The Cost of Crossing Worlds

Some discoveries change the world.

Others change who you are — inside and out.
Professor James North was about to learn the difference.

Professor James North had always believed that true scientific progress begins exactly where fear takes hold. His experiment, developed in secrecy over many years, pursued a single, radical goal: to prove that multiple dimensions coexist, brushing against our reality like overlapping pages of the same cosmic book.

He succeeded.

What James never anticipated was the personal cost of that success.

When the experiment spiraled out of control, the confirmation came with a cruel twist. He didn’t merely cross into a parallel dimension — he became trapped within it. And worse still, not in his own body.

James now inhabits the body of Francine, his research assistant — or rather, her interdimensional counterpart. A respected woman. Married. Embedded in a reality where time advanced at a slower, uneven pace. Here, scientific development lags decades behind his original world, making the reconstruction of the dimensional device a distant, long-term hope at best.

Each passing day reinforces the same unsettling conclusion: it will take years before he can even attempt a return.

As his mind clings to logic, method, and the identity of a renowned scientist, the body he occupies demands new habits, new boundaries… and new social expectations. The reflection in the mirror no longer answers to the name James. The world around him requires adaptation, restraint, and silence.

And as if the dimensional shock weren’t enough, there is one detail he cannot ignore.

The ring on his finger.

In this reality, Francine is not just an assistant — she is a wife. And the man who loves her is beginning to sense that something is profoundly wrong. Her gestures feel unfamiliar. Her gaze hesitates. Her voice carries an indefinable distance.

Between equations scribbled in secret, improvised explanations, and sleepless nights, James realizes that his greatest challenge may not be scientific at all. Maintaining the illusion, surviving within this borrowed body and life, could prove harder than crossing dimensions in the first place.

After all, proving that parallel universes exist was the easy part.
The real challenge is discovering who you become when you can no longer be who you were.