Sam walked slowly over to Bill and snuck him a small carrot he kept stashed in his pocket. "Just between us," he whispered to the pre-packaged pony.
Merry and Pippin sat dejectedly on the ground, each staring wistfully at the leaves in front of them wishing they would erupt into flames (The leaves not themselves. Although that would make them warmer). Aragorn appeared quietly behind them distributing blankets. A tattered and frayed piece of fabric hit Merry square in the face. In a flash, Pippin wrapped his grubby hands about it. Merry would have none of this, as he started to tenderize the younger hobbits mid section.
Frodo looked back from his gaze over the threatening mountains to catch the two Hobbits wrestling on the ground, "Now come on, we're supposed to be working together."
Merry got in a good jab and responded, "Why did we even bring him along. All he's going to do is fall in a hole somewhere and become Hobbit chow for a wolf."
"Not if I give them you first," Pippin responded as he wrapped his mouth around Merry's wrist.
"Oh for the love," Gandalf raised himself slowly from an oak stump. In a quick move, he whacked the two Hobbits on the back of the head with his staff, "knock it off, or there won't be no blankets for anyone. Where the hell is Legolas?"
Boromir looked up from his hands, "Oh well, I believe that Aragorn had sent him forward to try and scout out what possible problems we could stumble blindly into. Perhaps some Orc scouts or another wolf. Something of that nature. He seemed to believe that Legolas could use his elf eyes to see farther and discern evil better."
"I'm still here," Gimli interrupted trying to remove his axe from the side of Gandalf's stump.
"Good, go and find him Gimli."
"What?" the dwarf stared at the old man's wrinkly face.
"Look, you're no use to us here, go off alone into the dangerous forest and find the missing member of our company."
Grumbling the entire way, Gimli shuffled off in some random direction, melding into the forest. No one watched him leave.
Aragorn lightly nudged Sam in the ribs, "What? Oh right. Last night Aragorn and I saw some birds. He seems to think they were scouts or spies or something. Right?"
He turned to look up at Aragorn, which took quite a strain on his neck. The Ranger simply nodded.
Gandalf looked at the two for a moment, one mothy eyebrow slightly raised, "Okay, time to head off into additional danger."
"What, why?" Frodo chimed in forgetting about his plan to rip Merry and Pippin's shared blanket in half with Sting, "We do not know if these birds were in fact spies or not. Shouldn't we simply take the safest road and put off on imminent danger until we are certain?"
Merry got in another kick to Pippin before Frodo pulled the blanket out of their hands and held it aloft.
For a moment Gandalf thought about simply hitting Frodo in the head with Sam's frying pan, "Because we must take the mountain Caradhras. It will be cold, wet, and treacherous, but there is no other way. And I said so."
Aragorn roughly cleared his throat, causing a death glare from the old Wizard. "Look, do you want to lead these band of misfits to almost certain doom?" Gandalf asked.
"Certain doom?" Frodo's face paled.
Aragorn shook his head and averted his gaze. "No? Anyone else want to be leader? Shut up Boromir. Anyone? Good. Now let's hit that mountain."
At that moment, Gimli's boots came crashing through the forest, his axe chopping down any vegetation in the way. He poked his head through a rather thick bush and said, "I couldn't find him."
Gandalf turned and stared at the dwarf, "Find whom?"
"That stupid elf, Lego-my-eggo, whatever his name is."
Gandalf turned his head to the left side and looked down for a moment, "Oh that's right, I remember now. He's just a few yards that way," he pointed his bony old finger behind Frodo, "He said he needed a special light to re-fix his hair or something, I wasn't really paying attention."
Gimli snarled, trudged through the foliage into the makeshift camp and threw himself onto the ground. The rest of the fellowship packed up and were just about the leave when Boromir noticed that Gimli was still sitting on the ground, "Get up Master Dwarf. Gandalf has determined that we shall take the more treacherous path and probably freeze to death on the mountain."
Gimli looked up at everyone for a moment, his
eyes connecting with Frodo -- who was peering warily at the rest of the
fellowship, "I don't care what my Dad says, I knew I should of just killed
you all in your sleep."
Little note for RAM: I don't usually do this but since you were one
of my faithful reviewers here is a link to my finished MST. Warning it's
very long (add some w's here) geocities.com/blablover5/fics/