InsaneJournal

Who: Rachel Greene
What: Arriving in Eerie Harbor, going through processing at the Facility
When: The last few weeks of May
Where: The Department of Anomalies Facility
Status: Narrative, Complete
Warnings: Nothing NSFW!




The bright, lightning-like flash caught her by surprise, more than anything else. There was a vague sense of motion in her gut, like the drop after the first hill on a roller coaster, and she dropped her shopping bags and purse with a gasp, stumbling over the dirt. ...Dirt? She'd been just heading back upstairs to work after her lunch break - one of the benefits of working for Bloomingdale's was the proximity to the storefront for a quick shopping trips - and there shouldn't be any dirt here.

"Miss?"

Rachel let out a startled yelp and whipped around, only to yelp again. There were people! Big, scary, intimidating people with serious faces and matching uniforms and masks over their mouths and noses, and this was not Bloomingdales. She froze, hands over her mouth. She wasn't even on Broadway anymore. ...Where in the hell was she? "Where am I? Who are you?"

"Miss, if you can please remain calm. I understand you must be confused, but we'll be happy to explain everything."

The nearest person, a huge guy with arms bigger than her thigh, held out a hand - he was gonna grab her! Rachel squawked and spluttered, slapping at his hands. "NO DON'T TOUCH ME!" She snapped, skittering back. He held his hands up and backed off, and she stared back at him. He and the big lady next to him watched her intently, and the others behind them, perhaps five or six of them, were watching as well, but none of them tried to touch her again.

Suddenly she felt very self-conscious.

Rachel forced a laugh. "I know what's going on here. What is this, are you kidnapping me? How'd I get here? Did you drug me?"

"No, miss, we didn't bring you here. No one here is going to hurt you - we're here to help. Are you able to walk? Could you could step this way, please?" He gestured behind him, sort of to Rachel's right, and she glanced over to see a door.

She shook her head. "Oh no no no, I'm not going anywhere with you! ....Where are we?" She turned, taking in the huge room. It looked almost like an atrium of some sort - wide bare dirt and smooth white walls, perhaps forty feet across, but there was sunlight coming from somewhere high above. She looked up.

It was not sunlight.

An enormous, glowing, whirling, silvery thingy was drifting in the air above her. She realized that there was strange, humming, shushing sound coming from it, soft but resonant. And as she watched, it swirled into a tighter, glaring white circle, and then just... closed up and disappeared into itself. And then, there was the sunlight, peeking through a massive skylight far above her.

"Miss, please," this was the woman now. She had dark hair and unlike the others, was wearing purple hospital scrubs. She stepped slowly closer to Rachel, hands offered beseechingly, but not grabbing.

"What was that?" Rachel said, words quick and shocked. The woman cautiously, gently, steered her back around. Rachel stumbled after her, still looking up, though she wasn't taking anything in. "Did you see...? Wha- a, big... swirly.... thingy?" She turned shocked eyes to the woman, who herded her towards the door. Beefy Guy scooped up Rachel's bags, and the others closed ranks around her.

"I know, the Portal's really something, isn't it?" said the woman, holding out her hands, but not touching.

"Portal?" Rachel said, voice short and tense, staring at the woman.

"My name is Elicia. You're safe, and we're here to help you. Can you tell me your name?"

"Uh... Um. Rachel. Rachel Greene." Too late she thought perhaps she shouldn't be sharing her name with these strangers, but... she was more than a little off-kilter at this point; she got a pass. She craned her neck over her shoulder, looking back down the wide hallway at the dirt-floored room. Past the other uniformed people behind them, she could see the doors shut.

"Hello, Rachel, it's nice to meet you. Can you tell me how you're feeling? Any pain or nausea? Shortness of breath?"

"I- No? Should I? Am I sick? Oh my god, is it like an outbreak or something?" the shock wasn't fading, but now there was a stroke of fear coming in. Something was really really wrong. They carried on down hallway, which appeared to have no doors. It crossed her mind that you could probably have driven a bus through it.


"No no, nothing like that. We're taking you to the medical bay to get you checked out, though." Elicia's voice was soothing, as were her warm brown eyes. She looked about 50 or so, and kind of reminded Rachel of someone's mother. Rachel walked a little closer to her. She spied a pair of double doors about halfway down, but Elicia and her scientist friends hurried Rachel past it.

