Chapter Four: Curse the Suethors
Legolas was not a stalker. Therefore, he had not been eavesdropping on the conversation between Caroline and Merenil. So, he didn't hear the Song of Beren and Luthien, and he was not returned to normal. All this just added to Caroline's annoyance as she came out of her room to find the hallway empty. It had to be the first time she wished someone had been eavesdropping on her conversation. The things desperation does to you.
As confident as she had tried to appear to Merenil about the whole thing, Caroline was terrified. She had some ideas of how to get some characters back to canon (Gandalf had been kind enough to detail some of it. For example, Elrond should be very easy, if a bit painful) but for most of the characters she had absolutely no idea (stupid time limits). But such problems were best kept to herself, and she would just have to improvise. She figured "Brave Sir Robin" might deal with a couple of the characters, specifically Boromir, but it might not work more than once. She was unsure what would happen with some of the less lusted after characters, like Gimli, and this worried her. She preferred to have some idea of what was going on.
She was shaken out of her thoughts as they came to Legolas, who had been waiting just around the corner for them. He made a sweeping bow to Caroline and took her free hand; her other hand was holding onto Merenil's for dear life. "Sister, you look beautifuler than I have ever seen you."
"Yes, because you've seen me so often and beautifuler is a word," Caroline muttered, sotto voce.
"That dress makes you look amazing. Your hair is like the spun gold in Rumpelstiltskin." Caroline growled at the comparison; Legolas shouldn't have even heard of that story (although she would grudgingly admit that of all fairy tales, it was possible that that one had carried over. Tolkien had, after all, been influenced by Germanic fairy tales). "Your skin is like fresh snow and your eyes are like…" Legolas trailed of as he caught sight of her eyes. "Dear sister! Your eyes are no longer their beautiful color! They're plain brown! It is so ugly! We need to find a way to return them to normal!"
"This is normal, you author-controlled airhead. My eyes are indeed brown and so they shall stay as long as I can help it," Caroline snapped at Legolas. She was well aware that her moods seemed to be shifting rather quickly, but Legolas annoyed her. Why was he always made a pansy? Why couldn't he be the misogynistic bastard for once? That at least would be interesting.
"I'm sorry, Sister. I didn't mean to be mean to you! You're still really pretty!"
Caroline took a deep breath and pinched the bridge of her nose,exasperated. This was painful. Honestly painful. Legolas would not be so informal. Come to think of it, he had been more formal earlier, before her conversation with Merenil. What had changed? Whatever it was, she hoped it wouldn't last.
Little did Caroline realize that, at this exact moment, Leggieluver123 was uploading the next few chapters of her story. They were just as bad as the first few, so there is really no reason to go into them. It is just too brain-breakingly awful.
"Legolas," Caroline said slowly, trying to restrain her rising temper, "I am not pretty. I look like an idiot. Even if I was pretty, you would not call me pretty, you would call me beautiful. Do you know why? Because you are an elf. Elves do not speak like twelve year old girls." It was about here that she lost the battle against her annoyance, and continued with increasing anger. "Trust me. I have been a twelve year old girl, and you don't want to talk like one. If I was held to all the stupid things I have said I would be the most racist, homophobic, idiotic, stereotyping girl you would ever meet. Luckily, I am not. Nevertheless, I never want to sound like an idiotic twelve year old girl again. If you are going to sound like a twelve year old girl, you should at least sound like my friend Olivia. She's eleven and she sounds more intelligent than you. You are a prince, Legolas. Act like one! You are such a pansy! I bet you couldn't hit the broad side of a barn with that bow of yours. You couldn't hit it if you were inside! And of course, it isn't your fault. It's the damn Suethors. They don't realize that your grandfather, if foolish, was very brave and fought against Sauron. Eru, but that was sad that all those elves died. You don't even remember that that happened do you? You aren't even you! You're an empty shell of a character! You are nothing! You-" Merenil touched Caroline lightly on the arm and Caroline abruptly stopped her rant.
In front of them stood a dark-haired elf who was dressed in greens and browns. Rather than the boots that Movie!Legolas had on, this elf had on light slipper-like shoes. His gray eyes glinted intelligently. "Legolas Thrandulion?" Caroline ventured hesitantly.
