ATM II RPG

[Feanor of the Peredhil]

Alli stopped at the sound of footpads following her down the flagstone hall way. She turned and raised her eyebrows at Maika, waiting for the Mordorian on-hiatus-ambassador to state whatever purpose was important enough for her to have followed Alli rather than waited inside the chamber for Lola.

"Alli," she almost whispered, "so, can I give this skin cream a try?"

Alli tilted her head a little, studying Maika with the intensity of a cat observing a dangling string. She half-smiled for a moment before allowing herself to grin.

"Of course, Maika. Would you like it now, or later?"

[Lhunardawen]

A shiver ran up Maika's spine as she looked at Alli grin.

"Maybe now, if you're fine with that. It would probably take some time to apply it, and I have to be prepared before Lola arrives..."

"Of course. Now, shall we?" Alli swept her hand and walked towards the place where the precious face cream lay. Maika fell in step with the Spymaster, her confident stride belying her uncertainty. Bah, whatever. She felt more and more pathetic by the second.

~*~

Maika stared back at the ghostly white face in the washroom mirror. It seemed hesitant to get into this. The Mordorian diplomat looked down at the tube in her hands. It was smooth and milky white, surely not unlike the semi-liquid it contains. "If it works for you, you can have it," Alli had said as she handed her the tube from its hiding place - a drawer in her office desk. Whoever kept face cream in her workplace? Alli did, apparently. Never mind the weirdness of it, but Maika was just thankful that it really was not from Panakeia. She had double-checked it on her way to the washroom, to be sure.

She was about to open the tube when she noticed a few thick hair strands standing on top of her head. It probably explains why Alli looked at her oddly a while ago. That Dracomir! she thought angrily, recalling his crazy wand-waving. The stupid stick must have caught her hair somehow. Dropping the tube, she pulled off the two ebony chopsticks and slightly shook her head, letting her jet black hair cascade down her back. With a powerful grip she took hold of the entire bunch of hair strands with her left hand while gathering the stray ones to it with her right. Then, with a few deft flicks of her wrist, the bunch transformed into a bun, and one by one she replaced the chopsticks. There.

She grabbed the tube again, twisted its cap off, and lightly squeezed its body - then stopped. How was she supposed to know how to apply this thing? She wracked her brains for anything from television that might help her, and the only thing she got was that whatever happens, she must resist the temptation to just smear the cream carelessly all over her face. Those soaps in TV always show that the unlikeliest, most embarrassing things happen in public washrooms. Come on, Maika, think! There must be something from those advertisements!

A few moments later she was back to squeezing the tube. To her surprise, the cream was colored green! Maika almost barfed in disgust. I thought she said this wasn't from Panakeia? But a quick reminder of Lola arriving - from some unexplored area at the back of her head - urged her to get it over with, so she squeezed a little amount of the caterpillar-colored cream onto her ring finger and dotted it on her forehead, both cheeks, the tip of her nose, and chin. Then with both ring fingers, she spread the cream evenly all over her face using tiny circular motions, not at all as expertly as the clause appeared to say. Magically, it seemed, the cream turned from green to colorless...and with a lovely powder smooth finish, too! At least the package did not lie in that respect. She hoped it would do its intended work just as well.

Maika finally stepped out and walked into the corridor, her head held high by the weight of her hair and the chopsticks. She hid the now-closed tube in her palms as she had nothing in which to keep it. Well, no one's bound to notice anyway. Thank goodness its manufacturer knew how to disguise the hideous color of the product.

She quietly sighed in relief upon reentering the room, with Skittles already in leather and Dracomir holding some weird plastic thingy, and no Lola yet in sight.

[JennyHallu]

"Oh, how exciting. New faces!"

The sultry voice from the doorway earned the undivided and immediate attention of all in the room, as was probably intended. Posed seductively in the frame stood a curvaceous, voluptuous young woman, and it seemed natural to scan her from the feet up. Delicate small feet in tall stiletto heels gave way to shapely, toned legs, under a sparkling red dress that accentuated a perfect hourglass figure, and seemed somewhat strained to hold anything other than her tiny waist. Slim arms, a creamy throat, and finally a perfect face with a pouty expression partially obscured by thick, wavy, silky blond hair. Women's eyes narrowed. Men's jaws dropped. The woman smiled slowly, like a cat, vamping into the room to sit on the table, thighs crossed.

