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The Time Lord of the Rings
The Shadows of Moria
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The blizzards on Caradhras were getting worse. Legolas hopped along the snow, while the Hobbits and the Doctor were stuck in it. Gandalf was tall above the snow, and Frodo and Sam cowered in the cold.
A huge blast of snow hit the Fellowship. The wind and ice were swirling around. The Hobbits were hit the worst, and the sudden wind beat them back.
"Gandalf, it's too dangerous here." Frodo said to the grey wizard. Gandalf nodded. "We need to leave, is there some other path?"
The wizard looked gloomy, then, "The only path is through the Mines of Moria. But Frodo, they would be a complete last resort." Frodo looked expectantly at Gandalf, but the wizard shook his head. "Your choice, Ringbearer."
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Gandalf began to speak in some strange language, but thanks to TARDIS translate, the Doctor understood every word.
To the others, it was just Elvish, "Annon edhellen, edro hi ammen!" but to the Doctor, Gandalf was raising his arms and shouting at the ancient symbols and letters, glowing in the moonlight, "Open!"
The door to the Mines of Moria didn't budge a bit.
"Well, that didn't work." the Doctor leaped up from the jagged rock he had been tying his shoelaces on, and pulled out his beloved sonic screwdriver.
"What on earth is that?" Gandalf asked, and the Doctor replied, "My lovely, good-ol' sonic screwdriver. It's wonderful! Ain't that right, sonicy?" The little glowing metal stick in his hand didn't reply.
The Doctor pointed the sonic screwdriver at the rock-face, and a high whirring noise filled the air. The tip of the sonic screwdriver lit up green, bathing the door in an eerie light. Everyone fell silent for a moment.
Suddenly, the sonic flew out of the Doctor's hand, and landed a few feet away, The sonic exploded with a pop of smoke, and a few sparks spat out from it.
"No, no! Not you too!" the Doctor kneeled on the ground beside the strange object, and he picked it up in his hands. The Doctor cried out mournfully, "I won't be able to fix it until the TARDIS fixes itself! What will I do without you..." the Doctor tucked the screwdriver into the inside of his jacket, and sat down on the nearest rock.
"What will I do now?"
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Frodo was peering at the inscriptions on the door that wouldn't open, with the Doctor tapping against random places along the rock.
Frodo broke into a small smile of comprehension, and he looked like he had finally understood.
"It's a riddle..." he said in a small voice. Gandalf frowned, but the Doctor began to pat Frodo on the back.
"Finally! At least one of you got it! I thought I would have to tell you, and that wouldn't have been fair." the Doctor ran over to beside Gandalf and sat down, crossing his legs and placing his hands around them, in a lady-like fashion.
"Don't you see?" Frodo said. "Speak friend and enter! Gandalf, what's friend in Elvish?"
Gandalf didn't completely understand, age was getting to him, then he figured it out. "Oh, mellon."
With that, the rock-face quietly, but not subtly, divided in two. Huge wooden doors swung outwards.
The Fellowship stood up, and wearily crept into the Mines of Moria. The shadows shifted and moved, silently watching them. They were hungry, but not hungry enough to reveal themselves yet.
They destroyed the weapon, but didn't destroy the wielder. They were smarter than before, and they weren't going to lose this time. They weren't going to fail like many great civilisations and powerful armies had before. The silence was coming, and they were afraid. They had never been afraid, when they weren't educated and when they were, but right now it only took one man to terrify the shadows.
They had even cleared the path for them, feasted on the hundreds of disgusting creatures who called themselves Orcs and Goblins, and the slimy squid creature that lived in the lake outside, when the moon was hidden and dark had made their prey more vulnerable. The water hadn't fazed them, they quite enjoyed the swim.
They were going to end the reign of terror who called himself the Doctor.
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Dwarven skeletons covered the ground, remnants of some old battle that had been fought in these mines.
Boromir whispered, "This is no mine!" he paused, lowering his voice, "It's a tomb..."
Gimli gasped in horror. Legolas pulled out a few crude arrows that littered one unlucky dwarf. "Goblins!" he gasped.
"We make for the Gap of Rohan! We should never have come here..." the group turned around, the Doctor twirling on his heel.
The tall wooden doors began to close. The Fellowship rushed forward in an attempt to pass, but they had already closed shut. They could just about hear the grind of the two rock-faces before it shut with a slight thud. Gandalf muttered some spells, but the doors wouldn't budge.
A faint glow rose from Gandalf's staff, lighting his face in a creepy glow. "We now have but one choice. We must face the long dark of Moria. Be on your guard. There are older and fouler things than Orcs in the dark places of the world."
The Doctor waved his hand. "I sit down and chat with those for tea!"
"Quietly now." Gandalf shushed the group. "It is a four-day journey to the other side. Let's hope our presence goes unnoticed."
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The Doctor became suspicious. He peered at every dark nook and cranny shrouded in any kind of shadow. Gandalf's staff provided the light, but the Doctor knew it wouldn't be enough.
Frodo noticed the Doctor's unsettling, darting eyes. "What's wrong Doctor? What do you see?"
