Subject: Re: Proofing Date: Tue, 30 Jun 98 23:58:15 -0400 From: Shinji was running full speed. The forest was turned into a big green blur as he rushed after Teri. Despite her weakened condition, she was really making tracks! He frowned. This delirium of hers must have affected her physical abilities. His face still stung slightly from where she had slapped him. He could imagine a red handprint pressing onto his cheek, like some bizarre tattoo. No time for that. No time for the pain, such as it was. They could be running straight into trouble and not know it till it was too...late? He stopped in his tracks. They had arrived at a cave, and Teri was still running. "Terrific. Just wonderful. With my luck it'll be the home of a dragon. Or two. Aaaaahh nuts to that!" he grumbled in resignation, before following after her yet again, albeit a little more cautiously. The dark shadow of the cave swallowing him, enveloping him in dim, dank darkness. Suddenly, a wave of emotion slammed into him. His eyes went wide and his mouth gaped in a silent scream. The pain was almost unbearable. He nearly doubled over, but a chilling thought suddenly made it's pressence known, turning his blood into ice. "Oh God. Teri!" he shouted, then fought down the second wave and stumbled as well as he could after her. Please. Don't let him be too late. It wasn't long before he saw his companion, standing infront of another woman, and a young man who was sprawled on the cold, cold ground. He saw Teri Lift up her bag and hurl it forward. Suddenly, the pain was gone. Shinji nearly collapsed at the relief. It felt like someone had just removed a great weight from his shoulders. He was about to call out to Teri, but then she staggered, then collapsed. He just barely reached her before she hit the ground. The two Jiy were humming in alarm. Shinji lowered her to the ground, and firmly shook her shoulders. She was cold. When she hadn't responded, he feared the worst. Then he remembered the other girl. Whirling to face her, eyes full of fury, he was met not by the sight of a deadly assasin, but with that of a girl who was obviously confused. And very, very scared. His eyes softened a bit, then he finally managed to speak. "Who are you, and what did you do to Teri?" he growled, still unsure whether or not to trust this person. She didn't answer at first, shaking her head and mumbling incoherently. Her eyes were glazed over, and she was visibly shaking. "I--My name--Stana. I didn't--is Teri Ok?" she stampered, voice quaking slightly. He noticed she was looking at him fearfully. Her frowned, then glanced back at Teri. She was definitely out of it, for the moment at least. He carefully lowered her head to the ground, then stood to face Stana. But she wasn't paying him any attention. She was busy with the other, the young man who was bleeding from a very large wound. "What happened here?" Shinji asked, kneeling next to the man as he lay on the ground. Stana looked at him uneasily. "Don't worry, I won't hurt you." She seemed to think about it for a while, then decided she could use all the help she could get. "What about Teri? We can't just leave her there." Shinji looked at his companion, then frowned. "I don't think we can do much for her right now, and this person looks like he needs your help more anyway." Stana looked down at Clip. He had been knocked unconcious by Teri's attack, but was still bleeding. She steeled herself, then looked back to Shinji. "What do you know of healing?" He shook his head. Stana growled in frustration, and pulled out a book. She flipped through hurridly and showed him a picture. "Can you find this herb?" It grows in shade so there may be some near. It likes dry soil as well." Shinji nodded. Stana flipped through to the next page. "And this one. This likes moist soil, and partial sun. I don't know how far we are in this woods but this man needs these badly." "I'll find them." he promised. "For Teri-is there anything you can use to keep her sleeping?" "You mean drug her?" there was hostility in her voice. "Why?" "It is for her own good, as well as ours. She would agree if she could." "I won't do it. I could kill her. Do you think I have a clue to what I am doing?" "That doesn't matter. if she is not kept calmed then she will die anyway." Stana rocked back on her heels. Then showed him one last photo. "This one-" ================================ Stana and Shinji sat around a small fire, Teri and Clip's unconcious forms lying closest to it. Shinji looked up from the bright, mesmerizing fire to Stana, were she knelt next to Clip, applying a moss-salve to his forehead. He had asked her about that before, but she had evaded the question with one of her own. "Why are you with Teri?" she had asked, brushing her hands together to rid herself of left-over moss. He hadn't answered her at once. Not because he hadn't wanted to, but because for the life of him, he honestly didn't know. She waited patiently, the silence broken by the crackle of the fire. "To tell you the truth, I have no idea," he finally answered, meeting her gaze with one of his own. "At first, I only wanted to find a town. But now--" he looked over to Teri. "I just don't know." "You got problems," she commented. She felt a kind of pity for this person. His looks, where young and had an air of confidence, belied a more sutle, deeper kind of sorrow. Probably so deep that he didn't even know it was there. "Doesn't know, or doesn't want to admit it's there," she thought to herself. Of course, Shinji couldn't hear thoughts. If he had been able to though, he probably would have laughed and said it was a bunch of garbage, although deep inside, he would always have that small glimmer of doubt. He was brought out of his thoughts by a sudden pain that bit into his arm. "Ow!" he yelped slightly. A stray ember had bounced out of the fire and landed on his forearm, just above his gauntlets arm guards. Stana looked up from her work, then focused onto his hand where it clutched his arm. "You okay? I could probably whip something up to take care of that," she said, motioning at her small collection of herbs. Shinji just shook his head. "No, no, that's okay. It's not too serious. I've--" Just then Clip began to stir. "Uh, what hit me..." he groaned, trying to sit up. Stana quickly demanded he lay back down, but he just replied that he didn't have to listen to the demands of a simple human. She steamed slightly, all previous