Part 3: Prettier than Thou
The sun came too early as he crawled out of bed. It was time to go to the Council and help defend the world. Or some such shit. Aragorn stretched, scratching his stomach as he contemplated the hilarity of the night before. Legolas, son of Thranduil, Inc. had given it up for his benefaction.
Elbereth bless him.
He rose and walked to the basin, ducking his head into the cold water. It jolted him awake and he sighed, blowing bubbles.
**********Nearby ...
Glorfindel sighed and rose, walking stiffly to the basin nearby. Sticking his face into the water, he blew bubbles.
**********Nearby ...
Legolas rose and limped toward the basin nearby. He put it on the floor and sat in it, blowing bubbles.
**********Nearby ...
Gimli stared at the basin nearby and laughed.
**********Nearby ...
Elrond sat in his bathtub and chuckled. Everyone else had only a basin. He had a bathtub. He blew bubbles too.
**********At the dinner table ...
They sat and ate quietly, breakfast the usual fifteen course meal that it usually was, was adequate. The cholesterol count was enormous and if most of them were humans, they would be dead by now. There are some things about mortality that cannot be overlooked. Unless you're immortal.
Elrond stared when no one was looking at Legolas, remembering the wild times of the night before. He smiled, sipping his sanka as he considered the joke he had pulled off over his arch rival, Thranduil of Mirkwood et al. It wasn't everyday he had such total victory over the constipated King of Mirkwood. Of course, Thranduil wouldn't know. That sort of took some of the gloss away but you couldn't win them all.
Gimli stared at Legolas without a pause. He considered their interlude the night before. It had been more or less what he expected. Normally, when a dwarf has sex with another dwarf, there usually isn't a dish unbroken and a chair left in one piece in the room.
Fortunately for the chamber pot under the bed, they had done the horizontal mambo without too much carnage. Now they were practically engaged. He sat and calculated how much gold he would now carry home as a dowry for the nubile and clueless Prince of Mirkwood.
Aragorn sat in his chair, remembering the intense sexual interlude they had undertaken the night before that ended up in multiple organisms and rug burns on the bottom of the walk-in closet. He had climbed a sexual Everest on the backside of the slinky blond from Mirkwood and he found himself bearing a proprietary interest in Legolas, especially since everyone was eying him when they thought he wasn't looking.
It was ticking him off big time.
Glorfindel nursed a hangover as he considered the losing hand of snakes and ladders he had played with the slightly slutty Sons of Elrond. They had cheated and he let them. He let them amuse themselves with his body parts but drew the line at piercing his foreskin. He had standards below which he wouldn't fall and even though it would have been romantic, he didn't want them to feel he was easy.
Boromir, late arrived from Gondor watched everyone watch Legolas and decided he wanted him too. No one would ever be able to say he wasn't a team player.
The bell rang once and all rose, walking to the council area where the talks would begin. As they did, they greeted Gandalf and spied four little short guys with hairy feet standing behind him, staring up at all the arrivals with big, innocent eyes.
/... good grief ... what now? ... this is bad enough without bringing Gandalf's illegitimate children along ... I *must* draw the line .../ - Aragorn, sulking to his chair where he would sit and wait to be insulted by the son of the pretender to his throne ... *his* throne, not Denethor or Boromir's throne. HIS! HISHISHISHISHIS!
/... good grief ... what hairy feet they have ... that is like so ten minutes ago ... SNIFF! .../ - Legolas, swishing to a seat with three other Elves, all ethereal and as asexual-looking as you could get and still claim a gender.
/... Elbereth ... I must be more hungover than I thought ... I think I just saw four hairy-footed short people ... I think I'm in love .../ -Glorfindel, limping to a seat with barf bag in hand.
/... Damn! ... Are those guys the right height or *what*? .../ - Elrond, moving with great stately outwardness toward his chair while his inwardness is filled with nasty thoughts of deviant sexual practices.
Aragorn sat down staring around the circle as Boromir sauntered in, swinging his casual smoldering sexual intensity around like an incense lamp in a cathedral. Of course, it really wasn't like that because Christianity isn't even remotely a direct allusion, but rather an indirect underlying theme as represented by the allegorical events such as life, death and redemption ... like that ... uh, what were we talking about? The hotness that is Boromir ... ah! Right. He sat down and women within forty miles had to change their underwear.
Elrond rose, gathering his dignity about him. Most of the men in the room wanted him at that very moment but didn't act on their impulse since they were representing their countries and it wouldn't look good to be too easy this early on in the talks.
