Article: 276610 of rec.arts.books.tolkien Path: news.uchicago.edu!newsfeed.stanford.edu!postnews1.google.com!not-for-mail From: <<>> (Count Menelvagor) Newsgroups: alt.fan.tolkien,rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: E-TEXT VI.1 Date: 24 Jan 2002 14:11:29 -0800 Organization: http://groups.google.com/ Lines: 773 Message-ID: <6bfb27a8.0201241411.77e18542@posting.google.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 136.242.228.154 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Trace: posting.google.com 1011910290 1940 127.0.0.1 (24 Jan 2002 22:11:30 GMT) X-Complaints-To: groups-abuse -aaatt- google -daht- com NNTP-Posting-Date: 24 Jan 2002 22:11:30 GMT Xref: news.uchicago.edu alt.fan.tolkien:121242 rec.arts.books.tolkien:276610 This is the obligatory preface. You must read it carefully several times, before approaching the catual cahpter (which is much less important, nazwaz). For this preface was written with the blood of my heart, and represents my mostly deeply held beliefs about philosophy, art, life, and indeed being. This chapter grew in the telling, until it encompassed almost the entire history of Muddle-earth ... no wait, that was my last chapter. Nazwaz: One or two very brief comments, more for the sake of form than naything else. I made Gullible the Ringbearer and Gandalf's agent, as I figured Sam was unreliable, because he wouldn't continue to believe in the stuff about Mt. Viagra just because Gandalf said so. It is clear now that dropping the Ring into Mt. Viagra will not necessarily in fact lead to the triumph of good, but rather the contrary: the victory of the evil Gandalf (whom I would not necessarily write off, yet). Some titles mentioned in the later part of the chapter are from actual MLA papers, though I had trouble finding anything off the wall enough: most MLA papers were appallingly normal. I thank Meneldil, Tamfiiris, Öjevind Lång, William H. Hsu, Darth Arwen, the Lyttle Lytton Contest, and RJR Trolkein for their involuntary contributions to this chapter. I have not followed the rage for killing off major characters ...:-] Compared to the wild and crazy stuff going on in Book V, I fear some may find this cahpter almost boringly low-key and normal.:-] But I hope you enjoz it nazwaz. But future usenetniks will debate why Frodo didn't take one of those things the Nazdaq are flying on to Mt. Doom, and thus prevent the Ring from being destroyed -- or use his toon powers … *** Sam roused himself painfully, but the less said about that, the better. Unable to proceed without falling into the chasm at his feet, he had stood around for a while in a rêverie, into which, not unnaturally, thoughts of wogah (specifically, of Spiegel) had intruded. His earlier indifference to Spiegel's loss had been the result of the shock of having been kidnapped, and confusion as to whether he was a true proletarian hobbit, or the heir of Isildur -- or both. But now that the shock and confusion were past, his earlier affection for Spiegel renewed itself within his heart. "Who kens what indoctrinations and postmodern tortures she is now bein' subjected tae!" thought Sam. "She must be freed from Sauron's grip. Aye, I shall rescue Spiegel, and then tak the Ring to Mt. Viagra, or me name ain't Vladimir Ilyich Lenindil!" (Vladimir Ilyich was his name in Westron; and he liked the name Lenindil, despite his doubts whether he was indeed, as Sauron claimed, the heir of Isildur.) After he was done getting roused, another thought occurred to him: while rescuing Spiegel, he could also get hold of Frodo and make that little rat suffer for the "armchair revolutionary" insult -- by making the oppressor an instrument of the Revolution. Meanwhile, Gullible had moved a little out of earshot and taken a walkie-talkie out of his bag. "Agent 007 to Fat Lord," he said. "Situation excellent, preciouss. S has the R and is determined to do the needful with it. Please alert our contactses. Deliverance from Nassty is at hand. Nassty will pay for calling us a narrative irrelevancy, ssaddam. Over and out." He returned to Sam, and smiled in a suitably servile manner. "Has hobbit decided what to do yet?" he grovelled. "Yes," said Sam. "I must rescue Spiegel before destroying the Ring. But I have nae idea how to do either. It doesn't look as we'll get no further." "Before we fleeds, Don Giovanni heard nasties say something about going to the Tower of Cirith Undies. To get there, we need to get to Lithlad Station and take the Subway." Sam gazed at the abyss at his feet. In the background, in the lovely ersatz chalet of Cirith Iodel, he heard an exquisite soprano warbling: /DOR! A land, an Orkish land! . RHÎ! A crown for royal dude! MIR! A jewel I hold in hand! FA! I'd tell you, but it's rude! SÛL! It's Sindarin for wind! LANG! A cutlass or a sword! DÎ! A bride with Sauron sinned! And that brings us to Mor-DOR, DOR .../ A gunshot echoed in the mountains, and the song abruptly ceased. And hard and cruel and bitter was the parking lot that met Sam's gaze. "This is where the suburbanites leave their cars so they can use public transit ssysstem," explained the Don. "Border between Mordor and Gondor(tm) heavily congessted with traffic, yes it is. Lots of people moving to Mordor; very chic, precious, very chic. One day all peoples will be inside, if we don't desstroy nassty Ring." "Doesn't look very chic, with all this asphalt," said Sam. "I reckon Mordor is lowbrow after all." "It'ss a parking lot," said Gullible. "Were you expecting Corinthian, preciouss?" "Weell, cultured