[Child of the 7th Age]

I wonder if anyone actually reads this as it progresses?

Mith-- Helen used to read it, but then she joined us! I am actually thinking as much about the fanfiction than about the PG per se. It is possible that the fanfiction would have a few bold readers. (At least, I'll bludgeon Bethberry over the head to read it!)

None of the fleet can be 'recalled'. They are already many days on their way to Aman by the time Sauron should find out about anything.

Pio -- I guess you are right so we have to figue out an alternative scenario for conflict.

The dragon sequence is good - with Angara coming back to let Mith and Pio know the details of his Encounter with the evil mind. Ancalimon already knows of this encounter - see Mith's post in the story about that. Should we assume he would already have told Mith and Pio about it, or not? Most of Sauron's concern should turn solely on the hint of dragon that he sensed.

In my opinion, Ancalimon would have immediately shared his knowledge with Mith and Pio. That knowledge would basically be that Sauron had sensed Angara. However,I think the dragon would come back and talk to them as well. Angara would be able to add two points to this. Before their link was broken, the wyrm sensed two things: Sauron would have loved to add Angara to his circle of minions, and, Sauron was suspicious about why there was a dragon floating around and began to wonder if there was something strange afoot.


Regarding the hobbits and Sauron I think Sauron does know that beings exist who are called hobbits, but I don't think he thinks about it very much. He's probably even aware that some hobbits are imprisoned. After all, the hobbit are out on work duty digging graves, in the mines, etc. and his own guys would have seen this.

Although knowing hobbits exist, Sauron does not understand their significance in the big picture. This is different than Morgoth and Ar-phrazon who do have a glimpse of this. He may see hobbits walking around, but he doe not know why Ar-Phrazon imprisoned them, or even that they are all in the tombs. He would see them as worthless pipsqueaks, and wouldn't pay them much attention.

However, even at the end of the story, Sauron can not understand about the significance of the hobbits. Otherwise, his suspicions will be aroused in the Third Age.

How about this as alternatives? First, Angara is miserable with Cami on the shore, but won't tell her what happened. He only says we have to get back to the ship right away. As soon as the storm is over, we leave with the hobbrim---we have one encounter with a ship of baddies who are stranded in the storm. They may actually have been beached. We kill them and scuttle the ship so Sauron thinks they drowned in the bad weather.

Angara tells Mith and Pio about what happened to him--this confirms what Ancalimon says but gives the added bad news that Sauron is searching for the dragon and has become a bit suspicious that something may be going on. Daisy is sent to spy in Levanto's headquarters. She gets the news back to us through the brothers and Levanto. She never confronts Sauron or his "big" commanders. Because Sauron is suspicious he doubles up the guards on all prisoners--not just the hobbits. He has only a few spy ships but he sends those out looking. They catch Daisy spying and she's imprisoned in guard headquarters.

Perhaps we get an Ulmo intervention to make the ships less visible? This is the second age not the third--the Valar haven't totally deserted yet. Perhaps a terrible fog that night??? Or a cloak of invisbility? That way they can get up the river without the spy ships knowing. Within the tombs, we have more guards to contend with plus the problem of releasing Daisy who's held in the guard's headquarters. (Hey, can Kali or Gamba help with this? Give her a young admirer. It might decide which way she chooses.) I can see we can't let the spy ships see us unless we destroy them--otherwise they will tell Sauron, and the 3rd age will turn out differently.

So maybe our "weapon" has to be invisibility. Like the hobbits, we--as rescuers of the hobbits--must be hidden.

There's one more problem, and this is important. We're doing this a week before the flood. So people would ave time t get back to Sauron and tell him what happened after the rescue. Even if they don't tell, Sauron can go see the cells with the hobbits are empty. Won't Sauron know the hobbits have been picked out specially for a rescue? There is a way around this. We can let open the prison doors for everyone in the vicinity --Men, too-so Sauron will never know we explicitly came for hobbits. I assume they would have had a ton of prisoners of various races. I think we have to do this, to obscure the fact that our only real concern is hobbits.

Any ideas?

Pio, do you want to give this discussion till tomorrow afternoon, and then take a stab at summing up the ideas you think will work best. Logistics isn't my strong point!

sharon

[ September 21, 2002: Message edited by: Child of the 7th Age ]