I am on such a high right now from, well, everything. I thank all who reviewed last chap and here's the next one, a little long but what can you do when you want to write all day. My dad's going psycho at me all the time, saying I need to learn Dutch and writing on the computer all day is not helping…if he takes away the computer, he takes away my life.

Muse #2: I can't see what the problem is, this is basically your future career ain't it?

Muse #3: But you DO sit up all night and type.

HM: Blame number 4

Muse #4: What'd I do now

#2: Made her dad mad

Vana: Made my dad mad

#3: Made her…

#4: OK OK I get the picture, sheesh.

* * * *

Here's the story

2: Ever Seen a Hobbit and Suds?

"FRODO! HELP!" The yell came from outside and three hobbits, 1 old and 2 younger ones, ran out into the garden to gawk at the sight.

Merry walked up the hill, or more correctly, Merry struggled and fell several times while walking up the hill dragging a big brown carry sack that seemed to be moving and jumping about on it's own accord. Merry's shadow and accomplice to many a crime was nowhere to be seen and all eyes went back to the sack as Merry puffed up, plonking it down on the ground and flopping alongside it.

"You called?" Frodo knelt down and poked the moving sack. A muffled squeak came from inside and he couldn't help but smile.

"Pippin?" He looked up at Merry and the hobbit nodded, but he wasn't smiling, in fact he looked unusually sour and the suddenly noticed dirt covering him from head to toe presented the fact that something was wrong.

"I popped him in the sack for his own safety."

"I thought you did it for a joke, like usual."

"This isn't like usual, Frodo. He's gone batty."

"Huh?" Frodo poked the sack again and the voice from inside sounded like Pippin, but the words he was saying made no sense whatsoever.

"Hey! Fruits bruise and I need to go and grow. If I don't there will be no more walking fruits and all pippins will be sad. He says he's merry but he chucks me in a bag after I told him I didn't want to and will you let the first walking fruit out, all pippin's need sunlight and water, and dirt of course or my hair won't take root…" he continued but they stopped listening, concentrating on Merry's story of what happened instead.

"I thought he was fooling around but it got weirder and weirder, than I just said the wrong things and he took it all literally. Then he got it into his head that maybe he was a new strain of fruit that had roots for hair and dived into the peat bog down on the field, between The Old Road and Hobbiton near the old lane. Took all my strength to pull him out again and then he pushed ME in, saying my 'roots wouldn't fall out if I grew them'. Nearly suffocated I did, and THEN he goes and empties my sack of well earned veggies saying 'Free, free now you can walk like fruits'. He is convinced he is a fruit, not Pippin like we know him. I think he's lost it, completely."

"I would say he's lost something, but not his mind as you would think it." The Gaffer knelt down next to the sack and proceeded to untie it, causing a mortified Merry to try and stop him.

"No! No you'll kill us all!"

"Never you mind about that Master Brandybuck, as I said before, I think he has lost something, and that might simply be his memory."

"His memory?" The three other hobbits echoed, even Sam, who had kept clear from Merry since he had arrived, he stank like high glory and he didn't want to get closer than need be.

"Yes, and unfortunately I think he lost more of it than would usually happen, so he has lost all sense of identity as a hobbit as well as basic knowledge of who he is and his past. You said he had a nasty bump Master Brandybuck? Well, I'll just have to check for my…AHH!"

Pippin leapt out of the loosened sack, landing nimbly in the garden and proceeded to snuffle around like a hog would, uprooting a few vegetables accidentally and putting them back, wrong way round of course, through his snuffles they could hear certain words that seemed to justify his actions.

"Got to put them in right…if roots are like hair than furry has to go into dirt…helps grow big and strong…oh, pretty flower…"

"Oh give us strength." Merry put his head in his hands and all watched dumfounded as Pippin continued to scurry with his head in the dirt, totally ignoring that fact he was tearing up the garden until Frodo came back to himself and looked around in dismay.

"Oh no, if Bilbo ever comes back and sees this he'll have a fit."

"Don't you worry Mister Frodo, I'll fix it up and it'll be as good as new before you can say…NO Pippin! Not the hyacinths!" Sam picked up the broom by the door and started whopping the poor little fruity hobbit with it, driving him away from his precious flowers and cornering him, threatening him with another whop if he so much as moved and inch.

All stared on amused, only an attack on the garden would get Samwise so wound up like this and it at least was keeping Pippin from any more trouble. And he stank.

"Aw Mister Merry, you'd better go inside and have a bath. You smell putrid, not meaning it in a disrespectful way of course, but…" The Gaffer held his nose to demonstrate the fact and Merry nodded, not feeling like arguing as he got up and smelled himself, scrunching up his nose in disgust.

"Uh, if you don't mind Merry. I would prefer it if we get you and Pippin rinsed off out here before I risk you coming inside, matter of pride you know." Frodo blushed and motioned to the pump, grabbing a bucket as they all trooped after him and Sam herding a muttering "pippin fruit" with his broom in the same direction with a face no one dared argue with.

10 minutes later, Merry and Pippin had been stripped down to their undergarments, both shivering in the front yard as the freezing water was poured over them but only Pippin was muttering words of thanks. Watering was good for fruits you know.

"Oh look! There's Sam and his father, and Frodo, and Merry and Pip…EEEK!" The shrill screech of three young female hobbits hiding their faces in their aprons sent Merry hurtling himself into the bushes, only Pippin stood openly in the yard and he grinned.

"Oooh what pretty little flowers." He was actually referring to the flowers on their dresses but the girls tentatively peeked out, thinking he was referring to them in person.

"Pippin, put this on." Frodo growled, shoving a towel at him with no response before he wrapped it around the hobbit himself, tying it securely round his waist as the girls came up closer.