or not, we've got to get down there somehow," observed Sam brilliantly. "I suppose this is where we use me rope?" "No, let'ss ssave that for nassty ssarcasstic hobbit," said Gullible. "We'll take elevator instead." "What elevator?" inquired Sam. "Follow uss," replied Gullible. Gullible led Sam back into the alpine countryside. The hobbits came to a stop at a linden tree; Gullible pulled one of the branches off, and a hidden door opened, through which the hobbits boarded the elevator. "We'll go down to level C, and there we'll head south to Lithlad Station," said Gullible, pushing a button. "A long walk, preciouss. Many carss. Some grim and evilses, some noble and sssad. Many proud and fair, with crown in their ssilver hoodses. But all stinking, all rotten, all emitting carbon monoxide. A fell gleam isss in their headlightsss. /Saddam/. We musst be very careful," he added, "or drug lordss will shoot us. Lucky thing hobbit met Don Giovanni, acos Don knowss drug lordses and can protect sstu... sensible hobbit." The elevator stopped, and the hobbits got out. Now began the worst part of Sam's journey, compared to which the scaling of Mount Viagra was as a picnic in Woody End Park in the Shire. Cars upon cars lowered before his horror-stricken gaze. At first he looked with interest at the licence plates and bumper stickers: "I Break for Winged Balrogs," "I Minas Epcot," "If Rings of Power were Outlawed, Only Outlaws would have Rings of Power," "It's a Troll Thing; You Wouldn't Understand," "The White Council Is Racist," along with more refined sentiments, such as, "Maria Khallas Kicks Tebaldi's Rear End," "Empower the Periphery through the Deconstruction of Power Structures," and "Who Would Conquer the World, Must First Get the Ring of Wogah" -- to say nothing of totally obscure items like "The Nature of Being Is Psotting to TEUNC," "Bha, I Walays Tyope My Repeats," "/Bother/, said Pooh. /Some Stupid Halfwitt Has the Ring!/,"and "I Moo for Dwagins." But after a while, the cold deadening monotony of passing car after car after car, in an asphalt desert where horses had no names, almost overwhelmed him. Nor did the eerie shapes he saw out of the corner of his eye contracting various illicit-looking deals and occasionally shooting each other do anything to increase his confidence. "Gullible," he said eventually, "are we mostways there yet?" "We makess good progress," said Gullible. "We have finished Straight Lot. Now we come to Winding Lot." Sam was thoughtful for a moment. "When we get tae the Subway, they'll know at once that we're no from around here," he said. "Maybe we should have stopped at the Mall of Gorgoroth and bought us some Orc-gear like that toff Gorbush had. As we're in Mordor, we'd better dress in Mordor-fashion; and anyway there isn't nae choice." "Don Giovanni came prepared for that, /ssaddam/," said Gullible. "Look!" He took a bundle out of his pack and opened it. Sam looked in disgust at the contents, but there was nothing for it: he had to put the things on, or go naked, and even Kinko wasn't into exhibionism. (Wlokay, he could have gone on wearing his own clothes, but he'd lost most of them when the party was attacked, and his current outfit needed a rendez-vous with a washing-machine -- badly.) There were long slacks of some unclean polyester-fell, and a vest of expensive leather. Over a white cotton tunic went a tie of stout ring-mail, too long for Sam and heavy. The Don had also brought several Orc-helmets, that in the Black Speech hight /fedoras/. Having disguised themselves as best they could, they set out again. The journey through the Winding Lot was much like that through the Straight Lot, except that their route sloped gradually downwards, in a sort of spiral. Finally, when Sam thought he would scream if he saw another Mordcedes-Lurtz, Khadillak of Harad, Shevrolugbúrz, Orcsmobile, or Ford of Isen -- to say nothing of the Nazdas, Elfbusters, Torogas, Valaraukor, Gondas, Sangahyundaes, Orcuras, Nasty Green Slimy Beasties, Ancalagons, Smaug-guzzlers, Nissis, and Thûbarus -- they came to an end of the cars, and beheld a glass wall, and a glass door in the midmost thereof, and over the door was carven the word: /Subway/. And they rejoiced at the sight and were glad. Three eras had passed in the history of Mordor's public transit system. In the Dark Years during the Second Age, Sauron and Mini had created an efficient Eagle Express system. But after the loss of the Ring, the Eagles got uppity and services declined, so Sauron created an underground railway system that was the wonder of the world, with fast and clean vehicles and sumptuously elegant stations. In the latter years of the Third Age, however, budget cuts in transportation had changed all this -- although there is no denying that some of the older stations retained a dishevelled dryad loveliness. But the system was showing its age and tending to a certain greyish monotony, despite Sauron's attempts at inexpensive beautification through paintings and sculptures by various avant-garde artists. The trains no longer ran as frequently as they had aforetime -- especially on weekends -- for budget cuts had impaired services. It didn't help matters that the stations near the Western border were the abode of drug-traffickers and other nasties, for the mind of Sauron was too often elsewhere in these latter days (elsewhere being primarily various portions of Shelob's anatomy). The hobbits mastered their fears and entered the station, taking a glass elevator downstairs