Sometime during the fall, Aurelie had closed her eyes, and so she wasn't aware at first that she had fallen into one-dimensional hole that opened up beneath her while she was falling off an eight story building. The only sign that she had entered the hole was that there was no more wind.

At first Aurelie thought that she had hit the ground, but after waiting a while without feeling pain, she tentatively opened her eyes. And then closed them again, rubbed them, and opened them again. No change. Well, no change that she could tell, as she could see nothing. Before her was a pure black expanse. At first she thought that she had gone blind due to impact, but as she still felt no pain, she decided she was just in a really dark place. She had an ambiguous feeling about that. It meant that she could see, but Heaven was supposed to be a place full of light.She hoped she wasn't in the other place, though it would make sense if she was.

As the hole had closed, she had no idea how she had got here. She did a quick check up of herself. Since she couldn't see, she had to focus on what she felt. The two things that immediately stood out were that her arm and side were... weird. Both had been shot, but they sometimes they flared up and the pain was as bad as it had been the moment she'd gotten shot. Then they died down to the point that it was as though they were completely healed. Sometimes they moved around the pain gradient in sync, other times out of sync. It was... odd, to say the least.

Deciding she would sort out the wounds that had no idea whether they wanted to hurt or not later, she felt around a bit deeper. This time her search yielded results that suggested that she was floating. She couldn't feel anything solid around her. Her feet weren't on the ground, neither was her sides, stomach, back, or even her head. She could no longer feel the weight of her bag's strap on her shoulder, though she did realize that it was floating around her shoulder when she started to flail.

Deciding to get back to this revolt against physics after she sorted out her injuries, she went back to examining herself. It was around this time that she discovered that she was no longer breathing. Well, it was more like she had no need to. Her body was in some kind of stasis, unchanging. This time, she finally freaked out. 'What's happening? Where am I? How did I get here? Did I die? Someone help me!! Zane!!' This continued for an undeterminable amount of time, but then she snapped out of it.

And then light appeared from underneath her. 'Huh?' Curious, Aurelie attempted to turn and look. But then her foot went through the source of light. A strong force yanked her out of the black expanse. Aurelie stared up at the place she'd just come from. What the..? A huge hole, which was easily as wide as the Empire State Building was tall, was open in the sky above her. Before her very astonished eyes, the hole quickly shrank and disappeared in the blink of an eye. 'You have got to be kidding me. What is going on? Was I just in that hole thingy? How did I get in there? Where was that?' Finally, she came to a conclusion. 'Great. I've gone insane.'

It was around this time that her shell-shocked and possibly insane mind realized she was falling. Again.

This time, the fall was from a much higher place, and there was an entire forest in between her and the earth. Fortunately, the trees would break her fall. Unfortunately, trees aren't like cushions.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

Namely, they're very hard.

Forest near Lejus Village, Sorainella

Aurelie lay at on the forest floor, groaning. She was pretty badly injured. Her skin was developing multiple bruises in various places, and she was covered in cuts, ranging in intensity from the size of a paper cut to a huge gash. She also had multiple splinters and a bruised rib. Nothing broken, though, so that was a bonus. She was still alive, too, despite being insane. Thank god for the little things. She lay there groaning for a while until she realized that she could be in danger of bleeding to death, after which she tentatively got up, realized that she had no idea where to go, and stood there organizing her thoughts. She quickly made a checklist in her head.

1. Find water source to clean wounds in.

2. Find shelter along water source and a food source nearby.

3. Heal, and then see where the heck you are.

With these three goals in mind, Aurelie listened for the sound of running water. She was using city girl logic, which dictated that everything you wanted was nearby, even when you had fallen out of a gigantic hole in the sky and into the middle of a forest that most definitely did not exist in Seattle.

Amazingly, city girl logic worked in this case. Within seconds, Aurelie's ears made out the faint sound of running water. She immediately rushed towards it, and as she got closer she realized that it wasn't the sound of a river she was hearing, it was a waterfall! She entered a small clearing, and discovered that her ears hadn't deceived her, there was a decently sized waterfall in the clearing, as well as a small pool that the waterfall emptied into. It was from this pool that a river ran.

Aurelie gave a relieved grin and immediately started see to her wounds. She gently washed the cuts, and applied a salve that was in her bag (which had managed to follow her on the way down). She then covered the salve with bandages, which were also in her bag. She carefully plucked out the splinters, and put a band aid on them.

When she'd finished, she examined her reflection. Her hair was a mess, with leaves and twigs in it. Her favorite emerald green tee was ripped in many places and smeared with blood. Her jeans were fine apart from a few specks of blood, though, and her combat boots only had a few scratches. If she had to comment on her appearance, she would say that if anyone saw her at the moment they would probably shoot her in fright. She plucked the leaves and twigs out of her hair, but that was the best she could do, considering the fact that she didn't have a comb on her, and she didn't have a change of clothes either, so she couldn't wash her clothes. She might be able to face down gunfire without panicking, but no way was she going to be naked in... wherever she was.

Then, she seemed to think of something. With a panicked expression on her face she quickly grabbed at the collar of her shirt and pulled out a leather strap, tugging on it until the necklace that she'd been wearing under her clothes came into view. With trembling hands, she quickly examined the pendant. It was a smooth oval of obsidian, surrounded by an intricate silver wire which attached the stone to the leather strap. Making sure that the pendant didn't have a single scratch on it, she let out a sigh of relief. The necklace was a present that she had gotten from Zane for her fifth birthday. She'd never once took it off, and it had remained around her neck for eleven years, unless the strap snapped, in which case Zane always bought her a new one. The necklace was, as far as Aurelie was concerned, the most important thing that she owned.