Kateb had shifted to a wall that was next to them, they were in someone’s home. A wall of books on the other side of the hallway with staircases behind and a doorway. In front where the two that came from looked to be the start of a living room, but it was all open, all they had done was turn the corner.

There was two of them, both that just stared at Kateb as confused as Kateb was by the whole situation. One was much shorter than the other, almost comically so, reaching only the upper chest of the other.

‘And you are?’ the shorter one asked before starting to walk forward, more in interest then trying to scare.  

Kateb found that they still had the book and they now hugged it tight against their chest. 

‘Kateb,’ they said quietly. 

‘How did you get in here and is that-’ the girl then asked and zoned on the feather what had fallen to rest on the floor next to Kateb. She wore long cargo pants and a simple red tank top that was much lighter than the shade her hair had. Then Kateb noticed the man behind her and even with the height, he did hide behind her as he looked over Kateb in worry. He had long black fluffy hair that was tied back and rather fair skin, at least compared to the girl’s sun-tanned skin. He was also just wearing a long-sleeved grey t-shirt with black track pants.

‘I don’t really know how I got here, I was in the library and I was reading. Then I got here, I…’ Kateb was saying and they looked down on the book in their hands, opening it up quickly and started to go through the book. Once they got to the page, they stared down at it and started to read the rest of the page out loud. 

‘This page is to be used in emergencies for when you need to get to a world’s link. When you touch the circle below, it will teleport you to said location,’ Kateb read out. ‘Please note: that use of said circle can be dangerous and may not send you to a safe location.’ Kateb fell silent.

‘You know that you are talking to a book, right?’ the girl said and Kateb looked over at where she was considerably closer, bending down in front of them, picking the feather up from the ground.

Kateb had forgotten about their current situation for a moment.

‘Yes, I am,’ Kateb said slowly as they watched her.

For the most part she was calm as she looked the feather over, though there was a fight of a smile before it finally broke through.

‘Sorry, I just thought of something funny,’ she said and looked to Kateb then to the book. ‘Could I have a look at the book?’ The tall one stayed where he was but started to look over her shoulders as Kateb looked back up.

‘Hi, my name is Vandana and standing behind me is Haldir,’ the girl gave and handed out her hand. Kateb looked at it before starting to hand it over. Vandana pulled it over and opened it up, Haldir leaned over more. More looming over her.

‘Well would you look at that,’ she said as she read it over.

‘That looks like yours, what’s it doing in a book?’ Haldir asked in surprise and she started to flick through the rest of the book. 

‘Someone had done their research well, I wonder if they had even gone there,’ Vandana asked out loud and Kateb couldn’t help but to stare. 

‘Wait, so is all of that real?’ they asked and Vandana looked over at them again. 

‘Are you going to think that I am crazy?’ she asked and Kateb shook their head, she grinned to that. ‘Good. Well, yes. It seems like a lot in this book is actually correct and I am not even reading it properly. The Scape is a real place and now we are going to have to kidnap you,’ she said, standing up at the end and looking down on Kateb, the book in her hand.

Kateb took a moment to process that.

‘Kidnap?’ they asked, and Haldir looked to Vandana in annoyance as she looked back with a grin.

‘Van, that’s not funny,’ he said and looked to Kateb before back to the girl. ‘You need to call for Scarlet; she will know what to do.’

‘Why not just get, ah,’ Vandana paused and look back to Kateb.

‘Kateb,’ answered and started to get up, the joke of them being on the floor was starting to wear thin.

‘Well we have to keep Kateb here anyway, I want to know if Horace was right.’

‘We can’t kidnap someone, he never said anything about them staying.’ Haldir said back.

‘Wait hold on, I am not leaving.’ Kateb said with a frown.

Vandana smiled in smugness to him.

‘Fine I will call her, she isn’t home for a while.’

Time passed slow, Vandana had left to call Scarlet. This left Kateb alone with the taller Haldir in the lounge room, who seemed to try to keep to himself as best as he could. Looking to the book left on the coffee table in front of them.

‘Could I have a read?’ he asked and Kateb looked over from their phone, trying to find any information on the things they had learnt so far.