A tall, blond man was first to find his voice. "You've got to be--"

She giggled. "Call me Lola, honey."

[Anguirel]

The moment the noble Lord Dracomir Malfoidacil of Gondor sighted the woman who had just entered the room, he dropped his Diabolo. The yellow hour-glass-thingy rolled and bounced off, giving out irritating plasticky noises. Some of the newer, less hardened Mordorians milling about shrank out of its way, for its escape had evoked a mental picture of a certain bouncing Ring of Power...

Tom, in the meantime, had quickly-well, quite quickly-got his breath back and his jaw had not dropped-well, not that much. He produced his wand with an irritated flourish, and muttered "Accio Diabolo!" The plastic object whooshed back towards him and he disposed of it with a cool "Evanesco," before putting away his wand again.

With a great deal of care, he turned slowly and bowed courteously towards...Lola.

"You must be the Lady Lola I have just been talking about with Skittles here," he remarked. "They call me the Lord Dracomir Malfoidacil. But actually, the name's Felton...Tom Felton."

Looking back towards Skittles and Maika, who had returned a short time ago with a rather dubious looking tube clutched in her hand, he remarked, "Well. Looks like it's time for us to face the music and drop in on His Mordorian Majesty. Let's be off."

He swept forward confidently, and held out his hand to Lola as though quite convinced it would be taken.

[Hookbill the Goomba]

Fury mixed with pride was always dangerous, especially in the small confines of a Dwarf's head, and especially this Dwarf. "All these corridors look the same,” he muttered angrily" and he decided finally to sit down. He found a bench (coincidently, the same on that he passed earlier) and began pondering many things: not least why a garden bench was in a corridor.

Orcs, men and other things walked by, ignoring Smilog as he sat with his legs swinging over the edge of the bench. He took out his axe and whetstone and began sharpening it, muttering and mumbling to himself. It wasn't long before someone sat next to him and began to eat some strange meat. "Pork," he said and offered some to Smilog.

"Nay," retorted the aggravated Dwarf, "I have business at hand." The one who sat by was a short man, not short enough to be a Dwarf, and he had no beard anyway. On his fingers were many golden rings and about his neck was a fine necklace with a great gem hung from it. His orange tunic and brown cloak, coupled with his green boots made him look almost comical. But Smilog was not in the mood for jests and wanted to get to that Roggie fellow as soon as possible. He hadn’t come all this way to get lost in some confounded corridors!

"May I introduce myself?" asked the man extending a hand for Smilog to shake.

"No," replied Smilog as he leaped off the bench, "I need to find that Roggie fellow. I hear he's around here somewhere."

"He'll probably be in his office." said the man, "up stairs, I believe. First on the left."

"I know!" lied Smilog, "now, if you will excuse me..." the Dwarf turned away and stomped off to see if he could find some stairs. The man began to follow him, but Smilog tried to ignore him and walk on all the same, grumbling curses in Dwarvish.

"I heard that!" cried the man, clapping Smilog on the shoulder, "that was not a nice thing to say."

"Oh, be off with you!" cried the now fully irritated Dwarf, "Can't you see I'm busy? I have important business to attend to."

"Andvarri," said the man.

"I beg your pardon?"

"Andvarrri, that is my name."

"Is it?" Smilog walked away, one step, two steps, and three. Andvarri? That name meant something to him. Yes, he had heard the name. "What did you say?"

"My name is Andvarri." he replied, bowing, "I see that you have heard of me. Well, Smilog the Dwarf, I had heard you were an ill-tempered little runt, but stay your axe. I have need of your services."

"That is what they told me to get me to come here on this ridiculous errand. I want no more pointless quests, thank you very much."

"That is sad, you have heard the legends, I take it?" Smilog stopped his stomping and listened, "the gold. The endless mountain of Gold?"

