A/N: I must warn you, this is a parody, but not a funny one. I really don't write humor well. However, I do describe things in an extremely long winded fashion. If this kind of writing style turns you off, click the "back" button right now.
She cartwheeled through space and time, stroking universes with the tips of her fingers as she felt herself spiraling downwards. Even with her eyes straining to see anything, there was nothing but solid black, black so painful and sharp that it seemed as though it could slice her very soul. She tried to kick her legs, much as a swimmer would dislodge tangles of weeds, but her body continued to float, weightlessly, through the darkness. There was a far away pinprick of white, and she tried to struggle amid the suffocating shadows. The pinprick got larger, swelling into milky whiteness that scorched her eyes and made her shudder. Everything rippled, almost as though a stone had been thrown into the depths of the time itself, and she blinked. Was that wind roaring through her ears? The falling sensation increased, and now she could feel breeze sending her frizzy hair upwards in stiff peaks. The whiteness became distinctly fluffy, and as she passed through the whiteness her clothes began to dampen. Then glimpses of green and flashes of blue streaked across her vision as she continued to fall. Panic clawed at her chest as she began kicking at midair, uselessly propelling herself to the hard, unforgiving ground. She saw a stripe of blue growing larger and larger, and one dim thought prevailed through her mind: she was about to fall into a river from several miles above the ground. Not only would she be flattened upon impact, but with her luck, she would smash her head on a rock and die. The fall, which had been taking forever up until this point, suddenly decided it was over, and Madison smashed face-first into a wide river.
Fla-boohm!
There was a whiteout of bubbles, and everything was airless, icy cold, and sopping wet. Her fingertips actually touched the gravelly bottom, and she tried to scream. Instead of filling her lungs with air, she filled them with water, and she began coughing. Naturally, this filled her small body with more liquid, and she began struggling towards the green surface which was beckoning invitingly. Her shoulder cracked into a rock, and she ignored the pain that shot up her arm. Oxygen was what she needed. She needed air. That one, raw thought consumed her mind until it was all she could think of. Huge black roses bloomed in her vision, and she broke the surface just as she thought her head would explode. Before her mouth even cleared the water she was drinking droughts of air. The first breath came back up, laced with fluid, but she greedily devoured more gulps of oxygen. The current was pulling her viciously downstream, foamy white caps gurgling hungrily around mossy boulders. Her feet couldn't touch bottom, and she grappled for control as her fingers slid uselessly over a slick rock. Not for the first time, she cursed her disability for swimming. It had been on her "to-do" list for almost five years. Her hands stole purchase on a soggy log that was oozing moisture whenever she squeezed. It groaned sadly and snapped apart in her savage grip, but she lunged for another handful of rotting log before the river plunged her underneath the water again. Bit by bit she clung to the rapidly disintegrating log until her toes scraped the bottom of the river.
She flopped on the bank, still marveling at her breathing, and wondered for the first time where in the world she was. Everything on her was soaked, and her shoes felt as though someone had clipped lead weights to them. She sat up blearily after a few moments of tense breathing and rubbed water out of her eyes, pushing her glasses up her face in the process. It was astonishing the small things were still on her nose, come to think of it, considering she had nearly drowned. A few mouthfuls of water were coughed up, and she shakily mounted her legs and stumbled over to a convenient stone which was roughly the size of a dinner table. After a long few moments, she dared to look around. The green river was rushing away from her busily, churning around large rocks, and the banks were lined with smooth tan pebbles. A treeline was about twenty feet away on either side of the river, and Madison decided the river was essentially larger when the rainy seasons were high. This once more brought up the question of where she was. The last thing she remembered was passing out on the back porch, and now she had cheated death twice in the past five minutes. Was this some kind of illusion?
It is quite possible that small Madison Poole would have gone on debating the idea of a simulation for some time had she not caught sight of a woman pulling herself from the river. The woman hauling herself out of the fast current was short, but several inches taller than Madison herself, who was only five foot two inches. Even from this distance, Madison could tell that the woman was slightly plump, but in a rounded way. She looked like the kind of person in which a bit of weight looks good on them. Madison was relieved to see that she was wearing normal clothes; jeans clung tightly to her curvy form because of the water, and Madison could see the thin outlines of her bra underneath her soaking tee shirt. Madison picked her way downstream until she was nearly level with the girl, who was still sprawled on the banks swallowing air. Madison tentatively poked her side with her foot, and the woman's eyes shot open, revealing bright green eyes that were precisely the shade of frost-covered fir trees.
"What the hell?" the woman spluttered, sitting up. Close up, Madison could see that she had one of those adorable "baby-faces" that were quite rare in adults. Her full cheeks and pouting lips gave her the look of a ten year old, but the fierceness in her silver-green eyes quite contradicted the rest of her face. Gingerly the woman got to her feet. "Who are you? And where am I?"
"Hi," Madison said with a little smile. "I'm Madison Poole. And I'm not exactly sure where we are. Who are you?"
The woman regarded her for a moment, then stuck out her hand. "Hey. I'm Daphne. Daphne Anderson. Nice to meet you. Now what happened? How did we get here?"
Madison scratched her head ruefully. "I don't know. I was sitting on my back porch when I passed out. I believe this is some kind of simulated illusion brought on by lack of fluid, causing a dehydration quandary which resulted in either a coma or an extremely realistic mirage."
