DISCLAIMER: This is a story that is written by numerous authors on the Mellon Chronicles list. It was written as a Christmas present for our mommies, Cassia and Siobhan. DO NOT FLAME! I have warned you what this is, so if you don't want to read it, don't.

Ch. 12

By Kellen

Aragorn eyed Trin and Kar dubiously. It was moments like these he wished he'd perfected the "eyebrows of doom" long ago.

"Now, the plan," he said.

Trin and Kar exchanged a look, then looked at the man and nodded.

Aragorn, through long association with MCers, sighed and asked, "Repeat the plan to me."

Trin leveled an "eyebrows of doom" look that rivaled Elrond's -- many long hours in front of a mirror paid off sometimes -- at Aragorn while Kar scratched her head and sighed.

"We find Cassia and Sio," Kar said, as if speaking to a child -- well, a child with a sword who knew how to use it and probably wouldn't hesitate running her through with it if he got irritated enough, seeing as how their history together wasn't all warm fuzzies. "Then," she continued, "we tell them what Elladan and Elrohir were up to, and how Coon and Saber were trying to get even more torture on you and Legolas by throwing this party and we will not be sidetracked by nearly naked elves, inflatable bananas, flying arrows or berserk orcs. Whatever is before our path, we will overcome and bring our message to Cassia and Sio."

Aragorn nodded. "What else?"

Trin sighed. "Say nothing of the table."

"Until when?"

"Wait until the opportune moment. Kar, how long do I have to put up with this?"

Aragorn smirked, and answered before Kar could open her mouth. "As long as I say."

Trin and Kar stood in front of the ranger, watching him smirk at them. Finally Aragorn relented. He sighed, uncrossed his arms and spoke. "Fine, go. I have better things to do."

*****

"El-whoever, I would beg of you to please stop doing that!"

"Kaldur! What did I tell you about silence?!"

"I didn't do anything."

"All of you please shut up!"

Four pairs of eyes turned on Bill.

"Yes'm," Kaldur replied with a small flourish -- small because there was no extra room for flourishes under this table.

There was silence for a time as the five of them continued their journey toward the main room.

"El-whoever?"

"Well, I can't tell you two apart."

"Kaldur? El-whoever?"

"I said I can't tell you two apart."

"I say just kill one of 'em and then we wouldn't have to worry," Kellen muttered, turning to glare at Elladan. "Let's start with that one."

The twin Kellen pointed to sighed and said, "I'm Elrohir, Kellen."

Kellen grimaced and pointed to the other twin. "That one, then."

"Kellen," he said. "I'm Elrohir."

Kellen eyed the two Elrohirs for a second before responding. "Get 'em both. No worries then, and more room under this table."

Bill grabbed Kellen's arm. "Just keep crawling."

Kellen sighed. "Going, going, going."

"Gone," Kaldur chimed.

"What did I tell you, Kaldur?"

"Something about silence. Can't quite remember. Did you want it or not?"

"Just keep crawling, Kellen," Bill murmured, her knuckles going white with the effort of not throttling Kaldur herself. "Keep crawling."

Silence reigned for a few blessed moments before Bill herself broke it. "Elf, ten o'clock."

"Huh? It's so not ten."

"Kellen!" Bill hissed. "Ten o'clock means... Oh, never mind. Just shush up."

"Who is it?" Elladan asked.

Bill smirked. "One very traumatized prince of Mirkwood, judging by the look on his face."

"Traumatized?" Kaldur snorted. "Not yet..." He grabbed an unsuspecting Elladan's arm and shoved him into Kellen, who promptly responded by shrieking -- surprise or anger, no one was sure, but the damage was done.

Something thunked into the top of the table, which, judging by the look on Bill's face, was not good.

"Guys, stop!!" Bill yelled, gazing out into the hallway.

*****

Legolas walked warily down the hallway. MCers had taken over. His gaze traveled over everything, taking it all in, hoping against hope... was that a table in the middle of the hall?

He heard some hissed words, and looked around for the source, heard more, and finally his gaze rested on the table. The sounds had come from the table.

He was going mad.

Then the table shrieked.

Without thinking too much about what he was doing, he had an arrow aimed at the table, and fired. The arrow buried itself into the wooden tabletop, effectively pinning the tablecloth on. It was then he heard a frantic "Guys, stop!" and the elf prince buried his head in one hand.

Not only did he just shoot a table, but he nearly killed the one MCer who might actually protect him from the rest of the craziness.

"Hello, Bill."

The table cloth moved, and Bill stuck her head out, Kellen right behind. Kellen waved. Bill frowned, craning her neck to see the arrow still quivering in the tabletop, and then landing a gaze worthy of Thranduil himself on the harried prince.

"Sorry about the arrow."

Kellen smirked. "I don't know. I think it adds a little something, don't you think?"