"The Gold of Andvarri, it is said, is cursed," retorted Smilog, "and how can you be he? The legend is thousands of years old!"

"Ah, it was my great grand father to the ninth degree that first established the Gold. The eldest son of our blood line who bares the birthmark of Andvarri is given this name." he lifted his hair from his brow to reveal a mark that looked alike to an anvil. "I assure you, that gold belongs to me. Wherever it lies."

"And I suppose you want me to find it?" said Smilog, "Sorry, as much as I wish to find a mountain of Gold, every Dwarf since the legend was born has sought it and found it not. Unless you had Andvarri's map, the finding is... is... impo... impossible..." the man was holding a small scroll of paper. He smiled widely.

"What say you now?" asked Andvarrri.

"Well, let me finish my business here and I shall help ye."

"Ah, this business here concerns the treasure. Roggie, I believe holds an artefact that will aid us, though he may know it not."

"Let us not speak of this in public. Come, show me to his chamber..."

[littlemanpoet]

Lola fled with, apparently, the most cutting rejoinder she could think of: "dense". Two possible meanings could adhere to the comment, neither of which were to the point. So Anakron cast them from his mind. He was worried about Panakeia. Where had she gone? Was she in trouble? He considered leaving the negotiations to go find her; but he was, after all, the Grand Anakronist, and he had a job to do .... even if the anakronisms were not conveying as he wished. Regardless of his personal inclinations, he must see to the negotiations. Gondor and Mordor were at odds. Anarkon's power came from the Blue Istari, and so his allegiance was to them and their purposes, even if he disagreed with them.

He looked up for a moment, halting his ponderings, to see that he was alone in the room. Apparently the negotiations were not happening here after all. The ambassadors had left him without a word. Something deep inside the Grand Anakronist lost its moorings. How dare they leave him without a word. How dare the Blue Istari interrupt his happy life in Umbar and force him into the thankless task. Misunderstood. Accused of corruption. Of evil. Of turning things to his own ends for his own narcissistic pleasure. How dare they think such things about him. How dare this negotiation interrupt the one bright thing in his sorry life!

He rose. His teeth were bared. His hand clutched the staff as if it were a neck he could choke.

"They do not know whom they are ignoring at their peril," he grated. He had held back from conveyance of late because it had been going wrong. Things were coming mixed. Fantasy and reality combined in macabre ways. Mixed technologies from incongruant future times destroyed each other before onlookers. People were getting killed and not coming back to life.

"I care not." Anakron knew that the potential for evil had always been there, and he saw that it was now rising from its formerly dormant seed. He felt it within. He knew that this would most likely be the end of any joy he had envisioned with Panakeia, and somewhere deep inside, a lonely little man wailed at the inevitable loss. He would spare her. It would be the only promise toward civility he would make. "Let them weep."

He walked out of the room and down the corridor that led to Roggie's depths. He raised the staff.

"Convey."

The Siamese Cat howled.

A car appeared suddenly before him and skidded into the wall, crashing. It burst into flames; its horn blared. A man covered in steel, riding a horse, a long pointed shaft held in his arm, hurtled down the corridor past Anakron. A man wearing a mask, tanks on his back, pointed a black shiny thing at the horse and rider. A trigger was pulled and held. Bullets rained and tore through the armored man and his horse and they went down.

"Too simple. Too brash. I need something more subtle."

Anakron continued down the corridor and searched the darkness of his rage.

[Formendacil]

Hyarmenwë's chest was pounding. They had slipped past the guards. They were still in the palace, it was true, but they were technically out of bounds, and the rule-abiding noble in Hyarmenwë was terrified at the thought that they were technically in a legitimate position to be Assigned to Mordor- or soon would be.

Speaking properly, giving the guards the slip merely meant that they were breaking the rules set by Aluminé Umfuil, which was certainly a breach of proprietry in and of itself, but it was not automatic Assignment, any more than opposition to Mardil meant Assignment to Mordor. No, Assignment to Mordor, basically boiled down to association with an anakronism. Being an anakronism, accepting anakronisms as normal, or making, producing, or perpetrating anakronism: these were what Assigned one to Mordor- not disobediance to the Mordorian spymaster.

