Fic: Were You Up For Pendragon? (Arthur/Merlin, AU)
Title: Were You Up for Pendragon?
Pairing: Arthur/Merlin
Rating: PG
Words: 2840
Warning: There are probably bits of this that only make sense if you're British.
Disclaimer: I do not own this variation of the characters, and have no intention of profiting from this fic.
Summary: Sequel to Shake Your Windows and Rattle Your Walls. Election Night, 1997, and there's only one Tory that Merlin wants to keep his seat.
Notes: The Portillo Moment, for non-Brits and non-politicos. Labour under Tony Blair swept to a landslide victory in 1997, ousting the Conservatives, who had been in power since 1979. And, yeah, there should be more of this, but I've run out of weekend, and this bit stands alone.
Oxford: May 1997
On election night, they all cram into the SCR and roar approval at every Labour victory. Merlin heckles David Mellor and James Goldsmith simultaneously and bellows louder than the undergrads when Labour conquers over Rifkind and the Lib Dems beat out Lamont. He's been waiting for this since 1979, and finally his party are rolling home (although, he has to admit, they aren't really his party any more, this New Labour and their slithery, too-charming leader).
There is only one Tory he wants to hold his seat, and Arthur has been around as long as the Tories have been in power, Junior Minister and Secretary of Energy and, later, of Defence. He's survived the Brighton bombing, the Poll Tax and Black Wednesday, the smug bastard. He's even outlasted Thatcher. He's a fixture.
The SCR is cozy, the heating turned up too high, and Merlin appoints himself bartender and is generous with the stash they' requisitioned from the college cellar. Everyone's here, physicists and early medievalists and geneticists, even Elena, the cheerful American literary theorist they appointed last year who still doesn't understand the swingometer and why everyone keeps cheering when it appears on screen.
“If it goes more than three points either way, you pour yourself another drink,” Merlin tells her in the end, beaming his most guileless smile her way. She knows she thinks of him as that sweet old classicist, and wonders if he can keep the con up long enough to get her naked before they have a new government.
(“Good God,” Arthur said over the phone yesterday, when Merlin confided that plan to distract him from exit polls, “are you still working on your knicker collection? I'm not doing the divorce paperwork this time.”
“I don't need to marry them to get into their knickers,” Merlin retorted, with as much indignation as he could pour on.
“Liberal slut,” Arthur accused and Merlin could hear the sudden high-pitched wail of a publicist somewhere behind him.
“Thatcherite scum,” he retorted, glancing out of his window at the old quad, where Lib Dem and Labour posters were hanging out of fourteenth-century windows like red and yellow Christmas decorations, punctuated by the odd defiant scraps of blue and green. “Do you even know how to get to the Opposition benches?”
“I won't ever need to,” Arthur informed him, and Merlin could imagine him so clearly, leaning against his office wall as people swirled around him, eyes tired but head lifted. “Damn, they want me on the bus. Why's my constituency so frigging far from London?”
“Your constituency, which elects you,” Merlin reminded him, “is barely outside the home counties. People commute from there. Sure you don't want me there? I can still get Cedric to organise the sweepstake.”
“He'd cheat you all. No, we've got enough greasy socialists littering up the halls already. I'll talk to you on the other side.”
“Good luck,” Merlin said cheerfully.
He heard Arthur snort as he hung up and laughed as he went back to his desk. He had an article to review and a lecture to prepare on the reception of Aristotle through the ages. He wasn't going to worry about Arthur).
There is a sudden howl of, “Scoooootland!” from outside, though he isn't sure if it's in triumph or dismay.
Behind him, Morgause grumbles, “And these are the best minds of a generation.”
“Destroyed by madness,” Merlin agrees solemnly. “Starving, hysterical, naked-”
“You don't fool me, stooge of the patriarchy,” Morgause hisses, glowering at him. “Also, your boyfriend's on the telly.”
