Roughly based on 'Kings and Queens' by 30 Seconds to Mars

The last thing Elsa Schneider remembered was slipping. And falling. The feeling of absolute nothingness below her. Only empty space between her and the rocky, ominous bottom of the abyss.

She thought she was dead.

So, naturally, she was surprised when she was able to flicker her crystal blue eyes open. Soft moonlight was visible at the distant top of the chasm. Her lips were cracked, and her throat was dry. She took a shaky breath, and surveyed her surroundings when her eyes adjusted to the light. Dark rocks surrounded her, and everywhere she looked were craggly, extremley steep cliffs. There was barely any light that reached the bottom, and it was impossibly cold and damp.

She tried to sit up, and when she did, she noticed she was bleeding. Her arms and legs were scratched, and covered in dry blood. Her clothing was tattered. Her back ached. She estimated the drop. About 100, 200 feet.

How did she survive?

"Indy?" She called softly, with a tiny bit of hope. Of course, they had left at dusk, after Marcus Brody. She laid back down, and wondered what was worse: dying falling into a canyon, or somehow miraculously surviving, and having to wait for death to overtake her. It was then she noticed someone standing in the shadows of the cliffs. The Grail Knight.

"You chose...poorly." He whispered, and she stared at his netural expression.

"Why am I alive?" She wondered.

"I don't know. You tell me." He shrugged.

"God probably wants me to suffer longer for what I've done." Elsa scoffed, and the Grail Knight shook his head.

"You are a lucky one, Elsa Schneider."

"Well, there's nothing to do now except wait, I suppose."

"For?"

"Death!"

"You think you're going to die?"

"No food, no water; hurt? Yes, I do." She looked over at the Grail
Knight, whose attention was trained on something in the corner. She sat up wearily, and a sense of nausea overcame her. She closed her eyes, and when she opened them, she saw the Holy Grail, seeingly unharmed, by a rock.

The whole world faded, and the only thing that mattered was the Grail. The Knight watched what she was going to do with curiousity. Her eyes widened, and she got up unsteadily, and walked slowly over to it, entranced. Elsa took it in her hand, and twirled it around. What the Grail Knight didn't expect was the intense anger to flash in her lapis eyes, and for her to throw it as hard as she could into the darkness. When she returned, he raised an eyebrow, but didn't say anything until she had settled down on a rock.

"Why did you do that?"

"It's not worth it." She whispered. He stared at her, and said nothing until she drifted back into unconsciousness.

The next morning, Elsa woke up to soft sunlight blanketing her. She blinked a few times, and stretched. Her back still ached. She must have landed on it when she fell into the canyon. The Grail Knight was still leaning against the walls of the chasm, looking older than ever in the sunlight.

"Who are you?" He asked slowly, putting thought into the question.

"Dr. Elsa Schneider." She smiled, and rubbed her foot, which was bursting with pain. She hadn't noticed the pain last night, but she did now.

"But who are you?" He reiterated. She raised a perfectly sculpted eyebrow. "You said you're going to die. Don't you want someone to know your story before you go?"

"I suppose." She shrugged.

"So, who are you, Dr. Elsa Schneider?" He grinned, folding his hands in his lap.

"Wait, how'd you get down here?" She asked abruptly, looking up at the great distance to the top.

"Not relevent. Go on. From the very beginning."

"I was born in Salzburg, Austria. My birthday is December 14th. I currently reside in Vienna."

"Your parents? Your childhood?" He inquired.

"I was interested in art from an early age. My mother supported my education greatly. I was put in the best private schools in the city. My family was fairly well-off. My father owned his own company. I don't have any siblings. When I was fifteen, my mother and I moved to Graz."

"Why?" He questioned. Tears of sadness and fury glazed over her eyes, which had turned cold.

"My father was...verbally and physically abusive towards my mother. He had a problem with alcoholism. My mother thought by making my education a top priority that it would keep me away from their arguments. I finally had had enough, and I packed up our bags and we left the next time he was on a business trip." She sighed.

"I couldn't let him hurt her any longer. She was hesitant at first, but...soon she was happy with the idea. My father died four months later. Liver failure, from the alcoholism."

"What were you like in school?" The Grail Knight wondered, feeling saddened, and wanting to change the subject.

"Top of my class. Popular, I suppose, but I didn't really take the time to make many friends. In Graz, I was seen as the new girl, like everyone else who moves somewhere new. Not ignored, but...left out of everything. Last one picked in everything, even though I was smart and athletic. I went to Cambridge, in England, for university. By then, I had learned French, Italian, Greek, Spanish, Latin, Arabic, and Mandarin, along with German and English, of course. My mother was so proud of me."

