"Those magnificent men in their flying machines

they go up tiddly up up,they go down tiddly down down.

Up, down, flying around,

looping the loop and defying the ground.

They are incredibly keen,

those magnificent men in their flying machines."

'Those Magnificent Men in their Flying Machines'

lyrics and music byRon Goodwin

Chapter 45 - Is it a bird? Is it a plane?

"What in the name of Eru is that?" Erestor shaded his eyes against the burnished sun.

He and Celebrimbor, accompanied by one of the younger Naugrim who was riding pillion with him, were scouting ahead of the main party. Their quarry was not too far ahead of them and, as was usual in the middle of the day, was obviously looking for a cool dark place to hole up until nightfall. If they could locate his hiding place and ride back to the main party there would be time to catch him.

Personally Celebrimbor thought it would be best just to kill him and get the weapon back, but Eonwe wished him to be alive so that he could be questioned. The Maia wanted to know who was directing him and why, and who was he to argue with a Maia?

The Naugrim, whose name was Bausi, snorted. "My eyes are as keen as a hawk's and I tell you that it is naught but a leaf blowing high on the wind."

Celebrimbor's luminous grey eyes lit up with amusement and he rolled them heavenward. Erestor choked back a laugh. The trouble with Dwarves was that they were determined to be the best at everything and while they definitely were best at digging and delving in rock, their tracking abilities were poor to say the least. Much poorer than Elves.

However, on first sight, it was indeed true. The speck that had caught Erestor's attention was still quite far away and although vaguely bird-shaped, did not resemble any creature known to the elves. Or apparently the Dwarves. Against the sunlight shimmering on the mountainside it could have been anything. On the other hand if it were a leaf, then as they watched curiously and warily, said leaf was coming much closer, moving rather rapidly and with a distinct flight path.

Celebrimbor squinted. "That is no leaf." He said firmly and turned his horse towards the only cover available in a large clump of bushes. Erestor followed without question.

They dismounted and sank down to their haunches as the strange 'leaf' drew closer and closer. Their Elven mounts did not need to be told to be silent. They stood quietly in the bushes with heads lowered.

The object was now much closer and seemed to have a distinct destination in mind, namely where they were hiding. They could also now clearly see that it had a bird-like shape, but was not a living thing. Neither Celebrimbor nor Erestor sensed life within. The sun reflected off a dull whitish-grey surface and they could also hear a soft whirring sound which may have come from wings except that they could also see that the wings were not flapping or moving at all.

Had Celebrimbor and his companions been modern mortals, they would have easily recognised the shape that whirred softly towards them and then flew in a wide circle around the bushed area. To any modern mortal it would have looked exactly like a large, sophisticated model airplane, the kind that enthusiasts control with a remote control box. Only much, much larger.

Just like a model airplane, it also had antennae and their usage was similar to that of a model, except that in this instance it was not only controlled by experts in another timeline, but was also fairly unlimited in its range. Also unlike a model, this aircraft had special remote sensors inside it which fed information back to the computer that controlled it and translated that information into data and compiled images of the surrounding areas.

They were more commonly used for locating personnel and mapping purposes, but a fascinated General Sheldon and the senior military and police officers with him on the other side of the time rift could clearly see the images forming on the screen. Including heat signals belonging to three living humanoids.

Celebrimbor, Erestor and Bausi were the first people in Ennorath to be on television.

Bausi cowered between the two elves and flung his hood over his head. "Ai, ai! It is a device of the enemy!" He wailed. "We are too close to Thangorodrim. I told Glosur. Far too close."

An irritated Celebrimbor kicked at Bausi's boot. "Hush." He whispered as sternly as he could. "We do not know what it is. It might not be from the enemy. We must be silent and watch, not fall around in panic."

Bausi fell silent but both Elves could see that he was still trembling in abject fear.

To his horror Erestor felt something very akin to the terror of Bausi also rattling inside him. If he'd had a hood he would have flung it over his head and wailed alongside the Naugrim. The thing, whatever it was, knew they were there. It kept flying round and around where they were hidden.

"I think it knows we are here." He whispered to Celebrimbor, trying to keep the tremble out of his voice.

Celebrimbor narrowed his eyes and opened his mouth to speak, whereupon the flying object suddenly changed its trajectory and swooped straight for them. Bausi squawked in fresh terror and Celebrimbor threw himself flat, dragging the crouched figure of Erestor with him so that they were lying over the smaller dwarf.

Erestor could feel his heart thudding as the object whirred only a few feet over their prone bodies. Once it had swooped away again he cautiously sat half upright and saw to his own terror that it had merely turned in a tight arc and was swooping back to them. He froze in a half sitting position with his mouth open in shock and Celebrimbor grabbed the sleeve of his tunic and yanked him back down, just as it zoomed in towards them. It buzzed them again for a few seconds that felt more like hours, then it whirred away and continued its onward flight.

They lay as still as the dead until they could no longer hear the whirring noise then sat up slowly.

"Well…" Erestor got to his feet warily and brushed the dirt and dried twigs off his tunic and leggings with shaking hands. "That was…interesting. " He could hear the shaky sound of his voice and glanced up at the sky anxiously to make sure it was really gone.

Celebrimbor was already on his feet and staring into the wide blue horizon. He shook his head and then whistled softly. A noise that should have instantly called the horses to them, but no welcome sound of hooves followed. All was silence in the shimmering heat of midday.