“He's not-” Merlin protests, but she's already slinking away towards the bar as if it's a battle front to be overwhelmed (and he's seen Morgause work through a drinks' reception and so thinks the simile isn't entirely overdone). Sighing, he settles back into the bulging armchair and watches as the BBC go to Albion South. The problem is that Morgause's digs sting because there's some truth in them. Merlin's been pretty much in love with Arthur for years now, since at least the end of his first marriage, when Nimueh's screaming analysis of their friendship was almost as startling as the wok she threw at his head (he probably shouldn't have started sleeping with her grad students as well as his own).
Arthur's stuck around longer than either of his wives, and is far more compelling company, if Merlin's honest about it. He's always liked the women in his life, but they've never meant what Arthur does - pompous, reactionary Tory scumbag of an honourable man that he is. Arthur is Arthur, and everyone fades into shadows around him, and they always have done.
Arthur's climbing up onto the stage now, looking subdued and awkward as he always does at this point. Standing in his smartest, most boring suit between a man dressed as a giant chicken and a intense-eyed brunette sporting a red rose the size of her fist on her lapel, he gives off the impression that he'd rather be anywhere else. It will change when he comes forward to make his speech, Merlin knows, because that's when Arthur comes alive and everyone thrills to his energy and purpose. It makes Merlin breathless watching him, even though he disagrees with every single piece of policy Arthur puts forward.
Adams, Patrick James, Monster Raving Loony Party, gets three hundred and five votes and lifts his feathery arms in triumph. Merlin sees Arthur's lip twitch. The Lib Dem does respectably, but Aredian-something from the Referendum party won't be getting his deposit back.
“Pendragon, Arthur Tristan,” the Returning Officer announces. “Conservative Party, nineteen-thousand, two hundred and sixteen.”
There's a smatter of uncertain applause and a sudden murmur of interest from the room behind him, and Merlin starts adding up frantically on his fingers. That's lower than it should be, much, much lower.
“Simmons, Elizabeth Jane, Christian Democrat Party, one hundred and thirty two.”
A single cheer from the back of the hall on screen, and Morgause takes a sharp breath behind him and lays her hand on his shoulder. Merlin's still trying to get the numbers clear in his head.
“Walsh, Anna Mordred, Labour Party, twenty thous-”
On screen and behind him, cheers drown out the rest of the count. Morgause is squeezing his shoulder so hard he can feel her nails biting down, and Merlin's got his hands in his hair, staring as the camera zooms in slowly on Arthur's face.
Arthur doesn't look surprised, just shakes hands with the chicken and kisses the- the child who's defeated him on the cheek when she comes to shake his hand.
She makes a pretty victory speech, but Merlin doesn't hear it. He takes in bits of Arthur's, the grave courtesy of his thanks and congratulations, the steadiness with which he speaks of the future of his party, his regrets that he won't be there to help them.
“He never hinted-” Merlin breathes up at Morgause.
“You've seen the polls, Emrys,” she tells him tartly, but there's compassion in her fierce eyes.
The BBC cuts away to somewhere in South Wales, and Merlin tries to breathe and thinks, Arthur, Arthur, Arthur.
Arthur just lost an election and, glancing around to check nobody's watching, Merlin surreptitiously pinches himself.
It hurts, but that's not necessarily proof that this isn't a dream, is it?
There's a lull in announcements, and they go back to the studio for pundits to blather about landslides and stunning defeats. Then suddenly, they switch again and Arthur's standing in front of a breeze-block wall and smiling stiffly at a microphone.
The reporter is blathering on, but Merlin's not listening. He's studying the set of Arthur's shoulders, the corner of his mouth, the lines at the corners of his eyes, and the more he looks, the more convinced he is that Arthur was expecting this.
“-your leadership ambitions,” the reporter says.
Arthur gives her a practised smile and says something about offering the party his full support.
“And I know it's early to be asking this, but do you know yet whether you'll be running again in the future?”
Arthur's shoulders lift a little, and his smile is more honest than it's ever been in public. Merlin yells, “Shut up!” at the conga line developing behind him and snatches the remote from the hand of an octogenarian theologian so he can turn the volume right up.
“I won't be seeking re-election, no,” Arthur says, the speakers dancing a little on top of the cabinet as his voice crackles and booms. “I see this as the end of my parliamentary career.”