"Well then... why are you all wearing masks? Do I need one?"

Elicia laughed softly. "We've all got wards on, but it wouldn't hurt, just as a precaution! Here," they paused in the hall, and she pulled a medical mask from the pocket on her scrubs. "May I touch you? Just to give you the mask?"

Rachel hesitated, then nodded. Elicia nodded and stepped closer, folding the nosepiece of the mask. "There's no outbreak, but we do have some concerns about your immune system's ability to cope here." She explained as she helped Rachel to put it on properly. "There are doctors and mages on hand that can help with this, but we will unfortunately need to quarantine you-"

"Quarantine?" Rachel put her hand up again, laughing nervously. "Hey, whoa. Okay, let's pump the breaks there, missy! I can quarantine just fine in my apartment, alright?"

"I'm afraid you can't, Rachel," Elicia said. She sounded truly apologetic. "You remember the Portal?"

"Portal. Yeah. Yeah! The big swirly shiny thingy!" She smacked a fist into her palm.

"Yes, that's right. Think of it like a gateway, from one world to another. From your world, to our world."

Rachel paused, staring at the older woman. "My god, you sound like something out of Star Trek!"

Elicia laughed. "Yes, we get that a lot. Unfortunately it's true - you came through that portal. From wherever you were, to here."

"...Well can't I just go back through it?" Rachel asked.

"I'm afraid it's closed down."

"So open it back up," she bit out, voice tightening.

"We don't know how."

"You- you don't know how." Okay, now the shock was fading, making room for a degree of anger instead.

"Yes. We have our best scientists and mages working on it, but unfortunately-"

"Stop saying that! Stop saying that word! Unfortunately - just stop it!" She squawked, then paused a beat. "...What's a mage?" she asked tersely.

~*~*~*~*~

It took a lot of cajoling and explaining right there in the hall before Rachel could calm herself enough to continue down the walkway. Elicia took her straight to the Medbay, as promised. It was not unlike the average Doctor's office, with all the usual sort of equipment and similar smells. The rest of their entourage disappeared (taking her shopping bag and her purse with them!) and Rachel was swept into a private room with one of those padded table/bench/bed things, with the roll of paper and everything. Elicia stayed with her the entire time, and she and the doctor that came and introduced himself as Dr. Khatri set about taking Rachel's vitals and asking her all sorts of weird questions (was she human? Uh, yeah? Of course? What else would she be?). Rachel followed their lead and answered all the questions as best as she could (did she have powers? What???).

They even took her clothes, and gave her a soft gray t-shirt and sweats, plus soft slippers to wear. When she asked why should couldn't just keep her own clothes, they mentioned that she'd be here for a little while, and they wouldn't want her to have to wear dirty laundry. "But I just bought some clothes, I can change if I need to!" Ah, but they'd taken her shopping bag somewhere, and her purse. Rachel didn't like that at all, but they'd just said something about checking for contraband. In the meantime, she'd have to wear the provided soft but shapeless cotton clothes.

She sighed and paced in the room she now found herself in. It wasn't huge - perhaps the size of her bedroom back home. There was a simple twin bed with plain grey bedding, a simple rug on the linoleum floors, and a generic colorful print of flowers on the wall like a hotel room. There was a bedside table with large water bottle and a few books neatly lined up on it. She didn't recognize any of the titles or authors. The ceiling light was recessed, but decent, and there was also a small window, but it didn't open, and the glass was strange - it seemed oddly thick and had a strangely buzzing texture, almost like there was something electrical on the other side, even though all she could see was sky. Pulling the nightstand over to stand on, she peeked out. She was on perhaps the second story, and out beyond the glass, it just looked like vast empty fields, with an edge of trees obscuring the horizon and a long, straight road. It didn't seem familiar at all, but then, if what they'd been telling her was true, she supposed that made sense.

She hopped down off the table and slid it back over to the bed. Dusting off her hands, she looked uncertainly back at the door. There was a small window in it, but she'd been grateful to close the curtain on her side so no one could see in. The door was ~unfortunately~ locked tight. Next to the entryway to the room was a second door that led to a small bathroom with a stand-up shower, and a small wardrobe with more soft, nondescript clothes. They were all roughly in her size, and they were all the same gray.

