WHOA, almost up to 30 chapters! I'd like to thank the academy, and all of you READERS for being totally awesome and reading 30 chapters of my very strange "out there" fanfic. We're almost to 3,000 views! that's actually incredible. KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK PEOPLE!
I survey the conglomerate of people gathering their most precious belongings from their homes and readying to leave. I trot over towards the herd of people who have already begun to leave. The line stretches over the hills toward the horizon. I sigh. "It's going to be a loooooooong ride."
"At least you're not walking." Nemo pouts from the ground. I feel better. I fall into line with the other people leaving.
"Lassie!" A voice with a strong accent says behind me. I turn to see Gimli trotting up to me on his little pony. "It's going to be a long ride." He says, "I figure it'd be nice to have some company."
"What's wrong with Legolas?" I ask. Gimli frowns.
"That elf and his full-sized horse!" He explains, sounding very hurt. He pouts at his pony. I nod understandingly, but I'm secretly crushed because I ship Legoli.
"Don't worry, you'll come around." I say hopefully.
"What?" Gimli asks.
"Just give him a chance." I say. Nemo gives me a horrified look.
"Please tell me you're not one of those crazy wackos who ship GimliXLegolas?" Nemo asks. I frown. He facepalms.
"Oh come on!" I say. "It's not like you haven't thought about it either! It's totally a legitimate ship!" Nemo raises his eyebrow.
"Ah...I don't see any ships anywhere. I don't even see any water." Gimli says. Shit. I keep forgetting everyone else can't see Nemo.
"…I was just thinking that ships are very legitimate." I say, while dying a little (a lot) on the inside.
"I suppose I can't argue that. I'm more of a tunnel Dwarf though." Gimli says. I laugh.
"I guess that makes sense seeing as you spend all your time mining and…mining…and what not…What do Dwarves do when they don't mine?" I ask.
"Well, when we're not mining (and that's not often), we like to fight."
"Just…fight?"
"Yeah. Mostly in bars. Sometimes we'll join quests. Tend to get some good fights in those."
"Alright. But what about when you're not mining or fighting?"
"Probably eating then."
"Do you do any recreational activities? Besides fighting."
"Does eating count?"
"No."
"Then no."
"There's no Dwarf tennis? Or soccer? Or music?"
"What's tennis?"
"What about Dwarf women? Are there Dwarf women? I've never seen one before."
"It's true you don't see many Dwarf women. And in fact, they are so alike in voice and appearance, that they're often mistaken for Dwarf men."
"It's the beards." Aragorn says. I jump on my horse because he appeared out of nowhere. Gimli continues.
"And this, in turn, has given rise to the belief that there are not Dwarf women, and that Dwarves just spring out of holes in the ground…which is of course ridiculous." Then his horse rears and it gallops through the throng. Gimli is thrown to the ground.
"It's all right. Nobody panic. That was deliberate. It was deliberate." He says. I help him to his feet and laugh because I've totally used that excuse so many times. I look up and see Aragorn and Théoden talking about something. Probably just football or something.
After a loooooooong ride, my ass is incredibly sore. I guess the movies and books just forgot to mention the fact that riding freaking hurts your butt. I collapse with exhaustion when we finally make camp. Someone yells at me to make soup or soap or something. I hope they said soup because that's what I decide to make. Only I'm so tired I just sort of throw random ingredients in. Peppers go well with Nutella right? At least, I think that was Nutella…
No one seems to want any of the soup I laboriously made. Luckily I get Gimli to eat about three fourths of it. I catch sight of Aragorn. I bet I could guilt trip him into eating it.
"Hey, Aragorn. Want some soup?" I give him a bowl.
"Thank you." He dips the spoon in the bowl and fishes for a bite of…meat? It might be misshapen bread crumbs. His face registers the distaste of the unknown ingredient. He swallows hard and nods with "Yuck" written all over his face.
"It's good." He says.
"Really?" I ask, feeling very accomplished.
"You do know that eggs don't go into soup, right?" Nemo says, looking suspiciously at the soup I made. I scowl at him. He continues, "Did you even cook those eggs?"
