Chapter 11
The orb lights disappeared and instantly the Charmed Ones stepped away from Aragorn. Paige grabbed the box of crystals they used to vanquish the Source of all Evil so many years ago.
'We're not going to vanquish the Company are we?' asked Phoebe.
Paige shook her head.
'I'm just putting the cage up to protect us. That's if we even need to put the cage up.'
Paige set four of the five crystals around the Fellowship and stepped back. With a flick of her hand, Piper unfroze them. Aragorn looked around bewildered and then his eyes fell on Piper. From just one look she could tell that what she had done had hurt Aragorn terribly, and the trust he had once so willingly given her was gone beyond reach for the time being and it was going to take a whole lot to get it back. Aragorn drew his sword.
'TO ARMS!' he roared
The Company woke up, jumped to their feet and drew their weapons. Piper turned to Paige.
'Um, now maybe...'
'Crystal!'
The last crystal swirled into blue orb particles and with a flick of her hand, Paige set the crystal into place in front of Frodo and the crystal cage went up.
'TRAITORS!' Aragon shouted.
He brought his sword down on one of the crystals. The crystal threw Aragorn back and he landed painfully on Boromir. Legolas aimed his arrow at another crystal and fired. The arrow stopped a few centimeters away from the crystal and fell harmlessly to the floor.
'Now if you guys keep on throwing tantrums we're not going to get anywhere', said Paige. 'So I'm just going to take your toys away. Weapons!'
Every ones weapons disappeared into orb particles and floated downstairs to Paige's bedroom. Aragorn glared at them.
'What is this dark magic?' grunted Gimli. 'Where are we? What have you done to us?'
'First, it's not dark magic', said Phoebe. 'We're good witches and we're against Sauron and Saruman and we want the Ring destroyed. Second, we are in our hometown of San Francisco and you are in the attic of our house. Third, we have done nothing to you but brought you here to our house and put you in the crystal cage so you can't hurt us.'
'Do you have any apples', asked Pippin from the back of the group.
'Pippin!' said Merry loudly.
'What? I'm hungry', protested Pippin. 'No offense to the elves, lembas is quite good, but I'm getting a little tired of it.'
'But how do we no the witches aren't going to poison it', asked Boromir coldly.
'I could help prepare the food', said Sam quietly. 'I know all there is about food and what shouldn't go into it.'
'You want to help me cook lunch', Piper asked.
'I could.'
'Are you sure Sam?' Frodo asked him quietly.
'It's the only way we're going to get a good meal in this world Mr. Frodo. Besides, I could keep an eye on Piper and what see puts in to our meal.'
'But how is any of this going to happen it we are stuck in this cage?' said Aragorn.
'Will you promise not to hurt us?'
The fellowship glanced at each other and then Legolas looked at Phoebe.
'We swear.'
Paige stepped forward, kicked a crystal away and the cage came down.
'You're free to roam the house but do not leave it. The people in our world will not understand you and they may hurt you. There are also things out there that will confuse you, so stay inside. Sam, I'll show you the way to the kitchen.'
Piper walked downstairs and the Company followed. Paige turned to Phoebe.
'It's going to be a long day.'
Leo must have been watching something on the TV earlier and had forgotten to turn it off. Boromir was fascinated by it and sat down on the couch, Frodo saw the phone and went to investigate it. Legolas went in to the den and, with a little help from Paige, was surfing the net within five minutes. Merry and Pippin disappeared in the kitchen with Sam and Piper, Gimli had gone down into the basement and Aragorn was still hanging around upstairs somewhere.
Paige walked back into the living room and stopped short. Boromir was now kneeling a foot away from the TV with the remote about two inches away from his face. The channel was on a sports station.
'Having fun', she asked.
Boromir shook his head sadly.
'The only thing I know how to do in this world is turn this mirror on and off. The only thing is, the mirror doesn't reflect my face. Instead, it's reflecting... whatever this is. From what I've seen, a party of men with the emblem of a black and white kind of fish breaking out of blue and red glass beat another party of men with the emblem of a blue leaf at some sport that involves sticks and a flat black ball. I even saw two men from the different parties fighting each other.'
'Oh! The Canucks beat the Maple Leafs did they?' She grinned. 'Piper owes me twenty bucks. She said the Canucks wouldn't win three straight games and they did.
Boromir gave her a blank look.
'Never mind', she muttered.
Paige walked out of the living room and into the kitchen. Piper was stirring something on stove that smelt like soup and Sam was fighting with a blender on the floor since the counter was too tall for him.
'Hey Piper, the Canucks won three straight games. Fork it over.'
Piper dug into her pocket and slapped a twenty into Paige's hand. She returned to her stirring.
'I don't know what you see in that team', she muttered. 'They hardly ever make it into the playoffs.'
'They got this really cute forward named Matt Cooke on the team. In fact', she added thoughtfully, 'Legolas looks a lot like him.'
'Don't go attaching yourself to any of these guys', Piper said cautiously. 'Once we're finished helping them, that's it. We're not going to see them again.'
Suddenly, half blended food was splattering the walls and the ceiling and Sam was holding onto the open blender for dear life as it flew around the room. Piper pulled the plug and then wiped some liquid green stuff off her sweater. She sighed.
'And this was new too.'
Phoebe climbed up the stairs to see where Aragorn was. As she passed Piper's room she stopped and stared. Music was blaring out of the hidden speakers in the room and Aragorn was looking around wildly, looking for the source of the sound. Phoebe walked into the room and turned the stereo off. Aragorn looked at her.
'You have a lot of magic in your world. You can make music; at least I think that's what it was, come out of nowhere.'
Phoebe laughed.
'It's not magic, Aragorn. The speaker is just hidden. See?'
She pushed aside the leaves of one of Pipers plants and showed him the speaker.
'It's a thing called technology. It's a little too hard to explain.'
Aragorn nodded and then stopped as he heard Legolas begin to scream.
'Ai! Ai! Darkness take you witches and your evil magic! Ai!'
Phoebe and Aragorn charged down the stairs and into the den where everybody else now was. Behind Legolas on the computer screen was the Lord of the Rings web sight with a picture of him on it.
'Crap', muttered Phoebe.
Piper began to quickly chant.
Let the object of objection become but a dream
As I cause the scene to be unseen.
The computer screen went blank.
'Curse you witches', Legolas screamed.
Legolas pusher Piper out of the way, ran into the hallway and out the front door into broad daylight.
