ENDING TWO: Chapter Forty-One: Hear You Me
A/N: All right, this is how it goes. I wrote two different endings. And in Shakespearean terms, one is a comedy and the other a tragedy. #2 is the "comedy" but it's not that funny. Anybody who knows what I'm saying … kudos. You know, Shakespeare's plays were comedies, tragedies, or histories. In the tragedies--everybody dies. And in the comedies … well, you realized what happens in the comedies, if you don't already know. (Kudos again). Personally, I like #2 the best because I wrote that one first, but after I thought about it, it's too typical a story (within moderation, you know, my plot is unique) so I decided to write #1, but I couldn't decide between the two, so I decided … let the reviewers decide! Or just post them both. Since I couldn't ask you guys to pick without revealing the ending to you, I decided to post both. The beginning of #2 is quite similar to #1, so stick with me, it's not just a repeat!
…
Aila lay back onto her bed, her mind full of the memories of her escapades in Middle Earth. However, it had been months since Aila had visited her dear friend through the mirror and she always felt like she should remember to go, but she never quite found the time. It was as if she was holding herself back: forcing herself to find homework unfinished and thoughts un-pondered for classes. Whenever she got back to her apartment from her classes at Yale she would be much too tired to travel to another world where she would resume her 18 year old body and catch up on old times as this world froze in time. It didn't appeal to her, night after night.
This night was no different, in either aspect. She wished to go dearly, but didn't feel up to it, so she lay in bed, dreaming of the times they shared, it was around midnight and she knew that she should have been asleep by then, because she had early classes that morning. But something was keeping her eyes wide open. Forcefully, she closed her lids and willed herself to sleep. Heavy breathing and footsteps reached her ears as soon as she shut out the outside world.
Aila's eyes flew open and Arwen's beautiful complexion met her gaze. However, Arwen's face was wrought with sorrow, fear, and urgency.
"Arwen! What are you doing here? How did you get through the mirror? What's wrong?" Her barrage of questions went unanswered and frankly unnoticed as Arwen grabbed her wrist and pulled her bodily from her bed. "Wha--?" But she had no time to finish her question as she was yanked through her mirror to Middle Earth.
Immediately, she was surprised to find that she was not in Arwen's room as the mirror was usually located, but rather one of the private sickrooms of Rivendell. She looked around the room and recognized many people sitting there. Gandalf, Lord Elrond, King Elessar (Aragorn), and several elves that she did not recognize were there. One, she knew, was King Thranduil of Mirkwood. She wondered to herself why he was there. Then her gaze fell upon Gimli, who sat upon the right side of the bed, near the pillow. His eyes shone with tears that he refused to shed. "Dwarves don't cry," was what she was positive he had said.
Then her eyes fell upon the face that lay upon the pillow amidst the soft blankets of the bed. Arwen sat herself down next to Aragorn, her eyes gleaming with tears that plowed paths down her red cheeks. A chair was left to the other side of the bed, opposite Gimli. Pale-faced and gaunt, Legolas lay in the bed, eyes closed in deadly slumber. His hands had been placed cupped at his sides and the warm blankets were tucked tightly around his lithe body.
Standing dumbstruck for a few moments, Aila collected herself and ran to the empty chair that had been left for her. She grasped the elf's clammy hand, which froze her bones with its chill. Aila began rubbing his hand between hers, trying to force some warmth into it with the friction, but she got no response.
"Is he …" she couldn't bring herself to finish her own question. Gandalf bowed his head and stared at the ground, regretting what he was about to say.
"No, he lives. But he is dying." Aila stared at the wizard, her eyes full of sorrow and tears, which streaked down her cheeks and fell from her chin, but she did not care about that. One question filled her mind. "Soon," was the answer. Choking on her tears, sobs rocked Aila's body as she grasped her friend's cold hand.
She laid his palm against her cheek, flinching from the cold that Legolas' hand omitted. Gazing down at her dying friend, she wondered what could have killed him like this, so slow and painfully. Not battle. No person could do this … Crying even harder in her depression, Aila willed herself to feel the blood pulsing through the veins in his hand, but it was still and she felt nothing. She tried to force herself into his mind, hacking away at the mind block with mental swords, but it was useless in his dying throes.
Grief shook through her as she compiled to make her final good-bye to this elf who had protected her, befriended her, helped her, and did so much more for her. Quietly, she began to sing. Her voice cracked and tears streamed down her face, but the heart and meaning was felt throughout the room, and the others felt tears rush down their own cheeks, from eyes they thought dry at the lyrics of her song:
"There's no one in town I know
You gave us someplace to go
I never said thank you for that
I thought I might get one more chance
What would you think of me now?
