Lord Of The Rings Fan Fiction ❯ The Rifleman ❯ Leap of Faith ( Chapter 2 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

do not own Lord of the Rings or any of it’s characters
I do ,however, own all OC’s that appear


Frodo, Sam and Rochben made for an extraordinarily strange traveling group. Frodo and Sam themselves didn’t make a particularly strange team, but the addition of the six foot tall, oddly dressed man earned the group a few stares along their trip. Rochben had not had the opportunity to acquire new clothes since the hobbits clothing was far to small to fit him so he had to keep the clothes he had woken up in, camo pattern utility pants, boots, a green tee and a camo pattern coat.

Despite Rochben’s unusual appearance and questionable past, Frodo seemed to trust him completely. Rochben had asked Frodo about this at one point during their trip and Frodo had simply smiled and said that he could just tell Rochben was a good person. Sam was a little more leery of Rochben but seemed to have no problem with him for the most part.

They were walking down a path in a corn field when Rochben suddenly heard something rustling through the stalks. He started to reach for his rifle when a hobbit burst from the corn rows and plowed head long into Frodo knocking him over as well as falling himself. A second hobbit emerged from the corn and ran into Rochben, bouncing off him as if he was a brick wall. Rochben relaxed and helped the fallen hobbit up off the ground and watched as Sam pulled the other hobbit off Frodo, they seemed to be familiar with each other. They argued for a bit before they noticed Rochben standing there.

“Who’s the big’un?” Asked one of the hobbits

“This is Rochben” Replied Frodo “Rochben this is Merry and Pippin, they’re good friends of mine”

“Good to meet you both” Said Rochben

“Likewise” Replied the hobbits known as Merry, shaking his hand.

“A friend of Frodo’s is a friend of ours” Said the hobbit Pippin in an excessively cheery tone.

Friends. Rochben hadn’t thought about that before. He had suddenly realized that he really was in the company of friends. After all, the kind of trust they had could only be shared between friends. Rochben smiled slightly and then noticed the armloads of vegetables in Merry and Pippin’s arms. This realization was followed by bellows of anger in the distance accompanied by the sound of barking dogs. He looked over the corn and spied an ominous scythe bobbing towards them.

“Those vegetables don’t belong to you do they?” asked Rochben

Merry and Pippin merely smiled and there was an awkward silence for a few seconds before everybody took off running through the corn. Rochben broke ahead of the group, using his long legs to his advantage. He suddenly spied a ledge in front of him and slid to a stop in front of it. He let out a sigh of relief then suddenly felt something bump into him from behind, followed by another bump. Rochben flailed his arms in the air attempting to keep his balance when one last big bump put the final nail in the proverbial coffin. Rochben felt himself tumble over ledge and started the painful trip down. The fall punctuated by the sudden impact on the ground.

Rochben chose to pass on the excitement of the mushroom discovery to gather his somewhat dazed head. He felt like he was forgetting something important. But what was it?

Rochben suddenly heard Frodo Shout “GET OFF THE ROAD!” That’s what it was!

Rochben dashed behind a large tree and watched the hobbits jumped under the roots of a tree on the other side of the road. Suddenly an overwhelming feeling of dread fell over him as he heard a horse approach. The sound of armor clanking permeated the woods as the rider jumped off.

Rochben peered from behind his tree and was terrified to see that a black cloaked rider was approaching the hobbits hiding place. Rochben slowly took his rifle from his back. He flipped the safety off and steadied the rifle against the tree, taking aim at the riders head. He adjusted his foot slightly and heard the most terrifying noise he could have possibly heard in that situation, a twig snapping in half.

The rider shrieked in a way that no human could ever hope to and charged at Rochben with inhuman speed. Rochben dropped himself and watched as the rider’s blade passed within inches of his face and lodged itself into the tree. He looked past the rider and saw that the hobbits were making a getaway and decided it was his responsibility to make sure that happened. While the rider was trying to pull his sword out of the tree Rochben kicked his stomach as hard as he could. The rider manage to dislodge it but stumbled backward because of the force of the kick. Rochben leveled off his rifle and fired at the black rider. A column of smoke puffed from the entry point of the bullet but the rider took the shock from the bullet with stride. Rochben stared in amazement, that shot would have killed any man, which meant that this was not a man but a monster. He figured he’d probably bought the hobbits enough time and took off down the road.

After a few minutes of running all out Rochben heard the sound of hoofs approaching. He peeked over his shoulder momentarily to see the rider fast approaching, sword raised in the air. Rochben ducked as the sword whistled over his head. He veered to the right into the forest and charged through the trees. Suddenly he heard the sound of the hobbits shouting to each other to “run faster.” Rochben began running as fast as he could, rifle in hand, in the direction of the shouts.

Rochben broke out of the forest and witnessed Frodo sprinting toward a dock and a raft containing the rest of hobbits slowly drifting off. Frodo was followed closely by a black rider. Rochben lifted his rifle, caught a bead, and pulled the trigger. The round flew true and struck the rider in the shoulder, causing the rider to suddenly bring his horse to a stop in surprise. Frodo made the jump onto the raft and turned around to look at Rochben with a look of extreme worry on his face, a look the rest of the hobbits on the raft shared.

“Don’t worry about me you idiots! Just go!” Rochben shouted to them. Merry, who had the ore at the time, nodded and began to paddle away. Rochben turned his attention to the rider he had just shot. The rider’s head slowly turned to face Rochben down. Though he could not see the creature’s eyes he could feel it’s gaze piercing his very soul. Rochben steeled himself for a fight when he heard numerous other screeches in the distance. Cursing his luck, Rochben decided it would be best to flee.

He took off back into the forest as the sound of hoofs began to surround him. He jumped between a forked tree, narrowly avoiding a sword strike. This flirtation with death lasted for almost half an hour as the riders pursued their only lead to finding the One Ring. Rochben’s adrenaline was beginning to run out on him as he began to lose his breath. Then the unthinkable happened, he ran into a dead end cliff edge. Rochben peered over the edge of the cliff, it must have been hundreds of feet high, though that could have just been fatigue playing with his head, and ended in a lake at the bottom. Still breathing heavily, he turned around to see nine identical riders were surrounding him. Rochben fell to his knees. “Well this has to have been the worst day ever, don’t care if I can’t remember anything this has got to be the one….” he muttered to himself. He weighed his options carefully and decided possible death from jumping off a cliff was better then definite capture, torture and then death. “Well boys, its been fun” Rochben said, pushing himself up with his rifle “But I’ve got better places to be right now so I’m just gonna take my leave of you now.” Rochben calmly shouldered his rifle “See ya” he waved his hand and simply walked off the edge of the cliff.

The air rushed by him as he fast approached the blue of the lake. Rochben closed his eyes and awaited the inevitable in blackness