The way to Gondor (Aragorn and Legolas fanfic)

It's a hard life

Pippin POV

This morning I just had a light breakfast and I could feel it in my stomach already now. I mean, a piece of bread and a cup of tea really wasn't enough for such a long journey. We would have to walk through the forest the whole day, and I supposed Aragorn and Gandalf wouldn't want to stop for lunch and afternoon tea. The last hour had been horrible, my feet hurt because I didn't have enough rest, just 10 hours of sleep this night, can you imagine? And I was so hungry I couldn't think straight anymore. Turning my head left, to where Merry walked beside me, I complained:

"Aren't you hungry? I almost don't hear my own thoughts anymore because my belly makes so loud noices!"

"Yeah, we should really have nicked some more lembas bread from the kitchen. Or the cake, but they would probably have noticed", he answered me excitedly. 

"Oh you mean the big chokolate cake on the stove?"

"Exact the one."

"You dummy! Of course they would notice, but we would already have been far away by the time they did! We should have taken it, I don't bear this starvation!", I exclaimed more loudly. Gimli, the dwarf turned his head back to us at my statement. 

"And what are you two babbling about, laddies?", he wanted to know, with a smirk on his lips.

"Oh just that we are about to die from lack of food", I told him.

The dwarf burst out in a loud laugh, holding his belly with his axe-free hand. I stared at Merry in astonishment. What was so funny about that? We were practically dying in front of his eyes. When he finally had got a grip on himself again, he said:

"Gandalf was right, you halflings are worse than stuck-up elves! How did you think your day would look like? Stopping at each inn on the way? I am sorry to disappoint you in that case, I don't think we will be passing any inn on our way the next few weeks."

"What?!", Merry called out. "No inns, not even a tiny one?"

"Nope", Gimli just answered and chuckled to himself. "Hungry after one hour of walking. Where will this be going?"

Still laughing silently he hurried to the front of our group and chatted to Legolas. I was still shocked about the realisation, that we wouldn't be eating anything until the evening, and maybe not even then. 

"Oh Merry, I'll soon start halluzinating steaks and beer in every tree we pass!", I whined to my cousin. He just gave me a confirming look, that told me he felt exactly the same. But our misery was interrupted by a mighty voice from a bit further in the front of our group. 

"Hurry up, hobbits, if you don't move quick enough in this forest, the trees will capture you and lock you up in their crowns!"

That made us move again, and we sprinted to the front, where Frodo and Sam stood next to Gandalf, who had just uttered this warning to us. They were grinning from ear to ear, and I saw Legolas and Aragorn doing the same, as they stood a bit behind and whispered in each others ears. Yeah, make fun of us, at least we don't eat roots from the earth like other species of humans did.

"Look what I found!", Sam exclaimed suddenly. "It's an edible root! You wanna have it?", he said as he proposed the dirty brown root to me and Merry.

"No thanks", I answered disgusted. But then I changed my mind. Might aswell eat roots, if this was the only food I'd get for lunch. "Merry, wanna try it?"

(So I decided to have some fun with Merry and Pippin, because they are just hilarious, aren't they? And this describes the atmosphere of the fellowship pretty well I think. Also, the title is a song from Queen, but whatever. Enjoy!)