“Oh, no, no, no!” Merlin shrieks at the telly as Arthur starts in on issue politics. “Even you are not that big a moron! Don't mention global warming! Or Europe!”
But Arthur's laying on the charm, at least until the reporter asks, “You've been in parliament for a long time, Mr Pendragon.”
“Eighteen years,” Arthur agrees.
“Any worries about how the change is going to effect you on a personal level?”
“It's certainly going to be nice to have a personal life after all this time,” Arthur replies smoothly, but Merlin can see the sudden tension in his stance. Back in 1974, Arthur and Morgana actually came to blows over whether the personal should ever be political, and Merlin hadn't been the only one to flee that dinner party with trifle in his hair.
“Any specific plans?” asks the nosy cow behind the microphone.
“Not as yet,” Arthur says, but then hesitates. Then he smiles, and in a flash he seems twenty years younger, some great weight lifting off his shoulders. Merlin knows what that smile means, has seen it a handful of times before. He knows, deep in his gut, that Arthur's about to do something stupendously, spectacularly reckless and probably idiotically glorious.
He's right.
Because that's when Arthur Pendragon comes out on live national television.
#
Twenty minutes later, Merlin finally gets through to someone at Arthur's constituency office. They pass him to Morgana, which is unexpected, given she's working for the other side.
“What the hell just happened?” Merlin demands anyway. His hands are still shaking and his brain's generating a constant, rather squeaky background loop of Arthur's gay. Arthur's gay. Oh, God, Arthur's actually gay.
“I can't hear you!” she screams down the line. It sounds as if she's in the middle of a riot or a rave. “Merlin, is that you?”
“I want to talk to Arthur,” he bellows.
There's a sudden click and the noise level at Morgana's end dies down considerably. “The press have gone insane,” she informs him. “I think they're about to start eating each other.”
“Where's Arthur? What happened? What are you doing there?”
“Everyone's here,” she says. “We only booked the local pub for Anna's victory do. We weren't expecting anything like this, so when Arthur disappeared his people agreed to just move everyone back here.”
“Disappeared?” Merlin repeats.
“That's why I couldn't talk to you out in the corridor. The press don't know. He just finished his interview and walked out. Didn't bother informing any of his concerned friends about where he planned to-” She's interrupted by a sudden clatter. “Damn, drawing pins.”
“Where are you?” Merlin says. “More importantly, where's Arthur?”
“I don't know, Merlin. And I'm in the stationery cupboard, so if we get cut off it's because the cable's finally come out of the this cheap piece of shit phone which won't come off the damn wall outside.”
“Do you need me there?” he asks. “I can drive up, or get someone to drive me, because I'm probably too pissed to be behind the wheel-”
“Stay where you are. I'll contact you. There's already too many people in this-”
The noise level suddenly rises again and a clamour of voices start shrieking, “Morgana, Morgana!”
“No comment, I said!” Morgana snarls. Then she hangs up and Merlin is left with his ears still ringing.
For lack of anything better to do, he goes back to the SCR. The numbers are thinning now, and some of those left are asleep. He watches the country swing red, victory after victory falling into place, and if he wasn't so worried he'd be ecstatic.
Blair returns to London and is greeted like a pop star. In the BBC studios, the pundits are heavy-eyed, their voices slowing, though they're still talking about Arthur.
“There have been persistent rumours about his sexuality,” someone's saying, and Merlin thinks indignantly No one told me!
“We'll have to wait and see if the Pendragon camp try to play this down tomorrow.”
“I really don't see how they can at this point, Oliver. His statement was pretty-”
“I'm sorry to interrupt you, folks, but we're going over to Conservative Headquarters, where John Major is about to make a statement.”
Merlin's always considered Major to be a dreary Kermit-lookalike, but he suddenly warms to him now. He's developing an entirely new appreciation for the dignity of defeat, he decides, one that's pure and aesthetic and noble and has nothing to do with the heroic set of Arthur's shoulders.
