The Makeover
Written by Anakin McFly, G. Leong and Y.Y.D.
Chapter One: Oh Mine, Poor, Poor Aragorn!
There was water... water... everywhere! Suddenly, a bottle of Head and Shoulders shampoo came into view, floating closer... and closer... and...
"AAAAH! MONSTER!" Aragorn yelled in terror, drawing his worst nightmare to an end. Hyperventilating, he looked up to see Legolas shaking him awake. "Wha... what... oh, it's you."
"Wake up! You'll be late!"
"For w..." Aragorn suddenly remembered. "Oh. No."
"You are NOT going to back out now. No way. You are going to the 'How to Take Care of Your Hair' seminar for little elves or I'll kill you."
Aragorn looked at the sharp arrow on Legolas' bow and decided to just go on with it. He grabbed the wine bottle next to him and took a swig.
"Ahhhhh..." Aragorn licked his lips and passed the bottle to Legolas, who gave it a strange look.
"Is wine supposed to be BLACK?"
"Uh... I think so."
The elf sniffed at it. "And is it supposed to smell of sweat, dirt and blood?"
"Doesn't it always?"
Legolas suddenly realized what was going on and threw the wine aside with a shout of, "Ugh! You're DISGUSTING!"
The two of them then went on to Rivendell where the seminar was being held. That is, after Legolas dragged Aragorn out of bed.
Most of Rivendell was inaccessible, due to the redevelopment works going on. Skyscrapers were springing up everywhere, and in the distance Aragorn saw the Two Towers.
And then... they were there.
Elves of all ages were staring at the scene going on outside one of Rivendell's most established educational institutes. A grown man struggling from an elf determined never to lose his grip on the other was not something one would see very often. And the man was shrieking louder than any banshee would.
"I DON'T WANT TO GO!""
"Oh no you don't; you made a vow. There's no way you can back out now," said the elf, whom we all recognise as Legolas.
"Er...Have you been reading Cinderella?"
Legolas just looked at Aragon, who sighed. "I must have been drunk when I said I would go to this stupid class," he muttered.
"Actually, you were. On that...wine. If you can call that disgusting stuff you had wine in the first place-"
"I don't find it disgusting."
"That's because YOU'RE disgusting. Anyway, I have a recording of you promising to go to the seminar."
Knowing that he could no longer put going to the class off, Aragorn resigned himself to his fate. He slouched all the way into the lecture theatre and took a seat in the back row. Legolas promptly sat himself next to him. A man looked up in surprise. "Don't you know how to take care of your hair already?"
"I do," Legolas replied. He turned to Aragorn. "But YOU don't, and I'm going to make sure you don't sneak out of class halfway."
As a matter of fact, that was precisely what Aragorn had intended to do. Mentally, he cursed Legolas for foiling his plan. He was about to make a jab back at him when the speaker arrived. Looking at her, Aragon was struck with sudden inspiration.
"Look, somebody actually has better hair than you do," he commented.
It worked. The green-eyed monster immediately possessed Legolas, who shot jealous looks at the speaker.
The speaker, however, seemed to be immune to death glares. She started droning on and on about hair care and general cleanliness, and in no time at all Aragorn was bored to death. True, he discovered what it meant to take a bath, as well as learnt about a cleansing agent known as 'shampoo', but other than that, he found a lot of things that was mentioned nonsensical.
"Er... Legolas? Isn't it a little ridiculous to count out a THOUSAND strokes and wash your hair THREE times a day?" he asked after the seminar.
Legolas looked miffed.
"It ISN'T." He added as an afterthought, "At least you've been paying attention..." His eyes gleamed. "Let's see if you can put what you have learnt to practice..."
"NO!"
"Yes."
"NO!"
"YES!!! Just think of Arwen..." Legolas gave an evil smile, "You will do anything to make her happy, won't you? Anything. Anything..." he murmured slowly, softly, but persuasively.
"But..." Aragorn the almighty whimpered pathetically at his elf friend.
"No 'buts'. Remember, you love her. You LOVE her. You would do anything for her. Anything..." Legolas attempted to guilt-trap Aragorn...
"..."
