This is a crossover (Earth to Azeroth) fanfiction. I own nothing in this story but the names and (often infuriating) personalities of my own characters.
You may find that you don't recognize certain geographical locations mentioned here; this is likely because I've added them in. The zones in WOW would have to be far larger and more complex to encompass the sheer size of an actual thriving, populated planet such as Azeroth, and are simply reduced for the sake of gameplay. In the story, however, there is more land, and with that land comes more towns and settlements. I know this is probably obvious to most of you, but I wanted to clarify.
Anyway, enjoy, and thank you for reading my work!
The torrential rain tonight is falling in sheets.
No, let me rephrase.
It's lashing, a severe, horizontal whip, with fat droplets that feel like bee stings through my jacket. Also it doesn't help that I am on my bike going sixty down the highway, and I still have twenty miles to go. The only upside to this situation is that the light on my vehicle catches the raindrops and makes me feel like I am in outer space, boosting into hyper drive and watching all the stars before me whoosh past.
Focus on the road, Ava. Stay within your lane.
There are no cars around, though. It's pitch black, raining, cold, and I'm soaked into my boots. The forecast this morning had said clear skies.
Hah.
Lightning strikes at random intervals here and there, sometimes close enough to follow with an immediate explosion of thunder that chills me further. I'm not afraid of much, but ever since I was a child and I saw my brother Isaac's hair stand on end only seconds before we both were knocked unconscious, well, I've been a bit easily spooked by massive uncontrollable flashes of energy. I've read somewhere that getting struck once improves one's chances of being struck again, and I'm not thrilled to be out offering myself to the lightning gods. I don't care how hot Thor is.
Up ahead I finally see a source of light other than my own bike, but it's off the side of the road, and it's coming up fast. Red taillights, flashing blinkers, and I realize someone's pulled off to the side of the road, probably to wait out the storm. A small voice in my head tells me to slow down, to make sure everything is alright. But it is, after all, a small voice, and I don't listen. I'm way too soaked and grumpy to even think about slowing down until I see my own apartment.
Moments later I wish that voice had been louder. It's only in the last second, right as I reach the blinkers, that I see a person standing in the middle of my lane with his arms waving for help. I brake hard, my tires screeching and then locking, sliding across the wet road as I attempt to swerve. It's strange. I don't scream or shout like they all do in movies; it's like my body forgot to respond emotionally and has put all its energy into preserving itself. I'm straight-faced as I see the dumbass in the road jump out of the way, and I think I'm in the clear, relief hitting me for a quarter of a second before the unthinkable happens.
Lightning, a giant, bright pillar that lasts only an instant in my eyes, crackles into the power lines to my left, tendrils snaking down to the ground, into the road, right in front of me. The explosive crack that follows is so loud I can feel the sound in my bones.
Now I do shriek, voice popping three octaves too high as my muscles lock up and I buzz full throttle into the electric volt, bike keeping her momentum. Something about that last second, that last glimpse of my life as I am certain it's about to end, is odd. Whether it is the way the lightning catches the rain or the road or maybe my own bike, I see my world erupt into bright neon colors that flicker from one to the next, cycling through so quickly I can barely process them.
I feel a jerk in my feet, a weird pop in my spine, and sudden nausea attack me from all sides, just as the world comes back into view. I'm still on a road, but it's so dark again that I can barely see. The rain has stopped instantly, and I notice that the ground that rushes past beneath my bike is nothing but dirt and stone path. I must have swerved completely off-road.
As if all of that hasn't been enough, as I'm barreling forward, I see someone walking ten feet ahead of me, right in my way.
I brake again, still speeding faster than I should be over the bumpy terrain, but not soon enough. With a shout of warning, I swerve again and tumble past him, clipping him with a handlebar and flying off the path, right smack dab into a cluster of trees.
I'm knocked off my bike. My head clonks against a tree, and then I land hard on my elbow, so hard I hear a crack and feel it a second later. I roll over with an inward gasp, clutching my arm to my ribs.
My head. My arm. My ARM. Fucking ow.
I hear the guy I almost hit shouting something, and it sounds like he's angry, but I can't really tell what he's saying, and I don't care. He's completely fine, as opposed to my broken goddamned elbow.
Ow.
I scoot backward and make a partially-successful attempt to stand up, but I start to careen when my head swims and my feet feel weightless.
Ow.
