Disclaimer: All Star Trek related characters and concepts belong to Paramount; all Lord of the Rings related characters and concepts belong to J.R.R. Tolkien. I am merely borrowing them.
A/N: Oy...I take back what I said last chapter. I had to rewrite this one four times before it felt right. This was definitely the hardest to write.
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THE SHADOW RIDERS
Chapter Twenty-One: The Road Goes Ever On
There still he stood far into the night, hearing only the sigh and murmur of the waves on the shores of Middle-earth, and the sound of them sank deep into his heart.
-J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings
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"Begin log recording."
The computer beeped.
"It has been a very strange few days. First, my armory officer and my communications officer disappear into thin air, and send us on a wild goose chase across an alien world, and then I see ghostly visions of them in varying places. I even saw Lieutenant Reed rise from the dead."
Archer stopped, shuddering. That was something he would definitely like to put out of his memory.
"And early this morning, I found a mysterious staircase leading deep into the bowels of the earth. I heard a voice—Malcolm Reed's voice—calling me, so I descended. I really can't say why I went down there alone and unarmed, but I did, and at the bottom..."
He paused again. How to put this into words? It sounded... illogical, to use T'Pol's favorite phrase. It sounded crazy.
"At the bottom," he said hesitantly, "I found Lieutenant Reed and Ensign Sato. But—they were intangible. Like spirits. My hand went right through them. I don't really understand what happened down there. I don't think I've ever seen Malcolm look so—so strange. At first it was like he was a completely different person. Hoshi was screaming in pain and Malcolm was just standing there, and then it was like something in the room snapped and they both came out of it all of a sudden."
He knew he was not making himself clear, but he could not think how else to phrase what he had seen. He was not entirely sure that he had seen what he had seen anyway, down in that deep dark room. How had it survived whatever blast had taken down the rest of the tower?
"I've never seen Lieutenant Reed look so terrified," Archer continued, his voice shaking a little. "And then he turned and looked right at me for the first time, and said, 'I'm sorry, sir. Go back to Enterprise.' The stone he had been holding—he flung it against the wall and it shattered and they disappeared completely. I have the pieces of the stone, but T'Pol can't make head or tail of it. She says it's like the scanners won't acknowledge that it is exists.
"That isn't the strangest part of the story, though. We went back to the ship. I thought Malcolm had destroyed whatever it was that had taken them away, so I called off the search, believing—believing that they were lost to us forever. I had T'Pol run one last scan before we left orbit, just a few hours ago." He paused and looked down at Porthos, who was calmly fast asleep in his basket, the tip of his tail twitching faintly. "Just human illogic, I suppose.
"But we found something. Two human biosigns on the west coast of the continent. Two human biosigns—and everyone aboard Enterprise well and accounted for. We sent down a shuttlepod immediately."
His voice broke again, but he didn't care. "I have no clue how they got there, or why they were dressed in such strange clothes. I have no clue why Phlox says Hoshi has lost more weight than should be possible in four days. Malcolm has scars on his chest and thigh that are healed over, something impossible to do in only four days. And both of them are showing simple signs of growth and change—hair, nails, things like that, Phlox will have a more detailed analysis—that couldn't happen in four days. He says it's consistent with patterns for—and here's the really strange part—a little over sixty days.
"So wherever they were, whatever happened to them, they were there for a long time," Archer murmured, reaching down to scratch Porthos' head. "Phlox refuses to wake them up yet... I, and the whole rest of the ship, am very curious about what exactly went on down on that planet."
He looked out at the stars streaking past the window in a blaze of white and black ribbon. The ship at warp hummed softly beneath his feet. "I for one," he added, "am glad to leave that planet, whatever may have happened down there.
"Computer, end log."
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To all appearances Malcolm Reed and Hoshi Sato slipped right back into their old lives—and to the crew of the Enterprise, they had only been gone for a few days. There was no 'old life' about it. Hoshi had an easier time of it, perhaps due to the time she had 'spent' on Enterprise while a prisoner of Sauron, but neither of them would have called any part of the readjustment easy.
