Disclaimer: HAH! I DO I DO I DO I DO I DO I D---- thunk
Gandalf: I hope that teaches you!
Archie: eh, nah... (hides under desk chair and shoots neon pink string at Gandalf)...
Gandalf: (smites Archie over the head with his staff) now THAT will teach you!
Archie:Fine! I...don't...own...it...YAAAAHHHHHHHH! (shoots more string at Gandalf)
Allrighty then, chapter 9: dictionaryflyingatmyheadAAAAHHHHHH! (please don't ask…)
After camping out on the cold hard ground all night, with some kind of weird tree thingys going by and freaking everyone out, and then waking up a couple of hours later to a cold and cheerless breakfast and even colder fingers, the company of riders and various important people rode across the Isen and towards Meduseld.
The riding arrangements were as follows: Merry refused to ride with Aragorn and wanted to go with Théoden, but of course was denied because Théoden was a king and wouldn't have a freaky little hobbit riding at his tail, so in the end Merry rode with Éomer. Pippin wanted to ride with Aragorn, but of course was denied for no reason at all, and got stuck with Goosy Goosy Gandalf.
Legolas took Gimli, as always, and suffered severe nasal discomfort for it too. "When I'm king," he growled under his breath, "I'm going to enforce the ECC on all of Middle Earth, cause everybody knows" –here he started shouting- "DWARVES ARE DIRTY!" Luckily, almost no one heard him, except Gimli, who whacked Legolas on the back with the broad side of his axe, evoking a satisfying "YIKES!" from the poor elf.
So, with these arrangements, the company galloped over the plains towards Edoras, heedless of the fact that they could not in fact gallop for 3 days straight, they did it in 1 day anyway.
That night, there was a feast in the Golden Hall, honoring those that gave their lives to defend their people at Helm's Deep. Aragorn, however, was thinking of something else – the specter that he had first encountered, here in this very village, were haunting him again – only now, they were partying along with everyone else, and changing color every minute or two so they looked really cool. He finally decided to just ignore them.
After the whole incident with Aragorn, Éowyn looked after him fondly as he walked away. Her uncle came up behind her, spoiling the moment as always. "I am happy for you," he said for no reason at all. What is it with kings saying random stuff all the time anyway? "He is an honorable man," her uncle continued. "It was not Théoden of Rohan who led our people to victory. Ah," he sighed, seemingly coming back to the present, "Don't listen to-" here he was abrubtly cut off by a whirlwind of bright colors rushing up to him.
"Aaaaawwwwww, honey, are you feeling down on yourself? Do you wanna talk about it? Huh? You know, you're really a very strong, good, caring king, do you know that? Come on, you've gotta get your self-esteem up if you're gonna rule this country! Don't get down on yourself! Let's do some easy stress-relief and self-esteem building exercises, okay? Laugh with me!" Here, the overly enthusiastic slightly nutty counselor broke into maniacal giggles, and was dragged away by the other people in the room, leaving a slightly stunned King Théoden standing with an equally stunned Éowyn, only to be dragged back moments later.
"A counselor! A counselor! A counselor! We've got a counselor! A counselor!" the peasants cried as the hustled her along.
"We have found a Counselor, might we depress her?" said the apparent ambassador of the group.
"Depress her! Depress!" yelled the peasants.
"Eh, how do you know she is a counselor?" asked Théoden politely.
"She looks like one," rejoined the ambassador.
Théoden consented, "Bring her forward."
"I'm not a counselor, I'm not a counselor!" complained the unfortunate victim.
"But you are overly enthusiastic and bubbly like one," the King pointed out.
"They made me bubbly like this," the supposed Counselor claimed passionately.
"No, we didn't -- no," the crowd protested.
"And this isn't my demeanor, it's a false one!"
"Well?" Théoden enquired of the peasants.
The ambassador looked slightly sheepish. "Well, we did do the bubbliness."
"The bubbliness?"
"And the demeanor -- but she's a counselor!"
"Depress her! Counselor! Counselor! Depress her!" the crowd clamored.
THEODEN: "Did you enthuse her like this?"
PEASANTS: "No, no… no… yes. Yes, a bit, a bit."
AMBASSADOR: "She has got a happy disposition!"
THEODEN: "What makes you think she is a counselor?"
"Well, she turned me into a happy person!" claimed an obscure peasant.
"A happy person?" Théoden repeated, shocked.
"I got better," he added.
"Depress her anyway!" yelled the ambassador.
"Depress! Depress her!" yelled the crowd.
"Quiet, quiet. Quiet! There are ways of telling whether she is a counselor!" Théoden explained.
"There are? What are they? Do they hurt?" asked the peasants eagerly.
"Tell me, what do you do with counselors?"
"Depress! Depress them down!" apparently the peasants were not entirely ignorant, if only on one point.
"And what do you depress apart from counselors?" Théoden should have been a philosopher!
"More witches!" the seemingly dumbest of the group said loudly, before being shushed by his friend, who said, after a moment's thought, "Steel!"
"So, why do counselors get depressed?"
After a long pause, the stupid peasant said slowly, "B-…'cuz they're made of steel?"
"Good!" the King commended.
"Oh, yeah, yeah," the crowd murmured.
"So, how do we tell, whether she, is made, of steel?" Théoden queried.
"Build a bridge out of her!" said the ambassador.
"Aah, but can you not also build bridges out of stone?"
"Oh, yeah," said the peasants, and went back to ruminating on the answer.
THEODEN: "Does steel get happy?"
PEASANTS: "No, no. It gets depressed!"
THEODEN: "What also gets depressed?"
PEASANTS: "Bread!"
"Apples!"
"Very small rocks!"
"Cider!"
"Great gravy!"
"Cherries!"
"Mud!"
"Churches – churches!"
"Lead – lead!"
Suddenly, a wise voice spoke from off to the side. "Storm drains."
The crowd went "oooohhhhhh," dramatically.
THEODEN: "Exactly! So, logically…"
PEASANT #1: "If…she weighs…the same…as…a storm drain, she's…made of steel!"
THEODEN: "And therefore --?"
PEASANTS: "A counselor! A counselor! Depress her, depress her!"
After the peasants had gone off to render whatever judgement on the counselor they saw fit, Théoden turned to see who the Wise One was.
"Who are you, so learnéd in the ways of science?" he asked curiously.
"I am Aragorn, King of Gondor. And you already knew that! So there!" And with that, he stomped off to terrorize somebody.
"Well, anyway," Théoden continued his speech to Éowyn, "You are young, and tonight is for you." She smiled at him, and skipped (yes, skipped) off to find Aragorn.
Author's Note: okay people, I lied…this one wasn't exactly quick in coming, but I do have a good excuse! My computer crashed and so I lost this chapter, and haven't had time to re-write the whole thing, but I did get to do it finally. Yay! Okay, reviewers get……… A piece of chocolate cheesecake a mile high, a cardboard standup of Aragorn, a pumpkin with Legolas' face cut out of it, and a bag of Lord of the Rings trivia stuff the size of Iraq. M'kay? Bleh….Well hope you enjoyed that, although if you don't know Monty Python…well, then that was probably a very odd chappie for you! oh well. And remember --REVIEW!