I feel two massive hands plant themselves on me, one on my shoulder and the other sort of on my upper back, and I immediately whip around, still dizzy with pain and confusion. My eyes lock onto one of the oddest, most disturbing faces I've ever seen. Glowing, whitish eyes are staring at mine from only a foot and a half away, and with that light I can make out his sharp features; he's a giant, purplish-skinned man with thick purple hair and huge, long pointed ears like nothing I have ever known.
"Christ-!" I hiss in shock, stumbling backward and toppling onto the ground with a poorly-timed misstep. The jarring throws intense pain rocketing through my arm, and I groan deeply again, the pain now resonating through my fingers, up my shoulder, into my chest. Throbbing, aching, on fire.
This is it. I got struck by lightning. I'm dead. Either I'm dead, or I've ruined my brain. That's the only explanation for what I'm seeing right now. He's an alien, right? Or maybe he's the guy who was in the road in the first place. Maybe my head or eyes are fucked up and making me see him weird.
My arm's hurting like a bitch, but I look at the alien. He's got his hands on his head like he's freaking out about something, pacing around in circles, and then he bends over and picks up a shitty old burlap bag and opens it to look inside. I hear him saying something angrily, but I can't tell what the words are. He pulls out a broken bit of porcelain that looks like it used to be part of a china teapot, with the spout attached. His freaky silver eyes dart right to mine, and I hear him growl under his breath as he holds it out toward me accusingly.
The language he's speaking is unrecognizable, a smooth string of soft syllables despite the frustration packed behind each one, and then he chucks the broken teapot to the ground. I might not understand his words, but I know what he's saying, and I feel blood boil into my face. He might not look or talk much like a human, but he certainly acts like one, and his obviously-aggressive actions are pissing me off.
"Are you kidding me?" I force myself to stand, clutching my arm, my anger fueled by my pain. "You're pissed about a broken teapot?" I stomp toward him two steps, but don't come too close. I know know that I am going crazy, screeching at a giant purple man while my arm is obviously broken. "A TEAPOT? Oh, sure! Heaven forbid you worry about the soaked, concussed girl who you just drove off the fucking road! Who cares about your cups, I've a broken arm and no health insurance!" I point at him, "This is all your fault! If you hadn't been in the middle of the-"
He interrupts me with a loud, angry phrase, pointing at the teapot, and then rubs his thumb and forefinger together, and waves that hand dismissively. He turns away from me, grumbling to himself, and I take a chance to gather my surroundings.
It's so dark I can barely see a thing, especially under the cover of the trees, but I'm thankful it stopped raining. I can hear crickets and other creepy crawlies singing so loudly it disorients me. How did they pick up so quickly after the rain quit? Not to mention, how did the temperature rise what feels like ten degrees in the past minute?
He's still talking weird, complaining about something according to his sharp tone of voice, and I roll my eyes and start looking for my purse. I need to find my phone. I can see my completely totaled bike steaming against a tree trunk, and the sight hurts me more than I hurt already.
I can't find my purse anywhere, and I stand up tall again and look at the guy.
"May I use your phone?" I ask sharply. "Mine's in my bag, and that's nowhere to be found through all this stupid-" I pause as I bat away the leaves of what looks like a giant fern. A fern? This big, in the American Pacific, in late autumn?
Through my situational confusion, I somehow clearly see my bag about three inches from my right boot. Momentary relief hits me as I scoop it by the strap and jam my good hand in, rifling through and finding my smartphone. The light is so bright when I unlock it, it hurts my eyes, and I immediately turn the brightness all the way down.
Any relief I did have is lost when I see through the cracked screen a small grey 'x' in place of the signal bars.
So. I'm likely gone into shock, stuck in some woods by a highway in the middle of the night with an angry alien teapot man and a broken arm. Not to mention my poor bike. Tonight is just the best.
"I'm going to find some signal. You and your pot have a nice...whatever," I grunt, clutching my phone and stumbling through the trees toward where I believe the road is.
My arm is swelling in my sleeve, and it hurts so badly that my breath catches sharply with each step, no matter how lightly I try to walk. I haven't let anything catch up with me yet, not emotionally, other than frustration and anger and adrenaline. And of course pain. So maybe I have let a lot of things hit me, but not fear. Or rationality, of course.
The ground foliage and brush is so thick that I can barely tromp through it. One would think I'd have cleared a little way with my bike, but apparently not. I see light catching the bark on the trees around me and stumble through them, hoping that the person in the car by the highway has a functioning phone.
Come to think of it, he probably doesn't, else he wouldn't be wandering out into the middle of the road in the first place. What is it with people tonight?
