Author’s notes: This mission was started in early December in very good time for Christmas. Then real life happened. (Yes, acquiring Skyrim totally counts as ‘real life happened’. Now hush.)
It is a bit long … Hey, wait! Come back! It’s not that long. Really, the only reason I mention it, is because I wanted to do some short missions to get the average length down. But this fic had a lot more things wrong with it, than I first thought, and I couldn’t just ignore all of them.
In the mission, I have some limitations on what can and cannot be done. These are not necessarily correct, but rather, they reflect what my agents think they know. For example, it is quite possibly that the Cad has a ‘home in on fellow agents’ button, but if that is the case, my agents haven’t found it.
The CAD MK-48 is a nod to the CAD MK-47 found in Aster Corbett’s Dragon Age mission.
The name Saxo Cruore is a Google translation from English to Latin of the bit’s former last name. I found the translation extremely dubious and haven’t been able to verify it using any kind of dictionary. However, the name Saxo have a special meaning for Danes, so I decided to keep it.
<Serious Business> Trigger warning: The sporked fic deals with severe child abuse and does so badly. It is rated T.</Serious Business>
Disclaimer: The Lord of the Rings belongs to J.R.R. Tolkien. The movie version belongs to Peter Jackson. The PPC was created by Jay and Acacia; I’m only playing in it. The Fellowship Mantra belongs to Elrond, but was brought to us by Miss Sandman. Through Anothers Eyes belongs to INHM, who can keep it. Mittens, the Radioactive Moss Creature, James Vulpes and Saxo Cruore are mine.
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RC #170 was the very image of holiday cheer, as filtered through the PPC HQ. The agents had been on a rare excursion to their home continuum’s version of the real word, where they had discovered, that their meagre salaries could buy them not only presents, but also a not insignificant amount of Christmas stuff.
Mittens had finished decorating the tree and was now for the umpteenth time taking an ornament from Aniseed, who kept pulling them down and batting them around. Under the tree were packages from various friends; the biggest one was shaped like a tea-pot and had a tag reading ‘To Mittens from Joss and Izumi’. In the background, the Cambridge Singers’ Angels’ Carol was playing and the young devil was tunelessly humming along, not really paying attention to the lyrics and therefore oblivious to the irony.
The console beeped, but it was a rather subdued sound and not the shrill BEEEEP! of a new mission. Mittens hung the paper star back on the tree and went to look.
“It’s a message,” he said.
The RMC was keeping an eye on the chestnuts roasting on an open fire, which was provided by the mini-Balrog, Riverdendell. “What does it say?” it asked, selected another letter from a small pile and started chewing on it. There had been some kind of attack on the PPC a little while ago; the attacker had spewed random letters and numbers everywhere and they had found their way to the RMC.
“’Since you were so eager to show the new recruits the ropes, you can continue to do so.’ Signed, the Marquis de Sod.”
The RMC started taking the chestnuts off the mini-Balrog. “I fuppofe it waf to be efpected that …”
It was interrupted by a knock on the door which Mittens went to answer. Outside stood the Death Eater the agents had recruited.
“Um. Hello, Fi…” Mittens began, but was interrupted when the former badfic-bit raised a hand.
“That,” he said, “is no longer my name. I am now called Saxo Cruore.”
“Okay,” Mittens said. “Why don’t you come on in. It seems that we are supposed to train you or something.”
Saxo stepped inside and let his gaze glide over the interior of the Response Centre which, although neat and tidy and festively decked, was rather cramped. The RC had grown in size a couple of times to accommodate the ridiculous amount of minis the agents had collected, but it had refused to budge an inch to give room to their newly acquired weapons collection. His face got a look of disapproval. “I was merely told to go here and … Merlin! What is that thing!?” He looked at the RMC, shocked.
The next thing he knew, he was flat against the wall, not quite sure whether he had actually passed though any space in between, and Mittens had his hands around his throat.
“Listen and listen carefully,” Mittens said. “You’re a new agent so I’m going to give you a pass, but if I ever and I mean ever,” to emphasise his point, he lifted Saxo a bit, so that he had to stand on his toes, then lowered him again, “hear you utter a single word that is, no, that could in any way be interpreted as disrespectful to my esteemed colleague, I am going to kill you. Do you understand?” His voice sounded oddly flat in contrast to the words. He wasn’t threatening as much as he was simply pointing out the consequences of a certain action.
Saxo managed a nod and Mittens let him go.
“And now,” he said, sounding almost cheerful, “I would like to introduce you to the Radioactive Moss Creature, my partner.”
Saxo tried to say something, but managed only a half choked sound.
There was another knock on the door and Mittens once again went to open it. Outside stood an anthropomorphic fox and, next to it, a sheepdog. Mittens looked surprised for a moment, but then he smiled. “James Vulpes.” He looked at the dog. “And Cabal.”
“Greetings,” the fox said in his squeaky voice and gave a flourishing bow. “I have been sent here by my new lieges. I was told, I should meet my new brother in arms here.”
There was a new half-choked sound from Saxo and then he said: “I’m being teamed up with a fox?”
James looked at him, narrowed his eyes and gave a low threatening growl. Mittens crossed his arms, but didn’t move otherwise. If Saxo and James were meant to be partners, the fox needed to be able to handle this himself.
The RMC looked from one new agent to the other. “Well,” it said, “now that you’re both here, why don’t you come inside, so you can get acquainted. We have chestnuts and I’m sure Mittens will be happy to make some tea and …”
BEEEEEEEP!!!
James and Saxo both covered their ears with their hands. Cabal laid down and tried to do the same with its paws. Mittens moved over to the console and hit the button.
“It’s a mission,” he explained. “I guess we’re supposed to take you with us.”
“A quest!” James said. “Finally!”
Mittens read the Intelligence Report and frowned. “It’s a Tenth Walker,” he said.
“Huh,” the RMC said. “I’m actually a bit surprised we’re getting it. There are so many other agents more versed in that canon. Then again, it is flooded with badfic and they need all the agents they can get.”
“According to this, the Sue is eight years old.”
“Eight years?” the RMC repeated. “That has be a typo; they must have meant eighteen.”
“I guess.” Mittens shrugged and turned towards the two newbies, who were eyeing each other with what he hoped was only disdain, but which was probably open hostility. “Do you know The Lord of the Rings?” he asked.
“I have begun reading the books by the honourable Yarr Tolkien, but I regret to say, I have not yet made it all the way through,” James replied.
Mittens blinked. “Just so you know it, it’s pronounced ‘J. R. R.’,” he said. “It’s his initials.”
“Oh, I did think it was an odd name.”
Saxo looked like he was about to say something, but Mittens shot him a warning glance, so he just smirked instead.
“And you,” Mittens asked. “Do you know the books?”
“No. They gave me them, but I only read the first two chapters and then I had to stop. The books are awfully dull, the magic makes no sense and the wizard is completely devoid of dignity; the way he uses his powers as entertainment for Muggles.”
“Um, fair enough, I guess. You’re entitled to your opinion, though I wouldn’t be too vocal about it.”
“How about training? Have you received any?” the RMC asked.
The new agents both looked at it blankly.
“Well,” James said, finally, “I received a leather bound book detailing the quests of two agents named Jay and Acacia.”
Saxo nodded at this.
“So, no training, but at least you know what we’re supposed to be doing,” the RMC said. “Better get to it then. Mittens, would you get weapons for them? I suggest we go as Uruk-hai.”
“Of course. Um, can I bring the crossbow?”
“They are used in the movie, but it’s debatable whether crossbows are really canon in Lord of the Rings. Better not take it.”
Mittens looked at the crossbow, slightly disappointed. It was sitting on a shelf all ready, the wood shining from oil, but, outside of the mission he picked it up in, he had not had a chance to use it. He turned to the weapons collection. “What are your experience with weapons?” he asked.
“I have my trusty baton,” James replied and waved it in the air.
“You’ll be much bigger as an Uruk-hai,” Mittens said. He looked over the collection. “Ah, here.” He picked a club and handed it to James. It was almost as big as the small fox-person. “You’ll grow into it,” he said.
Saxo smirked again. Mittens turned towards him. “And you?” he asked.
“I’ll use my magic.”
“You’ll do nothing of the sort,” the RMC said. “There’s enough Potterverse magic in Middle-earth from brainless crossovers, without us adding to it. Choose a weapon.”
Grumbling, Saxo asked for a sword and Mittens picked out a simple broadsword. As for himself he went with his two trusty knifes and the RMC had a sword as well.
