Chapter 5: Pastimes in a Cave
Varied memoranda from the unofficial conclave of the fellowship of the ring while in hiding in a cave belonging to friendly cave trolls.
(In other words, we got so bored we started writing down everything everyone said.)
Secretary: Merriadoc Brandybuck
Vice Secretary: Peregrin Took
Gimli: (entering the room and slumping down into a corner) This is a rotten cave. Nothing to the ones at Helms Deep. Nothing to the caverns of Moria. Nothing to Erebor...
Gandalf: It's better than the dungeons of Barad-Dur.
Gimli: How do you know?
Legolas: (jumping up in the corner and doing a theatrical sort of dance) There's spiders in here.
Gimli: I thought you were used to spiders.
Legolas: (sitting down again in a different corner) I don't like them.
Gandalf: (suspiciously) What are you two up to over there?
Merry: Nothing.
Pippin: Minding our own business.
Gandalf: What is that you're writing?
Pippin: A play.
Gandalf: A play, indeed! I hope you don't intend to perform it for us.
Elrohir: (to Elladan) Remember that dumb play Aragorn wrote about Turin and the dragon?
Aragorn: That was like seventy years ago! How do you still remember that?
Elrohir: I don't know. Seventy years isn't that long.
Elladan: I think we still have that play somewhere.
Elrohir: We should find it so we can show it to Arwen.
Cave troll passes through the room on its way out the door.
Gimli: Where is he going?
Gandalf: To the village, to buy food.
Gimli: How do you know that's what he's going there for? Maybe he's going to tell them where we are. Maybe he was planning to do that all along.
Gandalf: Then why wouldn't he have done it sooner? Don't be paranoid. Things are bad enough without imagining them worse.
Sam: (looking over Merry's shoulder) That's no play. There's not a quoth or forsooth from beginning to end.
Inserted by vice secretary: mind thus thine own business quoth Pippin forsooth.
Merry: Give it back!
vice secretary: It's my turn.
Merry: Seriously, give it back. I had it first. Stop writing everything I say.
Aragorn: What? You're writing what we say?
Sam: Every blessed word.
Pippin: Stop looking!
Long silence as everyone in room tries to remember everything they said for the last five minutes.
Aragorn: Where's Gandalf?
Legolas: I think he went to take a bath.
Gandalf: (entering room while waving staff and yelling) Merriadoc Brandybuck and Peregrin Took! What have you been doing to the bathtub?
Merry: No!
Pippin: Don't touch it!
Gandalf: If those cave trolls kick us out of here it will be your fault! What madness drove you to fill the bathtub with dirt?
Merry: It was an experiment.
Pippin: We were trying to grow pipeweed.
Aragorn: (looking eager) Did it work?
Pippin: No.
Sam: You can't grow plants in a cave. There's not enough light.
Merry: I know, we can borrow Frodo's phial of Galadriel.
Frodo: (coming out of a sort of coma) No! It's mine.
Gimli: Not so loud, all of you. Someone might hear us.
Gandalf: (grumbling in an undertone) No food, no pipeweed, and no bath.
Elladan: Remember the time Aragorn was showing off for Arwen and he fell into the hot tub?
Aragorn: Don't you guys have anything better to do than relate embarrassing moments from my past?
Elladan: (after a pause) Nothing comes to mind.
Legolas: (suddenly freaking out and trying to pull his hair out) I'm having withdrawal symptoms!
Gimli: But you don't smoke.
Legolas: (pausing and then freaking out again) I'm having orc-slashing withdrawal symptoms.
Aragorn: Me too.
Elladan: Maybe we could slip out just for a few -
Gandalf: Certainly not. Far too dangerous.
Elrohir: But we'll all go insane, cooped up in here!
Sam: Nobody invited you.
Gimli: And in any case, stop making so much noise.
(Long and bored silence)
Gimli: That cave troll ought to be back by now. It's been long enough.
(Loud and ominous knock on door, like knock of doom)
(Total silence in room for about two minutes)
Pippin: (in stage whisper) Who is it?
Gandalf: (also in whisper) Hold your tongue, fool of a Took!
Merry: Pippin! How many times have I told you not to answer if someone knocks! It might be the nazgul.
Pippin: (loud whisper) We're not home!