...And succeeded.
"FINE! WHATEVER YOU SAY!"
"MUAHAHAHA!" Legolas laughed manically at his latest success.
"Oh well... I suppose it can't be that bad..." Aragorn thought, trying to comfort himself.
Chapter Two: And J.R.R. Tolkien Turned in His Grave
"Can't you comb at a faster pace, Legolas?" Aragorn complained.
"Why don't YOU do it, then? Be grateful I'm combing it for you. Combing YOUR hair a thousand times is no easy feat. And your hair is all... tangled...up!" said Legolas, struggling to comb the man's hair.
"OW!" Aragorn yelped in pain as the comb snapped in two. Sighing, Legolas picked up another one and tried to remove the first.
"Stop moving. You'll mess up the hair. If that happens, I'll re-comb it a thousand times," Legolas said menacingly.
Aragorn sat very still after that.
Everything went smoothly till somewhere round the 758th stroke...
"It's so late and I haven't even got the chance to comb my hair." Legolas moaned.
"Well, what were you doing in the morning, then?" Aragorn turned to ask.
"Attempting to wake you up so you would not miss that seminar." Legolas scowled. "Stop moving your head, Aragon. Its distracting!"
"Okay." Aragon shrugged.
"Stop MOVING!" Legolas blasted.
"Whatever." Aragon bowed down his head and muttered to himself.
"I said: S-T-O-P M-O-V-I-N-G." Legolas hissed through clenched teeth, "Which part of that do you not understand, Aragon?"
Aragon gulped nervously, and wisely kept his mouth shut as he kept as still as possible. Suddenly, he felt Legolas stop.
"Uh... what..."
The elf's face was whiter than usual. "Aragorn... There is a MUSHROOM growing on your head."
"Oh." Aragorn paused to contemplate the meaning of Legolas' words. "Well, I'm not surprised. It IS the mushroom and truffle season..."
There was a moment of silence. Legolas briefly pictured Aragorn harvesting a crop of mushrooms growing on his head. "Um, do you want me to leave it there or what?"
"Nah, just take it out."
Legolas took a deep breath and pulled out the mushroom. He placed it in front of Aragorn, who promptly popped it into his mouth.
The elf was speechless. Maybe Aragorn CULTIVATED those mushrooms.
The next day...
"WHAT!" Aragon roared indignantly.
"Yes, you heard me right," Legolas commented in his as-a-matter-of-fact voice.
"But... but... To DYE IT???"
"Yes, and to dye it silver. Like elves' hair." Legolas concealed a small smile as he dragged Aragorn out of bed for the second time running.
A grown man struggling from an elf determined never to lose his grip on the other was not something one would see very often.
And yet, elves loitering outside one of Rivendell's most established educational institutes were treated to that same scene for a second time. Again, the man was shrieking away at a pitch that would put the best piccolo player to shame.
"I DON'T WANT TO GO!"
Somehow or other, with much hauling and threats on the elf's part, Legolas managed to get Aragorn into the hairstylist's and onto a chair.
"I DON'T WANT TO..."
Of all elves who could be on shift at that particular time and place, it had to be Arwen. It took just one look at her beloved, the Mister "I-don't-know-what-is-personal-grooming" in a HAIRSTYLIST'S for her to faint.
Another female elf scurried out, and with much difficulty pulled the unconscious Arwen on top of a chair, all the time mumbling something about how chivalry was vanishing these days. Legolas heard that with his sharp elven ears, and immediately got up. The female elf at once plastered on a professional looking (but fake) smile that said, "No, I can handle this."
She finished soon enough on her own. "May I help you?"
"Yeah," Legolas replied, as he slumped, exhausted, into a chair. "This guy would like his hair dyed silver."
"What do you mean I..." This time Aragorn was interrupted by a glare from the elf girl.
The latter seemed to have the ability to speak with her eyes. This glare said, "You made enough trouble here already by causing Arwen to faint and making me work extra, so you'd better shut up." Her look then became more professional. She surveyed him, wrinkling her nose at the smell.
