Day 3
Operation: Arato
0600 hrs MST
The preparations for the quest are nearly complete. As I write, my brother and grandnephews are finishing the final weapons inventory. It is fortunate that SCOME's armory is one of the best equipped in all of Arda. The sue in charge must have been a very powerful general. Kira was her name, I believe. Again, I begin to harbor doubts regarding our choice of SCOME member. Had we known our course would have been drastically altered as such, a skillful sue might have proved more beneficial to our cause. All dispatches have been sent and replies from our Allies have been received. By the grace of the Valar, all but two of the pigeons have returned safely. One can only hope the poor creatures were mercifully devoured by Mirkwood's spiders. I shudder to think of their hapless fate, were they captured and kept as pets by any of Prince Legolas' wives. Thankfully the third pigeon we sent was able to deliver our missive to Thranduil, who has promised his support despite natural reservations on working with a sue. The pompous Feanorians have completed readying the provisions ahead of schedule and are now barking orders on how to arrange the packs. Loath as I am to admit it, their assistance has proven invaluable. After I have finished my log, I shall assist the sue with her task in preparing the horses. We ought to be leaving for Eregion on schedule exactly 55 sue minutes from now.
Blowing on the parchment so the ink would dry, Elured sealed the inkwell and packed it away with his quill in his records satchel. It was important to keep account of every step of their quest. Should any or all of them fall into the spell of oblivion that often went with crossing over the borders from one Arda to the next, the journal he now packed would remind them of how to continue.
As he lit a torch and entered the secret passage, Elured thought on with sorrow at how disfigured his world had become. Once, long before, Arda had been a single world. There had been a single timeline. All was as it should be, according to the Music of Eru. Granted there had been the strife caused by Melkor's discordant melody. But then, all of Arda had been free. Now, everything and everyone was subject to the will of The Contagion. Arda itself had been torn into scraps of reality, made to form countless counterfeit worlds, all revolving around the wishes of the respective author that ruled each of them. The true inhabitants of Arda had been cast into these different realms, some repeatedly tossed between several territories, to live subject to the author's whims among changelings that took the place of other unimportant "characters". The only form of escape, if it could be called such, was this Central Palace, where they may be allowed by their authors to mingle with themselves, more often than not under the supervision of one or more sues.
A small sigh escaped Elured's down turned lips as he made his way through the tunnel leading from the SCOME HQ to the stables. Conflicting emotions always ran through him whenever he thought of them.
'Mary sues are evil,' Elured remembered her say. 'No matter how you may love me, you must remember that,' she had told him and his brother as she tucked them into bed every night.
A small smile replaced the frown on his lips as he let his mind linger on the memory. Elurin and he had always thought her words but a jest, a little game she played with them so they would kiss her and reassure their nana of how much they loved her. Elured's heart clenched at the memory.
She had loved them. They had loved her back. She saved them from the wilderness and raised them into the elves they now were. They had cried and mourned her when she departed with Eru's gift.
She had been their alpha sue.
Free Will had been Eru's greatest gift. The free will of nature, the ainur, elves, men and all the peoples of Arda were what ensured the order of Arda's song. The Contagion obliterated that. Elured knew it had to be restored.
Upon their nana's death, the relatively benevolent author of their world finished her story. His and his brother's free will had been returned. Eru be blessed, no other author had plucked them into another realm. Elured paused at the door to the stables. He knew that should their quest succeed, they would cease to exist. Elurin and he will never have even known their beloved nana. But she had taught them well and in their hearts burned the resolve to do what needed to be done.
As he snuffed out the torch and hung it on the wall, Elured took note of the sue who was busily brushing enchanted oil into a mare's black coat. Hearing the door shut behind him, she turned. A look of shock formed on the sue's face as he gave her the warmest of smiles.