Cosmic doppelgangers'.

The night is warm. Endless stars hang over my head like a thick curtain, almost close enough to touch. I slip a hand off the steering wheel to feel the curtails of wind wrap around my fingers. The sensation is so fragile and clean. The road empty, I speed up, the fragmented embers growing around my arm. And I suffer sad reluctance when the growing lines of city buildings come to view. 

On entering the city, a breakdown of rain falls onto my car, drumming on its shell. The city's fluorescent glare drowns out the natural skylight, creating pockets of shallow darkness on the pavement where unsettled men hide. Shamefully, I grip the steering wheel tighter. A city is a nervous place, and I like to avoid its warning signs. In the city, I could float away like a lost helium balloon, and no one would ever find me.

A street away from home, a weight catches in my throat. The thought of finding my way through the dark, trying not to wake my roommate as I clatter the door shut. The sting of the stone-floor tiles and the fight to brush my teeth in the drowning silence. And knowing it will happen again. 

Crawling into my unmade bed, I still taste the frost falling from my mouth as I curl myself tighter under the blankets. I curse the rising energy prices and stop myself; that conversation isn't worth the fight.

***

The planet slips from view, replaced by scars of foreign stars. The electric shaking of the engine wobbles the water in my glass, and I turn to the oncoming footsteps of Commander Xand.

"A sight to behold, is it not?" He gestures to the star encrusted space that sparks and glitters as the ship glides past. 

"Yes." I agree, the sentence settling in a weight. 

Commander Xand pats my shoulder awkwardly and stiff, bedside manner clearly unnatural to him.

"It gets easier. It's harder for you humans." He meets my eyes, his face falling in pity, before patting my shoulder again and leaving.

I find the mess hall, just managing the mangled hallways and walls inscribed with floating blocks of unknown letters and language. The site is filled with humanoid and alien personnel, uniformly dressed in a fitted grey suiting. Their dress is regimented with wavering stripes of orange, blue and green, their meanings unfamiliar to me. 

Ill-fitted in comparison, my trousers drag against the metal floor as I make my way towards an empty table. I wrap myself in my oversized jacket and look to the floor as I earn some quizzical glances. Unnerved, I'm relieved when I find my seat, slightly spilling my water as I sit, my body robotic under suspicion. Watching the scene, I try to examine the alien bodies in the room but find their strangeness too overwhelming to properly look at; the horns, the scales, the heights and the colours. 

I must look distressed because a warm drink is pushed into my hands as an alien sits next to me. A strange cultural commonality, but nice... I decide as the alien says something to me in a language I cannot understand. She-her voice sounds more akin to a female speaks in odd shapes of vowels and sounds, her tongue split, vaguely lizard-like. And she must realise I do not understand because she stops and looks at me, her eyes dark and round, pupilless against her pale-purple skin. 

"Th-Thank You." I croak, the words catching in my throat. 

And she seems to pause, her face freezing until her eyes dilate, opening her face again.

"You're Welcome." She smiles in accented English. "My darling."  

We both look at each other in an equal amount of awe, unabashedly interested in each other. I feel the pressure in my eyes grow as a glaze overcomes them, and I find myself constricting under it. My chest shudders as my lungs try to inhale but fail. The mechanics of breathing are becoming unnatural as air moves within me like rust, barely enough. The alien comes closer and holds me, and she's talking, but I cannot hear her. Her hold is forceful and tight, and I feel the constriction around my body as my limbs flex outwards in rigid movements. I can feel my heart slap inside my chest like a punch, too fast to be safe as my sight begins to quiver into darkness. 

***

My body, fresh in shock, startles me awake, and I check the time, the phone light biting my eyes. 4:20 AM. The time hits like a punch, and I wish I stayed asleep as the nightmare quickly washes from memory. I try to sleep again, managing another hour before my alarm rings; I can tell this day will be a long day.

My morning shower does little to invigorate me as my body seems to linger in tiredness. Even my daily dose of caffeine is slow to bite against it, and I barely suppress a yawn on my drive to work. And again, when Nathan at the front desk jostles around my state and insinuates unsavoury reasons. 

"You can call me anytime, sweetheart." He schmoozes, condescendingly smug.  

Followed by the morning meeting, my mind is hazed by running thoughts of sleep and intermittent blankness. I am torn by tiredness by my lunch break but force myself to leave the office, away from my supervisor's pushy pokes to sell, sell, sell!

