. . . .
Never steal, the government hates competition. -Unknown
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That night the stars shone crystal clear, bright and silver like lanterns in the heavens. It took twice as long to get up into these woods as last time. Back roads twisted and turned all over the countryside.
Now the group camped, pulled well off the road and a mile or so from the cabin. Estel and Tauriel came into the clearing they found, breaking through the tree-line. Kristy didn't look up; Legolas arrived just a minute ago. They were scouting the area for soldiers. They couldn't start a fire until it was safe.
And so, Kristy was freezing.
"Will you just go sit in the car?" Legolas asked for the third time. She was huddled in the sheltering roots of a tree, wrapped in a blanket, "where it's warm?"
Kristy made a face.
He thought she was a pathetic little girl. Well she wasn't. And if he could take the cold, so could she. He could mind his own business.
"Keep the flames low." Tauriel advised. "I'll take first watch."
Fire! And Kris had an idea.
"Lemme do it." She spoke up.
Legolas glanced sideways. He was about to go gather branches for the fire. It was dark out, but the moon reflected off the snow. Every branch glowed faintly in the blackness, and looming shadows made the trees.
"You?"
"I can make a fire." She said, scrambling to her feet with blanket in tow. "My mom was a girl scout and she taught me. I can get the wood and everything."
Aragorn's brow twitched.
"Well I can." She insisted. After all, Kristy was self-reliant. And tough. She could survive as well as these buggers in the wild, if she had to.
Estel apparently relented, because a moment later, he sighed simply. "Go with her."
Legolas blinked.
"What?" She protested. "I'm not totally inept, you know!"
"Me." he echoed. It wasn't a question.
Estel just gave a look. He waited until Kristy didn't see, but the message was obvious to Legolas. It said something like 'Now is your chance to make amends with her, idiot elf!'
And yet, Legolas didn't particularly want to make amends. He had Kristy right where he wanted her.
The woman hated him.
"Oh very well." He muttered.
Kristy stared at the elf an instant, before shaking her head and stalking off into the woods. "Fine."
Her boots crunched over the frozen earth. It was rough and covered in black leaves. She kept slipping and stumbling, turning her ankle on stones and snow-dusted underbrush. And the more frustrated she got, the worse it became. The best part was she could hear the faint whisper of Legolas' feet on the forest earth, stepping lightly and silently behind her.
She clambered over a fallen log, cutting her palm in the process. Ice clung to the dead lichen and it was slippery. When she finally looked back up, she discovered he was walking along atop, one boot in front of the other.
Godammit.
"Don't you ever just trip?"
No answer.
"I hate you." She growled. Dumb elf.
"I know that." He said, so quiet and close she stopped where she stood in the snow.
Kristy looked up. The air had become so cold, it curled her breath and blew away in vapors as she spoke. "Then why don't you leave me alone?"
Legolas leapt from the log and landed silently in front of her. Kristy had to shuffle back so she wasn't tempted to lean into the warmth of his body. It was tangible. And it would have been inviting if it wasn't so repulsive.
"So you may trip and break your body? Suffer hypothermia? Die from exposure?" he lifted his chin. "I think not."
"So what?"
"I-" Legolas stopped, lips parted. He was about to answer, something snappish and curt, but decided not to. He rethought them. Because I will not see you hurt, no matter how angry we are? No, they were too kind. They might encourage her!
"I think you don't need an answer to that."
Kristy narrowed her eyes at him. They gleamed in the dark, even as she shivered. It was so…so Kristy like. Kitten fury.
"Oh right." She finally rolled her eyes, before spinning around and walking on. "Because you 'care' about me. I forgot."
Legolas didn't bother replying. He just waited a minute, before shaking his head and following after her. He decided it was time for a topic change. "So, do you even know what you're looking for?"
"Sticks."
"Obviously."
"Dry ones." She clarified. And with that, she yanked a branch down from the boughs overhead.
"Alright," he sighed. "'Tis apparent that you don't actually know what you are doing."
She ignored him.
"Choose that one." He said, pointing. "The wood of the Hickory is a much warmer burn. Yours will sputter and die."
Kris might have been tempted to ignore him. The dumb elf knew everything. But she couldn't. She liked the sound of that: warm. It made her hesitate.
Legolas couldn't resist. His mouth twitched into a slight, crooked grin. "And you…wouldn't be at all cold out here, would you Kristy?"
