Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

October 2008

The sky was dark over London. The moon was making a half-hearted attempt to break through the clouds, and a chilly autumn breeze sent fallen leaves skittering along the pavements. Under the artificial glow of the streetlights, several things were happening at once.

Arthur was hunched over at his kitchen table, squinting his way through a stack of spreadsheets in the dingy half-light of his flat, trying to ignore the growing ache in his neck. The company’s yearly budget was troubling him; for the life of him, he couldn’t work out where so much money was going. So far, every attempt to follow a line of inquiry had left him at a dead end or caught up in a web of red tape. Uther had dismissed his concerns of embezzlement, but it wouldn’t be the first time his father had ignored something while it disappeared before his eyes.

Merlin was running. The sole of his left shoe flapped annoyingly where it had come away, and he skidded on a dropped crisp packet as he rounded another corner. The sirens following him were growing louder, piercing the night air but doing nothing to drown out the sound of his own heartbeat thundering in his eats. He vaulted over a pile of bin bags and double-checked the Distortion charm he’d managed to cast over himself before the alarms went off.

Headlights lit up the street as a black van rounded the corner after him. He cursed and picked up the pace.

Morgana was staring into a mug of lukewarm tea. Morgause had set it on the tale in front of her almost twenty minutes ago, but it was still untouched. She’d tried to stop herself obsessing, stop her magic bleeding over, but the past few months had made it harder and harder to ignore the faces that followed her, watching her from puddles and mirrors and darkened windows – anything reflective was fair game. Now, Uther stared up at her from the depths of the murky liquid. He looked sad.

Morgana picked up the mug and went through to the kitchen, where she carefully poured the tea down the sink. Morgause frowned from behind her computer, but said nothing.

Uther’s head of security stood rigid on the other side of the desk, babbling about a possible perimeter breach. Every so often the man – what was his name, Jackson? Johnson? – took off his glasses and started cleaning them with his tie before cramming them back onto his face, shiny with sweat. Uther ignored him in favour of the photo on his desk. Igraine smiled sadly at him from behind the frame’s carefully polished glass. He could feel Morgana’s baleful stare on the back of his neck. They both knew what he was doing.

In a dark attic flat, Sefa stood at the window and stared up at the night sky, straining to catch sight of the barest hint of wings flapping. She could feel the anxious tension the others were radiating. Edwin was doing push-ups on the floor and muttering in what sounded like Russian. Gilli was slumped over at the table, flicking through one of his spell books with glazed eyes, probably not taking in a word of it. Above them, they could hear Aithusa prowling around on the roof – her restlessness was getting worrying, even with her assurance that she’d stay hidden and inside Iseldir’s wards.

Sefa sighed, and squinted harder into the darkness. This whole underground resistance thing was wreaking havoc on her nerves.

Chapter Text

October 2008

Merlin crouched on the floor of his hideout, humming to himself in an attempt to fill the eerie silence caused by the muting spells around the windows and doors. The mage light hovering beside him flickered slightly as he concentrated. Merlin took no notice. He frowned and ran a finger down the list of ingredients, making sure he’d included everything before he added the final components. He brought the light down slightly so he could scan through the rack of vials by his foot, causing the shadows cast on the walls by his unpacked bags and sparse furniture to grow and shift like impatient spirits. Merlin found the vial he was looking for and picked it up, uncorking it with a muttered word.

Carefully, he poured one drop of the liquid into the bowl in front of him and waited for the contents to stop fizzing. He rubbed one of the long silver hairs Gaius had given him between his fingertips and dropped it in just as the bubbles cleared. The translucent liquid shimmered slightly and seemed to distort, the space inside the bowl shifting oddly until Merlin couldn’t see the bottom of it anymore. He cleared his throat and spoke.

“Message begins. Password - griffin shit. Cased the R&D department, but couldn’t get inside. Looks like he’s siphoning security from the rest of the park to focus on that building. Plan A is no longer an option. Message ends.”

Silence fell again. Merlin’s thighs ached, but he stayed crouching over the bowl. It wasn’t long before his reply came, Gaius’ crotchety voice echoing out from the unseen depths, slightly distorted as if speaking over a shaky phone connection.

“Message begins. Password - unicorn piss. Enact Plan B, effective immediately. Be at the secondary safehouse before seven am tomorrow to collect your necessary documents. Work starts at eight. Message ends.”  

The liquid rippled and then stilled, inert once more. Merlin kept staring into it anyway. Panic was starting to lurch in the pit of his stomach, but he pushed it down.

“Who the fuck,” he said aloud in the ringing silence, “even comes up with those passwords?”

********

“Plan B,” Iseldir sighed, rubbing his hands over his face when Gaius had finished filling him in on the Emrys boy’s message and the sudden change of plan. “That’s a rash decision, Gaius. You’re sure he can handle it?”

“I’m sure,” Gaius said quietly, not looking up from the note he was enchanting to be unreadable to anyone other than the recipient.

“This could be the thing to put you back under the microscope,” Iseldir warned. “Uther only allows you so much leeway because he’s known you for so long. Bringing a new face into the mix, especially working so closely with you-”

“It’s worth the risk,” Gaius interrupted. “We’re old, Iseldir. We may have started this, but I’ve never been under any illusions that we’d be the ones to end it. That responsibility lies elsewhere.”

“With the Emrys boy?”

“Perhaps.”

“And you think putting him behind enemy lines this soon is the way to get him there? Gaius, he’s a smart lad, but he’s so young-”

“He’s twenty. Only four years younger than Pendragon’s son. And you know as well as I do what the prophecies say about the two of them.”

Iseldir snorted.

Gaius raised an eyebrow. “Losing faith, are you? Reconsidering your loyalties?”

“You know I would never,” Iseldir huffed. “But since last year – hmph. Any talk of prophecy right now is just inflammatory. We can’t afford to waste any more time fighting the other half of the resistance when we’ve all got a common enemy to focus on. Too many druids are already threatening to jump ship. We can’t risk a schism, Gaius.”

