"Your Majesty! There are dwarves on our land! What are we to do about them?"

"...Let them in. I should like to know why they're here. How many are there?"

"Thirteen, your Highness, along with one wizard."

"Hm. Very interesting..."

The Elven King Thranduil sat upon his throne, puzzling. Dwarves in Mirkwood? That seemed simply preposterous. And the fact that they have a wizard with them! Are they going to attempt to invade? There may be a whole army of them just waiting for the signal to attack his kingdom! He wanted so very badly to send his soldiers after the seemingly small party so he could lock them up and torture answers out of them, but he had a feeling that would not work very well. Perhaps if he can trick them into thinking he can be quite hospitable, they will reveal their plans. But how to approach it? Dwarves are easily provoked. What can he say that will persuade them? The wizard might have reason...

Legolas was in a smaller throne to the left of his father's, legs crossed with an unreadable expression on his face.

"What do you think, iôn?"

No reply.

"Legolas?"

The young elf's head snapped up towards Thranduil as he said, "Yes?"

Thranduil then noticed the strange object in his son's hands. "What are you holding?" he asked.

"Oh! It's..." Legolas started, hesitating while looking back and forth between the object and his adar's face. "It's my new Uphone."

"You-phone?"

"...Yes?"

"Where did you get it from?" the Elven King asked, making note that he would either exile the maker or get one for himself.

"Well, there's this guy down the road that makes them and he's been giving them to most of the youth," Legolas explained, fearful that Thranduil might take it away.

Thranduil sensed his son's nervous tention and smiled slightly as he said, "I wonder why I didn't get one."

Legolas shrugged, even more on edge. "Who knows? Elves are crazy."

"Use your words, nín iôn. Use your words," Thranduil said and returned to puzzling about the dwarves. A bright flash startled him out of thought and he turned to see Legolas moving his thumbs at an impossible speed across the object. "What was-"

"Arwen forgot what you look like," the young elf cut in, not even looking up. After a moment, he laughed at a comment that Arwen made about Thranduil's picture, which notabley read, "Does your dad drink a lot?"

Thranduil read the comment over Legolas' shoulder and instantly became offended. "Could you be so kind as to put that thing away?"

Legolas replied, "Hold on. Let me turn it off." But then it buzzed and a picture of Tauriel's face appeared so the young elf answered it. "Hello my dearest best friend in the whole wide world! What's going on with you?"

Thranduil cringed at his son's use of profane language (as used by common folk). He decided to up the requirements of his son's language classes and tell Tauriel she better stop hanging around his boy so much. A shiver ran down his spine when he imagined his little tree in an unacceptable relationship with a she-elf that was far lower in social status.

On the other end of the line, Tauriel responded to Legolas, "Count down from three!"

"Three...Two..One!"

The entrance to the throne room burst open and a huddle of gaurds plus Tauriel walked in. Ignoring the presence of everyone else, the captain of the guard skipped happily up to her companion, which quite offended the Elven King, for he was not properly addressed, nor even glanced upon.

Before King Thranduil could speak in defense of himself, he was blinded by another flash from a Uphone; Legolas and Tauriel were taking a friend selfie. After the image had saved and Thranduil recovered from temporary blindness, he snatched the phone away from the two young elves with a glare resting on his beautiful face. Legolas and Tauriel bowed their heads in shame.

One of the guards approached the king and said, "Your Highness, the dwarves are almost to the castle."

Down the road a little ways, a group of thirteen dwarves, a hobbit, and a wizard were preparing to explain their untimely presence to a rather prideful elven king, or more specifically, Gandalf the Grey was repeatedly telling his company to "Shut up or suffer the consequences."

So why are dwarves and elves so racist towards each other? Well, it just so happens that Thranduil is afraid of getting his hands dirty and Thorin is the champion of holding grudges for more than a few hundred years. In short, a dragon burnt Thranduil's face and he's not about to ban his entire kingdom to the same fate.

