A/N: I know guys, really short chapter. But I felt I had to get something up, and so here it is.

Updates are getting less and less frequent, but I'm not quitting this story! I willfinish it. It's just at the moment I've had a lot going on, coz I've been making my first full-length film… I've written about half the script and principal photography will begin soon on that first half. Ginny plays a girl called Bree in it. :) Aiden's in it too, playing 'Asher', the flirt.

But that's all irrelevant…

Review replies!
Maille of Midgard: Yeah, I finished Maximum Ride in a week and a bit, but it wasn't because of the action, it was because of Iggy and Gazzy. They just made me want to read it. XD It was okay for the first three books, until Max/Fang started taking up the ENTIRE FREAKING PLOT (not to mention the terrible writing). Eragorn is on my 'what I need to read next' list. Have you read 'Thirteen Reasons Why'? It's an interesting book.

Hermione. the. Evenstar: Aw, thanks! :) That means so much to me!

Melissa:Lol Abby! XD She sounds awesome, I can totally imagine how weirded out people would be as they walked past… O.o… I'm planning to write a LegoLego fic as soon as there's a lull in movie-planning-making-stuff. :D

CHAPTER TIME!

…

[23rd January, T.A. 3019]

"Look what I found," Julia said, approaching Lola.

Lola peered up at her, squinting from her spot on the ground underneath the tree. It was mid-morning, and she was lying around, not doing very much of anything.

"Yeah?" She blinked a couple of times. The sun was bright in the sky, but it didn't make Dimrill Dale any warmer, somehow. The days were growing frosty. Winter was coming, if it wasn't already here. Lola hoped it wouldn't get much colder.

"Catch," Julia tossed her the object, and plopped herself down as Lola caught it.

"What the…" Lola frowned, turning it over on her hand. "…money?"

A two-dollar coin, in fact. In all it's 55.126cm squared-of-aluminium-and-brass glory. A white heron etched into one side, Queen Elizabeth II on the other. A perfectly normal… New Zealand two-dollar coin.

"Where did you get this?" Lola asked incredulously, her fingers tingling from the cool alloy on her skin. It was beautiful. She felt a sudden ache in her chest. The coin was pulling her in, demanding her back to her homeland…

"I found it in the river." Julia said, "Is it yours? Did you bring it with you?"

"No," Lola frowned, "I mean, I was wearing my pyjamas when I landed here. Ginny was the only one with clothes, remember? Oh, and Tran, sort of."

"Oh yeah." Julia remembered, and Lola passed back the coin regretfully.

"You should ask one of them. It must be one of theirs. How else could it have got here?" Lola laughed, slightly shaken up from the sight of something so poignantly reminding of everything she had left behind.

"Yeah. Kay, I'll ask," Julia stood up, but Lola stopped her.

"Wait… could I hold it?" Lola asked, "Again? Just one last time."

Julia passed it back to her, and Lola took it gratefully. It made her chest throb again but it was comforting to feel something so homely, even though it was so painful…

Lola.

Lola jumped about a foot in the air and dropped the coin as if it were a tiny burning sun. Julia looked at her, confused.

"What?" She asked.

"Did you hear that?" Lola said, her eyes wide.

"No. What was it?" Julia frowned.

"A voice…" Lola trailed off. It had been such a cold, but dark voice. Like a silent midnight snowstorm in the middle of nowhere. Frosty and ashen, the single word had fallen like a snowflake as black as coal.

Lola.

There it was again. Lola was thoroughly terrified now. "Are you sure you didn't hear that?"

"Hear what?!" Julia asked exasperatedly.

Lola, the voice said for the third time, You believe you would be a daughter of the Greek god Apollo. Daughter of the light. A sun-child.

What do you want? Lola thought in response, believing the voice must be an internal force, from inside her head, instead of an external one.

If the voice heard her it disregarded the question. But one day you must face the truth. You are a night-child. Daughter of darkness.

Lola felt herself pale. Go away!

The voice seemed to hear her this time, and chuckled coldly. No Lola, it replied, I cannot go away. Not forever. Just like you cannot pretend forever.

I don't know what you're talking about, Lola tried, but knew it was no use.

Yes, you do. You cannot pretend that your ancestry does not exist. You are no sun-child. You are death's daughter, cold's daughter, my daughter.

Lola's heart began thrumming wildly in her chest like a spooked hummingbird. It seemed to be shaking her entire frame.

But the voice wasn't finished yet.

Embrace it, Child of Mandos: You are daughter of every man's greatest nightmare.

…..

"Gin-ny!' Julia called, "Gin-Gin-Ginny!"

"Ju-lia! Ju-Ju-Julia! What is it?" Ginny asked, looking up from where she was picking at the gravel at her feet. She and Tran were on watch, and she was quite happy to be able to say it was a lot less awkward than last time.