"It is a nice centerpiece," Legolas agreed.

"Were it in the center," Bill finished.

"Wasn't aiming for the center," the prince huffed. Then, as if the thought just occurred to him. "Why are you crawling around under table?" He peered in. "And who all is under there?"

"Under where?" Kaldur chimed.

"Shut up," a chorus responded.

"Never mind," Legolas said and started to move away.

Bill smirked. "Come here."

"Not a chance."

"Legolas!"

"Tell me what you want from over there."

Bill huffed. "Fine. We're Aragorn's revenge. Want in on it?"

"How is a moving, talking table Aragorn's revenge?"

"We haven't quite figured that out," Kellen responded. "Still, it's inane. It's bound to wreak havoc."

Legolas smiled. "Where do I sign up?"

*****

Cassia eyed the giant inflatable banana in her arms. She turned to Sio. "Why am I carrying this again?"

Sio held up her cheese wheel. "Same reason I've got this. It might come in handy."

Cassia tried to respond but was cut short by a shriek, thudding footsteps and a body impacting hers at full speed. She went down, trying desperately to keep the banana -- wonderful weapon that it was -- between her and her attacker. "Sio, a little help!"

"Let go of the banana, Cassia."

Cassia shook her head. It was the only thing between her and ... Trin. Cassia let go and scrambled away as Trin wrapped her arms around the banana and sank in bliss to the floor. For a few moments, there was stunned silence before Sio turned to Kar, who was standing off to the side, wide-eyed, where she'd been pushed against the wall in Trin's desperate banana-dash. "Hey, Kar. What's up?"

That did it. The three of them started laughing, giggling a little a first before erupting into full hysterical laughter.

Trin rocked her banana back and forth.

*****

The table was moving along slowly, not because its "occupants" wanted to, but because with the five of them squashed together, crawling was becoming increasingly difficult, especially with Kellen continually turning around to spear Elladan with a glare or shush Kaldur, who wasn't even talking. It just seemed prudent to remind the bandit of the necessity of silence every once in awhile.

Bill, the intrepid leader of the little group, stopped and turned to swat Kellen's shoulder. "We're never going to get anywhere," she hissed.

Kellen, streaks of purple on her face and clothes and dark hair caked in mostly dried purple paint, hissed back. "And where are we headed?"

Kaldur, sensing a bit of a fight going on, and knowing full well that whatever happened, it would not be best for him, interjected with an inane, "Did I ever tell you how much I love purple?"

Bill and Kellen looked at each other, and turned, as one, to Kaldur. "Shhh!"

"Can't you see we're discussing?"

Kaldur eyed Bill. "Right." He made shooing motions with his hands, while Kellen stared at them -- it was awfully close quarters after all, and Bill, with her non-huggle policy, refused to let anyone within two feet of her.

"You're taking up a load of room," Kellen told him.

Kaldur eyed Kellen, and smirked. "Less than you."

Elladan and Elrohir immediately backed off as much as possible. This could not be good.

It wasn't.

Bill tried to grab the back of Kellen's coat, but missed entirely as Kellen hurled herself at the bandit, who was scooting back closer to the twins. The four of them hit the table legs and the entire table lurched backward, scraping noisily against the tile. Bill ducked as the table moved and suddenly found herself crouched in the hallway, staring at the table as it continued to scrape down the hall. Bill hurriedly scrambled after it and dove back underneath into the melee.

Elladan had tried to pull Kellen off of Kaldur -- not the smartest thing, considering he was the one who'd dumped paint on her head, and the previous fight was forgotten as Elrohir and Kaldur dove to pull apart Elladan and Kellen. Kaldur grabbed Kellen's arms and promptly passed her to Elrohir. "Here, you 'old her, mate."

"Thanks," Elrohir grunted.

Bill grinned at the mess. Tapping Elrohir on the shoulder, she motioned him aside. She leaned in and whispered in Kellen's ear.

The response was immediate. Kellen perked up, turned to Bill, and said "Where?"

Bill chucked a thumb over her shoulder, in the direction they had been going.

"Lead the way," Kellen responded. She then turned to the other three, who where sitting on the floor and staring, bewildered, at Bill and Kellen. "Shush up, guys, and let's go. Bill smells food."

*****

Legolas ran lightly down the hall, keeping his senses alert for any MCers moving around. He had decided to treat this as a siege situation. Rivendell had been invaded. Elrond had enlisted the help on a rogue MCer, by name of Saber, to help stave off the coming war. Cassia and Sio -- Legolas shuddered; he liked the girls, he really did, but seriously, how many times had they almost killed him! -- were, as far as he knew, locked away and unconscious. Of course, knowing them, they had found a way around that. Aragorn had coerced two more MCers into helping him plan revenge upon the rest of the MCers. The elf suppressed a groan. This was one big, huge, whopping mess.

