Chapter Four

Note to self: Coke and Dwarves don't mix

Jamie stared in shock at the two teenagers who had appeared before her. One, his shirt trimmed in red and gold, his tunic a dark navy blue, had to be Boromir. The other, wearing a soft blue tunic and leather breaches had to be Aragorn. This was unbelievable! She tried not to faint as she looked at her two favourite characters from the books. Finally it dawned on her, finally sinking in, that these men were real, and that Mr. Murphy would flip if he found out.

As she had been sitting there, the two Numenoreans had been stuttering at how to answer the man's questions. So far no one had guessed what their cryptic answers meant. Jamie wanted to keep it that way and so, raising her hand, looked directly at Mr. Murphy.

"Yes, Ms. Jamie?"

"Uh, I'm sorry, Mr. Murphy, for my cousins' behavior."

Mr. Murphy squinted at the blurry figures beside him. The two young men merely stared in shock at what the girl had said. Mr. Murphy glanced back at her.

"These ruffians are with you?"

"Uh, yes, Mr. Murphy," Jamie stood up to go stand in front of the podium. "They just need to go to the office to check in. They might even be leaving now, I'm not sure when my aunt is getting here. May I take them there?"

Boromir and Aragorn were about to say something when Jamie nudged them both in the ribs.

Her teacher considered the situation a moment, finally consenting.

"Take the pass. Just make sure you get the notes from someone else."

"I will, Mr. Murphy. Thank you!"

Jamie was about to leave when Allison Rays blurted out, "They look like the guys from Lord of the Rings!"

Mr. Murphy turned his wide-eyed stare in her general direction.

"Excuse me, Ms. Rays?"

"They do!"

There was a silence.

"Just look, Mr. Murphy. Hey Melonie, tell him!"

Melonie Hours nodded.

"Allison's right, Mr. Murphy! They do look like the guys from Lord of the Rings!"

Soon the whole of the class was shouting out similar comments. By the end of five minutes both Allison and Melonie had detentions to match Shirley and Clayton. Mr. Murphy, his vision blurring the figures before him, motioned for Jamie to take her 'cousins' to the office. Releived, the girl complied.

Once the door was closed and they were down the hallway, the two young men stopped Jamie, each pulling on a shoulder.

"Excuse me, miss, but we are not your cousins." Aragorn told her. "We need to get out of here."

"I agree!" Boromir cried. "Where are we? Who brought us to this strange place?"

"Alright! Alright; calm down. I know you guys aren't my cousins, ok? It was the only thing I could think of to get you out of that room."

She continued to walk, watching out for the Dean. The other two followed.

"To answer your question, Boromir," she started, but stopped at the look of confusion he gave her.

"Yes, I know your names. Now, as I was saying, to answer your questions, you do need to get out of here, or at least hide, and I don't know how you got to my school or why so don't ask me more questions, ok? Just follow me. Oh, and keep an eye out for a skinny guy with glasses, we don't wanna meet up with him."

Back in Math class, Vikki had just a revelation of her own. She had just answered a rather hard question posed by Ms. Brooks when out of nowhere a tall blonde something landed in the empty chair beside her. At first she thought it was a girl, but as soon as she saw the ears she froze. It was an elf! The other students, noticing that something interesting was happening, slowly began to revive themselves from their math-induced stupor.

Ms. Brooks, hearing something thud behind her and not used to students actually responding in her class, turned from the board just in time to see Vikki throw her jacket over the elf's head.

"Vikki!" she cried. "What are you doing to that student?"

"Uh," Vikki thought feverishly. "This is my neighbor . . . uh . . . Eugene! Yeah, that's his name, and um, he needs to go to the office to get a pass and he accidently cut his ear! Yeah, that's why I put the jacket on him."

There was a pause. Vikki felt the elf beside her shudder and reach up to get the jacket off when she whispered to him to keep still.

"Soo . . . can I go?"

Ms. Brooks, actually believing the girl, allowed her to leave saying something similar to Mr. Murphy's comment on note-taking. The rest of the kids kept grumbling about that weirdo girl from Math class but stopped when she left the room.

Once outside in the cooridor, Legolas, for that is what his name was, struggled with the jacket. After only a few moments he succeeded in getting it off, frightened, pulling and feeling the edges of his pointed ears for any sign of injury. Upon finding none, he sighed, relieved, glaring at Vikki.

"Why did you tell that woman I cut my ear?! You scared me!"

The girl felt pitiful; she'd embarrassed her favourite elf! Then again, she had needed something to get him out of there. Speaking of getting out . . .

"Quick! Come with me!"

Vikki ran out of the hallway and onto the open part of the floor near the balcony. She could hear the handsome elf cursing something in elvish, screaming at her, but she didn't care. The staff could not find him! Running as fast as she could to the bathroom, she stopped short. Outside, in the courtyard were the ninth graders, having B Lunch. There was screaming coming from inside the cafeteria and so, pausing from their run, she and Legolas stopped to watch. Suddenly bursting from the cafeteria came two women, dressed in fine robes, being chased by one of the freshmen. Hearing footsteps the two whirled around, expecting the worst. Instead, Nicky, Michael and two others dressed rather archaicly ran up the stairs to join them.

When Vikki's eyes widened in surprise at who the two men were, Mike, being Mike, introduced them quickly.

"Ok, this is Eomer and Faramir. Guys: that's Legolas. Woop-dee-doo. Vikki have you seen what Shawn is doing?"

The girl's head whipped around to find the two girls, still screaming, being chased by the boy. Sure enough, what her friend said rang true: it was Shawn, one of the boys from the bus and a male obsessed with Arwen. It turns out she was one of the screaming females down there; the other was Eowyn, Eomer's sister. Glancing at the Rohirrim she found she was glad not to be Shawn at the moment.

