Guys, this chapter gave me so, so much trouble. Sharley faced off with the Mother in Plague of M, but I didn't want to just totally re-hash that scene. Tossing Sauron into the mix definitely helped, but re-working it was surprisingly difficult.
Dread washed through Galadriel in a sudden, shocking, icy wave. It scoured at her heart, shivered through her fëa, driving her to lean against the bedpost for support.
Celeborn was resting; if this horror did not wake him, let him remain so. Bad enough that she endure it – her, and every other waking Eldar.
She made her unsteady way to the sofa, staring into the fire, reaching for its warmth. Not since Helcaraxë had she known such cold, but it was a chill of the fëa, not the hröa.
Celeborn did not stir, so Galadriel rose as soon as she was able, and went to find Thranduil and Elrond. They might not know what this was, but she did.
She shivered as she walked, and the sheer wrongness tore at her, whispering across her skin like the memory of poison fog. If she suffered this badly, it must be worse for the others, all who had not her strength.
She hadn't gone far before she found Lorna – or rather, Lorna found her. A very panicked Lorna, eyes wide with terror, who skidded to a halt on sight of her.
"Lady Galadriel – Christ, you too?" she said. "Something's – something happened, something's wrong with Thranduil, but you – what the hell happened?" She hurried over and wrapped Galadriel's arm around her shoulders, so that Galadriel might lean on her – somewhat pointless, given that their height disparity was nearly as great as hers and Thranduil's.
"Sharley," Galadriel said quietly. "I believe that Sharley happened."
Lorna winced. "Shite," she muttered. "Let's get you where you can sit down." Fortunately, the room occupied by the rulers of Lothlórien was not far from Thranduil's chambers.
It took longer to get there than it ought, but Galadriel's steps were steadier by then. Lorna led her to one of the chairs by the fire, and she was grateful to sit. The room was warm and dim, but it still couldn't touch the cold inside her.
A grey-faced Thranduil occupied the other chair, looking very much like he was about to be sick. He had a blanket wrapped around him, and Lorna draped one over her as well.
"I'll go get Lord Elrond," she said. "Nobody die while I'm gone."
Galadriel shut her eyes, still shivering. She said nothing, and neither did Thranduil. All she could do was try fruitlessly to get warm, to banish the formless horror gnawing at her heart.
Lorna returned with Elrond, Elladan, and Elrohir, and dragged over the chair from Thranduil's study. Elrond all but collapsed into it, while the twins sat on the hearth. There being nowhere else, she herself went and perched on Thranduil's lap. Unsurprisingly, he wrapped his arms around her on what seemed to be instinct.
"Sharley," Galadriel said, before anyone could ask. "Whatever that was, it was Sharley's doing. I have felt that power before, though not to that extent. I can only assume she found what she was looking for."
"Who is Sharley?" Elrond asked. He was every bit as grey as Thranduil, bordering on green.
"Someone who told me she could break the world, if she was not careful," Galadriel sighed. "After this, I believe her. I do not know what she did, but I fear we will find out."
"I…might have a guess," Lorna said slowly, curling into a tiny ball. "In the other timeline – I think, at some point, she made Memories."
The significance of that was lost on Galadriel, but Thranduil tensed. He gently took Lorna by the shoulders, and leaned her back so he could look at her. "What?"
"Memories," she repeated. "They come from Sharley's world. In one'v my dreams, she made them. She'd lost her voices somehow, and the voices are her…anchor, sort'v thing. I don't know what else she could've done, to affect you all like this. It could be worse," she added. "At least she didn't break the universe."
"She could do that?" Elladan asked.
"Sharley…isn't supposed to exist," Lorna said slowly. "The universe hates her for existing. When she calls herself an abomination, she's not being melodramatic. I don't know the why or how'v it, but in the other timeline, she broke reality. I don't know if she fixed it or not – someone did – but she smashed it."