So lucky, so strong, so proud
I never said thank you for that
Now I'll never have a chance
May angels lead you in
Hear you me, my friends
On sleepless roads the sleepless go
May angels lead you in
So what would you think of me now?
So lucky, so strong, so proud
I never said thank you for that
Now I'll never have a chance
May angels lead you in
Hear you me, my friends
On sleepless roads the sleepless go
May angels lead you in
(May angels lead you in)
May angels lead you in
(May angels lead you in)
May angels lead you in
And if you were with me tonight
I'd sing to you just one more time
A song for a heart so big,
God wouldn't let it live
May angels lead you in
Hear you me, my friends
On sleepless roads the sleepless go
May angels lead you in
May angels lead you in
Hear you me, my friends
On sleepless roads the sleepless go
May angels lead you in
On sleepless roads the sleepless go
May angels lead you in"
(Hear You Me by Jimmy Eat World)
She pulled his hand from her cheek and opened his palm to her lips and gently kissed it before closing his first around her kiss. Aila held his fist for a moment, breathing deeply through the racking sobs that plagued her body once more, but she forced herself to calm at least for a minute so she could speak.
"I will be forever in your debt, dear Legolas, mellon. Truly, you are a friend. May your ways be forever light." She had calmed enough to speak this levelly and truly. From the corner of her eye, she saw Gimli shake with sorrow, a tear escaping down his cheek. He could hold back no longer, after listening to her song and words. Tears rushed from his eyes like a flood and he tried his best to hide them, but no longer could he tear his eyes away from the distressing face of his dearest companion. Aila placed Legolas' fist upon his chest and felt depression settling itself upon her own chest. Here lie the friend who had turned her life around for the better, and now he was gone, despite immortality.
The others sitting in the room would have cried as well, but all of the tears in their eyes had been long since washed out, or had been rid of them during Aila's song. Seeing Aila place his lifeless fist upon his chest registered to them that he was well and truly dead. Sorrow descended on the room like an eagle upon its prey, feasting on their heavy souls. Aila reached a hand up and stroked the golden locks from her friend's forehead, knowing that there would never be another joke from his lips, another sarcastic remark, a smile, a laugh, a song.
It was all lost.
Aila felt like she wanted to find a sharp knife and simply slice her throat, so she did not have to live without her dear friend along with her. She knew she should have been there in those months that he was sick. She knew that Arwen could only pass through the mirror in times of great distress. Until Legolas was almost dead would she be able to pass through, and that's what happened. Aila's last moments with Legolas had been something she would regret for the rest of her life. As she stared at his closed eyelids, wishing she could gaze into his lively blue eyes one more time, she saw them flicker halfway open. She saw the eyeballs beneath his eyelids roving wildly under them as if in some terrible nightmare, but more real.
The breath caught in her chest as she watched Legolas open his eyes, her wish come true. A smile swept her swelling face and joy washed away all of her sorrow like a tidal wave over the insignificant sand. Legolas' breathing became regular and he just stared at the ceiling, his eyes out of focus. Then his deep blues shifted and Aila saw recognition in his face as he saw her. She grasped the fist that she had laid on his chest and opened his fist. The hand held searing heat within it, as if trying to thaw itself out, so different from the freezing cold she had previously felt, just moments before. Gently, she placed his hand against his own cheek, transferring her kiss from palm to cheek: the only way she could express the joy that she felt.
Legolas simply looked at her; confused, dazed, but strangely happy that she was with him again. He seemed to be recovering at a rapid pace, surprising even for an elf's immunity. Smiles replaced frowns and tears all around the once pain-stricken room. Servants rushed inside the room to give Legolas food once he was well enough to eat.
Gandalf watched the prince closely as he was given food. Previously, the royal had refused to eat anything, but now the prince ate ravenously in the company of his good friends who were with him at death. This affirmed Gandalf's theory and he stood as if to leave the room.
"I am glad to find Prince Legolas well and alive. It is a great relief to us all. Aila, if I may have a word?" He gestured to the door and Aila barely heard him as she gazed happily at her living friend who ate as if he were facing a ten-year famine (or coming out of one). She felt reluctant to leave her friend who seemed to have arisen from the dead, but she saw that he was not going anywhere at the moment, alive and breathing, so she consented to speak with the White.
He pulled her into one of Rivendell's breathtaking gardens, seating her upon a beautifully carved stone bench, the same one that she had laid upon while Legolas sang with her, all those months ago. She smiled at the memory and stroked it fondly as she sat down upon the stone. The wizard paced in front of her and she followed him with her eyes, confused and becoming quite concerned.