“The truce is holding for now, and will continue to as long as Mordred stays on task.” He finished with the note and held it out. “Can you read this?”

Iseldir glanced at the scrambled letters and shook his head. Gaius nodded his thanks and crossed the room to open the bird cage by the window. “Focusing on the common enemy is exactly what I intend to do,” he said, carefully lifting out one of his pigeons and fumbling to tie the note to its leg. “We’ve been stationary for far too long while we argue, and so far, the only thing anyone can agree on is that the labs need to come down. The only way that can happen is if our people aren’t in there when they do. Not to mention-”

He broke off and opened the window. Iseldir waited as the pigeon was let go, and they both watched as it flapped off into the darkness. Gaius closed the window, locked it firmly, and returned to his seat, exhaustion deepening the creases in his face.

“I’ve been hearing things around the office,” he said. “Rumours. He’s been culling entire departments and bringing in new personnel. A lot of muscle. A lot of geneticists.”

Iseldir stilled. The back of his neck tingled. “You don’t think…”

Gaius shook his head. “I don’t think anything,” he said. “But I’m afraid. Even more so thinking about the amount of information Uther must have already gleaned from Kilgharrah. And Freya…”

He broke off and shuddered again. Iseldir dragged a hand down his face, trying not to contemplate the implications and failing.

“I can’t keep our foothold on the inside and run the mission at the same time,” Gaius said at last. “Merlin is our only shot at getting them out.”

Iseldir tipped his head back and stared at the ceiling in defeat. “You’re probably right.”

“I know. I don't like it either.”

********

The attic flat was quiet. Edwin was humming to himself in the kitchen as he chopped vegetables for dinner. In the main room, the News at Ten was playing softly in the background. Absolutely no one was paying it any attention.

“Our top story tonight, further threats of a terrorist attack from the extremist group known as the Druids have been intercepted by government officials. Prime Minister Richard Bayard has been unavailable for comment, but an official statement from Downing Street has been issued urging the public not to panic…”

“We should have heard from someone by now,” Gilli said, checking the time on his old watch for the third time in the space of a minute and then shoving it away as he continued to pace up and down the length of the living room.

“I’m sure it’ll be any minute now,” Sefa said, though she was tapping her fingers nervously on the windowsill as she scanned the dark sky outside.

“…assures that the Metropolitan Police, working in cooperation with Camelot Technologies, are more than equipped to deal with the threat…”

Gilli made an irritated noise and paused in his pacing to stab the TV’s off switch. Sefa shot him a look.

“It’s alright, Gil,” she said as he went back to marching. “It’s only a couple of hours late, they’re probably just-”

Right on cue, a pigeon smacked into the glass, making her jump.

“Delayed,” she finished under her breath, tugging the window open and grabbing the bird. She found the little scroll tied to its leg and eased it off carefully.

“Is it from Gaius? What’s he said?” Gilli demanded, still pacing.

“Give her a minute to read it,” Aithusa said from where she was sprawled on the sofa with a hand over her eyes. “Sit the fuck down, Gilli, you’re giving me a headache.”

Gilli glared at her, but stopped himself with some difficulty and flopped down in the armchair opposite, where he immediately started jiggling his leg. Aithusa let out a low growl.

“Don’t even try it, it’s not even that scary when you’ve gone all scaly, now it’s just sad,” Gilli sniped.

Aithusa shoved to her feet. “You want me to go scaly on you, keep talking, you-”

A cupboard slammed in the kitchen and Edwin appeared in the doorway, pointing a reproachful tin of kidney beans at them. “Don’t you two start. Gilli, take some deep breaths and stop being a dick. Aithusa, I know you’re frustrated, being cooped up like this-”

“Cooped up doesn’t even begin to cover it, but go on-”

“And we know you’re worried about Freya-”

“Please stop trying to be sympathetic, it doesn’t suit you-”

“But we’ve got to keep our heads,” Edwin ploughed on as if he hadn’t been interrupted. “Whatever happens tomorrow, we’re going to need to keep it together, right Sefa?”

Sefa didn’t answer, too busy staring at Gaius’ note. The others fell silent and watched as she read it once, twice, three times over, before she crumpled it up and sent the pigeon back out of the window, slamming the pane shut behind it.

“Well?” Gilli asked.

“Plan A’s a no-go. Plan B’s in motion,” Sefa said. “We’re to move into position first thing tomorrow morning.”

“Oh. Fuck.” Edwin stared blankly at her, and then around at the flat. “Just like that?”

“Just like that.”

“Thank fuck,” Aithusa said, scrubbing her hands over her face. “One more day and I would have turned Gilli into spam.”

Gilli didn’t glare this time, too busy gnawing on his thumbnail. “This will be weird,” he said. “We’ve been on standby for so long, I sort of forgot all the work that goes into this sedition business.”

“You’ll be fine. It’s just like riding a bike,” Edwin said. “Come on, let’s have one last house dinner together, yeah?”

“What are we having?”

“Chilli sans carne, we’re out of beef,” Edwin said over his shoulder as he disappeared back through the door. “Got some eggs and some broccoli, though.”

“Those aren't viable replacements!” Sefa called after him, to no avail. “Ugh. Aithusa, can you-?”

“On it,” Aithusa said, already running for the kitchen.

There was a long silence, broken only by a series of thuds and yelps as Aithusa wrestled the eggs away from Edwin.

“This means you’re going back undercover, then?” Gilli asked Sefa.

“I’ll be alright,” Sefa said, sounding much less sure of herself than she probably meant to. “I’ll be in touch plenty. Besides, you’ll barely notice I’m gone, you’ll all be run off your feet helping Merlin with his recon.”

“Gods, don’t remind me. This is going to be a mess.”

“You worry too much. Merlin can handle this, and he’ll have Gaius and Gwen in there to keep him on the level.”

