AN: Wow it's been awhile *guilty grin * Just a note on this story: I know
this has probably been done thrice over before, but the characters (with
the exception of Tolkien's) are mine and the plotline (yes there is a *gasp
* plotline!!:) is mine. Any complaints, comments, threats to take over the
world, please let me know.
Disclaimer: Don't own LotR *sob * belongs to The Great Tolkien. ALL HAIL!!!
The lovely melody floated through the beautiful morning, causing all who heard to pause and listen, most of them with a slightly glazed look on their faces. One such victim had been tracking the sweet voice for over an hour, but to no avail. The forest of Mirkwood was deep, and the elusive song seemed to emanate from the trees themselves. I hope she runs out of melodies soon, Legolas thought bitterly as he changed directions again. The song ceased suddenly, and the elf felt hope rise in his heart. Perhaps he would be able to eat a good, long breakfast for the first time in days. But alas, Legolas's hopes were shattered once more as the singer began her melody again, and his legs began walking against his will.
"Valar, not again!" He cried, struggling against the awful grip the melody now held on his body. This strange ailment had been plaguing Mirkwood's residents for nearly a week now, and every time that accursed woman began to sing, Legolas was forced to follow. Quite unfortunately, the song was usually sung around mealtimes (breakfast had become quite popular), and the prince was beginning to wonder if he would ever taste fresh food in this age.
Suddenly the trees opened into a bright, sunlit clearing, though it was nearly impossible to get even a ray of sunshine this deep in Mirkwood's borders. In a last, desperate attempt for escape, Legolas tried to cover his eyes. 'Must not look, must not look upon the beautiful witch.'
He looked. Rather, his arms seemed to turn into stone, and he had no other choice but to gaze upon what looked like the loveliest maiden ever to grace Middle-Earth. Golden tresses that settled on moonlit skin nearly blinded the helpless elf, but the flowing, queenly dress dark as a midnight sky helped his vision a little. The maiden was stroking her hair lovingly, like it was a pet that hung from her head. Turning deep blue eyes to the prince, she smiled, almost evilly, but with her luxuriant lips, such a feat was impossible.
Fighting down the urge to speak, Legolas's usually fair face contorted with agony.
'I do not want to marry her, I DO NOT want to marry her; Valar please do not let me speak~'
At last, his prayers were answered. A sudden crash broke the cheesy love tune that had been playing, unnoticed, in the background, and Legolas felt something hit the back of his head. Hard.
"Thank you, kind angel," he breathed happily before darkness took over his senses.
~ ~ ~
The remnants of a pencil gnawed in half flew into a small black trash bag next to Rachel's bare feet. The flustered author reached for a fresh writing utensil while transferring her nibbling to her nails. She glanced up at the computer screen in front of her, then at an open notebook lying in her lap. Outside the window next to the computer a full moon shone, illuminating her cluttered bedroom/writing cave.
"Curses!" Rachel shouted, rising and slamming the window shut as the neighborhood werewolf began to howl an annoyingly mournful tune. "Where is that muse?!"
The girl's muse, a slightly insane invisible friend named Crazy Elf, had disappeared the night before, leaving only a note saying, 'back whenever'.
Rachel sighed and reached for a pixie stick. She hadn't updated any of her stories on fanfiction.net in weeks. The ragged author stared at her computer screen, discovering after a while that the white screen turned a funny greenish color if she didn't blink for a few minutes.
After snapping out of her trance when her eyes felt like they were shriveling up, she looked over distastefully to her unkempt mattress lying in a puddle of moonlight. It was against her ways, but Rachel was pondering actually sleeping that night when an earsplitting roar knocked her out of her chair.
"I DIDN'T DO IT!" Rachel yelled from under an armrest, hoping the police would hear over the helicopter's noise. But there was no roar of beating wings, or a bullhorn commanding her to come out of the house. Instead, there was nothing, only the faint glow of her computer screen. Pulling her blond hair out from the painful position it had taken under her arm, she risked a quick glance around the darkened room.