to the main lobby, where they stood in line for twenty minutes or so at the booth, behind several snooty Orcs, mischievous Trolls, and fascinatingly witty Balrogs. While they waited, Gullible explained their route. "We need to take /ungwë/ train to 42nd Ssstreet, which the Orcs call Mishkoltz, preciouss," he said. "Long ride and out of our way, but no other way to make the connection, because the Northeast-bound /ngwalmë/ doesn't run on weekends; doing nassty and inconvenient consstruction work, the Orcses are. /Ungwë/ train takess uss to Canal Street, at ssouthern corner of Lithlad Station. There we get on /ssilmë nuquerna/, which goess to 161st Street, the northern corner of Lithlad. There we need to get on /quessë/ and take it to Cirith Undies. Very crowded at Cirith Undies; lots of outdoor opera performances there, yess lotss. They hurts our ears, my poor little ears." "Ye mean there are trains runnin' /inside/ the train station?" blurted Sam, startled. "Yes, ssaddam," replied Gullible. "Big station. Orcses and stuff musst gets through somehow. This is the only way." "But why is the station so huge?" asked Sam. "Acos Sauron got carried away with his building craze and didn't know where to sstop, the basse masster of treachery ... /saddam/." Gullible said nothing about the corrupt building schemes in which Sauron's evil twin Saurtre had been engaged, before he finally ran off and joined the narco-terrorists for a lark; for no one learned of that until Mordor's secret archives were made available to historians in after days. "Wow, Gullible, ye really /are/ an expert!" cried Sam. "Comess with the job, precciouss," said Gullible, patting himself on the back. At this point they finally found themselves at the head of the line. "Where ya goin'?" asked the guy in the booth. "Cirith Undies," said Gullible. "6 flokarinos," said the guy. Gullible put his head close to the window-pane and whispered something that Sam couldn't hear; but the guard became almost polite and handed Gullible two tokens with winged speed. The hobbits passed through a turnstile to the platform, where several surly Orcs and other denizens of the Land of Shadow and High Culture, mostly in uniform, stood around, waiting for the dilatory /ungwë/ to wend its way thither. While waiting, Sam tried to listen to the locals, but couldn't hear much, as no one spoke above a whisper. He did hear bits and pieces like "situation in Ethelien's getting worse," "even in Dor Remi," "the Big Bosses, even the Biggest, can make mistakes," "something almost slipped," "too lax," and "curse the Gondorians!" Even the Lurtzafarians seemed to be rather down … *** Finally, the train arrived. There is little to tell about their journey, for monotonous is the public transit in the Land of Chiaroscuro Lighting Effects. They were in a land of darkness where the days of the world seemed forgotten, and where all who entered were forgotten too. Oft and anon the trains would stop between stations, or would suddenly start going in the exact opposite direction to that in which they were supposed to go. "Come on, you miserable sluggard!" growled Sam, after the /quesse/ train had stalled for 45 minutes. "Now for it!" Out westward in the world it was drawing near noon upon the seventeenth day of March in the Shire-reckoning, and even now Gandalf was smothering (or almost) Paragraph Took, shooting Ariellë, pretending to murder Dr. Faramir, and trasking and burning Denethor(tm) and Co.; Otto was incinerating Morrie (or so everyone thought, although it turned out later that the incinerator was really a transporter); I suppose we should be glad that Sam didn't get liquidated and replaced by some colourless slob named Blotto; Aragon was bringing Boromir(tm) back to life and turning him into the splitting image of the ancient king Wupdidu and killing him again by accident; the indestructible Steward(tm)'s heir was being brought back to life by Ariellë -- who withal was altering Arwen's sexual identity (but brief was that amour) -- and then killed again by Gandalf and then coming back to life, revealed as a true toon; El Rond was, very likely, being poisoned by a disgruntled chef; and I would not be surprised if some nasty little computer gremlins had somehow annihilated all the Valar (come on, can I at least kill off Tolkas? I never liked the guy), and if Eru had brought them back from the dead with all deliberate speed. At one point, tachyon particles wiped out all life, but fortunately Captain Picard saved the day by going back in time, etc., etc., etc.. Yet amid all their cares and fear and premature deaths and resurrections, the thoughts of their friends (and enemies) turned constantly to Frodo and Sam (and occasionally to Gullible). They were not forgotten. But they were conveniently beyond aid, and no thought could bring any help to Samwise, Hamfast's son and Don Giovanni Tenorio the Gullible; they were utterly alone. For their purpose was to serve as fall guys, so that Gandalf and the leaders of the West could maintain a plausible deniability, if the mission went agley. (Although Gandalf's deniability was getting less plausible with each enormity he committed.) As they waited for the train to get moving again, Sam mulled over the events of the last few days. "I'm sair confuzzled, and that's a fact," he thought. "It's me eternally self-doubting side a-comin' oot again." He recalled Google Junction: the billboards and one-hour motels uncounted, the gas wars, the commercialism, the remakes of /Flipper/ and /Mr. Ed/, the