I push through a wall of thick leaves and stumble forward, eyes meeting something they didn't expect to. A campfire, loud and crackling, illuminates the entire area, the last thing I anticipated when searching for a highway. It's surrounded by more forest, which alarms me. The treeline by the highway is only about half an acre thick at best, as far as I knew, but this looks like it goes on forever.
I see a few people, though, and they've all frozen and are staring right at me. They're normal-looking, too, which relieves me. Maybe a little rough, maybe could use a shave, but they're human beings. And they're not purple. To be honest, they remind me of the guys I worked with on construction jobs last year. I feel more at home with people like this than most.
"Oh thank god," I stumble in, breathing out heavily in relief. "Do any of you have a phone I could borrow? I crashed my bike and my arm is-!" I don't finish my sentence.
I gulp as I feel a hand grab my hair and see a gigantic knife glinting at my throat in a matter of a second. Pain sears through my entire arm and shoulder, and even into my ribs, due to the odd movement.
I hear a deep, hissing voice growl something unintelligible in my ear, and I freeze. It's definitely not a warm welcome.
"Woah, woah," I breathe cautiously, heart pumping now. "Hold on, I swear I'm completely alone. I just need your help. Nothing funny about this. I'm hurt. Badly hurt. Please. I can...I can pay you, whatever's in my wallet, I don't care. I just need help."
More foreign words are spoken in my ear. They sound like questions, but I have no answers, and I don't respond. The voice at my ear repeats its question once more. I shake my head.
"I don't know what you're saying."
A second passes, and then I hear a chuckle. The knife moves under my chin and lifts my head to expose my neck further, and I swallow hard. If my arm didn't hurt so horribly, I might try something. I've been in similar situations before. Not exactly, not like this, but I know how to take care of myself. I'm strong, physically, too. But...not when I'm injured.
The man holding me hostage grumbles something and unloops my bag from my shoulder, and he chucks it to one of his buddies. The action jostles me, and I grunt as my arm throbs.
Then the guy does something super creepy. He grabs my wet hair and smells it, and then he laughs, shouting something to his friends. I don't know what language he's speaking. Russian, maybe? I wish I'd taken more foreign language in high school. I yank my head away from his hand, and he just tightens his fingers into the black locks and yanks back. I feel my heart drop into my stomach.
His friends laugh. The one with my bag turns the whole thing upside down and dumps it on the ground. I still have my phone clutched in my hand, but anything else I had with me is there on the dirt by the fire: wallet, makeup, granola bar, loose change, raspberry mint chewing gum, emergency tampons, hand lotion, pepper spray, ibuprofen, spare keys, phone charger, bits of paper trash, and a mini flashlight. Usual stuff, right? Nothing they'll want, except for the money.
"Take what you want," I say carefully, head still angled with the knife at my neck, and I silently slide my phone in my jean pocket.
The man grabs my waist and pushes me forward, and I stumble into the camp. My foot catches on a root, and I trip onto my knees, choking again at the pain this causes. I've landed dangerously close to the fire, and I feel the heat uncomfortably on my neck and face. All four men start laughing, and as three of them pick through the contents of my purse, the one that had the knife on me turns me around, and I catch sight of his face. He has a lot of ruddy brown hair and a thick beard, dirt on his nose, and leather clothing that practically looks like it's been stitched with thin rope. He runs the knife along my face and says more Russian. I'm so lost, and I don't know what he wants from me.
Behind him, I catch faint movement between two trees, and my eyes flick there. As they adjust, I realize I've been followed.
Standing with his arms folded and a scowl on his face, I see that purple alien man's glowy eyes first, and then everything else. My heart drops; until this point, I had convinced myself I'd made him up. Something is really wrong with me. I've never hallucinated before, but this is so vivid and makes me more than uncomfortable.
He looks inconvenienced at best, maybe a little bored, but at the same time I catch the way his eyes darken as he looks at the Russian guys. He doesn't like them, but he isn't doing a thing about it. None of the men around me notice him.
I don't know who I'd rather be with less, but the more I think about it, the more I want to escape from the people holding a knife to my neck. Muggers or aliens? Let's go with the imaginary one.
My mind is racing as I'm trying to come up with an escape. My bike is totaled. My arm is useless. My head is pounding from where I hit the trees, and I'm on my knees with a knife on my carotid. I can only hope they'll just take my things and leave me alone, but with the way this bearded guy leers at me, that doesn't seem likely.
