Her cave was dark and dank and cold, but it was familiar. When she closed her eyes and tucked herself back between the trash cans with her knees hugged to her chest, she was back in Pylea and there was nobody to hear her talking to herself. She was comforted by the partial enclosure formed by the wall behind her and the solid surfaces on either side of her. The filth of the alley was nothing. Nothing at all.
“Not a cow. A human. Winifred Burkle.” She’d almost forgotten her name, but it was easier to remember now that she was back in Los Angeles. Back in the world that she’d been born in. “Pressure is force per unit area. The uncertainty principle …”
She carried on, reciting the same formulas that had brought her back to the city. Because she remembered that any good experiment required replication and because she wanted to anchor herself to Los Angeles before she started to drift away.
(In the part of the city where the first portal had opened, a second portal shimmered into life in the cool evening air. A creature with fangs and scales and the training to hunt down missing slaves stepped through, sniffing the air to catch the scent of a cow he’d been hunting for a long time.)
When she opened her eyes, she was back in Los Angeles. The handsome man with the dark hair and the even darker eyes was watching her.
“Are you here to take me back to market?” she asked, soft and fearful.