Disclaimer: A dead English professor just happens to own the rights to the characters here. Just borrowing a few characters to give a scene more depth. They will be put back in pristine condition (or at least the way I found them).
A/N: Well, I was reading through Two Towers and this just kind of came out. It's a bit rough and maybe hard to follow, but I tried to do it in the state of mind Pippin would be in while being dragged to the ends of Middle-earth by orcs.
When he had nightmares back in Hobbiton, Pippin knew that he could always scamper over to Pervinca's room and be comforted by her soothing voice, lulling him back into sleep. Even while he was with the Fellowship, he could be reassured by opening his eyes to see the sleeping figures of Frodo, Sam, and Merry so close to his own shivering form. The nightmares were nothing new to Pippin, though the ones in his childhood and on the Fellowship were different than now. Before, he could tell when the nightmare ended and where life began.
But there was no such comfort here. Even when he opened his eyes, the nightmare continued. While he slept, images from the past few days replayed upon his eyelids, mercilessly accurate. Awake, walking horrors filled his sight and clutched him close to their rank bodies. His skin burned from the constant contact with such vile creatures. But he had not the strength to move or protest.
The few times he forced himself into consciousness, shivers wracked his body until he was too weak to fight the pending darkness that always lurked in the corners of his vision – a darkness simply waiting for the right moment to pounce and begin a different set of nightmares. Vaguely, he was aware of Merry's presence. Once in a long while, he would see Merry's small body, limp and pale in the foul grasp of an orc. He was so pale that Pippin would fear the worse until Merry's eyes would open for a brief second and lock onto Pippin's own, the gaze a bit lopsided by an angry red gash across the right side of Merry's forehead, swollen due to neglect. Merry would try to give him a reassuring smile, but it was weak and hollow, fading before it even had a chance to begin. Then, he would slip back into his own set of nightmares, leaving Pippin alone again. Not long after that, though, Pippin would follow Merry's example and have the ghosts of his dreams for company.
The nightmares never started at the same place, but they always ended the same way. He had done nothing…
It hadn't been like the Mines of Moria. There, he had had the whole Fellowship to fight alongside him. It was easier to be brave with a wizard next to him and a Ranger on his other side. But at Amon Hen, it had just been him and Merry and…Boromir. A quick stab of guilt slashed at his heart. Boromir. The arrows whistling overhead…the shock on his face…the dribbles of blood…the completely paralyzing fear. He had done nothing to help the man who he had come to call friend. In disbelief and in fear, all he could do was stand dumbly and watch arrow after arrow hit Boromir, all of them somehow missing Pippin and Merry. Then the world came rushing back in a roar of sound, snapping him back to his senses already knowing it was too late. Before he could even act, the orcs had seized him and carried him off, his eyes still locked on Boromir's. When Boromir's broken body was out of sight, he had fainted and awoken from a nightmare tightly bound, surrounded by orcs, and completely alone. Soon he came to realize that Merry was with him, but he wasn't in any condition to be of comfort to Pippin.
Inside and out all that he could do was shiver and ache. The guilt was ripping him apart and all he wanted to do was submit to the pain and slip away into oblivion while he slept. It would almost be appropriate if he died while watching his own failure to help Boromir. What was there left to live for, anyway? He had to be far away from the Fellowship by now. Not only would it be too far for any of them to catch up, they had more important issues: getting Frodo to Mordor to destroy the Ring. So they lost two hobbits along the way, it was a sacrifice that they had to make so Middle-earth would be safe.
His eyes blinked open, awake for the few seconds before he slipped back into his nightmares. The ground still moved swiftly beneath him, his orc carrier moving swift, even in the daylight. Shuddering, he almost welcomed the unsettling dreams as they dragged him down into their clutches again.
"Pippin," Frodo whispered to him one night. "How far do you think we are from Hobbiton?" The rest of the Fellowship slept soundly while Legolas was on watch.
"I dunno, Frodo. Ways and ways, I'd gather." The two hobbits were lying next to each other, peering through the branches of the trees, the rumble of the great Anduin not far off.
"Why did we ever leave it?"
At first, Pippin thought that the question had been rhetorical, just a passing comment. Frodo would often mumble to himself, questioning why the Ring had come to him and why Gandalf, lost to them in the Mines, had entrusted him with it. Pippin had always dismissed these as self-pitying (deserved as it was) what-ifs. But tonight, Frodo wanted Pippin to answer him.
"Well…because of the Ring," Pippin replied, a bit flustered. "It couldn't stay in the Shire, now, could it?"
"No, I suppose not. I wonder what would happen if I never would have agreed to leave Bag End," Frodo mused wistfully.
"Nothing good, I can assure you of that. Those Black Riders would've cut us to ribbons before second breakfast."
"Why'd you come along with me, Pippin? You could still be cozy in Tuckborough if you hadn't have insisted on going with me."
"Because you're my friend and cousin," Pippin answered that one easily enough. "You don't think that I could've just sat idle back in Hobbiton with you out here in all this danger, do you? At least while I'm here I can keep a good eye on you."
"A good eye on me?" Frodo laughed quietly. "You talk as if you were years my elder. If anything, I should be keeping a watch on you. What would I tell Pervinca if something happened to you out here? She'd never let me out the door alive. Or at least with my feet still attached. Oh, you should never have come along, Pippin. I'd never be able to go back to Hobbiton without you being alive."
"I'm not dead yet, Frodo. I'll make it back alright."
Pippin opened his eyes for the first real time in what seemed like months. Another first, he was on the ground. Right next to him, Merry lay still and pale. Around him, a fight seemed to have erupted. Orcs were fighting, a dead one falling almost on top him. That's right. He wasn't dead yet. Squirming in his binds to the dead orc, he managed to grasp his hands around the cold steel of the dead guard's blade. A few blind slashes and he was free of the rope. Before loosely retying it to keep up appearances, Pippin ran a hand through Merry's damp hair. Merry gave a shiver and a barely audible cry.
"Shh," Pippin comforted, stroking his face, not caring if the orcs saw him free or not. "We're going to be fine, Merry. We'll make out alright."
Lying back on the ground, he felt completely awake. Quickly, he tied his bonds back around his wrists, giving himself a lot of slack. He had no sense of the days or time he had wasted while in his daze. But he knew that it had been long enough.