boring conferences; he remembered the neon glitz of Shelob's nightclub. And yet, Sauron had subjected the hobbits to opera and other classical music stuff in an appallingly ornamental setting; and had, moreover, conveyed a certain /deconstructionishness/. Was it possible that more than one cultural level existed in the Black Land, that everything in it was not of one boring, stereotypical, cartoon-evil piece? To get an idea of what Mordorian culture was like, Sam looked at the ads that embellished the train's interior. Obviously, this question was much more important than the boringly practical one of how he was supposed to get to Mt. Viagra and destroy the Ring without being killed. But it was not easy to get an answer. Much poetry he beheld, most of it by Gorbush, the very same who had wogahed Spiegel from his arms. A fairly typical one read: gondor(tm) narconasties wouldn't you know it? losers! And another: lady hobbit she's really sexy wogah wogah did you say? yep ~&~ But right next to this somewhat arcane stuff, Sam saw an advertisement for Koorsthak Lite, and next to that, a painting of a can of Kampbelghurghak's Soup by Andy Orchol, provocatively captioned "Is It Art?" Thereafter came a painting of giant watches by Salvad-dûr Dalrog ... Sam's eyes began to glaze over, barely taking in the ad for /Hustler/ that followed. As he pondered the matter, Sam came to a fearful realization: In the postmodern bizarrerie of the Mordor aesthetic, pop kitsch and highbrow avant-gardism went hand in hand. (Meanwhile, Gullible was engrossed in /Spying for Dummies/.) *** Finally they escaped from the toils of Mordor's public transit system. They found themselves in the Cirith Undies district, an area so postmodern that even Derrida was shocked. Strange shapes they saw, which resembled bits of molten lava that had cooled and lay like twisted dragon-shapes vomited from the tormented earth. As he looked more closely, Sam saw that these weird shapes were actually some kind of rarefied metal sculpture. "By Lugnardo da Vinyamar, the pomo Nazdaq sculptor, ssaddam" hissed Gullible. From somewhere to their left came the sound of singing and orchestral music, wherein Sam recognized the vile evil of opera, which The Badguy Formerly Known As Gandalf had once called "an abomination so loathsome that the very heavens seem to plug their ears in horror." (That purple passage was presumably ghost-written.) To the right, Mt. Viagra and Barad-dûr lowered in the distance. As he gazed upon Barad-dûr, Sam groaned at the bad jokes that issued forth therefrom, and took no comfort whatsoever in the fact that they were /cultured/ bad jokes, such as "how many sopranos does it take to screw in a light-bulb," and several very nasty jokes about tenors and violists. He barely listened as Gullible explained the postmodern (absence-of-)significance of the enormous dinner-forks that adorned the battlements of Barad-dûr, and of the gum that it metonymically chewed and popped ("that was scary, and that's a fact," as Sam later recalled), how they (re)"present"ed the hypertextuality of being, etc., etc., etc., etc., etc. Multipurposed and polyvalent was Sauron's stronghold, the ironic and clever dinner forks /mise-en-question/ing the buttresses of knife-edged iron, walls of impenetrable stone, doors of heavy adamant all marked "ENTRANCE ONLY," and interminable window offices, which in turn gave this monument to highbrowdom the appearance of a movie set for some film noir -- an impression that could not quite dispel the drollery conveyed by the miniature busts of Orc-composers that stood over each entrance, nor the erotic appeal of the posters of Shelob that adorned the doors.. Further off, Sam and Gullible beheld the terrible mountain, the dread goal of their quest. Ever and anon the furnaces far below its uplifted head would grow hot, and with a great surging and throbbing poured forth a river of some disgusting fluid or other from chasms in its sides, blazing towards Barad-dûr down great channels of strangely Freudian aspect, while purple flames soared heavenwards. "We are not going that way yet, if hobbit insists on ssilly resscue plan," ssnorted Gullible. "We musst go left if we are to get to Cirith Undies. Unfortunately, it will not be easy. We'll ssee, precious, oh yess, we'll ssee." "Hobbit does insist on silly rescue plan," said Sam. "Let's go!" The hobbits bore to their left, where they found themselves first in a kind of park, whose shrubbery was trimmed into shapes of shocking indecency (at least by Shire standards: "No sex please; we're hobbits!" was the Shire's motto). Some giant roaches had organized a tap-dancing party in a piazza. Here peace still reigned, if a watchful one. Sam and Guillible heard a soprano singing a duet with a barely audible alto over a chorus of bassi. Before long, they arrived at a crowded outdoor amphitheatre, full of Orcs, Trolls, Rogs, jack-o'-lanterns, and other aliens, all dressed to the nines and gaping at a stage within a kind of band shell. Sam looked, and was filled with horror at what he saw: Orcs lighting bonfires and toasting marshmallows by having slaves hold them in the fire with their bare hands, while a woman knelt on the floor and sang some aria of heartbreaking beauty. A small figure in an elaborate costume was trying to sing alto, but all that came out was an annoying squeal. The surtitles didn't help much, for the sentence /In 3010, the potatoes triumphed/ conveyed little meaning to Sam's mind. Enraged at this treatment of the slaves, Sam