Gollum crept forward and found something slightly glowing where the party had left it. He was hungry. He sniffled and touched the flat and thin thing to find it cold. And it could open up like a clam! Gollum was mystified and he crept closer, and with careful fingers, pried the thing apart! Instead of a dark inside like the outside, it was glowing brightly with little squares of color down the upper left hand column of the bright thing and on the bottom were little squares he could press! Ooh! What fun! Laughing in a little gargle, Gollum looked at the letters labeling the bottom section. Luckily, he could read. And there was a little stick you could move around . . . and press . . .
You�ve got mail! The thing suddenly sang and Gollum jumped up, surprised, but the thing did not want to bite. Instead, what seemed to be an envelope flew onto the screen, and a little box appeared on the colored screen reading, "Welcome to Elven-Mail-Check I_HAVE_A_VERY_PRETTY_NOSE! Please enter your password here." And there followed a little box. Password? Gollum wrinkled his nose, what was a password? But yet he wanted mail! It was his! His Precious!
Gollum turned towards Moria. Everyone had disappeared inside. He quickly closed up the clam and stuck it beneath an arm before scurrying after them. He needed to find his Precious, but now, it seemed, he had another . . .
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"We have but one choice." Gandalf lit his staff for the final time, "We must journey through the long dark of Moria!"
"Dark?" Legolas bit a nail nervously, "What about the dark?"
Gimli sighed. Legolas Whiteleaf was every inch as annoying as Legolas Greenleaf. Still, he ought to give the elf a fair chance. A new beginning. The elf would never admit to being afraid. The dwarf cleared his throat, "You know, it would make me feel a lot better if we were better lit. With torches and things." Legolas positively beamed and pulled out a little pink pony night-light which ran on batteries, "Or pink pony night-lights. Exactly what I had in mind."
"OOOH!" Legolas screamed, hugging Gimli, "I never knew that you had such deco-sense! It�s from REE!" The elf waved the little pony around, making clip-clop sounds, "Clip-clop-clip-clop!"
"Oh gosh." Gandalf rolled his eyes, "Legolas Whiteleaf is very immature, isn�t he?"
"Well . . ." The elf sighed, "I�m not really sure what you mean by that." Sirius snapped at the elf�s ankles and Legolas jumped forward reluctantly into the dark, he turned around and glared, "Hey! You could have caught some good elf ankle there!"
"Frankly, my dear Legolas," Sirius sighed, "I don�t give a darn."
As Gandalf led the way and was followed by Gimli, Legolas turned around, walked backwards, and batted his eyelashes at Sirius, "Do you really think I�m as pretty as Scarlet?" Not waiting for a reply, he spun about, humming something, "Mirkwood . . . Seven Oaks . . . I see the connection!"
"Umm . . ." Adhara offered, "You�re both as snooty."
"Snooty." The elf paused in his humming, "Is that a compliment?"
"Yes. Now shut up." Gimli snarled, "Or else you�re going to get eaten by something that dwells in these depths."
"Like . . ." Legolas squinted, "What in their right mind would live down here?! It�s so dark and the air is so unsanitary!" The elf stepped carefully over one of the many dwarfish corpses which lay about Moria, "And why don�t they bury their dead?! Where�s the health inspector?!"
"Let us hope that our presence may go unnoticed." Gandalf announced with an extra mean look at the elf, "That means . . . SHUT UP!"
"Okay, okay!" Legolas shrugged, and clamped his mouth shut.
"Um, we have a problem." Boromir rolled his eyes, "For pity�s sakes, even if the elf doesn�t say anything, he smells like a gigantic lavender and for some reason whatever lives down here will be like �hey, there aren�t any lavenders down here!� and we�d get beaten up anyway!" A pained look passed his face, "This is folly!"
"Now that you mention it," Legolas whispered, "It does stink in here!" He quickly whipped out a pink aerosol can, and yanked off the lid, "REE Spring Fresh Elven Scent!"
"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" The entire Fellowship screamed, but alas, it was too late! The fair elven finger came under the influence of gravity and pressed the little aerosol button and PHEEEET! Little particles floated into the air in a compressed stream and instead of the damp mustiness of Moria, all anyone could smell was REE Spring Fresh Elven Scent.
The elf took a deep breath and shoved the can back into his pocket, "Ah, it smells like my closet!"
"PU!" Aragorn coughed, "Rivendell never smelt like that!"
"Oh, that�s only because Elrond insisted on using REE Summer Fresh Elven Scent instead." Legolas spat as though an insult, "SUMMER? Who would want summer when they could have spring?!"
"Elves!" Gimli snorted, "What else do you have tucked away into that toga of yours?" The elf opened his mouth, "Wait. Never mind. I don�t want to know."
