When Gabe came to, he was laying completely still on the hard ground. He was afraid to open his eyes. “Oh crap, I was just hit by a bus!” was the thought going through head on repeat, as his heart was pounding in his chest. Then as he calmed down a little, he wondered “Why, am I not in pain. I must be in shock.” Slowly and carefully, he flexed his fingers testing to see If they worked. He could move his fingers, that was a good sign. Next, he curled his toes to see if those would work as well. “Ok, I’m not paralyzed” This seemed like something to celebrate. Somehow, he ended up without being paralyzed and with no pain after being hit by a bus. He opened his eyes to look into the dark overcast sky.

            He sat up quickly, his heart rate speeding up again. “Where am I?” he thought to himself a sense of déjà vu coming over him. He was on the sunny street by his apartment building when he got hit, but now he didn’t know where he was. There were large grey stone buildings forming the walls of this wet cobblestone alleyway. Giant piles of trash were piled up on each side of the alleyway and there were large dark puddles that Gabe could only hope was dirty water. The alley smelled like it had been used as a urinal by a whole generation of drunks and he could hear the sound of rats and mice squeaking in the rubbish. He also noted with a start, that he wasn’t alone in the alley.

            As he looked around, he saw his friends Kat and Sinclair laying near him. Gabe jumped up and rushed over to Kat. As he was checking her, she stirred and opened one eye. “Did you come to rescue the damsel in distress?” Kat sat up as she teased him.

            “Please you might be the least damsely person who has ever been in distress.” he reached down and pulled her to her feet. She opened her mouth as if she was about to respond with would could have only been a witty retort when they heard Sinclair stirring. They rushed over to him to help him up.

           He was still a little groggy and he asked the two of them “What are you two doing in my dorm building?”

           “You might want to take a look around. I don’t think we are in Kansas anymore.” Kat said teasing him a little.

           Gabe looked around them and replied, “I don’t think we are in Oz either.”

           “Then where are we? Last, I remember I had taken a tumble down the stairs in my building.” Sinclair was still rubbing his eyes like he had just come out of a deep sleep.

           “Yeah, I had just slipped on a wet floor and fell in my bathroom. I thought I had cracked my head on the edge of the tub. I’m glad I’m not hurt, but I don’t know how we got here?” Kat volunteered as she stretched her arms and shoulders. They both stopped and looked expectantly at Gabe. He was standing there thinking now about the enigmatic message the old woman had given them. When he looked up, his face went red with embarrassment.

           ” Oh…. I got hit by a bus.” Sinclair and Kat both looked at each other with shock in their eyes, but before the conversation could continue, they heard a scream from down the alleyway. Gabe and Kat started running that way and Sinclair followed behind them, protesting.

            “Why are we running towards the scream? This is how people die in horror movies.” Sinclair whined as he tried to keep up with the two of them.

            “Because, someone needs our help.” Gabe called back to Sinclair.

            “Yeah. Grow a pair.” Kat had also said over her shoulder. As they rounded the corner, Gabe gasped. There was a beautiful young woman with blonde hair lying in a pool of crimson fluid. Her stomach had been torn open and her eyes were open staring blankly toward the group with a look that encompassed fear, confusion and pain frozen on her face. All of the life that had to of once animated her pretty blue eyes was drained from them. Gabe approached the body to get a better look. Her stomach had been torn open as if by some kind of animal, but her neck had some mottled bruising as if something had been holding her down and choking her at the same time as they ripped her open. She was wearing a simple pretty dress and around her neck was a small golden locket on a delicate chain.

             Gabe sat there, squatting by the body seething. “What kind of a person would do this to someone? Especially someone with so much life to live?” he muttered. He was upset and part of him wanted to hunt the person who had done this down and make sure he faced the just repercussions of his actions. After few minutes his anger subsided and he was just faced with a sadness for the loss that this person and anyone in her family had sustained. He felt like if he had just responded faster then maybe he could have saved her and he hoped she didn’t have any kids to be left behind. For the moment, their circumstances had left his mind and he could only think about the scene before them. He didn’t know if it would help but he said a little prayer that wherever she was now that she would be at peace.

###

             Kat stood about five feet away from Gabe. She stared at the body with a mixture of fascination and disgust. The woman had been wearing a nice dress but nothing to fancy and Kat assumed that if she got closer, she would be able to find the signs of hand stitching. The woman had probably made this dress herself. Something else about this dress struck Kat as odd. It looked like something someone would where to a renaissance fair, not like an everyday dress. She felt a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. She had no idea where they were, but Kat didn’t think it was in the U.S.

            She took a few more steps closer to the body and that allowed her to get a better look at the wound in the woman’s stomach. That savagery of it made her shudder with a mixture of revulsion and fear. It didn’t look like it was just torn open, but it looked like something had dug around in there and maybe even removed an organ or two. “What would do this to somebody.” She thought to herself. Her dad had raised her up hunting and camping as much as possible and she had seen the results when an animal attacks another animal and this didn’t seem the same. It looked more like a human did this to here. She could see the bruises on the girl’s neck and they definitely seemed to be in the shape of a human hand, but something seemed a little off about them. 

            Gabe had his head down and Kat put her hand on his shoulder to try and comfort him.  She had thought he was crying but she realized with surprise that he was praying over the corpse. Still trying to get the poor girl some comfort no matter where she was. Kat knew Gabe was always the most religious of the three of them, but she didn’t realize that while they had left town to go to college, he had continued to go to church. She had thought he had given that up when his mother died a couple of years ago. He had stopped going for a while, but he must have started back when he got over the hurt and the pain of the loss.

