*Drumroll* The Mysterious Masked Hunter wins the prize for the 150th review! [:::] [:::] [:::](It's ice cream sandwiches.)
(And you're welcome, by the way. XD) Blueberrymuffins76: Yup, Thranduil is boss! And not to disappoint you, Elrond's not going to be evil. At least in this story... :] The Awesome Me: I like your username. B) That's a face wearing sunglasses, btw. I'm glad you like Sauron. He's really fun, although he's getting ooc even for this story. :P LOTCR: Why, thank you! What's that, Thranduil? I have to help clean too? Nooooo! *stomps off muttering about how Sauron should keep his dumb tower cleaner* Sixty-four K: Thank you for TWO awesome reviews! I actually like tictacs... but I'd rather have chocolate... Dude: (Another awesome username) Thank you! Pip the Dark Lord of All: Yes, they are both creeps. :P Um, I'm not sure what will happen yet, but I don't think anyone will die. I WILL SAVE THEM! *rides off into sunset* Lily Lindsey-Aubrey: Me too. That's my favourite line too – I'm glad you caught the reference! (Thrandy is turning a bit Ronan in this fic. O.O) Rousdower: Yeah, poor Feren. *has immense guilt trip over dousing Feren*
Thanks, everybody! Just a few more chapters to go! (Maybe two.)
Chapter 25. Legolaaaaaaas! You're Better Than Uuuuuus!
(For no reason except that song is cool)
Elrond looked at the ring in his hand incredulously. He was actually holding the ring of power. He was invincible.
"No!" Elrond clenched his hand over the ring. He was not going to let it corrupt him like it had everyone else. He would resist it. But what to do with the cursed thing? Easy. He must take it at once to Mount Doom and chuck it in.
He glanced out the window at Mount Doom, still smouldering dangerously and spouting smoke and lava at frequent intervals. Maybe not so easy after all.
Rumil filled another water balloon with paint and tied it shut.
"Whoa, dude, watch this, man!" shouted Orophin. Rumil looked up just in time to see an elven trooper get smacked in the face with a splat of yellow paint. He snickered and lobbed his balloon at a ducking elf gunner.
Unfortunately it hit Orophin instead.
"Whoa, man," said Orophin, groggily scraping red paint off his eyelids.
"Hey, I'm sorry, dude, I really am," said Rumil, who couldn't stifle a giggle in spite of himself.
"Hey, what happened to peace and love?" demanded Orophin. He picked up a green balloon and threw it hard, clocking Rumil on his ear as he attempted to dodge it.
"Watch it, dude!" shouted Rumil, beginning to get angry. He could feel green paint trickling slowly out of his ear, and green happened to be his least favourite colour. "Hey, your shirt's ugly. Try some purple on it," he suggested as he hurled a purple-hued missile. Orophin had always been a little twerp.
"Hey, I liked this shirt! And I hate purple! I'm not gonna be part of your commune anymore!"
An orange balloon landed on Rumil's trousers, mixing with the orange stripes that were already there and blending in rather well.
"Fine! Start your own commune! I always hated your organic brussels sprouts anyway!"
Rumil wound up his arm and flung a blue-paint-filled balloon straight at Orophin's head. Unfortunately (in case you haven't already noticed), his aim was not the best and the balloon flew over Orophin and landed with a smack in the face of Glorfindel.
Both hippie elves stopped lobbing balloons and stared at Glorfindel, now covered in blue paint and looking like Mel Gibson from Braveheart (except with blond hair).
"Uhhhhhh..." said Orophin.
Behind Glorfindel stood a large band of extremely fierce-looking orcs all brandishing terrifying and painful-looking weapons. Most of the orcs wore war paint, but as soon as they saw what had happened all the orcs without war paint rushed for paint-filled water balloons and started splattering themselves with bright colours.
"What's going on?" asked Glorfindel as soon as the paint had dribbled away from his mouth enough to make it safe for him to open it.
"Uuhhhhhhhhhhh..." said Rumil.
"We were just having some fun," said Orophin sulkily.
"Thranduil called me in to break up a protest," said Glorfindel. "So we can do this the easy way or we can do it the hard way. The easy way is you take your signs and go back to your commune. And stay there. The hard way is I take those tanks and start running you over with them."
"Uhhh, what's so hard about that?" asked Orophin.
"The hard part is trying to run over fleeing elves with slow, difficult-to-manoeuvre tanks," explained Glorfindel patiently. "But I will do it if you force me to extremes." He shook a finger at the impassive elves to drive home his point.
"SINCE WHEN DID GLORFINDEL ABANDON ELROND FOR THRANDUIL?" boomed a voice from above.
Glorfindel looked up in surprise. Was that Gandalf? On an eagle?
Erestor stretched his arm out, trying to reach the tip of the right-hand spike of Barad-dur. Thranduil would be sure to do a thorough inspection and he didn't want to be caught on the elvenking's bad side, but cleaning the roof of a three-hundred-storey tower (or however many storeys it had; he'd never bothered counting) was an unpleasant task even in the best of weather and with the best of heads for heights. Erestor resisted a morbid urge to glance over his shoulder at the landscape thousands of feet below.
Suddenly something large and feathery flew over his head with a whoosh and, with a second whoosh, something dropped to the roof of the tower shouting "Hi! Avast!"
Erestor nearly toppled from his step ladder to his death.
"Legolas?"
"Erestor?" said Legolas. "You started working for Sauron?"
"Shh, I'm an undercover agent," explained Erestor. "This job is just a cover for my true purpose in being here: namely, to bring about the downfall of the evil dark lord. And anyway, right now I'm working for Thranduil. He's taken over."
"What? DAD'S HERE?" gasped Legolas.
