The Ring
Gandalf rides to the White City looking for a psychiatrist, sees Mount Doom's fire over the mountains. Barad-dur rebuilt-from inside Gollum's voice screams 'Shire! Baggins!' The Nine Nazgul ride out of the gate. Gandalf, meanwhile, looks through the library in the White City, searching for telephone numbers of good Gondorian psychiatrists, and accidentally comes across Isildur's old diary.
The year 3434 of the Second Age.
Dear Diary: Today, I found a Ring of Power! Yay for me!! I had to chop It off the hand of this really big, scary guy in outdated black armour, though-I don't think I shall ever be the same! That ARMOUR!! Oh, and he slew Daddy, but that's not really important. What's important is, now I'm King, and I get to keep my beautiful new Ring! Elrond wanted me to toss It in the fires of Mount Doom-can you imagine?!-but I told him to jump in himself. He didn't though...oh, well, better luck next time! I think I shall give the Ring to my son when I get bored with It; that way, that *BLEEEEP* Elrond-elf will never get It!!
Bye!
Isildur, the new High King
Gandalf: Oh...I wonder if maybe that old ring of Bilbo's might be the same one...
A Hobbit cutting wood is startled by a Dark Reindeer(oops, sorry, I mean Rider). His dog growls for a while to make itself look good, then gets out of there as fast as it can.
Dark Rider: *creepily* Shire. Baggins.
Hobbit: No Bagginses here. They're all up in Hobbiton. That way.
He follows his dog as the Rider turns toward Hobbiton.
Frodo comes back from the tavern to find the window open and the whole hole dark. Gandalf latches onto his shoulder scarily.
Gandalf: *equally scarily* Is it secret? Is it safe?
Frodo digs the envelope out of a chest and trustingly gives it to Gandalf, who promptly throws it in the fire.
Frodo: What are you doing?*starts sobbing like a small hobbit-child* My beautiful Ring! You're destroying it! You're HURTING it! Oh, you're such a mean wizard, wahhhhh....
The envelope goes all crispy and falls away from the ring. Gandalf gets it out of the fire with Frodo's tongue-I mean tongs.
Frodo: *snorts back snot* Phew...
Gandalf: Hold out your hand, Frodo. It's quite cool.
Frodo: *accepting it back happily* Yeah, it's the coolest Ring ever!! Yippee!
Gandalf: *ignoring the outburst* What can you see? Can you see anything?
Frodo: *in a lamenting tone* No, alas, I cannot see at all, for I am blind...
Gandalf: *startled* What!?
Frodo: *giggles* 'M sorry, I just couldn't resist! I mean, it was such a dopey question-
Gandalf: *incensed* Not in general, you fool! I meant on the Ring, can you see anything on the RING!
Frodo: No, nothing. There's nothing...wait. There are markings. It's some form of stupid, loopy Elvish script, and you know I could never read that stuff!
Gandalf: *sighs* There are few who can. The language is that of Mordor, which I shall not utter here.
Frodo: Why not?
Gandalf: Because it's EVIL, you fool! *shakes head at the inbreeding of Hobbits, which produced this under-sized Brainless Wonder * In the Common Tongue, it reads, 'One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them. One Ring to bring them all, and in the darkness bind them.'
Scene changes. Frodo and Gandalf sit at the kitchen table and stare sideways at the Ring like it's going to grow tiny legs and run off if they don't prevent it.
Gandalf: This is the One Ring, forged by the Dark Lord Sauron in the fires of Mount Doom, taken by Isildur from the hand of Sauron himself.
Frodo: Bilbo found it, in Gollum's cave.
Gandalf: How about you try telling me something I didn't know, huh? *returns to his lines as though nothing interrupted* For sixty years, the Ring lay quiet in Bilbo's keeping, prolonging his life, delaying old age. But no longer. There is evil stirring in Mordor. The Ring has awoken. It's heard its Master's call.
Frodo: But he was destroyed. Sauron was destroyed.
The Ring whispers denial.
Ring: You DOLT! I can't possibly have heard him if he's DEAD!!
Gandalf: *aside* I agree with the Ring. Now, please, no more dumb remarks! *clears throat, continues in a pompous voice* Sauron's spirit endured. His life-force was bound to the Ring, and the Ring survived. Sauron has returned. His orcs have multiplied. His fortress of Barad-Dur is rebuilt in the land of Mordor. Sauron needs only this Ring to cover all the lands in a second darkness. He is seeking it, seeking it, all his thought is bent on it. The Ring yearns above all else to return to the hand of its Master. They are one, the Ring and the Dark Lord. Frodo. He must never find it.
Frodo: I should say not! He wants to steal my beautiful Ring!
Gandalf: *rolls eyes* Yeah, well! There was one other who knew that Bilbo had the Ring. I looked high and low for that little slimeball, Gollum, but the Enemy beat me to him and tickled him until, amid the hysterical cackling and inane drivel, they recognized two words. Shire. Baggins.
Frodo: Shire. Baggins. But that would lead them here!