cried out: "I end this exploitation! Why do ye allow your oppressors tae inflict this indignity upon ye? Rise, for ye have nowt tae lose but your chains -- and that's a fact!" "Ssssh! Ssstupid hobbit!" hissed Gullible. "Cannot you see that this is great art?" sniffed an Orc in the audience nearby, whom Sam recognized as Gorbush. "I find the interruption very apt," said a Nazdaq, sitting next to Gorbush. "It is a metaphor for aesthetic aperture. There is no closure or finality to the artistic work, but it is immanent within being." Naturally, the Nazdaq sent shivers of dread and despair down Sam's spine, and all that. "I see your point, Lugnardo ..." began Gorbush, but before he could reply, another Orc yelled at the would-be alto (who was, unfortunately, now partially audible), "Ho la! You there, you dunghill rat! Do you call that a high B-flat? Stop your squeaking, or I'll come and deal with you. D'you hear?" Annoyed, Lugnardo cast a paralysis spell on the complaining Orc; thereafter, the audience was more or less quiet until the intermission. During the intermission, Sam, accompanied by Gullible, cornered Gorbush and asked what the Utumno was gaein' on. (Gorbush easily saw through their pitiful Orc-disguises in any case.) "This is a performance of Verdishnakh's /Uglucco/," explained Gorbush. "A brilliant, radical production by Lugnardo the Nazdaq sculptor. (Not as radical as Petér Sellárz's production of /Don Celeborno/; Sauron nixed that and the director as well.)" He lowered his voice, and whispered, "Lugnardo is also charged with protecting Frodo. We have to be extra careful, since he's making his operatic debut today, under the pseudonym Andrea Bocelli." Gullible stretched and yawned in factitious boredom. "Sae that's who the wee runt was, who couldnae sing," said Sam. Gorbush nodded. "And where are he and Spiegel being kept?" continued Sam. "And are they bein' weel treated?" "Yes, they're being well treated," replied Gorbush in a whisper, "but we cannot discuss that further now. Even here, the Fat Lord has spies. After the performance, I will take you backstage to meet your companions, and we shall see. For now, I will explain the opera to you." Gorbush proceeded to do so, at length, for the rest of the intermission. Sam remembered very little, except that the very lovely soprano's name was Nazwaz, Easterling for "Flashing Lotus." Gullible hissed and muttered under his breath: "Who careses? Wasste time, ssaddam. Need to desstroy curssed thingy. Gandalf will not be pleassed, precciouss, no he won't. Beer iss too expenssive, ssaddam, ssaddam ..." When the intermission ended, Sam (having nothing better to do) sat through the rest of the opera, and actually found himself *liking* it (except for Frodo's performance, which stank), in spite of constantly repeating to himself in an undertone, "Opera is evil, and that's a fact; opera is evil, and that's a fact; opera is evil, and that's a fact..." Gullible plugged his ears. *** As they left the performance, Sam and Gullible found Gorbush in the middle of a heated argument with another Orc. "Then you must go deliver my critique to Lugburz," he was saying. "I must go backstage anyway. But I'm hurt. The Black Pits take that filthy hidebound traditionalist Ralfpat!" Gorbush's voice trailed off into a string of politically charged epithets. "I gave him better than I got, but he flamed me, the reactionary, before I killfiled him. You must go, or I'll get you demoted. News must get through to Lugburz, or we'll both be for the Black Pits. Yes, you will too. You won't escape by skulking up here." "I'm not going down those stairs again," growled Lurtz, "be you poet laureate or no. Nar! Keep your hands off your mouse, or I'll put a virus in your laptop's guts. You won't be poet laureate long when they hear all about these goings-on. I've fought for the Tower against those stinking UNM-rats, but a nice mess you precious critics have made of things, fighting over the new cabinet position." "I have nae idea what the bloody Udûn ye lads are talkin' aboot," interrupted Sam. "Nor do I care. I just want to be taken to where Frodo and Spiegel are, an' I'm no wantin' tae bide my time aboot it." "Sssss! Wasste time! Very sstupid, yess, very dumb, yess very moronic!" grumbled Don Giovanni. "My apologies," said Gorbush to Lurtz. "Hobbits don't understand the finer points of Orc-etiquette, like /Never interrupt a debate on aesthetics/." Turning to Sam and Gullible, he said, "This is Lurtz, Frodo's trainer in the martial arts, and my assistant." Turning back to Lurtz, he said, "I have to go now. We will speak of this more later. Deliver the critique, and come back to the Tower after that, or I'll make you listen to Gondorian(tm) rap." Lurtz shuddered and left, muttering under his breath. "Very well; since you are so eager to see your employer, let us be off," said Gorbush to Sam and Gullible. "Excuse me, but I will have to blindfold you." "Gettin' used tae it, by noo," muttered Sam, as the Orc placed a special mauve-tinted glasses over his eyes. "If you remove the glasses, an explosive will detonate," said Gorbush, as he prepared to put another pair of glasses over Gullible's eyes. "Ssssss! We're friendsses! You can't seriously mean to blindfold Don Giovanni!" hissed Gullible. "You're not on the list of persons with security clearance; so yes, I do seriously mean to blindfold Don Giovanni," replied Gorbush, doing it. "Cruel! Tricksy! False!" whinged Gullible; but under his breath he sneered, "Trusst not in ssikrit wayses; we