Her voice was turning far away, and he noticed her eyelids drooping. She was tired, and no doubt hungry and thirsty, too. He watched her carefully as she told her story, and the Knight gathered that she didn't share her past with just anyone.

"Would you like to sleep?" He asked, and Elsa nodded, her eyes already closed. She laid down, exhausted already. She was asleep in seconds.

Elsa woke up a few hours later. The late afternoon night was illuminating the whole cave in a dusky light. The Grail Knight was still in the shadows, watching her. The burning in her throat was becoming unbearable. She had never been this thirsty before. She could go without food for awhile, but not without water.

"Continue, please." He requested. She raised a confused eyebrow. "You left off when you were going to Cambridge?"

"Oh. Right." She said, her voice cracking from the lack of water. "I went to Cambridge, and eventually got my doctorate in Art History. Not a lot of woman get doctorates nowadays, so everyone was pretty shocked."

"Your mother included." He smiled.

"Yes. Shocked, but very proud. All of the dreams she had for me came true."

"When did you first learn about the Grail?" The Knight wondered. Elsa sighed.

"I read Le Morte d'Arthur by Sir Thomas Malory when I was thirteen. In French, but when I was fourteen, and my English was good enough, I read it in English. I sort of forgot about it. I wasn't very interested in knights and castles and that sort of thing. But my mom wanted me to read it, and so did all of my tutors."

"What happened when you finished university?"

"Right. I got a job working with the University of Vienna. I didn't teach, but I worked with the school and the Museum of Fine Arts. I traveled, visiting various museums and archeaological digs. At the digs, I would date the artifacts, and other things like that. I was living my dream."

"Did you have a special someone?" He inquired with a smirk, and Elsa rolled her eyes.

"No. I mean, many of my male colleagues found me...attractive and asked me out numerous times. I refused. I never had the time to forge relationships."

"When did you join the Nazis?" The Knight asked softly, watching her intently.

"I'm not a Nazi." She replied coldly.

"Then why did you join them?"

"They showed up at my door one day. They knew that I was becoming a more prominent figure in the art world. They needed help looking for the Spear of Destiny. The-"

"Sword that pierced the side of Jesus at the Crucifiction." The Knight murmured.

"Yes. Christian mythology wasn't my specialty, but it wasn't like I could say no. Anyway, they never found the Spear of Destiny. I never thought they would find it, but I kept my suspicions to myself. Well, once you work for the Nazis, you're in forever.

"They thought I would be the next great thing. The rising star of the Nazi party. My mother would be horrified. I never told her. She hated the Nazis more than I did."

"You never tried to leave?" He wondered. Elsa shook her head.

"No. It would be impossible. I would probably be killed. I was brought to Berlin, to meet with a lot of officials." Tears clouded over her eyes, and her voice turned far away. "They brought me on a tour of Auschwitz. I still have nightmares about that place. I can still see the children lining up with their parents, going into the gas chambers. The screams still echo in my mind.

"The book burnings were horrible, as well. All of the culture, the education; destroyed in a matter of seconds. It was malevolent. It makes me sick to think about."

"Was there anything that set you over the edge? Made you want to leave everything behind?" The Grail Knight questioned solemnly. She closed her eyes, and took a deep breath.

"It was my second month in Berlin. I was going back to Vienna in a few weeks. We were walking around Lustgarten. They were showing me all around Berlin, and we were looking at the Berlin Cathedral. A man was running a market stand nearby. Fruits, vegetables, bread. He came running up to us, and said a boy had stolen a loaf of bread. He was running across the park, and the men I was with caught him.

"He couldn't have been more than six. He had the Star of David on his coat. Jewish. His clothes were all worn and dirty. He was too thin, and he was terrified. They decided to bring him to Theresienstadt. A little boy to a concentration camp all by himself. They decided to bring him that day, and I had to sit in the back of the car and watch him. He was quiet. It was a three hour drive, and about an hour into it, they gave me a sandwhich and a soda for lunch. I waited for them to back into the front part of the car.

"Here." She said, handing the little boy next to her her lunch. He looked up at her in confusion. "Take it. I'm not hungry." The boy slowly unwrapped the sandwhich, and looked up at her again. She nodded encouragingly. He dug into the sandwhich ravenously, and gulped down the soda. "What's your name, dear?"

"David." He said between bites.

"And how old are you, David?"

"Six." He replied.