It wasn't that they weren't glad to be home. And it wasn't that they didn't remember their duties or how to get around the ship.
The simplest tasks were different. Muscles used to riding and walking everywhere cramped when sitting at a console all shift. The food, even Chef's fine cuisine, tasted wrong after two months of eating medieval-style fare. Ears used to hearing Common Speech found English odd-sounding and tongues had to work to respond in the correct language. They found it hard to sleep on the Starfleet-issue beds, missing both the plump feather mattresses of Edoras and Minas Tirith and the hard ground of various encampments.
And after being in the wide-open spaces of Middle-earth, Malcolm especially found the ship close and a little claustrophobic.
Hoshi had finally dropped off to sleep, her head on his shoulder, and he stroked her hair absently as he stared up at the dark ceiling. He couldn't actually see it, but he knew it was there, no matter how hard he tried to pretend it wasn't.
Hoshi stirred on his arm; he stilled and waited, but she did not awaken. Carefully he slid out from under her and slipped out of bed, feeling his joints loosen as he moved. He padded down the corridors to the mess hall, not really hungry but wanting to wander. Vaguely he thought of the report he had turned in to Captain Archer that morning and wondered just how much of it the captain would believe.
The stars were streaking past the window when he reached the mess, the captain having wasted no time getting away from Middle-earth. Arda, Malcolm recalled with some flash of leftover knowledge from Elowë, the name of the planet was Arda, but likely no one except him would ever call it that.
For the thousandth time since returning to Enterprise he wondered what had happened to the people of Middle-earth. The Elves were leaving already, he knew, but what about all the others? It seemed to him unlikely that they'd all merely died out.
Nothing in the cabinets looked appetizing, so he merely poured himself a cup of tea and sat down at one of the tables nearest the windows. No one else was hungry at this hour; it appeared not even the night shift wanted a snack. He didn't mind. At times it was difficult to talk to people, because the work and the gossip all seemed to him to be long past bothering about. Yet everything was as he had left it.
If things had changed, Malcolm mused, staring into the brown depths of his tea, he could have dealt better. He felt as though he had changed, but the world he had returned to was still the same, and it no longer quite fit as seamlessly as it once had.
The door opened with a whoosh. Malcolm didn't turn around as whoever it was walked in, and when a hand gripped his shoulder a moment later he jumped in surprise.
"Some crazy shore leave," said Trip, taking a seat across from him.
Malcolm smiled wryly. "Agreed," he said, sipping at his tea. He didn't meet Trip's eyes, suddenly terrified at the questions his friend would ask and the inevitable incomprehension that would follow. He knew it was illogical—he shouldn't be afraid to tell Trip anything—but he couldn't help it.
"I read your report," said the commander, tossing a PADD on the table. "Interesting stuff. Reads more like a fantasy novel than a Starfleet report, really."
Malcolm looked at the PADD. "I know," he said. "But it's what happened. It's like Marco Polo coming back from China—it's only a little of what I saw. The rest—you wouldn't believe it at all."
"I'd have a hard time believing any of it," said Trip, "if I hadn't seen you disappear into thin air spouting a lot of drivel about your reckoning and a Black Tower."
He looked up and met Trip's eyes at last. "I'd forgotten about that," said Malcolm. "A lot happened at Helm's Deep, and it was a bit much to take in at times." He'd edited his report carefully, knowing that a sudden transmogrification into an Istari and a Maia called Elowë sounded a bit too crazy for anyone here to take it seriously.
"You chose to stay there," said Trip accusingly. "Jon told me—he said before I got out there you had a hole in your chest the size of a fist. And you got up and came back to life somehow and when he ordered you to stay you refused. Could you have come back to our time, our universe, whatever, then?"
Malcolm thought back, considering. "Probably," he admitted. "That's a bit hazy. I did die, after all."
