Asher puts his bandages back on, a sense of preassure leaves everything around them. The slightly wilting grass and leaves push back up as if in relief. Even the shadows of leaves and the two strangers that lay on the pavement and grass near them dim a bit more. 

"Sorry, wouldn't want to hurt you." 

He then sees a maw form, multiple series's of white fangs set on a black swirling maelstrom behind her head, as if a crown or a halo. It then forms into a beutiful purple and crimson flower and promptly vanishes from sight. 

"How would you hurt me ? You a creep ? I have pepper spray." 

She chuckles. 

"You have no powers ?" 

He asks, so confused by the ordeal before this that he hadn't focused to look through what she exactly was. Thats why he hadn't realized he couldn't see anything in her, except those strange visions and an overwhelming intuition. 

"No ? ...Not that I know of..?" 

She turns her head, brows coming down as she sends him a very confused look. Powers were things of fantasy books... no ? Who was this... albino guy with a bandage anyway, maybe he was some eccentric cosplayer ! He seemed so familiar though... 

"Hmm... Im lost. I didn't mean to be in this universe." 

He looks up and stays like that. 

"Wait- Universe ? As in multiverse ?" 

Oh right, yeah he was insane or LARP'ing in real life right infront of a stranger. Too bad, he looked handsome, she supposed. Oh well. Though she shakes her head, choosing the entertain this fool for a bit more. Well she would do that if he would stop staring at the sky and answered her. 

"Yo, Mister ? Whats up ? Stuck in thought ?" 

She looks up too, only to see the usual metallic blue sky the morning stars shining brightly above them, not being overpowered by the sun. 

"I've been having a few issues thats all." 

"You need therapy fella, but I prefer Ice cream to be honest-" 

She scratches her cats jaw and he purrs. Maybe if he did go... He would get some help and be back in reality. On the other hand Asher had focused on the girl, she was emanating this crimson aura, raw energy sizzling from her human skin in various thinner, invisible to the eye, dimensions. Though of course such things were only invisible to humans, not him. He shakes his head. 

"Oh no Im in the right place." 

So he was ? Huh. How fortunate. She smirks trying her best not to make fun of the poor guy in his illusionment. That would've been cruel...

"What ? I thought you weren't-" 

She says, only for the tall insane, cosplayer to step closer to her and lean down to talk face to face, inches apart at best. 

"In a few days, strange things will happen to you. My name is Ash, call it out when it overwhelms you." 

She tries taking a step back, stumbling over her words. 

"Wait wha-"

He cuts her off again. 

"Though you are a strong girl, it might take a bit of time." 

He takes one more step. His hand swipes across the side of her head, pushing her hair over her ear. The rough curls of hers immediately fall back into position. 

"Im here, for you. Dolly. Say my name and I'll be there." 

And then where he stood, is replaced by a gentle wind in a sudden movement. Bewildered she stumbles and backs up to a tree, her cat falls of of her shoulders. The feline seems weirdly uncaring of the dissapearing man as it looks up to his owner. Dolly hits her back to a tree and then slides down to a sitting position. What the hell was that ? Had she gone mad ? He hadn't only known her name but then... disappeared. In clear daylight, infront of her. No that, that wasn't how reality worked. He must've been some kind of... magician ! Thats right. Or she was just seeing things... dreaming things up. 

Indeed that was not how this reality worked. Things were much different outside. 

Asher watched Dolly from a far, very far. A few dimensions backward, he stood at the top of a skyscraper. A party going on around him, he took a drink and leaned back staring at the distance. He didn't understand or knew what was going on with her, but after seeing that vision behind her head he was more or less sure something would happen and he would finalize his mission. 

This one had gone a bit longer than the others. Asher had unknowingly visited the same park he and Dolly met, over and over again and they had only met now. Such things would rarely happen and when they did, they would never be without a reason.

Well that was nice, he would go back to the Lobby soon. 

Meanwhile, Dolly would spend the few days after that mystic encounter trying to wrap her head around wether she was insane, was going insane, or simply had seen things one morning and... had to accept that seeing things just happened to people sometimes. 

Walking from the library, to her other part time job, thinking about Ash. Walking from there to the grocery store, still trying to figure out how exactly he did that. She even looked up some YouTell videos explaining magic tricks... they made no sense. She even asked the cats at the cat cafe, her other part time job, and they meewed at her, just like always. 