Morgause takes the glass out of his hand before he tips weak gin-and-tonic into his lap. She then calls him pathetic and emasculated, but that's affectionate from her, so he just grins up and asks plaintively, “Why didn't anyone tell me?”
“We thought you knew,” she says and pats him on the head in a disturbingly maternal way for a geneticist. “Stop using alcohol as a prop to escape your own inadequacies.”
“I wouldn't sleep with his grad students,” he tells her. “If he had any, which he doesn't, so I suppose it doesn't matter. And if he wanted to go to Greenham Common and camp in the mud, I'd go with him and I wouldn't write a single poem about spousal abandonment or have sex with his sister when the divorce papers arrived.”
“Good God,” she mutters, and actually brings him coffee and hobnobs and then crouches down to stare at him as if he's a particularly anomalous mutation of fruit fly.
He dozes off for a while then, and dreams about Arthur, years ago when they were young and brash and immortal. It's only as he wakes up that he realises that Arthur was always tense, even then, always locking something inside. He'd thought it was just Arthur, just his honour and ambition and the horror that was his relationship with his father.
Arthur needs to be okay. The world isn't fair, he knows now, but it's got some justice in it. Arthur deserves to be okay.
One of the night porters is at the door, saying, “Dr Emrys, there's a man in the lodge who says he has to see you.”
Merlin runs, stumbling over his own feet and the Keep Off the Grass sign in the middle of the quad. When he bursts into the lodge, Arthur is leaning against the counter, still in his suit, though he's lost his tie somewhere and his hair's on end.
“Finally,” he says, rolling his eyes as if he's been waiting all night.
“But- what- you-” Merlin stammers.
“And they made you a fellow,” Arthur remarks with a shudder. “Education system's going down the drain.”
“Fault of a Tory government,” Merlin says automatically. “What are you doing here? Morgana's hiding from the press in the stationery cupboard.”
“She loves it,” Arthur says and pushes himself off the side. He stalks along the length of the lodge, and that reckless grin is back on his face. Merlin honestly has no idea what's coming until Arthur grabs him by the lapels and drags him into a hard and desperate kiss.
Arthur's mouth is pressing his open, a little too forceful, and his hands are fisted in Merlin's jacket. He's rough with stubble and tastes like stale coffee, breath gusting into Merlin's mouth in little chokes of desperation, and within seconds Merlin's forgotten everything but Arthur, who isn't lost, hasn't disappeared, but is right here, with him, and who he's never ever going to let go again.
When Arthur finally breaks the kiss, Merlin's head is spinning, and he doesn't think it's from the gin.
“Thank God,” Arthur says distinctly, but his eyes are wild. “I've been waiting to do that since 1964.”
“We met in 1964,” Merlin says, feeling Arthur's hands shaking against his chest.
“You're such a moron,” Arthur says, his face a mess of affection and condescension.
Merlin's mouth falls open, and Arthur kisses him again, tender and exhausted and triumphant in defeat.
Pairing: Arthur/Merlin
Rating: PG
Words: 2840
Warning: There are probably bits of this that only make sense if you're British.
Disclaimer: I do not own this variation of the characters, and have no intention of profiting from this fic.
Summary: Sequel to Shake Your Windows and Rattle Your Walls. Election Night, 1997, and there's only one Tory that Merlin wants to keep his seat.
Notes: The Portillo Moment, for non-Brits and non-politicos. Labour under Tony Blair swept to a landslide victory in 1997, ousting the Conservatives, who had been in power since 1979. And, yeah, there should be more of this, but I've run out of weekend, and this bit stands alone.
Oxford: May 1997
On election night, they all cram into the SCR and roar approval at every Labour victory. Merlin heckles David Mellor and James Goldsmith simultaneously and bellows louder than the undergrads when Labour conquers over Rifkind and the Lib Dems beat out Lamont. He's been waiting for this since 1979, and finally his party are rolling home (although, he has to admit, they aren't really his party any more, this New Labour and their slithery, too-charming leader).
