The new dimension is wreathed in fog, and appears to be some hazy twilight hour despite the noonday sun outside. The sky is thoroughly gray and dreary, and the landscape as far as the eye can see is dusty brown soil, dotted with patches of scraggly, depressing grass, twisted leafless trees, the occasional blank gravestone, and every few meters, a set of sepulchres paired end-to-end, both rectangular, one stone and one wood lidded in glass. The lids lie listlessly to the side of each. A corvid of some kind caws eerily from one of the trees before taking flight.

Well, that is more than a bit eerie.

He takes flight, is there any sort of building in the distance? What happens if he tries to clear the fog with his weather magic?

The fog is amenable to being cleared, but as soon as he stops doing magic to it it starts fading slowly back in. There are no buildings in the distance.

Okay... is too much like a horror movie victim mistake to check on the sepulchers? Maybe, but better do it then not. He lands and checks if there is anything inside or anything obviously special about them.

Nothing is inside them.

Wait. That pair over there looks like it might be closed, unlike all the others?

Okay... even Felix takes the time to gather the electricity for a thunderbolt he can't safely discharge that thing if something jump scares him. Felix gingerly approaches that pair over there that is not like the others.

Those two are in fact closed.

There is a woman with her eyes closed and her arms folded over her chest in the glass-covered one. Her chest rises and falls shallowly.

Huh. And the other one is closed?

Felix taps on the glass. Steadily louder. "Hello?"

The other one is also closed.

He gets no response.

The problem is that as far he knows opening the thing might drain all her lifeforce or something.

Okay, is there a way to open the lid?

There aren't any obvious latches or anything.

It won't slide nor lift?

It won't slide and there isn't an obvious edge to get his fingers under to lift with.

Felix paces. He goes to another pair of coffins and examines the glass-lid one, see if there is any difference and if he can detect any mechanisms from the outside...

If he wants to put the lid on the coffin he can, it'll just sort of lie there.

But does it open fine again? What if he puts a pinky in the interior?

It slides right off, yeah.

Doesn't he miss his family? His twin? He misses him a lot, right? Maybe he should think about him some more. And climb in the coffin.

Felix really is missing his twin. And his parents are dead. Arthur is dead. His uncle died before he was even born-

He puts a foot inside the coffin before forcing himself to resist.

The coffin sits there being tempting--not as tempting as when he had part of him inside it, but still tempting.

He is going to take several steps backs from the thing.

Is it vulnerable to impact damage? A.k.a. thrown rocks?

It is not vulnerable to impact damage on the scale of rocks he can manually throw at it.

Fire?

Nope.

Well, shit.

Felix finds a coffin-pair that is safely away from the sleeping girl. He waits for a few minutes and the strikes the thing with a thunderbolt.

The wood looks a little bit charred but not structurally damaged.

Yeah, and is not like he could have thunderbolted the one that girl was in anyway.

What else can he do?

He goes back to the girl and shouts at the top of his lungs to see if she wakes up.

She does not.

Okay, plan b.

Felix goes looking for her real body. He puts on a trench coat to disguise his wings and tries to triangulate her most likely location.

It will take some doing but is doable. A Jane Doe was found apparently-catatonic in a no-tell motel and moved to a local hospital.

Okay, he comes up with a list of things to dream up. Like as much informaiton he can find about the Jane Doe's true identity, her current state, likely relatives, any other pecularities reported?

It occurs to him that the dreamshard could have caused this, somehow, he checks the motel`s room for it.

The motel room does not currently contain it.

Well, darn.

This does not look like the sort of place with a reliable lost and found, but he asks anyway.

The police came and took all the Jane Doe's stuff when she was hospitalized, maybe they have it.

Alright, thank you, presumably-a-hotel-staff.

Felix checks on the girl before checking all the police documentation.

Her name, it transpires, is Emily Xavier; a year and a half ago on her eighteenth birthday her parents and twin sister were found murdered in their home and she wasn't found at all.

Oh, no.

Surviving relatives?

Anything on the Jane Doe report that mentions a crystal shard?

No surviving relatives. Her parents were both only children, her paternal grandfather died of some kind of lab accident when her father was six, her paternal grandmother died of liver failure when her father was seventeen, her maternal grandmother died of cancer a few years before she was born and her maternal grandfather died of heart failure not long after his daughter was murdered. Her mother does have a living step-brother but the two haven't interacted since long before Emily was born.

There was some kind of chunk of grey quartz held loosely in her hand when they found her.

Was it kept in police custody? Felix will check where and plan how to retrieve it. And make a note to alert the police about her true identity later.

He visits the girl's dream-avatar.

Still unresponsive.

That expected.

Felix actually does not know if she can't wake up at any moment or something. He also does not know if she is going to turn into a vampire or if the coffin is separating her into good and evil parts... regardless he is going to leave a note explaining everything and a cooler with foodstuffs. As far he can tell dream-avatars don't kill the real selves, but it's better play safe.