"And you didn't come back then?" Trip's tone was dark and Malcolm looked up at his friend in surprise. "You'd rather stay in some strange world full of Elves and Dwarves and crazy flaming Eyes?"
"I could have stayed!" Malcolm cried, the vehemence in his voice surprising himself as much as Trip. "I told you at Helm's Deep that I had to fulfill a task... that I couldn't leave yet. I had to rescue Hoshi! If I hadn't gotten her that entire world would have fallen! Sauron would have overcome her and gotten control of the captain and the ship, and taken over Middle- earth!"
He stopped abruptly, catching a glimpse of the astonished look on Trip's face. "I'm sorry, Trip," he said, dropping his voice to nearly a whisper.
The engineer's face softened and he shook his head. "I have no idea what you really went through, Mal," he said. "I got the feeling, reading your report, that a lot more happened than what you said."
"I wanted to stay there," said Malcolm, his voice breaking. "But Gandalf was right, I am more needed here than there. I would have been happy there, but I wouldn't have been doing anything except fading away into the shadows."
Trip reached across and gripped his forearm. "Hey," he said. "I'm sorry. Twice you appeared and we thought you two were dead and never coming back."
"I did come back, though," said Malcolm, looking at the half-empty teacup.
He looked up at Trip and felt a lump in his throat as the engineer's face broke into a grin. "That you did, buddy, that you did."
Malcolm returned the smile, suddenly feeling more at home on Enterprise than he had since returning. "It's good to be back," he said. "Really."
"Bet you're glad you rescued Hoshi," said Trip, his eyebrows going up suggestively. "Since she's not sleeping in her own cabin..."
Malcolm's mouth dropped open. They'd been very discreet, but obviously not enough. "And just how do you know that, Commander? Should I add Peeping Tom to your list of credentials, Mr. Tucker?"
"I have my ways, Mr. Reed," said Trip, grinning more widely than ever. "Especially when I page your quarters and Hoshi answers by saying, 'He's not here, Trip, and I'm trying to sleep!' only with a few choice words added on that I didn't know a lady like Hoshi even knew."
Malcolm snorted with laughter. "And she was the one who suggested not calling attention to it," he said through chuckles. "Why were you paging my quarters at 0200 in the morning anyway?"
"T'Pol turned these over to me after she finished with her scans," said Trip, picking a square case up from the floor that Malcolm hadn't noticed until now. He opened it and pulled out a smooth black ball, shining with some incandescent inner light. "She can't get a darned thing on them at all and she wanted me to take a look. I didn't get anything either, but I guess it doesn't really matter now that we're away from that planet. I thought you might want it back, since you were holding it when we found you." He turned the palantír over in his hands once more and handed it to Malcolm, looking a little sheepish. "To tell you the truth, I wasn't really thinking about the time."
"It's all right," said Malcolm, gazing at the stone. There was nothing at all there, not even Denethor's burning hands. Though the faint light still shone from within, the stone was as good as dead.
"It's not going to transport someone else back into the past, is it?" asked Trip, a faint hint of worry crossing his features.
"No," said Malcolm absently. "It's pretty much dead now, I think." He stared into its depths for a long moment, hardly noticing as Trip got up and took three more pieces of a broken palantír from the case.
"The captain brought this back from that Black Tower of yours after you smashed it," Trip said. "Don't stay up too late, Malcolm."
"I won't," he replied, looking up at the commander. "Just going to finish my tea. I'll see you in the morning, Trip."
"Night, Malcolm," Trip said, nodding to him. He left the mess hall, Malcolm hardly noticing as the door opened and closed once more to let the engineer out.
Gently he ran his hands across the smooth surface of the palantír, hardly believing that it was real, and nearly dropped it in shock when the inner light brightened and a ghostly image shone within its depths.
