A/N: Second chapter! Whoo!
Disclaimer: I no sell. You no sue.
There should be pain. Lizzie knew that. She remembered pulling out of the parking lot behind Sam and Amy, seeing the Suburban barreling towards them, heard the incessant blare of the horn…then nothing but a loud, shrieking crash and a nothingness that enveloped her in a mild warmth. She wasn't quite sure if it was light or dark - her eyes wouldn't open when she told them to, and she couldn't move at all when she tried to get up. There was the strange feeling of lying prone of something very hard and flat, a feeling Lizzie had never felt before, and then the peculiar prickling sensation sweeping her from head to foot. Her whole body quivered, every hair on edge, pins and needles jabbing at her and making her most uncomfortable, and then it faded away. There was no pain, to Lizzie's great relief, and she happily discovered she was able to get up. She did so, blinking very hard and rubbing her baby blue eyes as she squinted into the mist. A very thick, very damp fog was swallowing her, and she batted aside sheets of it as she looked around. Vaguely she was able to discern a few gigantic trees scattered here and there, and the grass she was standing on - or rather standing in - was knee high and it tickled her bare legs annoyingly. She stumbled towards the trees, intent on finding something solid to lean against, when she trod upon something very soft and rather cushy. The Soft And Cushy Thing That Lizzie Trod Upon gave a most un-cushy-like squawk, like a mixture of a yelp, a groan, and a sneeze all at once. She back pedaled and peered at the squooshy thing until she was able to make out a foggy figure in the thick mist. As soon as she saw the pile of red hair flopping most ungracefully in front of her face, Lizzie gave a squeal of delight and pounced upon her friend. "Oh-my-god-oh-my-god-oh-my-god! I thought I was dead and alone in heaven with nobody I knew but now you're here and everything's okay and heaven really sucks doncha think and where exactly are we?"
Amy was still catching her breath from Lizzie's accidental trampling when Lizzie's barrage of questions and statements reached her ears. She winced, cracked her jaw a few times, then rubbed her head. The mysterious prickling sensation had left a weird buzzing noise in her ears, and she tried dropping her jaw again to get rid of it. Her ears popped, whined, and the buzzing stopped. She got to her feet unaided by Lizzie, who was still too excited at the prospect of being in the middle of nowhere with one of her best friends to be of any assistance. The thick fog obscured practically everything, and the only thing Amy could see was Lizzie's long, messy ponytail and her big blue eyes. "I have no idea, Liz, and shut up so I can think," Amy said, discovering her voice was very hoarse, as if she had been screaming for hours and could hardly talk. She rubbed her eyes and squinted into the glare of the fog; the sunlight was almost completely gone, but her eyes felt very weak and unused in this new setting. She tossed back her head and tugged her mane of thick red curls out of her eyes, wishing desperately that her hair tie had stayed with her, like Lizzie's had. Amy slapped her cheeks lightly a few times to try and wake herself up, then looked around. "You know, I have no idea where we are. Hey, Lizzie, come over here." Lizzie obediently came over to Amy, who promptly twisted a small patch of skin on Lizzie's arm. The blonde howled with pain and swatted her redheaded friend.
"For crying out loud! What was that for?" Lizzie cried, examining the bright pink patch where Amy had pinched her. Amy sighed and turned her attention away from the blonde. If it was heaven, there wouldn't be pain, theoretically. She explained this to Lizzie, who wasn't listening anymore and was clinging to a tree like she had just been scalded by a teapot. "Shh! What was that?" Lizzie whimpered. Amy listened hard, and then she heard it too; a stumbling crackle of someone shambling closer. Amy was about to shove Lizzie out of the way and scramble up the tree just in case it was a wild animal approaching them, when she heard a faint curse in a very familiar way.
"For crying out loud!"
"Sam?" Amy called into the fog. "Sam, is that you?" There was a long pause, and Amy suddenly recalled all the stories she had read about deceiving creatures in mist that bewitched you. She was about to hop to it and scale the tree anyway when Sam called back, this time her voice sounding very relieved and a little dubious.
