Prologue: A Strange New World

When Amanda woke, she had no idea where she was.

She thought that she was only taking a nap in the break room between meetings. Running back and forth between angry clients and her boss threatening layoffs was a bit more than draining. The solution was just to take a thirty-minute nap. A glorious thirty minutes for herself to rest her poor feet and mind.

Actually, the more she thought about it, the more she was certain she should have been at work. The fluorescent light sound and hard plastic chairs were definitely not the comfortable bed she was laying on. Even if she thought she found her way home, a draping fabric canopy with soft twinkling lights was not part of her boring bedspread. The longer she stared at the warm, glowing lights in her morning daze, she was starting to convince herself that the lights were woven into the fabric. Little LEDs that twinkled on a timer.

She turned her head towards partially curtained windows at her left. She could feel herself sliding on the glossy silk pillowcase from under her. Sunlight was pouring into the room through the open sliver, creating a perfect rectangle on the wall across from her. The light was harsh but inviting in the morning daze. It called to her like a moth to a flame.

Amanda slipped through the silky sheets and placed her feet on the cold wooden floor. She ignored the nightgown she wore. She ignored the unfamiliar bright red hair sticking to her face. She ignored many little things around the room that were definitely not in her budget. Even the things she would have considered “odd” didn’t stop her as she walked faster towards the light.

Throwing the curtain open, she grimaced and squinted, flooding the room with light. When the pain of light adjusted, she was left with an unfamiliar sight. She was used to city lights and gray-colored buildings. Rainy days and crowded streets were familiar to every commute she had to and from work. It had been that way for the last ten years. Instead, a lush green garden terrace with a city backdrop full of white and green greeted her view.

Without realizing it, she found that the window was actually a pair of windowed doors. She pushed mindlessly at the glass barrier and walked out onto the concrete balcony. Parrot looking birds chattered to each other on the balcony edge and flew away as she approached with her head up to the sky. She counted four other large buildings with similar garden terraces to the right and a large office building to the left. A pink hologram showcasing a type of drink and panda mascot was playfully teleporting across the office building as if the entire thing was a billboard.

A line of flying vehicles stuck in traffic could be seen not far into the distance, and she watched mesmerized as a flying vehicle with vibrating wings and a sail clipped through the blue sky overhead. Nothing was familiar to her congested and rainy city. She almost expected her manager to interrupt whatever dream she was in and blink her back to the smell of old coffee and sounds of copy machines.

Only then did she realize that the city sounds were muffled. There were sounds, but it was as if the whole garden was surrounded by noise-canceling headphones. She had to cup her hands behind her ears to verify if this was true. Amanda found herself relaxing into the lack of sound. She tilted her head and felt a genuine, peaceful smile wash over her face. She hadn’t felt this calm in a very very long time.

A breeze of wind blew through the garden, rustling the leaves and blowing the bright red hair into her face. She spat at the hair and cursed the rude interruption. She clawed at her face trying to get the tangled pesky strands back into place. That was when she noticed her hands and the long, bell-like nightgown sleeves at her wrists. These…weren’t her hands… and this wasn’t her hair. She felt her chest and stomach, not recognizing any of what she was seeing. She picked at the intricate embroidered details of the nightgown. There even was a red light built into the fabric like the canopy she saw before. Placing a hand over the red dot to pick at it, it immediately transferred to her hand.

Odd.

Removing her hand, the light was back to her chest.

It was as if it was being pointed at her from elsewhere…

“Lady Jovanna!” a voice screamed behind her.

Her senses snapped to existence as she felt a man's body tackle her to the concrete floor. The harshest “bang” she ever heard rang overhead as they hit the ground. Through the limited view she had over the man’s shoulder, Amanda saw a perfectly splintered door with the other decorated in a spider web of glass.

Fear flooded her mind the more she stared.

She was standing right there.

A flower vase on the balcony shattered instantly, and the two immediately turned their heads in its direction. The clattering garden parrots were flying away as another bang rang out. Almost all at once, the city noise erupted around them. The peace of the headphone covered world was gone, disguising any further shots that may have been firing at the two.

“Stay down, Lady Jovanna! If they’re using a NeedleTail sniping gun, it has to reload!”

“W… what? What does that mean?” Her voice felt as foreign as everything else around her.

“It means we move NOW!”

The man looked up and hurried Amanda to her feet. His body was the only thing that was protecting her from whatever was firing at them. They kept low, and she covered her head. The man was right; the mere seconds they had between reloading, her bare feet scraped at the concrete floor into the supposed safety of the home she walked out of.

She screamed as a bullet followed after them into the bedroom. It just barely missed her as they lunged out into the hallway off of the bedroom. She was surrounded by another unfamiliar place with what looked like maids cleaning the floors and windows.

Amanda didn’t know how long she was screaming… but as she felt herself grow limp and tired, the last thing she heard was a symphony of voices crying out:

“Lady Jovanna!”