“But they’ve worked there ages, they’re not even on Uther’s radar anymore, especially not Gaius. Things are different now – I’ll be surprised if Merlin can even get in.”

It was Sefa’s turn to look worried. “I think Gaius has a way in sorted – he was checking out all the security staff a while back, remember? Gwen’s got their schedules. They’ll make sure whoever’s admitting him tomorrow is one of the lazy ones, I bet hardly any of them can be bothered keeping up all those new security measures from last year.”

“Oh great, are we talking about the incident?” Aithusa asked, appearing back in the doorway with an egg carton in her hand and a streak of yolk on her cheek. “I’ve come up with a whole new list of insults for Morgause-”

“Let’s not,” Sefa cut her off. “I’m going to have to start getting back in character pretty fast, I don’t need your voice in my head telling me to call her the human embodiment of slug slime. She’s hard enough to manipulate as it is.”

Aithusa huffed. “You won’t last very long if you don’t have some kind of an outlet for dealing with their bullshit.”

“I’ll figure something out.”

“Listen to you, getting all concerned for your colleagues,” Edwin grinned, appearing once more, picking bits of eggshell out of his hair. “And here I thought you were only here to complain and breathe fire on anything that might threaten Freya.”

Aithusa stilled, and turned to face him with a calm smile. “Don’t question my motives,” she said kindly. “You saw what I did to the bounty hunter that took her.”

Edwin grimaced as the memories of blackened bones and burnt flesh sprang up from where he’d shoved them in a locked drawer at the back of his mind. “Stop reminding me of stuff like that before we eat,” he muttered, ducking back into the kitchen. “Bloody dragons.”

********

The security guard looked from Merlin’s papers to Merlin and back again, unimpressed. Merlin shifted uncomfortably despite the knowledge that Gwen’s forgery was flawless as ever, and adjusted the strap on his messenger bag, shivering in the cold morning air. He looked past the guard into the booth she occupied at the entrance of the industrial park. She had a space-heater and a kettle in there, he noticed with envy.

“Look,” he said. “I’m not really sure what to tell you. I don’t have an employee ID because it’s my first day - I haven’t been inside yet, how would I have got one?”

“They could have posted it to you.”

“The woman on the phone said that was against security protocol, she said I’d have to pick it up when I got in on my first day. Listen, just call Doctor Granby, my internship’s with his department, he’ll vouch for me, um-” He glanced at her name tag – “Vivian.”

He gave her his most charming smile, ignoring the voice at the back of his mind that sounded suspiciously like Gwaine telling him he looked like he was trying to hold in a shit. 

Vivian heaved a great sigh and picked up the phone. She appeared to be going as slowly as possible as she dragged a glossy red nail down the list next to the phone, looking for the number for Gaius’ extension. When she found it she took great care to dial one digit at a time, looking to the list and back with the speed of an arthritic snail. Merlin shoved his hands in his pockets and waited. Finally, she looked up and gave him a sardonic smile.

“S’ringing.”

Merlin smiled patiently. Vivian tucked the phone between her ear and shoulder and got out a bottle of red nail varnish.

“Yeah, Gaius?” she said at last, shaking the bottle and unscrewing the cap. “Someone here to see you. New intern, he says.” There was a pause where Merlin could hear Gaius’ voice on the other end, tinny and faint. “I dunno,” she said, starting to apply a new coat of red to her nails. “Gawky looking. Needs a comb, a shave and a new shirt. His name?”

She paused and looked at Merlin expectantly.

“Martin,” Merlin supplied, the alias rolling off his tongue as easily as if it were his real name. “Martin Rhys.”

Vivian relayed the information to Gaius. There was a pause while she listened to the reply, before she slammed the phone down with a huff. “Go on in,” she said grudgingly, pressing the button that raised the barrier and shoving his papers back at him. “Engineering’s over that way. D block, floor five, just follow the signs.”

“Thanks,” Merlin said with a grin.

She ignored him and went back to painting her nails. With a sigh, Merlin stuffed the papers back into his bag and headed into the park.

By the time Merlin reached the fifth floor of building seven, he was rather severely winded. He’d managed to navigate his way through the maze of square grey structures towards the engineering department without getting too lost, but the stairs just took the biscuit. He checked his watch when he reached the door that had Gaius’ name on the plaque outside and groaned. He was ten minutes late. Fucking Vivian.

He knocked on the door.

“Come in!” called Gaius from inside, sounding distracted. There was a loud crash and a few bangs.

Merlin hesitantly poked his head around the door. He managed to register a large but crowded room overflowing with books and papers and what looked like most of a dismantled car, before there was a metallic ‘twang’ and something flat and sharp came whizzing at his face – he yelped and ducked. The sharp thing slammed into the doorframe where his head had been an instant before and stayed there, quivering with the force of the impact. Merlin stared at it, then over at Gaius, who had the grace to cringe.

“Sorry,” he said, before going back to wrestling with what must have been a functioning piece of machinery at some point but now resembled a pile of scrap metal and screws with several pennies and a pencil stuck in the side. “You’ll be the new intern then? You’re late.” he added.

“Um. Yeah. Sorry.” Merlin glanced around the room again and this time caught the glint of the security camera watching them from the corner in his peripheral vision. He let his eyes relax and skate past it as if he hadn't noticed it. “Martin Rhys, sir.”

“Call me Gaius, boy, everybody does,” Gaius replied absently, still fiddling with his contraption. He removed one of the pennies, turned it over and put it back in. A light on the top blinked on, and he smiled in satisfaction. Merlin decided it best not to ask.

“Right,” Gaius said, stepping back from his workbench and waving Merlin into the lab. “Come through to the office, we’ll get you processed.”

With that, he turned and disappeared through a door to the side, sending a pile of important-looking files spilling onto the floor as he brushed past. Merlin hesitated, and followed.