"Who- anybody t-there?"
"As a matter of fact, yes, there is somebody here." Rachel broke the sound barrier with a high pitched squeak and scrambled for one of her many flashlights scattered about the floor.
There was a muttered curse from whoever was in the room. It sounded like they-she-he-it stood by the now closed window. Rachel found a small flashlight buried under an unidentified lump and flipped the switch. Nothing happened. A slight chuckle came from the window, and within moments, a torch flamed to life.
"What are you doing?! You're going to burn the house down!" Rachel shrieked in a panic, starting a mad wiggle toward the bedroom door.
Don't worry about that," the figure continued as if nothing was wrong, " no technology works around me after being in the AT."
"What'd I do?" Rachel squeaked, fumbling with the lock on her door.
"My name is AJ, and you are in big trouble. You were mere seconds away from spawning the horror of all fanfiction horrors, the cursed Mary Sue." AJ paused dramatically for effect, waiting for Rachel's response.
"Huh?"
There was a frustrated sigh, then a thump as AJ moved closer to the now thoroughly confused author, the torchlight revealing intense amber eyes and an obvious frown of irritation. Rachel risked another small squeak as the woman took her arm.
"I'll explain later. Right now, you must come to CUP with me to discuss your fanfiction permits."
"CUP?"
"Cruel and Unusual Punishment," AJ replied calmly, almost happily and pulled Rachel to her feet, "If you're lucky you will not suffer much, considering the annoyingly high Mary Sue growth rate this month."
Rachel stared blankly at the apparent escapee from a mental institution as AJ fiddled with something in her belt.
"I will explain everything in great detail under one condition: you do not scream."
Before Rachel had a chance to react, a loud beep sounded from whatever was on AJ's belt, and her bedroom/writing cave blurred and vanished, leaving Rachel and AJ spiraling down a pitch- black tunnel.
Rachel's first instinct was to shriek the eardrums out of whoever could hear her, but failed as AJ clamped a hand over her mouth. The author risked a glance up at her apparent kidnapper and almost hurled. They seemed to be hurtling past hundreds of windows, each slightly different from the last. Abruptly AJ moved her other hand over Rachel's eyes and the pixie sticks from breakfast stopped threatening to appear again.
"Ready," AJ shouted over the whoosh of wind in their ears.
"Mmmhmf?" Rachel inquired through AJ's hand. The beeping noise was back, and the author felt AJ's body go rigid. There was a flash of light, or a change in atmosphere, and suddenly they were standing in knee- deep grass. AJ slowly removed her hands, revealing an endless looking meadow of the wavy grass, bordered to one side by an equally endless looking forest. Rachel gawked, thought about yelling, thought the better of it, and fell in a twitching heap in the long grass.
"That is the AT," AJ explained, "agent transporter."
"Ow," was all Rachel managed to say. Ignoring her, AJ strode briskly through the meadow, toward the great forest. When Rachel lifted her head again, the older woman was almost invisible among the trees. After a quick glance around, the author picked herself up and followed. What was the use of running away when you didn't know where 'away' was?
"Okay, I'll play along," Rachel panted as she caught up with AJ, "You're a secret agent with really good special effects stored on your belt. Right so far?"
"Not even close," came the cool response, "I am an agent, yes, but I work for CUP, an organization created to minimize the appearance of Mary Sues in popular categories of fanfiction. They have a tendency to, ah, disturb certain characters, and, erm, disgruntle storylines. With me so far?"
"Umm, what's a Mary Sue?"
AJ heaved a disgusted sigh. "They really are careless about issuing author's licenses aren't they? A Mary Sue," she continued before Rachel could interrupt, "Is an author-created character written into a book mostly for the purposes of relieving raging hormones. The character, 99 percent of whom are female, are described as beautiful, perfect, witty, charming, and have the most annoying, repulsive, SINGING VOICE." the agent paused to fume silently for a minute, and Rachel took the time to edge as far away from her as the trees surrounding them would allow. "Anyway, our job is to a: exterminate already-made Mary Sues, b: prevent authors such as yourself from creating them or c: preventing meddling authors from throwing book characters into our world."
