An- So this here is the rewrite of the end of the first story. As I read it over a few months ago, I noted that, quite frankly, everyone was way too upbeat. I mean, the Fellowship was leaving and everyone was just all 'well this sucks…but have a good trip!'. I mean, even and Erin and Frodo had like a two paragraph cry fest and then were all smiley again. Maybe it's just me, but that doesn't seem very realistic (I've gone somewhere and left people behind, and believe me, you're never cheery about it). So this was one of those things that I felt the need to 'correct' for lack of a better word.
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"Argh! Where is my damn wallet!"
Niori looked up at Carla's curse, and after seeing that her cousin was cursing at herself, went back to painting her nails a rather cute shade of purple.
"Did you try your room?" Jane called out the helpful suggestion from the kitchen.
"Of course I did!"
Niori had the urge to turn up the TV to block them out. She wasn't feeling very social today. The only problem was that it was Carla's turn to pay for supper, and without her wallet the pizza on the way was going to be coming out of someone else's pocket.
"What about your van Carla?" Niori spoke in a dry voice, not bothering to look up from her nails.
Carla didn't say anything for a minute, then she cursed again and stormed out of the house.
"How did you guess that?" Jane asked as she walked into the room.
"Oh please," Niori rolled her eyes, "her van is a lost and found."
Jane chuckled "the pizza should be here in-"
"NO!"
The abrupt scream made Niori smear nail polish up her hand and knock over the bottle, spilling purple liquid all over Carla's coffee table. Jane jumped and dropped the milk she had been holding, shattering the glass and spraying milk everywhere.
It was Erin's panicked cry that had startled them, and they were on their feet and rushing towards their friend's voice.
God only knew what was wrong with Erin now.
Jane took the stairs two at a time, Niori right behind her. When they hit the down stairs hallway they veered to the right and stumbled into the family room.
Niori wasn't sure what she had expected to see, but it certainly wasn't this.
Frodo was standing in the middle of the room, looking down at his hands in horror…because they had gone semi-transparent.
It was quite obvious why Erin had screamed.
Erin was sitting on the floor and quickly falling into hysterics.
"No! You can't!"
Niori and Jane looked at each other, and the message in Jane's eyes was clear; go find the others. Niori nodded and with one pitying glance down at Erin, left the room. Jane walked over and sat down beside Erin.
"No…"
With that tearful word, Jane looked up at Frodo and sent another message; get your ass over here. Frodo blinked a few times under Jane's glare, and then seemed to realize that Erin was crying, and better yet why she was crying.
"Erin!" he cried and rushed over to her.
Jane really should have left them alone, but she knew Erin…and how Erin reacted when she was upset; she would take it out on someone, and Frodo didn't need Erin screaming something horrible at him as some of the last things she said to him.
"You can't leave me!" now Erin was sobbing, "I can't do this alone!"
"I'm so sorry Erin," Frodo whispered in misery.
Frodo was openly crying and Jane was only seconds from doing it.
This was so far beyond not fair.
"Stop yourself!" Erin's voice was now desperate, "Try to stop yourself!"
"I can't Erin," Frodo's voice was miserable, "and I…won't."
Erin's eyes instantly flared at the word 'won't' and Jane was glad she had decided to stay; this was going to get ugly really fast.
"I'm committed to a task," Frodo tried to explain, "I am the ring bearer, and I must-"
"The Ring!" Erin cried in fury, "You'd leave me for a stupid Ring! What about your child!"
Frodo looked like a deer caught in headlights, and he was only looking more miserable with every nasty word.
Erin looked like she was going to start screaming again and Jane gave her hand a hard squeeze and whispered.
"Don't Erin. You'll regret it."
Erin's anger was instantly gone and she was crying again.
"I'm sorry," Frodo whispered, taking hold of her hand, "so sorry."
Only then, when Jane knew there would be no blow out, did she get up silently and leave.
On her way out Jane bumped into the Hobbits, also fading and looking panicked.
"Not now," she told them as she ushered them away from the family room.
Now Frodo and Erin needed to be alone.
Erin's mind was whirling; if she thought this pregnancy was impossible at first, it was nothing compared to this. Now she wasn't going to have Frodo to help her through it. She was going to be alone.
And Erin whispered that fact to herself before she could stop herself.
"No," Frodo tried to comfort her, "Not entirely…you'll have the girls…"
"It's not the same," Erin spoke, her voice barely above a whisper.
"I…love you. I love you Erin."
Erin looked up into his face.
"I love you too."
Frodo leaned down to kiss her-
And then-
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"But we're becoming ghosts!" Pippin was telling Jane in a high pitched voice as she lead him and the other two Hobbits away from the family room.
"No you're not!"
Right now she was in no mood for rather dumb comments; she didn't have it as bad as Erin, but this new development was cutting at her heart.
Over the past two months Jane had become great friends with the members of the Fellowship, and now they were going to be gone as abruptly as they had come. Not to mention she really was in love with Aragorn.
They all figured it would come, but now that it was here she couldn't believe it at all.
Tears were sliding down her cheeks, and although most of them were for Erin, some of them were from her own pain.
She was going to miss them all. She was also going to be there in the aftermath to help Erin pick up the pieces of her heart and her life.
"Jane," Sam's voice, "are you alright?"
"No."
What was the point of lying? This was just about as bad as losing a friend to death; none of them would ever see each other again. This goodbye was going to be forever.
