“I wouldn’t move if I were you.” With blurring speed, Legolas had drawn his bow from behind him and notched an arrow, however he was not aiming it at Gimli, but something behind him. Smirking, the Elf spoke once more, “Go ahead and look.” Slowly, fearing an arrow in places where arrow wounds would not be deadly, but lastingly painful and embarrassing, Gimli turned around to observe what Legolas was aiming at. His view centered on Gimli’s pick of belongings, more closely, on a long smoking pipe that was sitting onto of his pack. Had it been anyone else aiming, he would have laughed and thrown the mudball, but this was the Elf. The Elf could hit his pipe and shatter the precious smoking object and being out this far, he would go a great while before he would have one again. Already knowing the Elf’s distain for the smoke anyway, he did not wish to test the Son of Thranduil’s wish to fire. The Hobbits, Gimli knew, would never share their smoking pipes, nor were they anywhere near the fine quality of the pipe of dwarf make. Turning back around to face his challenger, the Dwarf took in his situation. Option One: Throw mud at Elf. Option Two: Drop mud and back off. Weighing each option he found pros and cons to each. The constant enjoyment of seeing a muddy elf would be something that could be hung over the immortal’s head day in and day out for the rest of their journey. However, to have to constantly face such peril without pipeweed was make this adventure turn into something he was not ready to face. Remembering back to his youth, his mind returned to a time when one silly Dwarf thought that pipeweed was something not needed for everyday life and that he was no longer going to partake of it. A sickness soon followed that quickly became legend among his people. This foolish Dwarf would shake and fidget and babble constantly about things no one cared about. Finally, he relented a rejoined the other sane dwarfs in blissful smoky heaven. However, muddy Elf. What more was there to say on that point? Having spent all this time thinking and recalling tales of his youth, he realized that neither of them had moved this whole time. Gimli still stood taught, arm drawn back, mud at the ready. Legolas sat there, bow drawn back with no sign of strain from the bowstring being stretched. Gimli knew better than to think that he could outlast Legolas in this pose, for if the Elf felt his ability to hold this posture until he finally tired, sometime next week for all the Dwarf knew, and he would just finally release the arrow and accept his muddy fate. Staring at the Dwarf, the Elf wondered what was going through that stunted head of his. ‘No doubt wondering how long I can hold this pose.’ Thinking back to Mirkwood, Legolas thought of a time when he and one of his training partners decided to try this very thing. Many hours later, his father finally made him come in. “Legolas Greenleaf, your mother went to all this trouble to make your favorite tonight and you will come in here and eat it!” The Prince gave a small shudder at the memory of his father’s powerful voice booming throughout the land. ‘I swear, the whole kingdom always knew what I was doing or if I was in trouble.’ “What do you mean you lost your books?” “Is that smoke I see coming from your room?” “You went onto the target range with ten arrows, why are there only six here now?” ‘Ai! I have to get my mind off these thoughts!’ ‘Ha! The Elf is fearful of me! Look how he shakes at my impressive stature. Must be because he is facing a real dwarf on the ground without his sneaky tall Elf tactics.’ Almost allowing a smirk to cross his face, suddenly this situation became a little more hopeful. Time passed, how long neither could really tell, neither wishing to press the situation knowing that the other would strike at the first sign of weakness. The most important factor riding on this standoff was ‘the taunt’. Elves and Dwarves were both masters of ‘the taunt’. That is, throwing everything, including the kitchen washing basin, in the form of insulting words at your opponent. The desired result being that you throw your enemy into such a fit of rage that they loose all common sense and do something stupid, like a ill-prepared full blown charge, the result of which being usually some sort of miscalculation and resulting in more embarrassment. Thus, ‘the taunt’ was a powerful weapon and this would determine which one of them would be allowed use employ such a tactics should future need arise. (Of course, knowing these two, it was a matter of how many minutes) ‘So, this Elf is a stubborn one. Must have gotten them from his father whom I heard is also this way. I wonder what would happen if you cut off those prissy pointed eartips, do they turn mortal? Would an Elf be….. SPLASH! Before either of them knew what was happening, they were drenched in very cold water, both being disarmed by its chilling affects and its general shocking nature. Looking up, Legolas and Gimli spotted a Ranger glaring down at them from on top of the rock they were feuding under. “Now, if you too are quite finished, Gimli you’re supposed to be keeping watch and Legolas, you should be resting. We will need your eyes tomorrow and you cannot travel tomorrow in reverie.” Aragorn tried to hide his laughter, but was failing miserably, as the last of his words began to shake with chuckles. “Also, the both of you might want to dry out. Gimli, you’ll catch a cold and Legolas, well, your hair might dry in a funny position.” The laughter was breaking out as he could barely hold himself up. “Come, Aragorn, that was quite childish of you.” Standing up, Legolas tried to maintain his dignity, even as a drop of water dripped of his ears and chin. “You should really be more mature.” Walking away, the squish squish squish of his walk did nothing but add to the man’s delight. Gimli, seeing the Elf stalk off, realized his hand still contained an amount of mud from his plot against Legolas. No doubt entered his mind as to who the mud would be launched at now. Fin