The Doctor turned to the little Hobbit, the bright blue eyes boring into his head, "Look at the skeletons." Frodo glanced at the now rotting bodies that littered the floor of the mine.
"They are the remains of dwarfs." Boromir had been eavesdropping; he must have noticed the Doctor's paranoia too.
"No, really look at them. No pieces of flesh left, stripped to the bone. How could every skeleton be stripped? There would be a few with still some meat left on them."
"Maybe the Goblins...maybe they ate them." Frodo said.
"They wouldn't have eaten every part of every body. And they would have had to rip off the bones as well. The skeletons are perfect; they haven't been moved or broken."
"What do you think happened to them?" Boromir was confused. What was the mad-man on about?
"The Goblins didn't eat them." the Doctor paused, glancing once more at the shadows. "Maybe something else a lot faster did."
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"Stay out of the shadows. Whatever you do, if you wish to live through this, do not go near the shadows, do not let your shadow cross anyone else's shadows, any could be infected."
"What is doing this? What's in the shadows?" Pippin asked. They were terrified; none had ever seen any creatures like this before, except for the Doctor.
"Almost every species has an irrational fear of the dark. But, you see, they're right. It's not irrational. It's the Vashta Nerada." the Fellowship moved closer to the Doctor, away from the dark and the shadows.
"They're what's in the dark. They are always what's in the dark."
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Gandalf was sniffing at the air around the three tunnels. The Doctor pointed out that at least one of them was infected with Vashta Nerada. It was too dark. The shadows were shifting around too much. The Doctor told Gandalf to not go near any of the tunnels, the shadows don't have to be cast by anything. He pointed out a spot of shadow that wasn't cast by a pillar or stone.
"Every shadow?" Aragorn was scared too, but tried hard not to show it.
"Any shadow. Anybody's shadow. If you have two shadows, it's over. You're dead."
"Is there any way to kill them?" Boromir asked, he was shaking. A new, unknown enemy that is evil has to be able to defeat. If they can't defeat these 'Vashta Nerada', there is no way they would survive this trip.
The Doctor shook his head. "Can you kill every speck of dust in every beam of light?"
The Doctor walked over to the tunnels. "Can you kill your own shadow?"
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Frodo and Gandalf were talking to each other, while the rest of the Fellowship had gathered around the Doctor, drinking in all of his knowledge about the Vashta Nerada.
"I wish the ring had never come to me. I wish none of this had ever happened. We wouldn't be trapped and terrified of our own shadows." Frodo sighed. The Doctor must have heard this, and walked over to the Hobbit.
"Frodo, there is something you need to remember. The Vashta Nerada haven't killed us yet. Look around."
The Doctor swept his arm across the Fellowship. "All of us still have one shadow." Everyone checked their shadows. None were infected.
"So, if they haven't killed us yet, they need us for something. Let's make sure that need lasts."
Gandalf brightened up, a look of revelation crossed his face, "Ah! That's the way!" the Fellowship rushed to their feet, scrambling at the opportunity of hope. Gandalf pointed to a tunnel to the right, the furthest from the dark tunnel.
"He's remembered!" Merry exclaimed, relieved of waiting in the dark.
"No, but the air doesn't smell so foul down there." Gandalf laughs. "If in doubt, Meriadoc, follow your nose!"
The Fellowship treacherously walked into the darkness, blissfully unaware of the moving shadows that blanketed the air in their wake.
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"Gandalf... We need light. Quickly, before the shadows come." the Doctor commanded the wizard. He knew how the Vashta Nerada worked, and swarmed, though they are prone to anomalies every now and then. And a lot of anomalies have been happening since the silence.
Gandalf tapped the top of his staff. Light blazes, a bright flash of lightning made the shadows hidden in the darkness scatter.
"Good." the Doctor whispered. "But that won't keep them for long. The light won't last for long. They can take out sources of light, if they wish to."
Gandalf ignored the Doctor's pessimistic muttering, and stated, "Behold! The great realm and Dwarf city of Darrowdelf!"
The Fellowship stopped for a moment, gaping at the high vast roof, upheld by numerous huge stone pillars. A magnificent, but empty hall, stretched before them, and it really dawned on them how far away the other side was. Black walls surrounded the hall, polished and smooth, like marble.
"Well... There's an eye opener and no mistake!" Sam gasped, in awe of the massive hall.
Not far ahead of them, huge wooden doors, not much unlike the entrance, had been smashed in. Sharp black arrows, like the ones that littered the Dwarf armour, were embedded in the dark timbers. Two goblin skeletons, picked clean like the rest, lay discarded in the doorway. Gimli rushed forwards.
Gandalf and the Doctor cried out after the Dwarf in unison, but he continued to rush into the chamber. Gimli cried out, "No shadows here!" and the rest of the group followed him in, a lot more cautiously.
The chamber before them was empty, but lit with a narrow shaft of sunlight, and the Fellowship all sighed in relief. "Sunlight is the best Vashta Nerada deterrent." the Doctor said. "But won't last long."
