The Perils of Innovation (III)

"And so the small folk did drink and joke and sing and talk with relish about how they would soon toss gravy and grease on clothes made of strings from baby moths, while they did crunch and munch and feast upon the sheep and fish and birds and lambs, and sloths, and carp, and anchovies, and orangutans, and breakfast porridge, and fruit bats-"

"(Wrong story again-)"

"And unborn baby chickens and newborn hens and what had since been prime-life fowls served alongside little fattened baby cows," Nori growled like a demon looming over them all, leaving it obvious that he was going to switch to a story about little fattened baby hobbits if he was interrupted again, and whatever beastie liked to eat them most such as were-bats, and it turned the little devils into angels quite nicely.

Ori stared at his older brother.

Really, Nori?

And it wasn't like little ones could be expected to stay interested in a story about science. Ori could already see that the children were losing interest in the tale, as none of them really wanted to hear about duct tape they must have seen everywhere all their lives. Despite how incredibly clever it was if it managed to give a dwarf ideas for how to revolutionize ship building just to get away from a talk about fish gazing.

…

Wait.

Wait.

Kili wanted at all costs to not get involved in a talk about fish gazing and accidentally revolutionized ship building for his troubles. And invented submarines, that too. All because he was hungry but didn't want to get roped into that talk about hobbits and how… they… didn't…

"That's it!"

Cries of startlement greeted him, especially since he'd jumped to his feet apparently, but that wasn't important! "They're not crazy!"

"What?" Nori asked, eyes him strangely as the mini-hobbits huddled behind him. "Little brother, are you alright?"

"Am I alright? Of course I'm alright! I'm better than alright!" Ori cried feverishly as many random facts finally came together into a coherent whole in his mind! "They're not crazy!" Then he turned and shook Adalgrim Took by his lapels. "You're not crazy!"

The hobbit just stared at him, wide-eyed.

Ori released the hobbit and pumped both fists in the air. "You're not crazy!"

"Er… alright?" Adalgrim Took said slowly from as he backed off to stand right next to Nori.

"You're not all crazy!" Ori cried with all the fervor of a man who'd had his belief in the sense of the world shattered only to be shown that the world did make sense after all and oh, he was just about ready to start spinning around in relief even though everyone was watching but he couldn't be arsed to care right now! "After the past week I was sure you were all nuts, but you're not!"

"Alright then," the hobbit recovered pretty quickly and casually reached into Nori's breast pocket to pull out a stone-carved pipe with the initials I.T. carved into the side and Nori, how could you!? "Now that I've recovered the Thain's property – and I'm sure the good dwarf next to me would have returned it by eve's end as is proper for games like this, but I find myself in need of a fortifying smoke, you understand – maybe you can elaborate?"

"Everything was true!" Ori said breathlessly, rushing to dig through his stationery pouch. "Everything everyone said about hobbits was true! We weren't crazy to believe it and the hobbits weren't crazy for not living down to those expectations!" And Maker, his situational awareness had somehow gotten worse in the past few hours if he didn't notice Nori's storytelling draw in… pretty much everyone.

"Living down to- and just what expectations would those be?" Asked Drogo Baggins irately from where he was perched on the top of a lean-to next to Primula Brandybuck.

"That hobbits are private, suspicious people with too little interest in the outside and too high an opinion of yourselves!"

"Hey now-"

"But it's alright!" Ori waved his arms frantically, journal flapping erratically through the air as he hastened to reassure Adalgrim Took that he didn't mean any ill with his words. "It's not your fault we thought otherwise! There's a perfectly valid explanation! I can see it all now!"

"… And what's the explanation?"Adalgrim Took asked with the strange air of someone who was deliberately avoiding the real point of contention for some reason.

"It's all Bilbo Baggins' fault!"

Silence.

"No, really! It is!" Ori hurriedly leafed through his notes to check all the things Nori didn't mention in his story or that only Ori had recorded over the past week to confirm and – yes, he was right! "It all goes back to the Fell Winter!"

While Nori and the other dwarves in sight looked relatively interested, the silence coming from the hobbits and even the men around them carried the unmistakable nuance of duh.

"No, listen! Mister Baggins, you joined the bounders a year before the Fell Winter right?"

Silence.

"He's not here right now," Adalgrim supplied helpfully. "But that's about right."

