Not In Kansas Anymore

When the light came down from the sky, my body instinctively flinched, bracing for unimaginable pain, but I awoke to nothing. The blinding white light was quickly met with black- in fact, it was darker than black. I couldn't tell if my eyes were open or closed.

My fingertips were trying to reach each other, but never met. Did I still have my fingers or hands even? Ironically, the feeling of losing my senses was throwing me through a loop of disorientation.

What happened to me?

Perhaps this was it - what happens after death. Nothing but darkness, an empty vacuum of space with no heaven or hell. Looks like every religion and group got it wrong, except for the atheists.

But hold on, I'm still thinking. I'm still me. Although my body could not be felt or found, my consciousness remained.

Suddenly, a wisp of light sparked in the distance. It was yellow and blinking like a match igniting. I couldn't distinguish the space, so the light could have been small and up close or vice versa. What followed was the fastest I had seen anything move in my life. Now, all around me in every direction, colors of light rocketed past, creating a tunnel of stars so vast as if I were a flea passing through the eye of a hurricane.

I started to notice that the tunnel wasn't moving- I was. It was as if I were traveling faster than the speed of light in a hyper jump, like a scene from a sci-fi flick. This rollercoaster of light and space began to feel less fun and more terrifying. All my senses returned as they were bombarded with an overload of matter. It started to feel like I was falling, and I screamed in fear of an incoming impact.

"HOLY CRAP!"

When I opened my eyes again, the white had returned, only this time it began to fade into gray with faint border lines and darker splotches patterning the canvas. The sky had returned. Cloudy and brisk as I remembered before.

The injuries I got from the lightning storm attack were no longer felt. I patted myself down frantically to double-check this miracle. My wounds had disappeared, as had any dirt or blood that I had on me. Even the parts of my clothes that were scuffed and damaged remained intact.

My backpack, too, had made the journey just fine. I would have hated to lose it, even though it was just hiking supplies; it was all expensive and carried a special memento on top of that. Then the most pressing thought occurred to me.

Where am I… no, what happened?

What I thought was my death moments earlier did not turn out to be the case. I was in the middle of the forest, with the road where I was "shockingly" injured nowhere in sight. My hands ran across the ground to feel out a rock slab I was currently sitting on. I cautiously turned my head from side to side, scanning what surrounded me, and found what appeared to be ruins. It was hard to tell exactly what I was looking at with the fog looming around me. A wide circle of monoliths bordered the stone foundation on which I was currently centered. If a comparison needed to be made, I'd say it was reminiscent of Stonehenge in England, but this was smaller and not as weathered by the years.

But there's something else that's giving me the creeps. Like something alive is watching. Like someone's standing right behind me.

"Hello?" I called out, sheepishly looking back and forth. I don't know why, but I felt like someone was close by. And although I patiently waited for a reply, I was only met with silence. There was no one else here but me.

I gathered myself together and vigilantly stood up. Taking a few paces away from the center of the stone foundation, the slab's shape and detail began to come together. Symmetrical grooves cut through the rock, creating a beautiful stone etched mural that features rune patterns throughout its surface. I awoke at the center of this mysterious circle…

Bit by bit, pieces of more prioritizing information began to pierce my slow detecting process. My breathing was now normal with no pain, meaning that my ribs might no longer be broken. I was starting to wonder if they had ever been hurt or if what I remembered about that lightning attack had even happened.

It can't be a dream. It felt so real, and so did the pain. I thought I had died.

Exiting the circle, what stood in front of one of the monoliths was a woman. Correction- it was a statue of a woman. She was beautiful and highly detailed to a reverent degree. I was no archaeologist, but this ruin appeared to be a shrine, at least that's what it seemed. Was this stone woman a god or just some muse? The whole thing was irregular; the entire ruin's design appeared to be ancient, maybe older than medieval, but the stone wasn't as worn off as it should be… it looked barely a hundred years old.

Okay, "Dr. Jones." Stop letting things distract you; focus.

I began to walk through the events that transpired to make sense of it. I was struck by a lightning bolt near the mountain and sent through a giant hole in space. Then I woke up entirely somewhere else, at an old shrine, with all my injuries gone. Thanks to my knowledge of movies, TV, manga, and light novels, my imagination kicked in with a few ideas. Considering the circumstances, throwing out the logical reasons for a moment and relying on science-fiction-fantasy theories was the only way to deduce what happened. How else can I approach it? I'm no academic nerd, just a pop culture one.