Based on that theory, one should presumably be able to move about in Mordor if one continued to act as a true Gondorian, didn't condone the anakronisms about oneself, and didn't absorb any of their anakronistic ways.

A difficult enough task by itself, Hyarmenwë reflected. He had once come very near to Assignment himself, nearly twenty years before, and had lost one of his own family to Assignment. Mordor and Assignments thereto were not to be taken lightly.

But neither were negotiations with Mordor, Hyarmenwë had managed to convince himself. He was here for the love of Gondor and the benefit thereof. And with negotiations stalled and potentially trapped in Mordor for life, it made logical sense to do some scouting- so long as one was careful not to contaminate oneself.

"Which way, do you think?" he asked Angawen, who was the most eager to venture out of their proscribed domain, when they came to a meeting of corridors.

"Left," said she. "The air smells differently- more stuffy and less wholesome. In other words, the smell of normal Mordor."

They turned left, away from the centre of the palace, and towards the smell of what they did not necessarily realize was smog. Soon they found themselves at the end of the corridor, where a small door opened onto a zig-zagging staircase that led to the street below. Angawen and her bodyguards leading the way, they descended the fire escape.

What a horrible land! Hyarmenwë thought in horror as he moved his aging feet down the many stairs. There was no fear of him condoning or accepting the anakronisms. Every strange thing about the land sent shivers down his spine.

"Look! Some of the locals," Angawen pointed at a group of disillusioned teenagers slouching against the building across the street from them. "Let us go question them as to where we can find the best source of the local gossip."

"If we must, let us get this distasteful task over with," said Bearugard with a sniff, and he stepped courageously forward into the street. He was very nearly run over by a yellow PT Cruiser.

"Hey mate!" shouted the ork driving through his open window. "Use the bloomin' crosswalk, alright!"

"Crosswalk?" a shaken Bearugard turned to Angawen and Hyarmenwë.

"An anakronism," said Hyarmenwë with a shake of his hand. "Best not dwell on the thought."

"All right, all together!" Angawen ordered, as soon as the coast was clear. Before any more automobiles could materialize to run them over, they dashed across the pavement.

[Roggie of Morgoth]

Roggie moped. His kingdom was falling into despair and he could do nothing about it, based upon the fact that a lot of his subjects were there against their will. He really needed to read Il Principe to get a grasp on how to control a potentially uproarious principality, but would you know it, he couldn't find a copy anywhere and he was woefully ignorant of Italian.

He sat on his throne in his audience chamber, looking at tapestries that were gifts from the mafia. Khamul had presented Roggie with those decorations that had hung in Dol Goldur before Galadriel and Celeborn had destroyed the place. Kammy had had them dry cleaned and sent the bill to Lothlorien before finding them a safe new home at Mount Doom. Elendil dead upon the ground, Isildur cringing like the worm he was, holding a broken blade, ready to take a cheap shot and stab Sauron's foot. Who injures lower extremities? What sort of a fair fight is that? Oh yeah, he thought angrily, Mardil.

Roggie rubbed his sore half-leg through his flame retardant breeches, cursing the King of Gondor and the cold virus that had frozen and shattered his leg. Mardil... Mardil that stole my leg. Mardil that stole my citizens. Mardil that plans to steal my kingdom.

Roggie stood, stretching, roaring his frustration and watching the tapestry go up in flames, burning into a small pile of ash on the floor. He glared into the large fireplace. He looked out the window and tried to spot the stranger he had so recently thrown out of it. No luck. The dwarf was also missing. Perhaps he'd taken the hint.

Perhaps he'd gone for reinforcements.

No... no, that will never do. War! Mardil will pay, and he will pay dearly.

With that thought, Roggie stalked to the back of his chamber, pressing a hidden stone into the wall and watching an entire wall shift to let him pass. It closed silently behind him and he was gone, having disappeared into the unending labyrinth of secret passageways through the volcano. They'll never find me here, he thought bitterly, making his way to his top military adviser. He wondered if he'd told her yet that she was... no matter. She would learn her new government position soon enough. And then... War.