Surprisingly, he pulls away his knife and sheaths it at his crude belt. I peer up at him in confusion, remaining still as stone, watching to see what he'll do. He jams a finger at me and grunts a word, glaring into my eyes intensely. I have no idea what he said. I return with a blank stare.
He says it again, "Stat." He holds up a closed palm.
I shrug my shoulders at him. "Stat," I respond back, wondering if that'll do anything. I can sort of tell what he means, though. He wants me to stay where I am.
He sighs, pointing at the ground where I'm kneeling. "Stat." He points to his own knife as a threat. Then he turns around and reaches into a big backpack of his, rummaging through it. The other three men are five feet away, and when I realize there's no one to hold or even watch me, I make a meager attempt to rise to my feet.
Before I can even get one leg up, the guy turns at the sound of my shuffling, and he growls. "Stat!" He produces from the bag what looks like a length of old rope. I feel a lump form in my throat in dread as he walks over and grabs my good arm, pulling it behind my back. He's going to tie my hands behind my back. He's going to grab my broken arm and wrench it into an unnatural position, and keep it that way.
I give a cry of terror and shake my head, dodging away from his hand as he tries to grab my broken forearm. He grunts in annoyance and grabs again, this time catching my wrist. More forcefully than necessary, he tugs it behind my back, and I shriek in pain, loudly enough that the other three guys look up from where they've been poring over my stuff and chatting. It's as if they've never seen chewing gum. Or tampons.
The pain becomes so strong that all I can do is give a broken, deep groan as he tightens the rope around my wrists. I realize now that this is the kind of stuff you see on the news, the horror stories of people found cut to pieces at the bottom of a lake. They don't care that I'm in extreme pain. They don't care about my money either, clearly. I have no idea what to do, and I feel completely numb. I can't even feel fear right now, I don't think. I'm just numb, save for the awful, horrid pain in my arm that's spreading to the rest of me.
"Please don't," I say, my voice far quieter than I meant it to be. I feel like I'm about to pass out from the pain alone. My thoughts are scattering. "P-pl-"
Suddenly I hear a cushioned 'whump' behind me, and the man is no longer binding my hands. The three guys in front of me stand up in alarm, shouting all at once, but I can barely look up. I do, however, catch sight of the purple alien in their midst, and he appears to be the source of their clamor.
Now I really feel alarmed. My hallucination is beating up real, live human beings. He's an entire foot, maybe two, taller than all of them, and although they seem fairly capable of fighting, they have nothing on the purple man. Even when one of the humans produces a knife, it's knocked from his hands a moment later. It's all a blur right now, but soon enough, all four men are lying prone on the forest floor around the campfire, and the alien kneels down next to me.
Up until now, I've still felt like I've imagined him. Something else, something more reasonable, must be happening. My head is putting these images in that reasonable thing's place because I have a head injury, and I'm in shock from my pain.
Then I feel his bare hands on the skin of my wrists when he unties the rope. I feel warmth, life, from his hands. I can smell some sort of musky, pleasant, pine-like scent coming from him now that he's so close.
This guy, whether he's purple or not, is real. He's real, and he very well may have just saved me from being a headline. The rope slackens, and my arm shifts. I immediately tense up, breath hitching in a strangled cry, any warm feelings toward him whisking away as my attention falls on myself again.
He holds up one finger to get my attention, looking me straight in the eyes. His are still glowing brightly behind dark purple lashes. And then he says that word.
"Stat," he says, his voice grumbly. Then he follows with a string of more words I don't know. He gets up and walks to the other side of the campfire, and I see him pick up that burlap brown bag of his that held the broken teapot. He reaches inside and pulls out a tiny object, and brings it to me. It looks like a little bottle of reddish perfume or something, corked and in a glass vial. He uncorks it, and I catch a whiff of mint and green tea. He hands it to me, and I stare at him without accepting it.
"What?" I ask reluctantly.
He says more weird words. I simply stare, so he points at his mouth and then hands it to me, pointing at my mouth. I take it with my good hand. He motions for me to tip it back and drink it like a shot glass.
I smell it. It smells...healthy enough, if a bit strong on the tea side. And who knows why it's red.
He urges me to drink it again, and I huff.
"If you think I'm going to-"
He reaches out and lifts the glass and my hand together to my face, and I have to put it to my mouth to keep it from spilling. It's second nature, and I don't think about it until a drop of it touches my tongue. I can't taste the drop.
