Disclaimer: Same drill as always…I own nothing you recognize.
As it turned out, blonde pointy-eared guy wasn't alone; it only took me a while to discover that. Just what I wanted, a bunch of dangerous men of various heights (few midgets were stuck in there…) pointing weapons at me and my best friends.
Approximately five minutes after the group of weirdos, as I so call them, found us, we were still tensely staring at each other. The rest of the guys quickly noticed that there was something up with the little group of people which consisted of pointy-eared guy, short, angry, bearded man, four even shorter hairy footed people, a couple of grubby guys that actually seemed kind of normal, and an old man that reminded me vaguely of Dumbledore from Harry Potter. Defiantly not a group you see on a regular day.
But this was far from a regular day.
So here we all were, nine of them, five of us, just looking each other over. Actually, they were looking us over, and we were just standing there hoping to God that they are all in good moods today. Frankly, I didn't want to be murdered by a bunch of freaks in wacked clothes.
"Who are you, and where do you hail from?"
I jerked my head up when I heard the Dumbledore look-alike talk. I looked at the other guys, all of whom seemed to be silently debating who was going to say something back to them. The decision was made when Zeke pushed Adrian forward.
Adrian threw a glare back at Zeke before responding. "Er…I'm Adrian, and those guys are Erick, Zeke, Jack, and Noel." Adrian introduced each of us, pointing to us each in turn. "And we come from San Diego." Adrian finished.
We got nine blank stares.
"You know, California? The United States of America? Are we ringing any bells here?" I blurted out, before realizing that I probably should be more respectful of a bunch of people with weapons.
The blank stares continued, except now we got a few suspicious glares mixed in with them. This was so not going well.
"I have never heard of this place, San Diego was it, before. I have made many travels. Perhaps you, Strider, or Legolas has any idea of where this place is?" My eyes widened when I saw pointy-eared dude, and one of the normal looking guys, the one with dark hair, shake their heads in response to Dumbledore's question. This was REALLY bad.
"If you don't mind me asking then, where are we?" I heard Adrian's voice quiver slightly in his question.
"In Middle Earth. We will give you no more details where." Dark haired normal dude answered.
"I'm getting the fleeting impression that you don't trust us worth shit." I said, once again, before I realized what I was doing, except unfortunately this time I found myself unable to stop talking. "I mean, here we are, in the middle of a freaking forest when you all stumble upon us. And you're probably thinking who the hell these freaks from this San Diego place are, and I'm not making our situation any better, am I?" I asked when I noticed the looks of dismay I was receiving from my closet friends.
"Let's just shut up for a while." Jack said, covering my mouth with his hand.
After struggling in Jack's grip for a while I gave up hope of escaping and opted to listen to Adrian's conversation, which was getting more and more desperate as each second passed.
"Really, we aren't evil! Really! We're good people." Translation: We're good people, please don't kill us.
"How can we trust you?" I winced at the blonde guy's harsh tone. For a guy who looks almost angelic he doesn't seem so pleased to see us. "How can we trust a group of children that show up in the middle of a forest, who claim they are from a place unheard of?" He continued. Somebody was in a bad mood today.
"I agree with Mr. Legolas. How can we trust them? And look at how they dress, and that man's hair is blue!" For the first time someone other than Dumbledore, Dark haired normal dude, and pointy-eared man (who was apparently Legolas…what kind of name is that!) spoke up. I looked down at the really short dude that spoke. He had reddish-brown curly hair and a pack on his back. What amused me was the large amount of pots and pans hanging off of it.
Then of course I realized that he had just sat there and insulted my clothing. Not that we looked normal compared to the weird group in front of us. All of us had on at least one article of clothing on that was black, in most of our cases our pants consisted of a few chains here and there, and as the little dude with the pots pointed out, Zeke's hair was at the moment blue. I had a feeling that these people weren't used to blue haired guys.
"What's wrong with our clothes?" I tugged Jack's hand away from my mouth, and before I could be stopped I made yet another stupid comment.
"Shut up Noel!" I felt another hand cover my mouth in a wild attempt to keep me quiet, Adrian's this time. I immediately recognized the feeling of his cool silver rings on my face.
"Well, look at you all! With those chains and that black stuff around your eyes!" I sent a glare in short pots and pans dude's direction. He was obviously referring to the eyeliner that Adrian, Zeke, and I outlined our eyes with. If there was one thing I was defensive about, it's the way I do my eyeliner. But I'm just crazed like that.
"Lets get off the topic of our clothes." I heard Adrian say. "The big question is are you really going to leave a bunch of defenseless kids here, alone, in the woods, where we could be hurt?" Adrian was begging now. Not that I blame him. If I was talking I either would have driven these people to kill me already (I think I was close anyways), or I would be on my knees begging to come along with them. So technically Adrian was coping better than I would.