Anyway, the dwarves were grumbling out of hatred for their whereabouts and also out of curiosity as to why their supposed enemy hadn't thrown them into prison. Two brothers, Fili and Kili, were traveling at the back of the pack and having a very one-sided conversation. Ever since they got into Mirkwood and somehow avoided those ugly spiders, Kili had been repeatedly saying, "Ugh! I hate elves! They think they're sooo great with their swishy hair and perfect faces! I just want to go in there and beat them all up!" Fili wasn't fond of elves either, but he really wasn't interested in hearing Kili go on and on about it for five grueling hours. Kili was still raging when the group was escorted before Thranduil, who was sitting lazily on his throne with his boots in Legolas' face.

For the first few moments, all anyone did was glare at each other. Then Kili noticed Tauriel standing in the corner. Indeed, she was just like all the other elves; swishy hair and a perfect face that was for some reason not glaring at him. In fact, her green eyes seemed to twinkle and her lips curled into a tiny smile when she looked at him.

Kili fainted.

Some of the other dwarves face-palmed and started shuffling towards the throne while Fili knelt and tried to shake his brother awake.

Straightening out upon his throne, Thranduil said in a fake-happy swaying voice, "Welcome my little friends!"

Thorin snorted and the other dwarves behind him continued grumbling.

The Elven King tilted to the side and whispered to his son, "Try your best not to get mixed up with these little-folk. They can be most difficult to deal with."

Legolas looked questioningly at his adar. "Difficult? I can't see it. They are a bit grumpy, but otherwise, I think they're rather cute."

"What was that laddy?" one of the dwarves, Gloin, shouted to Legolas above the grumbling of his brothers.

Thranduil looked angrily at his iôn and told both him and Tauriel to leave, flicking his hand back multiple times. While the young elves moved quickly out of the room, Fili was dragging Kili's unconscious body to catch up to the rest of the dwarves.

With a swish of his hand, Thranduil got back on subject. "Anyway, what brings you to my kingdom?"

"We're here to burn down all of your houses, eat all of your food, and steal all of your women," came the reply from a most unhappy Thorin Oakenshield.

Gandalf looked disgusted towards the reluctant dwarf and then turned to the Elven King to better explain the situation. "I apologize for our rudeness, King Thranduil. We are not here for any of the reasons our prideful leader has stated, but instead we wish only to pass through this land without trouble."

"And that is all you require? You do not wish for food and rest, nor any equipment? None of my guards to assist you with your quest?"

"We only ask for the least, your Highness."

Thranduil puzzled again for a moment. "But what if I were to be gracious and give these things to you?"

Gandalf, along with much of the other dwarves, found this surprising. The wizard finally said, "Do what you believe to be best."

From the back, Dori shouted to the arrogant ruler, "If you really wanted to help us, you'd summon up your army and take on that dragon yourself!" His brothers raised their fists and shouted in agreement. Of course, this wasn't very pleasing to Thranduil.

Over the commotion, the king yelled, "WHAT IF I DO BOTH?!"

The dwarves fell silent.

The Elven King smirked and repositioned himself back into a lounging state. He called, "Guards! Escort these fine men to their temporary living quarters!" Then the dwarves were shuffled out of the throne room.

Gandalf said thank you, bowed, and began to leave, but was stopped short by the ruler of Mirkwood.

"Might I ask who this is?" Thranduil said, pointing at Bilbo, who at the moment was hiding behind the wizard's robe as a child does with its mother's skirts.

The old man smiled down on the shy form and replied, "This is Bilbo Baggins of the Shire. He is accompanying us on our journey."

"Hmm. How peculiar. I've never heard of a halfling going on a dangerous quest. He must show real promise."

"He does, I assure you," said Gandalf as he lightly patted his hobbit on the back, which caused Bilbo to lose his balance.

Then the two were dismissed from the throne room and sent down the gaping hallways, where they stumbled into Fili, who was still dragging Kili's unconscious body by the arm to their housing area.