Disclaimer: LOTR does not belong to me. I wish I could claim credit for it, but that work of art must be attributed to J. R. R. Tolkien and the adaptation of it to Peter Jackson.

Chapter 5

The Discussion of the Sages

"What do you mean?" Elrond asked, perplexed. Something along those lines had been lurking in the depths of his mind, though he had not been able to name it.

"This strange occurrence," Gandalf pronounced slowly, "is far too strange to have been caused by Sauron. The power that would be necessary is beyond the Maiar. Possibly beyond the Eldar."

"Then you are saying that this...occurrence, as you call it...was caused by Eru Illuvatar?" Elrond's voice was cynical, though Gandalf thought that he could sense an undertone of fear beneath everything.

"Possibly," Elrond said. There it was again, that cynical, aloof voice trying to hide Elrond's fears.

"Did either of the two give you any explanation?" Erestor asked, his voice polite but showing his concern. Erestor had a very strong parental instinct, and happened to be the residential baby-sitter at Rivendell in addition to being Elrond's head counselor. It was only natural that he would be concerned about Hunter and Thor.

Elrond shook his head. "It appears that neither of them thought much of it, though I did not ask." He began to pace around the small chamber. This seemed to be a habit of Elrond's, Gandalf noted, remembering all of the times that Elrond had dragged the wizard into the library so that Elrond could pace around and lecture Gandalf in that annoyingly aristocratic voice. Not that Gandalf was incapable of tolerating aristocrats. Most of them he found rather irritating, including many of the stewards of Gondor and a few kings of Rohan, but over the years he had learned to deal with them. They were just...so annoying.

Gandalf silently reminded himself that the successes that came from him working with those pig-headed fools were more important than his own displeasure. "This occurrence is too complex to have been caused by Sauron, though I do not doubt that he is somehow involved in the matter. More clues will be revealed to us in time, but for now, our best source of information is the two children." He paused. Wondering how two people had popped out of nowhere was distressing him. Perhaps some pipeweed would soothe him. Unfortunately, he'd have to hide in the gardens if he wanted to smoke. These elves just didn't understand what beneficial effects smoking had. Saruman always maintained that smoking addled the mind, though, as Gandalf had just come back from being tortured by Saruman, he would have maintained that Saruman's mind was already addled and he was in no condition to talk.

Gandalf quit thinking about pipeweed when he suddenly remembered a very pressing issue that was at hand. "What of the Ring? Who has come for the council?"

Elrond stopped pacing and began to rattle off names. "For Men, there are Strider and Faramir. I surmise that Denethor would have rather sent Boromir in his stead, yet with the elder son's death he was forced to send his younger child."

All four paused to think about Boromir's death. The circumstances surrounding it were so very unusual: Boromir, a strong, relatively youthful warrior, had dropped dead while having breakfast with Faramir and the Steward four months ago. Poison had been suspected, though there was no poison know to Middle-Earth that could kill a man so quickly. Nothing unusual had been noticed before he died, in fact, he had seemed to be in perfect health up until the moment he collapsed at the table and immediately died.

Elrond startled the other three out of their reverie when he spoke again. "For the Dwarves, Dwalin, Dori, Nori, Bifur, Bofur, Bombur, and Gloin and his son Gimli have come, though I am not sure that all of them intend to attend the counsel. If they do, we shall certainly have a problem transporting Bombur." Elrond allowed his lips to curve upwards in a small smile. What he had said about Bombur was true: the Dwarf was now so fat that it took six young dwarves to carry him around. Eru only knew where they would find a chair that would support the Dwarf. The monster of a chair that the Dwarf used for dining was much to small for the place that Elrond had chosen for the council. Gandalf had already told him that the little platform overlooking the lake was far too small, but Elrond, who loved that little spot, told Gandalf that if there were too many people, they could all stand. Anything was worth using that location for the council. Gandalf had a strong suspicion that the many years of feasting and drinking at Rivendell had caused Elrond to become slightly unhinged. Not that the Elf's mind had ever been entirely sound.

"What of the Elves?" Gandalf asked. "Surely there must be some to represent other Elven-lands than Rivendell."