"Fine. Fine! Not the weirdest thing to happen to me tonight," I grumble, and I down the liquid. It's strong. Really strong, not at all like the plainness I thought it would be. Bitter at first, then horribly sweet, and then it gets this weird mixture of minty cold and tingling. I can feel it go down, the mint. It chills my stomach behind my ribs, and then the cold spreads.
Suddenly, my headache vanishes. That awful pounding, that annoying ache, lifts out of nowhere, and I inhale sharply.
"Oh!" I gasp, and then notice that my arm doesn't hurt so bad either. I start to lift it, to straighten it out, but alien man jumps in and stops me, shaking his head frantically with his brows arched in alarm. He stares at me like I'm an idiot, and then reaches into his bag and pulls out a roll of thick cloth. Carefully, he bends my arm at a slightly-acute angle and wraps the cloth from my arm, up over my neck, then back down, like a sling. He does that a few times up and down my forearm until it's snug, and he ties it off.
One of the unconscious men nearby shifts, and my savior glances his way, then looks back at me. He asks me a question - very obviously a question due to his inflection - and I stare at him plainly.
"I have no idea what you are saying," I apologize. I feel like a broken record at this point, and I can't believe I'm talking to a hallucination. Then again, if he's a hallucination, who gave me this sling? He's very obviously a normal guy, and I'm just seeing him weird. I'll get that checked when we make it to the hospital. Concussions can do weird things to your vision, right?
The corners of his angular jaw jump as he grits his teeth, clearly frustrated with my inability to understand him. He leaves my side and kneels down next to my satchel where all my things are scattered. He scoops everything up and shoves it in the bag, and then comes back. With no warning, he pulls me up, with little resistance on my part. His gigantic hand still wrapped around my wrist, he pulls me back through the brush and ferns, away from the unconscious campers. Suddenly we're back at my bike and the broken pieces of his teapot, which he takes a long, negative glance at before looking at me again.
He points at me, his eyebrows arching in a question, and waits.
"Hm?" my voice is quiet, almost inaudible, but he definitely hears me.
He pauses, and then puts his thumb to his chest. "Fyr," he says, and then points at me inquiringly.
"Fear?" I squint my eyes in confusion. He nods. I blink. "You're afraid?"
A moment of hesitation passes, obviously because he's trying to understand my question. He places his entire palm on his chest. "Eranu'noma Fyr," he pats himself once, and then points at me again. "Anu'noma...?"
He is calling himself Fear? That's a bit pretentious, yeah?
"Ava," I point to myself.
"Ava." He nods once, and then points at the broken teapot on the ground. He rubs his fingers together over his thumb, the universal sign for currency, and says a few more slippery gibberish words before I hear my name again. He reaches in his pocket and pulls out a weird silver coin that looks like it was fashioned by hand, shows it to me, and puts it back.
"Oh. You want me to pay for your teapot?" I say, my temper flaring up again. I'm not currently in any pain anymore thanks to whatever he fed me, and I should be thankful toward him. But he clearly only has one agenda, and that is getting his money's worth for whatever that thing meant to him. He didn't give me that analgesic from the kindness of his heart. "You're not getting a goddamned penny from me, Buster. I need to find my way home. Or better, to a hospital. No thanks to you."
He picks up on my attitude straight away, and those glowing eyes of his narrow into slits. His shoulders square as he takes a deep breath and lets it out in the form of an annoyed growl.
Suddenly, everything hits me at once. I look around me. These trees, this wooded area, is nothing close to the kind of trees beside the highway. The smell, the weather, the temperature, all of it, is different. Something is very wrong.
Then I look back at the man in front of me. 'Til now, I'd been seeing him through this weird shield, a means of blocking out the fact that he's not exactly...human. Now, I look at him plainly. It's not a hallucination. It's not in my head. I can see every little detail and feature on his face, the glow from his eyes that illuminates little buttons on his clothing, everything. He is as real as real gets right now.
That settles it. Whoever this man is, he is not human. And wherever I am, I am no longer twenty miles from home. And taking into consideration everything I've seen until now, with whatever happened in that road, with getting struck by lightning, I realize I may not have been as lucky as when I was a kid.
I'm dead. I'm dead, or I was abducted by aliens. This is real. I have no idea where I am.
I gasp hard, sucking air into my lungs suddenly and then releasing it just as quickly. Then I repeat the action again and again, breathing deeply and quickly and out-of-control as the reality of everything happening to me fully sinks in. My frantic eyes, as I hyperventilate, meet the alien's, and I see that he looks legitimately concerned.
