Yes, okay, I admit it, I'm a bit obsessed with Maglor. So of course I absolutely had to write a story about him as a rebellious teenager. It was required of me.

Facts About this Story: Every single chapter in this story is named after a song from Guitar Hero II, one of the best video games EVER. Also, the title is the name of a Nirvana song. And everyone talks like modern people because I like writing Tolkien's characters like that. It's fun!

I'll add some other notes as we go on.

Smells like Teen Spirit

It's a long way to the top if you wanna rock and roll…

-AC/DC

Chapter 1: Institutionalized

So, yeah, you've probably heard of me. Maglor the Mighty, greatest or second-greatest or whatever singer in the history of the world.

Well, guess what? I never would've earned that title if I hadn't skipped out on my forge lesson with Dad when I was fifteen. Never.

Actually, I might've. But whatever.

It's always been a bit of a mystery to me why the heck Dad was so insistent on the whole smith's-apprenticeship deal for me anyway. I mean, even after about two lessons, it was evident that 1) I sucked, 2) I didn't care, and 3) I would always suck, and I would never care. A normal dad would have said "well, you tried your best, go study something that you actually give a crap about." Not my dad. I come from a line of very stubborn people.

So, one day I got so fed up with the whole thing that I skipped. It's not like it was anything that new. I'd skipped regular lessons a ton of times before because my attention span was too short for me to learn much of anything (especially math), so really, skipping my lessons with Dad was a logical next step. Well, it was for me, anyway. Therefore, at the time that I was supposed to have my lesson, I just didn't go to the forge and instead went to hang out with Maedhros and Fingon, who were playing cards in the garden out back.

"Hey, Maglor," said Maedhros. "Why aren't you in the forge?" He laid down a card. "You lose, Fingon."

"I'm skipping," I said. "There was no point in going anyway."

"Isn't your old man going to be mad?" asked Fingon.

"Nah. If anything, he'll relieved." I grinned. "I drive that poor guy crazy."

"Poor dumb Maglor," said Maedhros. "You'll never be good at anything except singing, will you."

"Nope. Underachiever and proud of it, brother."

"More of us should follow in your example," said Fingon. "Then we'd be a pissed-off, absentminded, perfect society, and we'd probably all be deaf."

"That'd be cool," I said. "So I decided that it would be way more fun to sit around and play cards with you guys than to get yelled at by Dad and singe my hair."

"It would be a tragedy if you burned your hair, wouldn't it," said Maedhros sarcastically. "You're such a girl, Maglor."

"Excuse me, but I have awesome hair. Don't pretend you're not jealous." I've always been pretty proud of my hair—it's reddish-brownish-blackish, curly, and really long. By the time I was fifteen it reached my waist.

"I might be jealous of your hair if you ever brushed it," said Fingon. "You look like a street urchin sometimes, dude."

"That's on purpose. I'm royalty; society wants me to look all perfect; therefore, I try as hard as I can to not look perfect. Aren't I great?" I said.

"If you can call futile rebellion greatness," said Maedhros. "Why can't you be a mindless conformist like the rest of us?"

"My, my, we're being critical today," I said. "Is Dad pissed at you? When are you going to get a clue and stop trying to please him? You know he only values people who can make lame jewelry out of melted metal."

"He's got a point, Maedhros," agreed Fingon. "Your dad's sort of a jerk like that."

"Hey, don't criticize my dad when your dad has plenty of faults of his own," said Maedhros, punching him in the shoulder.

"Whatever. All parents suck. Isn't that right, Maglor?"

"Yep," I said. "Adults are stupid and are not to be trusted. With any luck, Dad will kill me before I'm twenty-one so I'll never have to be one."

"Maglor! What are you doing out here?"

"Looks like that was a self-fulfilling prophecy," commented Maedhros as Dad stormed into the garden and pulled me to my feet.

"I asked you a question, Maglor," snapped Dad angrily. "Did you forget that we had a lesson today?"

"Oh, yeah, I forgot," I retorted. "I'm too dumb to remember anything that complicated, as you've made a point of telling me many, many times."

"Don't get smart with me, young man."

"Too late, I already started. Go fawn over Curufin, why don't you, and leave me alone."

"When are you going to stop it with that attitude of yours? It's just going to keep getting you into trouble."

"Good. At least then you won't ignore me like you did until I was fourteen and a half."