"She told me that breaking things was the easy part," Galadriel sighed. "That the damage she could do, all unwilling – why she did not use her gifts. I would not like to think what might have driven her to use them now. Whatever she has found, it must be dire indeed."
"I hate to say this," Lorna said, "but it might be a good thing she's got Sauron with her. He could well be the only person who can at least slow her down. I mean, he's basically a god, right?"
Anyone else might have missed Elrond's slight shiver, but Galadriel didn't. "That term could perhaps be applied," he said. "His followers certainly believe so. If he is the only means of stopping this Sharley…"
"Sauron his many things, but he is not stupid," Galadriel said. "He cannot rule the world if Sharley destroys it, and she cannot kill him so long as the Ring endures. If nothing else, they can fight one another to a standstill."
"Why does that not comfort me?" Elrohir muttered.
Lorna scrubbed a hand over her face. "Because you've more than half a brain in your head. Are the other Elves likely to be as bad off as you?"
"Yes," Elrond said grimly. "Some much worse."
She frowned. "All right, you lot. Stay here and rest. I'll go get everyone drunk. Where in bloody hell is Legolas?"
"Most likely the armory," Elladan said, pinching the bridge of his nose, "preparing for the hunt."
"All right, I'll drag him back here, too. Meanwhile, rest and get yourselves ossified." She slid off Thranduil's lap, pressed a kiss to his brow, and was gone.
Lorna really, really wished her dreams had been more specific. She knew Sharley could make Memories…and that was about it. How, or why, or what she did with them later, was a mystery.
Wherever Lorna went, she found Elves that looked like they'd been punched in the brain, either sitting on the floor or actually sprawled out. There was nothing she could do save help them to their feet and direct them to the wine. She didn't have any answers for them – none that she would give, anyway. She knew too little to tell them what she did know.
She wasn't an Elf, and didn't have their heightened senses, but even she had felt something…off. A wave of rage, coming from everywhere and nowhere, alien yet weirdly, impossibly familiar. In another world, another life, she'd dealt with this – she knew that, even if the details were unknown to her. But she was nowhere near Sharley, and even if she had been, they weren't the same people now that they would have been there.
She hoped like hell Sauron was up to the job. If he wasn't, she had an unfortunate feeling that nobody would be.
Memories, affronts to creation though they were, were fascinating.
They followed Sharley, and Sauron followed them, intrigued as he had not been in many a century.
They could, upon first sight, easily be mistaken for the living. In form they were unremarkable, save for their flat, dead, hungry eyes, wells of malice so deep it impressed even him. Their movements were fluid as any Ainur, yet there was something unnatural to them – the sort that came from granting shape to something that should not have it.
Like Sharley, they ignored him utterly, perhaps sensing he could not give them whatever it was they sought. He was content with that, content to watch them hunt among the ugly grey buildings – to watch them tear at the corpses of the dead, fruitlessly chasing some lost spark of life.
What did Sharley plan to do with them? Did she have a plan at all? Watching her, he doubted it. This strange, cold creature, who somehow maintained and air of stillness even while moving, would not, he thought, bother. He had no idea what was going on in that cracked head of hers – and he suspected it was better that way.
It was certainly more entertaining.
In one of the buildings, a large metal door hung open, and he left the group to investigate. The light inside was bright and strangely even, issuing from long glass tubes on the ceiling – harsh light, and flat. It shone on counters and shelves of dull, smooth steel – too smooth for Edain work, yet without the craftsmanship of Elves or Dwarves.
They contained glassware – bowls, bottles, and jars – some empty, but others filled with liquid of various colors. He would give a great deal to know what they were.
The centerpiece of the room was a long glass tank, filled with some pink, viscous fluid. In it lay a man, tall and broad-shouldered, but paler than a corpse, each vein picked out in a black tracery beneath skin that was almost translucent.
Oh, how Sauron wished Sharley hadn't killed everyone. He would dearly love to know what this was. What all of this was.
"Mother wants you to see this."