"But first I think he'd better take a bath." Chucking a white towel and a bottle of shampoo at him, she shooed Aragorn outside. Legolas, however, stayed put as he browsed through a book of different hairdos.
"And what would you like?"
Legolas flipped through a few more pages, finally settling on one of an elf with a punk hairdo. The spiky kind.
He held up the picture. "I'd like this hairdo." He paused. "And I'd also like to dye my hair."
"What colour?" the hairdresser asked, taking note of the picture.
Legolas thought for a moment, and then grinned.
"Blue," he replied.
The elf girl arched one of her eyebrows delicately.
"Electric blue," Legolas affirmed.
And J.R.R. Tolkien turned in his grave.
Chapter Three: The Black Sea
"It'll be alright," Aragorn muttered to himself, looking at the crystal clear river Anduin. "It'll be alright, its just water..."
Slowly he placed the towel and the shampoo on the ground, and started to strip until he stood naked before the rushing waters.
Aragorn was scared. For a moment he thought of turning back… but then he also thought of what Legolas would do to him. And he thought of the woman in his heart.
Taking a deep breath, Aragorn overcame his hydrophobia...
And dived.
The waters of Anduin turned black.
#
Downstream, a little boy threw a causal glance out of his window at the River. One could not imagine the extent of his horror to see the beautiful body of water he saw everyday all BLACK. And of course, as a little git, he knew of no other reaction then calling for his mum.
"Mummy! Mummy! Come look! The river turned black!"
"Later, honey," said Mum, who was always busy, absent-mindedly.
And when 'later' came....
SPANK! SPANK! came the loud noises of the mother spanking the kid.
The poor little boy sobbed pitifully, not knowing what he had done to deserve his punishment.
"I told you many times before, never bathe in River Anduin! Now look at what you've done!"
SPANK! SPANK! SPANK! After a few rounds of spanking for the little git, the mother sent the poor boy to bed without his meal.
"Sob...sob...sob..." The boy sobbed pathetically. "But... *hiccup*...I'm *hiccup* in-... *hiccup* -nocent... *hiccup* sob..."
Moral of this sidetrack: To a mother, no one is dirtier than her own little boy.
#
"Ah..." Aragorn gave a contented sigh. It felt so good to have years of sweat and dirt washed off him in one go.
He was enjoying it all when suddenly, he felt someone jumping into the river behind him.
His body tensed reflexively. He was, after all, stark naked.
"Aragorn!"
Hearing his name being called out in a familiar voice, which he could identify as Legolas', he relaxed.
And then he turned. "Oh my..." Aragorn's jaw dropped. He uttered a whole string of words that expressed shock with negative connotations. They are not appropriate to be recorded here as it may offend some people, and it would definitely up the rating.
Legolas frowned.
"Someone pinch me. Tell me this is not real... OW!!!" Aragorn struggled to get away from Legolas who had suddenly decided to do just that.
"What the h*** did you do that for?" Aragorn screamed as he rubbed his swollen cheek.
"You told me to pinch you." Legolas replied matter-of-factly.
"You didn't have to take that literally..." Aragorn muttered under his breath.
Legolas, who had sharp (and pointy) ears, picked that up but chose to ignore it. He gave a careless shrug of his shoulder and surveyed the environmental impact of Aragorn's bath on the River Anduin.
(According to various myths and legends, Aragorn's bath turned the River Anduin black and salty because of all his sweat and dirt. That's why in years to come, the river ended in "the Black Sea".)
Aragorn, however, had not yet recovered from the shock of seeing Legolas. "What...did...you...do...to...your HAIR?"
"I dyed it. And I got a new hairdo. You like it?"
Aragorn's mouth was hanging open.
"It's a new kind of dye. You know, waterproof. The latest elf technology." Legolas took out a pair of sunglasses and put them on. Aragorn just stared.
"What're you looking so surprised for?" Legolas asked. "It's the new elf look. Trust me. Soon others will have it too." He paused, thinking for a while. "I'm going to start a gang. And everybody in it will look like me."
"WHAT?" Aragorn finally managed to splutter.
The elf ignored him, lost in his daydreams. "And guess who else I saw at the saloon changing their hairdo?"