The shaft of sunlight seemed to get a little darker, even as the Doctor spoke, as though a shadow was crossing over the small gap near the roof. Very clean Dwarf and Goblin skeletons piled high around the room, and in the corner sat a stone well.
The shaft of light fell directly onto a stone tablet in the centre of the room, a single block, around four feet high, topped with a bright slab of white stone, made Gimli fall to his knees in front of it, sobbing.
"No...oh, no...no!" Gimli cried, and the Doctor moved in to comfort him.
"Whoever did this to your cousin and this city is long gone. Defeated already. But there is a real threat, a real army down here, much worse than Goblins or Orcs. We need you, and we need you ready to run, because that axe won't help you here. Just... just sober up. Grieve for a moment, but not a second less. Because a crying Dwarf is bad, but an angry one is worse."
"Why do you say that Doctor? Isn't anger meant to make you strong and fearless in the face of battle?" Gimli seemed a little outraged. So much for the Doctor to think, he hasn't fought hard battles.
"Now you sound like a Sontaran!" the Doctor smiled, but then his face took on an angry, but sad grimace. "Anger clouds your judgement. Anger makes you an easy target, because you would hurt and stab just about anything. I was angry once, and it made me so bitter and greedy that I may have ruined the lives of those I love. Anger is useless."
Gandalf began to read an inscription of runes, for the other's benefit, but TARDIS translate works with writing too.
"Here lies Balin." he read, glancing at a broken Gimli, "Son of Fudin, Lord of Moria." Gandalf sighed. "He is dead then. It's as I had feared."
Gandalf lifted the rotting remains of a huge book from the top of the white slab. It was slashed and stabbed, covered in dried blood. The pages were stiff, and cracked as Gandalf carefully opened them.
Legolas urgently whispered to the Doctor, "We must leave. We cannot linger, the shadows would move in." the Doctor nodded, but had his focus concentrated on the book Gandalf was reading.
"They have taken the Bridge and the second hall; we have barred the gates, but cannot hold them for long. They-they have stopped. They just all fell to the ground in skeletons, the flesh had vanished off their bones. The shadows move, and swarm around the halls. The ground begins to shake, drums beat in the deep. A terrible darkness fills the halls and rooms, shadows reach out." Gandalf paused before he reads on, glancing at the Doctor, "They are coming."
Pippin grew pale and unnerved, the thought of the Vashta Nerada, or the Swarming Shadows, had him wishing he was somewhere else right then. He stumbled against the well, nearly falling in before Merry caught him, but sending a precariously balanced armoured, but stripped, skeleton tumbling down the well.
The Fellowship froze, stunned, listening as the skeleton crashed against the sides of the long well, with clatters and loud echoes.
Gandalf turned angrily on the now even paler Hobbit, enraged, "Fool of a Took! Throw yourself in next time and rid us of your stupidity!"
The Doctor turned on Gandalf, annoyed, "Don't say that! We all make mistakes from time to time and I think the Hobbit is allowed to be scared when he is trapped in a mine with carnivorous shadows, don't you think?" Gandalf seemed a little taken aback, but did not apologise to Pippin.
The Fellowship then fell silent.
A low rolling boom of drumming rose from the depths below of the mines, growing louder and louder, as though the whole of Moria was a drum, and whatever was making this noise was getting closer. A great horn blasted in the air, and some of the Fellowship jump. More horns answer the call, with the hard padding of running feet, and harsh cries.
Sam glanced down at Frodo's belt, where the scabbard of Sting was glowing a soft blue.
"Mr. Frodo!" Sam exclaimed, worriedly.
Frodo looked down, and pulls out the sword from his belt. He stares at it for a moment, unsure of what the blade glowing meant.
"Orcs!" Legolas cried, and Aragorn warned the Hobbits to stay close. The Doctor stepped up, and stood on a pile of skeletons, reaching out to a rope.
Aragorn and Boromir rushed forward and slammed the doors closed, and wedged it shut. Boromir's face grew more shocked, and he turned to Aragorn, "They have a cave troll!"
Gimli turned to one skeleton, and snatched up two rusty dwarf axes and leaped onto the stone slab.
"Let them come!" Gimli yelled, "There is one Dwarf yet in Moria that still draws breath!"
The Doctor leaped up from his high spot, where he had been tying the rope to some armor, for whatever reason, and raised his fist in the air. "That's the spirit, Gimli!"
The Fellowship readied themselves for the attack, but then, silence, only hundreds of soft thuds on the ground outside. No running feet, no drums, no horns.
Only the silence. And that was what the Doctor feared the most.
"What happened?" Merry asked from the little group of Hobbits who had been huddled beside the well.
"The Vashta Nerada took them. They ate every single Orc in one split second." The Doctor had dropped whatever clever plan he had formed, and was just standing on top of the pile of the dead.
"It is much worse than I thought." the Doctor whispered. "There are trillions of them. Trillions of trillions of Vashta Nerada outside that door."
Frodo muttered, "And yet, we're not dead. They need us, and I think I know why."
The Doctor frowned. "Why?"
"Don't you understand?" Frodo seemed to grow taller in that moment; his sudden epiphany was clear in the little glow in his blue eyes.
"They're lost too."