And, to top it all off, five people were crawling around underneath a table, heading for the sleeping MCers.

Legolas had to wonder what in the burning depths of Moria Aragorn had been thinking.

A table moving around was his grand revenge scheme?

Of course, with half-drugged MCers just coming around, it might be amusing. Legolas was almost tempted to change course and head that way, but ultimately decided against such a thing. He was intercepting Trin and Kar, who were supposed to go find Cassia and Sio to tell them what was going on.

Problem was, with those four together, who knew what they might come up with.

He was going to confiscate any and all writing utensils, tell them what was going on and plainly forbid them from any sort of strange revenge. There was quite enough of that going around.

After all, he was a prince of Mirkwood, a fairly powerful elf lord in his own right. They would listen.

He hoped.

*****

Meril groaned. She blinked, confused, before realizing that she was staring at the ceiling. Rivendell had nice ceilings. She lay there for a moment, unwilling to move, quite content in contemplating elven ceilings. That is, until she heard scraping.

At first, she thought it was merely her own mind trying to claw its way to full awareness.

Then, it came again louder.

Thoroughly spooked now, Meril rolled onto her side to find Halo watching her with wide eyes. "Do you hear --"

Halo nodded.

They sat up, and faced toward the doorway through which the scraping could be heard. It seemed forever until even a shadow appeared on the wall behind the doorway. Both girls narrowed their eyes, trying to get their fogged minds to understand what it was they were seeing. The shadow shortened ominously until finally what caused it came into view.

Neither Halo nor Meril said a word as a table nosed around the corner. The corner of the table caught the jamb, causing it to come up short. They heard muffled cursing and the table back up to try the approach again.

The table came into the room, heading unerringly for the cake -- the same one that Bill had poked earlier and inadvertently found Elrohir. Meril and Halo watched for a second more, then both scrambled to their feet.

"The table cursed," Halo breathed.

"Forget that," Meril squeaked. "It was moving."

"Must have been made from an ent."

Meril blinked and turned to stare at Halo. "First off, that's just morbid and secondly, I think you're missing the point. It walked into the room talking."

"And now its eating," whispered Halo, who had not torn her gaze from the table.

Meril blinked and looked. Sure enough, the cake was rapidly disappearing.

"I think I had way too much to drink," Meril whispered.

*****

"Hey, Bill," Kellen whispered, snagging Bill's sleeve, "check it out. We have an audience."

Bill, mouth full of chocolate frosting, rolling her eyes, pulled her arm away and muttered something that Kellen hoped was merely, "eating, leave me alone."

"Bill, seriously."

"Have some cake, luv," Kaldur injected, handing Kellen a handful of frosting rich cake. "Our leader ain't listenin' right now. She's eatin'."

"But-"

Kaldur shoved the cake in Kellen's open mouth.

"Nice move, Kaldur."

Kellen gave Elladan the evil eye for that comment. One more reason to murder a twin. At this point, she cared less which one. One of them had to go. Two of them were too much for the world to handle. She would be doing a public service. Really.

*****

Legolas rounded a corner (convenient, how many corners there were in Rivendell to round), and slid to a stop. "I'm too late."

The scene that greeted him, quite frankly, scared him. Sio and Kar were rolling a cheese wheel back and forth, laughing, while Trin was curled around an inflatable banana on the floor and Cassia stood above them all, laughing hysterically. When the elf spoke, three pairs of eyes -- the fourth fixated on the banana -- turned toward him. Cassia grinned, still laughing.

"Oh, by the Valar, no..."

"Oh, relax, Legolas," Sio said as she rose to her feet. She picked up the cheese wheel, still grinning at Kar. "Let me guess. You have a message."

"Uhm, yes..."

"You won't take no for an answer."

Legolas raised an eyebrow. "Something like that. And before we speak, I want your pencils."

Cassia sighed. "Mine was already taken. No worries."

Legolas held out his hand.

"Oh, fine." Cassia reached into her coat pocket and pulled out another pencil. "Give him your writing utensils, girls." As she handed Legolas the pencils she gathered from Sio and Kar, she said, "Did you want Trin's?"

Legolas sighed. "I'm afraid to try to pry her away from that banana long enough."

Cassia stepped back beside Sio and motioned her to speak. Sio cleared her throat. "You had a message?"

Legolas actually smiled as he launched into the craziness he'd encountered. After he was done, they stood there for a second. Cassia and Sio looked at each other, then Kar, then Legolas. "Bill and Kellen are WHAT?"

Kar giggled. "Sorry. I couldn't tell you. Oath on a ranger and all that."

"Right," Cassia drawled. "Where are they headed?"

"Main party hall," Legolas responded with a grin.

"Sio, this I've got to see."

"Oh, yeah. Kar, bring Trin." Cassia smiled. "Lead the way, oh mighty elf prince."