“Now, for this first mission,” the RMC said, “you will simply observe me and my partner. Although I suppose that you, James, can write the charge list.” Mittens handed a standard issue pen and a notebook to the fox. The RMC continued: “And now, Mittens, if you would set the disguises and the portal, please.”
Mittens hoisted the backpack and bent over the console. A moment later the portal appeared and he and the RMC jumped through it, followed by their new trainees. The portal closed behind them and back in RC# 170, Cabal decided that now would be a good time for a nap and curled up on Mittens’ beanbag.
They were in prefic darkness and the Author’s Note boomed.
I don’t own ANYTHING in this story. NOTHING. NADA. ZIP. Okay? I don’t even own Laurie. I got her and her back round story from Willo Davis Roberts. Therefore, I still own nothing. Enjoy.
“Who?” Mittens asked, when it was safe to remove one’s hands from one’s ears.
“I have no idea,” the RMC replied. “We could be dealing with a crossover, but the Intelligence Report didn’t mention anything like that.”
Mittens bit his lip, which turned out to be a bad idea, seeing as he now had much sharper teeth than he was used to. If this mission was going to get weird and complicated, he would much have preferred to not have the newbies with them; which was probably Upstairs’ plan.
The darkness lifted and the four agents found themselves in a kitchen. They heard loud voices coming from another room and carefully peeked through the door. In a nondescript hallway a woman was hitting a puppy with a broomstick and a little girl was screaming at her to stop. There was also a small boy; Tim, according to the words.
“So that is the Sue?” James whispered.
“I think so. It would also seem, that she really is only eight years old,” the RMC whispered back.
The woman’s name was Annabelle, and she was Laurie’s mother. Laurie never called Annabelle “mother” but never called her “Annabelle” either. She had picked up the habit of calling Annabelle “Annabelle” when Annabelle had married her second husband. His kids, Laurie’s step brother and sister, had called her “Annabelle”, so Laurie thought of her as “Annabelle”.
Mittens groaned. “Don’t say it’s one of those fics.”
Annabelle was abusive. It was a thing had Laurie had to deal with since she was three years old, when her father abandoned her and Annabelle. That’s when Annabelle had started to lose it. But then again, who wouldn’t?
“Who wouldn’t?” the RMC growled. It wasn’t trying to growl, but being an Uruk-hai kind of made it come naturally. It continued in a more normal tone of voice. “James, write a charge for slandering single parents by claiming that this is typical behaviour. Even if it’s from the girls perspective, she ought to know that this is not normal.”
“Certainly,” James answered, then started fumbling with the notebook. Suddenly having hands this size wasn’t doing anything good for his coordination. Saxo sniggered and James glowered at him, but the RMC placed a hand on his shoulder.
“Just write the charge,” it said, then turned to Mittens. “Get a reading on these people, please.”
Mittens nodded and took the CAD from the backpack. Then, after checking that it was muted, he pointed it at Laurie. After a moment he said: “Sue. Definitely.”
“And the other two?” the RMC asked.
“Non-canon bits.”
“So we’re not dealing with a cross-over. Good, since we don’t know the other book. Make a charge for copying a back story.”
In the fic, Laurie now shielded the puppy with her own body. Her mother dropped the broom, grabbed an iron fire poker instead and proceeded to beat Laurie with it.
“Something occurred to me,” James said. “Her name is Laurie and she’s eight years old. Do you think …”
The agents looked at each other, expressions of horror slowly creeping over their faces, even Saxo’s, as they realized what this could mean.
“In that case,” the RMC said, “we charge and kill her immediately. The slightest hint of romance and we charge her with that and with whatever are the most aggravating points on the charge list and then we kill her.”
“What if we don’t have enough for a charge list?” Saxo argued. “Like if she decides to romance Frodo before she even joins the Fellowship?”
“Sam will kill her if she tries anything,” Mittens deadpanned.
The two newbies looked puzzled, but the RMC smiled grimly – possibly the only way for a Uruk-hai to smile – for a moment, before it said: “We’ll charge with conspiring to do further crimes.” It glanced at the words. “Anyway, the Sue is unconscious and somehow fading into Middle-earth. Time to neuralyze the two bits. Mittens, grab the woman. Saxo, she has locked Tim in a closet; get him out of there.”
The puppy had run out of the house and Annabelle was going to run after it, but Mittens grabbed her shoulder. At least, that was what he was trying to do, but his coordination was still not what it usually was, so instead he hit her on the side of the head and knocked her into the wall. Saxo was fumbling with the lock on the closet. The RMC, who was setting the neuralyzer, was the one doing best as an Uruk-hai; it had to adjust to walking on two legs and having hands every time it went into a mission and being this big and having hands the size of hams was really not much weirder.
Annabelle started screaming as Mittens reached down and pulled her to her feet. In contrast, Tim, who had been yelling and kicking inside the closet, fell silent as Saxo opened the door. The two bits were dragged over to the RMC. The agents closed their eyes as it pressed the button on the neuralyzer. Annabelle fell silent and the two humans stared at the RMC with vacant expressions.
“Annabelle,” the RMC said, “you do not have a daughter named Laurie. You are not a violent person and you would never hit a child.”
Annabelle nodded. Now that the expression of rage had gone from her face, she actually looked very kind.
The RMC turned to the boy. “Tim, you do not have a stepsister named Laurie and your stepmother is not violent. Now, both of you, there’s a scared and possibly hurt puppy outside. Since you both love dogs, you will find it, take care of it and give it a forever home here.”
Annabelle smiled. “Poor little dog,” she mumbled. Then she and Tim turned and went outside.
“Now,” the RMC said, “we have to catch up with the Laurie. Mittens, will you get the Remote Activator?”
“I’m trying,” Mittens said. “It seems to have gravitated to the bottom of the backpack.” There was a rather loud meow. “Ohai, Aniseed,” Mittens said, “have you seen the …” He stiffened. “Aniseed?!”
The RMC rubbed its forehead. “It must have stowed away in the backpack. Not a problem. We’ll just send it back.”
Mittens had his whole arm down the backpack, ignoring the annoyed sounds from Aniseed. “Here it is.” He pulled out the RA.
“Now open a portal back to …” the RMC began, but then the agents all froze as they heard a voice right outside saying: “I’ll get the leftover meatloaf from the fridge. I bet it’ll like that.”
There wasn’t time to send Aniseed back first.
“Middle-earth, now,” it said and Mittens set the RA. The portal opened, the agents all jumped through and it closed behind them, just as Tim entered the house again.
The portal led to a road running through a forest. A bit further down the road, two Hobbits were walking.
“Sam and Frodo,” the RMC said. It looked at the words. “They’re just about to meet Laurie. And the prose has gotten tolerable. Apparently it was just that one sentence that was mangled.”
“So now we send Aniseed back,” Mittens said, reached inside the backpack and took out the tulip cat. The following seemed to happen in blur. Aniseed caught sight of the two Hobbits and hissed loudly. What was really strange was that she also turned from her normal orange colour to a dark red, almost indistinguishable from black. Apparently, her origin as a CAD could not be denied in the presence of OOC Hobbits. She wormed her way out of Mittens’ grip and ran off, into the forest.
The RMC muttered something under its breath. From the tone of voice, Mittens guessed that it was probably swearing, but the only word he could make out was ‘eggplant’. He decided to not ask it to repeat it.
The RMC turned towards him. “You’ll have to go after her,” it said. “Send her back and then use the RA to rejoin us. Just use the ‘home in on Sue’ function.”
“Okay. How do I do it, if you’ve already executed the Sue by then?”
“Then you locate us through the Words …” The RMC’s voice trailed off as realisation dawned on it. It wasn’t that Mittens, like some agents, was unable to see the Words at all. When he squinted and cocked his head, he could see the words in front of him well enough to determine what had made a mini spawn or which awkward phrasing had turned someone into a gnome. But there was no way he would be able to skim the huge amount of text needed to find them. The RMC was about to say, that they would hold off executing the Sue until he got there, but that didn’t really seem an option. They had to kill the Sue fast if she tried anything. Having to sit through an romance-scene with an eight-year-old was the kind of thing that could crack the sanities of the two newbies.
It could see the same realisation on Mittens’ face as he said: “You go.”
“But the newbies?”
“I’ll lead them and collect charges. Just go after Aniseed, get her home and then rejoin us.”
“Very well. If you think you can handle it.”