Gandalf: *tapping Frodo on the head* Well, duh! Is there anything actually IN that pretty little head of yours?
A Black Rider kills a Hobbit night watchman. Somewhere outside, not in Frodo's living room. Back in the living room, Frodo holds out the Ring to Gandalf.
Frodo: *ignoring Gandalf's insult to his intellect* Take it, Gandalf, you must take it!
Gandalf: You cannot offer me this Ring!
Frodo: I am giving it to you!
Gandalf: I had kinda noticed that, Dodo! But don't tempt me! I dare not take this Ring, not even to keep it safe. Understand, I would use this Ring from a desire to do good...but through me, it would wield a power too great and terrible to imagine.
Frodo: But it cannot stay in the Shire!
Gandalf: No. No, it can't.
Frodo: *droops, knowing that Gandalf has pawned something off on a Baggins yet again* What must I do?
Frodo begins packing quickly.
Gandalf: You must leave, and leave quickly.
Frodo: Where? Where do I go?
Gandalf: In the toilet, fool! Oh, and after that, get out of the Shire. Make for the village of Bree.
Frodo: What about you? Where will you go? You can't use my toilet, you're far too big! You'd break it!
Gandalf: I will wait until I get to the Inn of the Prancing Pony. I'll meet you there, I've got something else to do first.
Frodo: You can wait that long? And the Ring will be safe there?
Gandalf: I don't know, Frodo. I don't have any answers. I must see the head of my order. He is both wise and powerful. Trust me, he will know what to do. You must leave the name of Baggins behind you.
Name of Baggins: *sobbing inconsolably* NOOO! You can't leave me behind! I WANT to GO!!
Gandalf: *in an explanatory way* That name is not safe outside the Shire. Travel only by day, and stay off the road.
Frodo: I can cut across country easily enough. It's so soft and flaky!
Gandalf: Frodo.
Frodo: Hee hee! Sorry.
Gandalf rolls his eyes and looks at Frodo, who is now packed, cloaked, and ready for his journey.
Gandalf: Dear Frodo.
Frodo: *absently arranging his cloak to look more stylish* You don't have to start a letter to me already!
Gandalf: *huffs* That's not what I meant. I meant that Hobbits are amazing creatures. You can learn everything there is to know about their ways in a month, and after a hundred years they can still surprise and irritate you!
There is a giggling noise outside the window.
Gandalf: Get down!
Frodo starts dancing like John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever, Gandalf bonks him with his staff.
Gandalf: Not like that!! I mean, like, duck!
Frodo: Where?
Gandalf: Arggh...I give up.
Frodo: Oh! You mean get down!
Frodo drops to the floor.
Gandalf: That's what I said...
Gandalf reaches out the window with his staff, hits a something which sounds suspiciously like a Sam hobbit. Hauls said Sam hobbit in by the scruff of his neck.
Gandalf: Confound it all, Samwise Gamgee, have you been eavesdropping?
Sam: I ain't been dropping no eaves, sir, honest, I was just cutting the grass outside the window there, if you follow me.
Gandalf: A bit late for trimming the verge, don't you think?!
Sam: I heard raised voices.
Gandalf: What did you hear? Speak!
Sam: Nothing important. That is, I heard a good deal about toilets, and letters, and *chokes back laughter* cutting across country, and something about the end of the world, but-please don't hurt me, sir! Don't turn me into anything-unnatural.
Gandalf: No? Perhaps not. I've thought of a better use for you.*puts on wisest voice* We'll use you for firewood!
Frodo: No, that won't work! Why don't we just use him as bait? I mean, like, if the Ringwraiths come by, I can, like, throw him at them and escape while they're slaughtering him, right?
Sam begins to look green.
Pippin: *sticking head in* Or, you could just eat him!
Merry: *sticking head in next to Pippin's* Or, you could-
Gandalf: *annoyed and roaring* That is ENOUGH!! My idea is best!! I am the wizard here! (A/N can't you imagine Gandalf doing his best Napoleon the dog imitation: Ahhhhhm the leader...) Now get OUT!! *shows off his powers*
Merry and Pippin: AHHHH!! *try to pull out of window only to discover that their heads are stuck* AHHHH!! *try again unsuccessfully, start to try a third time*
Gandalf quickly changes scenes before they can ruin the whole film, leaving up to our imaginations just how they got out, while in the background the sounds of one Sam being sick all over the floor are covered by music.
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A/N More of dolphin's potty jokes!! And, worse, many more on the way! Oh, well!
Have you noticed that we use a lot of Disney movie references? As in-movies that no sane adult would ever admit to having ever seen? (Napoleon the dog, for instance, is from The AristoCats.) Well, that would be because dolphin and I share his late grandmother's apartment, which was built right off the main house's living room. When the younger members of dolphin's family watch a children's video, the sound blasts right through the paper-thin walls and dolphin and I have no choice but to listen. We've tried everything, believe me, and nothing can cover the sound! So, if you begin to see infantile humour leaking through into our writing, that would be the reason. (That and the fact that we both are due for a little psychiatric help of our own!) Morphy