The next room was smaller, but considerably less crowded than the first, for all it was lined wall-to-wall with bookshelves groaning under the weight of what must have been an entire university’s worth of reading material. A desk was shoved into the corner and Gaius was standing behind it, shuffling through a pile of documents. He didn’t speak until the door clicked shut.

“We can talk freely in here – no cameras or microphones, and I’ve modified the door,” he said. “Not that anyone would notice if I hadn’t, I’m fairly certain Uther is only keeping me around out of nostalgia at this point, but better safe than sorry.” He looked up suddenly, his gaze harsh and direct. “You didn’t meet anyone else on the way in other than Vivian?”

“None that I talked to,” Merlin said, dropping his bag off his shoulder and waiting for Gaius to sit down before taking the seat on the opposite side of the desk. “Passed a couple of suits and a lot of white coats, but they all ignored me.”

Gaius nodded as if this was what he was expecting, and returned his attention to the documents.

“So,” he said. “You’ve got a contract for a year’s paid internship. If people ask, you’re just my dogsbody, no going into specifics, got that? Here’s your ID,” he added, handing over a lanyard bearing Merlin’s fake name and details. “Keep that on you at all times, if you’re caught without it you’ll be out on your backside.”

“Got it,” Merlin nodded, taking the lanyard and slinging it around his neck. “Anything else?”

“Yes, and I want you to know that I’m only saying this because it’s you,” Gaius said, pointing a stern finger. “No drawing attention to yourself. No insulting any brilliant scientists, no tripping over and spilling coffee on any heads of department, no putting your foot in your mouth in front of the canteen staff, none of that, am I clear? And take that look off your face, you and I both know how you get when you’re overthinking. All the grace of a drunken giraffe on stilts.”

“Drunk? And on stilts? You had to get both in there, did you?” Merlin asked, genuinely offended.

Gaius gave him a look. “Your mission here is to blend in,” he said. “Become part of the furniture. Stay in the shadows, listen in on conversations, be the eyes and ears I can’t be anymore. Edwin, Gilli and Aithusa will be taking shifts monitoring the situation – if anything happens, if you find a threat brewing, if your cover’s blown, anything, that’s what they’re there for, either as backup or to get you the hell out. Gwen’s also prepared to help, of course, but her position here is to vital for her to be exposed, and she can’t disappear like you four can, so try not to involve her too much. You have one year to find a way in and out of those labs. Freya and the dragon are both counting on you.”

Merlin grimaced. “Understood.”

“One more thing,” he said. “I know I’m hard on you, but I want to say – I think you’ll find that a drunken giraffe on stilts is exactly what we need for this mission.”

Merlin blinked. “You really mean that?”

“Of course. Junius Brutus managed to infiltrate the king’s court by pretending to be stupid – imagine how much more effective such a ruse can be when the perpetrator is so obviously an actual idiot.”

“I’ll try and take that as a compliment, sir. For my self-esteem.”

“Good lad. Now, come and give me a hand with this equipment.”

********

Arthur was having a bad day. He’d woken up to an email from his father summoning him to his office as soon as he came into work, which never boded well. His favourite coffee shop had been closed down – something about Thomas, the owner, going on an extended holiday, according to the man who’d been boarding up the windows when Arthur had arrived there earlier that morning.

That meant he’d had to use the machine in the breakroom, which, when it even elected to work, made truly terrible coffee; and, because apparently the universe hated Arthur Pendragon, the machine had decided to have a day off from doing its job, which led to now, with Arthur late for Uther’s meeting, the front of his suit sopping wet, swearing continuously as the coffeemaker continued to expel sporadic bursts of boiling water and frankly alarming amounts of steam.

Frantically dabbing at his shirt with a couple of flimsy paper napkins from the box on the counter, he managed to extract his phone from his pocket and dial the number for maintenance, which some enterprising soul had pinned up on the notice board.

“Yello?” Someone answered after a few too many rings. “You’ve reached maintenance.”

“Yes, this is Arthur Pendragon,” Arthur grit out, trying to keep his temper under control. “I’m calling from the third floor breakroom-”

“Coffee machine is it, sir?” the voice interrupted, apparently recognising the clunking noises in the background. “Third time this week, that is. I’ll send someone up right away.”

“See that you do, I’m late for a meeting,” Arthur commanded.

“Yessir,” the person on the other end said, before hanging up without another word.

Arthur huffed indignantly, put his phone away and carried on trying to wring out his tie. He heard someone come into the room behind him.

“Finally! Tell your supervisor I’ll be sending someone down to maintenance to review your department’s efficiency,” he said, turning around to find someone standing in the doorway, mostly hidden behind the large, rather worrying-looking piece of machinery they were carrying. “Why on earth do you need that to fix the coffee machine?”

“Oh, no, sorry,” the person replied, their dark head peering over the top of the precariously balanced equipment, somehow managing to extract an employee ID from somewhere one-handed without dropping anything and waving it in Arthur’s general direction. “I’m from engineering, not maintenance. New intern. Just running an errand for Dr Granby. He wants this set up in here - something to do with accessibility to radio-waves, I think. He tends to mumble when he’s working. Um.”

Arthur raised an eyebrow as the stranger trailed off awkwardly. There was a long pause, broken only by the coffee machine, which was now issuing a steady stream of milk onto the carpet and making noises like a cat trapped in a tumble dryer.

“I’ll just… um. Get to it, then,” the person said, edging forwards towards the window.

Arthur sighed and waved him into the room, turning his attention back to the machine, cursing when he realised he now had milk all over his shoes.

It was another five minutes before the maintenance guy finally got there, and when he did, Arthur was well and truly pissed off. The front of his jacket was covered in little white specks of napkin where he’d been trying to dab the worst of the water away, and Gaius’ new assistant was humming annoyingly as he clanked away with whatever machinery he was setting up at the edge of the room.

“What sort of time do you call this?” he demanded when the man came sauntering in at last, hefting a toolbox and a roll of blue paper towels.

“Sorry sir, got waylaid. Someone’s photocopier was acting up while I was coming up through reception and there was no one else around to fix it,” the man said.

