They reappear somewhere quite different from where they left.

It's a city, or the ruins of one - tumbled and scorched piles of brick, asphalt rent apart in neat lines down the center of roads, glass warped like arms out of the few remaining hints of windows. Scraps of wood piled here and there like drifted sand, and crushed vehicles in the roads or thrown into empty buildings. Broken glass and plastic debris, dirt and fallen leaves, dull brown weeds destroying whatever this disaster missed -

This was a city once. It isn't anymore, not really.

They shake their head, blinking as though dazzled. This definitely isn't the uninhabited creek bed they had stopped at - it looks like the remains of a city, but something feels off. They haven't seen a surface city before, though, so… maybe this is just what they're like? Well, minus the ruination.

They approach one of the most immediately unfamiliar things, a crushed metal carriage-thing with shattered windows.

It's... Only maybe metal. Parts of it - a complicated machined tangle, dark and tacky with oil - certainly, but much of the crumpled part doesn't look like crumpled metal should, even beyond being a deep cherry red.

It doesn't move as they approach.

Nothing does, not even the wind.

This just keeps getting weirder and weirder. They pace a circle around the destroyed red vehicle, then look up - not at a sound, but at the extremely unsettling absence thereof. 

And then -

There's a distant crunch of footsteps.

They turn around again, stepping away from the wrecked car on instinct. Where's that noise coming from, and what made it?

Seems to be coming from down the street, around a corner. The rhythm and spacing sounds bipedal.

Hopefully whoever's approaching will be able to shed more light on this bizarre situation than inanimate objects. They walk towards the source of the noise.

Seems to be: a somewhat tall human woman, her build lean and powerful in a way Lucine might associate with knife fighters or acrobats. She tilts her head at Lucine, and says, "And here I'd have thought I was the only soul in this whole city."

They briefly assess the stranger, offering a somewhat nervous wave.

"That's not surprising. I-"

They pause, a hand jumping up to their mouth. They didn't notice until they paused to consider their words, but somehow the language that comes out when they speak without thinking is not the language they grew up with. And neither is whatever the other person is speaking, though hopefully she'll understand them.

Oh, right, they have a sentence to finish.

"I wasn't here, until about two minutes ago. Um. Somehow."

"And you don't know how you teleported?"

Headshake.

"No. I haven't actually heard of magic that can do that, but I'm not a philosopher."

They pause.

"Have you?"

"Teleportation's a common enough power, as these things go."

"How interesting…"

They wonder why this might be the case. Maybe they've been pulled to some formerly-prosperous city other side of the planet, where everyone studies magic all the time, but they'd suspect that this knowledge would quickly spread. Not least because the teleportation they experienced seems to have no side effects other than the weird language thing, which they're counting as solidly a plus. 

Speaking of which.

"Is, uh. Language transfer also a common power?"

"Hm, it's not unheard of certainly, but a full and permanent language transfer would be tricky for most people."

They're not totally sure what to make of that - another mystery, it seems.

"Well, I hope it'll be full and permanent! It would definitely be inconvenient if I was in the middle of a conversation and, whoops, there goes my ability to speak-"

Quick mental check.

"English."

"We might be able to find someone who can top you off, somewhere more civilized than this."

"Really?"

They perk up a little.

"How do powers work around here? Back where I'm from, magic is just one thing. I think some wizards have signature spells, but that's more because they've honed their technique in a particular way. I guess there's also priests, but divine magic is basically just regular magic but more."

"'How do powers work' is subject of pretty active academic debate, everywhere that still has academics. You get them more or less the same way, though by different routes - exposure to the body of or radiation from Armageddon - which, if you are not familiar, is one name for the creature that ended the world as we knew it."

Everywhere that still has academics?

Ended the world as we knew it?

"Well, it's - good that you've still got enough academics that they can debate that! And no, I wasn't familiar… is Armageddon still around?"