"Friends, relatives, acquaintances, kings, countrymen, second cousins, strangers, really intimate partners in projects that failed due to a lack of adequate venture capital, illegitimate children, former lovers, exiled leaders of small Caribbean dictatorships, vendors, high jump champions, and Boromir, I welcome you to Imladris. We come together over bad times. Frankly, I am just pleased you showed up. I get such a rush from this power thing I nearly wet my pants. Aragorn doesn't know what that feels like and I hope he never does. If he does I have to give him my only daughter and she has to give up her immortality and live with him until he lies down on a pyre and gives up his spirit for the good of his people before he gets old and feeble and they have to smother him with a pillow."
/... what the fuck? .../ - Aragorn
"I give you, Gandalf."
A round of applause went up and Gandalf did fifteen minutes of stand up before introducing the Ring Bearer, his oldest illegitimate child, Frodo Baggins, the son and nephew of his current lover, Bilbo. Or, at least Glorfindel thought so. After all, he was hung over and only functioning on two cylinders.
He stood in a shaft of light that beamed down from heaven. Frodo, not Glorfindel. He had huge blue eyes, a small slender body, curly black hair, Elven ears and pale skin. Everyman in the area wanted to do him but didn't since it was too close to pedophilia for them to admit to anyone but Dear Abby or their diaries.
They all sighed as one.
"I have the Ring."
"Show the Ring, Frodo," Elrond said, wiping the spittle off his chin.
He walked over, all trembling and waif-like. Every man in the area shifted uncomfortably in their chairs as they lay their cloaks over their laps. He set it down and limped back to his seat. On Gandalf's lap.
"Well, there you have it," Elrond said, with a dismissive wave of his hand. He sat down and put both legs over the arm of his chair. "One of you wankers has to toss it into the fire of Mount Doom. I *tried* to all ready and you men ... you *men* sabotaged me. I am like so annoyed I forbid any Elf to do it. So, Aragorn and Boromir and you old guys who aren't named in the movie or the book but have seats here in the Council ... who will do it?"
It was quiet a moment and then Gimli sighed. "Well, I don't want the nancing Elves to have it. Of course, I could make an exception if you give me Legolas. I will take him and ditch the Ring for you."
"You *won't*!" Elrond said, jumping up. His sons looked at each other and sighed. "Legolas is not yours."
"Oh yeah?" Gimli said, craning his neck way up to glare at Elrond's face, which seemed way the hell up there among the clouds.
"Yeah," Elrond said, leaning way down and glaring eyeball to eyeball with the little wanker.
Legolas watched them, secretly pleased that really rich and powerful men were fighting over him. Of course, he *belonged* to Aragorn. But it never hurt to have outside interests. He stood smiling and taking bets on who would win any fisticuffs.
"I will take the Ring!"
Frodo Baggins shouted over and over, telling all the disinterested people that he would take the Ring himself although he didn't know the way. Boromir, annoyed at last, took Frodo and stuffed him face down in a trashcan, rejoining the shouting match.
Gandalf, irritated over the indignity of his son being stuffed in a trashcan turned everyone into toads and had a smoke. When he was done, he undid his ungodly and slightly amoral spell, noting an absence of flies around the chamber for the rest of the meeting.
When it was all over but the shouting, it was decided that Frodo would take the Ring.
"I will help you, Frodo," Gandalf said.
"Thanks, Dad," Frodo replied, hugging his dad and bringing a contented smile to his face.
The pervert.
Aragorn, overcome with the moment rose and walked forward. "If by my life and death I can protect you, I will. You have my sword."
/... oh my god! ... do something! .../ Legolas rose. "And you have my bow."
/... oh crap! .../ "And my ax."
Legolas rolled his eyes. Gimli put his hand on Legolas' butt. Legolas looked down and quelled his desire to kick the dwarf in the nuts. After all, they were allies now.
/... Well, isn't *this* just ducky! .../ Boromir rose and glared at Aragorn, the usurper to the throne that they had usurped. "Well, if that is the way you're going to act, then count me in. If that is what you're going to do, Gondor will see it through." He turned to Aragorn. "My Gondor."
Aragorn shot him death stares.
Elrond, drunk with sorrow over losing Legolas, staggered to his feet. "Well, isn't *this* a find how-do-you-do?" He sighed and bent to the popular will. "Alright. Go. Do your thing. But be home by eleven."
With that, the Fellowship of the Ring was born.
Probably.
TBC c2010