HPbf picks up the bat, Elbreth pitches once more, and strikes her out. Elbreth looks around the small white room, is there anyone left? What fun it was here, while it lasted. The poor couch was worse for wear, and the budgies...well they died after so many detonations, the bat and ball were all else that was there. Elbreth smiled.

(We're all gone...yiiiikkkkessss!!!!)

*hugs the "plastique", then waits 15 seconds*

*fizz*

"Fooled ya!"

*picks up the bat*

"We want a pitcher, not a belly itcher!"

They escape... only to be back at Niffiwan's futuristic movie theater, where he and only he has the power to do anything.
Having lost even his signature and self-photo, Niffiwan has a good reason to be angry; who was it that had strangled him? He must have become unwary for a second...

However, since the "artificial sweetener" part is/will be gone from his title, he feels that he owns gratitude to at least one member of the party, especially one who has had more than enough...

As all of them appear back on the glass floor, with the tower stretching below into infinity, Gilthalion accidentally falls on the hole that the Hobbits had started to dig some time ago, forgetting that it was a several kilometer drop below in air filled with radiation.

"NOOOO! Help, someone! Oh why, oh why couldn't I just go back to my Hobbit-hole..." Bullroarer reaches out, but it's too late. The floor falls out from Gilthalion's feet.
As he falls and reaches the level of the radiation, they see his brains explode in a most gruesome way, and his bodily juices start oozing out of his body.

Then they knew that he was no longer alive, but dead under the awfull radiation of the future world.
"Alas," cried Eruve, "if only he had chance to live longer..."

*******************************************

However, Gilthalion, to his surprise, wakes up in a brown chamber which looks like the inside of some humongous creature. He screams in horror as a tentacle with a sucker on the tip plucks away from him. It rectracts and dissapears into the living, pulsating room.
He looks around, and sees that the other members have similar tentacles attached to their heads. He tries to remove one, but only succeeds in ripping off a part of the person's skin.

*******************************************

"Ow!" cries Darth ATAT as part of the skin on his forehead peels away.

*******************************************

Suddenly, a portal opens beneath Gilthalion's feet.
He falls through, and much to his surprise finds himself in the party room in which he had had that food fight so long ago...
When he looks up, he sees neither the living room which he was inside nor the portal through which he had come through.

A dark shadow suddenly appears in front of him with a burst of black smoke.
Niffiwan raises his shadowy hands, and suddenly all traces of the food fight are gone.
"Enjoy", he says, and the shadow is gone.

Finding himself back in the secret room, he decides, in sensible hobbit fashion, that everything that had happened since he had walked in the door had been pure fantasy.

Whatever had happened, it was high time for a bite of real food.

He strode out of the tunnel that brought him there in the first place, carefully closed the secret door, and went straight home as fast as his furry little feet could carry him!

"Well, I'm back," he said to his Mrs. "What's for supper?"

"I don't know," she replied. "Whatever you want to make, I guess. And make me one, too!"

The hungry little hobbit bustled off to the kitchen to make some nice roast beef sandwiches!

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!
Gil!!!!!!!!

Shan Jumps to the hole trying to grab Gilthalion, but it's too late. "wooo, wooo, whoooooooooooooo"
His gravity center being to far ahead, he then proceed to fall in the hole as Gil did...

Elbreth looked around in befuddlement, wondering how exactly her little game had gotten out of her control. Aha! That was it. The ominous form of Niffiwan raised itself before her. Elbreth swung her lightsaber, meaning to slice him in half......

...And in her hastiness forgot that he was nothing more than a shadow, the lightsaber being absolutely harmless to him.

"Look, Elberth, if you want to get out of here then kill yourself!"

Elberth looked at the shadowy spirit with uncertainity, unknowing of the good fate which had befallen Gilthalion after he had fallen into the hole.
Finally, she picked up her light saber and...

Meanwhile Shanamir found himself in the room which Gil had found himself in...
"I never said you could leave!" a shadowy voice bellows, "I won't give you the pleasure of dying in the illusionary world! I will do everything in my power to keep it from hapenning!"
The tentacle with the sucker latched on even tighter to Shan, and within seconds he was once again falling through the vertical glass tunnel in radiation-filled air, badly bleeding and with a horrible headache.
As he looked down, he realised that he still caouldn't see the bottom.
"Heeeeelp!!!!!!" he cried in vain.

Ooooooh.... I'm dooooooomed!

No you're not, this is not your real self, remember? You'll be in a lot of pain, but you can't die (illusionary) because I won't let you. Be creative! I'm sure you can think of something!

hmm... large, living, hobbit-eating creatures, attacking Entmooters...

where are those plastic explosives when we need them?