"You need to cook eggs? Oh well. All you need to do to make soup is put random things into water. Technically, it is soup." I defend myself.
"I suppose that is true." Aragorn says. I guess he understands why the soup is so bad now.
"Hey…I was just wondering…I heard it through the grape vine that you rode to war with Thengel, my grandfather. But he must be mistaken." I say. That came out of nowhere. It must be the thing Nemo was talking about, with the story trying to stay on the script.
"King Théoden has a good memory. He was only a small child at the time." Aragorn replies. I do the math in my head.
"Does that mean your 60?" I ask. He chuckles uncomfortably and looks away.
"Omgosh. 70?" He still doesn't respond.
"80?!"
"87." He finally admits.
"Maaaan. Can I have the number of your plastic-surgeon?" I ask, while pulling on Aragorn's face to make sure it's real. He laughs.
"I am one of the Dunedain. A descendant of Numenor, blessed with long life. There are few of us left. The Northern Kingdom was destroyed long ago." He explains. I suck my breath in deeply.
"Yikes. That sucks…I bet that soup'll make you feel better." I suggest. He looks down disgusted at the soup. He reluctantly grips the spoon, and cringes as he sips it.
"You are cruel." Nemo says.
"You don't even know the half of it." I say. Aragorn starts to choke a little bit, thinking I was talking to him about the soup. To be fair, I don't even know the half of that soup. No one should ever have to know that…I shudder and walk away.
Nemo and I wander around the camp for a bit, leaving Aragorn with his soup. I avoid doing as much work as possible because being this fabulous is hard work already. By the time the sun is setting, the camp has been set up. I'm just about ready to find a tent and camp out (literally in this case), when I catch sight of Aragorn. I head over but freeze in my tracks. I notice that he's just sitting there smoking his pipe…then he starts stroking the air…and then making out with the air.
"Ehm." I cough, purposely obnoxious. "I didn't know there was weed in Middle Earth."
"I was just…thinking to myself." He replies.
"Um…Alright. Do you think you could do your "thinking" in your tent? Because it's making me really uncomfortable." Aragorn doesn't say anything to me. He just walks away.
"Whoa. What's got his goat?" I ask, to no one in particular.
"He was thinking about Arwen." Nemo answers me. He doesn't seem to understand my rhetorical questions.
"Hmm. So that's the source of his angst. Very deep." I yawn. "I don't know about you, but I could use some sleep."
"Especially because we're going to be attacked by Orcs tomorrow." Nemo says.
"Wow. Spoiler alert?" I ask.
"What? You'll be better prepared if you know it's coming."
"Yes, but it also takes all the fun out of it." I say. Nemo smiles.
"Why are you smiling? It's creeping me out." I say.
"I thought all you cared about was getting home." He says. I scrunch my nose.
"I still care about that. A lot…It's just…I'm here anyway, so I might as well enjoy it, right?" I say.
"All I'm saying is you should be careful because if you're not ready you could die tomorrow."
"Please. I've survived much worse. I made it through the Hunger Games! Plus, my plot armor hasn't failed me yet." I point out.
"Fair enough." Nemo says. I start towards my tent. "But-"
"But?" I freeze mid-step.
"But you're not a main character anymore. Your plot armor will be much weaker, if you have any plot armor at all." Nemo says. I frown.
"Why must you bring up legitimate points?" I ask. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I really don't want to die tomorrow, so I'm going to go get some shut eye."
Nemo and I head to my tent. Nemo sleeps on the rocky ground, while I sleep on the fluffy bed. After all, I'm the one that's going to be fighting tomorrow. Yet I can't fall asleep. I lie in bed trying not to have a heart attack because I'm panicking about not dying tomorrow. This is a repeat of the Narnia-worrying-about-not-dying-tomorrow-thing all over again. My deep breaths turn into shallow gasps. I hear Nemo stirring on the ground.
"Psst. Nemo. I'm having trouble falling asleep." I whisper. He yawns then rubs his eyes. Before he says anything, a random background soldier comes into my room.
"Ever heard of knocking?" I say.