"Do you know," he began breathlessly, "the two ways in which an elf can die?"
"I know of one, and that is to be killed in battle or murdered. I never knew that there were two ways."
"Then this will be difficult." He frowned and continued to pace for several more minutes, saying nothing and leaving Aila even more confused and concerned than she had been before.
"What is the other way, Gandalf?" she persisted, tired of waiting, wanting to go back to her friend's side.
"Elves die," he said reluctantly, "if they are separated from their true love, do you follow me?" Realization dawned on Aila's face and Gandalf thought he didn't have to explain anything further, but he was proved wrong.
"You mean some b**** broke his heart? I'll kill her, just tell me who it is!"
"So you're suicidal, Aila?" he sighed. She knitted her eyebrows together, remembering her thoughts of suicide when she had thought Legolas dead, but her thoughts jumped to something else, but she was not willing to believe it. "Put the pieces together Aila, isn't Yale supposed to be a school for the extremely smart? You leave and go back to your world. Immediately, Legolas begins to become downhearted and sad. A month later you still haven't come back to visit and he begins to be depressed, a horrible state to be in, if you're an elf. Several more months pass by and still you don't visit. Legolas begins to think you are never coming back, in his depression, and decides that he will never see you again--ever. Naturally, he is so heartbroken, depressed, and sorrowful that he refuses to eat. Soon after, he falls ill and still refuses any food to pass his lips. His father, Thranduil, brought him to Rivendell in hopes that Lord Elrond and his healers may be able to help. They could not do anything to bring Legolas back into this world. Finally, at the last stage before death, Arwen was able to pass through the mirror and retrieve you to say good-bye to your friend as he died.
"Remember, when you felt his hand? How cold it was? His heart no longer pushed blood through his body, thus providing no heat for him, so sorrowful it was in losing its love. However, when you came, things began to look up for Legolas. Soon after, he awakened from his coma-like state and heat surged through his body. You felt his fist again, was it not searing with heat? So joyous was his heart that its Love had returned! Pay attention, Aila! He came back from the dead at your beckoning, your song, your kiss. He loves you. You are his One."
…
A/N: Well … WELL? Isn't this great? I'm OBVIOUSLY not finished yet. Ending #2 will be a couple more chapters. Oh, it's great being me. Biscuits? No biscuits? Fun cliffhanger, huh? Yeah, that's what I thought. Hope you enjoyed! De nada.
A/N: All right, this is how it goes. I wrote two different endings. And in Shakespearean terms, one is a comedy and the other a tragedy. #2 is the "comedy" but it's not that funny. Anybody who knows what I'm saying … kudos. You know, Shakespeare's plays were comedies, tragedies, or histories. In the tragedies--everybody dies. And in the comedies … well, you realized what happens in the comedies, if you don't already know. (Kudos again). Personally, I like #2 the best because I wrote that one first, but after I thought about it, it's too typical a story (within moderation, you know, my plot is unique) so I decided to write #1, but I couldn't decide between the two, so I decided … let the reviewers decide! Or just post them both. Since I couldn't ask you guys to pick without revealing the ending to you, I decided to post both. The beginning of #2 is quite similar to #1, so stick with me, it's not just a repeat!
…
Aila lay back onto her bed, her mind full of the memories of her escapades in Middle Earth. However, it had been months since Aila had visited her dear friend through the mirror and she always felt like she should remember to go, but she never quite found the time. It was as if she was holding herself back: forcing herself to find homework unfinished and thoughts un-pondered for classes. Whenever she got back to her apartment from her classes at Yale she would be much too tired to travel to another world where she would resume her 18 year old body and catch up on old times as this world froze in time. It didn't appeal to her, night after night.
This night was no different, in either aspect. She wished to go dearly, but didn't feel up to it, so she lay in bed, dreaming of the times they shared, it was around midnight and she knew that she should have been asleep by then, because she had early classes that morning. But something was keeping her eyes wide open. Forcefully, she closed her lids and willed herself to sleep. Heavy breathing and footsteps reached her ears as soon as she shut out the outside world.
Aila's eyes flew open and Arwen's beautiful complexion met her gaze. However, Arwen's face was wrought with sorrow, fear, and urgency.
"Arwen! What are you doing here? How did you get through the mirror? What's wrong?" Her barrage of questions went unanswered and frankly unnoticed as Arwen grabbed her wrist and pulled her bodily from her bed. "Wha--?" But she had no time to finish her question as she was yanked through her mirror to Middle Earth.
