Chapter 1: What Happened?

It was a beautiful Saturday morning in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. It was pouring with rain and it was 5 degrees Celsius, a typical late autumn morning temperature. Mateusz Ornowski, a fifteen year old boy from the outer eastern suburbs, was lying in bed, trying to have a sleep in. He hadn't been able to sleep properly for at least a week. He'd been having an ominous feeling, anticipating that something strange was going to happen, and that had kept him awake. As he lay there, attempting to at least get some rest, he wondered why he had this feeling. Could it be that something was actually going to happen? Or was it just his anxiety playing up? No. It couldn't be his anxiety. It never lasted for more than one night at a time. He must be just paranoid; after all, lots of bad things were happening in the world. The Sydney siege, a terror attack on Australian soil had happened last December, perhaps one would happen in Melbourne, after all, Melbourne was almost as big as Sydney and more important to the country's status of multiculturalism and wealth. Other issues included: Ebola, Russia's invasion of Ukraine, his father's cancer. He lay in bed, thinking about these things. After some time, he decided to get up. He walked out of his room, only to be greeted with a furry thing at his feet. It was the cat. He stepped over the cat and continued his walk down the hallway. He noticed that it was cold in the house so he pressed the on button for the central heating. He walked into the lounge room, and then the kitchen as he was hungry for breakfast.

"Good morning, Mateusz." he heard come from the lounge room.

"Morning, mum." He replied to the voice that belonged to his mum.

He made himself some toast with vegemite on it and sat at the dining room table to eat. He looked at the couch and saw his mum, his dad, and his two younger brothers sitting there, watching TV or playing on their iPads. He noted how addicted all the male members apart from him in his family had become to their tablets. They were all playing the same game, Clash of Clans. He thought how sad it must be to be addicted to such a crappy game. He finished breakfast and went into his room to get dressed into some daytime clothing. He checked the weather on his phone and it said the maximum temperature that day would be 15 degrees Celsius with rain and a possible thunderstorm around mid-afternoon, cool weather so he put on a t-shirt with a jumper over the top, with a hoodie on top of that and some tracksuit pants and socks. He walked into the living room again and asked his mum if he could use the computer to do a school assignment, English again, he had to rewrite a few scenes from Shakespeare's play: Macbeth, in modern context. A few hours later, he was done. He had been working for a few straight hours, besides a break for lunch at 1. He emailed the assignment to his English teacher and shut down the computer.

He walked toward his room but before he got to the hallway, he heard his mum speak, "Mateusz, can you please get the junk-mail out of the letterbox, it's soaked."

He went down to his room and put his shoes on. As he tied his shoelaces, he sighed at how boring and un-eventful the day had been so far. Strangely and suddenly, after thinking this, a noise began to build in his head, a sort of ringing, and warping noise. It was getting louder every second. Soon it was too loud for Mateusz and its tone lowered. Mateusz winced at the painful sensation assaulting his ears. Then, there was a loud boom noise, accompanied by a bright flash, colours in a tunnel shape, a vortex exploded before his eyes, and then, Mateusz remembered no more…

Mateusz awoke under a tree, feeling dizzy and vague. He couldn't remember what had happened or where he came from. Who were the people he knew? He couldn't remember faces of people he knew, or had known. He managed to stumble to his feet and the feeling of dizziness subsided. He soon slumped back down to the ground as a sharp pain cut across the right side of his chest. He placed his hand where it hurt, and he felt beating.

"A heart beat?" Mateusz thought.

He placed his hand on the left side of his chest; he felt a heartbeat there too as normal, "But two hearts?!" he thought.

He looked around and noticed he was in a strange forest he did not remember. All the forests he barely remembered from back home were made up of eucalyptus trees, and didn't have such a small amount of undergrowth. Mateusz decided he would have to look for civilisation.

After taking no more than 10 steps, a giant bee-like creature flew out of nowhere and charged at him. Mateusz ran, not wanting to be stung by such a large, strange looking version of what he knew was called a bee from wherever he was from. As he ran, he thought it was funny that he remembered all the scientific information from where he was from but not historical or social, he couldn't remember who his family was, or his friends, if they ever existed. He soon escaped the strange bee-like creature and rested against a tree. At that moment, he saw a small, rat like creature, purple in colour.