"Who are you?" He asked, looking at her suspiciously. "I have seen your kind before. How dare you come to a place protected by Lord Elrond Peredhil?"
Caroline held her hands up in the universal symbol of surrender. "No, no! I'm not a Sue! I promise! Remember in the black hall? I was the girl faced with the choice, the girl Mithrandir spoke to. I'm just trying to get home! Besides, I don't lust after you anyway…" The last sentence she muttered to herself, but Legolas's elven hearing picked it up anyway.
"You don't desire to make a puppet of me to do your bidding? That is what your kind do. You are worse than orcs," he spat the last word with disgust.
"Yes, that is what Sues do. But, as I said, I'm not a Sue. I was the girl in the hall, the blond one, Caroline. I made the 'Suethor' comment and argued on behalf of Boromir and promised to write a well characterized fanfic when I got home. Remember?" Caroline bit her lip and looked at him hopefully.
"She speaks the truth, Lord," Merenil put in helpfully.
Slowly Legolas's wary expression relaxed as he saw that Merenil's eyes were clear of a Suethor's spell. He nodded slowly, "Yes, I remember. Are you truly her? You look nothing like yourself. But, no, I remember. You were cursed. You had to live as Leggieluver's character, did you not?"
Caroline nodded. "Such is the nature of my curse. I am forced to live in this horrid body and live as-" she broke off abruptly. "What's happening? Legolas!" She cried in alarm. As she watched, Legolas's hair was fading back to blond. The shape of his face was shifting, and his clothes were changing. Overall, it was a very disturbing process to watch.
Within a matter of seconds, Canon!Legolas had disappeared to be replaced by Movie!Legolas. Caroline let out a stream of curses that would have embarrassed a sailor. Her time on the internet had not been ill-spent. Merenil muttered a quick apology to a confused looking Legolas and dragged Caroline away down the hallway and around another corner.
"What was that?" Caroline exploded as soon as they were alone. "He was canon! You saw as much as I! He was completely and totally canon! He was wary, he remembered the hall, and he was actually holding an intelligent conversation!" She ticked off the points on her fingers, angrily. "But then he turned back! What happened? Why is there once again a blond Orlando Bloom back that way?"
Merenil looked at Caroline sympathetically. "I know no more than you. Perhaps the influence of the Suethor is too strong on him? It may be that he will not fully return to himself until you turn the rest of the world back to as it should be."
Caroline groaned and leaned her head against the wall. "Why does the world hate me so much?" she wondered aloud.
Merenil patted her back comfortingly. "The world does not hate you. The world would like to help you, no doubt. But the author's presence is strong. The world cannot fight it off alone."
"So it's up to me, then, to turn the world back to how it should be? Do you realize what a huge task that is?" Caroline pushed away from the wall and turned to face Merenil. Merenil was startled by just how small and scared Caroline looked. "I don't think you understand, Merenil. It isn't just the elves I have to turn back to normal. It is everything. It is a very real possibility that I will have to face Sauron himself and turn him back to normal. I don't know the ending to this particular story, but I know the type. If my gut feeling is right, I may be in more peril than the Ring-bearer himself before the end. And I don't have a Sam to rescue me and help me. I'm alone."
Merenil tugged at Caroline's hands and held them gently in her own. Looking seriously into Caroline's eyes, she said, "You are not alone Caroline. I will help you for as long as I can."
Caroline smiled a little. "You are a wonderful friend, Merenil. Not many people would pledge to help someone only a few minutes after meeting them," she said gratefully.
Merenil grinned back. "Well, I'm not many people. Come on," she said to Caroline. "We might as well turn someone back to normal today. Who shall we go find?"
Caroline looked thoughtful for a minute before responding, "Take me to where there are sure to be a lot of elves. We can begin there and you can point people- I mean, elves - out to me."
Merenil nodded sharply, then, still gripping one of Caroline's hands, pulled her off down the corridor.