Aragorn crowned, the white flowers of the Tree falling across the Courtyard as the citizens of Gondor cheered. Faramir and Éowyn clasped hand in hand, Legolas and Gimli applauding as Aragorn swept a dark-haired Elf into a passionate kiss... The White City gleaming as the people rebuilt after the damage of the siege... Gandalf riding with the King and Queen and the hobbits... the Kingdom flourishing and growing under Aragorn's long rule...
A ship, leaving a harbor—Frodo and Gandalf standing on the deck, looking toward the west—the Elves departing Middle-earth and following the Straight Road, away from Middle-earth and away from the mortal life of Men...
He rushed onward through the history of the Reunited Kingdom, as king after king ruled in prosperity and the race of Men flourished and grew strong once more, as thousands and thousands of years passed... as the Dwarves delved in their mountains and the Ents quietly disappeared into the shadows of time and the Hobbits lived quietly in the Shire...
And after a time the Dwarves began to follow the Elves, passing from Middle- earth... the Hobbits went next, their love of gardens and order finally overcome by a longing for farther shores, the taste for adventure begun by Bilbo and Frodo finally manifesting itself in the population at large... finally the race of Men looked to the West and began to build ships.
Malcolm watched as the very last ship left Middle-earth, the people on it looking to the horizon, and felt his heart cry out in sorrow for the now empty land, once a marvelous place and now bereft of all the people which had once made it so beautiful. But he also rejoiced, for he knew deep in his spirit that this was right. Wherever the Straight Road led, he knew that it was good, that it was meant, that all the people of Middle-earth should finally take it one day.
He closed his eyes and put the palantírs, one whole and one broken, back in the case. With a smile on his lips, he closed the lid and picked up the case. With a last look out the window, he drank the last of his tea and left the mess hall, the case tucked firmly under his arm.
He walked out of the turbolift and at last turned down the corridor to his room, and so came back to his room as the clock turned to 0300. And he went in, and there was a dim light on for him, and Hoshi smiled a sleepy hello as he slipped under the covers, curling up against his stomach, and put his arms around her with a sleepy sigh.
He smiled in the darkness, tightening his embrace. "Well, I'm back," he said.
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A/N: Oy...I take back what I said last chapter. I had to rewrite this one four times before it felt right. This was definitely the hardest to write.
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THE SHADOW RIDERS
Chapter Twenty-One: The Road Goes Ever On
There still he stood far into the night, hearing only the sigh and murmur of the waves on the shores of Middle-earth, and the sound of them sank deep into his heart.
-J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings
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"Begin log recording."
The computer beeped.
"It has been a very strange few days. First, my armory officer and my communications officer disappear into thin air, and send us on a wild goose chase across an alien world, and then I see ghostly visions of them in varying places. I even saw Lieutenant Reed rise from the dead."
Archer stopped, shuddering. That was something he would definitely like to put out of his memory.
"And early this morning, I found a mysterious staircase leading deep into the bowels of the earth. I heard a voice—Malcolm Reed's voice—calling me, so I descended. I really can't say why I went down there alone and unarmed, but I did, and at the bottom..."
He paused again. How to put this into words? It sounded... illogical, to use T'Pol's favorite phrase. It sounded crazy.
"At the bottom," he said hesitantly, "I found Lieutenant Reed and Ensign Sato. But—they were intangible. Like spirits. My hand went right through them. I don't really understand what happened down there. I don't think I've ever seen Malcolm look so—so strange. At first it was like he was a completely different person. Hoshi was screaming in pain and Malcolm was just standing there, and then it was like something in the room snapped and they both came out of it all of a sudden."
He knew he was not making himself clear, but he could not think how else to phrase what he had seen. He was not entirely sure that he had seen what he had seen anyway, down in that deep dark room. How had it survived whatever blast had taken down the rest of the tower?
"I've never seen Lieutenant Reed look so terrified," Archer continued, his voice shaking a little. "And then he turned and looked right at me for the first time, and said, 'I'm sorry, sir. Go back to Enterprise.' The stone he had been holding—he flung it against the wall and it shattered and they disappeared completely. I have the pieces of the stone, but T'Pol can't make head or tail of it. She says it's like the scanners won't acknowledge that it is exists.
