Hello!
As the title suggests, this will be 26 unrelated one shots with a strong focus on hurt/comfort for the Durins in particular, although I will probably do chapters for other characters too :-) I'll put warnings up for separate chapters, but expect heavy whump! Prompts are also welcome too!
Enjoy!
A is for attack
The morning was fresh and crisp, with the faint smell of wet grass and soil in the air as Kili woke at dawn, shuffling inside his blanket as his foot slipped out the bottom, cooling in the breeze. He sniffed lightly, his hair poking up the top of his thick blanket alongside a small strip of cold forehead. They had pitched camp for the night in the shadow of a small forest of trees, and Kili had fallen asleep to the steady hooting of an owl and the chirrup of insects in the bushes.
'Morning.' His uncle's greeting in the silence made him jump a little; he turned his head, fixing bleary eyes at Thorin, who looked like he'd already been up for hours.
'Morning...' He replied, licking dry lips and swallowing as he slowly sat up, trying (and failing) to stifle a yawn. 'What time is it?'
'Early yet.' Thorin muttered from his place at his nephew's side. 'We've run out of things.'
'Oh, like what?'
'Breakfast.'
'Oh,' Kili muttered, eyes wide. 'We've run out of that cured meat I brought along already?'
'Evidently someone has been...hungry, during the journey.' Thorin said, nodding his head back at the group of still slumbering dwarves behind him. 'I said we should ration it, but I have not been listened to..'
'Me and Fili will get something, we-' he looked around himself, spotting the neatly folded up blanket to his other side where his brother had slept.
'Here, Kili-, the dwarf in question spoke up before Kili even had a chance to ask where he was. He was passed his skin of water from his brother, and as Fili sat back down cross-legged onto the grass he smiled appreciatively at him. 'Thanks.'
'No problem,' Fili grinned as he packed away his own skin, before looking across at their Uncle. 'I left yours by your pack.' He said, blue eyes reflecting in the early morning sun.
'Thank you.' Thorin smiled across, before standing and wiping dew from his trousers. 'As I was saying to your brother, we need some more food. Nothing too arduous, maybe some fish if you can find a stream, or some rabbits.' He looked across at the others and gave an angry sigh. 'Just make sure there's enough, and I'll go and have another word about sensible eating habits.' He added, before giving his nephews a small smile. 'I was rather looking forward to that salted pork Kili had brought along.' He finished, before grinning as Kili looked at him almost guiltily. 'Ah well, can't be helped- just be back before they all start quarrelling and moaning.'
'Will do, Uncle!' Kili grinned, standing up and stretching. They watched their uncle walk back to his pack, away from the others, and get out his sword to clean it.
'Well, what's it going to be?' Fili asked his brother as they both pulled on their cloaks. 'Fish or rabbits?'
'I never saw a stream,' Kili muttered as they began walking away from the others and into the shade of the forest, 'maybe we'll have better luck with rabbits.'
'You just don't want to get wet!' Fili teased with a small laugh. 'All right, brother-rabbits it is!'
Xxxx
'You know, maybe we'd have had better luck finding fish in this blasted forest!' Kili grumbled after an hour and no catch to show for it. Fili snorted a laugh beside him, nodding his silent agreement.
'We'll find a couple soon, I-'
'What's that?' Kili cut across him. Fili looked to where Kili was pointing. It was a hulking, dark creature, lying sprawled on the forest floor ahead of them. 'What in the...' He whispered, eyes wide as the two of them picked their way through brambles to get to it. 'Durin's beard! It's a bear!' He breathed when they finally got closer.
It was dead, he could see that plainly- red oozed from a wound to it's side and covered the green grass around it. It looked like a fresh kill, not more than an hour old. 'What could have killed it?' Kili whispered. 'Another bear?'
'Maybe...'
'A deer with it's antlers?'
'Could have been..'
'What about a-'
'Kili! How am I supposed to know?' Fili snapped lightly, rolling his eyes with a small smile as Kili fell silent. 'We should just leave it be...'
'Leave it be? Fili, this could feed us all for days!'
'Do you want to try and drag it back to the camp?' Fili argued. He relented slightly when he realised Kili was right. It would be more than enough food for them all. He was just about to suggest going back and bringing back the others to help, when they heard a series of strange, keening noises from the other side of the body of the bear.