"Who?" asked Aragorn. He had a sinking feeling, a premonition that he would get experience an even greater feeling of shock.
He was right.
Chapter Four: Of Bright Green Bandanas, Jewelry, And Hair Tonic
"Who?" Aragorn repeated.
Legolas turned to look at him through his sunglasses. The elf grinned, flashing his pearly-white teeth. "Gollum."
"WHAT?" Aragorn exclaimed, grabbing hold of Legolas as he fell backwards into the river.
There was a yell... and both Aragorn and Legolas fell beneath the water's surface.
The waters of Anduin turned blue, thanks to Legolas' hair dye.
Maybe elven technology wasn't really cracked up to what it's supposed to be. Or Legolas just got a cheap dye job.
(The dye was really bad. A few days later, it wore off. Miraculously, Aragorn's sweat and dirt remained.)
Meanwhile, on the banks of the River, Legolas (fully clothed) was sobbing away. "My blue hair! It's all gone!"
Aragorn (also fully clothed), tried to comfort his companion. "Don't worry, Legolas. You can always dye it again. Anyway, don't you still have your hairdo?"
Legolas only looked slightly comforted, so the man started digging in his pockets for something to cheer the elf up. After a few moments, he brandished a bandana.
A BRIGHT GREEN bandana.
"Here."
"Wow." Legolas took the bandana and tied it around his head. He admired his reflection in the Anduin. "Cool." Legolas put on his sunglasses again, which had fallen off. He grinned. "Really cool."
#
Meanwhile, standing by his window again was that same little git from the last chapter. His mouth was now hanging WIDE open.
One could not imagine the extent of his horror when he saw the remarkable change in the river's colour. Of course, being a little git, he would have learnt nothing from his previous experience. He shouted at once for his mummy.
"Mummy, mummy, look! The river's all blue!"
We can all anticipate what would happen next.
The sound of spanking reverberated throughout the whole of the neighbourhood.
SPANK! "How many times must I tell you-" SPANK! "-Never eat blueberries in River Anduin!" SPANK! "Now look at what you've done!" SPANK!
The little git tried to talk through his sobs.
"But...sob... I'm...*hiccup*...innocent! Sob..."
Moral of this sidetrack: To a mother, no one is greedier than her own little boy.
#
Not too long ago...
"The number of photos you are taking, Sam, is ridiculous!"
Sam put down his brand new Canon Digital Ixus V3. "Why would I, Frodo? Rivendell's an interesting place, and I still have more than 20 memory cards to burn."
"I don't know, but you really look like a tourist. Anyway, our purpose here is not to sightsee, but to bring Gollum to the hairdressers'. Right, Gollum?"
"Yesss, Massster."
The other hobbit sighed. "Well, since we're here, we might as well do something else. I mean, isn't it a long time since we've been here?"
Suddenly, his eyes lit up as an idea popped into his head. "Look, Frodo, I've got something to do. Bye!"
Frodo and Gollum were left blinking in the dust.
"Well, Gollum. We're on our own."
"Yesss, Massster."
The pair made their way to the hairdresser's, just in time to see Aragorn storm out with a towel and shampoo. Frodo couldn't believe his eyes. "Is that guy ARAGORN? I don't believe it..."
He entered, with Gollum trailing behind, and then he saw Legolas doing... stuff with his hair. "Hi, Legolas."
"Hi, Frodo," Legolas responded. "Here for anything?"
"Not exactly. It's Gollum who needs to have something done."
The elf girl, who heard their little exchange, choked. "Hello? That guy doesn't have any hair!"
"That's why I hoped that you would be able to recommend a good hair tonic..." Frodo tried his best to look appealing.
Aw, he looks so cute... The elf girl melted. "Well, the Oriental brands are the best. You can go to this hair care centre called Beijing 101, they're not bad, or you can try..."
#
Sam looked in the large window, eyes wide and sparkling. "Look at all those jewels!" His eyes then took on a maniacal gleam. "Perfect for the precious..."
Grinning, he entered the room. A small creature looking not unlike Gollum came out to greet him. "Yes, Master? What do you want? Dobby will do it for Master."
