Consciousness returned slowly, like wading through a thick fog. Alan became aware of sensations one by one: cool air against his skin, hard ground beneath his back, the smell of earth and vegetation. Not the sterile environment of his laboratory at all.
He opened his eyes and immediately shut them again, the bright sunlight sending a spike of pain through his head. Groaning, he raised a hand to shield his face and tried again, more cautiously this time.
A canopy of unfamiliar trees stretched above him, their leaves a strange purplish-blue that filtered the sunlight into dappled patterns on the forest floor. Alan blinked several times, wondering if the explosion had damaged his vision or if he was hallucinating.
"Concussion," he muttered to himself, slowly pushing himself up to a sitting position. "Or some kind of neurotoxin released in the lab." That would explain the bizarre colors and the fact that he seemed to be outdoors when he should be in a basement in Cambridge.
But as his head cleared, other details began to register that challenged this explanation. The air he was breathing was different—fresher, with unfamiliar scents. The quality of light was wrong too, somehow more vibrant than Earth's sun. And the sounds—distant calls of what might be birds, but in tones he had never heard before.
Alan climbed unsteadily to his feet, checking himself for injuries. Remarkably, he seemed unharmed. His clothes—jeans, button-up shirt, and lab coat—were intact, though the coat was smudged with dirt. His glasses were miraculously still on his face, and a quick check confirmed that his wallet and phone were in his pockets.
He pulled out the phone, unsurprised to find no signal. The screen showed the time as 3:17 AM, which was clearly wrong given the bright daylight surrounding him. More concerning was the battery level—already down to 47% when it had been fully charged before the experiment.
"Hello?" he called out, his voice sounding small in the vast forest. "Is anyone there?"
Only the strange bird calls answered him.
Alan took a deep breath, forcing himself to think logically. Either he was experiencing an extremely vivid hallucination, or something in his experiment had gone catastrophically wrong in ways he couldn't yet understand. Neither option was particularly comforting, but the scientist in him refused to panic before gathering more data.
He chose a direction that seemed to show more light through the trees and began walking, keeping track of his path in case he needed to return to his starting point. The forest floor was covered with soft moss in shades of teal and amber, and occasionally he passed flowers unlike any he had seen on Earth—some with translucent petals that seemed to glow from within, others that slowly turned to track his movement as he passed.
After about twenty minutes of walking, the trees began to thin, and Alan could make out what appeared to be a path ahead. It was narrow but clearly artificial, the ground packed down by regular use. He followed it, hope rising that he might find people who could explain where he was.
The path led him to the edge of the forest and then down a gentle slope. From this vantage point, Alan could see a small settlement in the valley below—a cluster of buildings that looked like something from a medieval European village, with stone walls and thatched roofs. Smoke rose from several chimneys, and he could make out tiny figures moving about.
"Definitely not Cambridge," he said aloud, trying to process what he was seeing. The landscape beyond the village was equally bewildering—floating islands hovered in the distance, seemingly defying gravity, while a mountain range on the horizon featured peaks that twisted in spirals impossible by Earth's geological processes.
As Alan stood contemplating his next move, a sound behind him made him turn. A man stood on the path, regarding him with open curiosity. He appeared to be in his fifties, with a weathered face and clothes that matched the medieval aesthetic of the village—a simple tunic and trousers of homespun fabric, with a leather vest and boots.
What caught Alan's attention, however, was the staff the man carried. It was made of dark wood polished to a shine, with a crystal embedded in the top that seemed to pulse with an inner light.
"Greetings, stranger," the man said in accented but understandable English, which momentarily stunned Alan. "You seem lost. And your attire is... unusual."
Alan opened his mouth to respond, but before he could form words, the crystal in the man's staff flared brightly. The man's expression changed from curiosity to alarm.
"What manner of energy surrounds you?" he demanded, raising the staff defensively. "I've never sensed such patterns before."
Alan raised his hands in what he hoped was a universal gesture of peace. "I mean no harm," he said quickly. "My name is Dr. Alan Chen. I'm a physicist—a scientist. There was an accident in my laboratory, and I... I don't know how I got here."
The man's eyes narrowed. "A laboratory? You speak strangely, outsider." He studied Alan for a long moment, then seemed to come to a decision. "I am Marcus Raven, once of the Council. If you truly mean no harm, then perhaps fate has brought you here for a purpose."
He lowered his staff slightly but remained wary. "Tell me, Dr. Alan Chen, what do you know of magic?"