(no subject)
glorfinniel gave me the challenge of writing a story with as many different fandom characters as possible, with the minimum of five fandoms. Well, I just about managed five fandoms, with a total of eleven characters. I apologise profusely if I have mangled anyone's fandom here.
This is for glorfinniel
“I’ve finished cleaning the bathroom, Bilbo,” said Frodo as he flopped into the kitchen chair. Bilbo was busy cooking up a wide range of snacks and enough tea to satisfy an army. Well, a very small army. “I don’t see why I had to clean the bathroom, why couldn’t Mrs. Gamgee do it?”
“You’re starting to sound like a spoilt Brandybuck, Frodo. Anyway, I gave the Gamgees the day off. We’re going to be quite busy here and we need as much space as we can spare,”
“Why, whose coming? Is it the Brandybucks?”
“No, not them,”
“The Tooks then?”
“No, I’ll give you a clue. They’re not hobbits,” Frodo’s eyes lit up.
“Are some dwarves coming?” Bilbo shook his head, “Gandalf!” Frodo said, positively leaping out of his seat in excitement.
“No, no, no. I’ll give you another clue. They’re not from this world.” That left Frodo very bewildered. They’d never had guests from outside Middle-earth before.
“You don’t mean, not… Valar!” Bilbo laughed.
“No, we’re not being graced by their presence today.”
“Well, then who?” Bilbo turned away from the stove he was slavishly working over and sat down opposite Frodo’s chair.
“You remember those times when you’ve had strange dreams. You know, sometimes you do things you wouldn’t usually do and sometimes you appear in completely impossible situations. There are also those dreams that merge almost perfectly with your waking life. But then again there are other times when a woman you’ve never seen before in your life forces herself upon you and for some reason you don’t mind,”
“Yes, please, don’t remind me,”
“Well, you should also remember that between these dreams you stop off in a room they call ‘the fanfic lounge’ to relax and get control of yourself,”
“Yes, I vaguely remember that,”
“Well, they’re redecorating so I’ve agreed to take a few people on,”
“When will they start arriving?”
“Any time now, but I’ve been told it’s a slow time because some kind of exams are happening everywhere, I wasn’t entirely clear on that,” Bilbo’s sentence drifted off as he tried to remember exactly what he had been told.
Suddenly, someone started banging frantically on the door. “Go get that would you, Frodo? I’ll bring some biscuits into the living room,” so Frodo went to get the door. When he got there the whole door was shaking with the force of whatever was one the other side. Frodo wasn’t sure he wanted to open it.
“Go on, Frodo, don’t keep our guests waiting!” said Bilbo as he walked past with a plateful of biscuits and a pot of tea. Frodo readied himself for some sort of great monster on the other side of the door, put his hand on the doorknob and pulled it open.
In fell three big folk wearing very odd clothing. Frodo peered around the door at where they had come from and saw not the Shire laid out before him as it usually was, but a large, dark room and more alarmingly, a huge three-headed dog with drool dripping from its jowls and really rather huge teeth. Frodo quickly slammed the door shut.
“Where are we?” said one of the big folk.
“No idea? Who’s he?” said another one.
“What are you looking at me for? Why would I know?” said the third one, this one was a girl, Frodo could tell by the bushy hair and girl-sounding voice.
“I don’t know, you’re always reading books, you might know,” said the second one, he was long and gangly, had lots of freckles and unnaturally red hair.
“Shut up, you two,” said the first one, who had black hair, wore glasses and had a strange mark on his forehead. He was also pointing a wooden stick at Frodo as if it was some sort of weapon. Frodo pushed it aside and smiled at them.
“If you would like to come this way, we have tea and biscuits waiting,” he said in his most polite and un-offensive voice.
“Tea and biscuits?” said the red-haired one as they followed Frodo into the living room.
“Ah! Hello there!” said Bilbo, “Do sit down,” the big folk all pointed their sticks at him. Bilbo also pushed them aside, “Excuse me, it’s quite rude to point, now, please sit down.” The three sat down, though still eyeing Bilbo and Frodo suspiciously.
