Origins: Dwalin

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Dwalin sprawled out on the couch with his boots resting on the coffee table and his hands linked behind his head. The main room of Erebor Tower was surprisingly empty for late afternoon; he and Ori had the place to themselves. Ori sat next to him on the couch, with his knees pulled up and his stocking feet tucked under Dwalin's thigh. The only sound was Ori's silver pen scratching across the page of his sketchbook, a sound that would stop every few minutes as the boy peered over the pages to regard Dwalin, before going back to work.

"Yer makin' me nervous with the way ya keep starin' at me, lad." Dwalin leaned over to look at the drawing, but Ori shifted his grip on the sketchbook to hide if from view.

"It's not done yet! No peeking!"

"All right then." Dwalin rolled his eyes, but grinned. "It's a bit unsettlin' how quiet it is with no one else here."

"Then fill the silence." Ori stared at his sketch for a moment before looking up and grinning mischievously. "Tell me what you were like when you were younger. Back when you first got your powers."

Dwalin blinked in surprise, but acquiesced. "There ain't much to tell. I was a freshman in high school, got into fights a lot, caused some trouble. Balin worried too much, so I stopped punchin' people and started punchin' walls." He shrugged, clearly unimpressed by his own story. "One day I hit somethin' and my dusters popped. And that's all there was to it."

Ori continued to sketch, but his brows furrowed slightly. "You weren't concerned?"

"I was fifteen and angry. My father had just died, my mother left years before..."

"So, you just accepted your powers and went on with your life? It didn't bother you at all?"

"Not really. Thorin and I were already friends and he'd gotten his powers the year before. It just seemed like one more thing we'd do together."

Ori shook his head and laughed softy. He stopped drawing for long enough to glance up at Dwalin with a disbelieving smile. "You're something else, you know that?"

"Something else, eh? And what makes ya say that?" He pretended to reach for the sketchbook and laughed when Ori swatted his hand away.

"Because you... You develop powers and nothing changes, you just go right on punching walls. Most people don't take that kind of thing in stride."

"My powers made things easier for me. I stopped having to ask Balin to patch me up when I busted my knuckles on somethin'." Dwalin considered his words carefully. "I know I was lucky. I had Balin and Thorin for support, and it was easy to hide what I could do."

"I'm glad you're not angry anymore. And that you're not punching holes in the walls."

"Yer right, I'm not angry anymore. I grew out of that once we formed the Company and started tryin' to do good." He smirked. "And there are more than enough villains around, so I still get to punch things."

Ori set down his sketchpad and reached out to trace his knit-covered fingers over Dwalin's knuckles. "Does it hurt?"

Dwalin flexed his hand slightly and extended his knuckle-dusters, the smooth metal tearing back the skin, his regeneration powers mending it. "I don't really notice it anymore."

The knit of Ori's gloves caught on edge of the metal as he ran his fingers over it. "But it does hurt. I'm sorry."

"Don't be. My powers let me be part of this team and I wouldn't trade that for anything." Dwalin caught his hand up and squeezed it. "Are ya gonna let me see what ya were workin' on?"

Ori grabbed his sketchbook and offered it to Dwalin, who took it and peered curiously down at the page. The drawing showed a much younger Dwalin, fewer lines crinkling around his eyes, a close-shaved crop of dark hair on his head. The Dwalin in the drawing bore a firm set to his jaw and a deep crease between his brows, caused by the permanent glare in his steely gaze. He looked angry and hard, but underneath all that Ori had managed to capture an air of sadness.

"I, uh, started off just trying to draw you younger. But then you started talking and..." He trailed off nervously, his lower lip caught between his teeth. "I wasn't trying to be presumptuous or anything."

"Ya ain't far off, lad. Missing a few piercings here." Dwalin pointed at the left ear on the drawing. "I'll bet Balin has a few photos from back then. Maybe he'll dig them out so ya can see how close this is to the truth. Of course, then ya might decide ya like younger me better."

"I don't need to see pictures." Ori smiled and cupped Dwalin's face with one of his gloved hands. "I like this you much better."

"Oh, do ya?" Dwalin teased. "And why's that?"

"Because this you is mine."

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A/N: Stay tuned Friday for the stunning conclusion! Does Blue Team make it out alive? Will Thorin and Bilbo ever hook up? Find out in the final chapter of 'In the Company of Heroes'! Same bat time, same bat channel!

Also, if you're enjoying the Bofur/Nori relationship, check out the other story I posted today- 'Deuces and Kings'. It's a modern AU Nofur smut fic... if you're into that kind of thing. ;)