Completely shocked, I dropped my duffel bag and screamed. I ran to the closet and without thinking, I dived in after Anakin. As soon as darkness enfolded me, I hit a hard wall. My groans of pain echoed around me with what I recognized as water dripping.
When I opened my eyes, I thought that there were stars circling my head in a speedy dance. After watching them for a minute, my pounding head processed that they were reflections from the waterfall and small pool at the far mouth of the cave, where a waterfall was allowing a hint of light in. Besides that, it was dark.
My brain beginning to clear, I heard ragged breathing to my left. I dropped to my knees and crawled in it's direction. My hand touched something warm and solid that by my adjusting eyesight I saw to be Anakin's face.
By the large bruise that was developing and cut oozing blood on his forehead, I gathered that Anakin had crashed head first into the rock wall without time to throw up his hands to protect himself. He had been knocked out, and fallen back onto the stone floor of the cavern. I grabbed the edge of my sleeve, attempting to rip it off to put on his forehead like the women in all those western movies. How the heck did you do it? Mine wouldn't tear, and was getting me very frustrated, when a shadow fell over us. (Yes, I had gotten used enough to the light that shadows could fall)
I turned my head slowly to face a tall man surrounded by…uh, some more tall men. He was just a different kind of tall man 'cause he had a sword instead of a spear or bow. But the strange thing was that it looked like he had cloth on it or something. I slapped my head as I realized that it was in a scabbard. About that time, one of the guys grabbed me (and I swear that he had the strongest grip ever) and pulled me away from Anakin. All the others surrounded him and I saw a rope in one of their hands. Thinking they were going to hang him or something (trust me to think up the stupid things), I kicked the guy who was holding me in the shins and dived into what I considered to be the fray. Naturally, I didn't watch where I was going and slammed headfirst into the floor with my arm under me. I heard it crack before blacking out.
A red haze filtered into my closed eyes, so I cracked one open and quickly shut it again as bright tongues of flame danced before it. I lay still for a while, thinking how nice it was of someone to build that fire for me. Then a door opened and I suddenly found it hard to keep my eyes open. I heard footsteps come toward me. They stopped, then I felt a wet cloth on my forehead. Eyes just about popping, I sat up with a little shriek.
"Owwwwwwwww!"
A woman sitting next to me just about jumped 5 feet from her chair at my surprising recovery. She pushed me back, breathing a little hard.
"There there dear. Oh, your arm wrapping is coming off from the wood again. Now you stay here while I get some more wraps and your man and hold still. You're head doesn't need to split open again! Goodness, you gave me a fright!"
Confused, I reached up to touch my head and my arm, gave a throb of pain so intense I almost screamed again. I looked to where the woman had been and saw myself vaguely mirrored in a copper mirror. I could make out my head witha cloth wrapped around it. I understood how frightened the woman must have been seeing me wake up like that. I mean, if that was just my face, what did the rest of me look like?
In addition, what did she mean by "my man"? Oh well. As I had nothing else to do, I lay back and relaxed, tying to ignore the pain in my right arm. I guessed that it must be broken. Thinking aloud to myself, I said, "Why doesn't it have a cast? Oh duuhhhhhh Cristi! You aren't in your own world. That explains this dress!"
My oral thoughts were interrupted by the lady coming back in (I noticed that she was a young, pretty nurseish looking girl) with a young man in the clothes of the menkind of Middle Earth.
"Cristi! I was worried about you. They said that you had a high fever and were on the brink of death."
Huh? Who was this guy? And me on the brink of death? As far as I knew…wait a second. WHERE WAS ANAKIN?
"Yo…erm, nurse, do you know about the guy that was with me? He was unconscious last time I saw him. He has blonde hair, he's tall, blue eyes, need I go on?"
The man laughed (why was it a familiar sound?) and strode over to me. He pushed a little blonde hair off his forehead, and I saw a nasty bump and scrape. I looked from them into a pair of blue eyes. I buried my head into the blanket, the sting of the wound on my head making me immediately regret it, as I flushed with embarrassment at not recognizing Anakin
"As far as I know, I'm conscious, but I'm awfully glad that you are too finally."
Deciding I needed to find out the particulars of everything, I removed my head from the casing of cloth. As soon as that was done, Anakin put a glass of water to my lips, helping me realize that I was on the point of dehydration. I'm afraid that while I was refreshing myself, I may have slurped and dribbled some water onto the front of my dress and such, so all in all, Anakin and I ended up being a little wet.
