Xanth Meets the Fellowship

Chapter 1 – Of Ducks and Elves

Summary of Chapter 1: Legolas looses his precious rubber duck in the mirror of Galadriel and has a royal cry-fest. The fellowship decides to go after the rubber duck affectionately named "Ducky" by Legolas. In the process Merry gets knocked out, Boromir looses his socks, Gandalf blackmails Pippin, and Celeborn holds a meeting on coffee tables. :D

Aragorn nearly jumped out of his skin as Legolas ran into the small house shared by the fellowship sobbing uncontrollably. Clearly something was wrong. After collecting his wits after Legolas had ran by, Aragorn looked at Merry and Pippin who were sitting is a nearby corner busied with their favorite hobby, plotting, at least he thought that was what they were doing. Merry and Pippin looked up clearly disturbed (unlike Boromir who was still oblivious to the commotion as he was hunting for his socks) by the bawling elf that was now crying on his bed loudly. Aragorn caught the hobbit's eyes and gave them a What-did-you-do-to-upset-him-this-time glare, oddly the hobbits looked innocent, that was a rare occurrence.

Aragorn had been sure Merry and Pippin has caused Legolas' great distress, after all who could forget when they stuck gum in his hair in the mines of Moria…Legolas had screamed so much he woke up the balrog. Or the time when they tossed Legolas' shampoo off the side of the Cahadras, That also involved a lot of screaming as he remembered; Legolas screaming in horror, Merry and Pippin screaming in fear as Legolas held them over the edge of the cliff by their furry feet, and Gandalf yelling urgently at Legolas to put them down. Aragorn would have helped Gandalf if he weren't laughing on the ground with Gimli, Frodo, and Sam.

Aragorn would have been content to sit and remember all the times Merry and Pippin had infuriated Legolas but unfortunately there was an elf still sobbing on the bed; and his wailing was getting more high pitched by the minute, so he could either risk loosing his hearing or try to find out what was wrong. Aragorn stood up from his chair by the door and went to the bed where Legolas was crying.

"What happened?" Aragorn inquired with a reluctant sigh. Legolas choked out his answer between sobs; "I-I was, going t-to take a b-bubble bath. And-and … DUCKY!" he wailed like a distressed chimpmunk.

Aragorn glanced at the hobbits that were now behind him to see if they had understood a single thing the elf had just said; the hobbits looked back at him just as confused as he was and shrugged their shoulders in unison. Aragorn turned back to the sobbing elf, "Erm, is Ducky a nick-name of one of your elf friends?" Aragorn inquired hoping to find out what exactly was wrong. Legolas with tears running down his face replied, "H-he's my rubber dduukkeeyy" Legolas cried. Aragorn was disorientated, "His rubber duck…oh Eru…" he thought to himself. Merry however, was eager to help and jumped in "what happened to Ducky, Legolas?"

Legolas had started to calm down a bit he was still sobbing but at least he had stopped howling. "He got sucked into G-Galadriel's mirror" Legolas said with tears. Pippin was confused, "So you were going to take a bubble bath and your rubber duck got sucked down into Galadriel's mirror? How did you manage that one?

Merry leaned over towards Pippin, "erm, Pip, I think he was going to take a bubble bath in Galadriel's Mirror. Pippin looked disgusted and then hurriedly hid his expression lest Legolas see it and get upset again. Too late, Legolas was wailing again. Aragorn shoved the hobbits out of the room as they clapped their hands over their ears. Aragorn tried to get the elf to stop crying.

Legolas had now begun to gain control of himself again now and was hiccupping. "We'll go find your rubber duck in the morning", Aragorn said reassuringly. Legolas' tensed expression lifted a little. "You promise we'll find him?" he asked rather pitifully. Aragorn replied simply, "sure if it'll shut you up…"

By the next morning the entire fellowship (and the rest of the population of Lorine) had found out all about Legolas' rubber duck. Aragorn doubted it was the fact that they all heard Legolas crying, although elves had excellent hearing; he was reminded of this by two guilty looking hobbits, whom he knew loved to gossip.

The entire fellowship (including Boromir; he had stopped looking for his missing socks long enough to come) and Celeborn were all gathered around the mirror of Galadriel in the garden sitting on assorted coffee tables; they had tried to get some folding chairs but they had run out because someone coughELRONDcough Had borrowed all of them for a council meeting and not returned them.

When Celeborn had summoned them all here to deal with this matter Aragorn asked him why, as it was not his problem to deal with. Celeborn simply responded that he felt responsible and walked away a blush creeping up his cheeks. Aragorn was confused…how could Celeborn be responsible for loosing Legolas' rubber duck?

All was at peace and normal in the garden, everyone was deep in thought about how they could handle this situation. That is except for Merry and Pippin, they were fighting over the mahogany coffee table, Pippin had refused to trade it for the oak one Merry was sitting on.

"Come on Pippin!" Merry said desperately, "I am older than you, you know! AND you owe me for taking the blame for the firecracker you put in Gimli's sleeping bag!" Merry almost whined. Pippin managed retaliated with confidence, "First of all, your only 7 months older than me; and second you were the one who came up with the idea to put a firecracker in Gimli's sleeping bag in the first place!" Merry grumbled a bit, blushing, and quickly glanced over towards where the dwarf was seated. Thinking of a new argument he took a big breath and opened his mouth to speak but there was a loud thunk and his eyes rolled to the back of his head and he sunk to the ground unconscious. Gandalf stood behind him with his staff where Merry's head had been a minute ago. "Now we may have some peace! And if you don't shut your mouth you fool of a Took I'll knock you out or find a worse punishment…" Pippin gasped his eyes showed his absolute horror as he whispered in a high-pitched terrified voice, "You wouldn't… Would you!" His eyes grew bigger and more scared. "Ai, I would, so behave yourself!" Gandalf stated and returned to his cherry wood coffee table between Gimli and Aragorn. Pippin sat up strait as if someone held a knife to his back, his eyes wary with fear.