“I can.” Mittens held out the RA.
The RMC nodded once, took the offered RA and ran after Aniseed.
Mittens watched it go, but after a moment it disappeared into the forest. Then he turned around to face his worst nightmare: Being in a position of authority.
“Right,” he said, as commanding as he could manage, “we have a change in assigned tasks. James, you still have the notebook. Saxo, you get our spare RA.” He dug in the backpack until he found it and handed it over. “You are both responsible for watching the Words. Look out for author’s notes, punctuation rains and unmarked scene changes.”
“She is in Middle-earth,” James said. “Is that not non-canonical? Can we not get her now?”
Mittens shook his head. “I like the way you think, but no, we have to collect more charges to make the sentence stick. Let’s catch up with the Sue and find out what we’ve missed.”
Not much as it turned out. Frodo and Sam had found the crying Laurie. The Hobbits had noticed that Laurie was horrible bruised, but she wouldn’t tell them who had hurt her. Since she was all alone, they had decided to take her with them to Bree.
“Is that a charge?” James asked, pen poised and ready.
Mittens bit his lip, a lot more carefully this time. “Taking her with them seems dangerous, but so does letting her walk to Hobbiton alone. And this is movieverse, which makes it seem like Bree is much closer than it actually is.” He wished that the RMC was here to answer the question, then wished that he hadn’t just wished that. It had been gone for less than five minutes and already he felt out of his depths. “We’ll let it slide,” he said finally. “It’s non-canonical, but they are acting pretty much as one would expect from those two, if they found a lost little girl. However, she should be charged with being able to communicate with them.”
“The thing with the bruises,” Saxo said, sounding bored. “They seem to be from the beating we witnessed her getting, but after being beaten with an iron rod, the little girl would be lucky to be alive; yet she only has a few bruises.”
Mittens nodded. “Yes, charge for trivialization of injuries.”
They kept on following the Sue and the Hobbits, who were soon joined by Merry and Pippin. So far the fic was simply copying the movie.
James walked besides Mittens and asked: “Do you know my new brother in arms, this Saxo?”
“Oh, yes,” Mittens said. “He’s actually from the same fic you’re from.”
James turned his head to look at Saxo. “I say,” he said, “we actually are a kind of brothers.”
Saxo stopped dead in his tracks. “We are not brothers!” he said, loud enough that Mittens glanced at the Sue to see if she had heard; fortunately she hadn’t. Saxo continued: “I am a Death Eater, one of of Lord Voldemort’s trusted men and I’m not the brother of …”
“You are a Death Eater!?” James’ voice went surprisingly shrill for something so big.
Oh bother, Mittens thought. I’m sure this wouldn’t have happened if the RMC had been here.
James was only getting started. He waved his club at Saxo. “Defend yourself, so that I may slay you in honest combat, you villain, you scoundrel, you blackguard, you …”
“Yes, we get the picture,” Mittens said, grabbed James’ hands and forced him to lower his weapon. “But trust me, you do not want to do that. The Flowers very much frown on agents killing their partners, especially when it happens on their first mission.”
“Oh, they do?” Saxo asked. He had looked at little worried at James’ threats, but now he was smirking.
Mittens met his gaze evenly. “Yes,” he answered, “they do. Fortunately, you and I are not partners.”
Saxo stopped smirking.
Finally, James hung the club back in his belt and, grumbling slightly to himself, let Mittens drag him along in pursuit of the Sue and Canons.
“Right. The Buckleberry Ferry. Follow me,” He said, gesturing through the trees.
There was a ‘pop’.
“I say, what is this?” James asked.
“That’s a mini-Balrog,” Mittens answered. He squinted at the words. “It must be Buckleberry.”
“What are we supposed to do with it?” Saxo asked, sounding as bored as ever.
“Watch and learn,” Mittens replied. He rummaged around in the backpack, until he found a smaller one made of a grey material. “Asbestos backpack,” he explained. He placed it on the ground and opened it. “Come on in,” he said to the mini.
It looked at him as if to say, that he had to be joking.
“Come on,” he said. “We need to keep you safe and there’ll be bacon in the end.”
The mini gave him another look as if to say, that he had better be talking about truly obscene amounts of bacon, but climbed into the backpack. Mittens closed it, not too tightly, and handed it to Saxo.
“You can carry it,” he said.
“Why me?” Saxo asked.
“Because I said so!” Mittens barked, giving his best impersonation of his old drill sergeant. It seemed to work, for Saxo took the backpack and didn’t argue any more.
“And now, would you please portal us to Bree?” Mittens asked.
Saxo fiddled with the RA and managed to do as told, and they portalled into the village. The Hobbits and the Sue were outside, asking to be let in by the Gatekeeper.
His wording reminded Laurie of a book she had once read about the Middle Ages.
The words were in the voice of Laurie, but she didn’t seem to be talking.
“What was that?” Saxo asked, not even sounding bored.
With some difficulty, Mittens checked the words and felt a sense of dread wash over him. “Until now she has basically just been paraphrasing what happens in the movie, but now she is starting to add her own thoughts on things and it manifests as some sort of commentator track.”
The agents exchanged glances. They knew that this was a bad thing, even if they still didn’t know just how bad.
Laurie and the four Hobbits walked towards the inn. The three Uruk-hai went over to the gatekeeper and Mittens used the neuralyzer on him. “Um,” he said, wreaking his brain for the man’s name. When he finally came up with it, it wasn’t from the book, embarrassingly enough, but from a mission report he had once read, where the name had been mentioned. “Harry,” he said, “only four Hobbits entered a moment ago. There was no little girl with them.”
With that taken care of, the agents followed the Sue and the Hobbits to the Prancing Pony. They stayed outside the inn, looking in through the windows and following the Words. And listening to Laurie’s thoughts, which were becoming more obnoxious by the second. Pippin told Laurie about Gandalf.
Laurie’s jaw dropped. A real wizard? She suddenly felt like she was in some epic fantasy tale, and the plot was thickening every second. Laurie’s first thought was centered on where this “Gandalf” person had gotten off to. Her next thought was pure and utter ecstasy at the prospect of meeting a real, live wizard. These thoughts ran together in her head as the Hobbits deliberated on a course of action.
“They are among humans now; they should be asking around for her parents,” Mittens said.
James looked at Mittens. “Should I charge for something?”
Mittens thought. “Making the Hobbits kidnappers,” he finally said. “Really, I can find no other words for what she is making them do.”
They continued to watch the scene inside the inn. The Hobbits were drinking and Laurie was playing with a bottle cork.
Mittens frowned. “I’ve never seen anything like this,” he muttered.
“Like what?” James asked.
Oh, great, Mittens thought. He had just revealed a lack of experience. He had to sound really clever now. He tried to copy the voice the RMC used when it explained things, as he said: “The normal reaction for a young girl who is thrown into another world, separated from anyone and anything she has ever known, is to be shocked, scared and sad.” He decided to continue in his own voice. “The way most Sues react – in fact one of the things that make them Sues – is to get used to the idea far too quickly and then be happy and enthusiastic. But this Sue is neither; in fact, I can only describe her reaction as … well, bored. I’ve never seen that before. Charge for it.”
In the fic, Laurie dropped her cork and got up to look for it. The cork had rolled into the corner where Strider was sitting and he handed it to her. She went back to the Hobbits and once again got caught in her own inner commentary track. She wasn’t pulled out of it until the three other Hobbits noticed that Frodo had gone and ran to find him.
“Hold on,” Mittens said. “There was supposed to be a scene with Frodo, where he accidentally slips on the Ring.”
“Hm, yes,” James said. “He was dancing on the table wasn’t he?”
“Well, this seems to be mostly movieverse so it wasn’t as elaborate, but it was there.” Mittens scanned the words as quickly as he was able to, but it was clear that the scene was missing. “It must have happened while she was zooned out. That stupid Sue!” he exclaimed. “She totally ignored the scene with the Ring in favour of inner monologuing. And she used a dropped cork to introduce Aragorn into her story.” He shook his head. “Charge for seriously bad storytelling.”
“There’s something in the words up ahead,” Saxo said. “I think it’s an Author’s Note.”
The agents covered their ears as the voice started blearing.
Author’s Note: Sorry if some parts are a bit (Or way) off, but I couldn’t get my hands on a copy of FOTR. I’m doing this from memory (so expect the scenes to be completely out of order.)
“Charge for writing and posting a fanfic without having access to the canon material,” Mittens said.