He figures out a way to retrieve the dreamshard right out of the police vault by just making a portal right next to where it is.

Fortunately the police aren't paying enough attention to this one random Jane Doe's belongings for this to worry any of them.

Great. Felix takes the shard back to his new home-

He should use it! He can help so much people with it! Save so many people from all this sort of thing! From all the monsters that lurk hidden-

Felix drops it...

...wait, did it talk to Felix?

Did said there were monsters around?

He gingerly picks it up. The shard is not very informative about it, but it's pretty sure about the existence of dangerous non-human creatures around. And apparently this girl was sort of one?

He investigates Emily's past a bit further, trying to not break her privacy too much, but maybe if there is references to magical beings around?

Well.

When her family was found dead there were suspicious bite marks on their necks.

Felix makes a point to check on the girl every hour in case she has raisen from the grave as a bloodsucking undead. He also checks for any references to vampires on her belongings, residence, or anything possibly related to her.

He can't make vampires with his dreamshaping, but he should be able to get "miniatures of non-human people in this city".

There are a whole lot of non-human people in this city.

If he delves into her past enough he can find that she's something called "The Vampire Slayer."

Well, that is... something. Maybe they do have pocket dimensions but not in a way he can notice?

He researches what the hell is "The Vampire Slayer". Also if there is any other sort of magic around besides these creatures.

The Vampire Slayer is a teenage girl who is Called to the position when her predecessor dies and monitored by something called the Watcher's Council. Magic: exists. Hell dimensions: exist.

Huh.

Felix honestly does not know what to make of this thing. He spends the next few days checking on the girl's state and figuring out what is going on with this council.

Also, magic. What is up with that? Can he do it? Is there some sort of analytical magic that he could cast to figure out the coffin's magical properties?

He could maybe learn to do magic! At risk of becoming addicted!

The Watcher's Council is...well...a bunch of old white dudes. Who may or may not put Slayers through this thing called the Cruciamentum on their eighteenth birthdays. That involves drugging them and locking them up with a vampire.

Felix can do the math and Emily family was killed right around... ugh. What the fuck is wrong with these people?

Is there any indication of how addictive it is? How fast can he learn? Are there people that would be able to sell the service?

Witches exist! How addictive it is varies wildly by person.

Felix debates the pros and cons of involving someone else in this and decides to give a try at learning magic himself to see if it's worth it. Might help if a witch tries to backstab him.

He set about reading, he reads and reads. He researches.

And he spending all this time alone and sometimes he can't help but waste an hour crying. He sometimes goes somewhere quiet to people watch. He manages to go an entire day without uttering a word to another human being and starts talking to himself.

If he's monitoring the coffins, it's a week from when he showed up when Emily's eyes blink open.

Felix set up cameras with a live feed by that point. He runs there the moment she notices Emily waking up.

She pushes the glass lid of the coffin out of the way and sits up, sighing and looking more than a little depressed.

Then the lid of the stone coffin starts moving.

There are cameras set around coffins, alongside a cooler with food and note on top of that.

And the stone coffin finishes opening, and another girl pushes herself up, groggily.

Emily takes one look at her and shrieks.

"Emily? What?"

In lieu of answering Emily vaults out of her coffin and into the stone one, clinging to her sister tightly and sobbing like she's trying to regurgitate her lungs.

Edie is alarmed, and confused, and hugging her sister and stroking her hair because whatever's going on Emily being in this much distress is obviously the most urgent problem.

Eventually, it shouldn't be hard to notice, in comes a red-orange feathered winged boy landing nearby. He blinks at the scene.

"Uh, who are you?"

Emily looks up when Edie speaks.

"Ah... I'm Felix Dalkaila, I landed in this universe about a week ago... uh, a magical artifact dragged me here and landed on her while she was asleep. Thus it granted her the ability to dreamshape, the power to create a pocket dimension, which is the place we are in now. And... dreamshapers can't wake up the first time around unless their projection walks out of the dimension through a portal. So I tried to rescue her and... couldn't because she was stuck in the coffin which is magical."

"Huh, okay." Still hugging.

"I can... give you two privacy if you want. There is more information on the note." He points.

"I'm--still confused, the last thing I remember is--"

"You died. You died and Mom and Dad died and--and I was never going to see you again--you died--"

"Oh, Emily."

"It was a year and a half ago. You two probably should sit down, you can do that and hug. " Felix reports. "Uh, the artifact told me some things and then I investigated..."

Edie climbs out of the coffin and half-carries her sister with her.

"Some things?"

"It indirectly informed me that demons exist and that Emily was the Vampire Slayer. I then found out about the Watcher's Council and the Cruciamentu... I was trying to figure ou the possibility of using magic to free Emily."

"...The Cruciamentum? What's that?"

"My Watcher drugged me and left me alone in a building with a vampire. He escaped and killed you. I killed him, and then the Watcher."