"...Ava," he says in alarm, then follows with more alien words I don't know. Him saying my name throws me into a full panic, and I stumble backward to escape him, feeling dizzy and weak all of a sudden.
"I d-don-don't u-und-understand wh-wh-" I try to talk, but I can't stop panicking, and suddenly my thoughts go fuzzy. I hear static, my vision goes dark, and the world slips away as my head feels so light it might float away.
It's Christmas Eve. I'm six years old, hiding underneath the decorated tree in our living room, surrounded by the smell of pine and sap. There's a box with my name on it. It's big, half as big as me, and wrapped in yellow and pink wrapping paper, with elephants in the design. There's a white bow on top, and I feel the urge to sneak a peek at what's underneath the wrapping. I learned last year how to open my presents without ruining the wrapping or the tape. I could do it. No one can see me right now. I can't wait 'til tomorrow, that's forever away.
I slide my finger under the fold of the paper at one end, carefully pulling the adhesive away from the surface, slowly enough that it won't tear the top layer of wrapping.
"Ava Warner!"
Every muscle in my body stiffens in surprise. My father's voice is like thunder every time he talks, and especially when he catches me doing something I shouldn't be. I freeze in place, hoping he didn't actually see me. Maybe he's just trying to find me, and he'll move to another room...
"Ava, I see you under there," he chides, dashing my hopes. "Put that back. Wait until morning." He sounds tired, and I peek from under the tree needles at his face. His blue eyes have dark circles in the skin beneath them.
Then I hear my mother's voice. "Come out of there, little elf, I want to tell you a story." Her accent is always stronger when she is tired.
I scoot forward reluctantly, squeezing out from under the lush white pine. Mom is wearing her work scrubs. She works at a hospital, and she's on call tonight. She's currently pulling her long jet black wavy hair into a tight ponytail, and I meander toward her sheepishly, twirling my own black hair in one nervous hand.
"A story?"
"About a girl who fell down a rabbit hole," she twists her hair tie into place, and her dark brown eyes smile at mine and make me feel warm. She keeps speaking, but suddenly I can't tell what she's saying.
Her voice becomes muffled, and the memory fades. The scent of the Christmas tree lingers, though, and I hold onto it, there in the darkness with an unintelligible conversation taking place around me. I feel snug, comfortable, and warm, surrounded by the cozy scent of pine.
Then I feel myself start moving. I feel footsteps, but they are not mine. I'm being carried.
My eyes open to slits. All I see is a dusky, warm light coming from behind me and catching the edges of what look like trees surrounding me, towering far above and blocking out the stars, except for faint peeking light through foliage. My face is mushed against something hard and warm. I shift, and realize my mouth is open and I'm drooling out the side. I close it and try to absentmindedly wipe the drool off without the use of my hands, all the while trying to find out where I am.
I'm sitting on something. Lying on something, secured somehow.
No, I'm lying against someone, held in the same way a person would prop a child on one's hip. That hard, warm thing against my face is a shoulder. That pine scent is coming from the shoulder's owner. I note that this is a nice shoulder, connected to a nice, toned arm, and that nice arm is wrapped around my lower waist, holding me snug.
I'm secure. I don't remember the last time I've felt it quite like this.
There's a voice right there by my ear, unintelligible. Masculine. Deep, warm, rolling. I can feel it resonate from the person holding me, quiet and rich. It makes me shiver pleasantly. I hear another voice behind me, also male. Not quite as pleasant, though.
I feel a gentle hand tap on my shoulder. I turn my head, opening my eyes just in time to see a guy standing there in a robe. He's middle-aged, with silvery-grey hair mixed with ginger red in both his hair and his thick beard. I blink hard once, twice, trying to bring his features into focus better, but my vision is groggy. He lifts one hand toward my face, and I'm too slow to respond. I'm pretty sure I see his fingertips glowing, but before I can react to that, I'm stunned by the brightest blinding light I've ever seen. My entire vision erupts in a flash, and I feel like it's just seared through my eyes and into my brain.
I recoil and start to swear up and down, every expletive I know escaping my lips, and next I know, whoever's holding me has dropped me on the ground. I land hard on my butt. I don't know if it was done in response to the bright light, or to the words coming out of my mouth, but either way, it pisses me off further, and my voice rises in volume. One of my arms is still restrained in a sling, but the other one props itself against the ground for balance.
