The Universe's Mixer

Ariel held the Directory book in her open palms, desperate. She was settled on a curbside, a shoulder pressed hard against the bottom pole of a pay phone that looked unused. Again and again her blue eyes searched the names and numbers. Each scan brought more panic and despair to her heart and mind. She was afraid. She felt so utterly and completely alone. And her heart felt like it had shattered into more pieces than she knew how to count to.

Her palm slipped from around the back page of the book, and a finger found the names again. He had to be here. He had to.

Her eyes scanned the names that appeared alphabetically, starting with the top of the list of new arrivals and ending with current residents. No ranger. Neither of the pair of brothers names showed or stood out to her.

That had to be wrong. But some how it wasn't. Some how it didn't feel wrong. Ariel knew that Faramir would have found her by now if he had come. He would have worried about her well-being, he would have been concerned for her safety in this new, strange world. And she had not heard a sound from him, no sight of him, no letters...nothing.

Her heart felt heavy. Too heavy.

Pulling her hand from the pages, Ariel lifted her fingers to her face, rubbing over her red, puffy eyes. She sniffled, a new wave of tears welling up and spilling over and coursing down her cheeks like a small river.

She snapped the book closed, setting it into her lap. The weight of it was absent though it felt far too heavy. The world around her didn't matter. If it had faded away she wouldn't have cared. This was what she had given her fin up for, her voice. A broken heart? It wasn't the ranger's fault, she didn't really know who to blame. But that didn't make it hurt any less. That didn't alleviate any of the pain.

Ariel pressed the book against the sidewalk next to where she was sitting. Gathering herself, Ariel sniffled again and lowered her hands from her face. Her lips frowned deeply as she rose, brushed off her skirt and began to travel down the empty sidewalk. Her pull to the sea was strong and it was stronger now. She would follow it indefinitely, until she found the comfort in the sight of the sand and waves, and then she would continue to walk. She would become one with the sea, become part of it and fade away into oblivion. That had to be better than the pain.

It had to be easier.

Ariel squinted as she beheld the strange sight that was erected before her. There was a small crowd of people standing one behind the other, almost seeming eager to get something...whatever it was they were waiting for. She read the sign over and over as it loomed over her, child-like as she stood there. There was dirt on her face, her red hair was a tangled mess from the fall she had taken when the Earth had shaken. And then she had ended up in this strange jungle of rocks.

And ice cream ?

What was.....ice cream?

She knew ice....ice was hard, frozen water. When the winter came often things in the sea grew of ice and they became frozen. But she didn't know ice cream. And trying to imagine it was confusing. Her mind swirled over a few things she was familiar with, but nothing was clicking together the right way.

She canted her head to the side as her gaze lowered, watching a small child skip out of line holding something strange in his fingers. It was a dripping, pile of....pink? And green? And what was that thing it was sitting on as he held it?

Frustrated, lost and frightened, Ariel moved to sit down on the ground. She watched the crowd lessen, and then attract more. Her fingers rubbed absently over her eyes as she settled, sighing hard through her nose. Her frame was perched in the grass near the line, and try as she might she couldn't stop watching the strangers. All of them were strangers to her, all of them dressed in clothes she knew. She knew pants, shorts, shoes, shirts...dresses...the TARDIS had a large array of choices when it came to clothes.

Slumping her shoulders, Ariel finally moved to stand up and brushed off her clothes, which were also covered with dirt, and stayed out of the way of any of the others that might want to walk around with the strange....ice cream.