"Did you have any cash on you when you landed here?" Julia asked.

Ginny frowned. "What, in Middle Earth?"

"Yeah."

"No," Ginny shook her head slowly, "No; why?"

Julia didn't answer, and instead turned to Tran. "What about you?"

"Nah," Tran picked at something on his shoe.

Julia froze. Her eyebrows furrowed and she bit her lip. "Oh… well…"

"Oi, why?" Ginny repeated, looking at Julia strangely.

"Because…" Julia's frown grew deeper, "Well, I found this."

Julia passed Ginny the coin, which was glowing bronze in the morning sun. "In the river, that day we washed our clothes. I didn't come with any money, and neither did Lola, and same with you two…"

Julia trailed off, and scratched her head, "… so I don't know where it came from."

Ginny's eyes grew wide. "Seriously? Like, you're not kidding?" She touched the coin in the palm of her hand, delicately, as if it might disintegrate or disappear at any moment.

"I swear," Julia swallowed nervously, "I just found it."

"Can I see?" Tran asked.

"If it doesn't belong to any of us, where else could it have come from?" Ginny passed the coin to Tran.

"Dunno," Julia said, still looking slightly dazed, "D'ya think there's other people from… New Zealand here?"

"It's highly unlikely," Ginny said, "I don't think there could be. I mean, why would they be here? In your dreams the Valar only ever mention us four, you know, the fixer, the trouper, the healer, the riser and all that. There's no reason for someone else to be here."

"But there's no other explanation," Julia rubbed her eyes.

"There has to be," Ginny told her, "Because that one doesn't fit. Logic."

"Oh, like any of this has actually been logical," Julia snorted, "I mean, the whole time travelling thing, the whole random people in Middle Earth thing. Get logic to explain why we're here."

Ginny grinned, "Okay, okay, but logic is the best place to start."

"So you found it in the river?" Tran passed the coin back to Julia.

"Yeah, just at the bottom underneath some pebbles," Julia took it and clenched her fist around it.

"See? Why would someone from New Zealand even put it in a place like that?" Ginny pointed out.

"Okay, you win," Julia sighed, "But if nobody put it there, and we didn't have any money, how did it get there? It couldn't have just, like, travelled here on it's own."

There was silence.

"Could it?" Julia asked weakly.

…

[7th October 2023]

Phillip had found out some things that were absolutely vital about the runes.

They had talked about places he had never heard of: Dimrill Dale, Moria. Upon searching them up on Google he had discovered they were places of Middle Earth—Tolkien's imagined world.

Which had confused him greatly.

The other thing they had spoken of was other people: people by the names of Tran, Ginny and Lola.

Phillip was certain he had heard of these names before—from Julia's mouth. So he went and dug up some of Julia's old yearbooks. It took hours of scanning till he came across the right one: her year eight yearbook, 2013.

The class photo didn't lie. There was Julia Peters, smiling a bright, closed-mouth smile, standing between two blonde boys. In the third row were a brunette girl and a Thai boy—Lola Evans and Tran Tongskill. Finally, in the back row was a girl with bright orange hair; Ginny Elton.

Upon closer examination of their class page in the yearbook, there seemed to be very little other pictures of them—except for one.

It was one of the larger photos on the page. It depicted the four of them—Ginny, Julia, Lola, Tran—at what appeared to be a sports day, a cross country or something like that. They were sitting on the grass in P.E. gear, in varying degrees of smilingness.

There was nothing conspicuous about the photo, but it told Phillip all he needed to know.

Julia, Ginny, Lola and Tran had all been friends at some point during the year 2013.

Phillip could not tear his eyes away from the page. He traced the faded pictures, deep in thought. There was also, he noted, a small picture of Julia and Ginny at the bottom—Julia wearing what appeared to be a costume made out of newspaper, and Ginny beside her, talking. And in the background of another picture, a tiny Lola jogged along a netball court.

He wondered who would've spotted these little people. Who would've guessed from a couple of pictures in a yearbook from a fairly insignificant year that these four would be… well, they certainly appeared to be… in Middle Earth.

And, he concluded, Julia was the narrator of this little tale.

For he now believed the runes were everything Julia had said since she had landed in Middle Earth.

Phillip's face cracked into a smile. He leapt off the bed, laughing like a madman (which, he concluded, he quite possibly was) and ran into the living room where he plopped down on the couch, chuckling and clutching the yearbook to his chest.

Julia wasn't dead. Not yet.

There was still hope.

…..

A/N: Yeah, there are all those photos of us four in our 2013 yearbook… I had to get my yearbook out to write that bit… XD

So whatdidyathink? It was short, but hey…

Additionally, I'm putting up a poll on my profile about whether Phillip should come to Middle Earth in this story. I'm not planning on doing it, but if enough people want me to I may consider it…

Remember to check out the poll, and review!