Arthur huffed, squinting at the name on the man’s lanyard.

“Look, Morris,” he growled. “I don’t particularly care about some dim secretary’s failure to operate standard office equipment. You’ve now made me late for a meeting with the president of this company, who I’m sure you’re aware holds your entire future in his hands, my clothes are ruined and I still haven’t had any damn coffee! So shut your trap and get to it before I have you fired!”

“Yes sir. Sorry sir,” Morris muttered.

There was a derisive snort from over by the window. Arthur ignored it.

Morris plonked his toolbox down on the counter next to the coffeemaker and snapped it open, rifling through it with an unnecessary amount of clanging and rattling. Arthur folded his arms and waited. Several long minutes passed in which Morris succeeded in getting the noise to stop and halting the flow of milk, apparently finding it necessary to start gutting the thing in the process. 

“Here, hold this would you sir?” he said absently, wrenching a metal cylinder full of coffee granules from inside the machine and pushing it into Arthur’s hands without looking up.

Arthur grappled with the cylinder and let out an incredulous noise. “Why on earth are you dismantling it?” he demanded. “I just need you to stop it acting up so I could have some coffee!”

“Oh,” Morris said, looking up and blinking owlishly. “Sorry sir, should have said. This thing’s been on its last legs for ages, it’ll take hours to fix. Won’t be making any more coffee today, I should think.”

“Why the hell didn’t you just tell me that in the first place?” Arthur asked, rather too loudly for an office environment. “And why hasn’t there been another one ordered if this one’s broken?”

Morris shrugged. “Budget cuts, I suppose, sir,” he said. “A lot of the non-essential equipment’s on the blink around here these days, doesn’t look like anyone’s paying to replace it, so me and Ollie are run off our feet, see, trying to keep it all going.”

“Well it’s no wonder this place is falling to ruin, if you’re what goes for high standards down in maintenance!” Arthur fumed, waving the coffee canister for emphasis. “Tell me, Morris, are you an actual idiot or just-”

“Alright mate, that’s enough,” said a voice from behind.

Arthur whipped around to see Gaius’ intern still standing by the window, fully visible now that he was no longer hefting his contraption. He was tall and gangly, a few years younger than Arthur, dressed in jeans and a button-down, a pair of battered trainers on his feet. He had black hair that put Arthur in mind of the phrase “dragged through a hedge backwards”, and had a small, friendly smile on his face. Arthur quickly came to the conclusion that he was weak in the head, or else shockingly bad at sensing the tone of a room, and decided to act accordingly.

“I’m sorry, do I know you?” he asked brusquely.

“I’m Martin,” the idiot said brightly, offering his hand.

Arthur didn’t take it, preferring to ignore it until the idiot withdrew. “So I don’t know you.”

“No, I suppose you don’t.”

“And yet you called me ‘mate’?”

“Right, that was my mistake.” The smile was gone from the idiot’s face now, and he was looking at Arthur with a surprisingly chilling glare. “I’d never have a friend who could be such an ass.”

Arthur was peripherally aware of Morris flapping frantically in the background, probably trying to warn the idiot off, but neither of them paid him any mind.

“Do you even know who you’re speaking to?” Arthur asked, taking a few steps forward, jiggling the coffee canister threateningly in one hand.

“I’m sure I’m about to find out,” Martin-the-Idiot said, his jaw set.

Arthur smirked.

********

“Well? What do you have to say for yourself?”

Merlin huffed and shrank back slightly in his chair, tugging uncomfortably at the damp collar of his shirt. There were still coffee granules in his hair, he could feel them. He hadn’t had a chance to clean them all out before Gaius had appeared outside the HR department and dragged him back to the lab by the scruff of his neck.

“I didn’t know it was him. He looks very different in real life to his photos,” he said after a few moments. “And he was being an arse. An entitled, pedantic, elitist arse. Couldn’t help myself, Gaius.”

“You couldn’t help yourself? That’s what you’re going with, is it?” Gaius demanded, swelling like a bullfrog. “I tell you the most important part of your mission is to blend in, and the first thing you do on the job is pick a fight with Arthur Pendragon!”

“I really didn’t mean for it to get that out of hand! I was just going to distract him long enough for that poor sod from maintenance to make a run for it, but then he went and tipped the coffee thing over my head-”

Merlin abruptly broke off. Gaius had raised the Eyebrow.

“Look, I’m not in any real trouble,” he said instead. “HR said I’ve been docked a day’s pay, which doesn’t seem legal but I’m not pressing it. They mostly just thought it was funny. Plus they kept calling me Melvin, which was actually pretty insulting, but what I’m trying to say is that I know it was stupid of me, but it won’t come back on you and the others, I promise.”

“It had better not, boy,” Gaius growled, pointing a threatening finger. “There’s too much riding on this mission for you and your impulsiveness to go cocking it up.”

“Sorry,” Merlin mumbled, looking down.

Gaius breathed out, deflating. “Alright,” he said. “As long as it doesn’t happen again.”

“It won’t. I promise.”

********

By the end of the week Merlin could only sigh at his own naivety, sat on the floor of the IT office in front of Gwen’s chair while she picked bits of bacon and egg out of his hair with a tissue.

“He really does have frighteningly good aim,” Merlin mumbled. “Waste of a perfectly good breakfast butty as well. Prat should be more grateful. Ow!” he added when Gwen cuffed him on the back of the head.

“Martin dear, as brave as I think you are standing up to a bully like Arthur, you’re really not in a position to complain right now,” she said as she continued extracting pieces of Arthur Pendragon’s breakfast from Merlin’s fringe. “You’re lucky they haven’t fired you.”

“But it wasn’t my fault this time!” Merlin protested. “I was just minding my own business and out of nowhere – ow, Jesus, fine, no need to pull my hair. I may have slightly called him a royal arse. But he definitely started it.”