The agents neuralyzed Barliman Butterbur and then followed the Hobbits, Aragorn and Laurie into the wilderness.
“Add Aragorn to the list of kidnappers.” Mittens looked darkly at Laurie. “Not only is she going to slow them down, taking her with them also means placing her in danger. They would never do that to a child, never. The worst thing is, that this fic actually seems to have an okay grasp of their personalities, except for this.”
Laurie’s inner voice started again.
Laurie followed close behind the Ranger, thinking that the closer she was to him, the farther she was from the Ring Wraiths. Laurie was in no hurry to meet the Nazgul again. It was several times that Laurie almost crashed into Strider when he stopped short to say something, or to check something on the ground. But Laurie still remained a solid three feet behind him at all times.
“Garh!” Saxo exclaimed. He went over to a tree and banged his head against it. He would have done so again, but Mittens grabbed his arm.
“This is what Bleeprin is for,” he said, digging in the backpack for the bottle and handing a couple to Saxo. “James, charge for having a really annoying inner voice.
It was near sunset when the group reached Weathertop, as per canon.
“Should we,” Saxo began, managing to sound both bored and arrogant, “charge her for being able to walk all day without getting tired, despite her age?”
“Yeah,” Mittens said. “Also charge her with not slowing them down. It’s canon that they reach Weathertop at this time.”
Laurie stumbled back, and in her haste, she tripped and fell back on her bad wrist. Laurie had broken the wrist less than a week before, when she had tripped and fallen while running down a steep hill… to get away from Annabelle. It had been the first time she had ever tried to escape a beating, and the throbbing wrist was a painful reminder.
“A throbbing wrist? A throbbing wrist?!” Mittens stared at the Sue. “If you fall and land on your broken wrist, it doesn’t just throb. It should make you scream in a pitch only dogs can hear.” He turned to James. “Charge for …” he paused. “We already have a charge for trivialization of injuries, I want you to ramp that up to being totally clueless. This goes beyond simply not doing research, this is actively stupid.”
Frodo was wounded in the attack and became gravely ill. Laurie couldn’t bear to look at him and Aragorn took the time to ask her if she was okay and give her a pat on the head and some encouraging words, before he went out to look for Kingsfoil.
Laurie, who hadn’t given a thought to her old life since she came to Middle-earth, decided that now would be a good time to wangst about it. Her inner voice was heard, sounding even more whiny than usual.
Laurie was suddenly very depressed. How could she be brave now, when she couldn’t find the bravery to stand up to Annabelle after all these years? Laurie had been abused since she was three years old, so it had gone on for roughly five years. Every time Annabelle had struck Laurie- whether it was with a spoon, or a pen, or a knife… she had never protested. With a sinking feeling, Laurie felt it was her own fault that the abuse had gone on for so long. She could have stood up and said “NO!”, but she never had. With these thoughts, Laurie felt herself sinking deeper and deeper into the lonely hole of seclusion she had fallen into so many years ago…
“Charge for being unbelievably self-centred,” Mittens said. “Frodo is dying and she’s thinking of nothing but herself.”
“She’s blaming herself for the abuse she suffered at the hands of her mother,” Saxo said. “That seems … unreasonable.”
Mittens thought this over. He had been on the wrong side of more beatings that he could count and it had never occurred to him to feel bad about not standing up for himself. What would be the point? It would only make the beating worse. But he had no idea whether humans, especially children, thought the same way.
Finally he said. “We should just make a general charge for bad psychology. Her inner voice is all over the place in terms of vocabulary and subject matter; at least some of it has to be wrong.”
James noted the charge and no-one made further comments. Mittens felt that he had just dodged a bullet, but he doubted that he could keep this up. He wanted the RMC back.
When Sam returned with the Kingsfoil. Laurie was still in her own bubble.
Thoughts of her mother had taken away what little joy and awe she had received from stumbling into this new world.
“What joy and awe?” Saxo snarked. “You haven’t exactly shown much.”
Which was a odd statement coming from someone who had himself called Lord of the Rings boring, Mittens thought, but didn’t comment on it.
Fortunately Arwen and Aragorn arrived and gave the Sue something else to think about. Aragorn took the time to call Laurie over and hurriedly introduce her – and her only – to Arwen, daughter of Elrond, the Lord of Rivendell.
Laurie blinked, and wondered if that meant Arwen was a Princess.
“She not a princess,” all three agents said, in almost perfect unison.
James and Mittens turned towards Saxo.
“How would you know,” Mittens asked, “that Arwen is not a princess?” Saxo opened his mouth to answer, but Mittens continued: “And don’t try to tell me, that it was in the first two chapters.”
Saxo closed his mouth again. He seemed to think for a moment before he finally shrugged and said: “I scanned the rest of the book. Everyone here seem to make such a fuss about it.”
“So you only read the first two chapters?”
“Yes.”
“And didn’t like them?”
“No.”
“But you scanned the rest of the book?”
“Like I said,” Saxo answered, sounding annoyed.
“And didn’t like the rest either?”
“Certainly not.”
“Fine,” Mittens said and turned away from Saxo. If he wanted to be stubborn, he could just go ahead.
While this conversation had been going on, Arwen had taken Frodo to Rivendell. Aragorn, the Hobbits and Laurie were also heading there and had left the agents behind.
Mittens squinted at the words to see where would be a good place to catch up with the canons.
On their third day of running,
“On their third day of running!?” Mittens repeated. “It was bad enough when they were walking, but does this Sue really think that an eight year old girl can keep up with grown Hobbits who are running? And for three days no less? James,” he tuned to his fellow agent, “charge her with bad physiology. She chose to be a small child, but she either doesn’t care about the limitations inherent in such a choice or she is totally ignorant about them.” He squinted some more at the words, then turned to Saxo. “Portal us to where she is talking to Aragorn, right before they enter Rivendell.”
Laurie told Aragorn that she wasn’t from this world and asked what it was called.
“Ironic. This world is called ‘Middle Earth’, or ‘Arda’, as the elves call it.”
There was a plop and a squeak and the new mini, Middle Earth, was placed in the backpack.
Aragorn didn’t doubt Laurie’s words, but didn’t seem much disturbed by the revelation, either.
“He sure is taking it in stride,” Mittens said and immediately regretted the bad pun.
“Should I charge for that?” asked James.
“Don’t bother. If we should make a charge for every single case of someone in this fic having an underwhelmed reaction, we would still be back in chapter two and we would be out of notebook.”
Laurie hadn’t told Aragorn or anyone else about her being abused, but Aragorn had noticed a lot of old scars on her and also that she seemed more quiet and careful than most small girls. He felt something was wrong with her.
He knew he would definitely need to seek Elrond and Gandalf’s counsel on this.
Mittens facepalmed. “Worst. Timing. Ever.”
“Well, he is a kind and noble man,” James said. “Surely, he would worry about one of his subjects.”
“The fox might be right,” Saxo said. “Isn’t that what good persons do? Worry about the weak and undeserving, rather than look at the big picture?”
“Not in this case. Aragorn has much more important things to worry about. Right now, all that should be on his mind is whether Frodo and Arwen made it here safely and in time. The Sue is making this story all about herself and her wangsty past.”
Finally, they reached the gates of Imaldris.
With a small pop, Imaldris, the mini-Balrog appeared.
“The backpack,” Mittens said, gesturing to Saxo. When the mini was safely placed inside, the agents continued after the Sue and the canons.
Gandalf appeared and Laurie was introduced; at least she seemed to show proper respect for him. Then Aragorn said that he needed to speak to Gandalf and Elrond about Laurie. Laurie sneaked after them and eavesdropped on their conversation.
“Worst timing ever,” Mittens repeated gloomily. “They should be talking about the Ring and Sauron and the coming war. If they should be talking about her at all, it should be about the fact that she’s from another world and whether or not she is a minion of Sauron. It’s like …” He hesitated, searching for the right words.
“It’s like she’s trying to make them all fit a role,” James said quietly.
“Yes, exactly.” Mittens nodded. “She’s trying to make them act the way adults would, back in her own world, if they found out about her scars. She refuses to acknowledge that there are much more important things at stake and that these three persons, as kind as they are, simply don’t have time to talk about how a little girl fell and got a welt.”
James nodded, but didn’t say any more. He was thinking about the Sue from the fic he had been recruited from. She had wanted an old, dignified knight and she hadn’t cared about whether the role had suited the character she had given it to or not. As it so happened, the answer had been ‘not’ and a character replacement had been created. “We should remember to check for character replacements,” he said.