(Door opens)
Gimli: Who forgot to lock the door?
(Erestor and Lindir enter)
Elladan: What are you doing here?
Erestor: What are you doing here? I thought you were in detention.
Elrohir: We escaped.
Gimli: How did you find us?
Erestor: We got in touch with the underground.
Elrohir: So why did you come here?
Lindir: We're in hiding.
Gandalf: You've chosen a poor place to hide. We could be discovered at any time.
Erestor: We're not hiding from the nazgul. We're hiding from Arwen.
Aragorn: Arwen?
Erestor: Your father is trying to make us marry her.
Aragorn: But I'm going to marry her!
Lindir: Then you'd better hurry up.
Erestor: He's getting desperate.
Aragorn: Don't be silly. How can I marry her when I'm hiding in a cave?
Erestor: Why are you hiding in a cave anyway? These look like pretty third-rate accommodations.
Elrohir: Do you think we want to be here?
Sam: (in an aside) Well, you didn't have to come.
Aragorn: Do you have any better suggestions?
Lindir: We have a plan.
Aragorn: What plan?
Erestor: Listen, Estel...I mean Aragorn. You remember the story of Beren and Luthien?
Lindir: - Your ancestors, weren't they?
Erestor: How they stole the silmaril from Mor - er, you know - that guy?
Aragorn: Yes?
Erestor: And another of your ancestors, Isildur - how he cut off...someone's...finger?
Aragorn: Well?
Erestor: These people can be defeated!
Aragorn: What are you saying? You want me to go chop off Sauron's finger?
Lindir: Yes.
Erestor: It can't be too much harder than stealing a silmaril.
Aragorn: That's insane! I admit desperate times call for desperate measures, but what you're talking about is suicide!
Erestor: Just think about it, Aragorn. Promise me you'll at least think about it.
Lindir: After all, if you get killed Arwen can go to the Halls of Mandos and beg for you to be resurrected.
Erestor: And that would be really romantic.
Lindir: And we would write songs about it.
Gandalf: They're right, you know, Aragorn. We can't hide for ever - sooner or later they're going to find us. Best to strike now while we still can.
Aragorn: Look. I tried. I did everything in my power - I even went through the paths of the dead. Remember the final stand outside the Black Gate? Can't ask for more heroism than that, can you? And still we were defeated. It would be no different a second time.
Sam: It wasn't Mr. Frodo's fault.
Gandalf: We're not blaming anyone, but this time we'll do it all together. We should never have split up last time.
Aragorn: Together or alone it's impossible!
Legolas: I agree.
Aragorn: Thank you, Legolas.
Legolas: And besides, there's another option.
Gimli: What's that?
Legolas: Not all of Mirkwood was overrun. Far to the north a small resistance force still fights on, led by my father.
Erestor: But they're just a bunch of commies!
Gandalf: You think we could fight Sauron with such a puny force? Our only hope is a surprise attack right at the heart of Mordor. ...Besides, I don't trust your father. He'd take the ring for himself.
Merry: I have an idea.
Elrohir: What?
Merry: We could go back to Moria and get the Balrog to help us.
Gandalf: Fool of a Brandybuck! What a stupid idea!
Sam: Gandalf killed the Balrog.
Merry: Oh, yeah.
Gandalf: Stop changing the subject! The point is, we need to go to Mordor and destroy the ring.
Elrohir: Orc slashing!
Aragorn: No, we need a plan of attack - one that will work.
Legolas: We should go to Mirkwood.
Gimli: Why not just stay here?
(Cave troll enters with enormous sack over shoulder)
Pippin, Merry, and Sam: Did you get anything to eat?
Aragorn: Did you check the P.O. box?
Cave troll: Yes. Here's the mail.
Gandalf: All that just since yesterday?
Cave troll: (dumping huge sack on the floor so that letters spill in all directions) This was all I could carry.
Gimli: It's probably all for you, Legolas.
Legolas: Don't feel bad. You can read half of them.
Elrohir: Half of them are probably for Aragorn.
Gandalf: There's probably quite a few for Frodo as well. Better wake up, Frodo.
Pippin: (sorting letters into piles and appropriating the largest pile) Oh, look. I got the most.
Merry: No fair!
(Note-taking here interrupted. To be resumed at a later date.)