If you predicted that I still own nothing and no one except Kelly, you're correct! Congratulations!

Chapter 9: The Enemy Among Us

The Fellowship was running, running towards a mystical mysterious magical mythical forest. Their footsteps were smothered by the tall grass as they crushed it underfoot.

"Why are we running?" panted Kelly, who was having a bad time of it what with her copious amounts of gear. She stopped for a second, hands on her knees, to catch her breath. "Because… I think… I'm …going…to…pop…a…lung."

Legolas shot her a grin as he bounced around easily with light steps.

"She makes a good point," Boromir said as he fell, too weak to continue to run, and began crawling for the trees like a man dying of thirst. "Some of us have been carrying fifty pounds the entire way, you know!"

"You people are such wusses," said Frodo from atop his litter as the other Hobbits laboriously continued to carry him. "We've only been running at breakneck speed for a few miles of so." The Hobbits below him nodded in agreement, appearing as though they were going to collapse at any given moment.

Aragorn ran up to their sides. "Keep moving, people! We're nearly there! Once we reach those trees, we'll be safe!"

"From what?" asked Kelly in exasperation, starting to jog once more. Behind her, Merry finally hit the ground, causing all the other Hobbits to drop Frodo with the shift in weight. Frodo, in response, began yelling at them.

"Why the goblins of Moria, of course!"

"But we're miles from Moria, and no one's been pursuing us so far! There's hardly a reason to run!"

"Hummm…," said Aragorn. "You might just be right."

"Then can we stop running?" gasped Boromir from the grass, extending one arm out to drag onward, continuing his sloth-like gait.

"I would think so," said Legolas, examining the path ahead of him thoughtfully. "We're ten feet from the trees."

"Oh wow," said Kelly, eyebrows raised in surprise. "Will you look at that." She strode purposefully over to the nearest tree and gave it a good, solid kick. "Yup," she announced. "That's a tree if I ever saw one."

"So I guess we're here," Aragorn agreed. "The forest of Lothlorien, home of the Lady of the Wood."

"Oh?" said Kelly. "Who's she?"

"You're not very well-versed in the lore of anything, are you?" observed Aragorn, his tone very dry.

"Jeez! I milk huge spiders and mug halflings for my living! What do you want from me? But really, who is she?"

" A sorceress of terrible power," Gimli began ominously. "It is said that all who see her fall under her spell."

"And then what?"

"Uhh…"

"Do we become like, slugs or zombies or graduate students or what?"

"Y'know, I don' actually think tha' me dad got ta tha'."

"You should really stop transcribing your accent," moaned Kelly. "It's getting annoying, and it wasn't even in the original books."

"Fine," snapped Gimli. "The point being, as we enter this forest we should be really jittery and on edge because of a couple rumors. Okay?"

"Right."

So they all went into the forest and were jittery and on edge for no good reason other than a few vague rumors. Frodo, now grudgingly walking, kept close to Gimli with the other Hobbits as he began recounting those vague rumors. Because Hobbits have the tendency to be unnaturally gullible, he made a great audience out of them. They were listening with wide-eyed horror when the spell of Gimli's gruff, obnoxious voice was interrupted by a loud thud as Kelly tripped over a tree root.

Kelly, being Kelly, began swearing at great volume and spitting out dirt as she peeled herself off the forest floor—to be met with an arrow one inch from her nose. She stared cross-eyed at it for a second, then her gaze rose to the face of its wielder. It was an elf, surrounded by companions whose bows were likewise trained on the Fellowship.

"You swear and trip over roots so loudly we could shoot you in the dark," he said softly.

"Congratulations," offered the female elf, shrugging.

"Oh? A smart-mouth are you?" snarled the other elf. "Well, missy, we have ways of dealing with your kind." He chuckled evilly, then stopped abruptly and frowned. "Wait, that didn't sound right." He turned quickly to one of the other elves. "What were we supposed to say again?"

"I forgot. We're going to have to do improv."

