over and over again

M  A   E    A I talked to God to no avail Said, "If you won't save me, please don't waste my time." If a person with hardly any color could pale, then Maea did. She didn't notice the flicker of annoyance in his voice, nor did she try to keep up as he kept moving on ahead. It wasn't so much that she wouldn't, but rather... she couldn't. Maea couldn't even breathe. Impossible. No, no no! How, how was it even..!? "It's not possi.." but she caught herself before she could say it again, because... well, apprently it was? Somehow, without her noticing, a whole year had passed her. In the forest, in that storm... Somehow, for some reason, by the fickle twist of fate or worked by a sprite or whatever, she had walked for a year... in what seemed like little more than a day. Or maybe two. Or..? She couldn't recall. Her mind reeled. The breath picked up, grew unsteady as shock began to set in. As her knees began to buckle, Maea clutched tightly to the cloak, the shawl, to anything at all that was solid and unmoving and constant, because all of a sudden not even the rules of time seemed constant anymore. What about her friends? Were they safe, were they alive? What about the portals, and the secret she had discovered but never had the chance to tell anyone... how much had happened without her being there to help, without her even knowing about it? The farm, the guild, all the responsibility she had reached for and tried to place on others... It was all too much to take in. "I need to go home. Right now. I... is it far? How long until we get there?" She looked up, not quite able to focus on the disappearing back of the stranger - because he was, even if she did know his name. It was all she knew about him, after all. Realizing only then that she had stopped, Maea began to walk again, stumbling along as though she couldn't quite feel her feet.