"You mean Le- LotR characters have been on earth before?!" Rachel yelped, wondering just how many times a certain blond elf had appeared somewhere in her world without her knowledge.
"A good 563 and a half times."
"And a half?"
"You don't want to know," AJ said with a shudder, "Don't get me sidetracked. I'm supposed to explain everything. Since the LotR section is currently suffering a huge Mary Sue growth rate with the arrival of the movies, we have been forced to recruit would-be MS writers to serve their punishment as temporary agents."
"Oh." Rachel replied, pondering whether or not to believe this utterly insane story. How many cherry flavored pixie sticks had she had that morning? They were known to bring strange and confusing dreams at times. Perhaps this as a warning from the little sugar crystal candy that she was in fact allergic to the cherry flavored ones. Nothing good ever came from cherry. Nothing nothing noth-
"Hello?"
"Huh?" Rachel snapped her head up. The two had come to a small clump of rocks tucked in the roots of a particularly huge and gnarled tree. AJ was pointing to the smooth, flat rock in the middle of the bunch.
"Push the button, if you please." The button, a small piece of what looked like moss, sat near the middle of the stone. Rachel hesitated a moment, then pushed. And dropped into a shallow hole that had suddenly opened under the rock. AJ landed lightly beside her as a pair of identical wooden bars came out of the rock with a low whirring sound.
"Automated at last," AJ said contentedly. Then, "Hold on tight."
Rachel had just enough time to grab her handle before the rock shot forward into a horizontal version of the previous tunnel. Without the windows, her stomach thought happily. The stone sped through the darkness at breakneck speed, twisting and dropping till all Rachel could comprehend was the darkness surrounding them. The author hung on for her life, and risked a small scream as a perfectly round wooden door suddenly blocked the stone's wild path.
"EEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH!!" She yelled, and waited for the end of her most vivid nightmare yet.
Then the door opened.
Disclaimer: Don't own LotR *sob * belongs to The Great Tolkien. ALL HAIL!!!
The lovely melody floated through the beautiful morning, causing all who heard to pause and listen, most of them with a slightly glazed look on their faces. One such victim had been tracking the sweet voice for over an hour, but to no avail. The forest of Mirkwood was deep, and the elusive song seemed to emanate from the trees themselves. I hope she runs out of melodies soon, Legolas thought bitterly as he changed directions again. The song ceased suddenly, and the elf felt hope rise in his heart. Perhaps he would be able to eat a good, long breakfast for the first time in days. But alas, Legolas's hopes were shattered once more as the singer began her melody again, and his legs began walking against his will.
"Valar, not again!" He cried, struggling against the awful grip the melody now held on his body. This strange ailment had been plaguing Mirkwood's residents for nearly a week now, and every time that accursed woman began to sing, Legolas was forced to follow. Quite unfortunately, the song was usually sung around mealtimes (breakfast had become quite popular), and the prince was beginning to wonder if he would ever taste fresh food in this age.
Suddenly the trees opened into a bright, sunlit clearing, though it was nearly impossible to get even a ray of sunshine this deep in Mirkwood's borders. In a last, desperate attempt for escape, Legolas tried to cover his eyes. 'Must not look, must not look upon the beautiful witch.'
He looked. Rather, his arms seemed to turn into stone, and he had no other choice but to gaze upon what looked like the loveliest maiden ever to grace Middle-Earth. Golden tresses that settled on moonlit skin nearly blinded the helpless elf, but the flowing, queenly dress dark as a midnight sky helped his vision a little. The maiden was stroking her hair lovingly, like it was a pet that hung from her head. Turning deep blue eyes to the prince, she smiled, almost evilly, but with her luxuriant lips, such a feat was impossible.