“Where are we?” asked the girl.
“And what’s happened to Hogwarts?” asked the red-haired one.
“You are currently in the living room of Bag End, which is at the end of Bagshot row in the north farthing of the Shire,” the three looked at him blankly, “I’m afraid I can’t help you with your Hotwargs place, though,”
“Hogwarts,” corrected the black-haired one, “Haven’t you ever heard of it? Hogwarts school of witchcraft and wizardry?” Bilbo shook his head.
“Wizardry? Do you know Gandalf?” said Frodo.
“Gandalf?”
“Yes, long grey beard, pointy hat, always wears robes,”
“That sounds a bit like Dumbledore,” said the red-haired one.
“Well, he does go by a lot of different names, I’ve never heard Dumbledore before, though,” said Frodo.
“Speaking of names!” said Bilbo, “I am Bilbo Baggins, and this is my heir, Frodo Baggins,” they both bowed.
“Well, this is Ron Weasly,” said the black-haired one, pointing to the red-haired one, “Hermione Granger,” was the girl, “and I am Harry Potter,” he said the last name expecting some sort of reaction but only received a ‘pleased to meet you’ from Bilbo.
“They’re not going to know about you, they don’t even know about Hogwarts!” said Hermione.
“What about Voldemort?” Ron flinched but Bilbo and Frodo stared blankly. “Apparently not,”
“Well! Anyone for tea?” said Bilbo, holding the pot aloft. All three big folk decided a cup of tea would do them a whole lot of good.
Then there came a quiet knocking from the front door.
“Frodo, would you go get that?” Frodo was in the hall before Bilbo had even finished his sentence. He pulled the door open, expecting to see a strange new world, but instead seeing the Shire laid out in front of him as it should be, although there was also a rather bedraggled-looking man standing on the doorstep. He was holding a pointy red hat in his hands, rather tastelessly covered in sequins, though most were now falling off and if Frodo had have been rude enough to stare at it, he would have seen the word ‘WIZZARD’ imprinted on it. The robes were similar but they had marginally more stains.
“I heard that there were tea and biscuits here, are there?” asked the man hopefully. He looked very ready for a rest.
“Yes, certainly, may I take your hat for you?” said Frodo.
“No, I think I’ll hold onto it, thank you,” the man wandered in (as much as one can wander when crouching) looking slightly bewildered at his luck of finding the right door. “Leave the door open for a bit, I’m expecting someone.”
Frodo led him into the living room where he immediately asked for his tea and sank gratefully into a chair. Everyone introduced themselves to the newcomer who, in turn, introduced himself as ‘Rincewind’.
“I see you’re a wizard,” said Ron, pointing to Rincewind’s hat while trying to hide a smile. Rincewind sighed.
“Yes, I am, of sorts, I trained in wizardry,”
“Ooh!” said Hermione, “Where did you study?”
“The Unseen University,” seeing their blank faces, Rincewind decided to elaborate, “Ankh-Morpork, right in the middle, can’t miss it,” Frodo didn’t quite catch the rest of the conversation because, standing in the doorway as he was, he was knocked over when a chest with hundreds of legs entered the room. Ron, Harry and Hermione once again pointed their sticks, this time at the chest, which had retracted its legs and sat rather immovably beneath the window.
“Don’t worry about the Luggage, it follows me everywhere, I’m sure it’ll be happy enough if you give it something to eat,” explained Rincewind. Bilbo pulled Frodo back onto his feet.
“Go get the muffins would you? Good lad,” Frodo went and got the muffins. “They’re only plain muffins, you don’t think it’ll want anything on them do you?” Bilbo asked Rincewind.
“No,” replied Rincewind, “I’m not even sure if it can taste,” the Luggage threw its lid open, “Just drop something in there,” Bilbo did so and jumped nearly a foot in the air when the lid snapped shut. And was that a tongue that flicked out? Still, the Luggage now looked as content as a chest can and Bilbo took that to be a good sign.