concern melting away slightly at his ungrateful attitude, but she just smiled slightly and shrugged. If he hurts himself, it won't be her fault. "Welcome back to the land of the living," Shinji chimed at Clip. The Unicorn looked at Stana, back to Shinji, then to Stana again. "Who are you?" he asked, his head very foggy. Everytime he tried to move his head, it felt like a whole bunch of huge rocks just went tumbling around in there. Maybe he should have listned to Stana... "Uh, this is Shinji. He's a friend. At least, I'm pretty sure he is..." Stana replied. Clip looked at him skeptically, tried to shake his head in resignation, couldn't. He looked around their make-shift camp site, then his glance fell on Teri's unconcious form. He pointed at her, his hand still shaking slightly. "Who is that?" "That's Teri. She's a friend of mine," Stana explained. Clip scowled weakly. "This trip just keeps getting more interesting by the minute..." ** Teri moaned and dug her fingers into her temples. Her head was throbbing quite strongly. She opened her eyes gingerly, and found nearly no sight. Before launching into a fit of terror, running around screaming "I'm blind, I'm blind," she decided that it must be nighttime, and wondered why her entire body felt like she'd been trampled by the parade in Barbara Streisand's movie-version of Hello Dolly. She grimaced.. "Does it hurt?" asked a concerned female voice... She tried to shake her head NO, but was quite thoroughly immobile. "No, I just didn't want Hello Dolly running around my brain for the next four days..." The girl chuckled. Teri blinked. "Stana? That's you, right?" Stana nodded, then realizing Teri couldn't turn to see her, coughed and said, "Yeah, long time no see." Teri grinned a little. "No kidding. What ummm... happened?" The stars, what she could see of them through the thick foliage, were large and bright. She closed her eyes and made a wish on one. "Aside from you crashing through the trees, knocking Clip unconscious with your bag, and then fainting yourself-- not much. Shinji went to get some water. He should be back by now." "You met Shinji?" "Yeah. He's quite the boy-scout, isn't he?" Teri chuckled, then coughed. "Yeah." "Where'd you pick him up?" Stana's voice was still somewhere off to the left, and Teri tried once more to turn, this time with a little more success: she could see the top of Stana's head. "On the road to some town... where've you been all this time? Why am I stuck here? I feel like I'm tied down or something..." There was a gurgling cough a little farther to the left, and Teri frowned in confusion. "Hey, are you ok? what's wrong?" "Oh! No, that's not me," Stana replied quickly. "That's Clip." "Clip?" "The uni.. the umm, guy you knocked out." Teri frowned. "I knocked some guy out?" Stana paused, "You don't remember?" "A lot of weird things have been happening lately." Teri replied, and sighed, reaching to massage her neck. So she WASN'T tied down... hmm... "Yeah, tell me about it." "Why can't I move?" Teri repeated herself, beginning to get frustrated. "Oh-- I gave you some stuff to help you sleep." "Put me in a coma's more like it," Teri grumbled, as she finally succeeded in rolling onto her side. And came face to face with the finely chiseled face of a young man... she scrambled to her feet, eyes wide. "I see it wears off quickly when you want it to," Stana murmured dryly. Teri was still gaping. "Close your mouth, you're starting to drool." Teri's mouth snapped shut and she frowned. "I was not," she said, bending closer to Stana. "Wow-- what a catch. You sure know how to pick 'em. How'd you get a hottie so quickly in this godforsaken place? Speaking of which, where in Hell are we? Where's Paul? I need some real coffee, and i need some real coffee really badly. They have this stuff called Kha here, but it's worse than Amtrack coffee-- tastes like someone ate a bunch of burning rubber and then shit it into the cup--" Stana grimaced and held up her hands, "Hold it, calm down. My word your mouth is foul." "Tastes like shit too," Teri mumbled back as stana continued. "Must've mixed those herbs a little too strong." "Why the hell'd you feed me that stuff anyway? Mixing around grass and feeding it to... why was I unconscious again?" Stana sighed and smiled a little. "Sit down." Teri obeyed. Or, rather, more like her legs collapsed. "I'm tired," she moaned. "Tell me about it," Stana replied, and Teri noticed the bags under the older woman's eyes. "You look like shit," she said, concerned. "Why thank you so much. I try," Stana replied. Teri grinned. "Want some cover-up?" Teri looked around for her black bag, now a little spotted with dried blood. She wrinkled her nose. "Never leave home without it?" Teri chuckled, "I guess. Speaking of never-leaving home-without it.... they won't take my credit cards here!!!" Stana nearly face-faulted. "Is that all you think about?" "What?" Teri blinked in confusion. Stana sighed. Teri had an ephiphany. "No," she said defensively. "I visited a local religious temple, bought some appropriate clothing, hmm, guess that doesn't count, had some coffee, helped fight a few bandits, though i don't really remember doign that, had a bath..." she rattled off a few more things without pause for breathing or proper grammatical structure while Stana once more pressed some grass to the handsome man in her lap. Teri looked curiously at him. "What's wrong with him?" she whispered. "And why are you putting grass on his forehead?" "It's moss," Stana said, "And he was..." she searched for an answer... "You hit him pretty hard," she lied, unable to think of something better, more quickly. Teri's eyes widened, and she blushed. "Shit.. i didn't mean to... I mean, I don't even remember..." Stana was about to take back what she had said when Shinji stepped into the clearing with the water. She got up hastily and relieved him of the bucket. She didn't want to tell them about Clip just yet. Aside from humiliating him she wasn't sure she trusted Shinji fully enough with that awesome secret. There was something about that kid... Yeah paranoia was good stuff. Stana trickled some more of the "herbal valium" she had made. Valerian root, hyssop, St John's...heady mixture that her book had hinted at. She was afraid to have Clip up when Teri was, after last time... She finished her rounds, checked the wounds and sat back down. "so you wanna tell me what's going on and where we are?"