"Of course," Elrond smoothly answered. Of course there would be plenty of Elves at the Council! Elrond had written the invitations himself and he, as an Elf, could not let mere mortals determine the fate of Middle-Earth. "Legolas Greenleaf, son of Thranduil, has come from Mirkwood and Galdor and Figwit have come from the Grey Havens." Elrond paused a moment to prepare himself for the trials of dealing with Figwit. The strange name had been given to the Elf-ling by his two parents, who had both been declared insane several decades later. (Elrond had always suspected that Figwit's parents were slightly deranged, though he had never thought that it could be so serious.) Figwit had been raised by Cirdan, though the Elf-lord's good character had apparently had little effect upon the disturbed Elf-ling. Cirdan, completely fed up with his unbalanced and irritating foster-son, had used the summons for the Counsel as an excuse to foist Figwit off on Elrond. He had even sent a note to Elrond stating that Figwit would be staying at Rivendell for the remainder of his life on Middle-Earth.

"There is no one from Lothlorien?" Glorfindel inquired. The Balrog-slayer had just returned to Rivendell after several years roving around the Elven-kingdoms and had not been privy to the planning for the Council.

"No," Elrond said. He was still rather annoyed that his in-laws had refused to send a representative to the Council.

In the valley below, Thor and Hunter were wandering around on the path that wrapped around the lake. Both were silent, feeling that to break the silence that filled valley would be to defile a holy place. 'This is indeed a holy place,' thought Hunter. 'A holy place where nature and beauty reign. To find Jerusalem a holy place, you have to believe in Judaism, Christianity, or Islam. To find this a holy place, you just have to be alive.' He did not consider the fact that orcs would probably not consider Rivendell a holy place. Even if they did, then they would consider it their duty to desecrate the beautiful valley.

Oh, how it easy it would have been for the two of them just to stay on that path, wandering around in awe of the beauty surrounding them. To just stay there and forget all of their troubles, the war that was about to break out, the fact that they were a long way from home with no apparent way of getting back. Right now, this was just what they were doing.

Unfortunately for them, this pure bliss could not last. Spotting an dwarf lumbering down the path, Hunter pulled Thor onto a small path that had clearly not been used in years. "Why'd you do that?" Thor demanded. The Dwarf was much too far off to hear them talking.

"Thor, we don't have a cover story. And we can't just go around Rivendell and not expect people to notice us. You're a girl who's going around wearing jeans when most of the males in Rivendell are wearing dress robes. I don't fit into any ethnic group that they've ever seen and I'm wearing my hair short while Aragorn has his down to his shoulders."

Thor raised an eyebrow. "How would you know how long Aragorn's hair is?"

'Why does she always have to be there to correct me?' he wondered. What would life be like if she didn't? Someone needs to take care of that attitude of yours. Hunter reluctantly admitted that the voice was right. He did need Thor there to deal with his conceit. "I don't," he said. "That's just a guess. Most people in the medieval ages wore their hair long: they didn't have a ready supply of barbers." He hoped that Thor would leave the matter at that. They got into far too many arguments over such trivial matters. Not that Hunter disliked these debates--in fact, he enjoyed them--but he and Thor did not have the time to argue about things such as the length of Aragorn's hair when they had no cover story to present to everyone else and they weren't even sure that Elrond believed that they weren't spies for Sauron. "Do you have any idea what year this is in Middle-Earth?"

Thor shrugged. "Probably 3018, if Sam's here. How old did he look?"

Hunter quickly replayed the memory in his mind's eye. "I'm not sure. If he was a human, then probably around thirty. And the first time that he sees Rivendell is when Frodo gets stabbed by the Nazgul, so it can't be before 3018. Considering how Elrond's been acting, Sauron hasn't been destroyed, so it must be around the time of the Council of Elrond. Sam came into your room trying to find Frodo, so he must have just arrived at Rivendell. It would have taken Strider and the other hobbits a few days to get to Rivendell after Glorfindel took Frodo, so a few days after he's stabbed. So we have some time until the Council of Elrond." He paused to take a deep breath. "Thing is, we don't know why we're here."

Thor smiled, remembering all of the times that she and Hunter had debated this question. 'Yes, "Why," is the question. Why are we on Earth? Does not every child ask that question at least once in a lifetime? And some it pesters forever.' She had been one who had been always asking that burning question, even when it threatened to overwhelm her. They'd had such lively debates over it and discussed every theory on it that they could find, until they finally admitted that they didn't know the answer. For two people who were accustomed to succeeding and doing everything perfectly, this was quite humiliating. But it was the truth. "I don't have any idea. The more important question is how we ended up here. Any theories?"