"That isn't the strangest part of the story, though. We went back to the ship. I thought Malcolm had destroyed whatever it was that had taken them away, so I called off the search, believing—believing that they were lost to us forever. I had T'Pol run one last scan before we left orbit, just a few hours ago." He paused and looked down at Porthos, who was calmly fast asleep in his basket, the tip of his tail twitching faintly. "Just human illogic, I suppose.
"But we found something. Two human biosigns on the west coast of the continent. Two human biosigns—and everyone aboard Enterprise well and accounted for. We sent down a shuttlepod immediately."
His voice broke again, but he didn't care. "I have no clue how they got there, or why they were dressed in such strange clothes. I have no clue why Phlox says Hoshi has lost more weight than should be possible in four days. Malcolm has scars on his chest and thigh that are healed over, something impossible to do in only four days. And both of them are showing simple signs of growth and change—hair, nails, things like that, Phlox will have a more detailed analysis—that couldn't happen in four days. He says it's consistent with patterns for—and here's the really strange part—a little over sixty days.
"So wherever they were, whatever happened to them, they were there for a long time," Archer murmured, reaching down to scratch Porthos' head. "Phlox refuses to wake them up yet... I, and the whole rest of the ship, am very curious about what exactly went on down on that planet."
He looked out at the stars streaking past the window in a blaze of white and black ribbon. The ship at warp hummed softly beneath his feet. "I for one," he added, "am glad to leave that planet, whatever may have happened down there.
"Computer, end log."
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To all appearances Malcolm Reed and Hoshi Sato slipped right back into their old lives—and to the crew of the Enterprise, they had only been gone for a few days. There was no 'old life' about it. Hoshi had an easier time of it, perhaps due to the time she had 'spent' on Enterprise while a prisoner of Sauron, but neither of them would have called any part of the readjustment easy.
It wasn't that they weren't glad to be home. And it wasn't that they didn't remember their duties or how to get around the ship.
The simplest tasks were different. Muscles used to riding and walking everywhere cramped when sitting at a console all shift. The food, even Chef's fine cuisine, tasted wrong after two months of eating medieval-style fare. Ears used to hearing Common Speech found English odd-sounding and tongues had to work to respond in the correct language. They found it hard to sleep on the Starfleet-issue beds, missing both the plump feather mattresses of Edoras and Minas Tirith and the hard ground of various encampments.
And after being in the wide-open spaces of Middle-earth, Malcolm especially found the ship close and a little claustrophobic.
Hoshi had finally dropped off to sleep, her head on his shoulder, and he stroked her hair absently as he stared up at the dark ceiling. He couldn't actually see it, but he knew it was there, no matter how hard he tried to pretend it wasn't.
Hoshi stirred on his arm; he stilled and waited, but she did not awaken. Carefully he slid out from under her and slipped out of bed, feeling his joints loosen as he moved. He padded down the corridors to the mess hall, not really hungry but wanting to wander. Vaguely he thought of the report he had turned in to Captain Archer that morning and wondered just how much of it the captain would believe.
The stars were streaking past the window when he reached the mess, the captain having wasted no time getting away from Middle-earth. Arda, Malcolm recalled with some flash of leftover knowledge from Elowë, the name of the planet was Arda, but likely no one except him would ever call it that.
For the thousandth time since returning to Enterprise he wondered what had happened to the people of Middle-earth. The Elves were leaving already, he knew, but what about all the others? It seemed to him unlikely that they'd all merely died out.
Nothing in the cabinets looked appetizing, so he merely poured himself a cup of tea and sat down at one of the tables nearest the windows. No one else was hungry at this hour; it appeared not even the night shift wanted a snack. He didn't mind. At times it was difficult to talk to people, because the work and the gossip all seemed to him to be long past bothering about. Yet everything was as he had left it.