Soon after, when everything had settled down again, a very strange noise emanated from somewhere outside. Frodo ran to the front door, which was still open but there was nothing there. He then ran to the back door and looked out over the garden. There was nothing there either, at least, that was what he thought at first but before his very eyes, a big blue box was appearing on the lawn. Frodo stared open-mouthed before he realised he’d seen odder things already and that he really should have expected something appearing out of nowhere like this.
When the box seem fully appeared Frodo decided to go investigate. It was a large box standing on its end, about big enough to fit two big folk in at a push. Around the top of it there was writing that read ‘police public call box’ though that meant nothing to Frodo, not that it would have been useful had it meant anything to Frodo. A sound like a door opening came from the other side of the box and then voices.
“This isn’t right,” said one voice.
“What do you mean ‘this isn’t right’?” said another.
“I mean, this isn’t where we’re meant to be,”
“You mean we’re lost?”
“Not lost, don’t say lost, I prefer the term ‘misplaced’,”
“Yeah, right, have you got any idea where we are?”
“Uh, no!” said the voice quite cheerfully. Frodo peered around the edge of the box and cleared his throat. There was a man and a woman standing there. The man put some sort of gadget back in his pocket and went down to Frodo’s level. “Hello there, would you be able to tell me where we are?”
“Why yes, you are currently in the garden of Bag End, which is in the Shire,” seeing no look of recognition, Frodo decided to continue, “Which is in Middle-earth.”
“Ah,” said the man.
“What now?” said the woman,
“We appear to be in a different universe,”
“A different universe! How did you manage to get us into a different universe?”
“Travelling through time and space is a very complicated thing, I’d like to see you have a go,” the woman looked like she was going to reply, but Frodo interrupted.
“If it helps at all, you are meant to be here,” he said, “I’m Frodo and if you follow me inside you’ll find tea and biscuits. Well, tea and muffins, we’ve finished the biscuits,”
“Well, thank you Frodo, I’ve never been one to turn down tea and muffins. I’m the Doctor, and this here, is Rose,”
“Pleasure to meet you,” said Frodo, bowing, “Now, just through here you’ll find a place to sit and rest. Watch your heads, though, I’m afraid this place isn’t built for big folk like yourselves,”
“Big folk?” said Rose,
“Yes, you are quite big compared to us hobbits,”
“Hobbits?”
“Yes, that’s what we call ourselves,” said Frodo as he showed them to the two remaining spare seats. “Right then, this is Harry, Hermione and Ron,” he said pointing to each, “That’s Bilbo and this is Rincewind,”
“And that’s the Luggage,” added Rincewind. The Luggage acknowledged its mention but no one could really describe how it managed it.
“Everyone, this is Rose and the Doctor,” everyone greeted each other.
“The doctor?” asked Harry, “Just ‘the Doctor’?”
“Yes,” replied Rose, “He won’t tell me his name I don’t even know if he has a name and every time the subject comes up he sits there grinning, just like that,” indeed, the Doctor was sitting there grinning.
“One sugar for me,” he said to Bilbo, who was pouring out more tea, they were onto the second pot as Rincewind had had far more than his fair share.
“Well,” said Hermione, “We’d love to stay and learn all about what you do, but we really should be getting on,”
“We should?” said Ron,
“Yes, we should, we can’t sit here all day as lovely as it is and it’s nearly three O’clock!”
“What does three O’clock mean?”
“Ron, you should be able to guess,” said Harry, “We have transfiguration next,”
“Can’t we just not turn up?”
“Most certainly not! Get up!” Hermione hauled Ron onto his feet and out of the door.
“Thanks for the tea,” said Harry, “Bye!” and he rushed out after the other two.
Once they were gone, Frodo and Bilbo took a chance to have a rest themselves. All five of them talked for a while, none of them had that much in common but the Doctor had something to say on just about everything and Rose wasn’t too far behind. Frodo and Bilbo were both quite used to talking to people they didn’t have a great deal in common with. They even managed to hold conversations with the Sackville-Bagginses, though admittedly they usually devolved into arguments and harsh words were almost always exchanged along the way. Rincewind seemed to be bathing in the bliss of not running for his life for once.