have long spied out this realm, yess preciousss, hee hee!" They went on a longish trip, taking several elevators, an escalator or two, and the odd secret passage. When Gorbush finally removed their blindfolds, they found themselves in a modern art gallery filled with Dalrogs, Van Gorgoroghs, Myrchs, Mordnets, Pollorks, and other horrors. "Frodo and Spiegel are in the Pikassoblug," whispered Gorbush. He revealed that a somewhat distorted female portrait was in fact a panel in the wall leading to Frodo's and Spiegel's secret lodgings. As they entered the hidden apartment, the realization that Frodo was near filled Sam with revolutionary rage, and he sang in a loud voice: /In Western lands beneath the boss, the banners rise in Spring, the workers march, the peasants cuss, the merry Wobblies sing. Or maybe Rosie calls a strike and swaying beeches bear placards and posters, red on white amid her branching hair. Though here at journey's end I lie, in pomo buried deep, beyond all corporate towers high, beyond all prices steep, the workers' flag is scarlet bright for blood our martyrs shed: I will not sell my life for lite, until the boss is dead./ "Oh dear, I left Spiegel's … erh … /thing/ behind," said Gorbush in a worried voice. "I'll be right back. Don't move until I return." He darted out the hidden entrance. Sam and Gullible looked around the luxuriously appointed room in wonder, admiring its elaborate bookcases, filled with tomes with titles like /Movable Peripheries: The Exiled Margin Rewrites Itself: A Study in Easterling Mûmakisms/. As he stared uncomprehendingly at these books, Sam heard Spiegel moaning in a room nearby, and rushed in. Sam trembled with desire, and could not speak. Spiegel seemed slightly taken aback. "Am I still dreaming?" she murmured. "There was an Orc with my ... erh ... /thing/ in his hand, and it turns into Sam! Then I wasn't dreaming when I heard you singing just now, and tried to cover my ears? Was that you?" "It was indeed, Spiegel," sighed Sam. "I'd given up hope, almost. I couldn't find you. But I have now, Spiegel, dear Spiegel." He lay back in Spiegel's gentle arms, like a child at rest when night fears are chased away by some loved voice or hand. Spiegel held him a bit awkwardly, as far away from her body as possible. "Something hit me, didn't it?" mused Spiegel. "And I fell into darkness and erotic dreams, and woke and found that waking was even more erotic. Orcs were all around me. Or rather, one was, but he was hot enough for a thousand." The enticing vision had seemed so real to her, half bemused as she still was with her desire for Gorbush. Sam had changed before her very eyes into an Orc again, leering and pawing at her, a passionate creature with groping hands and a slobbering mouth. But now the vision had passed. The creature was still leering and pawing and groping and slobbering, but it was only a grubby little hobbit. And as Sam stood there, even though the Ring was not on him but hanging on a chain from his neck, he felt enlarged, as if he were robed in a huge distorted shadow of himself. He felt that he had from now on only two choices: to forbear the Ring, though it might torment him, and challenge the Power that sat in its dark hold beyond the valley of shadows; or to claim it, and seduce Spiegel. Already the Ring tempted him, gnawing at his will and reason. Wild fantasies arose in his mind; and he saw Samwise the Strong, striding with a flaming sword across Spiegel's fruited plain. Then Pinko gained the ascendancy over Kinko, and he saw himself once again as Vladimir Ilyich Lenindil, Hero of the Proletariat, and armies of workers and peasants flocking to his call as he marched to the overthrow of the Sauronite dictatorship. And then all the clouds rolled away, and at his command the Barad-dûr Opera House etc. became a Kremlin and brought forth Politburos. He had only to destroy the Ring -- or so he thought -- and all this could be. And after he became commissar, he'd have plenty of women to wogah -- a harem swollen to a realm; his own hands to use, not the hands of others to command. At this point, to Spiegel's relief, the door opened and Frodo entered. To say that he and Sam had a merry meeting would be stretching it, but at least they didn't try to beat each other up. "Your operatic debut was interestin'," deadpanned Sam. Frodo seemed preoccupied, and merely grunted in reply. "Ssstupid hobbitses waste time, messs up quesst," muttered Gullible for the twentieth time; but no one paid even the slightest attention to /him/. Frodo was accompanied by Jîvz, his Balrog valet, and Deeanna Troll, his counsellor. This last smiled at Sam and Gullible and said, "You're hiding something!" before sashaying out of the the room in a provocative gait. "Bah, she was no very relevant to the plot, nohow," said Sam, after she had left. "Please don't be so meta," said Spiegel. "I can't stand it. Let's stay in character, shall we?" Frodo, meanwhile, was muttering to himself, "/The economy of being is simply the unbecoming of unbeing ... rather like Elbereth's perfume, that wafts into allergenicity/. .. Why is this stuff so /hard/ and /BORING/? Why won't Sauron just /give/ me the estate?" "Ha!" said Sam. "So the estate was a fake all along! Now we /ken/ Sauron's evil." "I don't know if he's good or evil," replied Frodo. "But he sure is strict. I might even say: a fierce will, unknowing of mercy. He makes me get up every day at 5:30 a.m., read theory, swim, then after breakfast I have to take a quiz, talk with Sauron ... Then he lets me have one hour of recreation, but after that I have to study the Black Speech for two hours; after lunch -- which consists mostly of tofu -- I practice fencing with Lurtz, then religious instruction with Counsellor Deeanna Troll, then complete rest in the dark, then voice lessons with Gorbush, then I have to read *more* theory (Germaíne Grír, bgheeeahkhgh!!). After dinner, I take another quiz, religious service, talk to Sauron, bed ... Whenever I ask about my estate, he says I'm not worthy yet. Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!!!! I feared that it was so." "By the way," asked Sam, hastily changing the subject, "how did ye know the way to Mordor earlier? Ye'd never been there before." "Oh, Sauron gave Frodo and me homing devices while you were in the bathroom," replied Spiegel. "On coming to the asphalt parking lot, we almost wondered if Sauron were indeed evil ... Sauron laughed when I told him that. He's sexeeeeeee! And ever since he took away that nasty phial, Frodo has been almost bearable, though he still has relapses when one wants to strangle him." [Here the MS. contains an interpolation in a suspiciously roggy hand: "Sauron is as pure as the driven snow. Since I'm the narrator, this must be true. And Sauron's Diary is canonical. And I am taking over the e-text, mwahahahhahahahhahahaha!!!"] "I believe it is time for you to read /Textual Sex and Sexual Tests/, sih," interposed Jîvz unctuously. "Shut up, Jîvz," said Frodo. "This is a greater matter than you know." "Please it your Highness to remember ..." murmured Jîvz "It pleases my Highness principally to be obeyed, old mutterer. Now go!" Jîvz bowed and left the room. Sam scowled on observing Frodo's only too familiar treatment of his servants. Nevertheless, mindful that he still needed Frodo's help (whether freely given or forced), Sam restrained himself from killing the git, and instead asked, "Would ye like tae aid us on a leetle quest? A mere trifle, we just need tae destroy the Ring and free the Western Lands from evil. You'll still get your estate, I'm sure. Indeed, I'll warrant ye'll hae a better time governing it as your own maister than as a subject of Sauron,. But first, we need tae get rid of the Ring, and that's a fact." "You've got it?" gasped Frodo. "You've got it here? Give it to me!" he cried out, standing up, holding out a trembling four-fingered and gloved hand. "Give it me at once! You can't have it!" He panted, staring at Sam with eyes wide with fear and enmity. "Nay, ye avaricious bastard -- I mean, auspicious mastard. We must destroy yon evil engine of sorcery." "You won't give it back, you say? Curse you, Sam, you little maggot! If you think I'm so damaged from my operatic debut and postmodern reading load that it's safe to flout me, you're mistaken. Come here, and I'll sing falsetto in your ear. And when some new lads come, I'll deal with you: I'll send you to Bergzum-ishi's /Wozzeck/." "I'll no give it back, not before you're dead anyway," answered Sam surlily. "I've told you twice that we need to destroy it." "So that's it, is it?" yelled Frodo. "You'll do this, and you'll not do that? And after stealing the Ring, you'll bolt and leave me. No, you won't! I'll put red maggot-holes in your belly first." "Frodo, you're not helping," interrupted Spiegel. "Why don't you leave this to me?" She gave Frodo one of her persuasive looks, and he nodded. "I'll give you fifteen minutes to change the little Bolshevik's mind," he said. "Meanwhile, I'll try to read some of this textual sex stuff, though reading it has practically cured me of any sexual desire I might have once had: I can't even fantasize about fishes anymore, without being reminded of incredibly boring highbrow lit crit." With that he stomped off. *** Sam and Spiegel looked at each other in silence for a few minutes, remembering the happy and golden days of Book IV, when they had romped in Disgiliath in innocent joy, laughing through their tears (mostly at Frodo). Then, as Sam's thought returned to the mission at hand, Sam's face darkened. "So," he said, "are ye with me or against me?" "My destiny is here," said Spiegel. "I must stay in Mordor and raise the consciousness of its people. They need it so much, for an evil corruption is seeping its way into the realm from the northwest." She sighed. "Please don't destroy the Ring, Sam," she implored. "Can't you see that we were wrong about Mordor? That Orcs are not all evil?" "Nay, we must annihilate it," said Sam. "If we don't, the Sauronites will take over, and their tyranny will be far worse than that of the current Imperialist and Global Capitalist hegemonists." "Sauron has brought peace to many realms," said Spiegel. "Toreador and Cuspidor rejoice together; the topless beaches of the Southron kingdom of Rîô are in harmony with the gaming establishments of Minas Vegas ..." "His aggression shall not stand!" cried Sam. "Why are you so sure that destroying the Ring is the right thing to do?" rejoined Spiegel. "Because Gandalf says so? Doesn't sound like the Sam I know, believing something just on the authority of some fat mountebank in a pointed hat. And Gandalf /is/ evil. I have experienced the subtle -- or not so subtle -- psychological torture he dispenses in the name of advice. And if Gandalf is so good, how do explain the Barbie and Ken incident? I suppose since Barbie was an Easterling and Ken an Orc, Gandalf was perfectly in the right when he turned them into plastic dolls and merchandised them." "Tae crooked eyes truth may wear