The Bridge
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters or anything, just the storyline.
Author's Note: Thanks everyone for reading! Here's the next chapter that can hopefully chase Monday Blues away for those who like reading humor or family stories / enjoy reading this story. Reviews and comments are as usual welcomed :)
Chapter 3: Erestor
Erestor was getting fidgety. He was carrying a ton of heavy books which was practically blocking his view ahead. The main source of his fidgety-ness, however, was not so much the amount of books he was carrying (which to him was rather normal anyway), but because he was approaching The Bridge.
On any other day, he might have never taken much notice of The Bridge—indeed, he thought that his phobia of The Bridge was long gone—but somehow, his Prank Detector was beeping wildly.
There is something wrong with The Bridge. The twins were plotting something.
He stopped for a while and looked furtively around and on the bridge. Unfortunately for him, the mountain of books he was carrying was blocking his full view of the bridge and coincidently also managed to block his view of the twins and Estel, who happened to be crouching down.
Erestor shrugged. Though he wasn't convinced yet that nothing weird was going on, he continued his way to the conference room. He couldn't afford to be late just because his intuition was spelling TROUBLE, could he?
No he couldn't. He won't forgive himself for being late either.
Yet…he was sure that there was something going on. He stopped abruptly right under the bridge, his Prank Detector all ready to explode within him.
Right on top of Erestor on the bridge stood the twins and Estel.
"That's not good, he's not moving," whispered Elladan into Elrohir's ear, "we've got to make him move."
"Just wait for a while, Elladan, he'll move. He has to, or he'll be late for a meeting. Did you see the mountain of books he was carrying and how fast he was walking? He'll have to move earlier than we have to," answered Elrohir.
He was right. Erestor, after pausing around, gave another shrug and decided to take that dangerous step outwards.
"Now, Estel!"
"ERES-
"tor…"
All Erestor felt was a sudden increase in the weight he was holding and a sudden momentary jerk.
There was no fear, no screaming, no falling down with books landing on his head. In other words, Erestor handled it in his usual Erestor way.
"Wow," whispered Elrohir to Elladan, "I've heard of catching things in their arms, catching things using nets and even catching things using baskets, but this is the first time I've seen anyone catch a boy using books!"
"He's even better than Ada…" whispered Elladan back.
Erestor stared up his mountainous pile of books to see what landed on it and was met with a barely seven year old face looking innocently down at him, with perhaps a hint of disappointment.
"Estel? What are you doing on top of my books?"
Estel pointed silently to the bridge from which he jumped.
Erestor understood immediately.
"Elladan…Elrohir…" he muttered ominously, "I must tell your Ada about this, Estel. It was dangerous and you could have hurt yourself badly!"
"'Dan and 'Ro said you would catch me!" Estel's eyes widened into a puppy plea—he would do anything to escape punishment—and continued, "and they told me about safety rules!"
"Estel, this is never safe! You could have been really badly hurt, like a concussion, or a fracture…"
"That sounds fun!"
Erestor rolled his eyes and looked impatiently up at Estel. "Really, Estel, you would get into trouble sooner or later like this. I have to tell your Ada what your brothers have been teaching you!"
"Erestor!" Elladan called out hurriedly from the bridge, "don't tell Ada please?"
Estel was about to blurt out that Elrond actually knew about this when he was silenced by Elrohir's look. The advisor did not need to know that their father did not warn him about the possibility of this prank happening (which would do nothing good for their friendship), and their father did not need to know that they had not yet stopped their antics.
"We would…we would clean the library for you and not pull any pranks on you for…for two weeks!" added Elrohir quickly
Erestor stopped. That could actually be a good bargain. Besides, he thought, not knowing that Elrond had actually been pranked (unsuccessfully), it would be good to give Elrond a shock after he gave me so much diplomatic work to handle.
"One month," Erestor bargained. Might as well make the best bargain you could, reasoned Erestor.
"Deal!"
Erestor smiled and nodded his head. As he lowered the books onto the floor, Estel jumped off the mountain with a huge glee and a shout and turned towards Erestor.
"Jumping was fun Erestor! Not the part about landing on your books though, Erestor, that was not exciting enough."
It would have been exciting for me, thought Erestor wryly, though luckily I did not actually see him jumping down. My heart might have just jumped out together.
Once Erestor collected his books from the floor, he motioned for the twins to follow him to the conference room. As the twins followed reluctantly, Erestor began to list the things that had to be cleaned in the library gleefully.
"Alright, boys, I want the weaponry section to be cleaned in five days, the history section to be cleaned in twelve days, the healing section to be cleaned in fifteen days…"
And yes, the young, cute, not-so-innocent little Estel managed to escape punishment-again.
-Next chapter to be uploaded-