Author's Notes: Lomie wrote this one...

Lomesir says: Sometimes there's not a lot to say, but this is not one of those times. In a strange twist of fate, there's not enough words to say it. Cancun was fun, and though we both denied it, it sunk into our imaginations from day one, as we stood in that effing line while waiting for our tickets. We dreamed of an airline run by bishies. When we arrived at the Moon Palace, aka Paradise, the "airline" changed to "resort". I recommended the name "Shangri-La", we chose names, and this story was born. This story has many levels, some only understandable by the authors. It's a parody, it's a snapshot of a week in the lives of two best friends. It's a joke, it's a biography.

It's a deep bow to the men and women who have worked tirelessly to provide beauty in its many forms. Today, we dedicate it creators of bishies and to the employees of the Moon Palace.

Chapter Two

"Letters in the Sand"

Her bed was never this hard. Ella was quite certain of this, even as the last remnants of sleep tugged at her eyelids and urged her to slip back into unconsciousness. Ella repositioned herself on her bed before jerking awake. She wasn't on a bed. She wasn't even inside a house. No, Ella was sitting in her pajamas on a large boulder at the edge of a beach, a tropical beach, judging from the turquoise hue of the calm water.

Fear flooded through her like a shot of tequila. She had no memory of this place. Ella, quite awake now, racked her memories for some clue of how she had gotten onto this beach. Last night she had waved goodbye to her parents as they went to a dinner party...that was normal enough. She had gone to the booze cupboard. That was the usual, too. Perhaps it was the new drink she had tried, Sangria. I knew I shouldn't have drunk so much, Ella scolded herself. She tucked a lock of chin-length brown hair behind her ear and tried to assess her situation. From the looks of things, she had gotten herself seriously hammered and, in a drunken stupor, somehow gone from Washington, D.C. to...a tropical beach? Okay, something wasn't adding up here. Then it struck her! She was obviously in some sort of alcohol-induced hallucination, or at least a lucid dream.

But her mind was remarkably clear for a drunk and/or unconscious person. Ella hopped off the rock and shivered. This beach and the nearby jungle were seriously damaging her calm. She had, over the past few months, developed a comfort zone by blaming unexplainable events on any booze she had happened to ingest. For the first time in a long time, she couldn't do that. She had a whopping headache, the sign of a hangover. She was sweating from the intense sun, something she never did in dreams. But how the hell had she gotten onto a tropical beach?

Ella sunk down into the sand and hugged her knees. She wanted her parents. She wanted her room and warm bed. She wanted the previously cursed sounds of cars below her window. She wanted her (okay, her parents') alcohol. She wanted to go home. Ella closed her eyes and attempted to think of distractions. Had she been home, she would have tried to catch the morning cartoons over a breakfast of sausages and toast. What would I watch? Ella asked herself in a methodical way. I'd watch Teen Titans, Justice League, Batman...

Batman. Ella had once adored Batman. The entire animated adventures of the Caped Crusader were sitting on her bookshelf in shiny DVD cases, a gift from her ever-loving parents. Ella's eyes widened as she remembered one particular episode. Batman had woken up into a perfect world. His parents were alive and he was not Batman anymore, but just regular Bruce Wayne. Some other guy had taken up the mantel of the Dark Knight. How had Batman figured out that it was a wicked plot by the Mad Hatter? Ella unfurled her legs and recalled the rest perfectly. Batman knew that the brain was divided into two parts, one for images and stuff, the other for...everything else, including reading and writing. You couldn't operate both at the same time, or something like that. Batman knew that he was dreaming when he opened up the newspaper and saw gibberish. An idea came to Ella.

Tentatively, she reached over and wrote with a finger, "I AM DREAMING." Ella stared at her words, realization sinking in. She stood up, numb. Her words seemed to mock her. She wasn't dreaming. She wasn't drunk. She was stuck on a tropical beach, more likely an island given her luck, and she had no idea how to leave. Ella backed away, unable to take her eyes off of the perfectly formed letters. A few seconds later, she was running down the beach, adrenaline coursing through her veins. "HELLO? IS ANYONE HERE?"

She ran until her chest hurt and her legs felt like jelly. She sank down into the saturated sand next to the gently lapping water, the surf soaking through her pajamas. She curled up into a ball and felt hot tears slip down her face. Maybe the tide was coming in and she'd drown. It sounded nice at the moment.

"Are you all right?" A concerned male voice asked. Ella felt a hand on her shoulder. "Salt water is very hard to get out of clothes, you know." Ella opened her eyes only to have a wave hit her full in the face. She yelped as the water burned her eyes. Strong hands pulled her up. "There now. It's okay. You've obviously been through a lot today." Ella peered up at the speaker and blinked.

He was a kind-looking man, young, probably in his mid-twenties. His big eyes and longish hair looked familiar. His blue kimono looked very familiar. And his voice...so full of wisdom, yet laced with gaiety. Even through the burning and constant blinking, Ella knew that she was looking at and being addressed by Sohma Shigure.

"Where am I?" Ella wailed, more confused than ever. She hastily pulled herself up and backed away from Shigure. Shigure knit his brow in concern.

"On an island called Shangri-La. If your story matches up with the other girls', you received an invitation a few days ago and probably circled 'yes'. Is that correct?"

Ella remembered now. She had gotten a letter in the mail telling her about a perfect world called Shangri-La, where there were no worries. She had read a book where there was a perfect island called Shangri-La, so she had brushed the whole thing off as a joke, though she had circled yes in a jaunty sort of way. She then threw it away and forgot about the whole thing. Ella looked at Shigure in mute horror. Shigure held out his hand. "Don't worry. You're quite safe here. There's even a resort beyond those trees. I'll show you the way."

Ella moved her hands behind her back and shook her head. Shigure's eyes softened and he nodded. "Just follow me, then. I promise that you'll be okay with me."

They walked into the trees, Shigure glancing every so often at Ella, who was doing the same thing, though in a fearful sort of way. Shigure tried to break the thick silence by making small talk. "So... what's your name?" he offered. Ella thought about it and decided that the question was safe.

"Ella."

"Well, Ella...where are you from?" he asked lightly. Ella frowned. She didn't want to give this person too much information.

"Where are you from?" she asked fiercely, though she already knew the answer: a manga series. And an anime. She wondered if this 3-D Shigure was aware of that fact.

"Japan, actually," he said serenely. The silence closed around the two again. Ella was more uncomfortable than she have ever been in her life. She thought about something Shigure had said a few minutes before.

"You said there were other girls here..."

"Yes, there are," Shigure said, though he frowned slightly. "And they all showed up just like you—suddenly and without any sort of preparation. Most of them were alarmed, I might add," he said, shooting a glance at Ella that she did not miss.

"Yes, well, you'd be alarmed too if you woke up on some remote island with no clue where you are and some random person comes up to you and—" Shigure laughed and interrupted her.

"Ella, I did too. We all did. No one knows how they got on this island, and no one knows how to get off."