If things had changed, Malcolm mused, staring into the brown depths of his tea, he could have dealt better. He felt as though he had changed, but the world he had returned to was still the same, and it no longer quite fit as seamlessly as it once had.
The door opened with a whoosh. Malcolm didn't turn around as whoever it was walked in, and when a hand gripped his shoulder a moment later he jumped in surprise.
"Some crazy shore leave," said Trip, taking a seat across from him.
Malcolm smiled wryly. "Agreed," he said, sipping at his tea. He didn't meet Trip's eyes, suddenly terrified at the questions his friend would ask and the inevitable incomprehension that would follow. He knew it was illogical—he shouldn't be afraid to tell Trip anything—but he couldn't help it.
"I read your report," said the commander, tossing a PADD on the table. "Interesting stuff. Reads more like a fantasy novel than a Starfleet report, really."
Malcolm looked at the PADD. "I know," he said. "But it's what happened. It's like Marco Polo coming back from China—it's only a little of what I saw. The rest—you wouldn't believe it at all."
"I'd have a hard time believing any of it," said Trip, "if I hadn't seen you disappear into thin air spouting a lot of drivel about your reckoning and a Black Tower."
He looked up and met Trip's eyes at last. "I'd forgotten about that," said Malcolm. "A lot happened at Helm's Deep, and it was a bit much to take in at times." He'd edited his report carefully, knowing that a sudden transmogrification into an Istari and a Maia called Elowë sounded a bit too crazy for anyone here to take it seriously.
"You chose to stay there," said Trip accusingly. "Jon told me—he said before I got out there you had a hole in your chest the size of a fist. And you got up and came back to life somehow and when he ordered you to stay you refused. Could you have come back to our time, our universe, whatever, then?"
Malcolm thought back, considering. "Probably," he admitted. "That's a bit hazy. I did die, after all."
"And you didn't come back then?" Trip's tone was dark and Malcolm looked up at his friend in surprise. "You'd rather stay in some strange world full of Elves and Dwarves and crazy flaming Eyes?"
"I could have stayed!" Malcolm cried, the vehemence in his voice surprising himself as much as Trip. "I told you at Helm's Deep that I had to fulfill a task... that I couldn't leave yet. I had to rescue Hoshi! If I hadn't gotten her that entire world would have fallen! Sauron would have overcome her and gotten control of the captain and the ship, and taken over Middle- earth!"
He stopped abruptly, catching a glimpse of the astonished look on Trip's face. "I'm sorry, Trip," he said, dropping his voice to nearly a whisper.
The engineer's face softened and he shook his head. "I have no idea what you really went through, Mal," he said. "I got the feeling, reading your report, that a lot more happened than what you said."
"I wanted to stay there," said Malcolm, his voice breaking. "But Gandalf was right, I am more needed here than there. I would have been happy there, but I wouldn't have been doing anything except fading away into the shadows."
Trip reached across and gripped his forearm. "Hey," he said. "I'm sorry. Twice you appeared and we thought you two were dead and never coming back."
"I did come back, though," said Malcolm, looking at the half-empty teacup.
He looked up at Trip and felt a lump in his throat as the engineer's face broke into a grin. "That you did, buddy, that you did."
Malcolm returned the smile, suddenly feeling more at home on Enterprise than he had since returning. "It's good to be back," he said. "Really."
"Bet you're glad you rescued Hoshi," said Trip, his eyebrows going up suggestively. "Since she's not sleeping in her own cabin..."
Malcolm's mouth dropped open. They'd been very discreet, but obviously not enough. "And just how do you know that, Commander? Should I add Peeping Tom to your list of credentials, Mr. Tucker?"
"I have my ways, Mr. Reed," said Trip, grinning more widely than ever. "Especially when I page your quarters and Hoshi answers by saying, 'He's not here, Trip, and I'm trying to sleep!' only with a few choice words added on that I didn't know a lady like Hoshi even knew."
