It didn't take long for the wasp to get bored, give up and buzz away. They were seemingly safe, for now at least. Shane had dropped to his knees, heart pounding and trying to catch his breath in the small space. The young woman next to him was gasping for air even worse than he was. At times like this he was very grateful to his past self for going for a run every now and then and being in relatively good physical shape.

He mostly kept up with his fitness for his job, but it didn't really prepare him for something like this. Whenever he went on a run it was just a casual run in the park. As a police officer he usually didn't have to run away from things, it was quite the opposite. He was usually the one chasing others and those people were generally in worse shape than he was.

His face felt all hot and he could only imagine the nice bright shade of red he was right now. He was sweaty and could feel his shirt sticking uncomfortably to his back. The woman seemed to be moving away from him as far as she could and was breathing normally again fairly quickly.

He looked up at her, she was resting her hands on her thighs and stood up straight a moment later. Shane got up from sitting on his knees too. He noticed that his legs were still feeling shaky; either from the running, the adrenaline or just the sheer amount of pure fear he’d felt.

“You just… saved me,” he muttered in disbelief when he realized what just happened, he didn't really mean to say it out loud like that but he already did. “Er, thank you.”

“No, I didn’t,” she said, a little defensive and at the same time he thanked her.

They looked at each other for only about half a second, her stormy gray eyes looked back at Shane without emotion, his own dark brown eyes reflected in them. She shrugged carelessly, trying to be nonchalant about it, and broke eye contact.

He wondered why she put so much effort in trying to appear like she didn't care, because she obviously did kind of care. He felt bad for assuming the worst about her and should try to change his attitude towards her, which would prove to be difficult.

“I’m Shane, by the way. Officer Shane Hall.”

Shane extended his hand to her, but she did not reach out hers. Uncomfortable, Shane lowered his hand back to his side.

“Shane Hall.” She repeated his name in a mocking tone. “Very forgettable name, I hope you don’t all have names like that.”

Shane pursed his lips again, she was so annoying. He was just trying to be nice and to not come across as ungrateful, but she had to screw that up too. It was like having manners wasn't part of her brain function, or maybe she just liked how he reacted. Just as he tried to relax his posture so he wouldn’t show her how annoyed he was with her, she opened her mouth again.

“Rowan.”

“You’re the one to talk! That’s a boy's name.”

Shane grinned slightly when she glared at him for making that comment, but it was only a relatively short glare. He just couldn't help himself and felt pleased with himself that he could get at least somewhat of a response out of her.

“They call that gender-neutral, dimwit,” she corrected him.

Most of all, Shane noticed that her voice wasn’t as sharp as usual when saying this. Her face was blank, there was not a trace of complacency, no irritation and no anger. It seemed as if she was wearing a smooth mask that didn't reveal any emotion. She was good at it, much better than him. He decided against saying something about that.

He had no idea that Rowan had taught herself to show as little emotion as possible in general and that she wasn't just doing it to annoy him. She didn't even think about it, it just happened. She was looking out of their hideaway, checking if it was safe there. All Shane noticed was that it was starting to get darker around them. Which was a little strange, because it was already evening and getting dark in NYC when they left hours prior.

“So, er… the device…” Shane tried to change the subject. “Did it cool down enough?”

Rowan tore her eyes away from staring into the void and looked at the device she pulled out of the pocket of her hoodie. She raised her gaze briefly and looked at Shane, shrugged again and cleared her throat before answering.

“We can try again,” was her answer.

She squeezed herself through the small space between the trees and Shane followed suit, feeling nervous about leaving their safe space. Who knew where the huge wasp was, it might still be around and if giant wasps were a thing, what else could there be?

He only got more nervous when she looked around and started to walk away from the shelter to a place where the trees were further apart. He had no idea how the device worked, so he let her do what she needed to do, but not without keeping a very watchful eye out on their surroundings.

“How are such large insects even able to exist?” he muttered, mostly to himself.

“No idea,” she answered without looking at him. “My guess is that something went wrong a few million years ago. The same reason that humans exist in all the other worlds. Because some went very wrong.”

Shane had to think about this. Did people really only exist because something went wrong? He believed in the theory of evolution, although he used to spend a lot of time in church with his parents where he was told differently. Ever since he had the option to choose, he decided to not go anymore and figure stuff out for himself. He had a hard time imagining that humanity was a mistake, an error in nature.

No, she was completely wrong, he decided, she had to be. He wanted to argue about it, but she didn't give him a chance. While he was getting philosophical she was already pushing buttons.

“It doesn’t work. It’s too warm here and the device doesn’t cool down fast enough.”

“So, what do we do now?” he asked, defeated.