Jane came into the living room, where she found Aragorn standing, also looking startled by his appearance.
Jane began to cry harder.
"Jane," he said, "it seems as though we're leaving."
"I guess so…" Jane managed to say in an even voice, "these guys and Frodo are fading too, so that means the others probably are…"
She let her voice trail off because she knew she was stating the obvious.
Jane wanted to tell him how she felt, but the words wouldn't come out; they were never going to see each other again, so it wouldn't hurt anyone. If she were Niori she probably would have thought 'what the hell' and kissed him.
But since she clearly wasn't Niori and the idea of blitz kissing him made her blush, Jane decided to hug him instead.
At first he was stunned when she abruptly threw her arms around him, but within a few moments he was returning the hug.
"I'll miss you!" she cried.
"Jane, I'll miss you also-"
And then-
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Carla found her wallet buried behind the front seat of her van. It had somehow got thrown into a backpack full of other completely random items. She slung the pack over her shoulder and walked back into the house.
When she walked in the front door, she ended up jumping and yelping in surprise. Gimli and Boromir were standing there…or at least their ghosts were.
"What the hell!" Carla cried, taking a step backwards, tripping and falling on her ass.
"We don't know!" Boromir said, "We think it means we're returning."
That news shocked Carla. She couldn't believe it; they were actually leaving? There weren't going to be anymore Fellowship made disasters or Fellowship babysitting anymore?
She had thought that that news would come as a relief when it came, but it made her sad. She never would have guessed it, but she'd rather go through a thousand more disasters if that meant they stayed. She had come to enjoy Fellowship babysitting.
"Oh my God," she let out a long breath.
Was this really happening? Is there anyway they could stop them?
It was a selfish thought, considering they had the fate of Middle Earth resting on their shoulders, but Carla didn't feel guilty about it; she and the other three girls had found love and friendship with these people, and it wasn't right that it was being ripped away so suddenly.
God, poor Erin and Frodo. Hell, poor Niori and Legolas, even if they refused to admit it. Poor all of them.
"I…" Carla was still thunderstruck, so the pain of losing hadn't really hit her yet, "we better go…see if the others are the same."
Boromir reached down a hand to help her up, and she took hold of it-
And then-
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Niori didn't care that Jane had ordered her to find all the others, only finding that one other person mattered. She knew where he was, and made a beeline for it.
She knew Legolas was outside at Carla's targets, and she had to see him. Niori had no idea how long it would take for them to be gone, she had too…
She wasn't exactly sure what she had to do, only that she needed to do it.
Her mind was spinning, and it was making it hard for her not to cry.
Don't cry, she told herself, please don't cry.
When she was outside and saw him, Niori just stopped walking and stared at his back. She wanted to call out his name, but she didn't trust her voice.
It shouldn't hurt this much. She knew losing all of them –him- would, but never imagined it being this bad.
She didn't want it to hurt this bad, because she didn't want to admit…
As if sending her standing there, Legolas turned around. When he saw her standing there he smiled, which made her blink back stinging tears. He noticed her expression and was automatically concerned.
"What's wrong?" he called out to her.
Niori continued to walk towards him, thoughts racing through her mind.
This is for the best anyway, she reasoned with herself, it never could have worked. That's why you kept yourself from sleeping with him anyway. This really was good…
"It's not something that's wrong with me," she spoke quietly when she reached him, "but you."
She lifted up his arm so that he could see his fading (and yet oddly solid) hand. He gave a cry of surprise, and then looked back at her with wide eyes.
"Looks like you're leaving," she told him softly, looking away from his face.
He only answered her with silence, and Niori couldn't help but wonder if he felt the same about his leaving as she did. Niori didn't know what would be worse; finding out he didn't care as much or finding out that he was feeling the same pain.
"We better get you back to the others."
With that statement Niori turned and began to walk away. Legolas reached out and took hold of her hand to stop her. She didn't turn around to face him but didn't pull her hand away either.
Please don't say anything, she wanted to say but didn't, leave it be. I don't want to feel anymore regret than I already do. Don't make me think that maybe we could have had something or wonder how things could have been. Let me keep telling myself that everything would have been a mistake if I had taken any chance with you.
"Niori…I…"
"I think I get it Legolas," she did look back into his face, "but there's nothing-"
And then everything exploded in blinding white light.
Both of them gave startled cries, and she automatically moved closer to him and he wrapped an arm around her shoulder protectively.
When the light was gone Niori was still seeing stars, along with feeling dizzy and sick.
What had just happened?
She blinked back the stars, and when they cleared she saw that Legolas was still standing there with her. Niori was confused; she had figured that whatever had just happened would have been the thing to take Legolas back to Middle Earth.
"You're still here," her voice was dumbfounded.
"No Niori, I'm not," his eyes were wide and voice stunned.
"What?"
"Look around."
Niori did what she was told, and the first thing she noticed was that everyone else was out there with them. Each girl looked as confused as Niori felt. Then Niori began to look at the much broader picture, and she understood Legolas's bewilderment.
She was decidedly not in Carla's backyard. Instead she stood in a beautiful, glowly and rather fairy tale style forest.
She was decidedly not in Canada anymore.
Oh. My. God.
Though it was Carla who captured it best.
"Holy shit!"
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An- So there is our rewrite of the end of the first story. I think it captured real emotions a bit more. Hope you enjoyed! See you later!
