geekhyena answered: Have you read Diane Duane’s work? If so, Sara with a Manual while on Ordeal.
I am not remotely familiar with Duane. I should pick her up, one of these days. Nevertheless, I shall attempt this with my own reality(s).
Fiction ho!
Manual Ordeal
“So…” Hank drawled. “A few questions…”
“Do keep them brief.” Sara turned a page, frowning. It was written in two languages by someone who barely understood either of them. Using it as a rosetta stone to decipher what was left of the controls was, if not an exercise in futility, at least something to stop her going mad with boredom. “I am trying to concentrate.”
“How long has this been happening?”
“Subjectively, on and off for five years. By events, two days total. Blame Forge.”
Hank shrugged. “That answers my second question. Third: Where are we?”
“I don’t recognize the universe, but it appears to be a derelict space ship. We’re lucky we have power and air.”
“How long does this last?”
“I must be touching everything I was touching when we went in the first place. And you had to go juggling with my hairpin.”
“I was merely–”
“Trying an untested skill you’d only observed in recordings with inappropriate tools on an unfamiliar device. And you dropped it. Down a grille.”
“Do you have a magnet?”
“In my other pants. Currently inconveniently located in another dimension.”
“Chewing gum?”
“Other pants.”
“Anyth–”
“Other. Pants.”
“Perhaps I could–?”
“Don’t. Touch. Anything.”
Hank sighed. “I get bored, too.”
“Fabulous. Help be unravel this console. But don’t touch anything.”