Chapter: 23, "Osgiliath"

Word count: 1,600

Disclaimer: I claim no ownership to J.R.R. Tolkien's masterpiece Lord of the Rings, this is purely for entertainment.

Beforehand Notes: I realized that (in the movies) the Osgiliath scene happens in The Two Towers. I'm messing around with time, and generally implying the battle of Hornburg took like three days to finish. That could be said, as I think it took four days to travel to Helm's Deep (because of Gandalf's "on the fifth day look to the east" thing, or something), and I made it seem like two days. I guess this is technically the "Ending of The Two Towers" because between the ending chapter and the last chapter, it's been non-canon stuff. The last chapter took place in The Two Towers. Oops. But the next chapter is going to take place in Return of the King, so there!

- Osgiliath -

Some time long ago that probably only elves remembered, Osgiliath was a shining city; a capital to the great kingdom of Gondor… Now it was little more than a graveyard.

Roads were littered with bodies and dust, houses were barren, and the stone that made it was an awful grey, tainted by the ash and dirt. The city was a man, the orcs were a plague, and we were the cure.

But the city was dying, the cure was failing, and the plague continued to spread. There was a lingering feeling of death and despair… Eru did it look terrible, and that was without the giant slaughtering happening. But the thing I really want to tell you is that I am describing it from before we entered in the city. If a glance will make you cringe, seeing it and breathing it is enough to make you cry.

Enough to make Frodo cry at least. He put on his best kicked-puppy look, widened his blue baby-eyes so you could see the tears gathering, even made his bottom lip tremble, and said, "The ring will not save Gondor. It has only the power to destroy. Please, let me go."

There was hesitation in Faramir's actions, between hearing and responding, I saw and age-old battle rise to surface within the man's eyes. To serve his king, his father, or to serve his mind, which knew right from wrong.

He chose neither, and pushed us on with a simple "hurry".

"Idiot." I seethed.

I know that Faramir eventually releases Frodo and Sam, but I couldn't help feel the surge of anger towards not Faramir, but Denethor. He was the man who played favorites. He was the man Faramir went to die for, who Faramir spent so much time trying to earn the approval of.

He was the man that reminded me too much of my own father.

"Faramir, you must let me go!"

His pleas were met with a shove in the back, pushing us closer towards danger, putting Frodo in perfect line of the enemy.

xXx

"Do not be a fool, my lord!" Dallin hissed, quickly flinching, as if expecting retaliation from his clearly delusional captain.

"It must be done," Faramir snapped. "The ring must go to Gondor! My father will not have it any other way!"

"But you are not your father, Lord Faramir." I said, trying to speculate how this could have gone off script. I personally blame Dallin, but I'm probably the reason he spoke out. "You know deep in your heart that the ring will not help you or your kingdom in any way. It will bring naught but ruin and death."

"To deny the Steward's orders is punishable by death," Faramir whispered, "My father will make no exception for me of all people. Once more, I must do this. I cannot fail my father! My king!"

"Your king is Aragorn, descendant of Isildur," Sam suddenly bursts out, "Not the Steward of Gondor. And do you want to know what happened to Boromir? You want to know why your brother died? He tried to take the ring from Frodo! After swearing an oath to protect him, he tried to kill him! The ring drove your brother mad!"

Faramir looked shocked, betrayed, sad, angered, panicked… and overall, hurt. How could his brother do this? The very man he would have followed into death, if given the chance. But he could not brood upon this new revelation, for a boulder decided to make its impromptu smash against the tower overhead, shattering it, and sending us into a minor frenzy.

Frodo suddenly looked like a prophet, his eyes rolled up and became misty in a sort of way. His voice speaking to a distant land, and I knew that he heard no words spoken to him.

"They're here… they've come…"

A horrendous shriek was heard overhead. It sounded as if Rebecca Black's Friday suddenly got super-sped up and played high-pitched, chipmunk-style.

Oh yeah, it was that bad.

Faramir cried out, "Nazgûl!" Then shoved Sam, Frodo, and I into a wall (they say it was a corner, I'm most definitely sure it was a wall).

