Chapter 2: The Council of Wha?

Kim and Erica landed with a loud thud. Kim groaned as she looked around, then she jumped up quickly in surprise. She was in the middle of a group of people, who were all sitting in a circle around a pedestal with a ring on it. There were some normal people, some people with pointy ears and long hair, and some really short bearded people (and one not bearded one.). Kim turned to the one with the silver headband and started to apologize.

"Errrr….sorry if we've interrupted anything." said Kim.

The man to her right with the long gray beard cut her off.

"What are you doing here?" He snapped.

"Well…ummmm…."

"I'll tell you what happened!" said Erica. Kim groaned as Erica got up and made her way towards Gandalf. "Okay, so I'm just trying to find something to eat, right? Well, I open up the microwave and what do I find but a weird pink glob! It's actually Kim's boyfriend, but anyway, I wanted to poke it, but Kim got all defensive and everything and slapped me. Even though that hurt-thanks a lot, Kim, by the way-I still wanted to poke it so I grabbed Kim's book and poked it and boom! Lots of freaky bright lights and next thing I know I've been thrown into the middle of some cult ritual! Weird day, huh?"

Everyone in the circle muttered confusedly. Elrond and Gandalf just stared at Erica like she was crazy. Kim looked around in amazement.

"I know this place."

Erica whipped around to look at Kim.

"What? We've never been here before!"

"No, seriously, I know this place! This is just like the chapter The Council of Elrond-"

"The council of wha?" Erica blurted.

Kim continued, "in my book! This is the spot where I left off! Look,"

She pointed at Gandalf, who looked alarmed.

"That's Gandalf, that's Frodo, that's Boromir, that's Aragorn, that's Legolas, that's Gimli, that's…well I'm not so sure who you are but I've probably read you're name somewhere! Don't you see Erica! When you shoved my book into the microwave goo, it blasted us to the place where I left off!"

Gandalf, if anything, looked even more confused.

"So you mean that we are characters in a book?" Gandalf asked.

"Yes! Well…no not exactly. Not anymore at least. Dang it, I'm way confused!"

"That makes two of us," Frodo muttered.

"And what made you come here, interrupting our highly important council?" asked Elrond.

"It was an accident! I don't know how we got here, but the point is, that I already know what's going on! You're going to try and take the ring, which is Sauron's one ring with lots of magical powers, to mount doom and try to destroy it!"

As Kim finished saying that, the whole crowd stood up angrily. Gimli drew out his axe and pressed it up against Kim's neck and Aragorn's sword poked Erica in the gut a little bit.

"Tee hee! That tickles!" giggled Erica.

"They know too much!" cried Legolas.

"Tell me Gandalf, should we question her a bit or should I just kill her now?" Gimli threatened.

As his blade pressed against her neck a little more, she whipped some nunchaku out of her pocket and sent Gimli's axe flying with a flick of the wrist. Then she spun around and thwacked him on the head. In the distraction, Erica jumped away from Aragorn's sword, ducked down, and attempted to trip him, but Aragorn was too awesome to fall for that. He had the sword on her again in a second and all Erica managed to do was kick him in the kneecap. As everyone else closed on her and she swung her nunchaku at them, Gandalf decided to step in.

"STOP!"

"But Gandalf," Aragorn complained. "They know about the ring, we don't know where they came from, they know our intentions, and they know us!"

"I'm scared of stalkers." said Legolas, and a few of the other hot elf guys nodded in agreement.

Gandalf silenced them again, then turned to Kim. "You're pretty talented with that…."

"Two sticks connected by a chain?" Frodo offered.

"Nunchaku." corrected Kim. "I'm a black belt in tae kwon do."

"Tell me, is this book of yours a completed book?" Gandalf inquired.

"Yes. Actually, it's three books that tell the same story. I'm partway through the first one, and in this part you were all having a meeting to discuss what you're going to do with the ring."

"Then you know what happened preceding the meeting?"

"Yes. Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin, who are all hobbits from the Shire, made their way to Rivendell from Hobbiton, and on the way met Aragorn and some black riders. Frodo got stabbed on Weathertop by one of them, and then you tried to rush to Rivendell even faster. Frodo barely survived and met with his Uncle Bilbo again. You had all just decided who would be in the fellowship. That's just in short, but really I'm about 245 pages in."

"So," continued Gandalf, "If this is a completed series, how does it all end? Does Sauron triumph?"

"I don't know. Like I said, I've only made it this far."

Gimli picked up his axe again and started to approach, more slowly this time. Kim prepared for attack.

"She's lying." Gimli said. "She must have been sent by Sauron! How else could she just fall out of the sky?"

"Let's kill the stalkers!" cried Legolas.

There were murmurs of agreement between the council members, but Gandalf silenced them.

"Did it never occur to you that if Sauron wanted to send spies, they wouldn't have dropped out of the sky right in front of us? Wouldn't he want to keep them unnoticeable?"

The council silenced a bit at Gandalf's reasoning.

"Besides, didn't they look as surprised as we did when they just dropped out of the sky? If they meant to come here, they wouldn't be too surprised, would they? For whatever reason they're here, it's not their fault. And pull your sword away a bit Aragorn." he snapped.

"But still," said Elrond. "They know too much."

"Not me! I haven't read the books!" exclaimed Erica.

Elrond continued, "We can't just let them go their own way with this much information."

"Let us be finished with them then," Gimli growled.

"No." said Gandalf. "I've got a better idea."

"I do not like the sound of this." said Kim.

"They know how to fight, especially the short one with the…nunchaku…"

"Hey!" Kim glared.

"I want to talk with them a bit, keep my eye on them, but I also want to use them. They should come with us on the journey."

There was muttering about the council again. Elrond looked shocked.

"But Gandalf, are you sure that's a good idea? We have better fighters than them, and we don't even know who they are. We don't even know what they are. How can we trust them not to ruin our mission?"

"We need them," Gandalf replied, "Because they might know things that we don't, and they use unique weapons. We can trust them because if they betray us, they will be killed."

Kim laughed. "You won't have to worry about me betraying everybody. As I was reading, I was cheering for you guys! I want Sauron to lose as much as you do!"

Gandalf eyed her doubtfully. "Well, almost." she corrected herself.

Elrond sighed. "It's settled then. You shall be the Fellowship of the Ring!"

"Yay!" yelled Erica. "Now, where's my sammich?"

Aragorn and Legolas stepped away from her cautiously. This was going to be an interesting trip.