Author's Note: Sorry about typos. This isn't as funny as my first chapter, but I had a wisdomteethectomy two days ago, so my meds have addled my brains. Wiritng this was good therapy, though. Please review! I almost forgot to add that I don't own Professor Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings, The Scarlet Pimpernel, Wesley from The Princess Bride, or the phrase "Alas, heavy sigh" from "Mork and Mindy." Please, please, please review! Have a more creative title in mind? Review or PM me with ideas. The winner of the contest gets a one-shot written by yours truly... Also check out my other works. I promise that they aren't this bad... ;)

~*~

January 8, 2009: There was a minor earthquake in Great Britain today. I, unlike the scientists, have determined its true cause: Professor Tolkien was rolling over in his grave. His ghost appeared to me at about 4:29 am—twenty-one minutes ago. Alas, there seems to be no rest for the wicked, after all.

Tolkien popped into my living room, all silvery and transparent. I was attempting to sleep in a recliner in the living room, due to having an operation on my teeth about 19 hours previously. I thought that I was having a hallucination from my prescribed painkiller/antibiotic/happy medicine. I immediately slipped on my glasses and proceeded to stare at him for several minutes.

"What are you doing?" Tolkien cried, taking his ghost-pipe out of his mouth just long enough to spit the words at me. Glimmering smoke surrounded his transparent head.

I proceeded to cock my head to one side, wrinkle my nose and stare at him in utter confusion, and mentally regroup for several minutes. "I'm trying to get some sleep," I muttered, trying not to rip the stitches in my gums.

He gave me a pointed stare. "I meant to say," Tolkien said slowly and clearly, as if explaining to his son, Christopher, when he was very small, "what have you done to my story? Of Herbs and Dead Rabbits. Don't think that I don't know what you're doing with it. Writing in Sir Percy, a character that most people have never heard of, making Frodo out to be a blundering idiot, giving Gollum sarcastic one-liners, having Samwise call Gollum 'Old Golly-wolly.'"

"You came here just to talk to me?" I said in awe, trying to not injure my gums more than necessary.

"Yes, I did," Tolkien continued coldly. "You have made my story into a complete farce, not to mention sticking other author's characters in where they don't belong. Sir Percy is ridiculous!"

"Well, he's that way in the books too," I said sheepishly. I hate getting dressing-downs from professors, especially when they are undead and British.

"Books, what books?"

"You have never heard of The Scarlet Pimpernel?" I asked him, aghast.

"Perhaps once or twice, but what difference does that make? You make my characters out to be complete idiots!" Tolkien was definitely becoming more agitated. The whole stiff-upper-lip British mentality was slipping away from him, fast.

Fortunately, I had my means of escape right beside me. I had brought a stack of my 'very favorite stories' and had set them by my recliner to keep me company. Gone with the Wind happened to be on top, with my 3-in-1 edition of Lord of the Rings that I've owned since I was 12, and the entire Scarlet Pimpernel series by Baroness Orczy. I handed him about 17 paperback books and said "Come back when you finish these. I'll be here."

Tolkien floated over and snatched the stack of novels. He then disappeared, leaving a faint smell like tobacco smoke. I was now free to write the next part of the parody. After my teeth felt a little better, that is…

~*~

Faramir's men blindfolded the hobbits and carried them for several hours. They finally set the hobbits down in a cave-like lobby, complete with a waterfall running over the windows. Another man, dressed in all black with a black hood and half-mask was sitting behind a large desk wearing a nametag that read "Hello, my name is Wesley; you kidnapped my Buttercup—prepare to die (or to fight to the pain.)"

Frodo and Samwise gaped around at the posh velvet furniture, down the hallways with blandly patterned carpeting, and read the sign marked "The Forbidden Pool." Everything was up-market and in midnight blue and silver. There were beautiful paintings on the walls of Osgiliath and Minas Tirith at the height of their glory days. Beautiful little sculptures littered the side tables and corners of the room.

"Please open up the Minas Morgal room, for my private use, Wesley," Faramir said to the man behind the desk. Wesley touched a button and a set of double doors with tinted glass windows popped open.

The hobbits followed Faramir into the room and sat down at one end of a conference table. The same waterfall ran outside the window here, and this room was decorated in black and a sickly green color. A mural of Minas Morgul covered the wall opposite Frodo and Samwise.

"Where is this place?" Frodo asked in a small voice. The whole atmosphere was a little creepy—black and sickly green are not the homiest of colors.

"Ah, forgive me," Faramir said, bowing. "What a terrible host I am. We had just remodeled the lobby and have not had the time to put up the new sign. You are in the greatest chain of hotels in Middle Earth: the Gondor Inn and Suites."

