The fenoperable gate spat LoVelly back out like a fruit pit with no care for the things that were in the way. Several of those things came crashing down on top of him in the dark and he heard other things go rolling away. He felt something wrapped around his leg and he thrashed about trying to get free, panic creeping in. Whatever had landed on top of him was thankfully light enough that he was able to push it off in his struggle and he rolled it off to the side of him. Finally he was able to get a hand on whatever held him and he paused, feeling slightly silly, running his hand over the fabric. Whatever was tangled around his leg felt like an ordinary sheet or cloth of some kind. It wasn’t moving and it wasn’t holding him there, it was just tangled from his crash landing. He took a moment to calm himself down, taking deep breaths and willing his heart to stop hammering in his chest.


    He knew before he’d even oriented himself that he was alone. Wherever he’d ended up was not where Mez had. He could still feel her fen- hot and acidic within him, and he knew she was okay wherever she’d ended up. Now he needed to figure out where it was that he’d landed because it definitely wasn’t where they’d gone into the portal. Yomi, Briha and the others were nowhere to be seen.


    He was able to clumsily detangle his leg in the dark and now that his eyes had had time to adjust he could see a tiny bit of light trickling in from across the room in a small, thin, line from beneath a closed door. It wasn’t enough to really see by, just enough to guide him in the right direction once he’d gotten to his feet. He bumped into several things in pursuit of the door and sent at least one item rolling across the floor before he managed to cross the room. He reached blindly for a light switch at first but when he found none he felt around for a doorknob instead.


    The light from the hall was blinding at first and LoVelly squinted, his eyes watering. On one end of the hall was a staircase and the other was a dead end so his choice was made for him at least. He turned to close the door behind him when he heard a thump from above and what he thought was a voice but he couldn’t be sure.


    Sound was…strange, he noticed as he walked to the end of the hall and took the first steps. The quiet was heavy, an almost oppressive silence pushing down on all sides. Everything felt just a bit too muted. If he hurried up the stairs in hopes of not being alone there for much longer, nobody was around to see it.


    The staircase opened up to another larger hall with several doors down one side and it appeared to open up into some kind of large room but it was dark and he couldn''t see much into it from the light in the hall. There was only one light at all and it sat just above the staircase. He looked up to see that the light was set in a very industrial base, a thin metal mesh acting as both a shield and a shade on the bulb beneath. A creaking door caught his attention and he turned to see one of the doors slightly ajar.


    “Hello?” He called out, making his way toward the door. There was no response and he stopped again to listen but no further sounds came. He stepped closer and just as he grabbed the handle a flurry of motion erupted behind him. A door was thrown open and a shout came from behind him before he was suddenly being whacked repeatedly. The blows weren''t especially painful but they just kept coming and he didn''t have time to figure out what was happening.


    “Whoa! Stop!? Stop! Please?” He squawked between whacks. Finally when he was on the floor, beaten into submission, his assailant paused and he was given a moment to assess. Before him stood a frankly tiny woman. She was barely his shoulder height and about half the size. She was holding a thick broom out in front of her, aiming it at him and the threat to keep on swinging was clear on her face.


    “Who are you?!” she shouted at him and made a threatening swipe with the broom when he tried to move. “No moving! Answer the question!” He stayed down.


    “LoVelly! My name is LoVelly.” He squeaked out, holding his arm over his face and head, just in case.


    “How did you get in here?” She demanded next. “This is a sealed container.” He wasn’t sure what that meant.


    “I don’t know! I came through a fenoperable gate but this isn’t where I went in!” He peeked over his arm at the woman. She lowered the broom slightly as she looked at him, like she was inspecting him for some visible show of proof. “I don’t even know where I am.” He offered instead. She narrowed her eyes but took a step back.


    “You’re telling me you came out of an old, broken, machine that hasn’t worked in decadi?”You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.


    “It works fine in my opinion.” It came out of his mouth before he had time to stop it and he tensed preparing for another thwack of the broom. When none came he released the breath he’d been holding, peeking out at the woman. Her eyes were still narrowed as she motioned to him with the broom.