“Uh, my lord,” came a voice from the still open front door.
“What is it?” came another voice from further off.
“Someone’s left a hallway in the pantry,”
“Someone’s what? Baldrick, are you sure you’re actually in the pantry?”
“Yes, my lord, I think you should come and look,”
“Baldrick, I am busy trying to live my life without having to converse with worm-brained balls of dirt that happened to have joined together to make what so many people wrongly call ‘intelligent life’,”
“Yes, but, my lord, there really is a hallway in the pantry, and midgets with hairy feet,”
“Baldrick, have you been eating those mushrooms you found in your shoe again? Just close the door and forget it. That shouldn’t be too hard for you now should it?”
So the man that appeared to be named Baldrick shut the front door of Bag End and when Frodo reopened it, there was the Shire sitting there like it had for so many years.
“Right, we should be off,” said the Doctor.
“We should?” said Rose.
“Yes, we’ve got people to save, futures to see. All the usual things.”
“We can’t stay? Are you sure there isn’t something we can do here?”
“Bilbo,” said the Doctor, “is there anything we can do here?”
“Nothing apart from chopping some wood for the fire,”
“There, you see? Nothing to do here, let’s go,” after a little more persuasion, Rose agreed there was no one for them to save in the Shire. They bid their farewells and went back into the TARDIS and disappeared, with the same strange grating sound it had appeared with.
Frodo and Bilbo went back to the living room and began tidying up.
“Can I stay for a little while longer?” asked Rincewind.
“You can’t stay overnight, I’m afraid. Something about a backlog of fanfiction or some such terrible thing.” Rincewind sighed, no doubt the moment he stepped back into his own world, there’d be some kind of mortal danger awaiting him.
So Rincewind waited as long as he could before leaving with the Luggage trailing after him. Frodo and Bilbo wouldn’t have said they were glad to see the back of him, that just wasn’t polite, but it had been a rather jaw-dropping day as far as days at Bag End went and it was a relief when it was over.
They dined on leftovers that evening and went to bed hoping that in the morning they would believe it all to be a dream.
This is for glorfinniel
“I’ve finished cleaning the bathroom, Bilbo,” said Frodo as he flopped into the kitchen chair. Bilbo was busy cooking up a wide range of snacks and enough tea to satisfy an army. Well, a very small army. “I don’t see why I had to clean the bathroom, why couldn’t Mrs. Gamgee do it?”
“You’re starting to sound like a spoilt Brandybuck, Frodo. Anyway, I gave the Gamgees the day off. We’re going to be quite busy here and we need as much space as we can spare,”
“Why, whose coming? Is it the Brandybucks?”
“No, not them,”
“The Tooks then?”
“No, I’ll give you a clue. They’re not hobbits,” Frodo’s eyes lit up.
“Are some dwarves coming?” Bilbo shook his head, “Gandalf!” Frodo said, positively leaping out of his seat in excitement.
“No, no, no. I’ll give you another clue. They’re not from this world.” That left Frodo very bewildered. They’d never had guests from outside Middle-earth before.
“You don’t mean, not… Valar!” Bilbo laughed.
“No, we’re not being graced by their presence today.”
“Well, then who?” Bilbo turned away from the stove he was slavishly working over and sat down opposite Frodo’s chair.
“You remember those times when you’ve had strange dreams. You know, sometimes you do things you wouldn’t usually do and sometimes you appear in completely impossible situations. There are also those dreams that merge almost perfectly with your waking life. But then again there are other times when a woman you’ve never seen before in your life forces herself upon you and for some reason you don’t mind,”
“Yes, please, don’t remind me,”
“Well, you should also remember that between these dreams you stop off in a room they call ‘the fanfic lounge’ to relax and get control of yourself,”
“Yes, I vaguely remember that,”
“Well, they’re redecorating so I’ve agreed to take a few people on,”
“When will they start arriving?”
