Battle of Five Armies

Bilbo fights to protect his family in the midst of war, all the while battling his own insecurities and the voices whispering in the back of his mind. There's something wrong here... (3rd in The Introspective Thoughts of Bilbo Baggins)

So yeah, after To Fear the Sun and The Darkest of Nights I decided "What the hell! Let's make a series out of this, I don't think I'll be stopping anytime soon."

Warnings: Violence, blood, gore, just the horrors of war in general, more bagginshield because I just can't even deal with those two, feels in general, Bilbo Will Probably Always Have Issues (thanks Thorin), BAMF!Bilbo, still more pining, mental problems, dark thoughts, angst galore, the Ring is Not Your Friend Bilbo God Damn It

The screams of the dying and wounded mix with the roars and battle cries of the warriors clashing like the most horrifying of symphonies and all Bilbo Baggins can think of (as his feet slip and slide in the ground turned to soup with spilled blood) is that he has never been so glad in his life that he managed to find the magic Ring.

It's his one saving grace right now, and it's the only reason he hasn't keeled over from shock or run screaming from the field and all the way back to the Shire.

He can remain somewhat detached, in his little world of muted colors and shadows, and not consciously register the fact that he's just seen a dwarf go down screaming under the claws and teeth of five blood-hungry orcs. The Ring lets him stay sane, even when he slips in the mud and lands face-first in a pile of rotting intestine hanging out of the disemboweled stomach of a Man who can't be more than eighteen in years. He can't lose his wits now, even as he hacks and slashes his way through the battle, trying to find the members of the Company. He has to protect them.

He can't lose them.

But he still thanks Eru for the fact that he now has his Ring.

And his mithril hauberk, and the other pieces of light-weight armor Bard had scavenged for him, when he had refused to stay out of battle.

-Bard sighed. "My eldest is twice your height, Master Baggins," he pointed out, a rueful smile on his lips and Bilbo raised one eyebrow. "And I'm twice as fast. You can't keep me out of this battle, Bard. I'm going in whether or not I have armor beyond my shirt." Something flashed in Bard's eyes and a real smile curved his lips. "You're just as saucy as my Sigrid, too." And Bilbo couldn't help but laugh-

Bilbo dives forward as Bofur trips, an orc rider descending upon him with a snarl. Faster than quicksilver, he slices Sting into the fragile underbelly of the snarling warg, spilling hot red blood everywhere. As the warg fell, wailing, Bilbo slams Sting into the back of the orc, spilling still more blood on the tortured ground.

He has a vague thought that the ground would grow few things when all was said and done.

He has another, even vaguer thought, that killing was becoming too easy for him. Too simple.

But he does not think it for long, as something is whispering in his mind, showing him visions of his friends all dead on the ground, butchered, maimed, dyingdyingdyingdead.

He doesn't want to lose them. They are his friends, his family-

-He hits the ground with a choked cry and staggers to his bruised, burned feet, only to be met with the cold eyes of the dwarves, cold and unforgiving, burning with the same hate and gold-sickness as their King, all hail the King, King of a tomb full of cold metal and rotting skeletons, he wants to scream at them-

All he is, is a thief to them.

They are all the same, wretched bastards who looked at him with eyes as cold as the ones in the Shire did, because he is strange and worthless and helpless and they never cared for him anyway and it would be better for everyone if he was just dead, and why is he helping those traitorous, greedy dwarves who turned on him for piles of cold gold?

He should just let them all die. Go back to the Shire and leave them all to burn-

He staggers, stopping dead in the middle of the field, hand scrabbling at his chest.

What in Eru's name is wrong with him?

The dwarves are his friends, his family! The only thing wrong with them was that cursed gold sickness, and that was no fault of their own, but the sick disease that lay in the hearts of all Dwarves and could be – would be, please EruYavannaMahalAule, let it be possible – driven back.

He is a Hobbit. To abandon his family – though they had abandoned him – is an idea beyond repugnant.

And if he has to do repugnant things to save them, then he will.

He slices through the orcs and wargs with wild abandon and pays no more attention to the voice screaming in him, the one yelling how this is wrong and what the hell is he doing?!

He falls into a trance as he whirled, protecting his friends. Hours could have passed and he would not have cared.

Until he hears the scream.

He whirls around and sees Thorin fall into the mud.

Everything slows.

Azog laughs and raises his mace.

"No!"

And something cold laughs in the back of his mind.

You'd better run, little Baggins…run to your king under the mountain…

He runs.

The mace falls.

"THORIN!"