‘Sure,’ Kateb said and watched for a bit as Haldir grabbed it and started to read. There was some louder talking from the storage room that Vandana had gone into, almost like an argument but Haldir didn’t seem to notice only to look up as Vandana exited the door. She looked mad but she growled out to the air before coming over.

‘Did Edric say something?’ Haldir asked and she came over to flop onto the cofa with a long sigh.

‘Said that we shouldn’t have just let them in the house, only at the end did he listen to me that they appeared at home and not to the front door,’ she was saying before looking over. Kateb looked up from their phone.

‘I thought I was expected or something,’ they said and lowered the phone to their lap.

‘We were never given a time or date, he thought that you are some crazy person that found out where we live.’ Vandana rolled her eyes. ‘Didn’t even give me a chance to explain first.’

Vandana started to look over at the book in Haldir’s hands.

‘Anything cool?’ she asked him, and he looked over.

‘It’s about a completely different place, I have never seen it before,’ he said before starting to flip back a bit in the book to a page that had had a crud map drawn in. Vandana looked at it for a while before shrugging.

‘Nowhere we have been, then again we are not very good at mapping.’ Haldir went back to the book as Vandana pulled out her own phone. Every so often the book would be shown to Vandana, sometimes something would be said but nothing new was being learnt by them.

Kateb was starting to get antsy in their seat, nothing on their phone was giving them any sort of information. Nothing on anything real anyway. The book had been returned to the table and they pulled it into their hands. Opening it up to some of the cruder drawings of people, with their animalistic looks. Many of them were smiling, some with notes next to them. A loving mother, local miner and local children in a larger group.

Vandana had gotten up at this time and come over to Kateb.

‘I wanna touch the circle in the book,’ she said and Kateb looked up.

‘I don’t think that’s a good idea,’ they said and closed the book.

‘Oh come on, I just want to know if it feels the same,’ she said and started to pull the book away. Haldir watched this start to unfold.

‘It has a warning on it, that can’t be smart this close to it.’ Kateb pulled back this only caused Vandana to pull harder.

‘Just give it over, why do you care?’ she hissed and pulled, Kateb being pulled to a stand.

‘There would be a warning for a reason, I wouldn’t have touched it if I had known,’ Kateb shot back and yanked the book out of her hands, dashing away from the lounge. Vandana went to chase after with a grin, Haldir jumped up and grabbed hold of her before she could run after them.

‘We just met them Van,’ he said in worry before lifting her into the air a bit. Vandana was still looking towards the book in a stare, fixated on it.

‘Wait no,’ Haldir attempted as she disappeared from his hands, only to appear much closer to Kateb. They turned to run, as she reached out for the book in their hands. The issue was with the fact that she had appeared in the air only for her to crash down right onto Kateb. The book tumbled out of their hands, flying somewhere ahead of the two of them.

It slid into a foot of someone else that turned the corner and Kateb looked up to find a woman, or at least a bit older than Vandana who was currently on top of Kateb.

‘Van, what are you doing?’ she asked and the weight on Kateb was gone. A man appeared from behind the woman as she picked up the book and opened it to a look over.

‘This is the dude I told you about,’ she said as she jumped to her feet.

Kateb started to get up after the man offered a hand, to which they took and was practically lifted in a tight grip. Once on their feet Kateb found that the man was looking at him in a stern stare.

‘The one with the book,’ she said, and the man took his gaze off Kateb to look at her, letting them go a moment after. Kateb couldn’t help but to back away a bit as they massaged their hand. The woman skipped forward to the last page, to which a small “oh” popped out.

‘My name is Scarlet, next to me is Edric, what is yours?’ the woman asked.

‘Kateb.’

‘We should have a proper conversation, not in the middle of the hallway. Come with me,’ Scarlet said and started to walk, gesturing for Kateb to follow. They looked around to Vandana before going to follow.

‘Van and Hal, could you go and see when the other two are going to show up,’ Scarlet called out and Vandana sighed.

‘Yep,’ she answered, watching them walk away followed by Edric and then turning to Haldir.

‘Well that went much better than I would have ever guessed,’ Vandana said and Haldir looked at her with a frown, as if she hadn’t just tackled the guest.