She shrugged once again, Shane was very sure it was just a habit of hers, kind of the same as biting nails, it just happened. She didn't answer him however and it annoyed him, but he had no idea if she was doing it on purpose or was just completely oblivious to other people and their needs for answers.

“Are we going to wait until it cools down?”

He tried to be subtle to get a real answer, he just hoped she wouldn’t just shrug again.

“Yeah,” was her short answer.

It wasn’t the explanation he had hoped for, but at least it was an answer.

Shane sighed and looked around. They were at a dangerous place, the sun began to set, casting the long shadows from the trees above them. The light slowly changed from a bright and warm white to faded yellow and a soft orange. Rowan didn't seem to want to say anything else and just looked at him. He was pretty sure she wasn't really looking at him, it seemed as if she was staring right through him and wasn’t fully there for a moment.

“It’s getting dark,” he stated the obvious.

“Thanks, I hadn’t noticed.”

Well, that was something at least. Not just a shrug or no answer at all while staring at him. That last one made him nervous because it was very different from her usual reactions. He started to prefer her being sarcastic or her sneers over the creepy staring and answers that didn’t help them getting anywhere.

She suddenly stopped staring and looked around with renewed alertness in her gray eyes. She looked up to the sky briefly just as Shane had, and looked back to the trees surrounding them and the closely grouped together trees they’d just walked away from. She had pursed her lips slightly and he was sure she was planning something.

“We can't stay here, we have to find a place where we can spend the night if necessary. But not among the trees, our previous hideaway was too narrow and we have to hurry up before it gets completely dark,” she said, after she seemed to have finished inspecting the area.

Shane nodded, feeling very tired at the moment. Tired of running away, tired because of all the information he had to take in in such a short amount of time, tired of arguing and of freezing alive and thawing. He was ok with everything at the moment, as long as they were safe.

Rowan started to walk faster, a speed Shane found hard to keep up with. It seemed like she was tireless.

He discovered more about Rowan by just observing her. At first he had thought of her like the standard meth head he'd encountered before, but he started to see that he was wrong. She had a slight accent, but formed her sentences and words effortlessly with a reasonable vocabulary. She certainly wasn't stupid, but very survival focused. He wanted to know what she was doing in his dimension and if she really was a drug mule like he’d assumed. He didn't really want to ask her right now, he was afraid that their voices would attract something even more awful than a huge wasp.

Because of this they both walked on in silence. He was sure that Rowan wouldn't say anything if he didn't talk, she didn’t exactly seem like the talkative type, which he had concluded based on the short time they spent together. Shane on the other hand often talked a lot and liked to talk, he knew that very well. He couldn't stand it when people were silent when he wanted to know something or needed information.

While they were walking he didn't really take the time to look at his surroundings and look around. He tried, but he was too tired and everything so far had been too overwhelming.

It all looked very similar as he had seen on tv; your typical tall, tropical trees and brightly colored flowers, some of whom started nyctinasty due to the lack of sunlight. For most people it would be pretty clear that some other things were missing, such as the chirping of birds or animals among the leaves, but Shane didn't notice because he wasn't paying attention. It was a strange silence, not even the wind was rustling the leaves above their heads.

Suddenly, Rowan stopped walking, causing Shane to stop as well, looking at her wearily. It was almost entirely dark, the sky was turning a deep orange and he didn't want to waste any time standing around and doing nothing. She looked straight ahead however, her eyes wide open.

Slowly and slightly terrified, Shane followed her gaze and noticed what she was looking at. It was, once again, a huge bug or something that looked like one. He didn't know much about insects, especially not giant ones. He could see an enormous carapace armor shining in the last light of the sun, it was purple-blue with a green glow and Shane would've said it was probably a beetle.

The beetle had six legs with long, spiky hair on it. At the end was something that looked like tiny black feet. On these six legs it turned towards Rowan and Shane. On its head were two antennas. Compound eyes were much scarier if you could see them in this size, Shane decided. Rowan had already turned to run the opposite way. If they were lucky, this beetle wouldn't be as fast as the wasp.

Shane got a little better in following Rowan. In general Rowan came across as a little clumsy and stiff. She had no grace whatsoever when she moved, but the way she moved her long legs and jumped over protruding roots, she suddenly looked a lot more nimble. He didn't have a lot of time to admire that though, Shane had no cool and convenient agility when it came to running and had to be more careful with what he did.

A branch hit his face when he wasn't paying enough attention, leaving a sharp pain on the right side of his cheek. He pressed his hand shortly against his cheek, feeling a warm wetness on his fingers. He quickly came to the conclusion that it was most likely a cut.

Because the trees weren't very close together, the last sunlight hit the ground and he could see the beetle could easily get through and follow them. They had to find some place to hide again where they were safe, and fast. His earlier mental fatigue had subsided instantly, but his body was becoming increasingly exhausted.