"Hello Pippin." One said shyly, obviously trying to keep her eyes averted and obviously not succeeding.

"Hello Diamond." Frodo came in aid of the "fruit" and pushed him in the general direction of the door, all the while talking to young Diamond as if they were merely speaking of the weather, which they were.

"So, do you think autumn is upon us yet?"

"I wouldn't know, Frodo…why is he all wet and shivering out here, he should be inside having a warm bath if he has a cold like you say."

"He fell in the mud." Frodo finalized it with a shove of Pippin into the Gaffer's arms, who then led him inside with promises of more watering to come.

Diamond just stared and went to sit on a bench outside the door, waiting for them to return, if they ever did.

"Where is he? I'm sure I saw him somewhere around here but now he's gone…ohh the stubbornness of that hobbit." Another hobbit lass was peering around the bushes, poking at shrubs and pulling aside branches of hedges, searching for someone and all could guess who it was.

"Ah, there you are…" The pleased sound of her voice turned to shocked scolding as she hauled the almost naked Merry out of the bushes by him arm, his face beat red with embarrassment at his vulnerable position.

"Meriadoc Brandybuck! What are you doing out here, in the cold breeze with naught but your cloths on. I would think you knew your health better than that if you wish to keep well enough for my pie tonight."

"Pie?" He perked up at the thought and suffered himself to be led inside by the female, all the while trying to keep his dignity by grabbing a towel of Frodo's extended arm and wrapping around his waist, whispering into his ear as he did so.

"I will get Pip back for this. I truly will."

"Now, now Merry. Don't you go and stand out here and chat all day. You need a hot bath and you will not leave this place until you have it, is that clear?"

"Yes, Estella." Was his meek reply and Frodo stared after him, a small smile playing on his lips.

"That Estella Bolger will be a try for him I wouldn't wonder, if they ever thought to be together that is hey Sam…Sam?" Frodo looked around for his departed friend and smiled again when he saw him leaning over the fence and obviously in a deep conversation with the last hobbit girl.

"So will Rose for poor Sam. He simply has no idea what dragon's lair he is leading himself into, she can have a temper, mind you, and being her friend I am usually taking the brunt of it."

Frodo looked down at Diamond on the bench and sat next to her, smiling as she took something out of her basket and starting munching on it, an apple of all things.

"Er, Pippin may not be available tonight."

"Why not?" She looked surprised, and so did he when he realized she had finished off her first apple and was now on the second. When had that happened?

"He's too sick."

"He didn't look that sick when I saw him out…" she blushed at the memory, hiding her face as she finished the second apple and went onto the third. No wonder she and Pippin seemed to fit together, they had so much in common, like the bottomless pits that were their stomachs for instance.

"He is VERY sick, trust me on that."

"Oh the poor fruit, I'll have to feed him my soup."

"The poor what?"

"Fruit. I always call my patients that, it kind of…Frodo, why are you laughing?"

Frodo hiccupped on the laughs that were just bubbling up in his system before he lost it and fell off the bench, holding his stomach with the mirth that continued pouring from his mouth as he laughed and laughed.

"I swear Frodo, if I didn't know you better I'd almost say you are like all Bagginses. Mad. But as your friends are the same, with you all bathing out in the air, I will say it is merely a disease and will pass soon, my little fruit."

This was too much and Frodo started wheezing and coughing, he was laughing so much. But as Diamond scowled a little at his over exuberance and proceeded inside, her scream sobered him straight away and he popped up to the door, gaping at the site before him.

"But flowers need watering. He said so." Pippin was covered in nothing but suds and water and was holding an empty bucket, the contents of which were now all over Diamond in a sudsy fury.

She stood silent for a moment, simply standing in shock while Merry (now clothed), Estella and the Gaffer all peeked around a door timidly, waiting for her wrath as Sam and Rose came up behind Frodo and held their breath.

"Well." She said finally, picking at the hem of her soaked dress and frowning a little. "I can defiantly say this is a genuine Baggins' party. 'Only in Bag End', they say. Only in Bag End." And with that she snatched the bucket out of Pippin's hands, tipped it over and dumped it on his head, effectively trapping him deep inside as she walked calmly and sedately further into the hole, dripping all the way as she munched an apple and left her poor "fruit" to scream and punch at the bucket in an attempt to get the "night away".

It was then, and only then that the other two females realized he was still naked and squealed a little before being led away by their respective hobbit lads. This left Frodo and the Gaffer standing in the wet hallway, both with an exasperated look on their faces.

"Well, that was weird."

"Happy Birthday Frodo."

"Don't you worry about that, I'm sure I'll either be laughing my head off by tonight, either that or crying my eyes out. If my hole survives long enough with that "fruit", running about."

"I can only hope it will." The Gaffer replied before another scream startled them and they realized Pippin had unwittingly followed Diamond down the hall and by the sounds of it, was not making her very happy.

"Free! Be free and grow my little fruits so you can walk and run and play like me! FREEDOM!"

"PIPPIN! You give me back my apples NOW! Stop throwing them out the window PIPPIN!"

"You don't have a window back there, Frodo." The Gaffer scratched his head and followed Frodo running down the hall, the little guy waving his arms about and yelling at the top of his lungs.

"PIPPIN, GET AWAY FROM THE VENT. You'll clog the vent!!! PIPPIN!!!"

"Free, free, free…!"

TBC

A/N: Ok, now I'm stuck. I haven't got much of and idea what to do next. HEEEELLLLPPP!!! I again thank all for the reviews but I am hoping to involve some other ideas into this aswell. I'm thinking I'll take Pipsqueak's idea up, but not till later, this is Pippin's story at the moment, he's gone "fruity". Hee Hee.