My vision returns shortly, and as soon as I see who I'm shouting at for dropping me, my words freeze on my tongue. It's the alien, the one who calls himself 'Fear'. He's the one who was holding me. He has a strange look on his face; it's the least-negative one he's given me all night, a combination of amusement and surprise. Beside him is the robed guy, and behind both of them is a shoddy building.
"Didn't intend to drop her," the alien mutters to the man next to him, and my eyes widen as a chill runs down my spine at hearing him speak and understanding what he says.
I gulp, and my stare darts around as I try to understand my surroundings. I realize there's not just that one building, but rather many, more like a small village. We are on the side of a wide street, on which there are creatures much more alarming than the purple alien. One woman looks like she's eight feet tall, and she has hooves. And she's blue. And I'm pretty sure I see a tail. No one is even reacting to her, not even the occasional humans walking beside her. I see more aliens like Mister 'Fear', but they're varied in colors. Some have pale skin that's almost white. Others are bluer, pinker, greener...
Then I see something that makes the hair on my arms stand straight.
"That's a cow on two legs," I breathe to myself, my eyes like saucers. "There's a cow wearing clothing."
"Oof," the robed, red-headed man in front of me laughs. "I wouldn't say that within earshot, lass. He'll have your hide."
"I do think he'd prefer 'bull' over 'cow'," the purple alien chuckles. "Or more likely, judging by the state of his armor, perhaps 'Sir' might fit him best."
My eyes flick back to him. "How can I understand you?"
"Courtesy of yours truly," the ginger man reaches out a hand to me, offering to help me stand. "Ferris Conley, magician and linguist, at your service. I was told you suffered a head injury. Solved your language problem with a simple spell that should hopefully hold as you heal."
Wary, I don't take it. 'Fear' simply nods toward Ferris as if to say, 'take the hand.' Like I'm being rude. His arms are folded as he watches.
Ferris is still waiting on me. I ultimately grab his hand with my good arm, and he hoists me to my feet. My eyes are still wide. I'm trying to think logically.
These people aren't hostile. They're speaking to me, trying to relate. I can communicate now.
"Thank you. Where am I?" I ask, my voice cracking in the middle of the question.
'Fear' looks at Ferris, then back at me. "Feralas."
'What?" my eyebrows tighten in confusion and nonrecognition.
"Camp Illisir, Lower Wilds, Feralas, Southern Kalimdor..." he lists off, slowing as my face remains blank and alarmed.
"Send me back," I blurt.
"Pardon?"
"Send me back home. You...you've abducted me. Send me back t-to Earth." I can't help but feel a little ridiculous hearing those words come from my mouth, but at the same time, I am entirely positive now that I've been abducted by this alien. That would explain those neon lights when the lightning struck...right?
"Earth?" Ferris tilts his head. "Are you a worm? A badger? A burrower?" I realize he's mocking me when he laughs. 'Fear' laughs, too. Then Ferris folds his arms amicably. "Last person Fyr carried into town was dragged by his ankle. You should feel lucky, Lass."
"Listen," 'Fear' interrupts, offering Ferris a smirk, then looking at me with none of that friendliness. "Ava, you can scurry back to your earthen tunnels as soon as I've been compensated for the glassware and reward for its retrieval, both of which you've cost me thanks to the destructiveness of your hideous mechanical contraption."
I feel blood rush into my ears with my frustration at hearing an insult toward my bike, but I bottle it down and take a deep breath, let it out slowly, and look him square in the eye. "I don't know where I am. I don't know what you are. I am injured and lost and tired; you're acting like I did something to you, like I took something from you, intentionally or otherwise. You're wrong. I've never seen anything like this place, like you, like that lady with hooves over there, in my life." I point at the blue woman who has made her way almost out of sight.
'Fear' glances where I pointed, and he tilts his head, eyes narrowing. "How hard did you bash your head on that tree, woman?"
"Really fucking hard," I grumble, feeling a throb in my skull at his words.
Both he and Ferris lift their eyebrows.
"Colorful vocabulary for someone who forgot how to speak," 'Fear' smirks. For a second, I think I see admiration, but I can't tell. But it's gone before I can guess again, replaced with a cocky smirk. "Where was that attitude when your bandit friends had you ambushed? All bark and no bite, eh, badger?"
I flare my nostrils, but say no more. What a dick.
'Fear' straightens his spine and changes his stance, cocking his head at me. "All right. Down to business, now. I do need paid for what you've cost me, Ava."
"It was an accident. I'm sorry you lost your teapot, really, but I don't owe you a goddamned thing." My heart pounds as it always does when I'm confrontational.
Ferris laughs at this point and excuses himself, exiting into the building near us.
