THE MOMENT
Tila opened her eyes slowly and sighed as she stared up at the dense canopy of trees. She was on her back and decided to stay there instead of sitting up right away; she was still a little light-headed. She could hear the river flowing and her mind began to work out the possibility of rolling into it without getting up. After a few more seconds, she felt her strength starting to return. The greyed-out, floating HP bar in the top left of her view turned red again and began to fill from 1 HP.
"Okay, so that's not so bad...," she mumbled to herself. After touring the AlterNet with Emily, Tila was ready to explore on her own. But, her first order of business was learning how her Class worked. She knew fainting was a possibility; but, she needed to test it to learn its trade-offs if she ever needed to push herself. She had enough strength to sit up and did so. As soon as she set eyes on the river a rustling came from her right; she turned and saw a tan, bearded man in a dark suit step out of the foliage. He met her eyes and quickly approached her with a concerned expression. His brow was furrowed but his eyes were wide as if he wasn't sure whether to be worried or not.
"Where am I?" he asked.
"This is the Toku-high server," Tila answered. It was the first time she knew the answer before someone else. As much as she wanted to explore by herself, she was still smart enough to stay close to her friends that attended school on that Earth.
"What??" the stranger's head swiveled left, right, up and down before he looked at her again. "I'm not familiar... is that in California?" he asked as he shook his head. "I don't know how I got here...," he added.
"Really?!" Tila perked up right away and hopped to her feet. "What's your favorite number!??" she asked with a little too much enthusiasm. The stranger stepped back even as he answered the question.
"35!" he said. His eyes narrowed as his confusion became more prominent. "Huh?" he asked. Tila giggled to herself.
"My name's Tila, what's yours?" she asked.
"Angel," he replied. "When did I get a favorite number?" he asked.
Giddiness swelled in Tila until she opened her mouth. Everything she was about to say refused to come out. She felt like it was a wall of information that she couldn't separate. Every brick was built on another, and he didn't have the foundation to lay even the first one.
"Mundo will explain it to you," she sighed. Alternate universes, the AlterNet, Unique Souls, myths, and more all made sense to Tila. Mundo took several hours to explain it and she paid close attention hoping to do the same for someone else.
"Who's Mundo?" Angel asked. "Will he know how I got here?"
"OH! I know that!" Tila was excited to give someone the same welcome tour that she got a little flustered; she felt like she was part of a club now welcoming lost souls to the AlterNet.
"You did that," Tila pointed at him. "You can do something called 'Traversing'; it lets you travel between alternate universes. Mundo is kind of like the information desk. There's a lot to learn about the multiverse."
"Wait...," Angel shook his head. "...alternate universes are real?"
"As real as me!" Tila replied.
"And I can just... walk into a new one?" he asked. "Because that's what happened. The lights went out as soon as I got home from work. When I went to go check the fuses I wished I could be relaxing at the river instead of dealing with my day from hell."
"Yep! You did that. Estrellas, that's you, Traverse by 'feeling'. Actually, everyone does," she added as she held up a black card. It wasn't black cardstock; she seemed to be holding a rectangular shadow. "This is called a Traverse card," she said. "It does what you can do; I just think really hard about where I want to go. And, this is extra important; I have to know why I want to go there. If you don't have a clear feeling in mind you might end up anywhere." She threw the card on the ground and it opened a large black hole in the grass.
"Let's go see Mundo," she said. She stepped onto the portal and encouraged him to do the same. But, he shook his head; his eyes lingered on the river as he did.
"Not that I don't appreciate your answers and your offer to help...," he said. "... but, I really need a minute to catch up. I had a really really bad day and I'm not sure this is better yet. I'm barely holding it together...." He moved to the riverbank and sat down while undoing his shoes. "I'm not even sure I'm still alive," he shrugged as he rolled up the legs of his slacks.
"I'm not in a hurry," Tila stepped off the portal, then knelt to put her hand in it. It shrank back into a card; then, she walked over and sat down next to Angel. "We'll go when you're ready, I was planning to spend most of my day here anyway," she said.
"I'm not interrupting?" he asked. He scooted forward and slid his feet into the cool, clear water. Tila shook her head.
"I'm just seeing what I can do as a Furycaster," she said.
"What's a Furycaster?" Angel asked.
"It's a Berzerker spec," Tila answered. "I can cast two spells at the same time; but if I do it, the second one costs HP to cast. I was testing what happens if I overdo it," she said.
"Oh, nice...," Angel nodded as he watched the water flow by. Then, he stretched his arms up as he lay down on the grass. "...I don't know what any of that means, and I'm not going to think about it right now. Maybe later."