“Any time now, but I’ve been told it’s a slow time because some kind of exams are happening everywhere, I wasn’t entirely clear on that,” Bilbo’s sentence drifted off as he tried to remember exactly what he had been told.
Suddenly, someone started banging frantically on the door. “Go get that would you, Frodo? I’ll bring some biscuits into the living room,” so Frodo went to get the door. When he got there the whole door was shaking with the force of whatever was one the other side. Frodo wasn’t sure he wanted to open it.
“Go on, Frodo, don’t keep our guests waiting!” said Bilbo as he walked past with a plateful of biscuits and a pot of tea. Frodo readied himself for some sort of great monster on the other side of the door, put his hand on the doorknob and pulled it open.
In fell three big folk wearing very odd clothing. Frodo peered around the door at where they had come from and saw not the Shire laid out before him as it usually was, but a large, dark room and more alarmingly, a huge three-headed dog with drool dripping from its jowls and really rather huge teeth. Frodo quickly slammed the door shut.
“Where are we?” said one of the big folk.
“No idea? Who’s he?” said another one.
“What are you looking at me for? Why would I know?” said the third one, this one was a girl, Frodo could tell by the bushy hair and girl-sounding voice.
“I don’t know, you’re always reading books, you might know,” said the second one, he was long and gangly, had lots of freckles and unnaturally red hair.
“Shut up, you two,” said the first one, who had black hair, wore glasses and had a strange mark on his forehead. He was also pointing a wooden stick at Frodo as if it was some sort of weapon. Frodo pushed it aside and smiled at them.
“If you would like to come this way, we have tea and biscuits waiting,” he said in his most polite and un-offensive voice.
“Tea and biscuits?” said the red-haired one as they followed Frodo into the living room.
“Ah! Hello there!” said Bilbo, “Do sit down,” the big folk all pointed their sticks at him. Bilbo also pushed them aside, “Excuse me, it’s quite rude to point, now, please sit down.” The three sat down, though still eyeing Bilbo and Frodo suspiciously.
“Where are we?” asked the girl.
“And what’s happened to Hogwarts?” asked the red-haired one.
“You are currently in the living room of Bag End, which is at the end of Bagshot row in the north farthing of the Shire,” the three looked at him blankly, “I’m afraid I can’t help you with your Hotwargs place, though,”
“Hogwarts,” corrected the black-haired one, “Haven’t you ever heard of it? Hogwarts school of witchcraft and wizardry?” Bilbo shook his head.
“Wizardry? Do you know Gandalf?” said Frodo.
“Gandalf?”
“Yes, long grey beard, pointy hat, always wears robes,”
“That sounds a bit like Dumbledore,” said the red-haired one.
“Well, he does go by a lot of different names, I’ve never heard Dumbledore before, though,” said Frodo.
“Speaking of names!” said Bilbo, “I am Bilbo Baggins, and this is my heir, Frodo Baggins,” they both bowed.
“Well, this is Ron Weasly,” said the black-haired one, pointing to the red-haired one, “Hermione Granger,” was the girl, “and I am Harry Potter,” he said the last name expecting some sort of reaction but only received a ‘pleased to meet you’ from Bilbo.
“They’re not going to know about you, they don’t even know about Hogwarts!” said Hermione.
“What about Voldemort?” Ron flinched but Bilbo and Frodo stared blankly. “Apparently not,”
“Well! Anyone for tea?” said Bilbo, holding the pot aloft. All three big folk decided a cup of tea would do them a whole lot of good.
Then there came a quiet knocking from the front door.
“Frodo, would you go get that?” Frodo was in the hall before Bilbo had even finished his sentence. He pulled the door open, expecting to see a strange new world, but instead seeing the Shire laid out in front of him as it should be, although there was also a rather bedraggled-looking man standing on the doorstep. He was holding a pointy red hat in his hands, rather tastelessly covered in sequins, though most were now falling off and if Frodo had have been rude enough to stare at it, he would have seen the word ‘WIZZARD’ imprinted on it. The robes were similar but they had marginally more stains.
“I heard that there were tea and biscuits here, are there?” asked the man hopefully. He looked very ready for a rest.