Kristy looked at her stick. "Oh shut up." She mumbled.
"Well it would have been warmer in the car." He said, taking the branches from her as she picked them off the ground. "I told you. You could run the heater."
"I don't want to use up gas."
Legolas let her cram sticks, brush, and broken pieces of log into her arms. He glanced down. "I suppose. But I feel like pride is a more determining factor than that."
"I don't know what you're talking about."
Legolas let it go.
. . . .
"Little harder."
Kris frowned. She was going to build this fire if it killed her.
"…Not that hard."
Flint and steel was so barbaric! It just didn't cooperate. "This works a whole lot better with starter fluid." She growled under her breath.
"But we have none." He said, close to her ear. "Therefore we make do with what we have."
"Legolas is right." Aragorn stepped into the clearing, settling back against a frosty log. He propped his boots up where the would-be fire would burn. "To survive in the wild, use all of nature's gifts. Look for the small things. Pay attention."
Kristy glanced up, before dropping her head with a dark thought. Not that I'll need that advice. She wouldn't be surviving in the wild anytime soon, not if Legolas had something to say about it.
As if echoing her thoughts, Legolas spoke up. "Though in your case, I'd recommend just…finding civilization again."
Kristy struck flint on steel a fifth time. "Why?"
Nothing.
"Because you don't think I'd make it?" she muttered blackly.
Aragorn's mouth twitched. Nothing else moved. Not until he slowly slipped his pipe from a coat pocket and slid it between his teeth.
"I don't think now is the time to discuss it." He said very, very softly.
And so it wasn't.
It ended that Tauriel would keep watch until midnight, when the moon was high and bright. Then Aragorn took her place. It was several hours later that Legolas even thought about talking to Kristy. He wasn't sure why. It didn't matter what she thought of him. He was an elf prince, a warrior, and not only that but he had a duty to protect her.
And so he wasn't sure why he crouched down a few hours later, behind the blanketed bundle. Tauriel lay in a heavy doze across the clearing, and warm firelight threw tiny shadows across the black trunks.
"Kristine." He murmured softly. Legolas knew she wasn't asleep. He could feel it across their bond. Maybe he came to her because her upset emotions were keeping him awake. Damn this link.
Kristy didn't answer. She just cracked her eyes open, staring at the blurry ground. She pillowed her head with an arm, curled in the fetal position. Legolas couldn't see her face.
"Would you like to talk?"
She wasn't warm, but not so bitterly cold either. The dim flame burned fierce heat and it lapped at her face. She was angry over their conversation in the hospital. She was confused and wounded. But yes…she did want it. Just a little part of her.
"Kristine…?"
"Go away." She mumbled softly. Dammit. Why did she say that!
No matter. He'd try again.
"Don't be a child."
Now was the time she should relent. This was silly.
But for some reason, she stayed silent.
Legolas was quiet a moment. As if he were thinking. Or stewing. She couldn't decide. Either way, a minute later, Kristy felt a second layer drape over her body and it was warm. Very. It took her a second to realize it was his cloak.
"You can't bribe me." She said in a tiny whisper. But she knew it was a lie. Bribery was actually very effective sometimes.
"…How about if I just let you speak?" he tried. He made no promise to do the same. At least now he could see if she'd explain the turbulent, mixed feelings on her side of their newfound link.
No answer.
"Speak freely. Unburden yourself. I swear I will listen."
And that was that. She couldn't pass it up. Kristy shuffled around onto her back and peered up at him. Legolas sat cross-legged, hands draped between his knees. "Alright." She whispered. "Legolas, you're an ass."
Legolas' face turned to ice.
"And every time you call me a child, I want to slap your face." She said secondly. "That's what I've got to say."
One of Legolas' brows twitched. "Anything else?"
Kristy thought. "Yes, I-" she broke off, biting her tongue.
Legolas tilted his head.
"I don't like you." She whispered very, very softly.
"Really."
Somewhere, a winter bird chirped quietly in the night. Nothing moved; only the branches fluttered in the breeze. But in the roots of the tree, the air was still and cool.
"And I don't like us, either." She snapped fiercely quiet.
"Some things must be."
Kristy was quiet for awhile, fidgeting with his cloak. Somehow, it seemed like the anger on her end faded a little. Legolas lowered the barriers around his mind and tentatively reached out, brushing her consciousness with his. He could do the same with other elves, to a certain degree. And yet this was different. He was assaulted by a whole barrage of confused, mixed up and…and hurting, feelings.