He spoke like Gollum too, reflected Sam. But his English was better.
"Uh, I have this ring, see, and I'd like to have it inlaid with diamonds..." Sam's eyes wandered and settled on a bright red ruby. "And that ruby, too."
"Yes, Master."
Dobby took the Ring from Sam. Then, unlocking the display case, he bent inside and emerged with a few diamonds and the precious.
"Um..." Sam could not resist the temptation to ask Dobby something that he was itching to know.
"Yes, Master?"
"Are you related to Gollum by any chance?"
"Gollum? No, Dobby has not heard of Gollum. Dobby is a house-elf."
"An ELF?" Sam spluttered.
"Yes, master."
Sam fainted.
#
Meanwhile, at Beijing 101...
Frodo entered the hair care centre, Gollum in tow.
"Good afternoon, may I help you?"
Frodo looked up to see a woman towering over him. Suddenly, he felt very conscious of his height.
"Oh...er, yeah. I would like some hair tonic for him." Frodo pointed at Gollum.
"Gollum wantsss dye hairs too, Master," requested Gollum.
Frodo glared at him. "You are NOT dying your hair purple. That is final. Anyway," He added as an afterthought, "You don't have any hair yet."
"And would you like anything for yourself, sir?"
Frodo turned to look at the person who had addressed him. "Um, no." He thought for a while. On the other hand... "Uh, then again, maybe I'd like to rebond my hair..." the hobbit grinned. "And dye it green."
And J.R.R. Tolkien turned in his grave, back to his original position.
"Okay, I'll get someone to be with you in a few moments. He's a hair specialist from China."
Frodo stiffened. "China? AIEEE! SARS!!!" he ran out screaming, leaving Gollum behind in a cloud of dust for the second time in a day.
"Massster? Where did massster go? Gollum must find massster!" Gollum looked around and decided to snitch a few bottles of hair tonic before running after Frodo.
"Hey! You haven't paid for that yet..." The woman frowned, picked up a telephone and punched in a number.
It rang for a few minutes before someone picked up at the other end. "Hello?"
"Agent Smith?"
Chapter Five: Sss... The English Language Centre, Gollum
Gollum walked along the streets of Rivendell, clutching onto the bottles of hair tonic as he searched for Frodo. "Massster! Where are you? We wantsss Massster!"
Suddenly, he caught sight of a glaring neon sign on a building – yet another one of Rivendell's now infamous established educational institutes. The words 'English Language Centre' were flashing on it in every colour of the rainbow. Only a single soul was loitering about the building, so Gollum had no choice but to ask the man for help.
"Do you knowsss where Massster is? We wantsss to findsss him!"
The man gave him a strange look. "Pardon?"
Gollum repeated what he said.
"Look here. I don't get you. Your English is so... Ugh. Maybe you should go in. The teacher in there should be able to understand you because she's probably used to people talking like you."
Gollum thought about it for a moment, and decided that the man had made perfect sense. He crawled in through the revolving glass doors...
"OW!"
And got himself a lovely bruise on his bald head courtesy of the doors, which moved a little too fast for him.
Nursing his wound, Gollum entered the classroom to see it already full with little elf students. None looked up when he arrived, walking through the revolving classroom doors...
"OW!"
...that is, until he once again got his head, well, crushed by the doors. Wincing in pain, Gollum stumbled around for a while before he regained his senses and walked up to the teacher.
"Do you knowsss where Massster is?"
The teacher, Ms Sharon, stared at him.
#
Frodo soon grew tired and stopped running, leaning against a tree to rest. There was no way that the SARS virus could run as fast as he had just done. Panting, his gaze wandered to one of those new-fangled computer terminals that had been recently installed.
Curious, he touched the screen. The hobbit almost jumped back when a number of green words popped up.
"Do you want to know what the Matrix is, Frodo?"
He blinked. "The WHAT?"
"If you want to know, follow the white rabbit."
Frodo looked around. "I don't see any white rabbit. What white rabbit are you talking about?" The curiosity of a hobbit was aroused in him, and he started spamming questions. "Who are you? How do you know my name? What is the Matrix? Why am I talking to a screen?" He paused to take a breath, and the LCD screen took advantage of that precious moment before the hobbit could get anything else in.