"If he does not cease chasing my sister I swear I shall run him through!"

Vikki laughed nervously as she scanned the chaotic crowd, wracking her brain for an idea of what they should all do. Suddenly she spotted a familiar face. There in the other building across the courtyard she spotted Jamie dragging two rather strapping men behind her.

"Jamie!" she cried, waving her hands around in the air. The girl had not heard her but had seen her friend's lunatic waving spree and knew she was wanted upstairs.

Meanwhile, Vikki, Mike, Nick and their new-found friends, made their way to the bathroom. Upon rounding the corner the group stopped short.

"Oh, crap." Michael muttered allowed.

Vikki moaned.

To their dismay they found the bathroom door wide open, nothing remaining of the group of little people save a trashcan full to the brim with soda bottles. None could imagine where they could have run off to and were about to go look, when they heard a familiar cry. Racing back out to the ledge they found Gimli, standing on the rim of the school fountain, waving a large piece of PV-C around in his hands.

Standing to the side under one of the courtyard's tall trees were the two girls. Eowyn had found a rather large tree branch and was brandishing it at Shawn like an overgrown sword. Arwen had climbed the tree, trying to find someplace else to run. Shawn insisted on calling up to her, referring to the elf as Juliet, or something, and making kissing faces. Luckily for her, Eowyn was a good fighter.

Upon seeing his amazingly attractive friend being attacked by a love-ravaged freshman, Aragorn had quickly made his way over to the tree. Eomer, taking a leaf from Aragorn's book, had lept down from the balcony to aid his sister. Vikki searched for her friend and Boromir but could not spot them in the stampeading mass of students. As it turns out, those still inside classrooms were supposedly enacting lockdown procedure. The Ninth graders were told over and over by the PA system to make their way to the office, but two hundred and fifty kids cannot fit in so small a space, and so there was chaos.

Still on the balcony, Legolas had taken shot at the piece of piping Gimli was waving around. The arrow hit its mark, softly thudding to the ground, the PV-C speared right through the middle. Gimli, now at a complete loss, jumped down from the fountain and ran through the crowd. He had no idea what magical draught the wizards had given him, but he liked it! He was proceeding to chase all the pretty human girls around the courtyard when he ran smack dab into a rather tall human with big round pieces of glass in front of his eyes and a sour look on his face.

"And just who do you think you are, sir?" the snooty person asked of Gimli. "How did you get in this school? I will have you arrested right now! LEAVE AT ONCE!"

Gimli, shocked, suddenly began to laugh. He laughed harder then he'd ever done so in his life, so hard he thought he would split open. This pathetic human was trying to threaten him! He, Gimli, heir of Durin! Oh, it was more then he could stand. Falling over, the dwarf clutched his round stomach, aching at the amount of laughing to be done. The funny human just frowned.

Nearby, Aragorn was just helping Arwen down out of the tree. Eowyn had tied Shawn upside down from one of the lower branches, brandishing her club if he so much as breathed wrong. Eomer had taken out his whetting stone and was proceeding to sharpen his sword, to the dismay of Shawn.

Meanwhile, deep in the stampede of frightened freshmen, Jamie and Boromir continued to try and make their way towards the stairwell were they knew their friends awaited. Much to their dismay, however, this task would prove to be far more challenging then either had previously deduced. The throng around them was screaming and crying while the princepal stood in the middle of the crowd atop the fountain's edge with a megaphone, yelling for order. A pair of rather grim-faced policemen held a familiarly filthy little man custody, under the watchful smirk of the dean. Jamie recognized who it was the same moment Boromir did.

"Gimli." she whispered in shock. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the glint of steel.

"No, Boromir! Don't!"

She raced after the young Gondorian, through the crowd toward where the dwarf was being held captive. The man had drawn his sword, about to run by and cut the handcuffs binding Gimli. This is what Jamie hoped he was doing, anyway. He'd slowed down so as to spring from the crowd for a dramatic effect, Jamie reaching him and unable to stop herself in time. The girl plowed right into the man's back, knocking his sword to the side and them both out into the circle where their evil dean brooded.

Boromir had to admit that the entry was dramatic, but not quite what he'd hoped for. The little man in the striped shirt glowered.

"Ms. Jamie!" he cried. "What is this? What are you doing? Is this your idea of a joke? Who is this troublemaker?"

So many questions spoken in one breath, and Jamie had to answer them all. She rubbed her forehead, which she'd brushed against the side of the fountain and was starting to redden. She hoped it wouldn't bleed.

"Uh," she began. Boromir, laying on his stomach under her, glanced back to tell her to get off when he noticed the smirk on Gimli's face. Instead he grimaced, politely rolling to the side and helping the girl to her feet, standing up himself. Jamie's face reddened more at his touch, and Boromir wasn't sure this was due to her wound. She had still not said anything, and so he turned.

"I am her cousin." he told the strange little male, the only one of the group still frowning. The princepal had stopped yelling to watch, but when he heard splashing coming from the other side of the fountain and looked to find two freshmen dunking each other in the water, he left to investigate.

The dean and the policemen looked dubious. He turned to Jamie.

"You're cousin?"

She smiled weakly.

"Yes, my, uh, father's second cousin's nephew."

The man's brain hurt when he tried to work that through. He shook his head.

"Get back to the office right now! Don't you know it's lockdown procedure?"

Jamie nodded emphatically, dragging Boromir off behind her without the dwarf. He didn't seem to mind, however, as had had already broken the flimsy handcuffs in two while the others were watching Jamie and Boromir. As soon as they were away, the dwarf erupted from his chains, grinning like a drugged Warg. Screaming, "In the name of Durin!" at the top of his lungs, he raced off, to the utter dismay of those around him.