She walked towards the same sea side park she had met Asher. Grass lined parallel to the sea, put there just above what she supposed was an old harbor. The surface of the water had grown tense in the few days after her encounter with the Oracle, the waves were much more powerful as they hit the concrete below her. She sighed, what the actual hell did all of this even mean..? She was at the point where she could just try calling him just for some answers... as if he could magically hear her and appear again. 

He had dissapeared hadn't he ? But ofcourse that was a magic trick... 

There were too many thoughts. 

The sea started to grow harsher, bubbling.

The trees and grass around her waved across the salty wind that hit them, as if hissing at her.

She put her head inbetween her two palms and shut her eyes.

It was too much- 

Far away Asher put his drink down. Finally, he thought. 

Dolly's face scrunched in pain, over stimulation, everything just... 

"Too mu-"

Her whisper interrupted by a wave crashing at the concrete powerfully and rising up to her level to wet her clothes and face. The water was cold, she immediately felt the chill down to her bones. Frustration exploded in a sudden flutter of her heart, she put her hand up swung her arm towards the horizon as she cursed without a thought. She couldn't see what was happening but something, definitely was different. There was a violent preassure change in the water far away from her. As if a titanic being had clawed the sea, the parts that had been covered by her swing from her perspective parted. A huge chasm on the surface of the water appeared, then the water and the atmosphere imploded, ricocheting off of the impact point a shockwave traveled in all directions. Walls of water exploded upwards like rockets and then started falling down like rain. When the sudden flux of preassure hit Dolly her clothes and hair jerked back violently, she put her arms up to cover her face and then... there was nothing. 

As if nothing had happened even occurred, everything went on. The city apathetically bustled far behind her, no cargo ships were near to notice the explosion. Only she had seen what had happened, well... she and an eye traveling here from an invisible direction with immense speed. 

Dolly blinked once and then a second time, her jaw had dropped. She stumbled back and then fell on her back onto the grass. Something in the horizon, where the implosion had happened beckoned Dolly. She was... shaking from adrenaline coursing through her veins. She shook her head from side to side. She cursed again.

"...Ash ? Agh... Beetlejuice rules maybe ? Ash. Ash. ASH !" 

Out of the thinness of reality, the young man slips out and simply appears. His foot taps the ground as he leans down at her. 

"That was violent huh ?" 

Dolly's nose starts bleeding as she looks at her hand and then up at Asher. 

"You... don't feel the preassure ?" 

Asher tilted his head in surprise, it was an exceedingly rare occurrence that he missed anything and yet he had somehow failed to notice how the trees waned downwards around the girl. The way the sea had been forced back. She was emanating explosive invisible power, suffocating everything around her including herself. 

"No I don't, but that doesn't matter. How do you feel ?" 

"The only thing I can feel right now is... something... weird... I... its itchy." 

She stopped for a few long moments and focused on her breaths. She tried to swallow the idea of magic, and things she couldn't explain, she tried to digest the idea of Ashers and her Powers's existences. 

No way right ? She was having an episode or something.

"Wait-" 

She holds her hand out and starts to draw a line with her finger. Her finger tip moves through the air making a squiggly line due to just how much her hand was trembling. 

"Can you see that ?" 

"I wouldn't be here if it was normal and I could see it." 

The surface of the sea implodes as parts of it vanish, the sky falling down on it and ricocheting from itself again. The parts her hand had gone through from her perspective suddenly explode with the momentum of the ricochet and rise upwards like walls of sea water.   

"Oh that ? Yeah everyone can see that." 

Asher turns his body and puts his back towards the sea, the shockwave reaches them shaking both of them powerfully and then as if nothing had happened life continues.

"Really strong start, so strong that you might hurt yourself." 

She looks at her hands again. 

"Wanna play with them more or want me to take you somewhere safe ?" 

Dolly gets up, she had powers. She starts drawing another line. She had. Powers. 

Another torrent of air bursts inwards and then bounces off of itself as if a massive deleting slash cut down into the sea to part it. The shockwave ripples across the surface and air and whips their faces.

Asher sighs.

"You'll run out eventually and it won't feel good. Though I suppose you have to train wether if it felt good or not so... better early ?"