The most likely answer is that I am dreaming. Boring as it is, I had no choice but to test that out.

"Ow," I complained as I pinched myself.

Man, pinching really hurts when you haven't cut your nails in a while. I proceeded to slap myself as hard as I could, like an idiot, to wake myself up…. nothing. I'm perfectly lucid, and everything feels lifelike.

Okay, I have three hypotheses.

Teleportation? Possibly, but that couldn't explain why my wounds mysteriously healed. I might be in the same forest, but I'm nowhere near the cliffside road or trailhead where I was hurt, and even the trees look different. Second hypothesis: time travel? That's even less probable, but both scenarios could be related to that light tunnel phenomenon I witnessed before waking up.

The third option is a jump from the first hypothesis: I could have been thrown into another world entirely by a wormhole.

My gut told me that the lighting attack, ordinary or not, could've created a supernatural amount of energy to send me through space and time. So it's just a matter of figuring out what, when, or where. I can't confirm either unless I find civilization to prove it.

I made my way through the woods to higher ground, leaving the ruins behind. As I did, the odd sensation I was feeling earlier began to decrease. This strange presence certainly gave the impression that something was watching me. But from what I could tell, nothing else was at the ruin with me. My mind was likely giving off false signals, similar to how eyes detect slight movements and mistake them for something in one's peripheral vision. The farther I got from the stone structure, its emanating presence shifted like temperatures- walking between a greenhouse and a freezer.

Luckily, my phone was with me throughout the incident. I had to check my maps to see if I was anywhere near the trailhead, or home... or Earth.

Opening up the phone, it was a relief to see the battery at near full health. However, there is no service. However, the service would be unsurprisingly blacked out in some dense forest areas, so this doesn't rule out my teleportation hypothesis yet.

A droning echo of wind crescendoed as I headed up to a clearing up ahead. As the mist broke apart, a streak of blue sky from above spotlighted rays of yellow ahead. My feet scrambled around rocks and fallen branches to reach a cliffside, but this one was different and steeper. The nature reserve at home didn't hold a candle to what lay before me now.

Enormous mountains stood over a stunning valley of dark green with a shining white river carving through the landscape. This was definitely not the same area as the nature preserve near home- hell, it didn't look like the same continent. My head tilted down below to find a rural town, with small buildings made of stone and wood, with smoke puffing out of their chimneys. The village rested near the river, with horses being ridden in and out of the entrances. And if what I was seeing wasn't enough to prove that one of my hypotheses was right…

ROOOAGH!

The screeching roar jetted past me, coming from what looked to be a gray-scaled dragon the size of a small plane. The fearsome creature then soared high above the white peaks of the mountain range, casting an intimidating shadow over the valley. My eyes were wide in awe, and I was pretty sure I held a dumb expression of amazement. I didn't even think to take a video of it with my phone, but who would I show it to? It became abundantly clear that I was no longer home.

"I'm… in another world," I uttered in disbelief.

Rarely does a dream come true the way you imagined it. Other than the painful and frightening journey that brought me here, seeing this world of fantasy mystified my eyes with wonder: a new life and an opportunity to make something of myself.

Back on Earth, I was Damien, the loser nobody who got broken up with on track to graduate with a pointless degree that would lead me to a dead-end job, but here I could be anybody. Here, I can be a warrior or hero and live the adventure of a lifetime. I could be confident, strong, and a better version of myself without the limitations and norms of the old world. In this world, I can be unlimited.

My excitement giddily built up like a rollercoaster, reaching its peak. No more school, no more lifeless jobs, no more deadlines or loans. All the freedom and adventure I could ever ask for. All the risks of danger and exhilarating peril. I might be wrong later on, but as of right now, no matter what this life can throw at me, I am ready for every second of it. I couldn't contain my childlike anticipation.

"YEAAAAHHHHH!" I cried out into the valley.

What was once the worst day of my life quickly became the best one yet. Anything seemed possible, and my eyes haven't strayed from my hopes and desires for one second. Finding the "one" could now be within the realm of possibility, and within this magical realm that is this other world.