"Hmm… my world didn't have any creatures like these, I must be somewhere different all together, in which case, there might not be any humans at all!" he deduced. Mateusz decided to keep walking to look for some form of civilisation.

Mateusz had been walking for some time now, and had seen more strange creatures that looked a little familiar, but altogether different at the same time, he was confused as to where he was and to where he was from. He was getting thirsty, and he felt the temperature beginning to drop around him, he looked up and the sun was beginning to set. He had to find water, and shelter before he thirsted to death or got sick form the cold that the night would bring. He had a few hours of light left so he looked for a cave, or something that would keep him safe and warm. He searched for a good hour before he found a rocky overhang that would be his home for the night, nearby was a clear creek, but he decided he would have to boil the water first to ensure there were no nasty bacteria or parasites that were in there.

"Hmmm…" Mateusz thought, "I'll have to find some dry sticks to make a fire with, to boil the water and to keep the cold away, but I don't want a big fire to attract unwanted attention from potential predators. I still don't know much about this place."

Mateusz gathered up some dry sticks from near his shelter, and put them in a strategically good position to light a fire in the overhang. Mateusz made a crude makeshift bowl from some tree leaves and strengthened it with sticks; he walked down to the creek and put it in the water. He only half filled it so as to not risk spilling any on the way back. He got back to the overhang and poured the water into a conveniently shaped stone he had found. He placed the stones over the crudely constructed fire place and looked for some stones to light the fire with and found what he identified as flint, which he thought was what it was called from wherever he was from. He struck the flint and sparks quickly set the tinder alight, and soon, the sticks above were also alight with yellow flame. The stone heated quickly and the water began to bubble. Mateusz removed the stone from over the fire by grabbing the non-hot regions and put it on the ground to cool. "Good," Mateusz thought, "At least the water will be safe to drink now." After the water had cooled enough for Mateusz to drink, he had some and decided to lie by the fire and fall asleep, but not before making sure nothing was waiting outside. He drifted off after an hour or two and breathed quietly in his sleep. He dreamt of home and his family that night but did not remember what he dreamt…

Mateusz awoke in the morning to a strange slurping sound coming from where he had left the stone with the water. He looked in the stones direction and saw a small purple, rat-like creature just like the one he had seen the previous day. It was drinking all his water and he quickly reacted and threw a stone at it. It looked up, saw that Mateusz was awake and ran. Mateusz decided he would have to find civilisation today or not find it at all, so he got up, stretched, and walked out from underneath the overhang and picked a direction to head in. After a few minutes of walking, he spotted a glimpse of greyish-white and purple between the trees, as he got closer, he realised that it was another type of the strange creatures he had seen so far, only, this one was large and humanoid, and it had to be a good 15cm taller than he was. It had a purple tail and underbelly.

"Interesting colour scheme, though, it doesn't exactly fit in with the colour of the foliage." He pondered.

He soon realised that he gotten too close, and, whether he liked it or not, the creature would soon realise he was there. He armed himself with a large pointy stick he found on the ground In case it was predatory, like large creatures often were on what he believed to be where he had come from, and approached, hoping to get the advantage of surprise. He was about 5 paces from the creature. And then, it turned around and faced him, it fixed him with a very powerful: 'what do you think you're doing?' look.

"Who are you, and what are you doing?" a voice said coldly and unemotionally.

He looked around for the source of the voice, but found none.

"Who are you?" the voice demanded.

He realised it could only be the creature in front of him.

"How can you speak without moving your mouth?" Mateusz asked the creature.

"I asked you a question," the creature said, "I expect you to answer it before I think about answering yours."

"I think my name is Mateusz… or was it Mathias? I'm confused and lost, I have no memory of creatures like you or the others I have been seeing, this can't be my world, but memories of that seem, fuzzy…" Mateusz trailed.

"Tell me how you can block my ability to sense your presence? You were a good 5 steps behind me before I heard you. I should have sensed your mental presence long before." stated the now inquisitive creature.

"I don't know what you're talking about, but please tell me where I am, or help me, or something!" said Mateusz, who still wasn't entirely sure whether Mateusz was his real name or not.

"Come with me, I must find out more about how you can block my abilities..." the creature said with an inquisitive look in its eyes.

Mateusz followed the creature, not fully trusting it, but this was his only chance to survive…