Title: Slayers Gateway: Discovery

By: Slayersgrl (slayersgrl@yahoo.com)
Disclaimer: I don't own the Slayers… just borrowing them…

A/N: This is the first in a trilogy I'm working on. Only the first part, Discovery, is done so far… Any feedback is greatly appreciated!

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The next morning did not start out exactly as Lina had hoped. Somehow, completely overnight, heavy dark clouds had formed in the sky. The sun was barely visible: only a few rays of light were able to pierce through the thick layer of clouds.

The dreary atmosphere seemed to suit Lina perfectly. She was still in her bad mood from yesterday as she came down the stairs to get some breakfast. Amelia, Zelgadis, Gourry, and Xellos were already seated at a table. Adara was nowhere to be seen.

After ordering her meal, Lina just sat in silence while the others stared at her curiously. Then, all of a sudden, her head fell to the table. "Ahhhh! I just realized something!" she screamed far too loudly for that hour of the morning. "I'm acting like Zelgadis!"

Insulted, Zel replied, "Hey, what's that supposed to mean?"

A loud crash of thunder was heard as the first raindrops hit the roof of the inn. About 30 seconds later, a figure rocketed down the stairs, red pigtails flowing out behind. It stopped right in front of the group's table. "It's… It's raining!" Adara whimpered softly.

"Oh! Are you afraid of the thunder?" Amelia asked, trying to calm the frightened girl down.

"N…n…no. I'm scared of the rain!"

Amelia was confused. "The rain? Well, try to calm down. I'm sure the storm will end soon." But Adara refused to relax. So Amelia tried to cast an Enhance Calm spell on her. "It's not working!"

Lina sighed. She slowly stood up and put her hand on Adara's shoulder. The girl instantly collapsed on the ground.

"Lina! What did you do?!" Zel exclaimed.

"Relax! She's only sleeping…"

"That wasn't very polite Miss Lina!" Amelia scolded as she started to take the sleeping sorceress back to her room. "You could have at least warned me."

Lina just shrugged her shoulders as her breakfast arrived. She hungrily began eating and was done in record time. She leaned back and patted her now full stomach. "Mmmm! That was good! I feel so much better now."

"Now that you're done eating, maybe we can talk about that note you found yesterday." Zel suggested.

"Oh yeah. I almost forgot about that!" Lina reached into her pocket to pull out the note when she remembered that she didn't have it. "Gourry? You have the note, right?"

Gourry looked at her with a blank stare. "What note?"

Lina's head hit the table for the second time that morning. "The note we found yesterday! In the box! Do you remember now?"

The swordsman scratched his head as he thought for a moment. He then pulled out a familiar folded piece of paper from his pocket. "Do you mean this?"

Lina grabbed it from him as she replied "Yeah… that's the one…" She then turned to Zelgadis to have a more 'intellectual' conversation. "So, do you have any idea what it says?"

Zel took the paper from Lina's outstretched hand. After studying it for a minute or so, he shook his head. "Nope, I'm afraid not. It's not any language I've ever seen."

Xellos decided it was his turn. He snatched the paper out of Zel's hand.

"Xellos! Who said you could have it!" Zel yelled as he tried to retrieve the stolen paper.

"Hmmm… very interesting…" the Mazoku muttered as he kept the note just out of Zelgadis' reach.

"What! You mean you know what it says?!" Lina asked incredulously.

Xellos looked over at her. "Oh, no. I have no idea what it says. But I do know who could tell us." At that moment he let the note slip through his hands and it slowly floated to the ground. Zelgadis reached out to grab it and tripped over Xellos' strategically placed foot.

Lina ignored Zel for the moment and turned to Xellos. "Who?!"

"Why a shrine maiden of course."

"What!?!" Lina and Zel exclaimed in unison.

Gourry suddenly decided to voice his thoughts. "A shrine maiden? Hey Lina! Do we know one of those?"

Through clenched teeth, Lina managed to reply. "Yes Gourry. We do know a shrine maiden. Remember Sylphiel?"

A light bulb seemed to go off in Gourry's head. "Oh yeah! Sylphiel! She's a great cook you know!"

Lina just groaned.

Zel, having now gotten up off the floor, thought about this latest piece of information. "But do we really want to go all the way to Sairaag just to find out what some piece of paper says? What if it's just some ancient grocery list? I for one don't want to waste six days just to find that out."

Nodding in agreement, Lina thought about what else they could do. "There has to be someone closer. Where's the next closest shrine?"

Zel pulled out a map and laid it on the table. He pointed to a location that didn't look too far from where they were now. "There. But it's still a three-day walk."

"Well, that looks like our best option for now." Lina then noticed that the rain had stopped. "I guess we'd better go wake up Adara so we can get going. The sooner we leave the sooner we can know what this note says."

Zel looked over at Lina with a hint of a smile on his face. "So now she's coming with us? I thought you hated her."

"Well, you never know… She might come in handy one of these days!" Lina grinned as she made her way for the stairs. "Maybe today wasn't going to be so bad after all."

Lina lazily stretched her arms over her head. They had been on the road for several hours and nothing out of the ordinary had happened. Lina was trying not to notice Gourry so as to not have any more unusual feelings. Zel was trying not to notice how Amelia was constantly glancing over at him. And Xellos was trying not to fall over laughing. Lina knew that if she glanced behind Xellos she wouldn't be able to hold in her laughter any longer.

Walking in the rear of the group was poor Adara. She was continuously glancing up at the sky looking for any sign of rain. Over her head she held a small, bright orange umbrella with tiny little dragons decorating it. Where she had managed to find that, only L-sama knew…

"Miss Inverse?" came a small voice from the rear. "Are you sure it isn't going to rain again?"

Lina had to quickly put her hand over her mouth before Adara heard her laughing. After composing herself, and without turning around, she was able to reply. "Yes, for the hundredth time, I'm absolutely positively sure it isn't going to rain again." "Of course… I'm not a weather expert or anything…" she thought. Then out loud she added, "And I already told you, it's Lina, not Miss Inverse."

"Oh, ok Miss… I mean, Lina." After a few minutes, the quiet voice spoke up again. "Um, where exactly are we going?"

"We're going to the nearest shrine to find a shrine maiden."

"Why?"

"So we can get a letter that we found translated."

Adara stopped. "Well, why didn't you say so sooner. Can I look at the letter?"

Lina pulled out the letter and turned to give it to the other girl. As she turned and saw the orange umbrella, she quickly clamped her mouth shut. This made her have a really odd expression on her face.

Adara looked at her strangely. "Uh, Lina, are you ok?"

Lina just nodded her head yes. She didn't trust herself to say anything. She motioned for Adara to quickly take the letter. While she studied it, Lina distracted herself by trying to count how many blades of grass were on the side of the road…

Suddenly, Adara began mumbling to herself. "This doesn't make any sense… It's a very old language… but the paper is new… It's a list… but it doesn't look like any list I've ever seen…"

"What! It's a list!" Lina exclaimed. "Zel was right! I'm glad we didn't go all the way to Sairaag then…"

The others turned and stared at Adara. "How were you able to read that?" Zel asked.

"Uh… It's a long story…" she replied. "One that can be told some other time. But first I need to know what you found this in."

From wherever she keeps those huge bags of gold, Lina managed to pull out the box that she had tripped over earlier. She then handed it to the girl.

After looking over it, Adara finally found what she was looking for. On the bottom was an inscription. "Look, right here. It's directions of some sort… I think that if we go to where ever this place says, we can find out what this list is for."

Lina glanced over at Zel and winked. "See, I knew she'd come in handy!"