Welcome Back Birthday Party!

[Estelyn Telcontar]

"Welcome to the Barrow-Downs forum!" the Lady Estelyn said. "Here is the City of the Dead where dwell the Lord Barrow-Wight and the Ladies and Lords of the Administrators and Moderators. Long were we unable to enter, for our foes caused the destruction of the gate, and long have we waited for its repair. Yet now we meet again and welcome friends old and new, as is our wont. Enter as you wish and partake of the singing, dancing, feasting, and story-telling."

Arms opened wide, the Lady smiled to see many familiar faces in the city they all loved so dearly. She welcomed each one in anticipation of a wonderful festivity.

[Hookbill the Goomba]

The old printing press was covered in cobwebs. More cobwebs than it usually was, at any rate. A small society of spiders, moths, and gazelles had taken up residence in the thing, making operating it a near impossibility.

Sir Hookbill Blackstone Goomba, hadn't written a word in many years, yet still felt confident that delivering the news would be the easiest thing imaginable. He took up a rock and slammed it against the wall repeatedly, banging out the news in morse code. Unfortunately, he was using a form of said code known only to himself and the family of gazelles living in the printing press.

A line of people passed by his wall and gave him a curious look. A little man stood in a ditch next to a single wall and a printing press inhabited by large south asian antelopes was not a common sight on the Barrow Downs.

Sir Hookbill, who had received his knighthood in a dream from a domesticated leopard dressed as the Barrow Wight Himself, maintained his stance. For another four and a half minutes at least. One can't stand in a ditch too long; trench foot was an issue The Downer staff had been plagued by on multiple occasions.

So, soggy and covered in ink, Hookbill followed the procession and started shouting things at other party guests. Things like, "NEWS!" and "OPINION POLLS", and "I WROTE A BOOK, DON'T YOU KNOW?"

Amazingly, he wasn't thrown out.

[Nogrod]

Nogrod had fallen asleep already some time before the falling of the gates and had slept ever since. He had awoken some time ago though, into a pitch dark world of silence - and a pressure on his wide chest. He was buried underneath the fallen rocks of the gateway.

For a while he tried to push with all his might, but the boulders that kept him imprisoned against the wall were not moving. The only thing moving seemed to be the little imps coming and going about managing their mischief. This he could hear but not do anything about.

And he grew angry with the little bots.

And he drew breath growing powerful in his might.

And he pushed with all the power of a great dwarven sage and smith.

And... he couldn't move the huge rocks.


Just as he had more or less given up and fallen asleep again he heard the noises and saw the tiny speckles of light coming from somewhere up above... He heard the eerie sounds of... what? The Barrow-Wight!

The Barrow-Wight and his apprentices had been hunting the little bots down and were now blowing the doorway open again!

"I'm here!" he bellowed, "help me out!". Someone clearly heard him and the huge boulder leaning on his chest pulverized into dust making Nogrod cough ridiculously.

"My sincere thanks to you my sirs. Could I be of any help?"

Suddenly he saw something small moving from the corner of his eye and sent his hammer flying shattering the little bot into pieces. "Aye, not much, but something...", he smiled.

Hearing the roar of others breaking through the doorway he smiled wider though. It seems we did this together, all of us - with the benevolence and guidance of the Barrow-Wight. He cheered aloud and even to his own surprise took a few dancing steps.

"O! Tra-la-la-lally!"

[mark12_30]

Cresting the hill, and seeing the repaired gates, Lindo was delighted. It had been so long... he drew a deep breath, and did not know whether to shout or break into song. The choice was made for him. Across the moor he heard an old favorite tune, sung by a deep, husky dwarven voice. He whooped in reply, and then replied (in tenor): "Here down in the valley! Oh tril lil lil lil lil lolly, the valley is jolly!" He ran laughing all the way to the gate and arrived breathless. He greeted singing dwarf with a salute, greeted a fellow who sped by shouting "I WROTE A BOOK DON'T YOU KNOW!" with "That's wonderful, congratulations!" And then he found Lady Estelyn, and bowed very low. "Well met, Lady Estelyn," he said. "It is good to be back. Have you ever seen antelope like those before?"

[Morthoron]

The Dark Elf sat in a clichéd shadowy corner of the room, his face shrouded beneath a stereotypical hood. Before him on a prop trestle table rested a mug of hackneyed stock (which he, as an archetypal elf, of course did not drink). He glanced around with a look of shopworn aggravation and issued a well-worn growl of standard filmic odium:

"Pffft! Bloody tourists."

[Encaitare]

It seemed a cruel irony to Encaitare, that no sooner had she taken leave of her dear friends and made the long journey back to her own land, their old home and meeting-place was lost to them. Friends had gathered from near and far in the house of Kath for songs, games, and merriment. But where friends gather, they must eventually part. Encaitare had mourned the destruction of the great barrow that held so many wonderful memories for her.