"Amy? Is that you? It's Sam. Keep talking, I can't see you yet." Sam stumbled her way over to the sound of Amy's voice and was very relieved to see the untidy mop of red hair and the shy grin. She hugged her fiercely and caught sight of Lizzie, who was still looking foolishly frightened and clinging to the tree. "You couldn't get rid of her?" Sam muttered in Amy's ear. Amy gave her a look which slightly chastised the brunette girl. "Where are we?"
"Lizzie and I were just talking about that," Amy said. "Lizzie thinks we're in heaven, but I pinched her and she felt it. I don't think there would be pain in heaven, don't you think?" Amy's voice contained the all-too-familiar note of worry. This was the tone of voice which had prompted Lizzie to nickname her "Mom" when Amy began fussing too much. "We could be dead," she said offhandedly. "Although I'm not sure I mind. My parents will flip, though."
"We're dead?" Lizzie shrieked, who had not followed through with her thought that they were in heaven. She hadn't remembered that one has to die before you got into the otherworldly place. "Shit! You mean we can't go back? This sucks! I keep all my stuff on Earth! I can't be dead!" she was rapidly dissolving into a hysterical lump, preparing to embark on one of Lizzie's Trademark Temper Tantrums, on sale now for only $19.95! Amy shook Lizzie's arm hard, and she was jolted back into sniffling and wailing. Sam looked as though she would prefer to slap the cheap blonde, but she let Amy handle it.
"Oh, shut your pie-hole, Lizzie," Sam snapped. "Stop crying about being dead. Is it so bad? I mean, there isn't any angels or shit like that, but it's quiet at least. Right?" She looked to Amy for support, who reluctantly gave it. All too many times Amy had to play referee between the shaggy-haired brunette and the shallow blonde model.
"Both of you, stop it," Amy said commandingly. "We need to figure out a plan of action, and how we can get out of here." Both Sam and Lizzie voiced their opinions at the same time, which naturally led to a quarrel about who should speak first. Their voices escalated until they were shouting at each other on either side of Amy, who was stopping her ears with her fingers and getting ready to scream at both of them in her best "Mom" voice and get them to shut up. It's quite possible that they would have continued like this, bickering and fighting, until the cows came home from the other side of the world, but there was a sickeningly loud Zzziiiiipp! and an arrow sprouted from Sam's shoulder.
Between the three of them, Sam had the highest pain threshold, but feeling an arrow bury itself in her shoulder made her pain ricochet right off the scale. She gave a bloodcurdling scream that made every hair rise on Amy's neck and dropped to her knees, her right hand instantly going to her left shoulder. Blood had already drenched her arm and was dripping on the long grass, and the sight of it made Lizzie woozy. Sam didn't stop screaming until she felt Amy kneel next to her and wrap her fingers around the shaft of the arrow. Then she didn't just scream, she shrieked for the world to hear. The merest touch of Amy's fingers on the arrow sent bolts of shuddering pain down her very core. It was unbelievably painful, too large and sharp for Sam to fully comprehend how much pain she was in. Dimly she was aware that Lizzie fainted next to her in a crumpled heap, and Amy looked like she was about to burst into tears.
Amy had no idea what to do. Sam's face had the flat, terrified expression of calves about to be slaughtered in front of their mothers. The piercing shrieks that were emanating from her mouth were enough to wake the dead, and Amy didn't know how to shut her up. She felt like screaming herself, although from helplessness, not from pain. Every time she tried to pull the arrow out, no matter how fast she moved or how gently she tried to pull, Sam's back arched and she spiraled into a fresh bout of screams. Lizzie was ashen white and still unconscious, and Amy had a nasty feeling that Sam would pass out if she didn't get that arrow out soon. She was just on the verge of pinning Sam to the ground and yanking the arrow out as quickly as possible when she saw a very large, very muscular figure bulling through the sheets of mist. He shoved Amy aside as though she were a sack of flour, and Amy felt herself tumble in a very undignified heap.