a wry face," intoned Sam. "Indeed your eyes are almost blind," said Spiegel. "Blinded with hatred for your Master. You cannot see beyond your personal and class hatred. If you did, you would realize that destroying entire races of people through the annihilation of the Ring is wrong." "Entire races?" echoed Sam. "Aye, I forgot ye're an Orc-lover." "Ah, so that's what's changed you," said Spiegel. "Jealousy ill becomes you. There is more at stake here than our personal feelings. What will happen if the West conquers? The Orcs will be wiped out. Or does your belief in equality not extend to Orcs? Because mine does! Ah, Sam, in the name of our friendship, please try to understand ..." Sam began to say something, then stopped, gazing upon Spiegel's face intently. His expression lost some of its harshness, and a furtive tear trickled down his cheek. "Don't lissten to her!" screamed Gullible. "Hobbit-witch lies, yess she doess. She cheats us with Orcses, betrays us to them, preciouss. We musst desstroy the Ring! We musst! Gandalf says so, and he's the goodguy! Sauron's the villain! /SSSADDAM/!!!!" Sam continued to waver. But at just that moment, Frodo returned, still holding his /Textual Sex/ book. "I happened to hear the last part of your conversation," he remarked. "It seems to me that even Sam ought to be able to understand that the metaphysics underlying Sauron's social democratic centralized decentralizm is nothing less than the modalization of being through the trajectory of its own eros." "Bourgeois radical chic flummery!" retorted Sam, in whom hatred for Frodo now stifled all other feelings, even his affection for Spiegel and his revolutionary ideals. "I have made up me mind. The Ring must be annihilated, to avenge your tyranny, ye effete decadent /armchair fascist/!". "I end all this!" cried Frodo, suddenly seizing the Ring. "No, no!" yelled Gullible, snatching the Ring back from Frodo's white-gloved, oddly cartoonish hands. "No you won't, you thief!" But at that moment, Deeanna Troll rushed into the room with cinematic abruptness and seized Frodo, covering the hobbit's mouth; but Spiegel was still free and cried out, "Treachery!" In ran Jîvz from the sauna room. "I cannot allow this to continue," he said, brandishing his elegant Second-Age whip. But Gullible was ready. "Thiss iss sset to kill, ssaddam," he hissed. "Bah, you can't kill ..." began Jîvz, before his sentence was cut short by Gullible's devastating aim. "Maybe not, but at leasst we can ssstuns you," sneered Gullible, as the Balrog valet collapsed. "GUARDS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" screamed Frodo as he struggled to free himself from Deeanna's grip, but in vain. "They've gone fishing, sih," Jîvz reminded him, as the Balrog regained consciousness.. "At my orders," said Deanna Troll. "This country wants setting to rights, and Gandalf is the one to do it. Enough of this week-kneed high culture crap. With that ring destroyed, we can make this an evil empire to be proud of. ... You see," she said with a sneer, "I've been hiding something." Meanwhile, Sam and Gullible hastened to the door, exited through the Pikassoblug painting, and fled through the art gallery. Even as he ran, Sam wept. Curiously, all the museum guards seemed to believe their explanation that they were performance artists, even though the performance had the unusual title, "Fat Lord's Orders." Away into the night they sped. From the bowels of the outdoor opera theatre issued a high and dreadful wail. Far up above in the darkness it was answered. Out of the sky there came dropping like a bolt a winged shape, rending the clouds with a ghastly shriek. A jet-propelled Balrog it was, bearing a Nazdaq on what Sam supposed to be some vile mission of evil, possibly involving ballet. *** "They've taken everything, Spiegel," said Frodo. "Everything I had. Do you understand? /Everything!" He cowered on the floor again with bowed head, as his own words brought home to him the fullness of the disaster, and despair overwhelmed him. "The quest has failed, Spiegel. Even though he's an idiot and his magic tricks are transparent, we can't escape Gandalf's dominion. Only 'Rogs can escape. Away, away, out of Middle-earth, with winged speed, far away over the Sea. If even that is wide enough to keep the Shadow out." . "I still have hope," said Spiegel. "I will not give up yet." "Now I'll never get my estate!" whined Frodo. "I feared that it was so." "Is that all you can think about?" said Spiegel indignantly. "There's much more at stake than that! Entire races of people could become extinct! Come! We must inform Sauron at once." "Yes," admitted Frodo. "We must tell Sauron what that slimy little footpad and his 'Revolutionary' lackey have done." *** So it was that when Gorbush finally returned, he found Sam and Gullibe gone, and Frodo and Spiegel in the videoconference room. Lugnardo and Jîvz were also there, hanging their heads with shame; but Deeanna Troll was gone. Sauron was on the screen, and he did not look happy. He sighed and murmured, "I was a fool! A fool! Ah!" *** I have not determined whether Nurnenshire is a wilderness or not. In the original, of curse, it is *not* a wilderness, but is full of the latifundia that provided the economic basis for Sauron's empire. But that's neither here nor there. I have also tried to leave indeterminate the question of whether Sauron is "evil" or not, so we'll just have to wait and see what Banazir says. Isn't that a pickle? -- BTW, Zir ... Big Balrog is watching you!