In the beginning, there was no version of me in other worlds. I wasn't meant to exist beyond my own, not until I did.
Seven months have passed since I left everything behind in the city. There was no reason to stay, nothing left to live for. Everything had fallen still. The people froze where they stood, and the animals too. Even the sun remained suspended in the sky. It had been a year, I think, that I had spent countless silent days wondering what could have caused it. A temporal anomaly, maybe. Some kind of cosmic disturbance. But none of my theories matter anymore. Time abandoned us. And I am the only one left to watch how the world ends.
All the misfortune of my original world, it seemed, was poured into me—cursed to suffer, cursed to stay awake, cursed to witness a world that no longer turned. Every time I opened my eyes, it was the same lifeless stillness. Except for one thing.
The Haken.
What I remember most vividly from our brief meeting was the way he looked at me. The gaze behind his glittering silver eyelashes spoke with pure intensity when he appeared in my apartment, moments after falling from the sky. He was weak, crumpled on my living room floor, and dying. A silver liquid oozing from the corners of his mouth, like spilled light. Words were spoken, frail, but certain. He told me his existence revolved around forging contracts with potential partners scattered across the cosmos. Strangely enough, I was the only one from Earth who met his qualifications.
Behind him, an aquatic gate stood tall, shimmering like water caught in starlight. He offered me a deal: he would grant me one wish in exchange for completing a task. It sounded simple, survive in his world until his Presence Bar recharged. But there was nothing simple about it. Ambiguous in its terms, cryptic in its limits. Still, I agreed. He needed me, and I had nothing left to lose.
"Ella Sanford from Planetary Earth," he said, "make me whole again. Fill me, and I shall return for anything your soul dares to ask."
With a single drop of blood, I sealed an unorthodox pact.
I stepped through the gate and arrived in Vikur, a world untouched by modernity, primitive yet strangely alive with people.
It took me nearly a month to adjust to the winding streets and the suspicious glances. I tried calling out to the Haken on my first day, screaming into the sky, cursing the empty air, but he never appeared. I'd been trying to find work, but everywhere I went, people turned me away. My clothes made me stand out, and my accent didn't help. After a week of rejection, I ended up near the market square, bruised from a scuffle. That's when Morris found me.
He tossed me a stale apple and said, "You throw a punch like someone taught you to aim. But you hesitate."
He wasn't wrong. I trained in Taekwondo in my world. I knew how to block, to counter, to strike but it had always been controlled, practiced, bound by rules and mats and referees. I wasn't trained for back-alley fights with people twice my size who played dirty and came at you with blades.
Morris saw that, and he brought me to the Underground Ring hidden beneath the eastern slums, where rich people watched from behind masks and commoners bet what little they had. I didn't want to fight, but I needed to eat. And more than that, I needed to survive.
We fought. We earned. We ate. We slept in the same abandoned workshop, took turns keeping watch, and stole food when silver was scarce. He made jokes when the nights were too long, and sometimes hummed old songs from his homeland.
Then Morris died.
Killed in the ring by Thalric Dornevale, the arrogant, bastard son of the Steward. He cheated with a blade. Poisoned-tipped.
I didn't plan to retaliate. But when I saw Thalric's face, smug and untouched by consequence, something inside me fell apart. I don't remember thinking. I only remember the glint of my blade against his face and the gasps from the crowd as his blood hit the floor.
That night, I marked the Steward's son for everyone to see.
For two days, I hid in crooked alleys, staying low while Thalric's men scoured the city for me. But Vikur wasn't kind to ghosts like me. A few people recognized me. They whispered, pointed, and eventually, they betrayed me. I don't blame them. Loyalty means little when fear is in the air and gold is on the table.
The first group came at dusk. Two men with blunt knives cornered me in a narrow passage near the weaver's square. They were non-fighters. I fought them off with a loose board I tore from a fence. One fled, bleeding from the temple. The other didn't get back up.
Every alley became a dead end. I stopped counting how many I'd knocked down, how many bruises bloomed across my skins. I was starving, soaked from rain, and one wrong turn away from being caught. Then I saw her.
Semira Elowena Lehman.
She sat like royalty in a silver-trimmed carriage, looking at me like I was filth, like something unfortunate she had just stepped over, but also... like I was useful. She didn't ask who I was. She didn't care.
"If you can serve me wisely," she said, "you can earn your supper."
I climbed into the carriage. I didn't have many choices. We left the Vikur behind and traveled to the Baron's estate, just beyond the city. She begged her father, Baron Molly Lehman, to take me in, not as a guest, of course. That would've raised questions. Instead, I became her "personal assistant," or something close to it.
They gave me a small room, warm food, and a role I could play. My only task: stay close to Semira.
I thought being away would mean peace. I thought I could lie low, fade into obscurity, wait out the Presence Bar, and finally claim the promise. But wherever I go, safety is an illusion.
I am being hunted.
And soon, I fear I'll be killed before I ever fulfill the agreement with the Haken.