[Eomer of the Rohirrim]

Aimé woke up. He was lying on his back and he could barely see. "Where am I?" he groaned. Wow, did that sound hackneyed he thought to himself. "Fell clichés, will I ever avoid ye?" he said.

"Probably not" answered the girl standing over him. Aimé stared quizzically, wondering who she was, then smirked. She looked wonderful, and not just in contrast to the dank surroundings.

"And what do you have to smile at, mister?" she said. "You can't possibly be proud of yourself. What kind of man would treat me the way you did?" Seeing the completely oblivious look on the young man's face, the girl elaborated. "Those thugs? Those thugs last night, who tried to rob me? There were three of them and I still tried to fight them off, and what did you do?" Aimé tried to think. Probably tried to resolve the situation with the magic of his verbiage.

"I resolved it with my magical verbiage, didn't I?" he asked. The response was not quite what he expected; it was a glass bottle flung at his head. He ducked with all the skill of a professional dodger.

"You ran away and left me!" she screamed. "Now, I'm leaving this horrible place and I hope to never see you or anyone like you ever again."

"Sweetheart! Angel!" he shouted. "I got us here didn't I? And you're safe and well, and no harm came of it, right? And didn't we have a wonderful night?" He smiled his trademark killer smile.

It did not work (to Aimé's considerable puzzlement). "It was wonderful to the extent that I can be physically harrassed by bandits and be manipulated by a fraud under the influence of intoxication. Don't worry, I'll get home alright. I sold those little trinkets of yours to the Orc downstairs. I told him they were precious jewels from the tomb of Elrond Halfelven. Dear Eru! Your associates are dumb. Next time, if you want to impress a girl, show some courage."

"But I'm a lover, not a fighter."

"Pah!" she almost choked with laughter, and walked out the doorway.

Aimé, not noticing this attack on his 'skills', turned instead to his own problems (and by turning to his own problems, we must understand this as his focusing harder on his own problems than he had been previously, for he is extremely self-centred and prone to never thinking about anything other than his own problems). First of all, he was still in hiding; and while laying low was, at times, rollicking and fun, it was often cruel and hazardous. Second, he had a feeling that he had been drinking in order to forget something troubling. Something particularly worrisome. And what's more, he had a feeling that this forgotten thing was something really important. He'd had this feeling for the best part of a year. What did it all mean?

"Where am I?"

[Hookbill the Goomba]

As Smilog stood panting outside Roggies chamber, his back against the door, his eyes were as wide as the walls of Minas Tirith. There was only one possible explanation for Roggie's erratic and, quite frankly, irrational behaviour. It is this very reason that Smilog not only guesses, but loudly states to the nearest passing being...

"He's totally mad, isn't he?" he said to a rather large and seemingly friendly Orc who was dressed as a clown.

"Don't talk to me about him!" cried the clown Orc, "He calls this 'comedy Tuesday' and so my sector has to come here dressed as clowns."

"Its not Tuesday," Smilog pointed out, and almost immediately wished he hadn’t as the Orc then stormed off blurting out all kinds of insults and swearwords and some words that no one had ever heard before. Holding his breath, Smilog realised that he had better get back in there and convince Roggie to restart negotiations. If I can't handle him, he thought, what chance do the rest have?

He pushed open the door and rolled behind a table and cowered down, listening for Roggie. Yet he heard no sound. Smilog thought this terribly odd, so he peered over the edge of the table and saw that he was the only being in the room. Then he saw a rat dash across the floor and had to re think his status as 'only living thing in the room'. This revelation led Smilog to Roggie's desk to investigate. Indeed, his investigations brought him to the drinks cupboard and to Roggies stash of Gondor's finest Ale and wine.

What was more, he found a good store of pipe weed and a small bag of gold, all these things Smilog soon placed in his pockets. Except for the wine, he drank some of that and hid the rest in his pack. Now, the issue of Roggie, he thought, where has he got to?