Immediately, she was surprised to find that she was not in Arwen's room as the mirror was usually located, but rather one of the private sickrooms of Rivendell. She looked around the room and recognized many people sitting there. Gandalf, Lord Elrond, King Elessar (Aragorn), and several elves that she did not recognize were there. One, she knew, was King Thranduil of Mirkwood. She wondered to herself why he was there. Then her gaze fell upon Gimli, who sat upon the right side of the bed, near the pillow. His eyes shone with tears that he refused to shed. "Dwarves don't cry," was what she was positive he had said.
Then her eyes fell upon the face that lay upon the pillow amidst the soft blankets of the bed. Arwen sat herself down next to Aragorn, her eyes gleaming with tears that plowed paths down her red cheeks. A chair was left to the other side of the bed, opposite Gimli. Pale-faced and gaunt, Legolas lay in the bed, eyes closed in deadly slumber. His hands had been placed cupped at his sides and the warm blankets were tucked tightly around his lithe body.
Standing dumbstruck for a few moments, Aila collected herself and ran to the empty chair that had been left for her. She grasped the elf's clammy hand, which froze her bones with its chill. Aila began rubbing his hand between hers, trying to force some warmth into it with the friction, but she got no response.
"Is he …" she couldn't bring herself to finish her own question. Gandalf bowed his head and stared at the ground, regretting what he was about to say.
"No, he lives. But he is dying." Aila stared at the wizard, her eyes full of sorrow and tears, which streaked down her cheeks and fell from her chin, but she did not care about that. One question filled her mind. "Soon," was the answer. Choking on her tears, sobs rocked Aila's body as she grasped her friend's cold hand.
She laid his palm against her cheek, flinching from the cold that Legolas' hand omitted. Gazing down at her dying friend, she wondered what could have killed him like this, so slow and painfully. Not battle. No person could do this … Crying even harder in her depression, Aila willed herself to feel the blood pulsing through the veins in his hand, but it was still and she felt nothing. She tried to force herself into his mind, hacking away at the mind block with mental swords, but it was useless in his dying throes.
Grief shook through her as she compiled to make her final good-bye to this elf who had protected her, befriended her, helped her, and did so much more for her. Quietly, she began to sing. Her voice cracked and tears streamed down her face, but the heart and meaning was felt throughout the room, and the others felt tears rush down their own cheeks, from eyes they thought dry at the lyrics of her song:
"There's no one in town I know
You gave us someplace to go
I never said thank you for that
I thought I might get one more chance
What would you think of me now?
So lucky, so strong, so proud
I never said thank you for that
Now I'll never have a chance
May angels lead you in
Hear you me, my friends
On sleepless roads the sleepless go
May angels lead you in
So what would you think of me now?
So lucky, so strong, so proud
I never said thank you for that
Now I'll never have a chance
May angels lead you in
Hear you me, my friends
On sleepless roads the sleepless go
May angels lead you in
(May angels lead you in)
May angels lead you in
(May angels lead you in)
May angels lead you in
And if you were with me tonight
I'd sing to you just one more time
A song for a heart so big,
God wouldn't let it live
May angels lead you in
Hear you me, my friends
On sleepless roads the sleepless go
May angels lead you in
May angels lead you in
Hear you me, my friends
On sleepless roads the sleepless go
May angels lead you in
On sleepless roads the sleepless go
May angels lead you in"
(Hear You Me by Jimmy Eat World)
She pulled his hand from her cheek and opened his palm to her lips and gently kissed it before closing his first around her kiss. Aila held his fist for a moment, breathing deeply through the racking sobs that plagued her body once more, but she forced herself to calm at least for a minute so she could speak.
"I will be forever in your debt, dear Legolas, mellon. Truly, you are a friend. May your ways be forever light." She had calmed enough to speak this levelly and truly. From the corner of her eye, she saw Gimli shake with sorrow, a tear escaping down his cheek. He could hold back no longer, after listening to her song and words. Tears rushed from his eyes like a flood and he tried his best to hide them, but no longer could he tear his eyes away from the distressing face of his dearest companion. Aila placed Legolas' fist upon his chest and felt depression settling itself upon her own chest. Here lie the friend who had turned her life around for the better, and now he was gone, despite immortality.
The others sitting in the room would have cried as well, but all of the tears in their eyes had been long since washed out, or had been rid of them during Aila's song. Seeing Aila place his lifeless fist upon his chest registered to them that he was well and truly dead. Sorrow descended on the room like an eagle upon its prey, feasting on their heavy souls. Aila reached a hand up and stroked the golden locks from her friend's forehead, knowing that there would never be another joke from his lips, another sarcastic remark, a smile, a laugh, a song.
It was all lost.