“I know,” Gwen sighed, giving his head a comforting pat. “Just be more careful in future, alright?”

“I’ll be sure to duck faster next time,” Merlin mumbled, and was rewarded with a small laugh from Gwen.

“There, I think that’s the worst of it,” she said, wadding up the tissue and chucking it into the bin. “Go and face the music from Gaius, we’ll get a pint after work and you can bitch and moan to your heart’s content.”

“You’re my new favourite,” Merlin told her sincerely, hauling himself up off the floor and kissing her on the cheek.

“Go on,” Gwen chuckled, giving him a light shove and swinging her chair back around to face her computer.

Merlin grinned at her and left the IT office, pleased that he was finally getting the chance to talk properly with Gwen. Back when she first joined up they had only really interacted whenever her work in tech support interacted with his vague mish-mash of undercover missions, protection detail and whatever the magic equivalent of donkey work was – unicorn work or something. They only started interacting more frequently when she had been sent into Camelot Tech to act as sort of low-level surveillance, laying the groundwork that made his current mission a viable plan, but even before that Merlin thought he had probably never met such a genuinely nice person. It had been easy as anything to fall into the fast friendship she had instigated when she “introduced” herself in the canteen after a skirmish with Arthur a few days earlier and helped him extract a number of tomato slices from down the back of his shirt.

His good mood lasted all the way to Gaius’ lab, where he was faced with the Eyebrow for the fourth time in as many days.

“Office,” Gaius growled through gritted teeth, before spinning on his heel and stalking back through the lab with far too much vigour for a seventy year old man.

Merlin exchanged his smile for an appropriately abashed grimace and followed him in.

********

Sefa hesitated when she reached the sisters’ door, taking a moment to collect herself. She had barely raised her hand to knock when the door swung open to reveal Morgause, looking far less put-together than usual and supremely unimpressed.

“I’m not impressed, Sefa,” she said. “It’s been almost a year.”

“Can you blame me, after what happened?” Sefa asked.

Morgause sighed. “I suppose not. Come in.”

Sefa stepped over the threshold, carefully not reacting as the wards washed over her, seeking out magical bugs and offensive spells. She followed Morgause through to the living room, where Morgana was curled up on the sofa, her hands clenched around a cup of tea, staring at nothing in particular. She wasn’t looking at all well, paler than ever with uncombed hair and bags under her eyes. She looked up when they came in and gave a weak smile.

“Hello, Sefa,” she said. “Saw you coming. It’s been a while.”

“Sorry,” Sefa replied, sitting down on the sofa opposite. “I didn’t know if it was safe to come back. The incident, it scared a lot of people into hiding. Some went over to Gaius and his lot, I lost a lot of connections."

Morgana looked miserable. “I know,” she said. “I tried to stop it, I really did. I didn’t mean for anyone to get hurt.”

“It wasn’t your fault,” Morgause said firmly, taking the seat next to Morgana. “Everything would have been fine if Merlin had stayed out of our way. He’s the reason it got so messy.”

Morgana nodded, her face going stony. “Mordred insists he meant well, but he wasn’t there,” she said in Sefa’s direction, although she had stopped making eye contact. “He keeps going on about maintaining the truce while we focus on the common enemy, but he doesn’t understand the history between Gaius and Uther. It’s not a common enemy if one group has a history of fucking collaboration.”

“He’s just doing his job,” Sefa said placatingly. “It’s required of the envoy to remain impartial, you know he doesn’t mean it.”

“I know. Doesn’t make it any easier to listen to.”

“You don’t have to tell me that. Have you heard about their latest plan? They’ve got Merlin on the inside, trying to find a way into the labs.”

“Are they still prioritising that fucking dragon?” Morgause demanded.

“Him and Freya, the druid girl.” Sefa huffed a cynical chuckle. “Talk about hitting Camelot Tech where it hurts.”

Morgana sat up, tense and jittery. “This is the shit I’m talking about,” she said. “These useless dead-end schemes that they pour all of their resources into, insisting it’s all part of a larger picture, constantly dragging up that stupid half-baked prophecy – what would Gaius know of prophecy?”

Morgause laid a hand on her wrist. “We know, dearest, we know,” she said. “But try not to get too worked up about it, you only just got rid of that headache.”

“They never go away for long anyway,” Morgana muttered, but sank back into the sofa cushions all the same and took a sip of her tea.

Morgause gave her a pained smile and squeezed her hand. “It’s going to be okay,” she said. “In a few months we won’t need Gaius or his resources anymore.”

Sefa frowned. “We won’t?”

The sisters exchanged a glance. Morgause nodded, and Morgana smiled, relaxing a little more.

“Sefa,” she said, leaning forwards. “How much do you know about Nimueh?”

********

June 1979

Vivienne plastered a fake smile onto her face as she took her seat at the dining room table next to her husband.

“This is a lovely room, Igraine,” she said, her breeding taking over as she ran through the standard dinner party script in her head. “Did you redecorate while I was away? You have wonderful taste.”

“Thank you, Vivienne,” Igraine beamed, equally insincere, before turning to her husband at the head of the table. “Uther, dear, could you carve?”

“Of course, Igraine,” Uther said with that quiet smile he saved especially for his wife, standing up and taking the knife, weighing it carefully in his hand before he cut into the roast.

Vivienne turned away and took a sip of water. Under the table, Gorlois took her hand and gave it a quick squeeze. She sent him a small but genuine smile, brushing her thumb over his knuckles. She really had missed him, after a year apart.

Uther made sure everyone had been served before he sat back down and raised his glass.

“A toast,” he said. The others immediately took up their own glasses. “To Vivienne’s safe return from Zambia, and to all the good work she did there. And to new business ventures,” he added with a nod to Gorlois, who grinned.

“To Camelot Technologies,” he replied. “May we be kept flush in good wine and roast beef for many years to come.”

“Hear hear,” Uther said, the rare hint of a laugh in his voice.

“The new company, it’s going well then?” Vivienne asked when they’d all drank, picking up her knife and fork.