Sauron didn't jump, because he was Sauron, but even he was tempted to recoil when he turned and saw a Memory directly behind him. It had been one of those who dwelt here, a golden-haired woman in a white coat.
"Does she?" he asked, though the thing's words might be cause for…concern. Mother, it said, not Sharley.
Perhaps this would be more entertaining than he had thought.
He followed the thing back outdoors, back into the sunshine that seemed strangely dimmed, hazed by some force he could not identify.
The Memories waited, and with them, Sharley. She said nothing, but the expression in her strange eyes was arresting: they burned. Not with anger or hate – not with any emotion he could identify. "Stay with me," she said, and while it was part order, it was also part supplication. She was still there, somewhere – the real Sharley.
Sauron took orders from none, and heeded no supplication, but the word 'mother' was enough to make him nod. That the Memories would refer to her as such, when their foe wore the title as well…it bore watching.
She took his hand, and it was all he – even he – could do not to withdraw. She didn't speak, but she did – something. He knew he would get no explanation out of her, so he did not press. He would question her later, when those mismatched eyes were not so brimming with suppressed madness.
He followed her, beyond intrigued, mace at the ready. He watched Sharley tilt her head to the side, and if she'd been living, he would have sworn she was scenting the air, searching for her prey like an animal.
Sauron needed no such senses. He knew exactly where their quarry was, but he let Sharley lead, content to watch her and her abominable creations.
At least she didn't take long in her hunt. The building they found looked no different from any of the others, huge and featureless, giving no hint at all to what lay inside it. The doors, naturally, were locked, but that sword, that weapon he craved so very much, made short work of them. Sharley paused, letting the Memories pour in before her, though he wondered just what she intended for them to do. If they couldn't harm her or him, he doubted they could do anything to this Mother-creature.
It was hot in here, surprisingly so, and so dark that even an Elf would have had difficulty seeing, and the presence of so many Memories might well have suffocated a lesser creature.
They came to a four-way junction, and the Memories spread out, searching. The pair of them alone went on into the stifling, sweltering dark, until they reached a pair of blue metal doors.
And here, he saw, Sharley hesitated for the barest fraction of a second before she hacked down the doors, and froze. Sauron came up behind her, and looked in over her head.
This room was entirely out-of-place in such drab surroundings. The size of a great hall in some castle of Men, the floor, strangely was made of wood – mahogany so highly polished it reflected the candlelight like glass. There were hundreds of them, rendering the room a soft gold. There was a massive, padded chair, its fabric woven through with gilt threads that caught the light, and shone with it, and a very large desk, but no bed – the Mother, like Sharley, must not need sleep. And when Sauron saw her, he knew why.
This Mother, whoever she was, looked nothing at all like Sharley. She too appeared to be an Edain woman, but she was fair as any Eldar. Hair like black silk, so dark it sparked with blue highlights, clear olive skin far too smooth for any mortal, and huge, liquid dark eyes that, like Sharley's, did not wholly match. Cold eyes, cold and completely mad – but it was a madness quite familiar.
Sharley, it would seem, was not as alone as she thought. This creature was akin to her – every bit as much an abomination, imbued with the same strange energy, the energy he could only assume was Time. She was perfect – she was beyond perfect. He understood, now, why Sharley would believe he would be tempted to suborn her to his side.
And oh, he was tempted. Yes, she radiated a madness so intense he could practically taste it, but she also exuded an immense amount of power. With her, he might even be able to destroy Sharley, sword or no sword.
But he looked at Sharley, tall and scarred, strong and broken at the same time. Her blue hair was a wild mess, her sleeveless white shirt travel-stained, her long fingers clenched around the hilt of her deceptively plain sword. Anger might simmer in the Mother's eyes, but in hers there was also a strange sort of grief. This strange, shattered creature, so beautiful in her pain…no. No, he would not move against her. Even yet, it seemed, there were some things he would not stoop to.
