Michael held Judith's hand as they stared into the looking glass of another world. Frame around the portal was glossy. White cheap laminate. Wrapped around layers of three inch wide compressed sawdust glue concoction. Corners of the frame were flawless. No mitres. Drab aesthetic but appropriate for the room which existed on the other side. Orderly but empty. A chaos of nothing.

The room beyond their reality was a shell of a basement. Dull light shined through dust drenched windows. Cast a faint glow upon the cracked and slightly heaved concrete. Would take a full day to pour self leveller into the valleys of the up and down bottom tier to fix the long and short speed bump of a floor.

Judith pulled her foot out of a flip flop. Dipped her big toe into the looking glass. The mirror didn't shudder or ripple or expose any reaction. Nothing changed except that her toe had entered another world like passing through the air of external intuition, which defeated internal intuition forever. Let it linger. Watched her oval digit along with her other toes. Extended them. Stretched. Flexed her ankle. Michael whispered in her ear.

"I'd like a taste."

"Due time, my man."

In their reality, the porthole was like entering any other room. If Judith hadn't known it was a simulation within a mirror, wouldn't have recognized the next room was another reality. Which begs the question, how would anyone know if a room they entered wasn't another reality? Another slightly different existence? Every doorway of every corridor could be an entrance into another simulation. How would anyone really know? It would be the labyrinth to end all labyrinths.

Michael squeezed Judith's hand. Licked his lips. Tilted his gaze away from her toes to her face.

"It seems the ground is different in there. Softer. More clay. Who would build a city in such a place?"

Judith regarded his words with a slight nod,

"Good for growing. Shitty for construction. I wonder if that basement was built upon the mire."

"It would make sense. Shall we find out, my tasty treat?"

"I'm game, my man. But I have a question. There's no borderline to this orifice. No ripple or glow. It's like walking into another room that's naturally just there. How?"

"The how isn't a good explanation outside of the jargon behind the technology, but I'm not so sure another portal would be like this particular portal. I haven't created any other simulations, yet. Who knows what fairy dust sparkly glitter will announce the next exit of an entrance."

Judith nodded at his answer. Both stepped into the out of. When they passed through the mirror like an invisible bend in horizons, Judith looked back like Lot's wife and felt a bit salty for a second.

"Motherfucker!"

"What's wrong?"

"I had a pang of absolute anger upon my world view for a moment. I wonder what that was?"

"Interesting, Judith. My body and mind can't pick up on anything like what you just experienced coming through the simulation. It's possible that it affects you in a way. We'll have to see if you get a heightened emotion the next time we go through. It may be because you exist in this place whereas I don't. It may be something completely unrelated to existence. I don't know. Maybe the simulation is jealous of your beauty and sexy bad ass ways."

Judith squeezed the fabric of her white tank top. Pulled up her black patchwork pants from falling too far down her womanly backside. Lifted her heels so she was standing on the balls of her feet in her black flip flops. Kissed Michael on the cheek. Took hold of him. Hugged him for a long moment. Nuzzled into his bare chest under his open blue trench coat, which was a recent fashion trend for young men and women in the city of Veridiction. He wrapped his arms around her. They both squeezed. Judith rested her cheek by one of Michael's nipples and felt like sunshine and smiles.

"Let's get out of this basement and witness this new world."

Michael nodded. Both rumbled up the shaky, snotty green painted wooden plank stairs. Upper door was open like another simulation. Toward it they went, up into a dank corridor made of old panel boards and popcorn ceilings. Lead to a desolate, gutted kitchen and a host of renovation tools laying on drop sheets in a small square dinning room. The house was in the process of a makeover. Plastic drapes blocked the furnished living room from the dusty work.

The two aliens stood for a moment to get their bearings. Eventually found the back door. Exited. walked out into a cloud covered, overgrown backyard full of shrubs and tall grass weeds. The rock elms were in dire need of pruning. A small shed was a paint peeled eye sore. Judith immediately felt at home when they walked beside. Touched the old grey wood with her fingertips. Appreciated the splintered, fur-like crannies as if she were an ancient soul made of the shadows of border trees and loess graves that appeared as glacial stones. Felt bygone for a moment.

The yard ended with archipelagos of dormant grass as the gravel came about. An alley like a backroad. They walked, hand in hand. Made little puffs of ghostly autumn dust with each step. Felt the light breeze of what smelt like the beginning of rain upon a chill. Judith wished to warm herself upon Michael's sturdy sculptured stick and stones.

Michael pulled off his deep blue trench coat. Placed it upon Judith's shoulders. She smiled up at him. At his bare chest and loving intentions. He knew and she didn't have to say one word about anything. Judith slipped her arms through the coat and held her man as they walked out of the alley and into what seemed like an olden city of busy, sunny markets and the worry of people. The alley had hidden the sounds very well. All of the activity should've been noticeable. Surprised both the scientist and the warrior. Maybe the conditions of audio meeting visual were different in this reality. Different consequences. Judith had a flash of Jane for a moment within that moment; a thought about why she couldn't hear what they were almost upon. Judith didn't like that feeling.

They walked past old houses with trees of yellow blended crimson autumn colours and smudged storefronts of glass. Witnessed hideously thin mannequins draped in every manner of pastel gender conservatism. And then something extremely unsettling. In one of the windows was the taxidermy of a bear. Only the bear was mange or shaved and its head wasn't like a bear at all. It had a horrific human countenance upon its facial feature. The eyes were sad within the anger of what appeared to be its death stare.

Judith stopped in front. Got close enough to the window pane separating her from the beast. Could witness her breath fog upon the glass before her mouth. Stared into its eyes. Eyes made of an obsidian. Blueberries that seemed to shimmer green. Gravities began glowing, darker and darker, like the entrance to a forest. Dim orbs of a deadly animal witnessed her misstep. Snarled. Snarling like when a tornado touches the earth.

  ~~~~~~~

Judith witnesses the animal at the very end of Glanton street. Breathing and sniffing the air that holds the graveyard girl's spice coffee scent. Its eyes are exactly that of the window pane taxidermy. Black with dark deathly green shimmers. The beast is far more bulbous at its shoulders and hips. Gangly, distorted ribs. Seething mass of hairless skin. Immense specimen of some ancient humid evolution. Seems to be smiling long human nostrils above its long, grimy yellow fangs. Lips like a downward spiral of hatred. Ears edge torn flaps of rotting skin. White as snow everywhere else, like a Tuurngait haunting two Antarctic mountains.

The graveyard girl notices staple mark stitches around the beast's neck, like its head and body have been sewn together from different creatures. She'd rather rub against sharp bark and hump the roughest sides of a chopped branchy oak tree than get close to the juggernaut watching her like a meal.

White bald beast slams its front paws upon the road. Crumbles the broken pavement further. Black orb green glimmer eyes wrinkly widen. Opens its human mouth. Lets out a roar that at its loudest is a wailing scream of torturous human anger.

Judith knows the beast isn't hungry. It's not desperate in that way. It wants to rip her to pieces for trespassing its territory. How dare she. Can smell the minty confidence in its breath through the distance between.

Judith has no axe. No weapon. No clothes. Not even her shadow. Stares the beast in its gravities. Doesn't blink. Steps toward it. Whistles the tune of her lover's first encounter. Cracks her knuckles. Walks faster. Salivates for the tasty treats buried in the body of the beast. Runs at it.

"Motherfucker, you're in my territory."