[MillietheWarrior]

Minerva, Tide Kuhna

---

Okay. I’ve read some bullshit endings before, but I have to admit, that was the worst.

I mean, God, why not just cut all their legs off and call it a day, right? Karen Traviss was crazy, I think.

I couldn’t even stand to look at the book that sat in my lap. Seriously. Even just having it sitting there made me want to toss it at the wall. What the hell kind of ending was that? “Messed up,” I mumbled, glancing briefly at the cover before following through with my previous thought and actually tossing it at the wall. It landed with a satisfying ‘thump’ and fell to the ground.

----

(Here there be Star Wars characters)

[MillietheWarrior]

It’d taken me all of two days to finish the damn book. Two wasted days of my life I’d never friggin’ get back. I was so disappointed in the ending, I didn’t consider the rest of the book, or it’s predecessors; it was a moot point now.

I grabbed my guitar case, slinging it over my shoulder and shoving some of my crap into the top two pockets. Nothing fancy: just my wallet and some extra picks, stuffed together with two other books…the predecessors of the last Republic Commando book I’d just spoken of. Yeah. I’m a nerd. Whatever. Don’t judge me, but I carry the damn things everywhere with me. I mean, what if I get bored? Like I said, don’t judge.

[MillietheWarrior]

I glanced over at the book that lay inconspicuously on the floor and I paused, considering it. Did I really need the stupid thing? It had already failed in the department of ‘not disappointing me’, so why the hell shouldn’t I leave it?

Ah crud.

Might as well take the dang thing.

[MillietheWarrior]

I trudged over to the wall and grabbed it with more force than I should have; psh, like the book could even tell I was mad. Stupid piece of literary disappointment. I could even resist grumbling at it as I slipped through the house and out the door. Look at me, grumbling at books. My mother would be proud.

It was nice living on my own, but I’ll admit, it got lonely from time to time. I didn’t have much family left, and even the ones I still did have lived halfway across the country. So I tended to be by myself a lot. I made my living as a waitress at a local diner, and moonlighted as a guitarist for a local band. I made a decent enough salary, and I rented a small apartment in one of the ‘not-so-friendly’ neighborhoods in town.

[MillietheWarrior]

I got used to it. Living in a place like this, one had to learn to toughen their ass up, or get their ass beat. I was one of the ones who toughened up. I mean, I carried a freakin’ pocket knife on me…Not that I’d ever used it, but you can never be sure, right?

I wrapped my hand around the strap of my guitar case, and then headed towards the door. When I reached down, hand poised above the knob, I suddenly felt this weird…feeling.

[MillietheWarrior]

All right, you know when you get those weird, tingly feelings that make you think something is wrong? The ‘I see dead people’ tightening at the back of your neck? Yeah. It was like that, but like, ten times worse. Seriously. I shudder to use the phrase, but it was a bit like the ‘Jedi tingly sense feeling’. But that was just the nerd in me speaking.

I shook my head, but I still couldn’t ignore the feeling. My hand descended on the knob, and for a moment, the feeling dissipated and disappeared completely.

[MillietheWarrior]

I let out a silent breath, glad the weirdness was over. I did not need any more ‘weird’ in my life. I was already a closet Star Wars geek, who secretly wore Chewbacca and Boba Fett shirts when no one was around: weird was the last thing I wanted on my plate. .

Of course, karma is a bitch, and it punched me in the face a second before I realized that the door was no longer in front of me. “Aw, fuck,” I muttered, before I felt myself plunge into darkness.

----

[MillietheWarrior]

The first thing I realized as I regained consciousness, was that my ankle hurt.

Like hell.

The second thing I realized was that I was no longer in my apartment. Heck, I was no longer in my neighborhood, or my city, or my town. I was….

“In a friggin’ forest?”

[MillietheWarrior]

Oh hells to the no! I don’t know what kind of strange, trippy ass hippy thing this was, but I sure as hell was not going to deal with it. Did someone put something in my food? Well, that would be impossible, since no one was in my house at the time…So it led to only one explanation.

Ninjas spiked my drink.

“Those bastards,” I mumbled, but I couldn’t keep the amused smile off my face. God, even I was too stupid for myself sometimes. But man, you have to admit, that was funny right there.

[MillietheWarrior]

Of course, whatever amusement I was skimming off of my mental processes was cut short when I remember the ankle crisis. I quickly averted my attention down to my foot, and realized the stupid thing was twisted. Not broken, thank God, because I didn’t feel the kind of lancing pain you felt when you broke a bone, but definitely twisted.

The ankle, of course, was the least of my problems. Right now, I had to figure out how I ended up in a  forest, in the middle of nowhere, in the middle of the day. I could have sworn it was night when I was stepping out the door. But then, I also could have sworn I wasn’t in a damn forest too, but who’s keeping track?

[MillietheWarrior]

With a grimace, I hauled myself to my feet using the nearest tree, feeling the familiar, comforting weight of my guitar case nearly pull me over backwards. Way to go guitar case; thanks for being a damn hero.

Okay. Enough mental chit-chat: it was time to gain my bearings and figure out where the hell I really was.

Easier freaking said than done, of course, as I had no idea where I was, how I got here, or what was going on. This was some crazy Twilight Zone stuff, I just know it. I immediately started humming the Twilight Zone theme song out loud, quietly amusing myself and getting side-tracked once more. I tend to do that a lot.

[MillietheWarrior]

I, of course, was saved from another mental side-track by the sound of approaching footsteps.

Now, I’ve never actually been known for being level headed, and usually, I tend to overreact. I mean, shit, I see a coat move on the hangar of the door, and I automatically assume there’s some sort of monster lurking behind it, ready to jump out and eat me. So of course, the footsteps sent me spiraling into what I like to call ‘freak-out-mode’ while I leaned against the tree.

“Oh shit,” I mumbled to myself, wondering if it would be worth it to risk breaking my ankle and running away.

[MillietheWarrior]

I couldn’t move, and I hoped I blended in enough with the tree that whatever was coming towards me would just…not see me at all.

Ha! Fat chance. Remember when I said Karma was a bitch? Yeah. I got punched in the face by it again when a figure in armor stepped through the tree and pointed a gun at me. A friggin' gun. Yeah, that’s right. ‘Freak-out-mode’ turned into ‘holy-shit-I’m-going-to-die’ mode.

“Who the shab are you? And what are you doing on my land?”

Ha. Fuckity. Ha.

[MillietheWarrior]

Someone was playing a God damn trick on me, and when I found out who it was, I was going to buy a pair of cleats and step on them until they looked like the top of a sprinkler. “Dude, I don’t know who you are, but seriously? Are you actually wearing armor, and speaking Mando’a? Classy, dude. But I’m not buying it. Who the hell put you up to this? And they better have some damn good lawyers, ‘cuz my friggin’ ankle feels like it’s broken, and when I find them, I will sue their ass for all it’s worth.”

[MillietheWarrior]

The helmeted person just stared at me. Or, well, I assumed they were staring. The thing about helmets, is they don’t really let you see the face of the other person. Handy trick, that. I bet whoever they were, their face was either screwed up in laughter, or in shock that their weird little prank had been unearthed so quickly.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. Now who are you, and why are you here?”

I blinked when I realized it was a woman’s voice. Did I know any women that liked or hated me well enough to play some elaborate prank like this? I didn’t think so.