"My apologies." The expendable character says. "But this is a tent."
"Oh yeah. I'll let it go…this time."
"But I've disturbed you because we are preparing to leave."
"What?! B-but it's like only 10, 11 at the latest!" I complain.
"No, it's nearly dawn." He says, and pulls open the tent to reveal the sun rising above the hills.
"B-but how?" I ask.
"Time can be weird in the Library." Nemo explains. I give him a dumbfounded face. He continues. "I already told you, the Library is what we- I call the database of stories."
"Well, sorry. That was a while ago, okay? If anyone just so happened to be listening to our adventures, it would be necessary to remind them of small details that were mentioned a long time ago as part of the exposition…"
"What?" Nemo and the guard say at the same time.
"I was just asking how long till we leave? And what breakfast will we be getting?" I ask.
"We have some bread."
"Bread? Just bread? Any Nutella?" I ask.
"I'm sure you could find some nuts. Or even berries if you look hard enough." He suggests. I shiver.
"No. No berries. Never again." I say intensely. The guard looks back and forth and then leaves awkwardly. I yawn.
"Better get going then." I say, forcing myself out of bed. I start heading out of the tent, but in my sleepiness I walk into a pole. "Ouch."
"That's not the exit." Nemo says.
"I figured that out." I say, rubbing my head. Not only am I exhausted but I also may have a concussion. Off to a great start. At least I successfully get on my horse. I stay awake just long enough to make it out of the camp. Then I fall asleep.
"OOOOORCS!" Someone close by yells.
"Just five more minutes." I mumble, and rub my head into the pillow/horse's mane. I feel something swing by my head.
"I said just five. More. MINUTES!" I yell. I open my eyes just in time to see an Orc slashing a sword right at my head. I lean backwards so as to keep my head attached to my neck, but accidentally roll off my horse. I sit up, and see the Orc's legs on the other side of the horse.
"This is probably one of the worst ideas I've had yet." I comment and then lunge under the horse towards the Orc's legs. I push him to the ground and grab his sword as he drops it. I pin him underneath me.
"Eeeewww." I cringe. "Why are you so slimy?"
"They're Orcs!" I hear Nemo say behind me. I catch sight of him fighting an Orc that seems very confused why a sword was floating in the air for no reason and attacking him.
"Nice of you to show up!" I yell. The Orc below me shakes in fear at the crazy person on top of him who is talking to thin air. I look down at the Orc and decide what to do. I can't kill him because of the promise I made to Rue…But does that include dismemberment? If he doesn't have a hand he'll still be alive but he won't be able to fight. I shut my eyes and hope to God I hit his hands. I hear a scream and look down. I completely missed. I hit the ground next to the Orc's head.
"Yikes. Sorry about that. I didn't get a lot of sleep last night." I explain to the Orc.
"What are you doing? Just kill the Orc already!" Nemo says.
"I can't. I made an oath to Rue to not kill anyone ever again." I explain.
"But it's an Orc!"
"Orc's are still people."
"No, Orcs are Orcs."
"Orcs still have rights."
"Maybe they still have rights, but they lose those rights as soon as they decide to start killing innocent people to help Sauron."
"We don't know this Orc killed innocent people."
"It tried to kill you."
"I'm not innocent though."
"But it didn't know that!"
"Look, we can debate morals later!"
"Eowyn!" Théoden exclaims, sounding relieved. "Oh good, you've kept one alive. We can question him." I give Nemo a sideways glance.
"I have some bad news though." Théoden says. "Aragorn fell over a cliff."
"What? But we're in the middle of a grassland!"
"Yes. But it seems there was a cliff. And Aragorn fell over it. Into a river. He's quite dead."
"Did you find the body?"
"No…But we're sure he's very dead."
"Mhmmm." I say. Aragorn is totally still alive. We all know it.
"We will mourn him greatly when we arrive at Helm's Deep." Théoden says. He helps me up. I hop back onto my horse.
"Nemo?"
"Yes?"
"Wake me up if there are any more Orcs."
"Will do." Nemo replies. With that I rest my head back onto my horse pillow and take a nap.