Daphne's silvery eyes narrowed, widened, then narrowed again. "I have no idea what you just said, but I get the coma part. I was reading a book when I got a migraine, then I fell into the river. I swam for a bit, then managed to climb out. Where do you think we are? It doesn't feel like an illusion, or a quandary, or whatever."
"I have heard that simulated illusions can be quite authentic," Madison said predictably. "There is one other option, although I hardly dare to entertain the notion."
"Well, do me a favor, Madison, and entertain it in plain English," Daphne grumbled, pulling off her shoes and wringing out her socks.
"We might be dead." Madison said simply. Daphne looked up, surprise and thoughtfulness written all over her face.
"That might not be so bad. Other than falling into the river part, that kind of sucked, but look around. It's kind of pretty here." Daphne said, gesturing to the surrounding forest and foamy river.
Madison suddenly froze, her smoky blue eyes very wide, and pointed one shaking finger downstream. "Look!" she squeaked, her voice suddenly very high pitched. "People!"
Daphne got to her feet, wriggling her bare toes, and squinted. There were two people trooping downstream, and from this distance she couldn't tell who or what they were. An odd tense feeling stole over her, making the tips of her ears prickle and goosebumps streak across her skin. It was as though someone had walked over her grave. She shivered suddenly, the stiff breeze chilling her, and she shaded her eyes to see better.
A dark-skinned Hispanic man and a young girl came trooping up the bank. The young girl appeared quite dry and comfortable, with a small, self-satisfied smile perched on her face, while the young Hispanic man seemed drenched and very irritated. He was carrying a thick leather jacket over one shoulder, and this exposed the inky black tattoo that was swirling around the back of his neck and collarbones. A diamond earring twinkled on his left ear, and when he caught sight of Daphne and Madison he offered a shifty one sided grin that suited him very well. He was tall and lanky, with an easygoing grace that made him appear very handsome. Black hair had been spiked and gelled into dangerously sharp peaks, making him appear more street savvy and lethal. Unlike Daphne's tousled blonde spikes, his had been perfected into needle-sharp points.
The young girl was pretty in an angular, solemn way. Her forehead was rather wide but made her look intelligent, and there was a smug smile on her face. She seemed very pleased with herself that she was the only person who was completely dry, and she folded her arms to enhance her satisfied smile. She looked quite young, perhaps twelve or thirteen, and she had yet to develop the swells and curves of a woman, although her blue-black eyes were glittering with an adult triumph that had yet to be matched by any of the other girls. She evaluated the two women carefully, arching one thin eyebrow at the clothing made tight by wetness, and Daphne scowled. Something about the small child made her skin crawl and her hackles rise. "Hey," Daphne offered. "Who are you?"
The young man bounded across the small distance that still separated them and snatched Daphne's hand fiercely. His grip was like having your fingers caught in a drawer, and Daphne winced. Madison, seeing this, quickly stuffed her hands into her pockets. "Hey, ladies, I'm Michael. Michael Rodriguez. Nice to meet you. This is Isabella Hanover." He flicked a finger disparagingly at the young girl, and Daphne saw a little scowl flitter across his face for a fraction of a moment. "And who might you be?"
"I'm Daphne Anderson, and this is Madison Poole. So you're here too, huh?" Daphne said, trying to give Isabella the same evil eye the young girl was giving her. Isabella smirked nastily and shook her hand.
"Have you deduced where we are yet?" Isabella challenged, sounding identical to a third grade teacher springing out a pop quiz on a Monday. Madison licked her lips nervously and tried on a little smile.
"We decided that we are either in a coma induced stupor or otherwise unattractively detained," Madison said. Daphne cleared her throat loudly, and Madison sheepishly added, "Um, I mean, we're either unconscious or dead."
Isabella reached over to Daphne, and with no warning pinched her hard on her rounded forearm. "Ouch!" Daphne yelped, instinctively swatting her hand away. "What was that for?" she demanded, ready to scratch her eyes out. Isabella seemed supremely tranquil, and gave a know-it-all smirk.
"If we were dead, we wouldn't be able to feel that, now could we? It's quite possible that we are unconscious or in a coma, but I highly doubt it. So, none of you have figured out where we are?" she asked.
"I have."
They all swung around as if connected to a string and saw a young woman climbing down from a tree. She was wearing an orange jumpsuit that had MILLER, MELODY 90087 stenciled on the sleeve. A sheet of rippling blonde hair was tossed carelessly over one shoulder, and her long legs and slender form made her appear very supermodel-ish. She blinked lazily, a smile curving her rosebud lips, and they all noticed her large, honey-brown eyes that were lined with dark mascara. She looked very sweet and innocent, but if the orange suit was anything to speak for, she was anything but. "Didn't you feel it? You all passed out, right?" Melody said, circling them like a bird of prey. "You all felt a fuzzy feeling, and then passed out. Am I right?"
"Yeah," Michael said slowly, who was staring at Melody's cleavage like he had just discovered that the moon was made of cork.
"Then we're dead," Melody said simply. "We all had either a heart attack, or we got migraines -" here she tipped her blonde head in Daphne's direction - "and fell down, then hit our heads on something. It's as simple as that."
But if the two elves on the shoreline had anything to say about it, it was certainly not as simple as that.