“Yes, certainly, may I take your hat for you?” said Frodo.
“No, I think I’ll hold onto it, thank you,” the man wandered in (as much as one can wander when crouching) looking slightly bewildered at his luck of finding the right door. “Leave the door open for a bit, I’m expecting someone.”
Frodo led him into the living room where he immediately asked for his tea and sank gratefully into a chair. Everyone introduced themselves to the newcomer who, in turn, introduced himself as ‘Rincewind’.
“I see you’re a wizard,” said Ron, pointing to Rincewind’s hat while trying to hide a smile. Rincewind sighed.
“Yes, I am, of sorts, I trained in wizardry,”
“Ooh!” said Hermione, “Where did you study?”
“The Unseen University,” seeing their blank faces, Rincewind decided to elaborate, “Ankh-Morpork, right in the middle, can’t miss it,” Frodo didn’t quite catch the rest of the conversation because, standing in the doorway as he was, he was knocked over when a chest with hundreds of legs entered the room. Ron, Harry and Hermione once again pointed their sticks, this time at the chest, which had retracted its legs and sat rather immovably beneath the window.
“Don’t worry about the Luggage, it follows me everywhere, I’m sure it’ll be happy enough if you give it something to eat,” explained Rincewind. Bilbo pulled Frodo back onto his feet.
“Go get the muffins would you? Good lad,” Frodo went and got the muffins. “They’re only plain muffins, you don’t think it’ll want anything on them do you?” Bilbo asked Rincewind.
“No,” replied Rincewind, “I’m not even sure if it can taste,” the Luggage threw its lid open, “Just drop something in there,” Bilbo did so and jumped nearly a foot in the air when the lid snapped shut. And was that a tongue that flicked out? Still, the Luggage now looked as content as a chest can and Bilbo took that to be a good sign.
Soon after, when everything had settled down again, a very strange noise emanated from somewhere outside. Frodo ran to the front door, which was still open but there was nothing there. He then ran to the back door and looked out over the garden. There was nothing there either, at least, that was what he thought at first but before his very eyes, a big blue box was appearing on the lawn. Frodo stared open-mouthed before he realised he’d seen odder things already and that he really should have expected something appearing out of nowhere like this.
When the box seem fully appeared Frodo decided to go investigate. It was a large box standing on its end, about big enough to fit two big folk in at a push. Around the top of it there was writing that read ‘police public call box’ though that meant nothing to Frodo, not that it would have been useful had it meant anything to Frodo. A sound like a door opening came from the other side of the box and then voices.
“This isn’t right,” said one voice.
“What do you mean ‘this isn’t right’?” said another.
“I mean, this isn’t where we’re meant to be,”
“You mean we’re lost?”
“Not lost, don’t say lost, I prefer the term ‘misplaced’,”
“Yeah, right, have you got any idea where we are?”
“Uh, no!” said the voice quite cheerfully. Frodo peered around the edge of the box and cleared his throat. There was a man and a woman standing there. The man put some sort of gadget back in his pocket and went down to Frodo’s level. “Hello there, would you be able to tell me where we are?”
“Why yes, you are currently in the garden of Bag End, which is in the Shire,” seeing no look of recognition, Frodo decided to continue, “Which is in Middle-earth.”
“Ah,” said the man.
“What now?” said the woman,
“We appear to be in a different universe,”
“A different universe! How did you manage to get us into a different universe?”
“Travelling through time and space is a very complicated thing, I’d like to see you have a go,” the woman looked like she was going to reply, but Frodo interrupted.
“If it helps at all, you are meant to be here,” he said, “I’m Frodo and if you follow me inside you’ll find tea and biscuits. Well, tea and muffins, we’ve finished the biscuits,”
“Well, thank you Frodo, I’ve never been one to turn down tea and muffins. I’m the Doctor, and this here, is Rose,”
“Pleasure to meet you,” said Frodo, bowing, “Now, just through here you’ll find a place to sit and rest. Watch your heads, though, I’m afraid this place isn’t built for big folk like yourselves,”
“Big folk?” said Rose,
“Yes, you are quite big compared to us hobbits,”
“Hobbits?”