"STOP INTERRUPTING! NO ONE CAN BE TOLD WHAT THE MATRIX IS! YOU HAVE TO SEE IT FOR YOURSELF, SO THERE! Ahem. Fine. No white rabbit? Follow the precious. Knock knock, Frodo."
Then, the screen went blank. Frodo shrugged, confused by what had just happened. Suddenly he felt something hit his head, and he blacked out.
A while later...
Frodo blinked sleepily. He thought he heard a voice speaking.
"Good morning, Mr. Anderson."
The voice sounded strangely familiar. He had heard it before somewhere... But where, he wasn't too sure.
"Who are you?" he croaked, still groggy.
The hobbit blinked again, and slowly the person in front of him came into view. It was an elf he knew very well.
"Elrond?"
It might have been his imagination, but he thought he saw the elf stiffen.
"It's AGENT SMIT- Frodo? Wha... You're not Neo?" The menacing manner left him.
Frodo was now very confused. Also, he now could see Elrond properly. Only that he looked different. His hair was short, for one. In fact, he was balding. Or had a receding hairline, to put it nicely. And he wore a black suit topped off with shades to finish the look.
"Who?"
"Um, sorry. Someone mistook you for Neo. But there isn't much resemblance between you and that guy... She must have been walking around without her shades. That's it."
"Huh? What's going on?"
"Nothing. You can go." Agent Smith, also known as Elrond, paused for a while. "Just... don't tell Arwen, okay?"
"..."
"Or else." Elrond took out a fibre-optic wiretap from a case and dangled it in Frodo's face. "You don't know what I can do with this, Frodo."
The hobbit panicked and obligingly swore to keep his lips sealed. Then he ran.
Frodo didn't know what was worse; SARS or that THING that Elrond had with him.
#
"Preciousss? Now, that's very profound word. Do you know what that means?" Ms Sharon asked.
"Er... Preciousss meansss we needs itsss," Gollum whimpered pathetically, horribly confused at being posed a philosophical question by Ms Sharon who questioned the existence and the very being of "the Preciousss".
He thought to himself: Ssshe must be a very great perssson if ssshe can quessstion the exissstence of the preciousss, Gollum.
"Oh great Mrsss Sharon, explains to usss what the preciousss isss," he asked in a fervent voice. He bowed awkwardly (given his height, it was understandable) and with adoration evident in his glassy eyes, he looked up at her.
Ms Sharon's face turned crimson red, half out of anger from being called Mrs., and half out of mortification at being worshipped by Gollum.
"Um... Why don't we come back to this topic later?"
"Whatever you sssays, missstresss."
Ms Sharon flushed even more.
Chapter Six: Personal Slave, Faithful Dog
"Look... Er, what's your name again?"
"Gollum," he answered, trying to seem helpful, his big yellow eyes open wide at the teacher as he tried to gain her admiration.
Ms Sharon felt sick. He was acting worse than her dog. But she ploughed through anyway. "Look, Gollum, you've been very helpful and all, but I don't really need you following me all around the place all the time."
The disappointed, rejected look on Gollum's face tugged on her heartstrings. Sighing, Ms Sharon decided to soften the blow a little. "Why don't you, er, spend some time revising your English instead?"
It seemed to work. Gollum's face brightened up, and he scampered off.
Ms Sharon continued on to the staff lounge, where she enjoyed a nice cup of coffee. That is, until...
"Sharon! What were you thinking of when you dumped this idiot on us?"
The teacher shrunk into her chair. Great. The worst troublemaker in the entire learning facility had just stormed into the room looking for her. The elf-girl strode right up belligerently and demanded an explanation, waving Gollum's textbook in the air.
Ms Sharon looked around and saw Gollum slinking about in the corners of the room. So that guy was pretty smart after all, getting HER to help him...
The "HER" in question was by now jabbing her elder with a finger. Ms Sharon decided that he had enough. She got up and decided to pay a long-needed visit to the optician, where that student with perfect eyesight would never find her...
"What's your problem? Are you scared of us? Hey! Where are you going?"
