The Official Fanfiction University of Middle-earth: Part LVIII
by Camilla Sandman
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Part Fifty-Eight: Rescue Me, Take Me In Your Claws

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Continued thanks to Dwimordene for help with the rescue idea and Jay for the lyrics to 'Rescue Me', which I mangled.

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So it came to be that Legolas for the first time stood among many of his lusters, and yet there was no stampede. A miracle, some hailed it as, but the cause was something much more mundane.

Exhaustion.

Even Michelle the dwarf was flat out, nearly having fallen asleep on her axe. A few human girls were whimpering quietly.

"I think I am dead," Stella muttered.

"I wish," Nodalec replied. "What was that screeching creature that zoomed past me?"

"That was Tessa chased by a Barrow-wight," Magen replied.

"She tried to save Frodo from it." Lina said weakly, staring up at the sky. Being chased by wargs, Nazgûls, orcs, Uruk-hais (naked!! Thank the Valar she was too exhausted to remember the mental image), dragons and Sackville-Bagginses was quite tiresome.

Boromir and Aragorn put away their swords as they glanced over the exhausted crowd.

"What is the rescue tally, Legolas?" Boromir asked, smiling so broadly you'd think it was his birthday. Or that he at least had received a gift.

"Middle-earth beings rescuing students: 601 times. Students rescuing Middle-earth beings: Half a time."

"Half a time?"

"Yes, I counted when that one student tried to push you out of the way of the Nazgûl, miscalculated and crashed head-on with it instead. She did help you."

"Fine," Boromir grumbled. "Half a time. That makes it 601 - a half. And what lesson do we take from this, students?"

"Wargs bite," Fallathiel replied, "and never charge a dragon when he is looking for a toothpick."

Aragorn smirked, patting his Polaroid camera. It was a gift from Miss Cam so that 'they could enjoy the moments again and again'. After Aragorn had figured out to point it in the right direction, of course. There were a few of the ground and Aragorn's chest (which Lotus had immediately stolen), but also some good ones of students trying to tackle Barlog in a recreation of the fight at the bridge of Khazha-dûm.

Of course, you can't tackle a Balrog. You are more likely to discover gravity and that no matter how hard you flap your arms, you will not fly. Barlog the Balrog was very fond of tossing students as basketball practice.

"Close," Boromir said, exchanging a smirk with Aragorn. "We are warriors. We will rescue each other if need be, as was the case when Legolas was nearly stampeded earlier today."

"I owe you a beer," Legolas replied. "What Boromir is so wisely saying is that we look after each other. We know the signs of danger. We will not be caught unaware by a spider or a warg. We will not need to be rescued by a total stranger who just appeared. If a stranger suddenly appeared, we would most likely reach for our weapons and point them at the stranger."

"And no one would blame Gimli or Boromir for being distrustful on such an occurrence," Aragorn injected. "Beauty will not convince us the stranger means no harm, either."

"Nor will the most beautiful creature always save the day," Legolas went on, to a few mutters of 'Why not?'. "It was Gollum who saved the Quest in the end."

"No one loves us, my precioussss," Gollum said sadly, crawling up from a ditch. "Nasssty rocksss trip us and we fall. Gollum rescue everyone. No one want to hugsss Gollum. Gollum wants hugsss. He promise not to claw."

"We all love you for falling, Gollum. Just from a distance," Frodo said, standing next to the other hobbits. They'd had a picnic while waiting for the attempted rescue from the Barrow-wights, which had taken some time given that the students had to try and rescue Bilbo from Smaug first.

"Now that everyone have completed our rescue marathon and failed," Elrond said brightly, "you are excused."

No one moved for quite a while. Finally, Lina managed to crawl to a tree, and pulled herself up.

'Note to self: Never, ever, ever, under any circumstances, attempt to tackle a dragon from behind,' she thought and grimaced. A dragon tail could make quite an impact, that was for sure. Even when the dragon was Smaug, and the wagging of the tail was really a sign of affection. Smaug had been nice enough to rescue her out of the tree, although nearly crushing her in his claws.

She begun to limp towards the University; the other students begun to follow slowly. Few students gave their lust-object a lustful glance, but no one had the strength to even attempt a tackle. Besides, the word of SNAOL was spreading.

Suddenly the earth shook. Dark clouds appeared out of nowhere, thunder rolled and lightning flashed.

"Do they always have to be this dramatic?" Dot complained, limping up next to Lina.

"You know evil. Entrance is everything."

Morgoth and Sauron were standing in front of the University, eyeing each other as well as the approaching crowd.

"What now?" Ryven asked.

"Hold, mortals!" Morgoth boomed, while Sauron held up bunny ears behind him. A few students giggled; most were too exhausted. "We have been given the task of teaching you why we will have no off-springs that will attempt to take over the world in our name."

"Especially no one named after us," Sauron injected.

"Shut up. We agreed I got the first lines."

"Hah! Evil makes no promise to keep it! That is why you are a lesser evil."

The crowd stood patiently and waited while the Dark Lords shouted insults at each other. You really got used to that when dealing with the pair; many were hoping those two would oversee the final exam, as that would making it very easy to cheat while the two were distracted.

"I am a Maia," Sauron finally said after a long staring contest. "We do not take Elven maids to have children with. The idea is preposterous."

"I am of the Valar; I would take one of them as a mate," Morgoth replied. A few of his lusters sighed mournfully.

"No one wanted you," Sauron smirked.

"Shut up."

"You are too ugly."

"I have yet to see you be run down with eligible Maias," Morgoth shot back. "I am Evil Sexy Bachelor of the decade."

"Only because you bribed the Mouth of Sauron to mix up the dates and I did not get there until a year after the contest was done!"

"If you fell for that you are not worthy to be evil!"

The rumble grew in strength; and suddenly the students found that the earth was beginning to swallow them. Flames rose into the air.

"Hey!" Gandalf called. "Evil fighting must be done in the dungeons. We have set up a Risk board for Middle-earth, fight over world domination there."

"I will be purple," Morgoth said sourly as the two Dark Lords begun walking inside.

"You're always purple. *I* should be purple; purple makes your armour shine and show how fat you are."

"You little."

"That's 602 - a half," Boromir said and smirked.


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