“Oh, sure,” Mittens replied. “We’ll do so at the council; everyone is there. In the meantime, charge for twisting this whole story to be about her being abused.”
In her hiding place, Laurie wangsted some more. This time, she blamed herself for the abuse, because her mother got terrible headaches and Laurie always managed to make her angry.
Lord Elrond stood up.
“There is nothing we can do about this now, as we have more pressing matters to deal with. Strider, Laurie is in Rivendell now, and I assure you that no harm can or will come to her here.
“Go Elrond,” Mittens said. “He is fighting the Suefluence.”
“Hooray,” James said with a grin.
Gandalf caught Laurie eavesdropping and tried to make her talk to him about her injuries, but she refused to reveal that they were made by her mother; she would only say that the person couldn’t harm her here. Gandalf was satisfied with this and didn’t press the matter.
He winked at Laurie, and she smiled. Another new friend! And in only a few days!
“She met Gandalf less than an hour ago,” Saxo said, “and now she thinks they’re friends because he winks at her? I foresee problems in this girl’s future, if she does not learn to be less enthusiastic about men winking at her.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t worry about that,” Mittens said. “She’s not going to have much of a future.” All the talk about the Sue’s injuries had given him an idea as to how to execute her. He just needed the RMC back to approve it. He frowned at the thought. How long had it been gone? It was hard to tell, since the Sue rarely mentioned time and when she did, she brushed through long periods in a few sentences.
His thoughts were interrupted by the Sue wangsting about how all this making friends was too good to be true and that something bad was sure to happen. All three agents smiled their widest, scariest Uruk-hai smiles.
Laurie went with Sam to the dinner hall, where they found Aragorn, Arwen, Merry and Pippin. Here the agents had to listen to Arwen giggling.
“The Lady Arwen. Does. Not. Giggle.” James growled the words.
“Yeah, I’d say that’s a charge,” Mittens replied.
James tried to write the charge, but pressed the tip of the pen so hard against the paper that he tore the paper and had to turn the page and start over.
The next scene featured Laurie and all the Hobbits in Frodo’s bedchamber. Laurie was still haunted by the image of him lying pale and dying on the ground, even though she had completely ignored him back when it had actually happened.
Mittens looked ahead in the words and frowned. “You check as well,” he said. “Is there any mentioning of Elrond treating her injuries?”
After a moment both the agents shook their heads.
“No,” Saxo said.
“Just a lot of people arriving,” James chimed in.
Mittens nodded, then turned around and kicked a hapless stone, sending it flying into a bush. “That stupid Sue!” he growled. “She makes everything about her and her trajeck and abusive past and her injuries, to the point where people, with much more important things to do, are having meetings about her. But she neglects to have Elrond, one of the finest healers this world has to offer, do the one thing that would make sense and be totally in character for him. Charge for not having Elrond heal her.” He took a deep breath as James wrote the charge. “Let’s skip ahead to the council. We might as well get it over with.”
Laurie hid with the Hobbits to eavesdrop on the Council, which proceeded mostly according to movieverse, punctuated by Laurie’s internal commentator track. Imaldris, the mini-Balrog, scratched on the inside of the backpack upon the mentioning of its name. Laurie briefly ignored the council in favour of thinking about her mother’s abuse.
“Can we make a charge for forgetting to capitalize proper nouns?” James asked. “Or maybe even for only capitalizing every other one? The inconsistency is starting to make me feel seasick.”
“Go ahead,” Mittens replied and turned back to the action. The story had reached the climax, where Frodo volunteered to take the Ring and Aragorn, Legolas, Gimli and Boromir pledged their assistance. When Sam ran in, Laurie followed him.
“I’m going too,” Laurie blurted. Frodo, and pretty much everyone else, gave her an odd look.
“Laurie, it will be dangerous,” Gandalf warned her. She shrugged.
“I don’t care- it’s not like I have anywhere I have to be.” The wizard looked hesitant. Then he gave a gentle sigh.
“As you wish, Miss Summers.” He said. Many other members of the council gave him a strange look. He was permitting a little girl to go on a life or death quest?
There was the sound of something creaking. It appeared to come from everywhere at once, yet none of the canons nor Laurie seemed to hear it.
Mittens looked around, not liking this at all.
“I say, what is that sound?” James asked.
“I think it’s the Canon straining under the sheer improbability of an eight year old girl joining the Fellowship,” Mittens answered.
“Straining? You mean we’re going to have a canon break?” Saxo asked.
“No,” Mittens replied, trying to sound more confident than he felt. “If canon was going to break, it would have done so already. I can only recall hearing of one canon break and that was when a Stu put on the Ring and nothing happened.” He pointed to the people giving strange looks. “At least some of them are reacting normal. Charge for almost breaking the canon.”
Merry and Pippin came running in to join the quest.
“Uh oh,” Mittens said. He knew what came next.
Elrond smiled slightly.
“You shall count to nine,” Mittens muttered, “nine is the number of your counting.” Oddly enough, two things happened. Firstly, the creaking sound stopped. Secondly, Elrond stopped smiling and when he spoke, he sounded hesitant.
“Ten companions,” he murmured.
Mittens blinked in surprise, but didn’t stop. “You shall not count to ten, nor to eleven.”
Elrond actually frowned and sounded even more reluctant when he said the last part.
“So be it. You shall be the Fellowship of the Ring.”
“Nine is number of the Fellowship,” Mittens finished and sighed. “That was weird. Usually the continuum only reacts that way when you cite actual canon. Shows how bad a shape it must be in, when goodfic is enough.”
“Should we get the readings now?” James asked.
“Sure.” Mittens pulled out the CAD, checked that it was muted and pointed it at Gandalf.
[Gandalf. Istari. Canon. Out of Character 81,29%]
“Hardly surprising,” Mittens said and pointed the CAD at Elrond. Then he looked at the readout and frowned.
[You are in a fic in which an eight year old girl joins the Fellowship] it said. The words disappeared as soon as he had read them and was replaced with: [Please assume that everyone who is okay with that decision] the words blinked again [is at least 80% OOC and don’t use me again unless] blink [you suspect an actual character replacement or have to check an OC.] After the last words, the screen went blank.
“What was that?” Saxo asked. He and James had both been looking over Mittens’ shoulder.
“Um,” Mittens replied. He turned the CAD over; on the back of it, a small label read ‘CAD MK-48’. “The RMC and I broke a CAD on a mission. It would seem that the one we got as replacement, has an attitude.
The screen flickered to life. [I heard that.] It went blank again.
“At least tell me the reading on Elrond,” Mittens said. “Not treating the Sue’s injuries is seriously out of character for him, even considering the fic.”
There was a brief pause, then the screen flickered to life once more. [Elrond. Half-elf. Canon. Out of Character 92,3%] The words disappeared again, almost before Mittens had read them and the screen went dark.
“So, no more analysing,” Mittens said. He shrugged and put the CAD in the backpack. “James, please write a charge for throwing everybody severely OOC.” He shook his head. “Including herself. I mean, whatever happened to ‘Laurie was in no hurry to meet the Nazgul again’? She was genuinely scared on the way here and she should want to stay in Rivendell. There has been no mentioning of her wanting to confront her fears or even that she only feels safe with her friends. She was just like, ‘Meh, I don’t have anything better to do. I’ll join you.’”
According to the story, the next couple of days were spent preparing for the journey and Laurie got to know her new travelling companions. The agents watched the narration for signs of bashing of Boromir or Gimli, but they found none.
“For once,” Mittens said, “Boromir and Gimli would have every reason in the world to give a ‘this is no place for girls’ speech and they don’t. We already have a charge for sending everybody severely OOC and I am still tempted to make this a separate charge.”
“Laurie has been given a dress for the journey,” Saxo said. “Why, with all the brain-bleeding stupidity this fic has already displayed, am I still surprised that she thinks a dress will be an appropriate attire?”
“At least she didn’t make Arwen give it to her,” Mittens said. “Charge for the dress.”
The Fellowship and Laurie set out from Rivendell and the agents went after them, after neuralyzing Elrond and everyone else, making a point to tell Arwen that she did not giggle.
Laurie kept up with the canon characters, even though she felt very tired and was not used to travelling on foot.
“I say,” James said, “This is the first we hear about her being tired and having difficulties keeping up. Why does she start now?”