Fighting down the urge to speak, Legolas's usually fair face contorted with agony.
'I do not want to marry her, I DO NOT want to marry her; Valar please do not let me speak~'
At last, his prayers were answered. A sudden crash broke the cheesy love tune that had been playing, unnoticed, in the background, and Legolas felt something hit the back of his head. Hard.
"Thank you, kind angel," he breathed happily before darkness took over his senses.
~ ~ ~
The remnants of a pencil gnawed in half flew into a small black trash bag next to Rachel's bare feet. The flustered author reached for a fresh writing utensil while transferring her nibbling to her nails. She glanced up at the computer screen in front of her, then at an open notebook lying in her lap. Outside the window next to the computer a full moon shone, illuminating her cluttered bedroom/writing cave.
"Curses!" Rachel shouted, rising and slamming the window shut as the neighborhood werewolf began to howl an annoyingly mournful tune. "Where is that muse?!"
The girl's muse, a slightly insane invisible friend named Crazy Elf, had disappeared the night before, leaving only a note saying, 'back whenever'.
Rachel sighed and reached for a pixie stick. She hadn't updated any of her stories on fanfiction.net in weeks. The ragged author stared at her computer screen, discovering after a while that the white screen turned a funny greenish color if she didn't blink for a few minutes.
After snapping out of her trance when her eyes felt like they were shriveling up, she looked over distastefully to her unkempt mattress lying in a puddle of moonlight. It was against her ways, but Rachel was pondering actually sleeping that night when an earsplitting roar knocked her out of her chair.
"I DIDN'T DO IT!" Rachel yelled from under an armrest, hoping the police would hear over the helicopter's noise. But there was no roar of beating wings, or a bullhorn commanding her to come out of the house. Instead, there was nothing, only the faint glow of her computer screen. Pulling her blond hair out from the painful position it had taken under her arm, she risked a quick glance around the darkened room.
"Who- anybody t-there?"
"As a matter of fact, yes, there is somebody here." Rachel broke the sound barrier with a high pitched squeak and scrambled for one of her many flashlights scattered about the floor.
There was a muttered curse from whoever was in the room. It sounded like they-she-he-it stood by the now closed window. Rachel found a small flashlight buried under an unidentified lump and flipped the switch. Nothing happened. A slight chuckle came from the window, and within moments, a torch flamed to life.
"What are you doing?! You're going to burn the house down!" Rachel shrieked in a panic, starting a mad wiggle toward the bedroom door.
Don't worry about that," the figure continued as if nothing was wrong, " no technology works around me after being in the AT."
"What'd I do?" Rachel squeaked, fumbling with the lock on her door.
"My name is AJ, and you are in big trouble. You were mere seconds away from spawning the horror of all fanfiction horrors, the cursed Mary Sue." AJ paused dramatically for effect, waiting for Rachel's response.
"Huh?"
There was a frustrated sigh, then a thump as AJ moved closer to the now thoroughly confused author, the torchlight revealing intense amber eyes and an obvious frown of irritation. Rachel risked another small squeak as the woman took her arm.
"I'll explain later. Right now, you must come to CUP with me to discuss your fanfiction permits."
"CUP?"
"Cruel and Unusual Punishment," AJ replied calmly, almost happily and pulled Rachel to her feet, "If you're lucky you will not suffer much, considering the annoyingly high Mary Sue growth rate this month."
Rachel stared blankly at the apparent escapee from a mental institution as AJ fiddled with something in her belt.
"I will explain everything in great detail under one condition: you do not scream."
Before Rachel had a chance to react, a loud beep sounded from whatever was on AJ's belt, and her bedroom/writing cave blurred and vanished, leaving Rachel and AJ spiraling down a pitch- black tunnel.
Rachel's first instinct was to shriek the eardrums out of whoever could hear her, but failed as AJ clamped a hand over her mouth. The author risked a glance up at her apparent kidnapper and almost hurled. They seemed to be hurtling past hundreds of windows, each slightly different from the last. Abruptly AJ moved her other hand over Rachel's eyes and the pixie sticks from breakfast stopped threatening to appear again.
