Frodo: Or, My Precious
AUTHOR'S NOTE: I love making stories like this…I really try to leave it up to YOU to decide what I REALLY meant…i.e., do I despise Legolas as a pimp who needs his ego shot down a bit and his blond hair cut back to a buzz cut? Or am I madly in love with him, unable to take my eyes off him and totally insanely crazy about blond elves in general? Or do I not care at all? It's all up to you to decide…
Legolas twitched nervously as Aragorn coaxed him down the hallway at the Prancing Pony. "Legolas, I really think you'd feel a lot better if you come down and have a drink or two of beer. Settle your nerves a bit."
"Nerves?" Legolas said as he walked sideways with his back pressed against the wall, inching down the corridor. "What nerves?"
"Those nerves," the ranger replied, exasperated. "Honestly, Legolas, it was only a joke!"
"Only a joke?" Legolas demanded, leveling a glare at Aragorn. "ONLY A JOKE? You had to follow me all the way to the Barrow-Downs before you could explain that it was 'only a joke'! You had Frodo and Sam—Sam! Country-bred Sam!—dye their hair to look like me and dress up like me, and resurrect Boromir using illusionary magic so you could play something that was 'just a joke'?"
Aragorn shrugged nonchalantly. "Hey, we wanted to make it something for you to remember, always, as a birthday present!"
"Don't worry, I'll remember it all right," Legolas muttered. "Right over a cliff I'll remember it!"
"Birthday present," Aragorn repeated.
"Don't you dare say 'my precious'!" Legolas snapped. Aragorn just raised an eyebrow, and motioned for Legolas to go first through the door.
"Oh, no," Legolas said grimly. "If you think I'm falling for the old 'lock 'em in the room with a bunch of zombies' trick, you think less of me than when you played that stupid joke!"
"It was funny!" Aragorn protested.
Legolas just scowled, and Aragorn shrugged before going into the tavern. When he followed, the lights suddenly went out.
A blond ghost of Boromir hovered over him with little wooden-tips on his ears. "COMPETITION!" the ghost screamed, and dove for him.
"Gandalf!" Legolas shrieked, dodging the ghost. "THAT'S NOT FUNNY!"
The lights came back on and the whole Company, from Aragorn and Gandalf to Merry and Pippin were howling with laughter. Even Barliman was laughing. Legolas glared at them.
"Happy Birthday!" Pippin sniggered, and held up a small sugar-cake that said "YOU HAVE COMPETITION" in bold green letters.
"Har har har," Legolas muttered, and blew out the two hundred or so candles they had managed to fit onto the cake. "You know, my friends, this isn't even my birthday."
"It isn't?" Merry demanded, delighted.
"Great!" Pippin cried. "We get to do this all over again when it is your birthday!"
"Gimli," Legolas said to his dwarven companion, who was, at the moment, interested only in his pint of beer, "we're leaving for the Gray Havens. Tomorrow."
"Great! We still have time for that last trick!"
"Correction—now!"
"You go on ahead…I'll catch up," the dwarf muttered, but Legolas saw a mischievous look in his eyes.
"All right, what did you guys do now?"
A blond elf that could have been Legolas's identical twin burst into the room. "COMPETITION!" he screamed. "MUST DESTROY COMPETITION!"
"YOU GUYS THIS IS NOT FUNNY!" Legolas shouted, throwing a chair in the direction of his attacker.
But Aragorn looked severely shocked. "This isn't part of the plan!" he protested.
"HEY!" Pippin yelled indignantly. "YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO WAIT FOR THE SIGNAL YOU MORON!"
"Kid," the elf replied. "I'm not hired just sit around all day, you know. COMPETITION!"
"PIPPIN YOU ARE ONE FLAT HOBBIT!" Legolas cried his double pinned him in a corner.
"Actually, it was Merry's idea."
"Was not."
"Was too!"
"Was not!"
"WAS TOO!"
"WAS NOT!!"
"No," Gimli replied suddenly. "It was my idea!"
Legolas shot them an ugly look and ducked under a table. "All right, that's it! I'm going back to Mirkwood!"
"Competition," Frodo moaned, and pulled out a blond wig. He put in on his head, then inserted blue contact lenses into his eyes. Taking out little wooden points, he glued them onto his ears. "Must destroy competition!"
"Ok," the double said. "Now you're scaring me."
He and Legolas exchanged looks. "Make for the door on three?" Legolas said, and the double nodded. "Three!" They dashed in opposite directions, the double escaping as Legolas was pinned by the Company, all suddenly gone blue-eyed, blond-haired, and quite mad.
"Com-pe-ti-tion…"
"NO!" Legolas screamed. "Help! Help! Help!"
Legolas screamed suddenly, and found himself in bed, with Aragorn shaking him by the shoulders. "Legolas! It's all right! It was just a joke!"
Pippin came in the open door, and grinned a very impish hobbit-grin. "Com-pe-ti-tion," he chanted.
Aragorn turned to scold Pippin, but he felt a sudden breeze against his neck, and looked back over to see the window open and the curtains flapping. A note on the bed, written in hastily scrawled elvish, said: Look, guys, this has been fun, but you are REALLY taking this joke thing a little too far. Tell Pippin I will get him for that—and no, I am not going to where you think I am going!
Aragorn looked over at Pippin. "He's going to Lothlorien," they chorused.
"Damn you're good," said a bitter-sounding elvish voice from outside the window.