"Really?" 'Fear' counters. "What about your life, mm? Those were Blackhand thugs. They don't mess around. I was surprised you weren't simply killed when I followed you to their camp. Stupidest move I've ever seen, walking right into the middle of them."
"They seemed interested in something other than killing me," I say, lip curling just barely in disgust.
His expression seems to disarm for a moment, a flash of sympathy, before it's flattened again.
"You are quite lucky I was there."
"Oh, that's the word for it?" I gripe. Part of me feels bad for not expressing gratitude. He does have a point. But he also wants my money, and I'm in a lot of pain, and my clothes are still uncomfortably wet from being pelted with rain.
'Fear' sighs with clear frustration, returning to his point. "Payment, woman. That glassware set was worth just under eighteen gold. The draenei missing it will be far from thrilled to hear that it's been shattered, and I will not be paid by him, thanks to you."
"I have no idea what the fuck half of that means."
He gives me a look when I swear. Unimpressed, this time around. "You can play a fool all you want, but you can't fool me; you're far too clean-cut and well-dressed to not possess the wealth I demand. You cannot weasel your way out of this."
"Sorry to break it to you, Buddy, but I'm not from here. I don't have your...currency. I've never held gold in my life. I've never heard of 'Fellaris' or 'Blackhand thugs' or 'dran-eye'. And I've never ever seen anyone like you before. What the hell are you? You're not human, that's obvious."
"Astute observation, dimwit; I'm a bloody night elf," he snaps at me, but he stops himself, furrows his brows like he's thinking to himself, and folds his arms. "All right, then, what's in your bag that's worth something to me?"
"Nothing with an exchange rate as high as gold," I grumble, and glare at him, gripping my bag. "And no, you're not touching any of my things." Then I hesitate. "Aren't elves supposed to be tiny and cute and festive and not purple? If anything, you're an overgrown Smurf. No, wait, those are blue..." I trail off, scrunching my eyebrows.
He blinks a couple times, face tightening in confusion as he stares at me. From the way he's looking at me, I wonder if that's how I looked when I first saw him. "Where are you from?"
"Are you going to send me back to where you found me?" I feel a surge of hope.
"Into the forest? Do you have a death wish?"
"Back to my..." I'm about to say 'world'. That's too out-there for me, still. "Home."
"You're from a place with humans only, aren't you? That'd explain your intolerance. And your...simplicity."
"Yes!" I breathe in relief. "Yes I am!" I ignore his other comments.
"If I offer to take you home, will you make a deal with me?"
I nod. I knew he knew what I was talking about before! Ava: 1, Alien: 0.
"If I take you back, you have to repay me for the glassware."
"I told you, I don't have any gold."
"Someone you know must have some. Figure something out. You want to go home? You accept my terms."
I think hard. I do have a lot of savings in the bank. Way more than I would ever tell anyone. My last job was in private construction, and that constant manual labor I worked with a team a few months back made crazy-good pay. I'm certain I could scrounge up enough from my savings to pay him back.
I look at him. "I accept your terms."
He smirks at me, a smirk I already know is one I don't like because of the attitude that accompanies it. "A fair warning: we are going on foot."
"What? How? Don't you just...um...beam me back the same way I came?"
"I'm no mage," he scoffs, as if that explains everything. "And I am not wasting more coin on flight than is necessary. I have no ground mount. Therefore, we are going on foot until we reach contested territories."
He talks so weird, I think to myself.
"Well, how far is it?" I ask as he turns around and hoists his satchel onto his shoulder more snugly. I follow after him. My arm in its sling sort of throws me off balance for a second, but I adjust quickly.
"I don't know how you ended up in Feralas, but we've got a long way to go if we want to reach Elwynn, Princess."
"What's Elwynn? Is that where you're going to send me home? Does it have a mage?"
He throws me another surprised, confused glance as he keeps walking along the dirt path we've turned onto. "You're more addled than I thought. Concussions are no joke."
"What?"
He halts and turns toward me. "Here's the plan: we'll both keep our mouths shut, and we'll have a grand time. Follow close to me; do not stray from the road, and if I tell you to do something, I need you to do it without question. If your arm starts hurting again or if you feel dizzy at all, though, inform me, and I will take care of it. Do we have a deal?"
My independent, obstinate side is fighting to rip free, but I bottle it in and nod once. "Deal."
He gives me a thank-you dip of his head, and keeps walking. I fall into step behind him. This is fixing to be a long, weird night.