“Yes, that’s what we call ourselves,” said Frodo as he showed them to the two remaining spare seats. “Right then, this is Harry, Hermione and Ron,” he said pointing to each, “That’s Bilbo and this is Rincewind,”
“And that’s the Luggage,” added Rincewind. The Luggage acknowledged its mention but no one could really describe how it managed it.
“Everyone, this is Rose and the Doctor,” everyone greeted each other.
“The doctor?” asked Harry, “Just ‘the Doctor’?”
“Yes,” replied Rose, “He won’t tell me his name I don’t even know if he has a name and every time the subject comes up he sits there grinning, just like that,” indeed, the Doctor was sitting there grinning.
“One sugar for me,” he said to Bilbo, who was pouring out more tea, they were onto the second pot as Rincewind had had far more than his fair share.
“Well,” said Hermione, “We’d love to stay and learn all about what you do, but we really should be getting on,”
“We should?” said Ron,
“Yes, we should, we can’t sit here all day as lovely as it is and it’s nearly three O’clock!”
“What does three O’clock mean?”
“Ron, you should be able to guess,” said Harry, “We have transfiguration next,”
“Can’t we just not turn up?”
“Most certainly not! Get up!” Hermione hauled Ron onto his feet and out of the door.
“Thanks for the tea,” said Harry, “Bye!” and he rushed out after the other two.
Once they were gone, Frodo and Bilbo took a chance to have a rest themselves. All five of them talked for a while, none of them had that much in common but the Doctor had something to say on just about everything and Rose wasn’t too far behind. Frodo and Bilbo were both quite used to talking to people they didn’t have a great deal in common with. They even managed to hold conversations with the Sackville-Bagginses, though admittedly they usually devolved into arguments and harsh words were almost always exchanged along the way. Rincewind seemed to be bathing in the bliss of not running for his life for once.
“Uh, my lord,” came a voice from the still open front door.
“What is it?” came another voice from further off.
“Someone’s left a hallway in the pantry,”
“Someone’s what? Baldrick, are you sure you’re actually in the pantry?”
“Yes, my lord, I think you should come and look,”
“Baldrick, I am busy trying to live my life without having to converse with worm-brained balls of dirt that happened to have joined together to make what so many people wrongly call ‘intelligent life’,”
“Yes, but, my lord, there really is a hallway in the pantry, and midgets with hairy feet,”
“Baldrick, have you been eating those mushrooms you found in your shoe again? Just close the door and forget it. That shouldn’t be too hard for you now should it?”
So the man that appeared to be named Baldrick shut the front door of Bag End and when Frodo reopened it, there was the Shire sitting there like it had for so many years.
“Right, we should be off,” said the Doctor.
“We should?” said Rose.
“Yes, we’ve got people to save, futures to see. All the usual things.”
“We can’t stay? Are you sure there isn’t something we can do here?”
“Bilbo,” said the Doctor, “is there anything we can do here?”
“Nothing apart from chopping some wood for the fire,”
“There, you see? Nothing to do here, let’s go,” after a little more persuasion, Rose agreed there was no one for them to save in the Shire. They bid their farewells and went back into the TARDIS and disappeared, with the same strange grating sound it had appeared with.
Frodo and Bilbo went back to the living room and began tidying up.
“Can I stay for a little while longer?” asked Rincewind.
“You can’t stay overnight, I’m afraid. Something about a backlog of fanfiction or some such terrible thing.” Rincewind sighed, no doubt the moment he stepped back into his own world, there’d be some kind of mortal danger awaiting him.
So Rincewind waited as long as he could before leaving with the Luggage trailing after him. Frodo and Bilbo wouldn’t have said they were glad to see the back of him, that just wasn’t polite, but it had been a rather jaw-dropping day as far as days at Bag End went and it was a relief when it was over.
They dined on leftovers that evening and went to bed hoping that in the morning they would believe it all to be a dream.