Hunter shrugged. "I don't know. Divine intervention, perhaps?" Thor scoffed at this one, as she knew he would. Thor, after all, was a resolute atheist who maintained that religion was created by fools who were a little too desperate for the answers to life's persistent questions. Hunter always told her that she was completely missing the supernatural angle of life. His parents were Catholics, though Hunter frequently skipped church and would have described himself as a deist, had he been asked. "Transportation between universes in the multiverse?" he asked. It was a wild theory that bases most of its evidence off of science fiction, but it was, after all, an idea, and Thor had asked him for ideas.

Thor rolled her eyes. "Unlikely. Besides, what're the odds that there's a universe exactly the same as the one Tolkien wrote about? This world couldn't have been created by Tolkien, since all he did was write a story. I doubt it's possible for him to have been inspired by this world, since it would have been impossible for him to come in contact with it."

"What about the Dreamworld?" Hunter asked. He was desperate to find an answer to this question, but he reminded himself to be patience. Patience is a virtue, the voice said. The other Hunter disagreed. Not all the time.

"Dreamworld?" Thor asked.

"The place where we were after we fell asleep. Then I fell into a hole and that's how I ended up in Middle-Earth."

"Why do you call it the Dreamworld?" The other, more pressing questions were forgotten for the sake of this minor one. Forgotten for the sake of curiosity, which still gripped this child's mind.

"I don't know. I thought everything was a dream at first, and I needed a name for that place, and 'the Dreamworld' had a nice ring to it."

"Hm," was all that Thor said in response.

Both just stood there for a moment, thinking. Well, to be honest, it was more than a moment: it was more like a few minutes. "What if it was truly a dream?" Thor asked, finally breaking the silence.

"What?" Hunter asked, startled. "If it were a dream, then I would have expected to have woken up by now."

Thor shook her head. "No, I didn't mean it like that. What if this Middle-Earth was created by Tolkien's dream? By his writing The Lord of the Rings?"

Hunter stared at his friend in alarm. "What're you saying? That's there a link between our universe and this one?"

Thor nodded. "I'm not sure of the particulars, but it seems to be the only thing that fits."

"Then why are we here?" Hunter asked. Underlying that question was and what are we supposed to do here?

"I don't know. Maybe something went wrong and it pulled us in here as a result. I don't know," she said again. Both remained silent, thinking.

"We should probably go back to our rooms," Hunter said quietly. Thor looked at him in askance but after a moment, nodded. This startled Hunter: usually Thor was always arguing with people, as she resented authority and any and all attacks on her personal freedom. That she would so easily acquiesce disturbed him. It was almost like something had been ripped out of his life now that he could no longer depend on Thor to be so contentious. That had been the one constant in his life after he'd found himself in the Dreamworld and now that constant was gone.

He dared not say anything to her, not that he was afraid of her reaction, but because that was his habit. Internalizing emotions was the way that Hunter dealt with them. His friends often remarked on his ability to remain (at least to appearance) unperturbed during horror movies. The truth was that he took all of the fear and anxiety and simply locked it away someplace in himself where it couldn't affect him.

No longer would he be able to use that tactic to escape from the terror that life would hold for him. He couldn't just lock it away and bury the key. Now it wasn't just some character from a movie that the bad guys wanted to kill, it was him and Thor. Locking the fear inside of himself would get both of them killed. He knew the trials that he would be facing in the upcoming days, and he had no idea how he would deal with them.

Thor's method of dealing with challenge was to simply to go in and start, making up her plans as she went along. She never crammed for tests, instead trusting to experience and natural skill. It worked most of the time, but there were occasions for which it was necessary to plan ahead. Hunter remembered a science project that they'd worked on together where they'd been working on it the night before it was due and Thor had found out that they'd forgotten some essential materials. Her solution had been to do a completely different experiment instead.

Hunter wasn't like Thor. Before he embarked on anything, Hunter had to have a detailed plan and solutions to any kind of problems that he might encounter. Thor would have dealt with those problems as they came up, but Hunter would spend far more time than necessary trying to think of everything that might go wrong before he even started the first step of the undertaking.

He knew that he'd only drive himself insane trying to find all of the problems that might result from this situation, he'd only drive himself mad. Hunter also knew that not even Thor was capable of just jumping into this lake and learning to swim while she was in such great danger of drowning. 'Something between the two,' he mused. Rather than just jumping in or spending days in the shallow end, they'd do something in between, like taking a few lessons before jumping in.

Yes, that was what they would do, he decided as they walked back to their rooms.

A/N: Right now I'm working on outlining the plot (especially how Boromir's death affects things) and the cosmological model that connects Earth, the Dreamworld, and Middle-Earth. Suggestions are very helpful.

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