"Ready," AJ shouted over the whoosh of wind in their ears.
"Mmmhmf?" Rachel inquired through AJ's hand. The beeping noise was back, and the author felt AJ's body go rigid. There was a flash of light, or a change in atmosphere, and suddenly they were standing in knee- deep grass. AJ slowly removed her hands, revealing an endless looking meadow of the wavy grass, bordered to one side by an equally endless looking forest. Rachel gawked, thought about yelling, thought the better of it, and fell in a twitching heap in the long grass.
"That is the AT," AJ explained, "agent transporter."
"Ow," was all Rachel managed to say. Ignoring her, AJ strode briskly through the meadow, toward the great forest. When Rachel lifted her head again, the older woman was almost invisible among the trees. After a quick glance around, the author picked herself up and followed. What was the use of running away when you didn't know where 'away' was?
"Okay, I'll play along," Rachel panted as she caught up with AJ, "You're a secret agent with really good special effects stored on your belt. Right so far?"
"Not even close," came the cool response, "I am an agent, yes, but I work for CUP, an organization created to minimize the appearance of Mary Sues in popular categories of fanfiction. They have a tendency to, ah, disturb certain characters, and, erm, disgruntle storylines. With me so far?"
"Umm, what's a Mary Sue?"
AJ heaved a disgusted sigh. "They really are careless about issuing author's licenses aren't they? A Mary Sue," she continued before Rachel could interrupt, "Is an author-created character written into a book mostly for the purposes of relieving raging hormones. The character, 99 percent of whom are female, are described as beautiful, perfect, witty, charming, and have the most annoying, repulsive, SINGING VOICE." the agent paused to fume silently for a minute, and Rachel took the time to edge as far away from her as the trees surrounding them would allow. "Anyway, our job is to a: exterminate already-made Mary Sues, b: prevent authors such as yourself from creating them or c: preventing meddling authors from throwing book characters into our world."
"You mean Le- LotR characters have been on earth before?!" Rachel yelped, wondering just how many times a certain blond elf had appeared somewhere in her world without her knowledge.
"A good 563 and a half times."
"And a half?"
"You don't want to know," AJ said with a shudder, "Don't get me sidetracked. I'm supposed to explain everything. Since the LotR section is currently suffering a huge Mary Sue growth rate with the arrival of the movies, we have been forced to recruit would-be MS writers to serve their punishment as temporary agents."
"Oh." Rachel replied, pondering whether or not to believe this utterly insane story. How many cherry flavored pixie sticks had she had that morning? They were known to bring strange and confusing dreams at times. Perhaps this as a warning from the little sugar crystal candy that she was in fact allergic to the cherry flavored ones. Nothing good ever came from cherry. Nothing nothing noth-
"Hello?"
"Huh?" Rachel snapped her head up. The two had come to a small clump of rocks tucked in the roots of a particularly huge and gnarled tree. AJ was pointing to the smooth, flat rock in the middle of the bunch.
"Push the button, if you please." The button, a small piece of what looked like moss, sat near the middle of the stone. Rachel hesitated a moment, then pushed. And dropped into a shallow hole that had suddenly opened under the rock. AJ landed lightly beside her as a pair of identical wooden bars came out of the rock with a low whirring sound.
"Automated at last," AJ said contentedly. Then, "Hold on tight."
Rachel had just enough time to grab her handle before the rock shot forward into a horizontal version of the previous tunnel. Without the windows, her stomach thought happily. The stone sped through the darkness at breakneck speed, twisting and dropping till all Rachel could comprehend was the darkness surrounding them. The author hung on for her life, and risked a small scream as a perfectly round wooden door suddenly blocked the stone's wild path.
"EEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH!!" She yelled, and waited for the end of her most vivid nightmare yet.
Then the door opened.