“Very well,” Gorlois said happily. “Uther and I just hired our first consultants yesterday – Gaius Granby for engineering, Balinor Emrys for magic. Decent men.”

“Very decent,” Uther agreed. “Although the Emrys fellow's politics..."

“As if it matters,” Gorlois chuckled around a mouthful of beef. “The man has pull with the dragons and a good head on his shoulders, that’s enough for me.”

“The dragons?” Igraine repeated warily. “Are you sure that’s wise, Uther? After what’s been happening, all the recent trouble? I heard one of their hatchlings was stoned to death in Wales just last month - some sort of incident with a sheep farm.”

“That had nothing to do with the dragons and everything to do with mob mentality,” Gorlois dismissed with a wave of his hand. “People fear what they don’t understand. But the more work we do with the dragons, the better we’ll understand them and their magic. And attitudes are shifting, mundane technology is a thing of the past - if we want to stay at the front of the pack, embracing magic is the only way forward."

“I’m sure you’ll do wonderfully, my dear,” Vivienne told him.

Gorlois beamed at her and pressed a kiss to her cheek. Vivienne shut her eyes, trying to be happy to be back with him, in spite of the ache in her heart that had been growing ever since she had left her new baby girl behind in Ipswich. She repeated in her head the reassurances Owen had murmured as they said goodbye, how strong and safe his arms had looked as he cradled their baby. She swallowed heavily and ached for her daughter, who she would never see again, left behind with only a letter and a kiss. She could only hope that Morgause would understand once she was grown.

********

November 2008

Things at Camelot Tech didn’t improve over the next few weeks. Merlin continued to bump into Arthur Pendragon in all manner of unlikely circumstances, manage to find some way of accidentally pissing him off, and without fail find himself covered in food and complaining about it to the nearest who would listen. Today, it was Gwaine.

“I just don’t understand it,” he moaned into the polished wood of the bar, not sure if he was even being heard over the ambient noise of drinking, gambling and fighting that inevitably accompanied an evening at the Rising Sun pub. “The place is fucking huge, how am I running into this tosser every single day?”

“Get your head off my bar, you’re getting salad dressing everywhere,” Gwaine replied, whacking him on the back of the neck with a dishcloth. Merlin sat up with a scowl, snatched a couple of napkins from the holder in front of him and started dabbing at his head. Gwaine sighed. “Have you stopped to consider that maybe it’s not an accident? I mean, you said yourself there isn’t hardly a single place in the complex that isn’t monitored around the clock. Maybe he’s suspicious of you so he’s seeking you out on purpose.”

“So, what, he’s combing through hours’ worth of CCTV footage every morning and finding the exact place Gaius has sent me running off to on errands that day just so he can come and throw food at me?” Merlin said sceptically, crumpling up the napkins. “He’s a dickhead, but he doesn’t care that much.”

“Fair point,” Gwaine conceded, slinging the dishcloth over his shoulder and leaning on the bar, looking around before lowering his voice. “Look, are you drinking tonight or did you just come in here to complain? Only, there’s a shipment coming through the back, if you give it a once-over and make sure nothing’s cursed there’s a free pint in it for you.”

“Who’re you moving it for?” Merlin asked warily. “If the Sidhe are involved you can take your fucking chances. I haven’t forgotten Sophia’s last run, all that fake youth potion that turned out to just be pond water-"

“It’s not the Sidhe,” Gwaine assured him. “It was brought in by one of Tauren’s men.”

Merlin froze. “Tauren?” he demanded. “Gwaine, Tauren? You’re still doing business with him, after what he did to Gwen’s dad? What the fuck? Why would you-”

“Merlin,” Gwaine interrupted. “Stop. You’re my mate and all, but I'm not having this argument again. I’ve never taken any sides in this clusterfuck, and I don’t plan on starting now.”

“Yeah, but this is Gwen we’re talking about – for fuck’s sake, you like Gwen-”

“I know,” Gwaine said. “I like her fine, she’s a right nice lass, and I’m sorry for what happened to Tom, but you know what else I like? Tauren’s money. I’m well aware that the man himself is a piece of shit, but he pays well to keep the pub as a flow-through point on his route. These smugglers, they’re the only thing keeping this place from going under at the moment.”

“Fucking hell,” Merlin groaned, passing a hand over his face. “Satan’s fucking ballsack. Can’t anything just be fucking simple for once?”

“Language,” Gwaine chided mildly, ignoring the two finger salute he got in return.

“Just give me a sodding drink, I’ll pay for it, I’m not looking through Tauren’s shit for you,” Merlin said, starting to root through his pockets for change.

“Fair enough,” Gwaine sighed, stepping back and reaching under the bar for a pint glass. “Usual?”

“Yeah.”

Gwaine set a pint of lager in front of him and wandered off to deal with a couple of brandy-soaked hedgewitches whistling at him from the other end of the bar. By the time he circled back around, Merlin had downed most of it and was staring into the foamy dregs with a morose expression.

“Another?”

“No thanks. Can’t show up tomorrow with a hangover, I have to go with Gaius to this R&D presentation, all the top execs, plus reps from Mora Incorporated. Apparently the lady herself is gonna be there.”

“Sounds horrifying.”

“Oh, it will be,” Merlin said, knocking back the last of his drink and getting up from the bar. “See you, Gwaine.”

“Night, Merlin.”

********

Arthur adjusted his tie and did his best to look composed as he entered the conference room at Uther’s flank. He stood back and kept quiet as Uther greeted Helen Mora with an uncharacteristically warm smile, and took his seat when he was told.

The tables in the room were set out in a horseshoe shape, with Uther at the centre of the top table, Arthur to his right and Agravaine, the head of R&D, to his left. A projector and screen had been set up at the other end of the room, directly in front of them. The rest of the people attending the presentation had been left to scramble for seats, or else struggle to see over each other’s heads at the edges of the room. Arthur caught a glimpse of a plaid shirt in the corner of his eye that indicated that the universe had once again decided to beset him with the presence of Martin-the-Idiot, and groaned internally. He didn’t even have any food to throw at him today.