She didn't like that they'd taken her things. Her purse was bad enough - it had her wallet, her ID, her keys... but they had to take her clothes, even! She may as well not be wearing anything at all, for how vulnerable she felt. She sunk onto the bed, sniffling and teary-eyed. She hated this. She missed Monica. She missed her apartment - the purple one, not the boys' apartment they'd been tricked into. ...Though, even that apartment would be better than this expressionless room that reminded her of an institution.

She wanted nothing more right now than to be curling up on the couch with the gang to watch a movie, or the noise and homey, warm smells of Central Perk. If she'd known that she would end up sitting in this empty, creepy little room with its stupid painting of lilies and its stupid gray clothes, she'd have never left the apartment this morning. Screw the new job. She hadn't wanted it anyways. Stupid demotion. Stupid Bloomingdales, killing her department. Stupid Joanna, forgetting to file Rachel's promotion paperwork before getting hit by the stupid bus. This was all her fault, clearly.

Rachel laid down on the bed, hugging herself tightly, and tried to swallow the sob rising in her throat.

~*~*~*~*~*~

"No, I told you already, I don't have any magic powers," Rachel said, exasperated. She ran a hand through her messy hair. She was getting frizzy. She missed blowdryers.

"We understand, Rachel," said the lady agent across the table. Whatshername. Rachel couldn't remember. L-something. "We just wanted to check for anything we might have missed." Rachel sighed and sat back, looking over at the glass door.

She was in another boring white room, but at least this one she could see out to the main common area. She'd been upgraded out of quarantine a few days ago, so thank God for that. Stepping outside had been nice, the May sunshine warming her skin. They'd also given her back her clothing, all freshly laundered. She'd only freaked out a little, and the man in charge of giving back their affects had been quick to assure her that they'd followed the washing instructions on the tags to a T. That dress was dry-clean only; she'd have been really mad if they ruined it before she even got a chance to wear it. She was still missing her purse, but she'd been assured that once they were finished with processing all her paperwork, she should have her belongings returned in full.

"Rachel," said Agent Torres, and she looked up at him demurely. "You have to understand, there may be things that seem very normal to you that aren't to us." She nodded along, smiling slightly at the cute DA officer. Oh, she liked Lady Officer just fine as well, but Agent Torres - Yum. He gestured with his nice, tanned hands when he talked. "Abilities or habits that you wouldn't think twice about because they're so average, but might not be part of our physical - or magical - capabilities."

She sighed, pressing her lips together. "Okay. Well. I can swim. I can... sail a boat," she offered, clapping a hand on her crossed legs. "And I have excellent fashion sense." She paused, looking at them expectantly before slumping. "Come on, you've already asked me all these. I got nothing."

Lady Agent turned a few pages in her binder, smiling ruefully. "I understand how trying this all has been Rachel. We just want to make sure we do right by you while you're here, and that means understanding your needs as best we can."

"Yeah, I get that. I guess this is all just a little hard to swallow, still," Rachel said, gesturing vaguely at the room. "You know I'm still not sure I believe in all this magic stuff. All these questions about me and no one's even bothered to show me yours first."

Agent Torres smiled. "Is that so? Agent Laren?" Laren, of course! That was it.

Agent Laren held her hand out, fluttering her fingers as she turned her palm upwards in the air, and suddenly a soft, golden glow surrounded her hand. Rachel startled and yelped, her hands flailing a little. She uncrossed her legs, pressing her hands against her mouth as she stared at the warm light. She was still for a long moment, caught by the glow, then laughed softly. "Ohhh that's really something." She shared a smile with Agent Laren through the glow. Then suddenly a shower of sparks shimmered up from Agent Laren's palm like fireworks, and Rachel gasped and leaned back. The sparks twirled in the air, shifting into the shape of a bird. Rachel laughed in delight, watching the shimmering bird shape fly up above their heads before fading away. "Oh, you've got to teach me to do that. Wow."

Agent Laren laughed and turned back to her binder. "Maybe later, if you've got the knack for it."