Sharley, who was visibly stunned. Her expression was one of terrible, devastating recognition – she knew this person, or knew of her. "Akathisia," she whispered. "You're not –" She fell silent, her eyes darting over the woman, as though reading her. "You're – shit. You're her kid."
"I wondered if you would ever work that out," the Mother said, with the arch of one perfect eyebrow. Her eyes flicked to Sauron. "And who is your friend? I have never seen his like." There was blatant hunger in her odd eyes, a covetousness he understood all too well. She might be the same sort of creature as Sharley, but in mind she was much more like him. There was in her face a craving, a thirst for power, for dominion.
But her will, he knew already, was not like Sharley's. They were both mad, but Sharley fought her madness – fought it, and won, on a daily basis. She had a fortitude that this being lacked; it was the very fact of her shattered mind that made it impossible to control. The Mother, though – this demigod of such dark loveliness – would, he was sure, break so very beautifully.
He felt Sharley's eyes on him, but she made no move to intervene when he stepped forward. "I am Sauron, my lady," he said, "and you trespass in my world."
As he had suspected, the Mother's eyes narrowed, rage spiking behind them. She was at the mercy of her emotions; her volatility was so extreme that it was nearly a visible thing. "It is mine now," she said, a statement so patently absurd that he very nearly laughed. Power she held, but no more so than Sharley, and Sharley, in spite of her sword, in spite of her ability to manipulate Time, could not take Middle-Earth from him without destroying it.
"I think not," he said, with a dry arrogance he was sure would infuriate her further. He was certain that she was older than Sharley, possibly by a few centuries, for she moved with an assurance that only came with age, but he had walked in this universe for some twenty thousand years. To him, she was less than a child. "I do not suffer rivals. And I do not share power."
Surprisingly, she didn't fly into a rage. Instead she smiled, so cruel and so very mad. "I do not need your permission," she said, and held out a hand.
Something…tore…at him, something raw and elemental and horrifyingly alien. He was incapable of pain, or he was certain it would have been agonizing – but it did no damage. Whatever she intended, it hadn't worked; if nothing else, the open shock in her expression told him that.
"Yeah, nope," Sharley said. "I already fucked him up once. His history isn't yours to screw with. You know, I was really, really hoping you'd be less…petty. I've already tried to tell that asshole why taking over the world is a dumb idea." She jerked her thumb at Sauron, who arched an eyebrow.
"You still have not convinced me," he said, his dry tone calculated to enrage the Mother. With all her strength, all her power, her mind was woefully unprotected…
Sharley's voice cut through his thoughts. "Sauron," she said, "don't. Don't even go there."
He fully looked at her. He did not want to hurt her, if hurt was even the proper term, but that mind was so very beguiling. "Do you really believe you can stop me, Sharley?"
The fact that his words, his threat, evinced no surprise in her – it troubled some deep, tiny part of him. She had been expecting betrayal, and that…bothered him. Even in the midst of all his hunger, it bothered him.
"Yes," she said, a strange weariness in her tone, "I can. You're tied to this world as long as the Ring endures – but there's nothing that says you're tied in this form." She shook her head. "I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm sorry, Sauron. I really am."
As Sharley had expected, that baffling statement distracted Sauron and the Mother alike – the Mother at least ought to have known what she was doing, but her fury blinded her, and she had no warning when Sharley tore apart time all around them.
It shattered the building, dropping them trio into a crater heaped with rubble, burying them and the Memories alike. She clawed her way out, flinging stone aside with every ounce of strength she had, fury lending it a force she normally didn't possess. What she couldn't shift, the sword did, and when she reached the surface she surveyed the damage.
The wild lines of broken Time sent flickering ghost-images rising from the ruins – the walls whole one moment, and exploding the next. A human would have been bewildered by it, and even Sharley was having a hard time sorting it out, but she was so angry she didn't care.
Only the Memories remained solid, for even now they were entirely unaffected by Time. They rose like a horde of nightmares out of the wreckage, but it was some minutes before the Mother herself made an appearance.
