Having the tall woman kneel and offer to carry her was the farthest kind of “help” Akira was thinking of, but she couldn’t turn it down now. “Uh—okay.” Feeling a bit like an idiot now, she did as she was told and wrapped her arms around the knight’s shoulders. It was uncomfortable, pressed against the armored back of the warrior, but she did her best to regulate her breathing. “Captain Rafaela Stringer,” Akira repeated when the stranger finally introduced herself. Guess she could count herself lucky the woman spoke at all; she struck Aki as a woman of few words type of person. Especially after she mentioned no questions until they were in a safer place.<span style="font-style: italic">Great.</span><br/><br/>Anyway, it was probably better for Akira at this point to speak as little as possible. Hoping her arms didn’t give out until they reached, well, wherever the woman was supposed to take them, Aki tried not to focus on the ache in her ribs. Seemed like the place they had just come from some was still some ways from the city proper, which was fortunate. Who knew what kind of damage the demons would have inflicted upon people at the heart of a bustling metropolis? As Rafaela moved them along, though, the number of decrepit buildings began to lessen, the locale becoming more gentrified. She knew this wasn’t Earth, at least not<span style="font-style: italic">her</span>Earth, and if this was another version of it, they certainly were not in her home country in the South Pacific. It was cold, and the architecture looked distinctly Victorian.<br/><br/>And then she saw the airships. “Holy shit!” Her gasp of surprise sent stabbing pain into her sides, making her let go of Rafaela as her body jackknifed. Her knees gave, unprepared for the abrupt landing and she lay curled up on the floor for a few seconds, coughing. “Shit…” Still, she kept her eyes to the sky, to the dark shapes moving above, impossible shapes she definitely had never seen on Earth before. She knew they were airships, watched enough movies, read enough books. It explained the unconscious woman’s outlandish gear, and the perpetual curtain of smog that settled all around them.<span style="font-style: italic">Victorian.</span>This was the stuff of her dreams.<br/><br/>“I-I can walk, ‘s’okay,” she mumbled as she got on all fours before mustering enough strength to stand. Her arms were getting wobbly, anyway, from hanging onto Rafaela. Thankfully, her curiosity and awe won out, for now, over her injuries, and she followed the tall woman closely as they moved through the streets of this unreal version of London. Of course it was London. Had to be. Well, at least that partly answered her earlier questions. Soon, though, she became aware of a different kind of attention coming from other people, bystanders who must be wondering where the hell these three women came from to look like they’d been through hell. She vaguely heard someone summoning guards or something, but they seemed to recognize Rafaela, or at least her outfit. She introduced herself as a captain, so she must be part of some peace-keeping force in this world.<br/><br/>At that point, though, the world began to spin. She sank onto one knee, wrapping her arms around herself again. Someone was lifting her up; maybe Rafaela, maybe someone else who had called for help. The sudden drowsiness told her that someone must have given her a sedative or something. The next sequence of events were equally blurry. She vaguely recalled being jostled and moved, of lights flashing before her eyes, the sound of equipment crashing. Did she do that? She closed her eyes for what seemed like a moment.<br/><br/>The first sensation that hit her was a feeling of great exhaustion. She squinted at the brightly-lit room, which looked so plain that she knew she must be in some sort of infirmary. It took her several moments to realize that the feeling preventing her from movement wasn’t just tiredness; she was literally strapped to her bed. “What the ever loving f—”<span style="font-style: italic">The Ring.</span>Eyes wide in panic, she tried to manipulate the fingers of her right hand and was relieved to still feel the sapphire ring around her finger. If she lost that, there was no way she would be getting back to Kire and Amria, and she would lose her power over metal.<br/><br/>“Hey. Hello?” she called out, trying to move her head. It was cold in that room, and the straps were uncomfortable. Underneath those, she could also feel a cast around her torso, probably for her fractured or broken ribs. She noticed the rails around her hospital bed were crooked and remembered the weird jumble of images on the way here. She must have lost control of her power in her delirium, hence the straps. “Someone there?” she rasped, louder this time.