            “Come on.” she said to him with as soft a tone as she could muster. “We need to get out of here before someone comes and finds the body. Gabe turned his head to look at her a strange combination of determination and regret covering his face and he gave her a little nod as he stood up. Kat started ushering him back the way they came, away from the scene of the crime. She looked to Sinclair and saw his face distort with fear just before she heard it.

            “Halt!” a voice called form behind them and she spun to seven men standing behind them wearing armor and brandishing swords. The men were wearing chainmail and little helmets that covered the top of their heads and had a piece of metal that ran down and covered the nose. They had on tabards that were colored teal and gold. Embroidered on the tabards was the symbol of a raven holding a scroll and a sword. The weapons in their hands looked very real and wickedly sharp. The lead man called again. “Halt! You are under arrest for the murder of this poor woman!” with that, the other six men rushed forward swords drawn. For a second Kat considered running but she didn’t want to be the reason that one of her friends was cut down. Besides she knew Sinclair wouldn’t have been able to keep up.  

            The men checked them for weapons and the whole time they were giving the clothing of the newcomer’s odd looks. One of the guards was especially surprised to find a lass in trousers, but when he made the mistake of mentioning it Kat gave him a look so cold that it could have made ice. That guard instantly found the ground by his feet very interesting. When she felt like the guard was successfully and utterly chastised for his remark she looked away. Kat didn’t know what was so strange about it. She was wearing a pair of jeans and a t-shirt. Nothing scandalous there. You would have thought that these men had caught her prancing around wearing nothing but a bra and boy shorts by the way they acted. However, the way they were dressed, as well as the dress that poor girl was wearing caused Kat to believe they weren’t on earth anymore, or at least not in their own time anymore.

            The guards led them around the body and out into a street. What they saw there took Kat’s breath away, while it confirmed her suspicions. It appeared as if the three of them had woken up in some kind of old medieval city. The shops all had cute little hand painted signs hanging from and above the doors. The streets were paved with worn cobble stone. All the people passing by that were giving them strange looks were wearing cute little dresses and peasant clothes. It was like they had gotten transported into that Heath Ledger film that Sinclair liked so much. A Knight’s Quest or whatever it was called. Everything had a very quaint cottage core feel to it and if it hadn’t been for the seriousness of the situation they found themselves in, she would have found it cute. She did notice one thing with growing irritation, she was in fact the only woman in sight who was wearing “trousers”.

            As they walked, she took in more of the sites. Seemed to be kids running all over the place dressed like adults. They were running shops and doing repair jobs all around them. The more Kat looked at them the more she realized that they were not kids at all, but just appeared to be kids. She heard Sinclair ask Gabe, “Are those halflings?” That settled it. They definitely were not on earth anymore. She looked around for any dwarfs and elves, but didn’t see any. Mostly she just saw regular people and a halfling here or there running about. Smiles on their plump faces. Every once and a while someone would stop and stare at the three of them being lead down the street by the guards, but most of the people seemed too busy going about their own lives to be concerned with them.

            The guards led them down the street and until they reached a larger stone wall and a gate guarded by two more of the knights, guards, or whatever they are. The ones escorting them stopped and they had a brief conversation. Kat looked past them into the courtyard and saw a squat utilitarian building. There were small windows on the side with iron bars going across them, a sturdy wooden door reinforced with strips of iron bolted into it, and banners on either side of the door that held the same symbol that the men wore so proudly on their chest. The men led them through the courtyard and into the front door. There were several more of the guards, she decided that they were indeed guards, milling about the room as they were led to the back right corner. The guard sitting by that door stood up and inserted a key into the lock. The door swung open and led to the room lined with a couple of dark musty cells. The group led them to one cell and threw them in it. They then slammed the door and left.

            “We didn’t do it!” Sinclair called to them with a defeated tone in his voice. Kat watched as Gabe and Sinclair sat down on one of the benches and when it appeared that they didn’t have any ideas, she started pacing back and forth. “How do we prove that we are innocent?” She thought to herself. The cell was dark and musty. There were a couple of dusty cots in one corner and a bench on the other side. There were two buckets one was filled with sour smelling stagnant water and another that smelled like a dive bar bathroom and was covered with a crusty mess. She wondered briefly if they ever accidently switched the bathroom and water buckets but the thought left her feeling sick to her stomach. After a period of time that she considered a herculean attempt at patience, but in actuality was only a few minutes she said “Well, what are we going to do?”

            “We wait.” Gabe leaned against the bars behind him and closed his eyes and began to pray.

            “What do you mean we wait?” Kat rounded on him and was waving her hands as she spoke. “You just want to sit here and do nothing!”

            Gabe met her eyes and sat back up. “We don’t have any weapons and we are not trained for combat. What chance do you think we would have if we broke out? We can’t fight our way out and there is only one door in this room.”

            She wheeled on the spot, cheeks flushed. She hadn’t even noticed yet that there was only one way out of this room. “Well, at least I’m trying to think of something.” Her voice was sheepish and defensive now and she hated it. How could she not have noticed there was only one way out of the room. It was common sense.

            Sinclair stood up and put his hand on her shoulder. “Gabe is right you know. Eventually someone will have to come in and talk to us and that happens we will plead our case. Until then we have to try and relax. Trust me, I’m just as scared as you, but there is nothing we can do.” He sounded terrified, but she was touched that he was trying to comfort her even now. Kat looked Sinclair in his dark brown eyes and with a defeated huff went and stormed off to one of the cots and pouted.

Next Chapter: Chapter 3