“Dunno,” Mittens said. “maybe it occurred to the Sue, that she could wring more sympathy from the readers by getting exhausted and having trouble keeping up. Of course, now she is simply contradicting herself and making herself look stupid. If anything, she should be getting used to walking by now.”
Laurie was also a little distressed. She had the feeling that maybe Aragorn had told Legolas about his suspicions concerning Laurie. The elf had watched her carefully for the first week of the quest, and would talk quietly with Aragorn at night.
Mittens groaned. “Again with her being the centre of attention. They’re on a quest that will decide the fate of the whole world; does she really think that Aragorn and Legolas has nothing more important to talk about than her?”
Laurie fell and landed on her bad wrist.
Legolas was the one that helped her up, and he waved off the other members of the Fellowship, saying that he would take care of Laurie.
Mittens tensed and drew his knives. Beside him, the other two agents caught his drift and did the same.
Oddly enough, Legolas said that the wrist wasn’t broken, only twisted or sprained.
He stopped, and Laurie realized he was looking at the back of her hand. “Where did you get this?” He asked, gently touching the long, jagged scar on the back of her hand.
The agents all held their weapons at ready. Mittens whispered charges under his breath, preparing to rant off as many as possible before striking at the Sue.
“My hand slipped when I was cutting some vegetables,” She mumbled, looking down. It was that same impulse of hers- ‘Don’t lie to nice people’. And Legolas was a nice person, if she had ever seen one.
Mittens wished that he had brought his crossbow, wished that the two knives had been actual throwing knives, wished that Legolas hadn’t been sitting too close to Laurie for him to try throwing the knives anyway.
But nothing unseemly happened. Legolas put a splint on Laurie’s wrist and they got up and moved on, after Laurie had indulged in some more wangst. The three agents lowered their weapons and let out sighs of relief.
The fic moved on. Laurie had to keep her wrist with the splint still.
“Oh, now she’s not only getting exhausted, she also has to care about her sprained wrist,” Saxo said. “Even though when it was broken she never thought about it.”
“Yep, I’d definitely say that she’s angling for sympathy,” Mittens said. “James, would you be so kind as to charge for serious inconsistencies?”
The agents arrived at the gates of Moria right before the Fellowship and hid behind a rock-outcropping, where they watched Gandalf start to work on the doors.
They waited for nearly forty-five minutes, in which Gandalf attempted countless spells in Elvish, Orcish, Dwarvish, and a language Laurie couldn’t pinpoint.
“But she can distinguish the three other languages by sound,” Mittens commented. “Charge for that.”
Then the agents waited the forty-five minutes. While waiting, Mittens had time to think about the RMC. By now he was beginning to worry; even when taking into account all the time-compressions and portalling, he knew it had to have been at least a day since the RMC had left them. It should have been back by now and it started to seem more and more likely that something had happened to it. As much as it bothered Mittens to admit it to himself, the RMC wasn’t a good fighter. It was, in fact, kind of useless in battle. Its heart was in the right place; it had no qualms about hurting other living beings and Mittens didn’t think for a second that it would hesitate to kill, but its technique was non-existent. He hated to think this way about someone he looked upon almost as a commander, but it was the truth and he would have to face it. Mittens promised himself that he would make sure the RMC got some weapons training. If something happened to Mittens, if they got separated again, it needed to be able to defend itself.
In the fic, Gandalf had given up. Laurie went up and touched the door and Mittens expected her to steal the canon line, but it was Frodo who solved the riddle. The Watcher in the Water attacked them and dragged Frodo into the lake. Lauren was hit by a tentacle, knocked into a wall and laid dazed.
“Let’s get inside,” Mittens said, taking advantaged of the Sue’s inattention. Gandalf checked on Laurie, rather than helping the Ring-bearer and Mittens shook his head in disgust as they moved past.
They sat down in a dark corner and Mittens shook his head again, this time in confusion. “I just don’t get this Sue,” he said. “Almost any other Sue would have either helped Frodo against the Watcher or solved the riddle – most likely both – to justify being in the Fellowship, but this Sue is totally useless and does nothing to hide it.” He rubbed his head. Maybe speculating about Sues like this was one of the ways to go mad as an agent, but he found he couldn’t help himself. “What is the point of her? What does she think she’s adding to the story?”
“Her fascinating comments on everything?” Saxo asked.
Mittens smiled. “That must be it,” he said. “Too bad that all of her observations are completely inane; even her joke about ‘Gap of Rohan’ has already been used – and much better – in The Very Secret Diaries.”
The Fellowship proceeded into the mines and a new mini was spawned.
“Behold,” Gandalf said. “The great realm and Dwarf-city of Dwarrodelf.”
With a ‘plop’ the mini-Balrog, Dwarrodelf appeared and was quickly placed in the safety of the asbestos backpack with the others.
“Creation of minis,” Mittens suddenly remembered, “that’s also a charge.”
James added the charge and they kept following the canons and the Sue.
Laurie stole Frodo’s scene, where he for the first time sensed Gollum following them and the charge for doing this was added to the list.
Then followed the Orc attack.
Laurie scrambled out from under the stone and, almost instantly she was attacked. She slashed blindly at the Orc, and it screeched when she caught its nose with the tip of the dagger. Laurie shoved him away and moved to the side. The Orc snarled, and Laurie stabbed forward. Whether she hit just the right spot at just the right time, she didn’t know. The knife hit the Orc’s chest, and it died.
The three agents looked at each other.
“Um,” Mittens said.
“Um,” James concurred.
Saxo simply started giggling.
“I know, I complained that she is completely useless,” Mittens said, “but they way for her to remedy that, is not to start doing impossible feats. Charge for killing an orc.”
“I’d say! She is far too small to shove an Orc to the side to begin with. She also lacks the strength to properly stab it,” James said, while writing down the charge.
Saxo was still shaking with suppressed laughter.
“Yeah, and the Orc was wearing armour,” Mittens continued. “Not to mention that apparently it just stood there and let her stab it.” He looked at Saxo who had tears in his eyes. “Are you okay?”
“That …” Saxo breathed. “That was the most hilarious thing I have ever seen. That little girl with her tiny knife and she used it to kill an Orc. It was ridiculous.” He suddenly seemed to sober up. “Actually, that’s not really funny, is it?”
“Not really, no,” Mittens replied.
Saxo dried his eyes. “Didn’t think so.”
The Fellowship made for the Bridge of Khazad-dûm. Now, Mittens started to worry. In a very short while, Gandalf would fall with the Balrog and he wouldn’t show up again until much later. The problem was, that Mittens wasn’t sure that Gandalf being away for a very long time and doing whatever it was that turned him into Gandalf the White, while still under the Suefluence was a good idea.
He turned to his two fellow agents. “Saxo, the RA, please. We have to neuralyze Gandalf now.”
“But how?” James asked. “They are all running towards the bridge.”
“I don’t think you can get him to just stop and chat,” Saxo said as he handed over the RA.
Mittens bit his lip, forgetting to do it carefully and winced. “I’ll have to do it when he’s separated from the others.”
“On the bridge?” Saxo asked. “They’ll see you.”
“No, in the abyss.”
The other two just stared at him. He didn’t stare back, but made for the edge of the abyss. He could think of only one way to do this and he would have to time this extremely precisely, otherwise the result would be … messy. He wished he had wings. Or another body with wings. His kind had so many interesting potential abilities, but he hadn’t had time to learn any of them.
He pre-set the coordinates on the RA and also readied the neuralyzer. Then, he and the other two agents waited for the canons.
Even in a Sue-fic, seeing Gandalf taking a stand against the Balrog was enough to give Mittens goosebumps. Then the Balrog’s whip wrapped itself around Gandalf’s leg and he tried to hold on, but fell. Mittens jumped.
He fell down the abyss next to Gandalf and saw the wizard’s eyes widen in surprise. Mittens pointed the neuralyzer in his direction, closed his eyes and pressed the button.
“Gandalf the Grey.” He had to yell, because the wind was snatching the words from his mouth. “You have never met a little girl named Laurie. You would never allow a little girl to go with you on this quest.” Mittens had wanted to say more, something about how Gandalf had more important things to do than hold meetings about little girls, but he was falling fast now and every second counted. “I was never here,” he finished, pointed the RA downwards and pressed the button. He landed in the snow on Caradhras. Conservation of energy dictated that he exited the portal with the same speed as he had entered it, so it wasn’t a soft landing, but he landed on a rather steep slope and slid a few feet before he was so deep in the snow that he couldn’t slide any longer. He laid for a second, the wind knocked out of him. Nothing seemed to be broken or seriously bent. He flailed around, trying to get up, then remembered that there was a cleverer way to do things. He was clinging so hard to the RA that he had to use his other hand to pry his fingers of it, but he finally managed to key in the coordinates and press the button.