"Kristy-"
"I know." She mumbled. "You don't have to tell me again. You think I'm an incapable child. You however, are a prince. You don't trust me. You think I'd die out there where you live. Y-you-" Kris broke off. She was just too tired. "you know what? Whatever."
Whatever? What a damnable word.
"Kristine, I want this to be easy."
She didn't say anything. So he continued.
"I wanted to spare you this pain." He whispered softer yet. "I swear I did."
"Well congratulations." She muttered. "You failed."
A few minutes passed, in which Legolas couldn't bring himself to answer.
"But you know what?" she whispered, sitting up against a trunk. "You're probably right. You're always saying how weak I am, how incapable I am. I wouldn't survive in your world. I'm a coward. You're right." she glowered fiercely at him. "Well you're right. And I lost my chance at becoming what I wanted to be because of it."
Legolas narrowed his eyes. "What are you talking about?"
"I told you I started police work." Kris said. She'd wanted to tell him for days, weeks. But she didn't want him to look at her differently. She didn't care now. "I wanted it to be a career. I did everything. I worked, learned, trained. I could out shoot anyone in my class, made prime grades. I was fresh out of the academy and ready to hit the streets. I was so eager, I was ready to take on the world."
Her voice was too detached for this conversation. Too cold. Legolas stayed silent.
"I'd been on the job a month. I had a partner. His name was Liam. A call came in, a gas station panic button. They were being robbed." Her eyes were icy and collected, but her heart was starting to pound. She hadn't spoken of this in years. In the dark of the forest, her head spun back to the dark of the alley. "We apprehended them as they were coming out." she said quieter. They had black ski masks on; like monsters in the dark. She remembered her frantic pulse beating in her ears. It was the first time she'd faced guns outside of training.
"They ran. We chased them down an alley. My partner was going in and he...he told me to cover him. But they saw him. They w-were scared I guess." her voice cracked and she hissed softer. "When one came up with a rifle, I was already on him. I sh-should've shot him right there. I should've. But I froze and Liam..."
Legolas leaned closer when she didn't say anything. "Kristine...?"
She locked eyes with him. Legolas almost shuddered at the bitter, steely anger in her eyes. "He died."
The elf stilled, leaning on his knees, waiting for something to break the quiet. Anything.
"Do you know what it's like to tell a child their father isn't coming home?" she muttered fiercely. "His wife?" She shook her head. "They said it wasn't my fault. 'He could've been surrendering', they said. Bullshit! I left."
"What happened to the thieves?"
Kristy tilted an eyebrow at him. "Why do you care?"
"What happened to them?"
"I shot them."
"All of them?"
Her hard stare said enough. "One in the leg, the other in an arm," she said anyway. "And the third...in the head."
He had no doubt the third was the one with the rifle. "Kristine-"
"It should've been me!" she said. "He didn't deserve to die. It-it..."
"It happened as it did for a reason," he said firmly. "You cannot hold yourself accountable. You call that cowardice? You are one of the bravest people I've ever known; you've risked your life and happiness for complete strangers."
She narrowed her eyes at him. "Don't give me those pathetic platitudes of comfort. Do I look like an idiot?" she shook her head.
"Kristine, you cannot simply give up." To think she gave up her dream for such a tragedy? It made Legolas grab her by the shoulders so hard her teeth clicked. "You must follow your heart. Whatever you face, you will overcome it. I know that. Never let fear guide your choices. Never."
She stared at him from the corner of her eyes. He could almost see the gears turning in her head. "What I want to know..." she said slowly. "...is if Galadriel can reach this world, what's stopping others?" she asked.
Legolas barely had time to process this before she sat up straighter.
"You're so worried about your world, what about mine? What's stopping the evil that's taking over yours to come to mine when it's finished?"
Kristy threw a finger in his face. "What makes your world more worth fighting for than mine?"
Legolas blinked. "Kristine, what are you trying to say?"
She folded her arms, before saying very quietly and very resolutely. "Just that you've convinced me. You're right, I'm capable of more than this. I'm saying I'm going to Middle Earth with you."
Sweet Manwe.
"Kristine... you-you cannot!" he gasped.
Kris flicked the blanket over her legs, laid down and turned her back to him. "Goodnight Legolas."