[the guy who be short]

The conversation died down as all three diplomats pondered the possibility of discrediting Malfoidacil. The relative quiet was broken by Bearugard, who said softly "Surely Mardil would not choose to send Malfoidacil if he had not the utmost confidence in the boy? This is a vital mission; he cannot afford to send the untrustworthy."

Angawen laughed to herself, though her face remained as blank as virgin snow. Hyarmenwë was here for his loyalty, she knew that. But she... Mardil knew she held no allegiance to the Kingdom or to him. But then, she supposed, he must also have known that while it was favourable, she would remain by his side. And he knew conditions would be favourable for a while yet. What better manner to command loyalty than to appeal to her self-preservation and promotion?

But this Bearugard, he was a mystery. She did not know him to be especially loyal, though she knew little about him. "Mardil is not omniscient," she replied aloud. "Still... I do not see the boy outsmarting him."

Hyarmanwë, meanwhile, was also stuck in thought. Send the untrustworthy rang through his head. Send the dinosaurs, the men of yesterday. It was entirely possible that the entire envoy had been to rid Mardil of undesirable elements. He was too archaic, Angawen too inituituve - not to mention a woman! Malfoidacil could have been sent for the very reason that they now doubted him - a suspicion that his loyalties lay without the Kingdom. Bearugard puzzled him as he puzzled Angawen. But Hyarmanwë, though he felt this information important, did not share it with the others. The thought of his being considered inadequate disquieted him, and he did not will to offend the others.

"Of course he couldn't!" Bearugard replied.

With that matter shoved aside (though persistantly nagging), Angawen allowed another thought that had been waiting to rise for a while now bubble up.

"Is it not injust that we are held here without the slightest indication concerning the current diplomatic predicament?" she began, and the other two swivelled round to face her, shaken out of their own thoughts. "We have been told nothing about the potential duration of our stay. We could be long term prisoners here. Prisoners in Mordor."

Hyarmanwë's mind leapt back to his disposal theory. Would Mardil care? "What could we possibly do about it, Lady? We are held here with guards posted at each end of the corridor. We must await Lady Alli."

"We cannot allow ourselves to be held infinitely. To do so would be to allow that woman to manipulate us most dreadfully."

"Come now!" said Bearugard, "you're just upset that she made a joke of you."

Angawen expertly ignored him and continued "Do what you may, I shall not stand this dishonour. This is not how ambassadors from a greater realm should be treated. In Gondor, we would have more respect."

****

Angawen approached the two guards at the end of the corridor followed closely by her own men, and further behind by the two Gondorians. This was what she lived for.

Upon approaching the guards, her immediate reaction was to recoil, and it was with utmost self-control that she overcame the desire. One of those guards was an ordinary, moustached, red-faced man holding a spear. The other was an orc.

What a land this was! Orc and man side by side! She barely kept her composure, retching inside. But she forced herself to take it in her stride. She had resolved herself in her room - no more emotion.

Carefully ignoring the orc, she addressed the man. "You! Guard! Send a message to Lady Alli! I wish to see her at once."

[littlemanpoet]

Anakron was a guest of Lord Roggie. As such, he had rooms separate, and close to, those of the most important individuals present at the Mount Doom Casino and Resort. And there was the matter of easy, quiet, and relatively secret access to and from the place of meeting. Things had been arranged.

Anakron left his rooms and entered the hallway, just in time to see one red-dressed vampish ambassador enter the chamber where discussions would be held.

His own black cloak flowing behind him, his tall and wide brimmed hat securely placed, his eyes would be seen as mere slits. His staff upon which sat the most regal Siamese Cat, kept time with every other left step. He turned the corner and entered the room.

The vamp was exuding sex appeal from a table, the foot of her crossed leg pumping suggestively. A piece of work indeed. Anakron wondered how much work. He gave out an "ahem", which served to give a rather rakish man the chance to pick his jaw up off the floor and regain some semblance of composure, pulling his eyes away from the attention grabber in red.

"Anakron," he announced. "Grand Anakronist and all that. Here to observe. Carry on."

With that, he swept into the room and removed himself to a corner of the room, behind the vamp, which gave him full view of the other ambassadors. The others' looks of suspicion, confusion, curiosity, and forced condescension, quickly gave way to disregard. Anakron preferred it that way.