Dark haired normal man and Dumbledore exchanged looks at Adrian's question. If anybody could make you feel guilty, Adrian was your man. Dark haired dude nodded his head minutely as did Dumbledore. I silently prayed to any Gods that there were, that the exchange of nods was a symbol of "they can come with us".
My wish was quickly granted.
"You may accompany us on our journey, provided that you do not delay us in any way. Be aware that we will not be letting you all out of our sight, as you do not have our full trust yet." Dark haired dude told us, giving each of us pointed looks that just screamed "we don't trust you at all, screw up and you're dead". I felt myself sigh in relief. Even though Dark haired man was staring us down, and Legolas (so I assumed), other normal looking guy, and all the people that were below average height were either glaring at us or regarding us with suspicion, I was beyond happy that we weren't going to be left in the middle of nowhere. Even if basically none of the people here trusted us.
"We are going to camp here for the night." Dark haired man said.
The group of us nodded and just stood aside as the weird people set up, what was apparently, camp.
I sighed and once again took my place leaning against my tree, vaguely wondering who these people were and what exactly I had gotten myself into.
"So, what do we call you all?" Zeke spoke up, voicing my thought up question.
Dark haired guy looked at Zeke, looking at his blue hair for a brief moment before answering. "You may call me Strider," mentally I snorted. Nice name dude. "The group over there is Gandalf, Frodo, Pippin, Merry, and Sam," Strider continued, motioning to each person in turn starting with Dumbledore, and ending with little, short pots and pans guy. "And the three over there that seem to be arguing are Gimli, Legolas, and Boromir." Strider once again motioned to each person, revealing short, angry man as Gimli, angry, pointy-eared man as Legolas, and other normal guy as Boromir.
What kind of names are these?
Apparently all the names were a bit hard to swallow, as each of us proceeded to pursue our nervous habit. I began biting my nails, Zeke shook his head and began tracing designs on his knee with his finger, Jack and Adrian just stared, And Erick, after a moment of what seemed like confusion, shook his head and pulled out a cigarette.
"Milady?" I glanced to my left to see Strider looking at me.
"Yeah?"
"If you don't mind me asking, how did the five of you come here?"
I shrugged. "Actually, we have no idea. We went to sleep and woke up here." I paused briefly. "And my name is Noel."
I could see a ghost of a smile on Strider's features. The man confused the hell out of me to tell the truth. He seemed to have power, even if it was well hidden, it was still there. He also
"If you don't mind, can I ask you a few things?" At Strider's nod I continued. "Where are we? Where are we going? Why does the blonde guy, Legolas, have pointy ears? Is there a reason why half of the group is midget size? Why aren't we dead? Why is the sky blue?" I asked in one breath, asking the last question to see what reaction I would get.
"You are between the Hollin Ridge and the Redhorn Pass, which is where we are going. Legolas is an elf, which is the explaination for his ears as the whole of the Elven race has pointed ears. Gimli is a dwarf, and Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin are Hobbits, both of their races are shorter in height than men. You are not dead because when we first found you we quickly noticed that you were children, and very few will kill a child without just cause. And the sky is blue because that is the color the Valar made it." Strider answered back, just as quickly.
I was just stared at Strider like he had gone absolutely bananas.
"Dude, elves don't exist. And what the fuck is hobbit?"
A/N: And there's chapter four! Just to mention, Aragorn told Noel, Jack, Adrian, Erick, and Zeke that his name was Strider because he still doesn't trust them. I mean they could be enemies for Gondor and it would hardly be good for Aragorn to just straight out state that he was Aragorn…so to Noel and the guys, Aragorn is going to be Strider. Now to good business! Thanks to all my reviewers, you all inspire me beyond words to continue!
cat.1.d- Yep, I did update…sorry for the delay on both chapters…I've been going through some personal problems that set me back, but I'm here now! Hope you enjoyed this chapter.
moody- Thanks much! I had fun writing the last chapter, particularly the flashback…poor Zeke…lol I'll keep an eye out for errors. Thanks for reviewing!
Ravyn-Spirit (aka Noel)- Yes, you get a nickname! And fear not, Haldir will be in later chapters, as will probably some unnamed sexy immortal that I think up, lol. Glad you internet is up and working again! Hope you like this chapter!
Thanks to all my reviewers, you all are so totally awesome! Thanks to all of the people who read my story, and even though you didn't review…you all are awesome too! I'll be posting the next chapter later this week or sometime next week, so stay tuned…
Laterness!
Celebel