He landed next his fellow agents, flat on his back. It hurt. He thought of the Stues that he and the RMC had dropped backwards through portals and found grim satisfaction in the idea, that it had hurt them as well. He picked himself of the ground. “That’s that taken care of,” he said. “Now lets move on.”
Saxo just stared at him, but James smiled broadly and said: “That was the most daring stunt, the bravest feat, I have ever seen!”
“Thank you,” Mittens said. “Hope you got a good look, because that was something I wont be doing again any time soon.”
They followed the rest of the canons as they exited the Mines and moved on to Lothlórien. Laurie claimed that her depression because of Gandalf’s death made her self-absorbed and uninterested in her surroundings; the agents were unable to spot a difference.
“Mae Govannen, Legolas Thrandullion.”
‘Plop’.
“Oh, another mini,” Mittens said. “It must be Thrandullion. I’ll get it. James, you can add it to the list.”
The Fellowship were taken to meet Galadriel and Celeborn. Galadriel spoke to Laurie, telling her that she had suffered much for one so young, but that all her suffering would come to an end.
“We’ll put an end to her suffering, all right,” Saxo said with a smirk.
“The Sue is making Galadriel sprout platitudes,” Mittens said.
There was a low growl from James at this, but before anything could be said, there was another of Laurie’s thoughts.
Galadriel was both a creepy and encouraging sight.
This time both Mittens and James growled.
“Charge for referring to the Lady of the Wood as ‘creepy’,” Mittens said. “Try not to break the pen or the notebook while doing so, but I won’t blame you if you do.”
An Author’s Note blared.
A/N: Okay, I kinda got Laurie’s gift from “The Chronicles of Narnia” (Lucy’s gift), but I couldn’t think of what she could get. But I assure you- it will play a part later on in the story. And for those of you who asked- yes, I shall be doing the complete trilogy.
The agents looked gloomily at the last sentence. Dead Fics, even bad ones, made them feel uncomfortable.
“Charge for ripping off Narnia,” Mittens said. “Also charge for getting a speshul gift, rather than just getting the same daggers as Merry and Pippin.”
Chapter Twelve opened with Laurie listening to the Elves singing.
She was slightly irritated that they always spoke in Elvish, and she could never understand what they were saying.
Mittens pinched the bridge of his nose. “Must. Resist. Urge. To. Make. Joke. About. Stereotypical. American. Tourists.” He swallowed some Bleeprin. “Firstly, you shouldn’t have been able to understand anyone in this world. Secondly, you get to experience Tolkien’s Elves in their homeland and your only reaction is to whine that they are speaking their own language, thou ungrateful whelp?” He turned to James. “Do we already have charges for being self-absorbed, lacking priorities and being super-underwhelmed?”
James looked through the notebook. “In some form or another, yes, yes and yes.”
“Add a charge for annoying PPC-agents.” By now, they had probably reached the point where no new charges would be generated, which meant that it was time to charge and kill the Sue.
She knew she would start to cry soon, and it would be all too embarrassing in front of a bunch of full-grown adults.
“Who have all been crying over Gandalf themselves,” Saxo said, with a smirk. “Except that she was too occupied with herself to notice.”
When Galadriel gave everyone their individual gifts, Laurie got a small bottle.
“A drop of this liquid,” Galadriel said, “Will heal any wound, no matter how serious. But be warned now- It cannot bring back the dead.”
“That’s ripping off Narnia all right,” Mittens said. “We’ll have to remember to get that bottle.”
“What did I miss?” a voice asked and a hand came down on Mittens’ shoulder. He spun around, standing face to face with an Uruk-hai. He had already drawn his knifes, when it occurred to him that most Uruk-hai do not go up to people, slap them on the shoulder and ask questions. He sheathed his knifes. “Most of the fic,” he said. “They are leaving Lothlórien.”
The RMC, disguised as an Uruk-hai, tilted its head. “I’m not sure what happened,” it said. “I fell through a plothole into something that looked like Narnia.”
“It most likely was,” Mittens said. “The Sue ripped it off.”
“That explains it then. I suppose the odd timeflow in Narnia meant that I spent much longer time there than I thought … Except, it should have been much less time.” It looked puzzled. “Oh, I know. I tried to go back to the beginning of the fic. I must have ended up in Narnia’s version of World One, where time moves much faster.” It nodded. “Anyway, I’m here now. What about the Sue, are we ready to kill her?”
“Yes,” the three agents chorused.
The RMC looked at them with a bemused expression. “Good,” it said. “Can I have a look at the charge list?”
“Of course,” James said and handed it the notebook.
The RMC read through it and frowned. “So, she doesn’t really do anything, except join the Fellowship and get in the way? And not even much of that?”
The three agents looked at each other and nodded; even Saxo and James agreed on this.
“She hasn’t got a lot of canon-breaks, no,” Mittens said, “but this fic is awful. Nothing makes any sense. She fails at logic, psychology, physiology and she can’t even be consistent about the things she gets wrong.”
“I see.” The RMC nodded. “No reason to drag this out any longer, then. If you have enough charges, we’ll kill her.” Its eyes got a distant look as it glanced at the words ahead of them. “The Fellowship reaches the Falls of Rauros. There’s a mini that we have to pick up.” It looked ahead further and its eyes widened. “Dear Eru, she goes with Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli, when they pursue the Orcs and she actually manages to keep up. There’s another mini.” Its eyes narrowed. “And she seems to be cosying up to Gimli.”
“What?” Mittens said. “I thought he was immune.”
“Well, not completely. He just gets ignored by most Sue, unless they want to use him as some kind of designated bastard. I can’t recall ever seeing a Sue who wanted to befriend him.”
Mittens shook his head to clear the confusion, then reached for the Bleeprin.
The RMC continued. “We can neuralyze Boromir, Merry and Pippin at the Falls.”
“Hide the boats and continue on foot. We approach Morodr from the North.”
With an indignant squeak, Morodr, the mini-Balrog appeared and was quickly placed in the backpack. Saxo grumbled about the weight, but Mittens suspected that he was making it up. He himself had never experienced the weight of minis as being a problem, just like there always was enough room for them in the backpack.
The Fellowship ran off in all directions in search of Frodo and Boromir and left Laurie alone.
“Once again she chooses to ignore the exiting bits in favour of her whining,” Mittens said. Then a burst of inner monologue hit them.
She rolled the cork in her hand, and made a note to keep a tight hold on it so that she didn’t drop it into the river or anything. She thought of Aragorn. Was this what it was like to have a father? Laurie didn’t remember her father- he had left her and Annabelle when Laurie was very young. She had a step-father… but he had never paid any real attention to Laurie. It wasn’t that he hadn’t liked her… he just thought she was a weird, clumsy, quiet kid.
They all winced.
“Dear Eru,” the RMC said. “Is this what the charge for inner monologuing was about? Has there been a lot of this?”
“Almost constantly, I fear,” James said.
The RMC shuddered. “I’ll do the neuralyzing,” it said. “Might as well finally make myself useful.” With this, it opened a portal and was gone.
Then, Laurie compared both ‘fathers’ to Aragorn. He paid attention to her. He was kind to her. He didn’t think she was just some ‘weird, clumsy, quiet kid’. He had gone out of his way to be nice to her. To protect her. He wasn’t Laurie’s blood-relative, but right now, Laurie wished that he was. At least then she’d have one real piece of a family.
“With her Suefluence, she could most likely make it happen,” James muttered.
“We wont let her,” Mittens said, handing out Bleeprin to his two colleagues.
After the RMC had carried out an actually quite impressive logistical feat and managed to get Boromir, Merry, Pippin, Frodo and Sam neuralyzed, they portalled to Rohan.
“This is Gimli, son of Gloin, Legolas of the Woodland Realm, and Laurie Summers. We are friends of Rohan and of Theodan, your King.”
The mini-Balrog, Theodan, sprinted over to the agents and was picked up and placed in the backpack.
“Now we can …” Mittens began, when they were all knocked over by an Author’s Note.
Author’s Note: Okay, due to popular demand, I am going to stray from the story line. But it’s not going to come up for a while, so just sit tight for a chapter or two.