Gollum wailed, big drops of tears falling from his face and splashing onto the ground as he watched the object of his affections being yelled at in such a mean manner.
"What is YOUR problem?" The elf-girl was thoroughly irritated by now. She was stuck with tutoring some hairless thing that couldn't stop hissing, that lousy teacher wouldn't even listen to her, the hairless thing was shrieking over that lousy teacher who had somehow vanished into thin air...
After she was done with Gollum, he had to be sent to a hospital. A mental one.
#
"Wake up, Sam. The Matrix has you. Follow..."
Sam stirred at the voice. It sounded vaguely familiar... "Mister Frodo?"
"Sam? Are you all right? I was so worried..."
"How did I get here?" Sam asked, looking around him from where he lay. Everything was white. The walls were white, the curtains were white and even his clothes were white. Even his hair... nah. Thankfully, that was still its normal colour and Sam assured himself that he at least did not appear like Gandalf. "Where am I exactly? The last thing I remember... the last thing I remember..." Sam screwed up his face in concentration. "The last thing I remember was... blackout. What is this place?"
"Heaven," came the answer in a rather uncertain tone. "I think..."
"I'm not dead, am I...?" Sam looked about ready to go unconscious again.
"No... uh, wait. I think it's a hospital..."
"You think?" Sam's face matched the colour of his surroundings.
Frodo looked flustered. "Lower your volume. It won't be good if someone heard us."
Taken out of context, that sentence alone could sound very bad.
"You see... apparently, I was over enthusiastic with my running and tripped over god-knows-what and my head hits god-knows-what and god-knows-who send me to god-knows-where... wait, I know where this is, this is the hospital!" Frodo beamed triumphantly at Sam. "And when I woke up, I found myself here, right beside you.
"Apparently, you too, were sent in because of some injury. The nurse told me that an elf had sent you in. We should ask Legolas to convey our thanks to that Good Samaritan."
Mental image of the "elf" flashed forebodingly across his mind. "I think... we don't need to..." Then, he remembered the ring. He groped his lower body and touched something hard in his pockets. He heaved a sigh of relief.
"Frodo," Sam paused for drama's sake, "I have something very important to tell you." He whipped out the ring in its full glory, studded with all kinds of precious stones.
Frodo's mouth dropped open and his eyes brimmed with tears. "You... you are proposing to me? Do you know, all my life, all my adult life, I've believed in the union of the souls of Frodo and Sam? And now... when this moment has finally come... I... I... am speechless."
Sam blinked. Whatever reaction he had expected, this was definitely not it. "Er... Frodo? Frodo? It's your ring. It's the ring."
Sam did a mental countdown, waiting for the message to sink in.
5...
4...
3...
"Is that THE ring?!" Frodo's expression was that of horror beyond description.
Ah... Frodo had improved. Sam gave a withering smile. Till he realised that it was he who was in deep... s***.
"WHAT DID YOU DO TO IT?"
Sam was thrown back from the force of Frodo's yell and banged his head on the windowsill. "Um... I borrowed it without you knowing?" he asked, rubbing his head in pain.
"You stole it." Frodo glared at him accusatively.
Sam gulped nervously. "I'm sorry. I'm er... really sorry. But it's so irressssissstibly beautiful. Don't you think so? It's... such a preciousssss." Sam's eyes held an evil look.
Frodo strangled Sam, breaking him out of his trance. "It's MY ring! MY precious! MINE, MINE, MINE! ALL MINE! And you've stolen it. You've vandalised it. You've destroyed its natural charm and beauty! How do you intend to atone for your sins, huh? Huh? Huh?"
Sam gulped again. Partially because of the sore throat he had, post-strangulation, but more importantly, because of this bad feeling arising within him. "How would you like me to..." his voice turned raspy at the words, "Atone for my sins?"
Frodo turned his back against Sam and mused silently to himself. When he turned back again to face him, Sam could see a maniacal glint in the other hobbit's eyes.
"How about this... You be my personal slave for a month."
Sam thought he heard evil laughter, but it couldn't have come from the good-natured Frodo... could it?
To Be Continued...
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