------------------------------------------------------------
Shan, still falling through the radiated glass tunnel, suddenly felt a strange sensation, & his vision went all blue & fuzzy. about 5 seconds later, he found himself back among the frightened Entmooters, all trying in vain to keep far from Niffiwan's dark shadow. Elbreth, with a puzzled look on her face, stammered "how did he..." but sheer surprise rendered her speechless. Shan, his mind blurred by the radiation, lay on the ground dazed. aryne, a strange-looking device in her hand, calmly sat next to Shan & pressed the odd metal cylinder against his neck for a second. And almost immediately, he stood up: "what the heck happened?" he asked to no one in particular. aryne replied - "transporters. and Magic Radiation Cure #47. this is what comes from watching way too much Star Trek..." she then twirled the strange metal tool in a highly cheezy hot-shot-gunslinger fashion & hid it away somewhere. seeing Shan recovered & the shadow of Niffiwan growing angrier by the second, she continued...

"it's really not that hard to get rid of a shadow..." but never got a chance to finish

aryne *

Shan sits there and begin to think about what he'll do now...

"I sent you out to get food for Miss Kitty 10 minutes ago! What are you doing back?" asked the Mrs of Gilthalion.

"Uh, I forgot... uh, that's why I came back! Thank's for reminding me, Little Cutie Sweet Patootie!"

And with that, he rushed back out of their cozy little hole and past the Secret Entrance and off to the Mercantile Store to get some cat food.

On his way back, he half imagined he heard wails of terror far underground, near the Secret Entrance. He hurried past and tried not to listen.

At his snug little hole, Miss Kitty was wailing for her dinner and Gil set down her little plate and bowl of fresh water. A real cat could fend for herself, but Miss Kitty was spoiled rotten! She meowed her disapproval for his lack of consideration and licked at her dinner and walked off as if uninterested.

The little hobbit shook his head, and the thought of the secret door lingered in his mind.

Were his friends actually in there? Trapped by the evil Niffiwan?

He resolved to go back and see!

Telling the Mrs that he was off for a walk, he scurried back to the Secret Door and looked inside. There, he saw his friends dozing comfortably in recliners, each with a can of Caffiene Free Diet Pepsi hooked to tubes that ran to needles thrust in their arms.

As quietly as he could, he pulled the needle from Shan's arm, stopped the bleeding with some pressure and waited for him to awaken and help him free the others...

*Shan Looks around and sees the needles and cafeine-free diet pepsi.*

You are not real, you are nothing but another's Niffiwan invention! Get away from me!!!! Niff, stop playing with my mind!!! aRghhhh! :x

Elbreth opened one eyelid, and looked causiously about the room. Seeing Gilthalion, she nearly jumped up to greet him. But remembered just in time that any sudden movement was automatically covered by camera, so was any sound. So she had to move slowly, silently.
With a grimace she pulled the De-Caf Diet Pepsi out of her arm, I hate Pepsi in the first place and slid her feet silently to the floor. She managed to catch Gil's eye, and, in sign language, told him about the cameras. He nodded, showing that he understood.

"Ya got your gas fuses, your napalm, your gunpowder, your guncotton, your nitroglycerine, your TNT, your C4, your pressure mines, your metal mines, your naval mines, your butterfly mines, your Claymore mines, your hand grenades, your 40mm grenades, your WP grenades, your mortars, your uranium fission bombs, your plutonium fission bombs, your deuterium/tritium fusion bombs (with optional uranium jacket), your neutron bombs, your EMP bombs..."

"But this job calls for something special... something elegant. The tox lab just brewed this beauty up... it's a foaming aspartame-neutralizer. One dose can neutralize every drop of Nutri-Sweet within two blocks. And if you're REALLY in a fix, you can take a drink of it... it can cause nausea, though."

"And in case the shadow comes back, I've got a special surprise for him..."

While Elbreth slapped the hysterical Shanamir, and as the mad bomber lurking in the shadow prepared his next series of detonations, the little hobbit scurried about reviving more of his friends, quietly pleading with them to hurry up and get out!

They did not need to be in that room either when Niffiwan returned or when the Mad Lurker's explosives went off!

... to blow everything this side of L.A. to Kingdom Come, that won't be necessary."

*while singing along with Clash's Rock the Casbah, takes out a clear glass marble full of a greenish liquid, begins to throw it at the ground, then stops at the last second*

"Whoops, that's the VX..."

*puts the marble away, then pulls out a sheet of blister-packing*

*pop* *pop* *pop* *pop*

"Hee hee hee..."

*peels the can of Caffeine-Free Diet Pepsi off of his bulging biceps*

"And now, for the catalyst."

*drip* *drip* *drip*

*WHOOSH*

The hobbit, who genuinely despised "Rock the Casbah" and hated even its mention, took the liberty of striking a match and stealthily dropping it in Johnny Lurker's backpack. He quietly led everyone out of the door he had just walked in, as the demolitions crazed Canadian mindlessly hummed the mindless tune and prepared his final detonation.

The hobbit was almost at his own little hole when he @#%$ed an ear, and heard the underground blast.

Cheerfully, he whistled an air from Beethoven's 6th and went inside with a spring in his step.

"What's for dinner?" he asked.

That's @#%$amanie.

(Hehe - look it up - it's a real word)

After the blast of foam concluded, Johnny Lurker looked in his backpack in confusion...

"A match? Who could have put that there?"

"Thank goodness it just landed on my spare pair of asbestos underwear..."

(Really, now... trying to put me to shame on the gridiron is one thing... cold-blooded homicide of everyone else is quite another)