[Hookbill the Goomba]

"There it is!" cried Smilog, as the helicopter got closer, sending dust and ash flying all around, "Lets get there quick!" they all dashed over the rocks and boulders towards the Road Sauron had made to the Crack of DOOM! Smilog slipped down a small pseudo cliff and scrapped his knee, but Tollin and Roggie leaped over him and almost didn't notice him. Eventually, Tollin picked up the Dwarf and ran towards the road.

The helicopter swooped down and officer Jim hung out of the side holding a large machine gun and proceeded to fire randomly towards the three. Fortunately, the dust cloud had made it almost impossible to be able to aim properly, but he still managed to hit Smilog in the shoulder. Roggie turned to look towards the helicopter, he then stretched forth his shadow in order to further hide them from sight.

At that moment, a large black creature screeched through the air, breaking the glass of the helicopter. It was a great shadow, and it descended like a falling cloud. It was a winged creature: if bird, then greater than all other birds, and it was naked, and neither quill nor feather did it bear, and its vast pinions were as webs of hide between horned fingers; and it stank. A creature of an older world maybe it was, whose kind, lingering in forgotten mountains cold beneath the Moon, outstayed their day, and in hideous eyrie bred this last untimely brood, apt to evil.

It swooped down and picked up Roggie and Tollin (who was holding Smilog) and lifted them up into the sky, just past the police copter. Further and further they went up into the sky, Mount Zoom becoming smaller below them and the Police slowly following. They broke through the clouds and there beheld a sight they thought they would never see.

High and jagged marble walls and a large terrible tower, all seemed illuminated by a strange pale moonlight. Paler indeed than the moon ailing in some slow eclipse, was the light of it, wavering and blowing like a noisesom exhilaration of decay, a corpse-light, a light illuminated by nothing. In the walls and tower windows showed, like countless black holes looking inwards into emptiness; but the topmost course of the tower revolved slowly, first one way, then another, a huge ghostly head, leering into the night. In its four corners were great wires leading up and up towards the nine (or eight at the moment) fell beasts of the Nazgûl

This was Minas Mor-go, in flight and as terrible as ever. Smilog gulped and hid his face from the sight as the ninth beast flew right into the city and set them down. They were in a darkened street, empty and stinking of death and doom. Slowly, Roggie rose and peered around, not looking too pleased with the situation. All of a sudden, "Here," said a voice, deep and cold, which seemed to come out of the ground, "I am waiting for you!"

"Who are you?" asked Tollin, taking his Morning Star in hand, "Where are you? What are you? So on and so forth!" There was no reply at first, only a dead, sleepless silence, like the uncomfortable silence after mistaking your spouse’s grandfather for your grandmother. Then a large, green skinned, rotten figure rose from a hole in the ground. Or, rather, half rose and got stuck in the middle.

"Ah, not again!" it said, "You couldn't give me a hand, could you?" They did and saw that it was a man, but dead and rotten, with armour of the numenorians. "Thank you," he continued when he had dusted himself off, "I am a Barrow Wight!" Smilog walked up to him and examined his golden apparel.

"Smilog the Dwarf," he said, "at your service." The Barrow Wight slapped the dwarf across the face and then drew back.

"Sorry, old chap," said the confused Wight, "I don't know why I did that." Just then, the Police helicopter flew over the city and the Barrow Wight lead them into the tower. They went to the top where there were a series of controls. The Wight took the helm and began to drive the city through the air. The control room had windows looking in every direction. The city zoomed over the clouds while being chased by the Police. Gunshots could be heard and bits of marble chipped off and the Barrow Wight cursed. They flew down towards the beach and the LA Sea. Over the water they flew at inconsolable speed while the police copter still remained hot on their tail.

The Barrow Wight made a violent turn on the controls and the city turned smoothly around and then began to fly back up again. The police were left behind for a moment before they too flew upwards. The city climbed almost vertically and Tollin nearly fell out of a window. The City glided up and down across the LA skyline, twisting and turning between buildings while the Police copter remained on their tale. Swiftly, the Wight moved the controls back, moving the city up and up, getting steeper, they sent so steep that the city went upside down and ended up behind the police copter.

With a wide smirk, the Barrow Wight flipped open a small box to his side and pressed the button it revealed. Small goblins were fired out of catapults toward the copter, smashing through its metal work and sending the blue flying machine into the sea. Moving faster than lighting, the Wight moved the city back above the clouds and turned it around and began to descend back towards Mount Zoom.

"Sorry about that, chaps," said the Wight, "jolly good show, though, don't you think?"

"I think I'm going to be sick," said Smilog.

“Why help us?” asked Roggie, “and what are you doing in Minas Mor-go? Isn’t it the Witch King’s vehicle?”

“Well, my dear old thing,” coughed the Wight, “the Witch King was destroyed at Pelenor. After the war of the Ring, Morgul was left mostly ignored by the Gondorians. Yes, they occasionally came for visits, but in the end they forgot about its full power! But we Barrow Wights, while on a holiday, came across it and tried to see if the legends were true, that this marvellous thing could be used as a racing machine. We got together some fell beasts, some wire and tally ho! We were off! But we wanted to use the Mor-go machine for good.”

“Do you know of project zoom?” asked Smilog,

“Of course, old bean! That’s why we were following it. We wanted to destroy all the Zoom projects around Middle Earth (ending with this thing, obviously) in case they fell into the wrong hands. Already we have gotten rid of Minas Tax, Medel Zoom, Orth Tank and last week we did Barad dash! Mount Zoom was the prise, my dear fellow! We were just getting ready to work on it, when it up and rolled away! We did the only thing we could, we got our Mor go out and chased it all the way here.”

“But why did you rescue us?” asked Roggie, “thank you for that, by the way.”

“Oh, not at all, my dear fellow,” the Wight pored himself some tea, “I knew it was you, Roggie, who was running the casino and that in the Mountain. And you, Smilog, I knew about your father, of course. Poor thing. Anyway, we got here just in time it seems. Who is driving the Zoom project?”

“We do not know,” answered Tollin, “we are trying to find out. We need to get ot the crack of doom before it’s too late!”

“Then you had better take these,” said the Wight, signalling to another who had just entered. He gave them strange packs. “Just pull the little string there and you’ll glide down to the Mountain. Have a jolly, trip! Tally ho!”