    “Get up. Keep your hands where I can see them.” LoVelly sighed and prepared for whatever mess he’d gotten himself into now. He carefully, slowly, got to his feet, keeping his hands in front of him. She motioned down the hall to him and he took the cue to start walking.


    “I’m really just as confused as you are.” He tried again, looking back over his shoulder at her. To be quite honest, he could probably over power the tiny woman and get away if he really wanted to. But he didn’t know the layout of this place at all and there’s a good chance she might have something sturdier than a broom laying around.


    When they came to the end of the hall and a door, there was a keypad beside it that the woman very quickly, while whipping her head back to watch him, punched in a code for. LoVelly heard the chimes of the beeps as she did and he thought he could probably remember that pattern if he tried. Once the door hissed she pulled it open one-handed and motioned for him to go through with the broom. She followed him through and closed the door with a clank.


    LoVelly’s jaw nearly dropped to the floor and he went straight to press himself against the railing of the walkway they found themselves on. He wasn’t a threat to begin with but now he barely even remembered the woman behind him at all, so thoroughly distracted by the view in front of him. The door opened onto a walkway but the walkway opened up to an enormous cavern. LoVelly was feeling dazzled by all the glittering lights twinkling back at him.


    There was an entire metropolis burrowed into the ice and stone around him. When he looked up there were wires and lights and layers of a city he’d never dreamed of, reaching up towards the sky above him. When he looked up he saw that the city appeared to be settled into a crevice in the rock and ice. Where there wasn’t width to the space the people had gone up instead. There was just a sliver of bright pink sky running in a long, thin strip, visible far above him but still, it was there, peeking down on him and the rest of the city. A swat from the broom to his hip dragged him back to his current circumstances and the tiny woman who’d found him. When he turned to her he found her stance more relaxed than before.


    “Where are we?” he asked, hopeful that she might be willing to tell him more. She side eyed him with suspicion as she motioned for him to walk with her.


    “Grinmeka.” She told him bluntly. Somehow his brain helpfully supplied him with the facts that he knew where that was. Grinmeka was on Daverda though. He had gone into the portal on Arlenasch. Where had Mezalie ended up?


    “Did anyone else come out before me?” He asked, head swiveling between the woman beside him and the sprawling city filling every corner of the cavern, spiralling up toward the surface. It was a task to try to take it all in. He also noted that while he could see flurries of motion, of tiny people going about their driev far above and below, there was nobody else around them.


    “I can’t give you any other information. If you really did come out of the gate-”


    “I did.” he insisted.


    “Whatever. I have to take you to my boss. He’s the only person who knows anything about those anymore,” she told him. She still held the broom between them but she wasn’t poised to swat at him further.


    “Okay. I guess that’s fine. It’s just, I went in with my friend but we got separated. I want to find out what happened to her,” he told her. She looked skeptical of him, eyes flicking back and forth.


    “I’m sure that Datsa can tell you all about what you want to know,” she huffed.


    “Datsa?” he nearly shouted. The woman bristled at his outburst, waving the broom in his direction. “Sorry. It’s just, Mezalie and I have been trying to find Datsa. Or friends of Datsa at least,” he explained. He watched as the woman’s eyes grew large and round at his words.


    “Don’t say that name,” she hissed.


    “But you just said it?” he questioned, surprised.


    “No, not Datsa. The other one.” LoVelly was thoroughly confused now.


    “Mezalie?” he asked again, though quieter this time.


    “Yes. Stop saying it,” the woman cringed away from him.


    “I…I don’t understand,” his brows wrinkled together in the middle as he tried to fit this new piece of information into his mental picture.


    “Look. No more questions. I’m taking you to Datsa and you can ask all the questions you want then,” she told him resolutely. He desperately wanted to ask more but he could feel the tension rolling off the woman beside him and he knew better than to push his luck.


    He would have his answers soon.