'What's that?' He asked, and together he and Kili peered round- three small cubs were nestling into the cold fur of the dead bear in an attempt to keep warm.
'Ah, no...' Kili muttered, feeling immensely sad for the cubs. 'We can't take their mother away.' He added, slightly crestfallen despite knowing the bear was dead and couldn't help the cubs anyway.
'Kili...' Fili muttered, his heart in his stomach as he looked the bear over again properly. The bear cubs, noticing there were now two strange scents in the air, began to cry louder and longer, signalling alarm. 'Kili, we need to go.' He said, grasping his sleeve and pulling him back. 'We need to go now.'
'What, why?' Kili replied, looking at his brother in slight alarm. 'What's the matter?'
'That bear..' Fili breathed as he and Kili stepped back, '...is not the mother bear.'
'And?'
'And, if that's not the mother- where is it?' Fili fixed his blue eyes on Kili.-By the way the cubs were noisily signalling their presence he knew they didn't have much time now. They widened immensely as they heard a crackling in the bushes. 'Quick- go!' He whispered, shoving Kili in the small of the back to get him to move. Trust them to go and investigate a bear surrounded by thorns and brambles- they moved as fast as they could, but it wasn't fast enough.
Kili's eyes and mouth opened in shock as the mother bear burst from the forest, her black fur gleaming in the morning sunshine. She was huge, no, she was colossal. Her eyes, red as garnet, searched for the source of the noise, a horrible barking noise coming from her throat. The brothers stood stock still as her eyesroved over the scene, until they landed on her cubs.
She moved over to them, sniffing at them as it to check if they were ok. They gathered close to her, making high pitched noises and brushing themselves up against her fur.
Fili dared to breath a sign of relief; she hadn't noticed them. If they stayed still long enough, and stayed quiet enough, she would just gather her cubs and be on her way, and everything would be ok...
Crack.
He felt his stomach drop into his feet as Kili lifted his foot off the large branch he had snapped in half, and looked around at him, his eyes wide and apologetic. Fili shook his head at him, before they flicked back to the mother bear. He forgot to breathe as he saw her staring directly back at them.
'Do we run?' Kili whispered, and Fili could feel his shoulder shaking where he had his hand clasped over it. 'Fili?'
The mother bear snorted angrily as Fili furiously thought about what to do. What had Thorin told them? Run or play dead? Or was it stand and fight back?
'Fili?!'
In the end the mother bear made the decision for them- with a bellowing roar that could have woken the dead she reared onto her hind legs, towering over them even from this distance, before launching herself towards them to protect her babies. Fili stood in front of his brother and pushed him forwards. 'Run Kili, RUN!' He yelled, and together the two of them bolted through the rest of the thorn. 'Go Kili, don't look back!' He shouted, before chancing a look himself as they neared the edge of the clearing. The bear was almost on them; the noise she made was incredible, loud and angry and terrifying.
He knew they didn't stand a chance if he didn't do something- with a grunt he gave Kili one final push to propel him forwards a little more, before darting to one side and screeching to a halt.
'HEY!' He yelled, voice as loud as he could muster. 'COME OVER HERE!' He breathed in deeply, feeling fear trickle down his throat as the bear stopped her pursuit of Kili to wheel around at him.
Right, now what, genius? He asked himself; he was woefully under-armed to fight off a bear, but he guessed his axe would have to do as the mother bear started running towards him now, teeth bared.
It was at the first yell that Kili realised he was no longer being followed by his brother- he stopped, turning on the spot with wide eyes as he looked back amongst the low hanging branches of the forest to see Fili backing away from the bear with axe in hand, his eyes locked on the animal's.
'Fili..' He whispered with a panicked breath. He knew Fili had done this for a reason, but he couldn't just stand here... His hands flew to his bow and arrow, and he looked down for a few seconds to check his arrow was notched in properly- in those seconds he heard a horrible yelp of pain from his big brother.
'Fili!' He shouted, looking up and making his way to the sound of his brother in pain.
Fili really should have made sure he was looking where he was going- backing away from the bear left him totally blind to what was behind him; like the trees root arching from the forest floor. He keeled over backwards with a dull thump, yelping as the wind was knocked from him.