"Is there anyone we can contact? Your parents?" Elsa wondered. David shrugged, and finished off the soda.

"No. They left awhile ago."

"Left?"

"Big men, like the ones you were with, took them away." He said softly. "I stayed with my aunt and uncle. They said my parents died. Then, they were taken away, too. I've lived on the street ever since."

"And when was that?"

"Three years ago, maybe." He shrugged, and she stared at him as he finished her lunch. "What's your name?"

"Dr. Elsa Schneider." She smiled. He really was quite talkative. He told her about his dog, and the friends he had made. He was quite smart. She hadn't noticed the car had stopped.

"Dr. Schneider, it's time to go." An officer said, yanking David out of the car. She stepped out of the car after him, and followed them into the line of people waiting to get branded. David looked up at her in alarm.

"Will you stay with me, Dr. Schneider?" David whispered.

"Sure." She nodded, and held his hand gently. David kept talking, but she was watching the other prisioners stare at her with disgust and hatred. They finally reached the front of the line, and David was hanging onto her for dear life.

"Please, Dr. Schneider, don't let them." He pleaded. The brander rolled his eyes impatiently.

"David, please, it'll only hurt for a second." His screams said otherwise. She lifted him into her arms after it was all over with, and he stared at the number on his arm in silence. It was a long line to get into the concentration camp as well. They waited in silence, and when they reached the front of the line, he wrapped his arms around her neck.

"Don't leave me, Dr. Schneider." He whispered. Elsa asked him to questions on the form quietly. Finally, the form was complete, and she was bringing him through those massive gates, but the guard yanked her back.

"I'm sorry, miss, but you can't go in there."

"Dr. Schneider!" David cried as she set him down hesistantly. Suddenly, he was being dragged through the gate, and he was screaming and crying. "Dr. Schneider!" She watched in silence as he was dragged through the camp, but then he jerked his arms away, and was running towards the fence once again. He reached the fence, and he was crying. "Don't leave me here, Dr. Schneider. Please, don't!" She leaned forward, bent down, and rested her hands on the fence. His hands reached through the holes, touching hers.

"I'll come and visit you, I swear. I won't let anything happen to you." Elsa insisted sincerely, looking right into the boy's sad, dark eyes.

"Dr. Schneider." He pleaded again, just as the guard yanked him away again.

"Dr. Schneider, it's time to leave." The man who brought her there told her from behind her. She didn't say anything as she got into the car, and left with them.

"Two weeks later, I thought that I'd check up on him. He died from cholera." Elsa whispered, the tears falling from her face.

"I'm sorry." The Grail Knight said softly. He waited awhile, until she calmed down to continue. "How'd you get involved with Donovan?"

"I had made my way up through the ranks throughout time. I had kept my fears, and my digust with the Nazis a secret. I went to parties, was associated with the highest ranks in the Nazi party. I knew Hilter had been searching for the Holy Grail. Then, Donovan unearthed the tablet, and contacted us. They sent me to the Grunwald Castle, on the Austro-German border, to meet with the team that was on the Holy Grail case.

"And what was that like?" He asked.

"Horrible." Elsa whispered, looking away. "I was the only woman there, and...they were...sexually abusive."

"They forced you?" He wondered solemnly.

"All the time. It was terrible. I wanted to leave so badly. Run away, and leave all of it behind. Then, I was sent to Venice, with Dr. Henry Jones, Sr."

"The man who was shot?" The Grail Knight inquired. She nodded.

"He was a sweet man. I also had to seduce him. He was like my father, or my grandfather. It wasn't like that at all. But, things happened, and then the Nazis took him back to the Castle. I had to stay in Venice to meet Marcus Brody, and Indy."

"The man who tried to save you?" Elsa smiled sadly.

"Yes. After everything I put him through, he still tried to save me."

"You seem to like him very much." She laughed, and blushed.

"Indiana Jones is the kind of man you never forget, and I know I never will. I know the Nazis only made me get close to him for the Grail Diary, but...I thought there was something real between us."

"You hurt him, however." The Knight confirmed, and she nodded.

"Yes, and greatly so. I never wanted to. I...loved him. I was enamored with him. He was unlike anyone I had ever met." Her voice turned soft, and far away as she remembered their wonderful time in Venice. The minutes of silence ticked by.

"You should rest, Dr. Schneider." The Knight said quietly, and Elsa nodded, and stiffled a yawn. He watched her silently fall asleep, and waited for her to wake up once again.