"Wait." Legolas held out a hand and the entire Fellowship stopped. The elf looked down, "I�m wearing white in a very dark place! Yipes!" He gasped, "That means I�ll be seen very easily! By HUNGRY THINGS!"
"Fortunately." The dwarf growled.
"UNFORTUNATELY!" The elf corrected, "I�m going to get eaten!"
"Just don�t move. Then that way they can�t see you." Adhara randomly suggested, "Alright?"
"Mmm . . ." Legolas sighed, "Mmm. . . ."
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Saruman hummed a merry little tune as he dipped his paintbrush into the emerald green paint once again, slathering the paint onto Isengard in large slaps, wondering how to translate Emerald City into Elvish or at least some other language used in Middle Earth aside from Common. Arg, that was so blah anyway. Besides, Isengard did look better green than it�s previous gray-white. So drab. And to think that now he had a yellow-brick road built from his front door all the way to Mordor! Mmm . . .
"My lord?!" An orc called up to where Saurman was currently painting, the highest tips of the tower, "You�re wanted on Instant Palantir again!"
"Oh, darn Palantir!" Saurman swore as he made his way down a long flight of spiraling stairs into his main computer room in Isengard, "IPS is so annoying! Instant Palantir Service, my foot!"
By the time the wizard made it down to his Palantir, Sauron was already hissing, Build me an ARMY worthy of MORDOR!
"Oh gosh!" Saurman kicked the pestle, "You�re demanding aren�t you? I build you a ROAD and now you want an ARMY?!"
Road? What road? The voice hissed, The icky yellow thing?
"Yes! That�s the yellow brick road!" The wizard frowned, "You said you wanted one."
Army, idiot! ARMY! The voice snarled again, GET RID OF THE ROAD!
"Why?" Saurman scratched his beard, "It�s good to promote tourism!"
No TOURISTS! The Palantir almost shattered with the anger from the other end, ALL KEEP OUT!
"OKAY! What�s wrong with tourists?" Saurman snarled, "They bring in revenue! See, I�m renaming Isengard pretty soon. It�s going to be the Emerald City and I�m going to attract so many more visitors than old dingy MORDOR!"
Build me an army, WORTHY of MORDOR! The Palantir hissed again, Now, you IDIOT!
Saurman crossed his arms over his chest, "I�m not building you an army, bud. You haven�t paid me for the road yet. And if you don�t, I�ll see you in court!"
See . . . The Palantir glowed, You shall see me . . . See my WRATH . . .
"No need to throw a hissy. Remember to take your blood-pressure medications! Yes, in court." Saurman tossed a dark cloth over the Palantir and stormed out of the room, "Who does he think he is anyway?!"
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"It�s kind of getting dark in here . . ." Legolas half sang softly on the third day of their trek through Moria, "Let�s go and dye some clothes . . ." Fortunately, they had passed on through the ancient mines and city unnoticed for the better part, although there was the gray wrinkly thing with the arrow in his head that was following them, Gandalf noted.
"Let�s not." Gimli sniffled and looked about, "Hey, we�ve been trekking here for seemingly forever. When are we going to see a live dwarf?!" Suddenly, a flat thing smashed into his face and was followed by the happy giggles of a giddy elf. "Oof!"
"LOOK!" Their friendly elf peeled the flat thing from Gimli�s face and the dwarf could see it was a very smudged mirror, "DO YOU SEE THE DWARF?" The impact of being smashed against a dwarf�s face caused a long crack to develop in the glass with a creek . . . and tinkle-tinkle-tinkle, all the little fragments fell to the ground. "Oh man, I didn�t think you were THAT ugly!"
"I�m not UGLY!" For the past days, every single irritation had been bottled up inside a very small bottle within Gimli and he knew that soon, he would not be able to keep his cool . . . he need to EXPLODE and GUT some ELF! Gritting his teeth angrily, Gimli glared at the elf, "I � AM � NOT � IN � A � GOOD � MOOD!"
"So, get in a good mood!" Legolas grabbed Gimli�s hands and began twirling about with the dwarf, pulling him ever onwards into Moria as Gandalf continued to lead the way, "I was afraid of your nasty caverns in the beginning, but now, I don�t think so! It�s so exciting and this is such an adventure and . . ." The elf finally let go of Gimli�s crushed fingers and he spun a pirouette and hummed a happy tune Adhara recognized easily. "Gimli! You are so dispirited you poor little thing!"
"POOR � LITTLE � THING?!" The dwarf roared and in a split second, all blood rushed to his face and his ears exploded, "THAT�S IT!" And he could no longer handle it! Gimli, son of Gloin had finally lost all his marbles, spun on heel and ran off in a random direction, screaming loudly, "NOOO! GET IT AWAY FROM MEEEE!"