"And by the way, how did you just drop out of the sky like that?" asked Erestor, thinking this a feat beyond even Legolas's impressive skills.
"I jumped off an eagle," explained Legolas airily, quickly recovering from his surprise at his father's proximity. "We needed someone to get into the tower and unlock the door from the inside and the rest of the fellowship nominated me for the job, seeing I'm the most adept at defying the laws of physics."
Erestor shrugged. "You didn't have to do that. The door's already unlocked."
"But what about all those tanks?"
"They're your dad's."
"Oh." Legolas looked disappointed. "Oh well, I guess I'd better let the others know." He turned and waved to an eagle circling nearby. It approached with Aragorn on its back.
"Legolas!" called Aragorn. "Is the coast clear?"
"Yes," said Legolas. "Let the others know. I'm going to find Gimli and rescue him."
"I'll come with you," said Aragorn.
"No! Don't - you'll never make it!" gasped Legolas. But Aragorn had already tried to jump onto the roof of the tower, lost his balance, and slid off the edge. His death scream was cut short by Erestor grabbing his cloak and hauling him to safety.
"Thanks," said Aragorn. "You're handy to have around. Now why couldn't Legolas have done that when I fell off that cliff?" He shot an accusing look at Legolas.
Legolas turned as if he hadn't heard and opened the trap door of the tower. "Better let me go first," he said. "I shall scout out the area and make sure it's safe."
"What do your elf eyes see?" whispered Aragorn.
Legolas's elf eyes grew wide as he peered into the room below.
It's my dad," he whispered. "You go first."
Gandalf leaped from the back of his eagle and confronted Glorfindel.
"I was just breaking up this protest," said Glorfindel awkwardly. "You can see they were threatening the elvenking's troops."
"What? These are Thranduil's troops?" said Gandalf. "Then we'd better get into the tower quickly. Sauron may be evil, but even I don't hate him enough to let him remain a prisoner of Thranduil's for any length of time."
He ducked as a water balloon flew past, flung by a disgruntled orc.
The water balloon continued on its course and hit Elrond, who had just emerged from the tower, painting his sleeve purple.
"Gandalf!" said Elrond, recovering quickly from the unexpected missile. "Just the person I need!"
"I'm busy," said Gandalf grumpily.
Elrond rushed up to him, coming so close he got purple paint on Gandalf's robe. "I've got it," he hissed, shoving his fist in Gandalf's face. "I've got the ring!"
Gandalf stared at him in unbelief. "Show me," he said.
Elrond opened his fingers a crack, with a worried glance at the tower behind him. "We must take it to the mountain before he finds out it's missing," he said.
"Frodo!" said Gandalf. "Come here. I've got a little job for you."
"Gandalf..." began Merry.
"Do you really think Frodo should..." continued Pippin.
"Of course I do!" said Gandalf impatiently. "He's the ringbearer, isn't he?" He took the ring from Elrond and handed it to Frodo. "Now take it to Mount Doom," he instructed severely. "And this time, throw it in!"
Nobody had the guts to protest. They all knew Gandalf had never lived down Frodo's earlier failure.
"Fine!" said Eowyn, brushing past Elrond. "But I'm still going to go into that tower and give Sauron a piece of my mind!"
"You do that," said Gandalf. He turned to Elrond. "We've got to distract him until Frodo has time to get to Mount Doom," he whispered.
"Distract him?" said Elrond. "Hmm, I may have an idea..."
"Where is it? Where is it, precious?" Sauron hissed to himself as he searched feverishly through his sock drawer. He only had one hiding place for the ring of power. How could it not be there?
Unless...
He turned and headed for the bathroom, bumping into Thranduil at the doorway. Thranduil was on his tour of inspection, making sure the tower was fabulously clean. He brushed himself off as Sauron stumbled back and turned a disapproving eye on Sauron's bedroom.
"There are socks on the floor," he said. "LINDIR!"
Lindir scurried out from somewhere behind him. "Y-y-y-yes, sire?"
"Pick up those socks." Thranduil shot a withering glance of scorn at Sauron. "Really. Aren't you old enough to pick up after yourself?"
Sauron withered.
"Sorry, your majesty."
This was horrible. His life was horrible. Bowing and scraping to a measly elf? Whatever would Melkor have said if he could have found out about it? Sauron's shoulders slumped. He needed his ring. That would make him feel better.
Elrond appeared in the doorway.
"Sauron," said Elrond, not even bothering to call him "your lordship."
"What?"
"I'm not happy about Arwen."
"So?" Sauron grumped. What made Elrond think he cared?
"I've just had a look at her facebook account and she's been doing entirely too much shopping and wasting time with her immature friends. Not to mention she's posted her status as in a relationship with no less than seven people in the last month, (all of whom have hotly denied it, by the way). It is my opinion that she needs to be more closely monitored."
"Great, you should do that," said Sauron, thanking his stars for the hundredth time that he wasn't a parent. Why was Elrond bothering him with his problems anyway? As if Sauron didn't have enough problems of his own! He was a prisoner in his own tower, for goodness sake. Things couldn't possibly be worse.
"Thank you," said Elrond with a smile, "I knew you'd agree. And I knew you wouldn't mind, either."
"Mind what?"
Elrond had to repeat himself before Sauron believed his ears.
"WHAT? Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!"
It is said that when Morgoth was caught in the toils of the enormous spider Ungoliant, he let loose a shriek so loud that it shook the mountains and split rocks asunder, and that the echoes of that cry dwelt in that land ever after. But that cry was nothing to the terrible cry - a shriek of woeful and utter despair - that Sauron shrieked upon hearing Elrond's news. Elrond was bringing Arwen to stay in Barad-dur.