"Go, Maglor!" cheered Fingon. Dad scowled at him.

"You are going to be punished for this," he said to me. "I'll talk it over with your mother later."

"Make sure you don't ground me again," I said. "I'm getting kind of sick of that. It would be great if you could think of a punishment you haven't used before."

He gave me an evil look before stomping out of the garden. I spat on the ground behind him and sat down again.

"Jerk," I muttered. "Where were we, guys?"

"Wow, bro," said Maedhros, looking shocked. "That was intense."

"What is it with him, anyway?" I said. "Why can't he just accept me the way I am? I'm never gonna be a genius or a great smith or anything. I'm a musician. There's nothing wrong with that."

"Of course there isn't," said Fingon. "I think your dad just doesn't appreciate the fact that you're not like everyone else and you make a point of that. If you could just hide in the background like you used to then he'd be cool with it."

"Disgraces are always easier to deal with if they aren't obvious," said Maedhros.

"Gee, thanks," I said dryly. "So I'm a disgrace now, am I?"

"Not to us, but to Dad, yeah. Anyway, I thought you didn't care about what Dad thought."

Actually, I sort of did. But I wasn't going to tell Maedhros that.

"Hey, no one likes getting called disgraceful," I said. "Even someone as awesome as me."

Later that day, Dad called me into the living room, where he and Mom were sitting on the couch looking stern. Well, actually it was just Dad who looked stern. Mom looked how she always did—calm, cool, and just generally Mom-ish. I fervently hoped that my mother in all her wisdom had managed to keep Dad from coming up with too harsh of a punishment.

Okay, but seriously, it seemed like they were making kind of a big deal out of all this. I mean, I skipped one lesson. How is that a horrible crime?

"Maglor, we've decided on yer punishment," said Mom in her cool-sounding Northeastern brogue.

"Yeah, I kinda figured that," I said, sitting down and slouching (sitting up straight was lame, or so I thought at the time. Back when I was fifteen, everything was lame). "So what's the verdict?"

Mom glanced over at Dad. "Feanor, would ye prefer to tell him yerself?"

"Very well. The day after tomorrow I'm going to visit Aule up north for a couple of weeks," said Dad, "and you, Maglor, are coming with."

"What?" I said. "Dad, that's totally unfair! You didn't punish Maedhros this harshly when you guys were gone for that one weekend last year and he had that party and everyone got really drunk and one of the windows got broken…"

"Maglor," said Dad in that argue-with-me-and-you're-dead tone of voice he was so good at. "You've been messing around with your apprenticeship for five years now. It's time you learned to take this seriously. So you will come, and you will not argue."

"Sure and it won't be so bad, me dear," said Mom comfortingly. "Maedhros will be coming, too."

"Really? What's he getting punished for?"

"He's not being punished for anything," said Dad. "He's coming of his own free will."

I shook my head. "It's sad when they go crazy like that."

Dad sighed. "Get out of my sight."

Being a good obedient boy for once in my life, I got up from my chair and went upstairs to Maedhros' room. I knew he'd be eager to hear about my punishment, which, I had to admit, was perfect. Aule's halls were pretty much the Lame Smith Guy capital of the world. I'd been there twice before—once when I was five, and once when I was ten—and I hated it. Everyone there told me that they hoped I'd turn out just like my old man, and no one gave a crap about music or anything cool like that.

Yep. This was gonna be torture.

"What'd they say?" asked Maedhros when I entered his room and threw myself face-down onto his bed.

I groaned into the mattress. "I have to come with you and Dad to Aule's."

"Hey, that's not too horrible," said Maedhros. "At least I'll have someone to talk to."

"But it's the one place where I fit in the least. Which is saying a lot."

"Maglor, it's not that big of a deal. Just slack off and avoid Dad the whole time, and you'll be fine."

"I hope you're right," I muttered. "Otherwise I'm screwed."

So here I was, fifteen years old, with no influence, no skill, and no future. All I had going for me was a good singing voice and an extremely sharp tongue that was constantly getting me in trouble anyway. Who ever said Valinor was paradise?

Final couple of notes: Nerdanel has an exaggerated Irish-sounding accent because I thought it suited her, and I've decided that 50 human years equals twenty-one Elf years so all the ages are in Elf years. Make sense? Excellent. Please review!