Automatically Temari reached behind her shoulder for her fan, but it wasn't there. Searching for an alternative, she spotted a lady in one of the inner rings using a white and red round fan in her dance. It wouldn't work nearly as well as her own iron folding fan, but there weren't many other options.
It was like the people started dancing closer together, because Temari could now barely move through the crowd. She pushed people aside and the guile of the place became more evident, as the people didn't respond to being shoved over at all. They only moved closer together.
Temari reached the woman with the fan and quickly snatched it from her. It was near impossible to get away, because not only did the bunch huddle together more and more, some of them now also tried to hold her back. Eventually she managed to break free from the mass and broke into a run.
At first Temari had blamed the difficulty with which she moved to her own confused state of mind, but now she felt it was actually the air. It was incredibly dense and even though she'd been in it for a while now, she couldn't get used to it. Even so she kept struggling onward and soon she ran into a sort of barrier. She tested its structure by pushing it. The barrier gave a little and when she put more and more force into it, it appeared to be really resilient and tough.
It took a lot of effort for Temari to let her chakra flow through the fan, whatever it was made out of, it was a horrible conductor. She took a deep breath and gave the small fan a powerful swing. The little force she produced did almost nothing to the surface of the barrier. It simply bounced off.
Temari then noticed a kind of hollow and clear noise behind her: like the sound of a bunch of small bubbles under water, shooting up toward the surface. When she looked around and up, it looked exactly what it had sounded like.
"Bubbles?" Temari mumbled perplexed, I'm under water?!
She was also surprised to see that the crowd hadn't moved an inch since she broke free from it. The people just stood there and watched her. Why had they bothered trying to detain her so desperately if they now seemed so confident that she wouldn't be able to get out?
Well, whatever, Temari thought to herself, trying to keep her head cool, as long as they don't bother me, I don't mind.
But her head wasn't cool. It was chaotic. She didn't understand the situation. If she was under water, how on earth was she able to breathe? She clutched her hair hopelessly, but in the process felt her hands go from one medium to another. There was an air bladder around her head!
She immediately took a deep breath and held it, as she "charged" the fan with chakra, stuck in the bubble, left of her face and swung it. As she expected, the bubble clung to the fan and as Temari released the air, it formed into a sharp blade-like shape. It only slightly sliced through the barrier, but it was enough: abruptly water burst through, the surface ripped further and Temari got dragged along.
She vaguely heard the people scream as they got pulled into the current as well, and then everything went black in front of her eyes.
When she came to again, she felt something hard painfully poking into her back. Actually, multiple things were poking her everywhere. She opened her eyes and saw that she was surrounded by trash. Toys, baskets, furniture: just old, broken and disposed of stuff, covered in dust and spider webs.
Once more, Temari felt disoriented.
"What was I doing?" she wondered out loud. As she tried to get up, she spotted something white lying on her chest. It was a down feather. She picked it off her clothes and discovered a few more. She wiped them off and took one in between her thumb and index finger. She looked at it with a puzzled expression as she wondered why she was covered in feathers, before she discarded it with a shrug and stepped off the pile of garbage. She still felt a little dizzy, because for a second she lost balance and leaned against a smaller heap, which suddenly started moving an moodily growled "Ow! Get off my back!" It turned around and on the other side appeared a little old woman who looked at Temari with an annoyed frown. She had the pile of junk tied to her back, like she was collecting it.
"Why don't you look where you're going, young woman! Hm?" she scolded Temari.
"I was looking," Temari mumbled. It was more an answer to her own question, than that of the hag.
"Huh? Huh?" she pried, "Where were you going, hm?"
"I don't remember.."
"You can't look where you're going if you don't know where you're going!" the old lady explained.
"I was searching for something," Temari continued hazily.
"Well, look here!" the woman said proudly, and produced an interesting looking specimen of a plant in a flowerpot, "Oo~h!"
"An evening-primrose?" Temari said, and with dim gratefulness added: "Thank you."
"That's what you were looking for, wasn't it, my dear?" the lady asked.
This was a rare desert plant and she was in fact an admirer of flora. That must have been what she was looking for.
"Yes. I forgot," Temari answered dreamily, but looked at the plant with uncertainty.
"Now, why don't you come in here," the woman pointed at and hobbled toward a filthy rag covering an opening in a pile of rubbish," and see if there's anything else you'd like. Hm?"
Temari followed. The garbage collector waited by the entrance and started cackling. Temari pushed the cloth aside, to see what it was hiding. She gasped and was rather taken aback when she discovered that her own bedroom was waiting for her behind it. Slowly she entered it and walked toward the windowsill. She put the plant down and looked out the window. Her regular view. She didn't really know why she was expecting anything else.
She plumped down on her bed and closed her eyes for a few moments. When she opened them, it felt as if she woke up from a strange dream. She was convinced it had been nothing more than that when she looked around her room and saw nothing out of the ordinary. She got up again and walked toward her bedroom door, on her way to get some breakfast or something.
Before she could reach for the doorknob, however, the door burst open and the old woman waddled in, still carrying her load. Temari's heart nearly stopped with shock.
"Better to stay in here, dear. Yes," the hag shrieked merrily, "There's nothing you want out there. No! Oh, no."
Temari stared after her feeling utter disbelief followed by pure despair. This wasn't even a dream: it was a real life nightmare. That is, she had no idea what was real anymore.