Disclaimer: No one and nothing in Middle-earth belongs to me. Everything belongs to Tolkien and I am not making any money from this.

Thank you to Lady Elwing and her neverending patience with my evil little commas.

Ainulindalë – The Truth

It all began- no, not with the forging of the great rings, but with a very bored Eru Ilúvatar.

He had been sitting in the ever-present silence of his yet empty realm for a long time now, and finally realized that something was missing.

He scratched his head, frowned and wondered what to do about it. Then he had an idea. Maybe it would be less boring if he had some company here, someone who could entertain him.

And so he created the Ainur from his thoughts,  taught them music and thus fashioned his own version of radio.

They stood before him in his halls and sang, and he listened to their fair voices with great delight. But even the greatest delight does not last forever, and he eventually got bored again. But soon he had another idea.

So he called them all together, presented to them a mighty theme, asked them to bring into that theme their own ideas, and make a great musical from it.

The Ainur looked at each other, quite unsure of what Eru expected from them, and started chattering excitedly. Finally they had discussed the idea long enough, and had come up with lots of ideas. They stood before Eru again and started singing. They had elaborated Eru's theme, and painted a wonderful picture with their words and melodies with elements of their own, not even Eru himself had thought of.

Eru listened and as the Ainur brought their musical painting to life inside his imagination, a new idea suddenly struck him. But before he could finish that thought, the perfection of the music was disturbed by an awful discord. The Ainur also perceived it, and suddenly there was silence and all eyes turned to Melkor, the source of that discord.

Melkor, shy at first, but eventually carried away by the beauty of the music, had unconsciously joined the singing, though explicitly told not to do so under any circumstances. Because unlike his brethren he was not a great singer and his voice tended to switch between high-pitched shrieking and low grumbling.

When he noticed that all attention suddenly had turned to him, his mouth closed slowly and he blushed deeply. His gaze sank to the floor and he slowly backed away, trying to escape this unwanted attention.

When he had disappeared from sight, the other Ainur resumed their singing. This time it was even more beautiful than before, and they added new thoughts and ideas to the picture that arose from both their own enthusiasm and the desire to make Eru forget Melkor's disturbance.

Eru sighed and relaxed on his throne. Closing his eyes, he let himself be captured by the beauty of the composition once again. Soothed by the harmony of the voices, he eventually drifted off to sleep….

… and awoke when a horrible noise, which he first believed to be a part of his dreams, mingled with the fair sound of the Ainur.

But when he opened his eyes, he realized that it was no dream, but very, very real.

Melkor had again joined the music and as the other Ainur did not want to wake Eru, they had thought it best to ignore Melkor and just continue singing. 

They were so absorbed in their difficult task of singing and ignoring Melkor at the same time that they did not notice when Eru woke up.

Eru frowned and then let out a yell that made the foundations of his halls tremble and silenced all the Ainur instantly. They stared at him in wide-eyed shock and did not dare to move.

But Eru ignored them and turned his attention to Melkor, who had frozen in shock and did not dare to meet the eyes of his creator. Moved by pity for the miserable Ainu, he finally ordered the others to sing louder, so Melkor could sing along, but would not be that easily heard.

Melkor beamed at him happily and when the others continued their song  where they had been interrupted, he proudly sang along with them.

Though the other Ainur tried hard to sing as loud as they could, Melkor could still be heard faintly in the background. Eru tried hard not to hear him, but he didn't quite succeed and soon that constantly present howling nagged at his nerves.

But fortunately, the idea that had earlier popped into his head had now found its way back. With a happy smile, Eru jumped from his throne and thus startled the Ainur again. They fell silent instantly and looked at Eru carefully for they feared that they had displeased him again.

A collective though unheard sigh of relief went through the waiting Ainur as they perceived that Eru was obviously not displeased but seemed to be in a good spirit now, though they could not imagine what had caused this good mood of their master.

Eru smiled at them mysteriously and ordered them to follow him. He led them onto the balcony of his halls, which had a lovely view over the void that surrounded it. Not that there was much to see but nothing, but at least you could see all of that.

The Ainur looked around, none daring to say anything, as they feared anything could be the wrong thing to say now. So they just stood there, gazing into the nothingness and waited to hear what Eru desired from them.

Eru grinned, aware of the uncertainty of his creatures and amused by it, and decided to build up tension a little more. So he too just stood there, staring into the void, waiting … and enjoying their discomfort.

Still none of the Ainur dared to move or speak. Melkor was silently wondering what this was all about, when he noticed a pebble lying on the edge of the balcony. Carefully he kicked it over the edge, watched with wide eyes as the stone drifted through the void as if weightless, and started giggling.

And as usually, all attention instantly turned to him. Melkor blushed and moved back until he was stopped by a wall behind him. He looked up and realized the others were still staring at him. He forced a smile onto his face, shrugged apologetically and dropped his gaze to the floor again, trying to pretend he wasn't there.

Eru cleared his throat noisily to draw the attention back to him, and the Ainur instantly turned to look at him with huge eyes full of expectation.

He waited a little longer, finding great pleasure in teasing these faithful creatures, before he finally released them from their anticipation.

He waved his hand, and in the midst of the void a world began to take shape. The Ainur gasped and watched with eyes, now as big as saucers, as that world began to unfold its beauty, secrets and history before them.

"This is the vision you created with your music!" Eru explained and wondered how much more it would take to make their eyes pop from their heads.

The Ainur still stared at the vision with silent wonder and did not know what to say.

Each of them perceived the details he himself had added to the picture and was amazed.

But after some time of silent staring, they also realised how Melkor's singing had influenced their own works and threw him annoyed glances.

Finally Eru spoke again:

"Those of you who desire it, may now descend into that new world," he snapped his fingers and grinned at the expressions on their faces as that new world thus appeared in real in the void, "and bring the vision you have just seen to life!"

'And I will so love to watch you do it!' he added silently and suppressed a wicked grin. It would be so much fun to watch this show and he would make sure that Melkor would be one of those who descended there, just to spice it up. 

He started to tell them what they would have to do and that they would be ruling over elves and men when they finally arrived, once Arda would be ready for them. And after some time he had awoken the desire to dwell on Arda in some of the Ainur and many lesser spirits who would accompany and aid the Ainur in their task.  Eru decided that they would do and sent them with a snap of his fingers down onto the new world.

Though Melkor had not uttered any desire to leave Eru's halls and live in the new world, he, too, suddenly found himself in a strange environment with the task to bring this desert to the beautiful world it would once be.

The moment, the Ainur had been sent away, Eru grinned and turned to the remaining Ainur. He snapped his fingers and at one wall of his halls suddenly a huge screen appeared. In front of the screen there were lot of comfortable armchairs, and some as the lesser spirits stood behind a large bar at the left. Others stood at the right side, running a large popcorn machine.

Eru grinned at the surprised looks of the Ainur.

"Make yourself comfortable," he offered.

After a brief moment of hesitation, the Ainur helped themselves to drinks and popcorn and finally sat down comfortably.

 "We'll now see how our friends are doing in their new world."

 Eru, now sitting on his throne, snapped his fingers again, and on the yet blank screen, suddenly a picture appeared. With bated breaths, the Ainur watched as the Ainur that would soon be called Valar, began their mission.