He hoped Panakeia would not be too upset over the cancellation of their most recent plans. It was beginning to get annoying. He wondered if it had been unwise to attach himself to a woman, no matter how charming and winsome; and interesting. But when they were together, time flew. He forgot that he was grand anakronist. He forgot about himself entirely, and it was Valinor to do so; or so he assumed, having never been there. Maybe I ought to convey Valinor to Mordor. No, likely some bit of Mordor would infest Valinor in return, and we musn't have that. As he watched the others, his mind wandered now and again to Panakeia, and it was most satisfying; almost as good as being with her in person.

He wondered how long it would be before the proceedings began, stifling a yawn.

[Diamond18]

No sooner had Dracomir whipped out his strange, yellow plastic toy than Lola arrived and he dropped it. Skittles watched it curiously as it rolled and bounced across the floor, then watched with even more curiosity as Dracomir retrieved it and made it disappear. She didn't find anything odd in this, being both insane and from Mordor, but she did think it was awfully cool. As Dracomir deserted her for the voluptuous Lola, Skittles turned her attention to trying out the neat trick on a switchblade.

"Evanesco," she said, waving her fingers over the blade. Nothing happened, which made her angry, so she tossed the blade across the room. It sailed out the open door and lodged in the windpipe of an orc who had chosen that inopportune moment to happen by. He staggered to the side, gurgling black blood, and as he fell to the floor he dropped the crate of nitroglycerin lolly-pops he was carrying to Roggie's chambers for afternoon snack.

KA-BOOM!

Everyone jumped as the Orc went up in flames just outside the meeting room. They peered out in horror at the blackened, charred remains smoking on the cracked marble floor. They shivered at the senseless loss of life, each thinking how it could have been them. Also, the wainscoting was absolutely ruined.

Anakron turned to scowl at Skittles, and she smiled guiltily.

"Evanesco," she squeaked, and ran out of the room.

[JennyHallu]

Lola laughed cheerfully at Skittles' antics and the welcome distraction they proved. She had no intention of giving Malfoidacil the joy of her arm, or any other personal attention, and Roggie was always so much more fun when he was a little impatient anyway.

Malfoidacil was, for some reason, sputtering, and Lola found it delightfully nonsensical, and told him so. "B-B-But she can't do that," he protested. "She's insane! She can't just say the word and be sure she's disappeared!"

"How do you know?" Lola asked reasonably, too reasonably, eyes sparkling with mischief. "For all we know, she did turn that knife invisible."

"No she didn't!! Obviously she didn't!! I could see it, so could you!"

Lola yawned. "Now I see why you returned to Gondor. Poor boy! Who cares if we saw it? The orc never did..." Malfoidacil was boring her, and she turned her attention to the strict looking man behind her. The Grand Anakronist himself...what fun that could be! She stretched languidly, lifting her hands high over her head to accentuate her slim figure, and giving her neck the tiny shake she knew would send a ripple down the length of her platinum curls.

"Why are you standing back there, Anakron? Enjoying the view?"

[littlemanpoet]

Anakron gave her a measuring look, homing in on her eyes. It was known in diplomatic circles that Lola was liked. That is, she had an uncanny ability to get what she wanted from whom she wanted it, when, and how. Anakron could see that she was fully skilled in at least one means of attaining her goals, at least in terms of the opposite sex. Such things had ceased to work on him long ago, however. Should he allow her to realize this, he mused? He decided that he would rather allow her to know that her escapades of allure were almost repulsive to him, but not in so many words. Thusly, he would afford himself the chance to see what other weaponry her arsenal contained. It could be most useful to know about that.

"Your insinuation, my lady, is beneath your dignity, one would hope," Anakron murmured casually. "Be that as it may," he continued, "I find your - ah - shall we say - epicurean approach to diplomatic preparation - energies misspent if aimed in my direction; however," he went on, "I find the - ah - view, as you put it, of your efforts as regards other personages - to be most educational. With all due respect, of course.

"Why do you ask, my lady?"