But finally the day had come! The gate had been rebuilt, and the Barrow-Wight and his workers were beginning to clear away the rubble that the bots had left behind. Encaitare strode through the gate with a smile and a twirl, greeting her old friends as she passed them. Some of them were already singing with clear, strong voices. Encaitare drew her flute from her pack and hopped up onto a fallen block of stone that had yet to be cleared away. She began to play along to the tune, a merry welcome to each traveler who entered the city.

[Galadriel55]

Gal wandered back curiously into the town, as if waking up after a long nights sleep, and with a feeling that something's been changed. "What happened to the yellow buttons?" she thought.

"Opinion polls!" she heard someone shout. Immediately, she replied, "I disagree!"

"I wrote a book, don't you know?" the man continued. Gal thought for a second. "Yes, now that you mention it, I do recall someone saying something somewhere about some book sometime. Maybe it was that time when we were enjoying onion rings and finger food in Chatau d'Mordor. Can't wait to get back to that place."

She continued walking. And walking. And walking. She knew her walking would have to be cut short soon - she could barely breathe due to her plugged nose and her eyes were streaming, all because some wind-pollinating plants can't be a little more discreet about their reproductive mechanisms. But she knew it would pass eventually; it always did. In the time that she had before she collapsed, she managed to think, "Weren't there also way more spheres around here?"

[Lalwendë]

The boggart had been busy for there was mischief to be had everywhere these days, and many things to shout about in the night. It had bellowed about wars between men dressed as bats and men in iron suits. It had screamed about raggedy men in blue boxes. It had stalked the dark corners of a land with many kings at war, and a school where children rode on broomsticks. It had even collected a lot of little plastic bricks; those bricks generated a very satisfying sound when stepped on.

But there was one thing better than all of this and it was to make unearthly noises about wizards and their 'third way' and how rmagic rings really worked. The boggart entered the room surrounded by its usual fog, bent double, coughed, and said: "Sorry, it's just miasma."

[Firefoot]

Ah! The old barrow. She had wandered far, seen and done many things in the years since it had been a regular haunt. But it had always been there, welcoming and familiar in its cold and eerie way, for the days when overwhelming nostalgia or a burning question had drawn her back.

Then - to find the old way blocked! Suddenly the untold stories and unwritten conversations seemed so pressing in their unavailability. She had to get back. What a relief now to find the old way opened again, and the barrow filled with life and music.

A drink then, and a toast - "To the Barrow-Wight, to old friends, and to new memories yet to be made!"

[TheGreatElvenWarrior]

Lady Great had been off on her own, utterly drawn in by her private teas and curly headed singer men. She hardly noticed her old barrow on her way to rattle the teacups, but one day she noticed a big sign outside of her much loved home. She couldn't go in anymore. Distraught as she was, she didn't idle, she threw in what she had to enter again.

After months of waiting, here she is again in her dusty old tea shop. "TeaGew's is open for business again after a long absence.," she hollered from her front door. Some had already arrived at the party: curmudgeonly Lal, the crazy old newspaper man Hookbill, Morth sitting in his corner to name a few. Ah. The familiar sight of home.

Well, I'm back., she said.

[Kuruharan]

Look!

Up in the sky!

It's a bird!

No, it's a plane!

No, it's a, a....DRAGON!!!!

EVERYBODY HEAD FOR THE HILLS!!!

RUN AND HIDE! RUN AND HIDE!

Wait, there's a familiar figure sitting on the dragon among the...baggage..?

Dragons come with baggage?

That's a tale for another time, for Kuruharan had returned riding his magnificent pet dragon Chrysophylax.

Yes, Kuruharan, World Renown Raconteur and Traveling Salesdwarf had come bearing free(ish) drinks, along with games, inflatable bouncy castles, barbeque grills, swimming pools, and other such trinkets all at reasonable rates!

Form an orderly line please, no trampling each other in your excitement.

[Zigûr]

As, comparatively speaking, a more recently-interred inhabitant of the Barrow, Zigûr loitered nervously in the background, occasionally muttering something about the "fatuousness of modern culture" to reassure anyone who might be interested that he had not undergone a radical transformation over the intervening months.

[Thinlómien]

Lommy, too, had slowly tramped back, after having been evicted from her home and done a might tour of Middle-Earth. ("I saw penguins!" she liked to tell people. Or: "I held Orcrist! The real one!" Surprisingly few of these discussions turned into debates about grave robbery, which was fortunate.)

Now Lommy was looking around, paying little attention to all the shouting and dragons and whatnot - those were, after all, common occurrences at the 'Downs. She smiled. Everything looked as it had always looked, if the grass on the barrows wasn't even greener. "Awful thing that what happened," she muttered, peering into a barrow to see if there were any traces of damage. "I bet it was that Bombadil fella collapsing wights' residences again."

Then she nodded, pleased with herself for figuring it out, and headed out in search of food, drink and old friends.