Malcolm snorted with laughter. "And she was the one who suggested not calling attention to it," he said through chuckles. "Why were you paging my quarters at 0200 in the morning anyway?"
"T'Pol turned these over to me after she finished with her scans," said Trip, picking a square case up from the floor that Malcolm hadn't noticed until now. He opened it and pulled out a smooth black ball, shining with some incandescent inner light. "She can't get a darned thing on them at all and she wanted me to take a look. I didn't get anything either, but I guess it doesn't really matter now that we're away from that planet. I thought you might want it back, since you were holding it when we found you." He turned the palantír over in his hands once more and handed it to Malcolm, looking a little sheepish. "To tell you the truth, I wasn't really thinking about the time."
"It's all right," said Malcolm, gazing at the stone. There was nothing at all there, not even Denethor's burning hands. Though the faint light still shone from within, the stone was as good as dead.
"It's not going to transport someone else back into the past, is it?" asked Trip, a faint hint of worry crossing his features.
"No," said Malcolm absently. "It's pretty much dead now, I think." He stared into its depths for a long moment, hardly noticing as Trip got up and took three more pieces of a broken palantír from the case.
"The captain brought this back from that Black Tower of yours after you smashed it," Trip said. "Don't stay up too late, Malcolm."
"I won't," he replied, looking up at the commander. "Just going to finish my tea. I'll see you in the morning, Trip."
"Night, Malcolm," Trip said, nodding to him. He left the mess hall, Malcolm hardly noticing as the door opened and closed once more to let the engineer out.
Gently he ran his hands across the smooth surface of the palantír, hardly believing that it was real, and nearly dropped it in shock when the inner light brightened and a ghostly image shone within its depths.
Aragorn crowned, the white flowers of the Tree falling across the Courtyard as the citizens of Gondor cheered. Faramir and Éowyn clasped hand in hand, Legolas and Gimli applauding as Aragorn swept a dark-haired Elf into a passionate kiss... The White City gleaming as the people rebuilt after the damage of the siege... Gandalf riding with the King and Queen and the hobbits... the Kingdom flourishing and growing under Aragorn's long rule...
A ship, leaving a harbor—Frodo and Gandalf standing on the deck, looking toward the west—the Elves departing Middle-earth and following the Straight Road, away from Middle-earth and away from the mortal life of Men...
He rushed onward through the history of the Reunited Kingdom, as king after king ruled in prosperity and the race of Men flourished and grew strong once more, as thousands and thousands of years passed... as the Dwarves delved in their mountains and the Ents quietly disappeared into the shadows of time and the Hobbits lived quietly in the Shire...
And after a time the Dwarves began to follow the Elves, passing from Middle- earth... the Hobbits went next, their love of gardens and order finally overcome by a longing for farther shores, the taste for adventure begun by Bilbo and Frodo finally manifesting itself in the population at large... finally the race of Men looked to the West and began to build ships.
Malcolm watched as the very last ship left Middle-earth, the people on it looking to the horizon, and felt his heart cry out in sorrow for the now empty land, once a marvelous place and now bereft of all the people which had once made it so beautiful. But he also rejoiced, for he knew deep in his spirit that this was right. Wherever the Straight Road led, he knew that it was good, that it was meant, that all the people of Middle-earth should finally take it one day.
He closed his eyes and put the palantírs, one whole and one broken, back in the case. With a smile on his lips, he closed the lid and picked up the case. With a last look out the window, he drank the last of his tea and left the mess hall, the case tucked firmly under his arm.
He walked out of the turbolift and at last turned down the corridor to his room, and so came back to his room as the clock turned to 0300. And he went in, and there was a dim light on for him, and Hoshi smiled a sleepy hello as he slipped under the covers, curling up against his stomach, and put his arms around her with a sleepy sigh.
He smiled in the darkness, tightening his embrace. "Well, I'm back," he said.
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