As the chaos ensued around us, it seemed we were pretty safe from the mess of it all. Seemed. Suddenly Frodo thought, 'Hey, I'm young and dumb and totally not carrying the fate of the world on me, let me walk out ominously as creatures that are trying to kill me lurk about destroying this city!'

At least, he might as well have.

He did just that, walking slowly out into the opening with a 'kill me' sign on his back.

"What are you doing? Where are you going?!" Sam shouted. Great question, Sam, what was he doing and where was he going? Seriously, there's not much you can do when dragon-y wyvern-things (of sorts) are tearing a place to rubble (more-so than it had been before).

Frodo, whom I've dubbed the crazy, corrupted, suicidal idiot, walked up some stairs and onto a bridge. "Eat me!" He dramatically cried as he made no indication of moving from that spot, even when the Nazgûl and his wyvern (looks like a wyvern or wyrm, has no other name than fellbeast, why not?) rose up to attack.

So maybe he didn't actually yell eat me.

Frodo held up the ring and then thought, 'Let me put on this dark and dangerous object while there's a dark and dangerous creature right there waiting for me to do it!'

Since I was closer, faster, and completely oblivious to the fact Frodo had plenty of reasons to kill me and not as many to listen to me, I tackled Frodo, instead of Sam doing it.

After acquiring bruises in places I'm not telling, my life was being threatened by an insane ringbearer on a homicidal/suicidal rampage. He gave a sort of yell, fury that I've never seen before prominent in his usual gentle or depressed eyes.

"You aren't the Frodo I met in Rivendell," I mutter. The cool metal presses into my throat, ready to end me. I am not Sam. Frodo does not love me. Frodo will kill me.

"Mr. Frodo! Stop! Can't you see? It's me, Sam, and that's Lady Ruth you're trying to kill." Sam shouts from a distance.

I am ready to die… the blade presses harder, drawing blood. I am ready to die…

My cheeks were suddenly wet, and I could still hear Sam begging in the distance.

I am ready to die…

I close my eyes, unable to watch Frodo kill me. "Please, Frodo… come back, Frodo… come back for Sam."

I am not ready to die.

The metal is suddenly withdrawn, I open my eyes, gasping for the air I had not previously received, and look for blue.

Two oceans stare at me, scared. He stumbles back, and pushes himself against the wall, wildly shaking his head, muttering to himself, muttering to us.

Trying to take back his actions.

"I can't do this…" Frodo says between his sobs.

Samwise The Brave begins to play in my head, "I know. It's all wrong. By rights we shouldn't even be here. But we are.

"It's like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger they were. And sometimes you didn't want to know the end. Because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened?

"But in the end, it's only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that stayed with you. That meant something, even if you were too small to understand why. But I think, Mr. Frodo, I do understand. I know now. Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back only they didn't. They kept going because they were holding on to something."

"What are we holding on to, Sam?"

"That there's some good in this world, Mr. Frodo, and it's worth fighting for."

Even after hearing that speech over and over, even after memorizing that speech, it still moves me. Hell, it moves cowardly shits like Gollum.

"I think at last we understand one another, Frodo Baggins." Faramir said, coming up to us suddenly.

Another man comes as well, and says to Faramir, "You know the laws of our country, the laws of your father. If you let them go, your life will be forfeit."

"To deny the Steward's orders is punishable by death," Faramir whispered, "My father will make no exception for me of all people."

"Then it is forfeit," Faramir said, sure of himself. "Release them."

I smiled.

xXx

"You will come with us, won't you?" Sam asked, readying himself to leave.

I thought about the road to come, and how, if Frodo can banish Sam from his side, what Frodo could do to me in the future. Cowardly and stupid, yes, but I felt myself obligated to help Faramir with his daddy-issues and bring Denethor to a more peaceful and respectable death than the flaming-chicken-falling-off-a-cliff method.

"You must heed Lady Galadriel's words and complete this quest on your own, Frodo- with the help of Sam, of course." I say, trying to subtly beg Frodo to reconsider his future actions. "I must find what has become of our dear friends, and tell them of this encounter. They will be most joyed to know you are safe."

"We are never safe," Frodo sighed.

Such truth, Frodo.

Such truth.