"Right." Oh good, Ori had just make a complete fool of himself. How shocking. "Right, and then he wound up in the Old Forest, among other… things." Which was a polite way of avoiding the story of how Bilbo joined the bounders because his mother did. Or how the Brandywine Bridge froze completely and Belladonna Baggins and Bilbo were in Buckland when the worst of the wargs and goblins attacked. And how they then ended up driven into the old forest where Belladonna died and Bilbo somehow… became magic before coming home after the springmelts. Bungo Baggins then grew ill after the starvation and chill of the Fell Winter and never quite recovered, so he pushed through until Bilbo's Majority, then in Bilbo's own words went on his 'final journey.'

"Well?" Nori prodded slowly. "Go on?"

"Right, so, ahem," Ori cleared his throat, feeling his courage draining now that his initial exultation had passed, but he had a point to make dammit! Even though Dori had finally emerged from where he'd been laid out with soporific drink and Thorin and Balin were coming from around the corner and Maker, give him strength! "Right so… As years pass and Bilbo becomes magic, he starts entertaining at every party he can think of, as well as randomly when the mood strikes him. His dawn songs start covering Hobbiton regularly around this time."

Adalgrim looked surprised at his deduction but nodded.

"This doesn't really do much to the Shire as a whole, but what does have an impact is that immediately after this, Bilbo's failures at adventuring start." Snorts everywhere. "He still manages to secure shipments of magic dirt sacks during the first one though, which means that sacks of magic dirt start being delivered to the Shire by elves. This results in very palpable improvements to every field and orchard and meadow and herb patches and medicinal and flower garden and basically every crop ever. This, in turn, fills up ALL short-term and long-term storage places in the Shire within 2 years and only keeps going from there.

"The first major consequence of this is that hobbits start partying and feasting several times more often than usual because they may as well do something with the surplus. Also, because you begin to feel strain on pottery and crockery and start feeling increasingly hard-pressed to store the new batch of bounty every year. You start to party for even the smallest excuse because of this, I imagine, which Bilbo, naturally, would have encouraged as it only meant extra venues for playing his instruments, which only enhanced the gradual rise in general merriment among hobbits in a continuous cycle.

"However, this ultimately isn't enough to actually prevent all stores from filling up, forcing you to dig out, build or otherwise create new storage areas at home and elsewhere, which is a somewhat ongoing process still. And the surplus keeps mounting, meaning that at this point you can either feed perfectly good crops and such to the livestock-:

"Unconscionable and doubly absurd for medicinal herbs and mushrooms, what are you nuts?" Someone cut in.

"Or two, sell or export the surplus somehow."

No interruptions this time, thank Mahal, now don't look up Ori, don't look up. "Only hobbits don't have any system in place for this! The attempt to encourage ranger traffic didn't quite pan out even after Bilbo managed to inform everyone relevant about them and their real activities during the fall festival of five years ago. So you've been trying to come up with something else, or alternatively waiting for Bilbo to do that since he's the one to blame for this bizarre conundrum."

"Damn right," someone groused, to much hmm-ing and haw-ing.

"Don't you see!?" Ori blurted at his brother and Valar, he looked up and he couldn't stop talking oh Maker! "The mass donation wasn't just on a whim. Hobbits quite simply have too much right now. The Thain, Mayor and Master came over today so easily because they hoped the Dunedain might help them or give ideas how and to whom to offload some of their massive surplus without having to actually set up sustainable exports! That's why they're so fixed on us! Blue Mountain dwarves bound east this or next year will make for a perfect solution to ease this concern, even if we don't… do all we plan to do by next year, and that's why they're not asking for more than a few shipments of iron and tools in exchange! They're all they need or want right now to further expand their stores! Don't you see!? It explains everything! Bilbo unintentionally improved Shire productivity and lifestyle to the point where Hobbits have to change their whole approach to self-governance. They can't keep to themselves unless they can live with the idea of wasting all that good food on the pigs." And just because he couldn't help himself, Ori hugged the nearest hobbit within reach. "You're not all crazy!"

Fortinbras Took bore the treatment with stoic dignity and Maker, Ori had just embarrassed himself, his brothers and the entire dwarven race by going on a fevered rant in front of every one of the free peoples of Middle Earth ever.

"Well…" Arathorn mused as he presided over the strange, impromptu congregation, because why not drive the final nail into the coffin of Ori's self-respect? "I do believe now would be a good time to set off the fireworks, wouldn't you think Mithrandir?"