"It is gone." He said grimly. "Device of the enemy or not, it has flown off in the direction of the main party. And our horses have taken off in fright as well." He sighed deeply. That meant following their tracks, which in turn meant valuable time wasted.

Erestor laughed, but it was a tremulous sound. "I am not sure that I blame them." He came over to stand beside Celebrimbor. "What do you think it was?"

The other elf shook his head slowly. "I have no idea, but I am not entirely sure it came from Thangorodrim." He turned to Erestor. "We have to find our horses and get back to Ereinion. We need to warn them although no doubt that thing will find them long before we do."

He bent down and gripped Bausi, who was still crouched in a heap and whose wailing was now a series of muffled groans, by his shoulder. "Bausi, get up now. It has gone and so have our horses. We need to get back to the main party and we will have to run until we locate the horses."

Bausi allowed himself to be persuaded to his feet. "Humph!" He said looking around him in typical Dwarven discontent. "I thought Elven horses were well trained. I thought all you had to do was whistle and they came."

"Normally that is so." Celebrimbor responded calmly, not rising to the bait. "But they are like any other creature when faced with something out of the ordinary. They seek shelter when they are threatened. So now we must pick up their trail, recover them and get back to the main party."

Bausi's eyes gleamed in their deep-set sockets. "Well as for running, we dwarves run like the wind. But we are more, shall we say, shorter distance runners you understand?" He hitched his long mail shirt up a little. "We are much better at sprinting."

He found he was speaking to empty space. The two 'slowcoach' Elves had taken off already, running lightly at high speed leaving him dawdling behind in the bushes. He cast one terrified look around him, as though a million orcs and a billion strange flying objects were drawing in on him and after his blood, and plunged headlong through the bushes after Celebrimbor and Erestor leaving a clear flattened path behind him.

ooOoo

The strange flying object had not escaped Thadak's reasonably keen eyesight either. If Celebrimbor and the other two had been in any kind of position to notice, they would have seen him standing among the rocks on the lower slopes of the nearby small mountain range watching the flight of the UAV with both interest and fear.

His first thought was that it might have been one of the many wonders that had been brought into the world by the magicks of the Dark Lord and his servants. Thadak was not sure what actually lived in Angband, but he had heard many rumours. Still, this thing was very puzzling and did not seem like one of the dark fell works he was used to. Yet it displayed no interest in him, which would give credence to it being one of Morgoth's devices.

Was it perhaps searching for him? He had heard no word from Sauron for a few days now, since his encounter with Redhair in fact, and indeed was wondering even if it was worth taking a risk bringing the weapon to him. After all he originally had many of the weapons. Sauron might indeed be angered with him once he knew there was only one left. Thadak was not the brightest spark in the grate, but he knew that he risked death merely because he had failed in the original endeavour.

He cursed the human female. She had put a spell on him. All he had been able to think about was her pale flesh against the golden skin of the god from the West she had lain with at that camp of the Elves. Now look, he had pursued her and almost met his death at the hands of Redhair and his accursed band of Elves.

The arrow wound in his shoulder twinged in sympathy. Deep down inside the wound he knew that the arrowhead and the jagged remainder of the shaft still lay. He had only snapped the protruding part of the shaft off during his first rest, he could not see to do anything else with it and he had no companions to aid him, not that any other of his kind would have. The jagged shaft and the arrowhead had sunk deeper into the flesh and dark infected flesh had almost covered it over.

Deep inside he could feel the flesh putrefying around the foreign object. Orcs were built for hardiness and they could withstand most injuries and recover because their constitution was bred to be strong. This, however, was something different. The poisons from the putrefaction were beginning to filter into his bloodstream and although he had both fed and drank since the injury he still felt very lightheaded and it was getting worse as the hours dragged on.

He rubbed a hand across his eyes in order to clear his infection clouded vision, then sank down onto his haunches and watched as the strange object flew circles around a thick patch of bushes as if searching for something…or someone. It did not fly his way and he was too weary now to care whether it was looking for him, what with the cruel sun high in the sky and his poison ridden body. He turned away in disinterest as the object flew onwards and dragged the assault rifle behind him as he slunk towards the cool, shallow cave he had found and slumped down in a heap at the back of it.

Thadak was ill, although he did not realise it. Illness was not something which habitually happened to orcs. His kind certainly did not usually die from illness. They were either usually killed outright by the enemy or by the hand of his own kind, not from kindness it had to be said, but because a badly injured orc was of no use to them. A dead orc meant fresh meat for the others, especially since supplies were few while on the march.

However, before he sunk into unconsciousness something very strange happened. He was granted the clarity of a sudden vision of a young ellon being greeted by an older ellith and ellon in a small cottage. There was food on the table and a fire in the hearth and there was also laughter and song and love. Somewhere deep in his subconscious a racial memory of what he and the others had originally been still sparked within him.

His heavy eyelids fell closed, but as he drifted off to sleep tears of loss tracked down his leathery cheeks. He knew that he was now running from everyone, including his own kind, and he had nowhere left to go. The Elves would most certainly kill him on sight and only a painful death awaited him if he went to Thangorodrim.

Thadak was on his own.

ooOoo

Ennorath [noun – Middle Earth

Ellon [Sindarin – male elf, singular

Ellith [Sindarin – female elf, singular