The man was tall and wide, with broad shoulders and a thick waist, a heavy-looking shield strapped firmly on his back. A cloak, trimmed with fur, swished on the ground and descended to his boots. An intricately engraved scabbard hung at his hip, and the hilt of a large sword was sheathed in it. Chain-mail gloves were stripped off to reveal a pair of large, calloused hands with an ornate signet ring on his middle finger. Reddish blonde hair was chopped short at his rugged jaw line, and his eyes were dark green. He examined the arrow embedded in Sam's shoulders, then swore loudly in a different language. He looked at Lizzie, who was still very white, and then at Amy, who was the only one who appeared to be uninjured. "Get your friend," he ordered. Amy almost cried with relief when she heard he spoke English, although with an indefinable accent. "Is she harmed?" he asked. When Amy didn't answer right away he shook her, his huge hand almost swallowing her small shoulder. "Speak, girl! Do you understand me?"
"Y- yes," Amy said, snapping out of it. "No, she's fine. Help her, please, help Sam now!" The man nodded once in a tight, jerky way, the picked up Sam gently in his arms. Sam had always been the largest framed girl of their little trio, but in their mysterious rescuers arms she looked positively petite. Amy crawled over to Lizzie and began shaking her, alternately slapping her cheek and pinching her nose. "Wake up, Lizzie, get up or I'll sit on you! Wake up, now, I mean it!" Lizzie's eyelashes fluttered once, twice, and then her eyes shot open. Amy dragged her to her feet before the ditzy blonde could say a word and began following their tall rescuer through the mist.
They hadn't been walking long before they reached a small hollow that was set into a hill. A campfire blazed merrily, although the cheerful campfire was a stark contrast to the faces of the men who were sitting around it. There were two men smoking pipes, one of them with a very long gray beard, the other with a roguish, handsome face, and a very short man who was brandishing an axe. The short man had a thick, bushy red beard that had been tamed into two wild braids. Behind them, one of them wielding a short sword, were four children with cloaks and no shoes. Amy managed to seize these few meager details before she saw their rescuer lay Sam down gently near the fire. She was vaguely aware of another, lankier figure bounding over, and she looked up. He was the only one holding a bow and arrow in his fists, and suspicion lit her mind. He had long blonde hair, with two small plaits running behind his ears - were they pointed, or was Amy hallucinating? - and his face was deathly pale and drawn as he took in the whole scene. "Boromir?" he managed to gasp out, his frosty blue eyes growing very wide as he watched the rugged man examining the arrow in Sam's shoulder.
"By the Valar, Legolas, look before you shoot!" the man called Boromir roared at him. "If this maiden dies, I'll have your pointy-eared head as a trophy for my sword!" Lizzie broke free from Amy's grasp and bolted to the one Boromir had called Legolas. She slapped him open-handed on the face, hard as she could, and winced, her palm stinging. The elf, or whatever he was, rocked backwards on his heels and automatically threw up a forearm to defend himself, but Lizzie was a ball of furious energy.
"You sonofabitch, you shot her! You shot Sam! I hate you! Die, die, die!" Lizzie's keening wails were perhaps more painful to the ears than her blows were to the "elf", as her hands were rather soft and pathetic. What she lacked for in force she made up for in rapidity, because the poor elf/Legolas/whatever was almost pummeled to his feet as the blonde girl spat like an angry cat. The man who had been smoking the pipe - not the bearded one - got to his feet and lifted Lizzie bodily from the bewildered "elf". He pinned her arms behind her back and clamped a hand over her mouth. Lizzie apparently was trying to gnaw at the calloused palm of his hand, but it wasn't working. Amy was horrified and shocked, and it was too much to take in all at once. She threw up her hands, gave a weak little cry, and passed out for the first time in her life.