Kateb followed Scarlet as they walked down the hallway back towards the entrance, the house was filled with books everywhere with wall shelves filling up walls.

‘Where did you find it?’ Scarlet asked and Kateb moved their attention.

‘The city library, I was just looking through the selves. I had thought I had seen a bird; a big feather had fallen on me so I was looking for its species. Scarlet had stopped and turned.

‘I had it when I got here,’ Kateb said and looked at the book. ‘Vandana took it at some point though.

‘They went for a flight, didn’t they?’ Edric asked Scarlet, who looked away for a moment.

‘Van told me they weren’t going near the city,’ she said and looked back. ‘Doesn’t matter, they disappear. No trace.’

‘It does matter, if Vandana would listen to me and take any form in understanding how bad this could all go. Today it’s some random kid off the street, tomorrow the federal government.’ Edric stated and the two of them stared at each other, Kateb stood there looking anywhere else.

‘We will talk about it when we all meet up, for now we have a guest,’ Scarlet said and Edric let out a long exhale through his nose, Scarlet turned to Kateb with a smile.

‘Sorry about this, we think that feather you found was involved with us. But for now, how about we play a round of twenty questions, so you get a handle on things.’

Kateb nodded to that and Scarlet continued, eventually turning to some stair near the entrance. Walking down Kateb was met with the sight of room filled to the brim with books. Bookshelves that almost went to the roof high above.

‘We just need to take a quick stop,’ Scarlet hummed and placed the book down on a table filled with pages and other books left opened. Kateb walked towards the table to look over other books.

‘Since its obvious this guest isn’t leaving any time soon, I am going to find something for lunch,’ Edric spoke to himself before he left. Kateb was already being drawn into a book that wrote of langrage or a form of a language. Kateb had no clue as to what it was about but it was familiar to the circle that they had touched.

‘I seemed to have misplaced the book I was looking for, want to start your questions?’ Scarlet’s voice called out and Kateb looked up to see that she was on a platform that had her raised to the much higher shelves, as she was looking through the books.

‘What is the Scape?’ Kateb asked and Scarlet looked down, the platform lowering a few shelf levels before she continued to go through books.

‘Well, that is a question that I have been trying to figure out myself,’ she said with a sigh. ‘But that is only a basic name of the sort of area. In fact, it is quite the distance in the air. Yet no effects of altitude sickness, it has seasons and the like.’

‘In the air? The book wrote of islands, but I just assumed it to be in water,’ Kateb said but looked down on the original book. ‘But then again, there wasn’t much of anything, just main points. Almost as if it was a teaser.’

‘There you are,’ Scarlet exclaimed, and the platform lowered as Kateb watched. A book in her hands, already opened and she walked back towards them.

‘I think you are correct about it being a teaser or a first edition of a book, now doesn’t this look familiar.’ She said and showed Kateb the book’s pages, it showed a section of the book that had drawing, and they looked very similar to the original. The writing that was in it was much cleaner and without the side notes or the like. In fact, the side notes had been included into the writings.

‘This must have been the last version of that book because it had gained a title,’ Scarlet was saying and she flipped to the front, finding hand stitched lettering but there were a few moments of focus from Kateb as the lettering shifted between what they knew to an otherworldly langrage.

‘A very old relative of mine called what your experiencing, planal shifting. No idea why it happens, but it is very much connected to the fact that it wasn’t written in this dimension.’ As Scarlet had spoken again then the words started to form.

“An Introduction to the Floating Isles.”

‘I thought the place was called the scape,’ Kateb spoke and Scarlet shook her head.

‘It’s like calling a swamp or the sea sides a place, they are landforms and the islands are a form of that. Though in the air, with a whole range of physics around it,’ she explained and Kateb looked down to the original book.

‘Is there the circle thing on the back page?’ they asked, and Scarlet flipped through to the last. No such circle existed.

‘The problem with this library is that no matter how much research I do, this place was never complete,’ Scarlet said with the closing of the book. ‘Your book doesn’t add much, but it could be connected to something that I have found here.’ Scarlet handed the book over before headed back for the shelving.

‘In a few books an old relative of mine they theorised that there is an old connection, when we used to travel between both with ease, not all but still, the few to tell tales of the place.’ Scarlet continued as she when back into the shelf lift. ‘That is all connected to the circles.’