The elf nodded grimly. "So it shall be." He looked back at Kelly. "Who are you? What is your purpose in our sacred wood? And of what race do you be? For I've seen none the likes of you."

Kelly took a moment to figure out the interestingly twisted grammar, then started. "My name is Kelly Dungflinger—"

"Eh?"

"What?"

"What did you say your name was?"

"Kelly."

"The surname?"

"Dungflinger."

The elf scrutinized her for a few seconds, then frantically dug his slender finger into his ear in an attempt to dispel earwax. "Come again, lady?"

"Dung. Flinger."

"Well," said the elf after a few seconds of thought. "I can only draw one logical conclusion of that. She's obviously an orc," he announced to the rest of the elves."

"But I look nothing like an orc," protested Kelly.

"That's because you're in disguise," explained the elf. "It's all so clear when you think about it!"

The Fellowship thought about it, and somehow it all became clear to them. Frodo gasped. "Kelly is an orc!" he screamed, pointing."

"Why did we let her fool us so!" cried Aragorn, suddenly brandishing his sword at Kelly. "It makes so much sense! The Hobbit-mugging! The unlikely last name! The cursing!"

"Frogs!" added Pippin.

"Why, Kelly, why?" wailed Pippin. "Why did you do this to us?"

"I didn't do anything! I'm not an orc! See?" She tugged desperately on a pointed ear.

"Yeah right," said Legolas nastily. "Like we're going to believe you now."

"Frodo, you should give me the Ring," said Boromir.

"I know!" said the elf suddenly. "We should vote on it!" Everyone but Kelly heartily agreed. Kelly's eye began twitching again as it had done so often in the weeks that she had partaken in the quest.

So they all voted. Unfortunately the vote was straight down the middle. The elf considered this then said, "There is only one option left to determine this matter!" His tone went low and grave. "Bring out the coin."

One of the other elves dug into a pocket and brought out a nickel. "Heads orc, tails elf?" The Fellowship and the elves of Lothlorien nodded. Kelly groaned, grabbed a tree, and began smacking her forehead repeatedly against the bark.

The elf flipped the coin. Everyone held their breath. The coin bounced into the elf's palm, and he declared, "She's an elf!" The Fellowship sighed in relief.

"You really had me scared there for a minute," Gimli told Kelly in all seriousness. "It really seemed like you might be an orc."

Kelly wasn't really in the mood to answer.

"Well, I'm glad we sorted that all out," said the elf cheerily. "Now we'll just take you to the Lady of the Wood, because she doesn't have much going on in her life at the moment!"

*******

Lady Galadriel was bored. Very bored. Incredibly bored for a ruler whose land is on the brink of war. She would have been even more bored still had it not been for her TV remote.

"Lame. Lame. Really lame. Lame. God-awful." Click click click click. She gave the thumbs-down for each channel she found. "Gosh darn it, I'm a child of the Valar and I still can't find anything good on Dish!" she snarled. "What's a girl got to do for quality television at a low, low price?"

"Yes dear," said Celeborn said absentmindedly as he busily knitted a hot pink woolen sweater. "It's just terrible."

"Shut up."

"Yes dear." Celeborn had learned not to pay her any attention by now, wisdom gained over hundreds if not thousands of years of a hands-off marriage.

"It's like the TV people have nothing better to do than advertise chicken and run courtroom shows! It's ridiculous!" Galadriel continued her rant. "And there are all these ridiculous stupid talk shows! Get a life, people!"

"Mmm-hmm."

"Excuse me, my Lady," an elite guard popped his head into the room. "There's some people her to see you."

"That would be the pizza delivery guy," said Galadriel. "If he hasn't got a large pie, then send him back."

"Erm, no. I'm afraid it's not the pizza delivery guy, my Lady," the elite guard apologized. "it seems to be some group of adventurers or another."

"Aw, crap," said Galadriel. "I got a note from Elrond the other day. He said these people might be dropping by. I guess I'm gonna have to get off the couch and put some make-up on. Seriously, this whole being-a-leader business is one big pain in the butt."

"Yes dear," Celeborn said automatically.