The Trouble with Time, Part 13 - Sugar

She steps into the Garden, then stops. Looks back at Kevin. He smiles to her encouragingly, and then is suddenly gone. The gates have closed behind her. She's alone now.

She takes a deep breath, and focuses on how she's feeling. Good. She's feeling good. Not great, considering she can't remember farther back than a few hours, but she's not feeling the effects of the Garden yet. Probably. Would she know if she forgot something? Or would the memory just disappear, without so much as a trace of its existence? She guesses the second. So she needs to focus on something in particular, keep checking if it's there. If she remembers the thing, then things are maybe ok. If she doesn't remember what it was she was supposed to remember, then... maybe that's the first memory to go, and she remembers everything else.

Enough standing around. You need to get going. There might be few memories you have to lose by staying longer than you need to, but they're kinda relevant to getting out.

She sets out briskly walking through the gold and touches the small bag hanging around her neck. The bag contains her instructions, for when she forgets. Because she has so few memories, Kevin thinks forgetting most of it is more likely than not. So she has a paper, that will keep telling her what's important.

~x~

She's hungry. She has no idea when she's eaten last. She's walking through a garden but nothing here seems edible. She digs through her pack and finds packets of sugar and water. Sugar? Why is there sugar in the pack? That doesn't seem like a good food. But she empties a couple of packets, and it makes her feel a little bit better.

She checks the rest if her pockets. There's a small bag around her neck, with some papers inside. She unfolds the papers.

You're in a Garden that takes memories, the paper informs her. She realizes she didn't remember that, or how she got there. She does remember she needs to find an orange, and she thinks she's heading in the right direction. I know it's all very confusing, depending on how much you've forgotten, but the task you have taken on is simple: find the Orange Tree, and bring back an Orange. No one is making you do it. You want to do it. You need to do it, to remember again. The compass in the small top pocket in your bag will show you the way out, back to friends, once you have the Orange.

Ok. She remembers enough. She remembers the feeling of urgency. She remembers she needs to find the Oranges. That's all that matters right now.

She looks at the map she finds in her backpack, reorients herself, and keeps walking. There's no other way. She's two thirds of the way there.

~x~

She's standing under an orange tree. The Orange Tree, something in her remembers. This is an important tree, and she needs to pick the oranges. And... Take them somewhere. She knows it's important, but she can't quite find the reason for that in her mind. But if it's important she picks some Oranges, then she'll pick some Oranges.

One.
Two.
How many?
Three.
Maybe it was three. Three seems like a good number.

But now what? She needs to take them to someone. Why can't she remember?

This place is weird. It's making her uncomfortable. The Garden. Everything is golden. She wants to leave, but she's not sure how. She remembers knowing, but she doesn't anymore. She sits down, has some water from her pack. She finds some papers in a bag around her neck.

The compass in the small top pocket in your bag will show you the way out, back to friends, once you have the Orange.

She finds the compass exactly where the note says it should be. It's pointing to the direction she came from. She stands up and starts walking, despite the fact that her feet are already hurting.
__________________________

Oh, I'm tired. The good thing about the time difference is that even if you're getting your thing out 16 hours late, I'll still be awake for hours, almost to the next deadline, so I can write my part on time anyway. But I have to say, not an enjoyable thing to do. Especially since I spent three of the six-ish hours I have between you getting yours written and me going to sleep walking in a forest looking for animals in the dark.
Anyway. Here it is. On time. Not very good, or very long, but on time.

The topic for tomorrow is Something.
(No, I didn't use that as a placeholder and forget to put the real topic in its place. The topic actually is Something.)

~matleena