"You run a hotel chain?" Sam said skeptically.

"Yes," Faramir said matter-of-factly. "What do you think that the Steward of Gondor does? When the kings left the country of Gondor to my family, they also left them the hotel chain to run. We've actually expanded." Faramir sighed.

"What's wrong? Sam asked.

"It's just that, my father is a hotel tycoon—a genius at marketing—and so is my bother, Boromir. I'm not. My heart's just not in it. I'd rather solve the problems in our government today: balance taxation with representation and enumerate the rights of out people with a constitution, just like they do at Dol Amroth. Alas, heavy sigh."

"Why not talk to your father?" Sam suggested.

"I have," Faramir sighed again, "it is no use. He wants me to take over the hotel chain, and for Boromir to run the government. I miss my brother dearly. I hope he will come back soon…"

There was an awkward silence between Frodo and Samwise.

"We met up with your brother, Boromir, on our travels," Frodo said simply.

"Really? Please tell me all that you know of his whereabouts," Faramir begged.

"All right," Frodo said. "We met up with Boromir in—"

"Not until you've untied our hands and given us something to eat," Sam interrupted.

"Fine," Faramir nodded wearily. He pushed a little button on the intercom near the door and spoke into it. "Wesley, tell catering to bring us up a meal. No, I don't care what's in it. Impress us." Faramir shook his head, then walked back over to the hobbits. He pulled his large, shiny knife out of his belt, brandishing in front of the hobbit's faces.

Frodo instinctively cowered in the corner. Sam cowered protectively in front of Frodo.

"You will only hurt Mister Frodo over my dead body," Sam said, voice trembling the tiniest bit with fear.

"I give my word as a gentleman, a Gondorian, and a hotel steward that I will not hurt you," Faramir said grimly. "Now hold out your hands."

"I will take your word, based on the third option," Samwise said, doing as he was told. Faramir's knife sliced easily through the bonds that had tied Sam's hands together.

"Go on, Frodo," Sam said, trying to get Frodo to quit cowering. Frodo kept cowering; perhaps Faramir looked too much akin to his brother for the black-haired hobbit's comfort. Or maybe Frodo had an irrational phobia of knives after seeing the play about men and knives, "Macreth," performed in the Shire when he was a small, impressionable child.

Sam held Frodo's wrists while Faramir cut through the ropes. Frodo stared at them both with his saucer-sized blue eyes. Once they were finished, Faramir stuck his knife back into his belt.

"Oh, was that all?" Frodo said, blinking normally. "You," he pointed to Faramir," weren't trying to decapitate me? And you," he pointed to Sam, "weren't trying to be an accomplice to that gory task?"

Both Faramir and Sam shook their heads.

Frodo pumped his fist in the air. "Phobia defeated! Only 319 more to go…Orcs with sharp knives, orcs with swords, orcs with maces…Yes, I think I'm coming along quite nicely. Thank you. I see now that I don't have to be afraid any more."

Cocking an eyebrow, Faramir glanced at Sam.

"Play along," Sam whispered out of the corner of his mouth.

Faramir nodded. There was a knock on the door. "Oh yes," Faramir announced, "here is our supper. Bring it in."

A man in a white coat and chef's hat wheeled in a metal cart piled with food and drink. On closer examination, the hobbits realized that he wore a black half-mask much like the man who ran the front desk. He quickly bowed and then left.

"Wasn't that Wesley?" Frodo asked suspiciously.

"Erm, yes," Faramir said, abashedly. "Since this is one of our…smaller establishments, we tend to wear many hats at once out here.

"Understaffed," Sam whispered to Frodo.

As a result of that comment, Faramir ate the rest of his meal in a huff. Frodo and Sam heaped food onto their plates, each having at least four helpings of everything. It was good to be eating something other than lembas again.

"Now, I have kept my part of the agreement," Faramir said solemnly. "Let us see you keep yours."

"All right," Sam burped. "My complements to Wes—to the chef, by the way."

"Yes," Frodo agreed eagerly, "The best food I've had since Lothl—for a while, anyways." Frodo decided not to mention any rival hotel chains, such as the Homely House Hostels, or the Lothlorien Lodging House. He hated it when people got all huffy, especially when they were twice his size and carried big knives.

"Thank you. I shall see that they are passed on," Faramir said, less huffily. "Now, for the story."

"I was born," Frodo said, "to two kind, loving hobbits in the year—"

"I don't want your whole life stories," Faramir growled. "Just how you journeyed here."

"Fine," Frodo snapped. "Miss out on all of the back-story about how my character was shaped when my parents drowned while boating one evening, and how my uncle, well, cousin a few times removed, took me in as his heir."