"After reading that and figuring out the pieces I decided not to get the Watchers involved."

"Good, they're shit."

Nod nod. "Uh, it's not urgent but your body is in a hospital in an apparent coma. It won't wake up until this projection crosses a portal out of this pocket dimension."

"No hurry but alright."

Nod nod.

"Is there anything I can do for you?"

"My sister is alive."

He nods knowingly. "I mean, in case you have any questions or want me to bring you something..."

"It's going to be a little while before I can--focus, I think."

Smile. "I figured."

"Is there anything we can do for you? It, uh, kind of sounds like if you hadn't come here my twin would still be dead."

"Huh? I didn't help you at all? -Ah. I didn't come here on purpose. The dreamshard just... took me here."

"Yeah but like. Sister. Not dead."

He smiles timidly.

Watery-eyed smile.

Aaaawww.

And then more clinging. She thought nothing would ever be okay again.

"Do you want a hug, you look like you could use a hug."

Felix nods.

Edie holds out an arm.

Felix hugs, his wings are soft and warm. He tries not to lean too much on the hug.

Soft warm wings are nice. Emily leans into them a little.

Well, she is certainly allowed to.

Good. She is in dire need of hugs and wingsnuggles are the second best kind of hug after sister hug.

Yeah, Felix wouldn't dare to compare his circumstances with what she went through, but he is also in dire need of hugs.

The nice thing about hugs is that by receiving them you also give them.

Yes! Hugs are a clean renewable positive sum resource

Emily is in absolutely no hurry to go wake up. She has her sister to hug and periodically cry on and also nice soft wings to snuggle into. She has been super focused on Doing Things for the past year and a half, she can just. Stop now. And hug her sister.

At this rate they might just be there until their biological needs catch up with them. Which, they do have a cooler nearby.

Being distracted by biological needs is for people who haven't been spending too long building unhealthy habits of self-abnegation.

That is an entirely valid point!

Is Edie going to have to drag both of them over to the source of hydration.

Yeah, Edie definitely should get hydration (which of course can be done while snuggling). Emily's actual body is somewhere else and Felix is immortal.

It is the principle of the thing and shedding copious tears will be followed by consuming fluids. Drink.

Yeah, that makes sense. Hmmmm, hydratation.

Good.

Emily drinks and snuggles her sister.

Eventually. "I don't actually know if it's dangerous for your body to stay in life support for that long. But I just realized that I can probably, uh, steal it from the hospital and bring it here so you don't have to interrupt your snuggling."

"How long has it been? Slayer powers include regen..."

"One week..."

"Probably better to leave sooner rather than later."

Sigh. "Fine."

"Sorry." He unhugs.

"You have nothing to apologize for," she says firmly.

Slow nod. "...I did have time to come up with a better plan than 'keep a portal to her hospital room', I think."

"Hm?"

"Ah... I created a portal from my pocket dimension to your hospital room in case there was some sort of emergency or solution that needed me there. I never physically visited though."

"Okay, so we can just go there, right?"

"Ah, I don't think I explained pocket dimensions properly? Uh, pocket dimensions like mine or yours exist overlapped to regular space and portals to and from them only transport to fixed continuous locations. ...Basically going to your hospital room actually requires travel time."

"Oh."

"Some dimensions have spatial weirdness, but typically if you go through a portal and then move a certain distance and direction and then leave through a second portal you will find yourself the same distance and direction from the first portal."

"That makes inconvenient amounts of sense."

Shrug. "True, but I don't mind."

"Mhm." She cuddles her sister some more.

Felix smiles at then. It's great that they are reunited. "See you soon."

Felix leaves and goes to the hospital. He researched how to unplug and how to move Emily out of her hospital and soon he drives her back (he created a car in the dimension that overlaps with the hospital.)

And when he gets back, Emily steps through the portal--and wakes up.

She sits up slowly, looking around.

She is a large-ish overdecorated room. She can see the portal her dreamself just went through and Felix by her side. "How are you feeling?"

"Better than I have in years."

Smile. Felix invites Emily and Edie to snuggle on the couch.

Excellent plan.

Felix is known to come up with those sometimes.

Good good.

Well, are they past the cuddly event horizon again? They might be.

Perhaps. Either way: so much hugs.

So much hugs!

Clingy sniffly desperate hugs. But still hugs.

Yes, that.

(He will sniff just a little, as to not intrude in their moment.)

What if some demons who heard rumors of the Slayer being vulnerable intrude on their moment?

In that case the moment will be intruded and Felix will jump to high-alert.

"What are you doing here?" he calls for the weather... wait, pocket dimension, there is a sky but less of it.

Emily does not bother with questions. Instead she opts to use her years of finely-honed slayer reflexes, at which point the demons are rather too busy to bother with Felix's.

Well, Felix might be able to help if these demons are vulnerable to being knocked out by intense heatstroke.