"Gimli!" Gandalf screamed in concern, "Where are you going?"
"ANYWHERE BUT HERE!" The dwarf wept and quickly ran away from them all, and his noisy footsteps and loud sobs all but died away.
"What�s eating him?" Legolas asked brightly, and the entire Fellowship gave him a very dirty look, "Hey!" The elf backed up a step, "What�s eating YOU?!"
"Look, elf." Aragorn growled, "You will either SHUT UP or WE will SHUT YOU UP!"
"I�d like to see that!" The elf stuck his nose into the air, "Humph!"
"Boromir," Aragorn called evenly, and stuck out a hand, "Do you still have the duct tape? And the surgical scissors?"
"Duct tape?" Legolas eyed them warily, "Scissors?"
"Yes." The heir of Isildur wiped his hands on his cloak, "We are going to perform a very simple surgical operation. In primitive conditions, I�m sure, but it will work all the same."
"What kind of surgical operation," The elf squinted suspiciously, "Eh?"
"Have you ever heard of a larynx-octomy?" Boromir asked brightly, and the elf shook his head, "I�ll give you a hint. An �octomy� is the removal of something. Larynx is a voice box."
"Hmm." Legolas sucked on a finger, "Removal of voice box. Hmm." Suddenly, he snapped his fingers, "I�ve got it! We�re going to find Gimli and take out his voice box! That�s such a good idea! I mean, what was he thinking about when he started to scream and put us all into danger!"
"We were not thinking about Gimli." Aragorn frowned, "We�re thinking of . . ."
"Hmm?" The elf bit on a nail again, "Hmm. I�m racking my mind. Can�t think of anything."
"Think again!" Aragorn pulled what seemed to be a large plastic oxygen mask from his bag and gave it to the elf, "Clamp this over your mouth and count to three."
"Three?!" Legolas barked, "I can count to TWO BILLION AND FIFTY TWO!"
"Okay . . ." Aragorn rolled his eyes, "Put this over your mouth and count to two billion and fifty three then!"
"TWO!" The elf snarled and snatched at the mask, "What comes after two billion and fifty two anyway?"
"Two billion and fifty three." Adhara confirmed.
"Hey." Legolas suddenly glared at them all, "I�m getting nasty suspicions."
"Fine!" Boromir snatched at the mask and made as if to put it on himself, "I will get the operation done and in the end I SHALL BE THE PRETTIEST . . ."
"OOOH!" The elf squealed, and snatched the mask back, "OH NO YOU DON�T!" And clamped it over his face. Aragorn and Boromir hid smiles. Legolas took a deep breath of the sweet air and began to count, "One . . . two . . . skip-a-few . . . two billion and fifty two . . . two billion and . . . SNORT! . . . ZZZZZZZZZZ . . . zzzzzzzz . . .z . . . z . . . z . . ."
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Gimli wiped away a last tear, shouldered his axe, and decided to continue marching in whatever direction he had picked. The stupid Fellowship had failed on the account of Elrond selecting a far too bright and cheerful elf. But then again, they were all like that. Aloof, snobby and giddy. Darn elves! Why couldn�t they be down-to-earth and serious like dwarves? Or maybe it was only Mirkwood elves. Must be the evil radiating from the woods has mucked up their brains. Or maybe it was all those elven hair products. Arg.
Suddenly, he looked around and realized what he was staring at. A pretty darn large stone tomb lay in the middle of the room, a single beam of sunlight shafting down, and Gimli blinked quickly. Surely the elf problem wasn�t great enough to commit suicide over! Arg. He shook his head, "Darn elf! Making me see things!" And he looked on the tomb and read the dwarfish inscriptions. Gimli sighed, "Balin, I wish I had that opportunity to thank you for the wonderful axe sharpening stone you sent me the Christmas before the last . . . before that one too . . . it was very nice. And your accompanying Christmas card with the singing carol? That was nice too."
He sniffled slightly, "Balin, is this your tomb? Or is someone just fooling around and wrote your name on a big piece of rock that just looks like a tomb. Hmm." Gimli jumped onto the solid stone, "Sure feels real. But is it?"
"GET OFF ME!" Gimli gasped and jumped off the tomb, "GET OFF NOW YOU BIG OOF!"
"Hey," The dwarf looked around, "Who is talking to me?"
"You have awaken me from my SLUMBER!" The tomb seemingly roared, and Gimli gulped, "You have stroked my surface three times!"
"Um," Gimli frowned, "So are you the genie of the tomb or something?"
"YOU HAVE BUT THREE WISHES!" The booming voice continued, "USE THEM WELL!"
"One," The dwarf raised a finger, "That Legolas Greenleaf . . . er . . . Whiteleaf . . .be not as annoying."
"DONE!" The tomb roared, "Next?"