Oh yeah, and thank you all for the lovely reviews! It’s encouraging that people aren’t beating me down and calling this a Mary-Sue. Then again, Laurie’s eight, and it’d be pretty dmn creepy if she fell in love with someone… (Shudders)
Mittens got up and glared. “First of all,” he said, “it would have been nice to know a lot earlier on, that you didn’t plan on making this a romance. Secondly, some of the worse Sues in recorded history have been children or siblings of main characters, rather than love interests. If that’s your excuse, it’s a stupid one. James, charge for not having any idea what a Mary Sue is, but still claiming that she isn’t one.”
James scribbled the charge. “Do we charge her now?” he asked.
Mittens looked at the RMC, who nodded. “Yes,” Mittens replied, “now it’s time; we just have to find an opportune moment.” He squinted at the words. “And I think it’s there.”
At the sight of the pile of burning Uruk-hai and especially the head of one, mounted on a spear, Laurie felt nauseous and she went off to the side. She was just done being sick, when she saw a blue light fall on her from behind and then someone grabbed her.
She screamed and her friends turned towards her, weapons in hands, but whoever had grabbed her, held her up like a shield and Legolas dared not shot and the others dared not come any closer.
She heard a voice saying, in a mocking tone: “Careful, we don’t want her getting lucky with the knife again.” Then she felt the knife being removed.
Another voice said: “Now that I have your attention …” Then there was a bright flash of light and Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli all got sleepy and confused looks.
“Okay, listen,” the voice said. “None of you know a little girl names Laurie who claims to be from another world. None of you would ever dream of taking a child on this quest. Also, Aragorn, you are far to busy to fret over some little girl’s bruises. You were looking for signs of the Hobbits and you should continue to do so.”
To Laurie’s horror, they all nodded slowly and just turned away. Even Aragorn didn’t as much as look at her. She wanted to scream again, break the evil spell they were under and force them to remember her, but she was dragged backwards into the blue light and her friends disappeared.
Mittens placed Laurie on the ground and the four agents surrounded her.
“You should read the charges,” the RMC said.
Mittens nodded and got the notebook from James. He cleared his throat. “Laurie Summers,” he said. “As Protectors of the Plot Continuum we hereby charge you with the following crimes: Slandering single parents; copying – no, ripping off – your back story; being able to understand people, even though they don’t speak English and you presumably don’t speak Westron; severe trivialization of injuries, to the point where you are completely clueless about them; making the Hobbits and Aragorn kidnappers; coming to a new world and reacting by being bored; bad storytelling; writing and posting a fanfic without having access to the canon material; having a really annoying inner voice; being able to walk and run all day and even keep up with the rest of the Fellowship; being unbelievably self-centred; multiple instances of bad psychology and bad physiology – basically, most of the time, you neither think nor act like an eight-year-old and you can’t even be consistent about how you are wrong; twisting the whole story to be about you being abused, to the point where it is the only thing on people’s mind.”
He lowered the notebook to glare at the Sue. “Didn’t it ever occur to you,” he asked in a conversational tone, “that people here are in the middle of a war that will determine the fate of the whole world and that maybe, they have more important things to worry about than you?”
The Sue looked at him blankly, which was all the answer he needed. Clearly, the idea had never occurred to her.
He sighed and kept on reading. “You are also charged with making Arwen giggle; not having Elrond treat your injuries and crimes against capitalization. If you’re not going to capitalize all the proper nouns, you shouldn’t capitalize half of them. For one thing, it clearly marks you as being lazy, which is worse than being ignorant, and for another, it makes my fellow agent feel seasick. You are also charged with almost breaking the canon by joining the Fellowship, even though you are only eight years old.”
He lowered the notebook again. “Really, I cannot begin to describe how wrong that is. ‘Do not place a child in unnecessary danger’ is not some obscure footnote in the Silmarillon; it is a rule so basic, that humans across the world goes by it. I won’t even call it common sense, since even several species of animals follows it. Saying that you threw everybody severely out of character, simply doesn’t do justice to what you did.” He leaned closer to Laurie. “Congratulations,” he said, “I believe you’ve managed to make the members of the Fellowship act more stupid and irresponsible than several species of frogs.”
He leaned back. “Besides that, you are also charged with making yourself act OOC by going into danger without any kind of justification; wearing a dress on the journey; having serious inconsistencies; being able to distinguish the three different languages by sound; creation of the mini-Balrogs Buckleberry, Middle Earth, Imaldris, Dwarrodelf, Thrandullion, Morodr and Theodan; stealing Frodo’s scene; managing to kill an Orc; referring to the Lady Galadriel as ‘creepy’; ripping off Narnia; getting a speshul gift; annoying PPC-agents and claiming that you are not a Sue, even though you clearly have no idea what you’re talking about, which leads me to the final charge for being a Mary Sue. You punishment for these crimes is death.”
When Mittens finally closed the notebook, the RMC said: “Good; you’re getting the hang of what makes a story work. It seems that all that watching the Nostalgia Critic has paid off.”
Mittens smiled, then looked at Laurie. “Do you have any last words?”
Laurie blinked with big tear-filled eyes. “You’re just like Annabelle. She hurt me all the time and whenever I made friends she moved us to a new city and I …”
Mittens hit her with the notebook to get her to shut up. Then he smiled; not a nice smile. “You’re right,” he said, “we’re exactly like your mother. We get these headaches and then the only thing that helps is to hurt you.”
“Not that I don’t agree we you,” the RMC said, “but we still need to find and neuralyze Gandalf before he meets up with the others.”
“Oh, I’ve already neuralyzed him,” Mittens said.
“Really? When did you manage that?”
Mittens told him when and how.
The RMC looked at him for a moment, then it grabbed his arm and dragged him off to the side. “I wish I could just tell you how much I admire your devotion to the Duty and your ingenuity, but honestly, what were you thinking?! You could have been killed!”
Mittens blinked. “I wouldn’t have stayed dead,” he said.
“None of us know exactly what will happen if you die, but at the very least it will be a bloody inconvenience and at worst you wont be able to get back.”
Mittens looked down. He thought he had done good, but it seemed he hadn’t. Now the RMC was angry with him.
Then the RMC grabbed him and hugged him so hard that he couldn’t breathe. “You could have died,” it said and suddenly it didn’t sound angry at all. When it finally let him go and stepped back, it said: “We’ll talk more about this later, but for now, I’ll put it in words you can understand. If you at any time have to choose between postponing the Duty and placing yourself in an unreasonable amount of danger, you are to postpone the Duty. And that’s an order.”
“Yes, Sir.”
“Now, it’s high time we found out what to do with our Sue,” the RMC said as they walked back to the others.
“Actually,” Mittens said, “I have an idea.” He looked at Laurie. “We are not going to hurt you,” he said. “We are not going to do anything to you. We’ll let you do it to yourself.” He reached over and took a small bottle from her pocket. “Can’t forget this. A rip-off from Narnia given by Lady Galadriel herself will make for a really nice souvenir.”
The agents stood looking through the open door to the Reality Room. Inside, the full effect of being beaten with an iron rod, was catching up with the Sue. It wasn’t a pretty sight. James looked away and the RMC placed a large paw on his shoulder; he didn’t know whether it was to comfort him or to remind him that he had to watch. At least it was over quickly.
After the clean-up was done, the agents all walked back to RC#170. They were expecting that there would be a message there, instructing James and Saxo about what they should do and where they should go. As it turned out, there was a message, but not the kind they had expected.
“Uh-oh,” Mittens said, looking through the open door and into the RC.“What? Are the mini-Darkspawn preparing a Blight again?” the RMC asked. “When will they understand, that they are not allowed to do so in HQ?”
“Better see for yourself,” Mittens said and stepped inside. The others followed him.
“Uh-oh, indeed,” Saxo muttered as he looked around.
The RC had grown quite a bit and instead of one door leading to the bathroom and two doors leading to bedrooms, there were now two extra doors in the opposite wall. There were also two extra beanbags.
“I say, it looks like we’re supposed to stay,” James said, sounding enthusiastic.
Mittens and the RMC looked at him, then at each other and nodded weakly.
Saxo looked outraged. “I will not stand this!” he said. “If I’m to be partnered with the fox, at least we should get our own room. I’ll …”
“Oh, hush,” the RMC said. “Sit down.”
“But I’ll …”
“Mittens will make us tea. He can open his gift early; it looks like a larger teapot.”
“Hm. Very well. But just one cup and then I’m off to complain to the Flowers.”
RC#170 