Aragorn leaned over in his chair to come closer to Gandalf and whispered quietly, "What would you do to Pippin that terrifies him so much? Gandalf chuckled softly, "he is afraid that I would tell someone else something I know about him…Aragorn looked serious and thoughtful, then looked at Gandalf, what is it you know? Gandalf spoke almost silently, "his middle name…"

The meeting went on unhindered by the hobbits, or anyone else for that matter. It was decided that they would go after the duck, because no one wanted to suffer the piercing wail of Legolas if they said 'no'. They decided to leave after lunch; the hobbits (at least those who remained conscious) had refused to set out on an adventure (where a meal was uncertain) without a full stomach. Celeborn also agreed that it would be best for them to eat before they set out…Where they would go no one seemed to know or care really, after all why would they think about that when they were hurrying to go get some food? In their haste to get edibles they did not only forget about the mission but about Merry also.

Merry was left sprawled out on the grass by the mirror of Galadriel still unconscious while the others ate their lunch with the elves. Although he was left alone he was quite safe in the garden, the only creatures that passed by were a pair of squirrels. They were quite confused to see about a dozen random coffee tables surrounding an unconscious hobbit lying on the grass and only poked him a couple times before running off for some random reason. They assumed it was more of that 'modern art' stuff.

Elves are not all to familiar with the culture of hobbits, or their eating habits; the elves for their noon day meal usually ate sweet fruit filled pastries…that consisted of about 99.99 sugar. The Hobbits not usually subjected to such amounts of sugar in their systems immediately became super hyper. The elves were concerned at first they had no idea why the hobbits started bouncing around giggling insanely they were convince they had caught some disease until Aragorn explained it all to them.

After the fellowship had eaten lunch they went back (or rather bounced back for the hobbits) to their quarters and gathered their packs (Boromir had quite a time tiring to find his socks; Gimli finally found one of them in the blender) and went back to the garden to look for Celeborn; after all they had no idea where they would go to find the rubber duck.

Celeborn looked at the fellowship, there stood a king of men (who hadn't washed his hair in a year as it appeared), A captain of Gondor (who could have been out witted by a potato, and was wearing only one sock), an elven prince (who was currently arranging his shampoo and conditioner in his pack), a wizard of magnificent power (who was picking his nose), a gardening hobbit (who was staring at Frodo, with a slack expression), a ring bearer (practicing his on-the-verge-of-tears expression), a professional mischief maker (who was silently replacing Legolas' hair spray with super glue while no one was looking), And a unconscious lump (who was drooling).

Celeborn shook his head in dismay thinking to himself, "couldn't Elrond find people better than this! I mean he might as well put Gollum in the fellowship while he was at it! Celeborn looked at the ragtag bunch once again and sighed, "they'll have to do I guess."

Celeborn began his dramatic speech; "You will now venture into a unknown land, on a quest to obtain Legolas' rubber duck. Do you accept to see this mission through to the end?" There was a chorus of yeses, Pippin could be heard clearly saying: "as long as waffle night continues I shall see this mission through." Gandalf rolled his eyes. "Well is that everyone?" Celeborn asked. Frodo kicked Sam in the shin; Sam came back to reality with a jump and quickly said, "Yes, I would like some French toast!" Frodo shook his head in hopelessness.

Celeborn cleared his throat and ignored it. "You will be traveling through the mirror"; at this the fellowship all went "Oooo!" Celeborn glared at them. "You simply have to touch the surface then you will be transported to another realm"; Pippin started to go "Oooo" again but then stopped because he was the only one and Celeborn was giving him the death glare.

Celeborn was quite eager to get them as far away as possible by now, and told Legolas to go first because it was his rubber duck they were chasing after. Legolas went up to the mirror and looked at the water, "Oooo! Pretty!" he squealed, "I see a tree, and another tre-" Celeborn had pushed the elf into the mirror and Legolas was swiftly sucked through the surface of the water. "Who's next?" Celeborn inquired cheerfully though his expression was slightly crazed. The fellowship backed away from Celeborn slowly.

Celeborn was not discouraged, he went over to the unconscious lump on the grass that was Merry and picked him up and dunked his head in the mirror, and he was gone in a blink of an eye. Pippin was panicking, Merry was somewhere, unconscious and he wasn't. If he didn't go who would help him steal all Boromir's socks? Who would help him hide every spoon in the house on soup day? Pippin lost it. He started running around, arms flailing and yelling, then tripped over a coffee table and fell into the mirror. Sam heard Gimli mention something to Gandalf about mad cow disease.

Meanwhile

Legolas landed face first on a cold hard floor, his head spinning. He lifted his head to try and find out where in the heck he was. He was in a hall; there were at least two doors and a staircase. He put his head down again to try and stop the hallway from spinning around crazily. All of a sudden a heavy body fell on top of Legolas and he jumped up causing the body to roll off of him on to the floor. He looked down to see Merry lifeless looking on the floor and completely lost what little sanity he had. He began running around Merry waving his arms about screaming " DEAD HOBBIT! DEAD HOBBIT! EWW IT TOUCHED ME!" in about two and a half moments a woman in a full-length green dress came running up the stairs followed by a girl in blue jeans. They stared at the elf that at noticing their presence stopped running and screaming, said "Hullo!" pleasantly, before another body dropped out of nowhere and landed on his head causing him to fall to the floor.

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