Aila felt like she wanted to find a sharp knife and simply slice her throat, so she did not have to live without her dear friend along with her. She knew she should have been there in those months that he was sick. She knew that Arwen could only pass through the mirror in times of great distress. Until Legolas was almost dead would she be able to pass through, and that's what happened. Aila's last moments with Legolas had been something she would regret for the rest of her life. As she stared at his closed eyelids, wishing she could gaze into his lively blue eyes one more time, she saw them flicker halfway open. She saw the eyeballs beneath his eyelids roving wildly under them as if in some terrible nightmare, but more real.
The breath caught in her chest as she watched Legolas open his eyes, her wish come true. A smile swept her swelling face and joy washed away all of her sorrow like a tidal wave over the insignificant sand. Legolas' breathing became regular and he just stared at the ceiling, his eyes out of focus. Then his deep blues shifted and Aila saw recognition in his face as he saw her. She grasped the fist that she had laid on his chest and opened his fist. The hand held searing heat within it, as if trying to thaw itself out, so different from the freezing cold she had previously felt, just moments before. Gently, she placed his hand against his own cheek, transferring her kiss from palm to cheek: the only way she could express the joy that she felt.
Legolas simply looked at her; confused, dazed, but strangely happy that she was with him again. He seemed to be recovering at a rapid pace, surprising even for an elf's immunity. Smiles replaced frowns and tears all around the once pain-stricken room. Servants rushed inside the room to give Legolas food once he was well enough to eat.
Gandalf watched the prince closely as he was given food. Previously, the royal had refused to eat anything, but now the prince ate ravenously in the company of his good friends who were with him at death. This affirmed Gandalf's theory and he stood as if to leave the room.
"I am glad to find Prince Legolas well and alive. It is a great relief to us all. Aila, if I may have a word?" He gestured to the door and Aila barely heard him as she gazed happily at her living friend who ate as if he were facing a ten-year famine (or coming out of one). She felt reluctant to leave her friend who seemed to have arisen from the dead, but she saw that he was not going anywhere at the moment, alive and breathing, so she consented to speak with the White.
He pulled her into one of Rivendell's breathtaking gardens, seating her upon a beautifully carved stone bench, the same one that she had laid upon while Legolas sang with her, all those months ago. She smiled at the memory and stroked it fondly as she sat down upon the stone. The wizard paced in front of her and she followed him with her eyes, confused and becoming quite concerned.
"Do you know," he began breathlessly, "the two ways in which an elf can die?"
"I know of one, and that is to be killed in battle or murdered. I never knew that there were two ways."
"Then this will be difficult." He frowned and continued to pace for several more minutes, saying nothing and leaving Aila even more confused and concerned than she had been before.
"What is the other way, Gandalf?" she persisted, tired of waiting, wanting to go back to her friend's side.
"Elves die," he said reluctantly, "if they are separated from their true love, do you follow me?" Realization dawned on Aila's face and Gandalf thought he didn't have to explain anything further, but he was proved wrong.
"You mean some b**** broke his heart? I'll kill her, just tell me who it is!"
"So you're suicidal, Aila?" he sighed. She knitted her eyebrows together, remembering her thoughts of suicide when she had thought Legolas dead, but her thoughts jumped to something else, but she was not willing to believe it. "Put the pieces together Aila, isn't Yale supposed to be a school for the extremely smart? You leave and go back to your world. Immediately, Legolas begins to become downhearted and sad. A month later you still haven't come back to visit and he begins to be depressed, a horrible state to be in, if you're an elf. Several more months pass by and still you don't visit. Legolas begins to think you are never coming back, in his depression, and decides that he will never see you again--ever. Naturally, he is so heartbroken, depressed, and sorrowful that he refuses to eat. Soon after, he falls ill and still refuses any food to pass his lips. His father, Thranduil, brought him to Rivendell in hopes that Lord Elrond and his healers may be able to help. They could not do anything to bring Legolas back into this world. Finally, at the last stage before death, Arwen was able to pass through the mirror and retrieve you to say good-bye to your friend as he died.
"Remember, when you felt his hand? How cold it was? His heart no longer pushed blood through his body, thus providing no heat for him, so sorrowful it was in losing its love. However, when you came, things began to look up for Legolas. Soon after, he awakened from his coma-like state and heat surged through his body. You felt his fist again, was it not searing with heat? So joyous was his heart that its Love had returned! Pay attention, Aila! He came back from the dead at your beckoning, your song, your kiss. He loves you. You are his One."
…
A/N: Well … WELL? Isn't this great? I'm OBVIOUSLY not finished yet. Ending #2 will be a couple more chapters. Oh, it's great being me. Biscuits? No biscuits? Fun cliffhanger, huh? Yeah, that's what I thought. Hope you enjoyed! De nada.