"Two," Gimli frowned, "May, may my axe, axe be very, very sharp and will hue many, many orcs but will never, never go dull, dull."
"WILL YOU STOP SAYING WORDS TWICE?" The genie snarled, "DONE!"
"And . . ." The dwarf sighed, "I�m not sure yet." He looked around, "That Gandalf knows the way out of here!"
"DONE!" The genie snapped and was quiet. Gimli looked around, but as before, there was nothing. Hmm. Might as well go find the Fellowship now. At least that elf isn�t being annoying.
The way back to the Fellowship wasn�t all that tough, and the dwarf found the group easily enough, and everyone looked very relieved to see him approach. The hobbits ran up to him and gave him a big hug, although it was Aragorn who looked the most pleased. It was then Gimli noted that they were all standing in a circle. About something lying spread-eagle in the center. Legolas. The dwarf squinted, "What happened to him?"
"He�s out. Ether." Boromir shrugged, and held up silver scissors, "We just preformed a surgical operation!"
"Um . . ." Gimli prompted them, "And . . . ?"
"And we cut his vocal cords. Basically, we were going to take the voice box out, but then he would have not been able to breathe." Aragorn provided, "And now that you�re back, we can keep on going!"
"I seem to remember the way!" Gandalf announced suddenly, and Sirius slobbered all over the elf, "What are you doing?"
"Aww, it�s doggy kisses!" Adhara cooed, "Slobber, slobber, slobber!"
"You�re so disgusting!" Sirius glared at her, "I don�t slobber all over the place!"
"Oh, sure you do!" She patted him on the head, "You�re a big lovable slobbery mutt!"
"I�m purebred, if you want to know." He replied crisply, "Genuine Newfie."
"Oh." Adhara looked a bit upset, but didn�t say anything else.
"Ah, he seems to be waking!" Pippin pointed out and Legolas sat up, wiping all the doggy drool off his face with a edge of toga. Luckily, there wasn�t much blood. "So, how do you feel?"
The elf opened his mouth and made a move as if to talk. Nothing came out. His eyes grew wider than Boromir�s shield and he tried again. And again, and again. And obviously, it was possible for his eyes to grow even wider as they did and he glared furiously at Aragorn, grabbed a marker from who knows where, and since he lacked paper, grabbed his toga and wrote in VERY LARGE letters, �WHERE ARE MY VOCAL CORDS?!�
At the time, Gimli was quite amused and impressed that the elf had been able to figure this out, but it really wasn�t that amazing. Boromir was holding up a little glass jar filled with some clear formaldehyde and in this, two little vocal cords floated merrily, dancing about when the man shook the jar.
Legolas printed before Aragorn could explain, �THOSE had better not be my VOCAL CORDS!�
"They are." Aragorn answered calmly, and the elf�s jaw dropped, "I told you that we�d shut you up!"
�YOU IDIOT!� The elf had barely finished scrawling before he leapt onto Aragorn, his fine elven fingers grabbing the heir of Isildur about the neck very tightly, and Boromir moved in to break up the fight (Aragorn was laughing so hard he couldn�t have fought much anyway, and the elf was too angry to care).
"Legolas!" Gimli snarled, "Calm down!" Of all the genie�s wishes, this one seemingly did not work at all! And suddenly, the elf caught sight of the dwarf. Legolas�s eyes lit up with a knowing, almost unearthly glow, and his mouth opened wide. On his hands and knees, he shuffled over to Gimli and released Aragorn, as though in a trance. Still without blinking, he raised his hands heavenward pushed Gimli aside, and began to kiss the ground upon which the dwarf had stood. Gimli stared in shock, and remembered, "I meant that he wasn�t annoying! Not that he had to worship me!"
And suddenly, a gigantic bolt of purple lightning (with advertising down the side: REE) flashed out of the rock heavens and smacked into the elf, and just as suddenly, Legolas was restored. The little vocal cords disappeared out of Boromir�s jar and as the elf blinked after being bolted by lightning, the first words that emerged were, "Can I give you a foot massage?"
"NO!" Gimli roared, but the elf wasn�t finished, offering a manicure, pedicure, hair treatment, and a whole assortment of things the dwarf wasn�t quite sure what they were. "NO! I don�t WANT any!"
"But I�m supposed to be nice to you!" The elf replied in a drippy voice, "I am being nice!"
"NO YOU�RE . . ." The dwarf paused. He was wrong. The elf was right. He was being nice. In his own way. Gimli sighed and laid a hand upon Legolas�s (who was still on the ground) shoulder, "Just try not to sing as much."
"Then I�ll hum!" The elf quickly stood and began humming For He�s A Jolly Good Dwarf-el very loudly and thus began the greatest friendship between a dwarf and an elf ever seen upon Middle Earth.
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