorin hadn't sent me here to pick up a coward," Reminick laughed, gesturing to Lizzy, who was still shying away shaking on the opposite wall.  "You should definitely bring a friend with you, Vivian.  The trip will be hard alone."

"Trip?"  I ask, I really don't want to do anything for anyone who decides to show through a portal, declaring she has orders from Grelathorin, whoever that is.

"The journey is for 8 people, and you are said to be the leader of it.  You need to bring some friends."

There is absolutely no way my friends will agree with this.  I text Ben, Connor, and Parker and tell them to come over as soon as they can get here.  They show up within 15 minutes. (Probably because of Connors bad habit of speeding)  Ben and Parker seem scared out of thier minds, but Connor finds Reminick interesting and continuously asks questions.

"How did you get here? Like, where are you from?" 

"I come from a place you that you cannot imagine existing.  It is called Dalmaedia.  Well, I live in Dalmaedia, its mostly elves and humans, but there is also Vapince and Harinset.  Where you decide to live is up to you.  But Dalmaedia is currently the most peaceful.  So will you come?"

Connor looks around at his friends' faces and despite the scared looks starts to say yes, but I cut him off saying no more forcefully than I intended. 

"We have families and school and lives to keep up with I can't abandon all that to go on a mission for you and your "elvish" friends."

Reminick sighs.  "Time stops here while you are away.  Time never stops in my land, but if a human from... Earth, that's what you call this place?  were to leave the planet, all time would stop because it is unnatural for humans to leave this place." 

Connor perks up, "Well, if you guys aren't going to go, I'll go by myself."  He walks over to the portal like he's 100% ready to leave. 

Ben and Parker hesitate and the walk over, too, not willing to let Connor be an idiot alone.  I agree to go, and Lizzy is practically left with no choice but to come.  She doesn't look at all happy to be coming, though. 

Reminick is smiling again, happy to have them all agree.  She lets us know that the portal on the other side is inside a church, and she informs us to get out of the way so we can all get through without becoming human dominos. 

Connor steps through first, and its amazing to see how fast he is gone.  I send my mom a text telling her I'm going on a trip with Ben and some other friends since his car is the only one not in the driveway.  I don't give her time to respond.  I step through the gray swirling of the portal, and into the city "Dalmaedia". 

The portal makes me sick, I try to close my eyes but that makes me feel unbalanced and the sick feeling in my stomach grows worse.  Just as I felt like I was going to puke, everything stopped and I felt wood on my knees and my hands planted on the ground. The last thing I saw before I blacked out was Connor lifting me up into his arms and carrying me away from the portal.