She definitely wasn't impeccable now. Her silk dress was torn, her hair now tangled and filled with dust. She looked, in fact, more like Sharley herself.
And she was not happy. She grabbed at the Time around Sharley, wrenching it as hard as she could, and oh shit did that hurt. It was almost enough to drive her to her knees – yes, the Mother was strong, much stronger than she'd thought. While she might not have Sharley's level of power, she did have centuries of practice. There was a finesse to her temporal torture that Sharley could only dream of.
She did it again, but this time, ironically, the pain was so horrible that Sharley had to move or fall over. She darted aside, and tried desperately to force her poor broken mind to think, but the agony was too intense for anything like coherence. She lashed out at the Mother, trying to make up for her lack of subtlety with sheer strength. It worked, but not as she would have liked – her pain diminished, but it by no means vanished.
Sauron chose that moment to make an appearance – a coldly infuriated Sauron, though she had no idea if it was her or the Mother he was pissed at. It didn't particularly matter just now – he'd attack one of them, and she couldn't spare attention for him until he did. Unlike the Mother, he didn't look at all as though a building had just landed on him; his black hair was free of dust, his face clean of it. Out of the trio, he was the only one who really looked like a god, much good though it would do him.
She was entirely shocked when it was the Mother he turned on – not with his mace, but with what had to be his mind, head tilted slightly as his eyes bored into her. The smile he gave her had all the warmth and humanity of a shark, and Sharley watched him, struggling to recover enough to move without falling over.
He didn't move himself, but the Mother screamed – a high, harsh, keening cry of complete agony. Her face twisted into something downright ugly, and again she reached out, her fingers twisting like claws.
Sauron staggered, but he must have recovered, for the Mother screamed again – unfortunately, it wasn't enough to stop her. Time shuddered again, the ghost of the building that no longer was flickering around them – first solid, then shivering into various stages of its destruction, jerky and incoherent. It tore at Sharley and at Sauron, battling the lock she'd set on his Time – the only thing that would keep either her or the Mother from winding it further back, and possibly wiping him out of history.
The paradox that would cause would be catastrophic. Sauron was as old as the damn world. She'd managed to contain the paradox that would have come from knocking off so much of his personal Time, but wiping him out entirely might well break the universe, or at least all of Arda.
She went still, watching the Mother snarl at Sauron. Pain still jagged through her like shattered glass, but the part of her mind that remained the Stranger was remarkably clear. Even now it held itself separate from her rage, for it had never known anger – not anger, or grief, or anything. Did the Mother have a Stranger? Was there any part of her that remained detached?
Sharley suspected not. Had she, it would have taken over at Sharley's first attack. The Stranger didn't mock; it would kill without a word, with neither regret nor satisfaction. If this creature was what someone like them was without one, for the first time Sharley was grateful for hers. It whispered to her now, softly inside her head. It told her she had a third option. A gift, it said. The sword kills anything, Sharley.
For a moment she was bewildered, but the realization of what it meant was horrifying. Horrifying, yet fascinating, and she looked at the sword in her hand, ignoring the Mother. Even her pain was forgotten, driven out by the blade's unique brand of euphoria.
There wasn't any point in warning Sauron, because he couldn't understand what she meant to do anyway. She could almost hear Time howling as she rent it apart, the broken lines lashing wildly around all three of them. That hurt, but her euphoria overrode it, and she cut again, and again, shredding everything within the bubble she had created. It flared like a sun gone nova, and soon enough she was blind, her eyes seared by light no creature of any sort should witness.
But she laughed again, and for once in her existence her madness took over entirely. It was an aid to her now, and she embraced it, pouring it out with her anger, until nothing of herself remained. There wouldn't be enough of this stupid bitch left to bury.
Phew. It's not over for either Sharley or Sauron – or the Elves she screwed up so much.
Title means "This means War" in Irish. As ever, your reviews keep me going.