Finding a round bench on the office grounds, I slump, the afternoon sun more drugging than refreshing. I hold my head in my hands; its weight is too heavy. I need to eat, I tell myself. I need the energy. But my throat is full, thick with worry, which makes it hard just to drink. The longer I sit here, the sun's gaze becomes more inviting, moving in ripples across my back. The growing warmth makes the thought of moving like a crime as I drift into its alluring hush. 

***

The knife in my hand is heavy by my side. Sweat licks my hand, making my grip tremble. The footfall grows closer, the floor groaning under the weight. I poke the knife into my thigh, reminding myself it's there. And I remind myself again as two metal-clad boots clank slightly askew from my hiding place. 

"I can hear you breathing. Show yourself." A deep voice commands. 

I feel bile stretch in my stomach as my breath quickens, and I try to hold my breath and fail. I don't know if I can die here, but I don't want to try. I take a slow step forward, outstretching the knife in front of me with both hands. The figure matches my move and extends a sword, its edge two steps away. The man moves his eyes over me, falling on my skin like weight and slides his weapon to his side. 

"No need to fret, Lady. I am the King's guard." The man-the elf says as I watch him, two long ears framed by dark blue cascading hair. He dons regalia, embroidered with swirls of gold and a cape. He takes a step forward, his footfall soft against the wooden floor, and I retreat, my arms jutting out straighter. He stops, his face shaken in confusion. 

"My Lady, I am no threat to you." He reassures but stays still. As do I. 

"I am Carian of the King's guard." 

I nod, taking a deep breath. 

"I am a protector." He says quieter, more careful. He seems sincere. And I nod again. I drop the knife a little, the grip painful now, and he shuffles forward a little.

"My Lady, I can assist you." He forwards again, the closeness intense, and I drop the knife and back away, beginning to run until I realise I'm in a loft, with nowhere to run. 

***

Dappled in raindrops, I return to the office, my supervisor enraged at my lateness. I stay late, my nap providing some extra energy. But time moves differently; 6 PM is more like the mid-morning chill. The night lights falling through the blinds like the sun through cracks in the floorboards. 

***

"My Lady, what is your name?" Carian inquires.

"Alma," I reply, the answer relieving him as his shoulders droop. 

"Lady Alma, please do me the honour of walking with me." This is a strange situation. But I nod, carefully following Carian down the bending ladder, creased in old age. We make our way out of the barn, a distance between us as we enter the daylight. 

Fields of yellow and green meet my eyes, falling on top of each other like rolling blankets. Fragmented leaves and dandelion seeds float and tiptoe in the crawling breeze. A small collection of similarly dressed men-elves malinger near grazing horses, talking as quietly as a whisper, all turn to look as we exit.  

***

Opening my eyes, red and yellow lights twinkle like stardust echoed by clinical dots of noise. The greyscale ceiling is flooded by a faint map of my body, shadowing my movement in thin 3D. The purple alien peers over at me, a fair few feet from me. 

"Hello, darling." She welcomes, soothingly sweet. A strange form for strangers, but not uncomfortable. 

The people cladded in grey tell me I had some sort of seizure. That my brain was overwhelmed and short-circuited to fix itself. But then continue to say that my brain operates strangely and performs its own organic synthesis of mutated neurotransmitters. The explanation is more of a non-explanation; the idea of it all is nonsensical. 

"Do you remember how we met?" Commander Xand asks. 

I try to think back, through the space of -the day. -the week. And find blankness meeting the thought, my first point of existence is my glass of water and the stars. 

"No~" The sound wobbles out my mouth, trapped by the unnatural realisation. 

"We met in Skaskga." He watches me... "We fought side-by-side. We were trapped in an ambush." I shake my head, with no recollection of this event or place; I am unnaturally numb until a thought pokes out at me. 

"I am Alma." The name feels right, instinctive. I can taste it in my mouth. 

***

Driving home is a fight, my sense of groundedness constantly moving away from me. One moment I know these streets like the back of my hand, and the next, I don't know where I am. The back of my eyes pools in pressure, shifting between absence and awareness, my sight playing out in front of me like a broken mirror. I pull over, jutting my car awkwardly out of the road onto the sand. My head pulsates under overcoming waves of pain, and I bite my hand, screaming. 

***

The staring is uncomfortable. As does the sight of the pointed elf ears standing from their heads. Elves. The thought is intimately new and old. And the longer I taste it, the more I feel, emotion settling into me like concrete, my edges becoming finer. 

"You're elves!" I exclaim, earning a chuckle from the group.

"Yes, my Lady. And you are human." An elf chalks forward, his red hair falling identical to Carian's. "A surprising one." He examines my attire, a blacktop and jeans-contemporary fashion. I look to the elves and their traditional regalia, realising I've travelled and not travelled home.