His brooding was interrupted by Helen strolling to the front of the room and standing next to the screen, clapping her hands like a teacher.

“Thank you, ladies and gentlemen,” she called as the rumble of conversation died down and heads turned towards the front. She was surveying her audience with a strange expression on her face, but when she caught Arthur’s eye she smirked. “If you’ll just give my colleagues a few more moments, they should have the presentation ready.”

“Whenever you’re ready, Helen,” Uther said, still acting unusually amicable.

Helen gave one last rather alarming smile before she moved back over to where a few of her employees were clustered around a laptop. They were looking a little odd themselves, Arthur noticed with a frown. Their robotic movements and blank expressions reminded him forcefully of a group of marionettes. He frowned and looked them over properly, trying to parse what was off. He saw Helen lean down to whisper in the ear of one of the men, who stiffened noticeably, although he didn’t stop what he was doing for a second.

“Father-” he started, intending to voice his concerns that something was wrong. Before he could, however, Helen returned to the front of the room. This time, the chatter died down immediately. Uther waved him off, eyes fixed forward.

“Apologies for the wait,” she said. “Now, if you’d like to direct your attention to the screen…”

The audience did as they were bid, and the rest of the world seemed to fall away.

Arthur wasn’t sure what was so captivating about the images on the screen, or the music that was suddenly filling his head, but whatever it was, he found it soothing. Very soothing, he amended, blinking contentedly as the welcoming thought of a nap tugged at the edges of his consciousness. On some level, he knew he was still in a room full of people and it probably wasn’t ideal for him to start snoring, but he found himself caring less and less as waves of music washed over him. His eyelids began to droop.

Just a little sleep, he thought to himself, slumping down in his chair. No one will notice…

He was vaguely aware of someone coming towards him from up ahead –

Something sharp-looking and shiny spinning through the air –

A flash of plaid –

The next thing Arthur knew, he was wide awake and on the floor with someone’s knee digging into his back, staring at the knife buried up to the hilt in the back of his chair, exactly where his heart had been less than a second before.

“What on earth,” he tried to say, frowning when his voice came out much hoarser than it usually was. He cleared his throat and tried again. “What on earth?” he said, sitting up.

He could hear shouting and struggling that indicated security guards were converging on someone in the middle of the room, but he found he couldn’t quite look away from the knife just yet. That had been - if he hadn't -

Uther was on his feet, looking from the knife to Arthur and back again with wide eyes.

“You – Arthur, my god,” he managed, shaking himself into action and striding over, grabbing his son’s arm and helping him to his feet. “Are you alright?”

“Fine, father,” Arthur said, forcing himself to stop shaking. “I’m fine.”

“You saved my boy’s life,” Uther said.

Arthur frowned again, finding this a strange thing to say, until he realised Uther wasn’t talking to him, but someone behind him. He turned around and almost swore again when he realised who it was.

Martin-the-Idiot was hauling himself up off the floor, rubbing his elbow and blinking confusedly, as if he wasn’t sure what had just happened.

That makes two of us, Arthur thought.

********

“Sorry, you’re going to have to run that by me again,” Gwen said, blinking bemusedly over her pint. “It almost sounded like you said Uther had made you Arthur’s PA as a reward for saving his life.”

“That’s exactly what I said,” Merlin grimaced, draining his own glass and knocking on the bar for Gwaine to bring him another one.

“So it’s true then?” Gwaine grinned, setting a fresh Guinness in front of him and leaning forwards on the bar. “Just heard from Percy over there, he was fixing a leaky ceiling in the next corridor, said he heard the commotion. Apparently everyone’s talking about it – plucky little intern drags the prince of the palace out of the path of a flying spear. Stuff of legends, that is.”

“Or tabloid headlines, as the case may be,” Gwen added.

“It wasn’t a spear, it was a knife,” Merlin mumbled, downing half his drink in one go. He looked up to see both Gwen and Gwaine looking at him with identical raised eyebrows. He sighed. “I don’t even know how it happened,” he said. “One minute, I look up from playing snake on my phone and everyone’s falling asleep while Helen Mora is playing this godawful music, sounds like those bollocks-y sounding whale CDs my Mum's friend Linda always has playing in her crystal shop. The next minute, the old bat’s transformed into an even older bat and she's hurling a knife straight at the git’s chest – I just kind of, I don’t know, reacted.”

“Reacted,” Gwaine repeated flatly. “Reacted, he says.”

Merlin frowned. “What?”

“Nothing, pet,” Gwen said, patting his hand. “Don’t worry your poor heroic head about it.”

“Heroic?” Merlin scoffed. “Seriously? You have met me, right?”

“Good lord, he’s making it worse,” Gwaine said. “But no matter. I’d rather talk about how mental Uther’s clearly gone, giving a job like that the first random who drags his arsehole of a son out of the path of a spear-”

“Wasn’t a spear-”

“I mean, did he even ask to see a CV?” Gwaine continued, ignoring Merlin completely. “After all this about higher security and not letting people in who don’t pass eight kinds of personality tests?”

“I… no, he didn’t,” Merlin said, furrowing his brow. “He just kind of gave me the job. Everyone was clapping. To be honest, it was probably just for publicity, human interest or whatever. I’ll likely be out on my arse tomorrow, or back in Gaius’ labs.”

His phone beeped with a text. Ignoring Gwen and Gwaine’s half-amused, half-apprehensive looks, he rooted through his bag for his faulty old Nokia brick, frowned at the unknown number on the screen, but hit ‘read’ anyway.

It has been made clear to me that you were not hired as my personal assistant by my father as a publicity stunt, in spite of what I had hoped. I will expect you in the office at 7am tomorrow. Don’t be late – AP.

"Well shit,” Merlin mumbled.