Disclaimer: I don't own IPS or the works of C.S. Lewis.

Author's Note: The following is a dream I had just before I woke up today; I have no idea what is wrong with me, but there you go. I added nothing and omitted nothing - all I did was flesh out the prose. Hope you enjoy it, and if you don't, simply dismiss it for the madness that it surely is. =P

What Happens in Narnia Stays in Narnia

Snow crunched under Mary's feet as a soft wintry wind caught at her hair. She was walking through a copse of pine trees, the long, slender needles teasing at her sleeves and brushing her face now and again. Another set of footsteps crunched reassuringly behind her as she made her way aimlessly through the woods, wrapping her arms closely around herself to fight off the chill.

"Here," Marshall's voice came, snow-muffled, from somewhere behind her.

She turned and saw that he was holding out a winter coat, a white faux-fur one with a hood; it was familiar, but impossibly so, right down to the detail of a pair of little pink-lined white cat ears on the hood, poking up cutely. It was a coat Brandi had owned as a child, one of which Mary, a teenager by then, had been secretly jealous, but they did not come in her size. She'd never said anything about it to anyone, had simply zipped her little sister up and tucked her hair beneath the hood every morning that winter in preparation for school. Brandi had loved the coat more than anything.

"Where did you get this?" she asked, a sense of childlike awe as she slid into the miraculously adult-sized garment masked by her suspicious tone.

"I don't know. I think I just found it," Marshall replied as he shrugged into a coat of his own, a heavy deep-charcoal pea coat with black buttons. Mary was pretty sure he owned one that was similar if not the same.

"How come you've got that and I've got this?" Mary wrinkled her brow at the curious disparity in their outerwear.

"I have no idea about yours, but this is a coat my dad had when I was a little kid. I have one almost exactly like it. He was always wearing it when he came home in cold weather. I loved that coat," Marshall's voice shifted to a softer tone. "I loved him being home. It was pretty rare in those days. It still is, come to think of it."

"Mine's a coat Brandi had when she was little, only this one's my size. I was so jealous but they didn't come in a size big enough for me."

"I guess they do now," he replied, smiling as she flipped up the hood and he got a look at the ears on it. "Dear God, that's cute. I can't believe that's something Mary Shannon would want to wear."

"Shut up," she grumbled, secretly reveling in the coat's snug softness. "Where are we, anyway? I thought we were indoors a while ago, but I can't figure out how we ended up outside."

"I can't remember, either," Marshall's brow furrowed slightly as he scanned the night sky above them. "The stars here are strange."

Mary gave him a narrow-eyed glance. "And that means what?"

"I don't recognize any constellations and I can't find the North Star. It means I have no idea where we are on the planet. Actually, assuming we're still on Earth is a pretty big leap at this point."

"Seriously?" her eyes widened.

"I think we've been relocated, Mare," he replied.

"Huh," Mary grunted. "So we're somewhere the stars don't match up to anything you know, coats we liked as kids magically appear, and we can't remember how we got here."

"That sounds about right," he nodded.

"That being the case, shouldn't I be feeling a lot more concerned? I mean, I feel like it's a little weird, and that's a little weird, isn't it? I should be completely freaking out."

"I know what you mean," Marshall murmured into the quiet night as he looked around them. "I feel unsettled, yet curious, and all of this seems strangely familiar. It's a bit like a dream you've had before and forgot about having."

By unspoken agreement, they started walking again, and after a time, a faint light became visible. As they drew nearer they discovered, in the middle of a clearing, a lamppost, its flame glowing brightly in the night. Mary reached out to touch the post, the tips of her fingers lightly brushing over the cold metal. She leaned closer; there was a small plaque affixed to the post with lettering on it.

"Check it out, Marshall. There's something here."

"Huh," he muttered as he read. "It's got information about the lamppost's manufacture, but nothing about why it's in the middle of the woods."

"Come to think of it, isn't it weird that we can even read it at all?"

Marshall looked at her questioningly.

"Well, you said you're not sure if we're even on Earth anymore, yet there's a plaque here that's got English written on it."

Marshall gave her a look of dawning understanding as she turned to stare at the plaque again; as she concentrated on it, the wording on the plaque seemed to change, but only for an instant.

"Marshall! Did you see that?" she hissed excitedly.

"What?" his eyebrows shot up as she grabbed him by the elbow and dragged him to her place in front of the plaque.

"You know Spanish, right?" she asked.

"Yeah, why?" he questioned. She'd never cared what languages he spoke before.

"I only know a few phrases, but I think something almost happened. Quick, look at the plaque and think in Spanish."

Marshall shot her a confused look as he complied. "Whoa!" he exclaimed a moment later.

"What is it?" she asked, tugging on his sleeve.

"The writing turned into Spanish," Marshall replied, his tone one of surprised glee. He stared again.

"What are you doing now?"

"Thinking in French," he replied casually. She smacked him in the arm.

"We don't have all night for you to play with the thing, Marshall!"

"You know what this is, don't you, Mare?"

She shook her head.

"It's some kind of magic," he replied, his eyes gleaming with excitement. "The lamppost, the coats, all of it."

Mary stared at her partner as though he'd gone completely off his noodle, which, Mary felt, seemed like a strong possibility. Suddenly there came the sound of a twig snapping, and both partners turned in time to catch sight of a strange creature as it fled.

"Did you just see that?" Mary asked, her rapid breath sending cold puffs into the winter air.

"Yeah," he replied; no elaboration, and for once, Mary might have liked some.

"It was a weird little man with goat legs, Marshall," she prodded.

"Yeah."

"It was wearing a red friggin' scarf, Marshall!" she hissed, growing frightened at his lack of reaction.

"It was a faun, Mare."

"A what?" she whined plaintively.

"A faun. A satyr?" he explained as she stared at him blankly. "It was a little man with goat legs, wearing a red scarf."

She smacked his arm again. "I said that already!"

"Listen, Mare," he murmured, his eyes sparkling as he took her hands in his, "I think I figured out where we are."

"Where?"

"We're in a place where it's always winter and never Christmas."

"Hmm. That sounds good," she replied thoughtfully.

"And there's a White Witch, who's cursed the entire realm," he added.

"I've got a Drunk Witch at home, she can't really be worse than that."

"And maybe there will be a Lion, and possibly there was a Wardrobe, if we could remember how we got here," he continued.

"Do you really think we've been here before?" Mary asked, beginning to feel a little breathless with excitement.

"I think we have. And you know what else I think?" he murmured, drawing her close.

"What?" she whispered, so caught up in the moment she could barely utter the word.

He leaned forward and breathed into her ear, "I think what happens in Narnia, stays in Narnia."

With that, he pressed his lips to hers, a soft kiss that made her heart flutter, filled her with a rising warmth that made her feel impervious to the cold. They shared the kiss for a long while as snow fell around them, until at last it ended and they made their way, hand in hand, through the woods.

Mary snapped awake, breathing just a little heavily, to find herself sprawled on a familiar couch, her face pressed to a familiar pajama-clad thigh. A familiar snoring reverberated softly from somewhere above her, and she sat up to find Marshall asleep sitting up with his head tilted back onto the couch cushion that supported him. A silenced battle waged by magical creatures played out on the television set; clearly, Marshall had turned down the volume after she'd dozed off.

She turned back to her partner, raising a hand to lightly trace her fingertips down the side if his face.

"That's what I get for staying up so late to watch movies with you, Doofus," she whispered, a faint smile turning up the corners of her lips as she pressed a gentle kiss to his cheek.