"Interesting, but no," Faramir shook his head. "I just want a condensed journey narrative."

"We left home, we walked, we were brought here," Frodo said. After an awkward pause he added, "The end?"

"I give up," Faramir said, throwing up his hands in exasperation. "Sam, you tell the story."

At this, Frodo's eyes filled up with tears and his lower lip began to stick out. He began to sniffle.

"All right," Faramir sighed, "If you're good, I'll let you help Sam tell the story."

Frodo immediately perked up.

Sam began with how they had left Rivendell in the company of the fellowship, had lost Gandalf in Moria, and how the fellowship had split up after Boromir tried to seize the ring right before an orc attack. Frodo and Sam had then found Gollum, trekked across the dead marshes, had a brief encounter with Sir Percival Blakeney, Baronet at the black gate, came down through Ithilien, and had gotten captured. Somehow, Sam had managed to leave the ring out of the story.

Frodo leaned forward, about to rest his sleepy head on the table. Clink! The ring, still on its chain around Frodo's neck hit the table. Frodo sat back up with a start.

Faramir was immediately transfixed by it as it gleamed in the soft torch-light. "So this is the ring about which everyone has been talking," Faramir mused.

"Are you going to take it from me?" Frodo asked, child-like.

After a long pause Faramir replied. "No. I will not."

Both Frodo and Sam breathed sighs of relief. Faramir had never given them reason to mistrust him, and besides, he had sworn on his status as hotel steward.

"No, the rings belongs with you, Frodo," Faramir said heavily. "My brother, a greater man than I was corrupted by this ring, it killed him in the end, you know, and he was a better man than I. Plus," Faramir scoffed, "gold really isn't my color. I'm more of a platinum kind of guy."

Frodo yawned. Sam also yawned. Faramir almost found himself giving them sympathy yawns.

"I'm sure that our wait staff has a room ready for you two," Faramir said. He led them into a suite that was decorated in light blue and white. Frodo and Sam each dove onto their own humungous featherbed. "We haven't quite gotten the TV's installed yet, sorry," Faramir apologized. By the end of his sentence, Faramir realized that the hobbits were already asleep. He paternally tucked each of them in, and then tiptoed out of the room.

~*~

In the middle of the night, Frodo and Sam were awakened by an awful din. They each slipped out of their beds, and down the hall. The noises were coming from the room marked "The Forbidden Pool." Frodo and Sam entered the pool room through the wide glass doors and gasped. The waterfall that flowed in front of all of the windows in the hotel actually poured into the pool itself. The Olympic-sized pool was empty, except for a long figure, which was surrounded by archers. Arrows were fitted to bowstrings, ready to be fired if the figure splashed so much as a toe into the water.

"What's going on here?" Frodo cried.

"Is this person a friend of yours?" Faramir asked. The archers drew back, to reveal Gollum standing by the pool, dripping wet.

Frodo stared at him in shock. Instead of the dirty loincloth, Gollum was actually wearing a brand new, presentable pair of red swimming trunks. Gollum glared at the archers, but otherwise didn't move.

"Yes, he is my friend," Frodo finally said. "What seems to be the problem?"

"He was swimming in," Faramir lowered his voice in awe "the Forbidden Pool." The entire room hushed at Faramir's words.

"It's a pool," Sam said innocently. "What is so forbidden about it?"

"There was no lifeguard," Faramir shuddered. "This friend of yours could have been injured and then sued the Gondor Inn and Suites for everything that we're worth."

"Why not lock us up and execute us, precious," Gollum said, rolling his eyes. The archers inched closer, as menacing as possible.

"Listen," Frodo said, "I will take full responsibility for Gollum until we leave the hotel. He's had a long day."

"Sounds good then," Faramir shrugged. "All right, everyone—back to sleep."

The archers withdrew as Gollum followed Sam and Frodo back to the suite. After a brief argument about sleeping arrangements, Sam and Frodo decided that Gollum could have the pull-out couch. The two Shire-hobbits were out as soon as they climbed into their beds.

"Pull-out couch, precious," Gollum muttered darkly as he tried to get comfortable. No matter where he laid, there was always a spring sticking into his bony back. "They takes the nice bedses for themselves, while I gets the pull-out couch. I feels rejected, precious." Gollum would get his revenge on the hobbits for this disgrace. Soon.

~*~

After a nice continental breakfast in the morning, (served by Wesley in disguise) the hobbits said goodbye to Faramir went on their way. Frodo had arranged for the hotel bill to be sent to Bag End, so there were no worries there. The trio tromped on toward the towering mountains of Mordor once more as Gollum contemplated his revenge for making him sleep on a pull-out couch…