"The warehouse is just a cover, Lucy. I have an ability that allows to travel between two entirely different worlds."
Alex paused, watching her face carefully as he continued.
"I’m not originally from this world. In fact, I am from a world that is way much technologically advanced compared to this world of yours by a number of centuries, probably hundreds of years," he said.
Lucy’s eyes widened in shock, but she didn’t interrupt him, her hand still squeezing his tightly.
"This ability allows to travel between your world and mine. When I disappear for hours or days, I was never in the warehouse at all. I was simply returning to my own world. I used to have limited ti to spend here every day, but not anymore.
"I now have complete control over how long I want to stay over there."
Alex took a deep breath and attempted to read her reaction before proceeding.
"It is a place where such things as the rain-making machines you saw are common. There are instrunts that are far beyond your knowledge, Lucy. With the instrunts that I have ntioned, it has enabled to solve the drought problem. This is how I have managed to find the bandits hideout last ti, and this is also the reason why I have managed to brought you back from them."
He squeezed her hands gently.
"Because I have access to knowledge and tools from a world that won’t exist for hundreds of years."
Lucy was silent, staring at the face in front of her.
He studied her expression carefully. "It’s not that I don’t want to be here with you, Lucy. It’s just that I used to have limitations on my ti here
However, since certain changes have occurred in my powers recently, I can co and go as I like."
Lucy had been listening silently throughout his entire explanation, her face unreadable. Then, suddenly, her lips twitched.
A slight giggle broke from her.
Then another.
And then, to Alex’s utter astonishnt, Lucy burst into laughter; a laughter that rang out through out the quiet room.
"Oh, Brother Alex," Lucy said between giggles, wiping at her eyes. "If you’re not going to tell the truth, then you have to co up with a better story than this. Going back and forth between worlds? That’s it? That’s too much."
She was still smiling because she thought he was joking around with her.
Alex simply stared at her, his face unreadable, not saying a word.
The laughter gradually slowed on Lucy’s lips as she saw his serious look. The smile left her face, replaced by confusion.
"Brother Alex?" she said hesitantly, her voice losing its amusent. "You’re.... you’re kidding, right?"
Alex remained staring at her in silence.
Lucy’s hands were shaking slightly in his grasp. "Brother Alex," she began to say, but trailed off in mid-sentence, struggling to accept what he said but unable to do so. "I... I don’t..."
She breathed quickly and nervously as she gazed at his eyes.
"It’s not like I don’t want to believe you," Lucy said. "After everything you’ve done, I want to believe every word you say. But what you’re saying is simply unbelievable," she added.
Alex was quiet, letting her think it out.
"I an, traveling between worlds? Technology from hundreds of years in the future? Brother Alex, that’s... that’s impossible. Those are things from fairy tales and legends, not real life."
She searched his face desperately, looking for any sign that he was teasing her.
"I do believe you," Lucy said finally, though Alex could tell there was doubts there too. "If you say it is true, then... then it must be true," she said.
Yet even as she uttered the words of acceptance, Alex felt the lingering doubt. She was attempting to convince herself more than she was stating a truth she believed.
Alex understood. He couldn’t bla her, really. He was asking her to accept sothing which defied everything she knew about reality, about the world, and about existence itself.
Words alone would never be sufficient.
"Lucy," Alex murmured, releasing her cheek to grasp both of her hands in his.
"Close your eyes."
"What?" Lucy looked at him confusingly.
"Trust ," Alex said, speaking softly but insistently. "Close your eyes. I’m going to show you the truth."
Lucy was only uncertain for a split second before the lids slowly slid shut.
"Don’t open them until I tell you to," Alex directed. "No matter how you’re feeling, keep them closed. Do you think you can do that for ?"
"Yes, Brother Alex," Lucy whispered, her hands holding on to his tightly.
Alex concentrated his mind on traveling, on the familiar feeling that ca with passing from world to world. He began to feel the power building inside of him, responding to his command.
The white light started appearing around them although Lucy couldn’t see it since she had closed her eyes.
She gasped softly as she felt the strange sensation.... like the world was shifting beneath her feet, like reality itself was bending and warping around them. Her fingers tightened around his.
"Brother Alex?" she whispered, a growing sense of fear creeping into her voice.
"I’m here," he told her. "Keep your eyes closed. Trust ."
The light grew stronger and stronger until both were bathed in its brilliance.
Lucy let out a little cry of distress but held her eyes tightly closed and waited on him.
And then, suddenly, they were gone from the bedroom of the Hartwell estate.
-------
The travellling occurred in the ti span of a heartbeat.
Alex felt the familiar hardness of the floor of the bedroom of the Lotus Crown Villa beneath his feet.
Lucy swayed slightly in his grip, disoriented by the sudden displacent, and Alex steadied her with his hands on her shoulders.
"You may now open your eyes, Lucy," said Alex softly.
Lucy’s eyelids fluttered open, then slowly opened fully
For a brief mont, she simply blinked, trying to comprehend what was happening before her eyes.
She looked from one unfamiliar thing to another, trying to understand where she was and what was happening around her.
Then her eyes went wide with shock.
"What... where... how...?" The questions spilled out in a jumbled ss as she turned about, absorbing all she could of the place.
The wooden furniture of her own family’s estate was gone. The silk curtains and traditional furnishings, which had always been in her life, were also gone.
Instead, she found herself in a room that was unlike any she had ever seen in her lifeti.
The surface beneath her naked feet was thick with so kind of soft, plush covering not wood, not stone, but sothing that sank beneath her weight in a gentle curve. She took a tentative step, amazed by the feel.
The walls were very smooth and very white, lacking even the slightest unevenness.
Strangely there is no candles or lamps in here but still a soft light seed to shine from the very ceiling itself, lighting the room with a steady, non-flickering radiance that resembled nothing else she’d ever seen.
And the windows...
Lucy’s breath caught as she stumbled towards the enormous floor-to-ceiling windows that filled one wall of this new space. Her hands extended, and she pressed them against the glass.
Past the glass was an extent of landscape impossible to comprehend.
Thousands upon thousands of lights twinkled in the darkness, like a river of fallen stars.
Towering structures stretched towards the night sky, each one taller than any building she had ever seen.
They were taller than the great towers in the capital.
Their windows shimred with an interior light that seem to make patterns in the darkness.
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