He scrambled up, backing away as quickly as he could, but it was no use. A swipe from the bear sent him rolling to one side, and he only just managed to kick the beast's jaw as it snapped at his face.
'Fili!'
'Kili, no!' He yelled, before yelping again as the bear's teeth met their mark at last.
'FILI!' Kili yelled, eyes wide as he loosed an arrow, catching the beast's shoulder. 'Get away from him!' He screamed as he ran to his brother.
Fili, his face scrunched in pain as he scrabbled to put pressure on the wound to his leg, shook his head furiously as Kili ducked a giant paw, before throwing himself to the side to avoid the snapping jaws. 'Get out of here!'
'Don't be stupid!' Kili shouted back, coming to a final stop, panting with exertion, between the bear and his big brother. 'I'm not leaving you!' The bear roared with all her might as another arrow was loosed, catching her side and embedding itself in her flesh. Kili knew she had babies, and he was sorry for what he was doing, but this was a kill or die situation, and he wanted to make sure he was on the right side of the argument.
The arrow only seemed to make the bear angrier- she batted Kili around the face, dragging her claws into his cheeks as he yelped in pain and fell to the side.
'Kili!' Fili moaned out, grappling with his axe as Kili struggled to see through a cloud of blood and pain in his head. 'Leave him!' He yelled out ,throwing the axe and watching in panic as it merely bounced off her fur.
He ducked another terrible blow, throwing himself over Kili to protect him as much as he could.
He closed his eyes as he waited for the inevitable to happen. How he wished they had decided to go fishing...
Only the inevitable never happened. Seconds later there was an almighty yell from somewhere behind them- a voice Fili recognised. An immense heat erupted around him, and as he moved his face so he could see better he saw Thorin standing in front of them both, a torch made of lit branches in front of him. 'Get away!' Their Uncle yelled, voice fierce as he pushed the flames into the face of the bear. It worked, pushing the bear away as the ashes flew into it's face. Thorin yelled out again, making himself look as big and powerful as possible as the bear attempted a rebuttal. Seconds later and she realised she was outnumbered. She slunk away with a growl, back towards her cubs. They ran back into the forest, with Ori and Nori walking towards them slowly, torches also in their hands too to ward them off.
Thorin was on his knees in front of his nephews in an instant. 'Where are you hurt?' He asked eyes roving over them both as Fili got off his brother. They both looked at him with wide eyes as they saw four deep cuts in his cheek. 'Its not that bad, is it?'
'Barely a scratch,' Fili lied, before ripping some cloth from his pocket and pressing it against his brother's face. 'Hold that on there to stop the bleeding.' He instructed, before wincing as he moved his injured leg.
'Did you get bitten?' Oin spoke up, already rifling in his bag. 'I've got some balm that'll help quite nicely...'
'Yeah...couldn't get away fast enough...' Fili groaned, looking sheepishly across at his Uncle. Thorin put a hand on his shoulder. 'At least you're both safe now.' He said, resisting the urge to shake his head. 'What made you both think you could take on a bear?'
'We didn't want to!' Kili said, nodding his head to the dead bear they had found. 'We were looking at that one, and the other just...appeared.'
'Appeared, eh?'
'She was looking for her cubs.'
'Ah.' Thorin nodded knowingly, before standing back up. He held out a hand to Kili, who took it and used it to pull himself up, head swimming as he did so. 'Are you sure you're ok?' Thorin asked him.
'I'll be fine.' He smiled, wincing a little despite his words.
Thorin didn't look convinced, but turned away and looked around. 'Oh, I went looking in the food packs whilst you were gone,' he added, turning back with a small smile. 'It seems we weren't as low on food as I thought- it was all in another pocket I hadn't checked!'
Fili snorted out a laugh as Kili helped him to his feet. Kili grinned despite the pain, shaking his head as Thorin gave them an apologetic look.
'Come on,' Bofur said, looking across at the dead bear with distaste. 'I used to like the taste of bear, but now I'm afraid I've rather gone off it!'
'Me too.' Fili nodded, and, with his brother and uncle's help, began the slow journey back to the camp- all the while listening out for any other creature that could be lurking in the shadows...
Thanks for reading! Updates will be weekly, hopefully two a week :-)
Please review, and don't forget to prompt if you want something specific!
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