*****

Cassia stopped short in the doorway and Sio, Kar and Legolas ran into her back, pushing her into the room. "Oh, my dear, sweet..."

"Yeah," Sio echoed, the beginnings of laughter stirring in her throat.

MCers were in various states of awareness. Those most aware were either blabbering incoherently in the corner about demon tables or planning an attack on the table. The table had mangled the cake and had moved on to -- probably at Kellen's insistence -- the cheese trays.

Several MCers snuck up behind the table and were within reach when the table seemed to belch loudly and shudder.

"Oye, that was good."

Cassia giggled. Kaldur. That had to be Kaldur.

MCers scattered at the sudden table noise and movement.

"Legolas, is that your arrow in the tabletop?"

Legolas eyed Sio. "I was tense."

Sio chuckled. Too good. This was too good. "So," she said, "how long do we let this go, eh, Cassia?"

Cassia shook her head and started forward. Sio and Legolas followed, while Kar escorted the banana-dazed Trin to a chair. Cassia approached the table, despite dire warnings from several MCers.

*****

"Bill!" The warning came out more of a squeak as Kellen tugged relentlessly on Bill's sleeve. "Bill! Company."

"I'm eating," was the muffled response.

Elladan and Elrohir exchanged a glance and peered under the hem of the tablecloth on either side of Kellen.

"Bill," Elladan hissed.

"You'd better pay attention," Elrohir finished.

"Move the table," Kaldur ordered, not entirely sure what threat was, but noting the other three's trepidation.

Kellen nodded and the four of them, despite Bill's muffled protests, started moving the table away.

"That table had better stop or I'll have Legolas put a few more arrows into."

"She knows," Kellen breathed as the table stopped. She looked under the cloth again. Sure enough, Legolas had an arrow notched and MCers were scrambling to get out of the way.

"Bill, swallow and do something!"

Bill complied, swallowing and calling out "Hey Cassia!! Sio!! Surprise!!"

When faced with the look from Kellen, Bill shrugged. "You wanted me to do something."

Cassia crossed the room and pulled up at the tablecloth. Elladan grabbed the edge. The last thing he wanted was for Cassia and Sio to know they were down here, too.

Cassia raised at eyebrow. "She has a pencil," Sio said dryly.

Elladan let go.

The two authoresses peered under the table.

"Uhm, hi guys," Kellen said brightly.

"Out," Sio said around a smile.

"But -"

"Out."

"What about them?" Bill asked, pointing to the MCers who were quickly going from bewildered to angry.

Cassia grinned. "Much as you'd deserve to be let to their plotting, their anger will quickly turn to amusement, I'm sure, once they get a load of you guys."

"Huh?"

"Bill, don't you remember?" Sio laughed. "You're dressed in a bathrobe and Kellen's purple. I think one look at the two of you and, well, the word laughingstock comes to mind."

"Hey!"

"Sorry, Kellen," Cassia giggled. "But purple is so your color. Now, out."

"Yeah," Sio added. "Let's salvage what's left of this party, huh?"

"Is that my cheese wheel?" Kellen asked as she stood up, joints creaking -- hey, under that table a long time!

"Aren't we missing someone?" Bill asked as she stepped aside to make room for the twins and Kaldur.

Kaldur narrowed his eyes. "And who would that be?"

Bill started to answer but was cut off by a shriek (happens a lot in this chapter, don't it?) and a loud pop, followed by a wail and the sounds of mad scrambling.

Everyone turned to look and found Trin standing over the remains of the banana leveling a look at Aragorn, who was backing away slowly, apologizing as he went.

"What just happened?" Bill asked.

Kellen shrugged, and was immediately echoed by the twins and Kaldur.

Cassia sighed. "I wondered how we were gonna get rid of that thing." She smiled, and clapped her hands, whistling for attention. "Well," she shouted, "Now that we're all here, the party can begin. The real party," she amended, smiling. She glanced sidelong at Sio.

"Check the punch," she whispered.

"I'll have Glorfindel guard it," Sio whispered back. "You do realize Saber's not in here, right?"

Cassia nodded. "I'm willing to bet she had something to do with all this." She turned back to everyone else. "Let's eat!" she crowed, watching in satisfaction as there was a mad dash to the food tables.

Sio caught Bill and Kellen's retreating forms. "You two have already eaten. You two go save Aragorn from Trin."

Kellen glanced at Bill. Bill sighed and steeled herself before walking toward the ranger who was to meet with imminent death for popping the banana, no matter his motives. Kellen followed. "Save Aragorn, console Trin, then we party."

"What happened to washing hair and murdering elves?"

Kellen glanced at Elladan, who was speaking animatedly to Cassia and Sio, no doubt trying to defend himself. "He's immortal. I think there will be plenty of time for that."

Bill chuckled, despite the looming task before them.

*****THE END*****