~O~O~
An hour later, Merenil and Caroline had found their way to the Music Hall. Technically, it wasn't called so in canon, but Caroline had always referred to it as such, since it had no real name that she knew of. It had taken a little while to actually find it, as Rivendell had, at some point, been described as a castle, and therefore even Merenil was lost. It, of course, did not help that the Music Hall had never been explicitly mentioned in the fic. Finally though, they found it, and settled down to listen in a corner. Well, they settled down until Caroline started muttering about how, as much as she liked Mozart, Elves should not be playing and singing things from Don Giovanni. At this point, Merenil decided to distract Caroline by pointing out various elves.
The elf playing the violin (Yes, you read right. Violin. Caroline was confused/annoyed as well) was Lindir. The elf currently singing was Erestor, Elrond's chief counselor. The small figure sleeping in the corner was Bilbo Baggins. Caroline felt a warm smile steal over her face at the sight of Bilbo. He looked perfectly canonical, sleeping as he was. A flutter of hope arose in her chest at the thought of him unchanged by the author. She really hoped so. Bilbo had been one of her imaginary friends as a child, geeky as it might sound. The thought of him unchanged made Caroline feel all warm and fuzzy inside (and no, she did not care that was a horrible cliché, thank you very much). Of course, her bliss was ruined instantly by the next elf that Merenil pointed out.
"That is Glorfindel?" Caroline asked incredulously. Her eyes narrowed as she looked at the elf in question.
Merenil nodded, equally disgusted. "He looks nothing like the real Glorfindel, but somehow I know who he is." Caroline pursed her lips as she took in the sight she was seeing. Sprawled across a bench, an elf was slobbering drunk. He had black hair which was tangled and fell across his face. It looked rather greasy and disgusting. Three empty bottles of wine were on the floor next to him; more could be seen underneath the table next to him. This, of course, begged the question, what were tables doing in the Music Hall in the first place? Caroline distinctly remembered the book explicitly saying that there were no tables in the room. Nevertheless, it was a small detail when compared with the current state of the elf.
Many things could annoy Caroline (or break her brain) when it came to Lord of the Ring's fanfiction: Sues, fake elvish, Boromir's transformation into a sexist pig, abuse of the common comma, horrible spelling, Legomances, second daughters of Elrond, failure to acknowledge the existence of Celebrían, ad infinitum. But there were very few things that could actually make her angry about it. She hated it when people screwed with Sam's character. She hated it when people screwed with Maedhros's character. And she hated it when people screwed with Glorfindel's character. She had counted on having to deal with a screwed-with Sam. She had known that the likelihood of an appearance by Maedhros was next to none (this thought had saddened her, until she realized he would have been mutilated beyond recognition). She had not, in her wildest dreams expected this mutilation of Glorfindel's character. In fact, she had rather hoped he would have been forgotten about and left alone. No such luck.
Angrily, Caroline stood up and stalked over to Glorfindel, leaving Merenil behind. No one messed with her lust objects. The moment she got out of this damn thing, she was going to make Leggieluver123 pay. Oh, sweet revenge…
She plucked the empty bottle out from Glorfindel's hand and poked him until he stirred awake. He moaned and sat up slowly, squinting at her groggily. Inside, Caroline was planning a rather gruesome death for Leggieluver123. On the outside, she grinned her best Cheshire cat grin at him and adopted a rather fake British accent. "'Ello, Glorfy."
Hi. Yes, I am doing an author's note at the end. Sorry... I just wanted to quickly explain (before I get yelled at) why my version of Legolas isn't blond. The simple answer is that I didn't imagine him blond as a kid. I do not actually remember what I pictured him as, but my dad said I was confused (even in the creepyish animated movies which I watched about a thousand times) about who "that blond elf" was. In addition, I want there to be a distinct difference between the Sueified versions of the characters and the real characters. "But Merenil looked pretty much the same!" Actually, I did say that "Caroline noted that Merenil's features had gained even greater beauty than they had had before." Also, Merenil probably wouldn't have been described in the original fic (other than being "Less pretty that Sornif"), and I'm operating under the assumption that anything not mentioned reverts to Canon.
Right, I just wanted to put that in real quickly. Thank you to everyone who reviewed, you are all very nice to me! Also, thank you to both L.M. Frick and Sayuri Ai for Betaing this chapter.
Finally (and then I'll shut up), head on over to my profile, please. I have a poll up over whether Caroline should get a love interest.