When Elsa Schneider woke up again, it was nighttime. She had a little more trouble getting up. She knew she was dying. No food, no water. Only an immortal knight to help her pass the time away. She sensed him standing in the shadows next to her.

"Why did you go after the Holy Grail, Dr. Schneider?" He inquired. "You said yourself that you forgot about it, and knights and princesses and fairytales weren't interesting to you." Elsa blinked.

"My mother. She has lung cancer, and its spread to her lymph nodes. She's dying. The doctors said they can't save her, and there is nothing they can do." She whispered. "I thought maybe the Grail would save her. She's done everything for me, and I thought I would be able to repay her.

"It was selfish of me. She knows she's going to die, and she knows it's her time. It was greedy of me to try to take that away from her. I'll never be able to see her again." There was a long silence, and it seemed like hours had gone by before the Grail Knight asked,

"And you know you're-"

"Pregnant?" She interrupted. "Yes. A few weeks. It would be a miracle if the baby actually survived that fall, and no food or water..."

"Does anybody know? The Nazis?" He inquired.

"No. Especially not the Nazis. It would be diasterous if they found out." Elsa said quietly.

"And who's the father?" The Grail Knight wondered, interested.

"Indy." She whispered.

"You're sure? I mean, you told me about Dr. Henry Jones, Sr., and the Nazis..."

"Very sure. And I can't think of anyone else who'd I want to be the father of my child."

"What are you going to do about it?" She smiled saddly.

"Nothing. I mean, I'm going to die down here, and the baby with me."

"I take it you didn't tell Indiana Jones, then?" Elsa laughed bitterly.

"No. I couldn't after everything I put him through. He hates me for betraying him, and thinks I'm a Nazi."

"If he was here right now, would you tell him?"

"Probably not." The Grail Knight was shocked.

"Why not?"

"He'd try to save me, but I think I deserve to die for what I've done." She whispered. "I belonged to the Nazis, watched thousands of books burn, and thousands of people die. I manipulated people, and let greed overtake me." The Grail Knight watched her. He could tell she was dying, too.

"Rest, Dr. Schneider." He pleaded softly, and she gladly obliged, falling into a dreamless sleep.

To her surprise, the sunlight woke up Elsa Schneider. It took a few moments for her to comprehend that she wasn't at the bottom of an abyss anymore. She was back in the entryway of the temple, lying on one of the many pieces of the cracked floor. She knotted her eyebrows in confusion, and sat up, looking down carefully into the chasm in which she fell.

"Still hungry, Dr. Schneider?" Someone inquired from behind her, and she turned to see the Grail Knight was a tray of fruit and water in his hands. Her eyes widened. "Eat up." He handed her the tray, and she gulped down the water in seconds, and starting digging into the grapes.

"How'd you get me up here?" She wondered between bites.

"Same way I got down there."

"And the food?"

"I still have to eat." He shrugged. Half way through a banana, and her second goblet of water, and looked up at the Grail Knight.

"Why'd you bring me up here?"

"You said that you thought you were alive because God wanted you to suffer for your decision." He said slowly, and she nodded. "I now know why you are alive. I watched you tell your story, and so did God. God kept you alive because he knew you learned your lesson." She blinked, and knitted her eyebrows together in confusion as she set down the banana.

"You think I deserve to live?" The Knight nodded.

"I do, and He does, too." She finished all the fruit, and three more cups of water in silence. She felt rejuvienated, and slowly shook her long, blonde hair out of her bun. "There is a town four miles north of here. Go there. They will help you. Hopefully, you can get there before the sun is high in the sky."

"And then what?" She asked, as she walked towards the entrance carefully with the Grail Knight.

"They'll help you get back to Vienna, but there are certain circumstances which you must follow, unless you want me to bring you back into that abyss again." Elsa nodded slowly. "First, once you get to Vienna, get a new job. Maybe in England, where you went to university. Second, don't tell the Nazis you are alive. Don't tell anyone that you're alive. People are so terrified of the Nazis these days, that they will alert them as soon as they see you. Third, manage you greed. That's what got you almost dead. Fourth, and this is very important: Don't go and find Indiana Jones, and tell him about the baby." She was about to ask a question, but he continued. "You must learn responsibility, Dr. Schneider. Maybe one day you'll cross paths again."

"Okay." She agreed, and before she turned to leave, and wrapped him in a hug, much to his surprise. "Thank you so much. I'll never be able to repay you." She stood outside the temple, about to leave, and turned to face the Grail Knight.

"You're a good person, Elsa Schneider." He called to her from behind the seal. "And good luck."