"Sheesh, This isnt even draining. I feel like I can do this forever !" 

Like a comic book hero, or some fantasy character. 

Asher only chuckles in response. After sometime of playing Asher tells her that people will notice if she uses her power again and that he didn't care but since it was her own dimension, she probably should. 

The two of them spent the next two days together, Asher had teleported her to a random rich guy's villa. The white building was situated near a sea, with its own private beach. No other buildings, no other roads or anything was near them. There wasn't a soul to hear or see them. 

Asher is playing with the sand while Dolly is on the wooden sun bathing seat, even though it was night now. Both of them were in beach attire. What had surprised Dolly about his appearance wasn't his albinism, which wasn't a cosplay it turned out, nor his very defined body and powerful looking muscles. Considering their ages and that they were alone really that should've been what caught her notice. No, instead she couldn't take her eyes off of the horrible healed scars on his body. Had he... been a gladiator ? What would even scar you that way ? She was too unnerved to ask... Though some deep part of her somehow enjoyed that she was hanging around with someone who looked so much like a comic book character. 

Asher pulls some sand and finishes making a sand castle. 

"I know its hard to believe but they pay me quite nicely when I find people like you and get you to them. Of course in relatively well health... both psychologically and bodily." 

"You still haven't told me what exactly I am-" 

Dolly noms on a sandwich. 

"Uhhh... You personally, look about the same to me as others in my class. Relatively mortal I'd say."

He stopped for a moment, his tone was more serious.

"I do think its dangerous for you to go outside of your "verse"" 

That was what he would call her universe or dimension... wherever she existed.

"Your powers are aggressive, gods like aggressive mortals. Trust me, you do not want to be liked by gods."

He chuckled grimly, as if he was talking from expirience.

"Aren't you ?" 

If he owned this luxurious villa he certainly was favored by them. But wait he had said he wasn't from this "verse" didn't he ?

"Or did you break into this place ? ...Something doesn't feel right here." 

Asher answered indifferently.

"The billionaire dumbass won't come to this villa in the next 14 years, we are effectively just borrowing it." 

He would take a side step and lean down starting to draw or write, either way Dolly couldn't see what he was doing. 

"I can just take you to the Institute anytime you want, but doing so will... separate you. You will break free from your fate." 

Dolly put the sandwich next to her and put her hand up.

"Okay okay okay rewind ! Whats the Institute ?" 

"The people Im working for... for a short while anyway." 

"Right..." 

She'd get up and walk over to where he is kneeled and appareantly writing in a language she cannot read. They looked to be runes more than anything she saw. 

"When can we go there ?" 

"Well, Im supposed to take you there immediately but as I said, I don't think youre ready to make that decision even though youre rather ... comfortable with these powers. Going there will break you free of whatever your creator intended you to be here, that shouldn't be an easy decision." 

"I may have spent most of my years reading sci-fi and fantasy jargon, so its a bit of an easy decision-" 

While Dolly was just about to laugh at her own joke, Asher violently flinched. 

"S-something wrong ?"

Asher shook his head, his expression was in pain yet it was very obvious he was accustomed to this. 

"Just loud." 

He stopped for a moment and gathered himself, then his usual attitude came back to him.

"Or bright ? It's hard to explain... think of it as being loud for the eye. Whenever you decide to tell me something I can "see" every possible option you could say." 

He gets up. The rune is finished. 

"You told me ... a lot, just now. Either way I was wrong about you, youre ready to make the decision." 

Ah the age old question huh ? The blue pill or the red pill, down the rabbit hole or not... 

The darkness of the sky deepened as Asher put his hand up above the rune. 

"1 Gate"

His voice had a nature to it that she had never heard before, it was commanding in a deeper subconscious way. Even though there wasn't even a verb in what he had said, the name itself was meaning enough. A gate had been called by its master. 

Whirlwind of light blue streaking magic props up around them and then calms down into a quite and soothing human sized cyclone just above the rune. 

Dolly takes a large step back, her eyes widened. Asher turns to her, the gate behind him glowing in the night as the only source of light. 

"Your choice Im not a kidnapper, you can go back to your old life if you choose to do so, but if you come with me there won't be a coming back. Not in a way that matters." 

Dorothy takes a step forward towards the cyclone. 

Ready to lose her fate and purpose. She had never found it anyway... too many never did.