Smiling a little smile that seemed to say, "She's insane," the nurse approached and laid her hand on my forehead again. She looked down at me with what I guessed to be understanding of why I was acting to out of this universe. Of course, she was right. I was out of this universe! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA ha ha ha, erm…yeah. Lame joke.
"It looks like you haven't shaken that fever yet."
Handing a towel to Anakin, she backed out of the room, pointing toward another door.
"I'll go and get someone else to watch her as I'm exhausted. Keep this on her forehead and dip it in water once in a while to keep it wet. Someone will be along presently."
Anakin grinned down at me after Ms. Nurse had closed the door, looking as though he was barely controlling his laughter.
"How is it that whenever I fall you get injured worse than me?"
"Laugh it up fuzzball."
I giggled to myself than sighed slightly as he didn't get the joke. Oh well.
"So, where are we anywho?"
His smile was a bit nervous for some reason as he paused before answering me.
"You recall what you referred to as Mary-Sue's? Well, you, like them have fallen into Middle Earth. But," he said hastily as I opened my mouth to spew forth venomous words at him for comparing me to the MS', "as you jumped in to save me from the disappearing closet, you will not end up like so many others. We are now in a city called Minas Tirith. Am I safe now?"
I felt ready to die of shame. Here I was, a chica who had ranted against stupid Mary Sues all my life, a…oh was too horrible to think about. I tried to forget about it and looked down at me hands. Wait a…my hands weren't ever that porcelain color. I looked down at the rest of my body…aaahhh! I'd NEVER, EVER had a figure like this before! Afraid to do it, but knowing I had to, I pulled my long hair…HOLD ON A SEC! I DON'T HAVE LONG HAIR! Now officially freaked out, I looked down at it. It was a platinum blonde. I spotted a small hand mirror on the little vanity table thingie, and knocked Anakin over in my rush to reach it.
I was told later that my screams echoed all around the castle and you could hear them on the first level of the city.
Anakin rose unsteadily to his feet from where I had knocked over his chair. He got his balance, put his fingers in his ears, ran across the room to where I was shrieking at the hideously beautiful apparition in the mirror, and knocked said instrument of torture out of my hands. I turned on him, screaming hysterically, "YOU DIDN'T TELL ME THAT IT CHANGED WHAT I LOOK LIKE! I LOOK LIKE A MARY SUE. I HAVE ELVEN LOOKING EARS NOW! I HAVE STUNNINGLY BEAUTIFUL BLUISH GREENISH VIOLETISH EYES! GET A DOCTOR, PLASTIC SURGERY! I HAVE TO BE LESS PRETTY OR I'LL GO INSANE! ANAKIN, I'M HIDEOUS! GET HELP GET HEL-"
Anakin smacked my face to bring me back to my senses. It worked quite effectively really. I stared up at him, my now rosy and perfect bottom lip quivering, and took a deep breath, effectively calming myself down. He pulled me to him and held me. As I relaxed in his arms, I thought how perfectly ridiculous this was. Here I was, more beautiful than Kelly could ever wish to be, with utter Mary-Sue eyes (meaning the most beautiful ever seen), and I was freaking out about it.
As I was wallowing in the depths of despair, the door burst open, and the room was suddenly filled with large, handsome, macho men in medieval looking clothing. One of them yanked Anakin away from me, and another grasped my shoulders.
"Milady, are you alright? Did this varlet hurt you?"
I realized that all of them were staring at me with dumbstruck expressions, some salivating liberally.
"Uh, no he did nothing to harm me. Please release him, he did nothing wrong towards me."
I began to panic again as I realized I was talking like a Mary-Sue. Thankfully, the honeyed tongue language came through and they rather grudgingly released Anakin.
However, none of them left. I moved rather uneasily behind Anakin and heard my now melodious voice, like the tinkling of small bells, requesting, "Please leave now. I need to rest."
They backed out of the door slowly and I noticed with a shudder a few bowing on their way out. Once they had exited, I reached up and clung to Anakin, desperation now doubt evident on my creamy white cheek.
"Please, please, please find some way to get me out of here and back to my normal self! This is just too horrifying to endure any longer. I'll go mad, I'll kill myself, or something of that sort if you don't!"
Anakin smiled down at me and said, "I will look for every possible way, but only when you've recovered fully, because after that exhibition of male friendliness in this place, I'm rather loathe to leave you here all by yourself. So, another day or two, and you and I will go back to that cave, alright?"
I sniffed rather loudly through my small, delicate nose and nodded tearfully.