‘A parallel dimension?’ they asked, and Scarlet glanced over.

‘Not so parallel, the Scape’s timeline seems to be more old age technologies with some mix of a fantasy to us. In the books here I have texts that do timeline some events that had happened there, time did continue so our timelines have continued in paralleled time just not a similar dimension or even the same laws of nature that it follows.’ 

‘So, your families had known about the place this whole time? Why not tell the world then?’ Kateb asked and Scarlet lowered back down after grabbing a book.

‘In this day and age, who do you think would believe it. Besides my family did try, several times. But the way to prove it, a way to get there no longer exist. 

My father locked it away from me growing up, for him our family finally did manage to make it over there, make that connection again. It took my aunt away for years, without a way for my father to get to her.’

‘She came back though?’ Kateb said as she walked over.

‘My father believed her to be dead, when she managed to return then it had been long enough that she found a life there. A partner and she then wanted to live there indefinitely, my father was broken hearted. Missed and even believed that she had died, had her photo up every Los Mentos and everything. He let her go of course. Then one day, she just turned up with a baby.’ 

‘A baby, hers?’ Kateb had to ask, they had ended up leaning forward to the story.

‘Vandana, something had happened, and she never even wanted to talk about it. From when I remembered of her, she was grieving like she was hurting and missing as well.’ 

Kateb blinked. ‘Wait remembered, did she pass?’ They asked and Scarlet smiled sadly.

‘Missing, when Vandana was still a child she disappeared one night.’ she was saying while thinking back before clearing her throat and looked to Kateb.

‘Well enough about that, Vandana doesn’t like to talk about it.’ Kateb nodded to that, understanding. ‘I think you should stay with us; some interesting things happen when you go over maybe you will have something. And I mean, if you can read this book then I am guessing that something is waiting for you.’ 

‘What do you mean?’ Kateb asked and Scarlet came back with the book opened.

‘For example, until I went over. I could never read this book, no matter how much work I put into trying to decipher it,’ Scarlet explained and Kateb looked out it, but it was just a series of writing that looked like ancient symbols. There was some writing that seemed to make sense, but only in a few words. ‘After I went in, this whole book, along with a few others, just cleared up. It was even explained in one of them, apparently it is a passable gene. But no one else has this.’ Scarlet frowned as she saw that Kateb couldn’t read it. ‘And I suppose we would have to see if you can, it would be nice if you did.’ Scarlet pulled the book away. ‘Being the only one to look into all this is quite lonely.’ She cleared her throat once again and held herself straightened up.

‘Let see, the first step.’ She hummed and looked to Kateb. ‘Do you want to see what this is? The only problem is that we do sort of bounce between here and there. I don’t know how well you could juggle a life here and there.’ Scarlet was saying and Kateb looked around the room. The walls of books sat in dust and mystery.

‘You know, ever since I was little, I loved reading. Well, more to learning about history, I was going to become a historian, but everything about the past has already been figured out or documented. In this day and age, there isn’t much of that left,’ Kateb said and Scarlet watched.

‘No, you’re right, unless you did recent histories but there is no real discovery there.’

‘Would it be crazy, going?’ Kateb asked and looked at her. Scarlet looked back in a sad smile.

‘Yes, it would be, but would it hurt to try?’ She asked and Kateb started to hug the books.

‘Isn’t there monsters?’

‘Yes, I have never seen one though. Read them in books, but three of the others have.’ Scarlet put down the book on a desk and came closer.

‘You don’t have to make a decision right here, give it a couple days. You can even stay here and have a read through to make up your mind,’ she said and placed a hand on their shoulder. ‘Do you want to meet the other who live here?’

‘That would be nice, but I think I would like to start with the books,’ Kateb said and Scarlet turned to the shelf she had been at.

‘Well this is like an index, where the beginner books of subjects are at with notes to the other areas that continue with that knowledge.’ Scarlet gave them a quick rub on the shoulder and started to walk to the door before turning back around. ‘Let me give you my number so that you can talk to me about any help or if you want to go home.’ Kateb struggled with getting their phone before Scarlet helped with the books in hands.

She left them to the chaos of the library.