There is only one Tory he wants to hold his seat, and Arthur has been around as long as the Tories have been in power, Junior Minister and Secretary of Energy and, later, of Defence. He's survived the Brighton bombing, the Poll Tax and Black Wednesday, the smug bastard. He's even outlasted Thatcher. He's a fixture.
The SCR is cozy, the heating turned up too high, and Merlin appoints himself bartender and is generous with the stash they' requisitioned from the college cellar. Everyone's here, physicists and early medievalists and geneticists, even Elena, the cheerful American literary theorist they appointed last year who still doesn't understand the swingometer and why everyone keeps cheering when it appears on screen.
“If it goes more than three points either way, you pour yourself another drink,” Merlin tells her in the end, beaming his most guileless smile her way. She knows she thinks of him as that sweet old classicist, and wonders if he can keep the con up long enough to get her naked before they have a new government.
(“Good God,” Arthur said over the phone yesterday, when Merlin confided that plan to distract him from exit polls, “are you still working on your knicker collection? I'm not doing the divorce paperwork this time.”
“I don't need to marry them to get into their knickers,” Merlin retorted, with as much indignation as he could pour on.
“Liberal slut,” Arthur accused and Merlin could hear the sudden high-pitched wail of a publicist somewhere behind him.
“Thatcherite scum,” he retorted, glancing out of his window at the old quad, where Lib Dem and Labour posters were hanging out of fourteenth-century windows like red and yellow Christmas decorations, punctuated by the odd defiant scraps of blue and green. “Do you even know how to get to the Opposition benches?”
“I won't ever need to,” Arthur informed him, and Merlin could imagine him so clearly, leaning against his office wall as people swirled around him, eyes tired but head lifted. “Damn, they want me on the bus. Why's my constituency so frigging far from London?”
“Your constituency, which elects you,” Merlin reminded him, “is barely outside the home counties. People commute from there. Sure you don't want me there? I can still get Cedric to organise the sweepstake.”
“He'd cheat you all. No, we've got enough greasy socialists littering up the halls already. I'll talk to you on the other side.”
“Good luck,” Merlin said cheerfully.
He heard Arthur snort as he hung up and laughed as he went back to his desk. He had an article to review and a lecture to prepare on the reception of Aristotle through the ages. He wasn't going to worry about Arthur).
There is a sudden howl of, “Scoooootland!” from outside, though he isn't sure if it's in triumph or dismay.
Behind him, Morgause grumbles, “And these are the best minds of a generation.”
“Destroyed by madness,” Merlin agrees solemnly. “Starving, hysterical, naked-”
“You don't fool me, stooge of the patriarchy,” Morgause hisses, glowering at him. “Also, your boyfriend's on the telly.”
“He's not-” Merlin protests, but she's already slinking away towards the bar as if it's a battle front to be overwhelmed (and he's seen Morgause work through a drinks' reception and so thinks the simile isn't entirely overdone). Sighing, he settles back into the bulging armchair and watches as the BBC go to Albion South. The problem is that Morgause's digs sting because there's some truth in them. Merlin's been pretty much in love with Arthur for years now, since at least the end of his first marriage, when Nimueh's screaming analysis of their friendship was almost as startling as the wok she threw at his head (he probably shouldn't have started sleeping with her grad students as well as his own).
Arthur's stuck around longer than either of his wives, and is far more compelling company, if Merlin's honest about it. He's always liked the women in his life, but they've never meant what Arthur does - pompous, reactionary Tory scumbag of an honourable man that he is. Arthur is Arthur, and everyone fades into shadows around him, and they always have done.
Arthur's climbing up onto the stage now, looking subdued and awkward as he always does at this point. Standing in his smartest, most boring suit between a man dressed as a giant chicken and a intense-eyed brunette sporting a red rose the size of her fist on her lapel, he gives off the impression that he'd rather be anywhere else. It will change when he comes forward to make his speech, Merlin knows, because that's when Arthur comes alive and everyone thrills to his energy and purpose. It makes Merlin breathless watching him, even though he disagrees with every single piece of policy Arthur puts forward.
Adams, Patrick James, Monster Raving Loony Party, gets three hundred and five votes and lifts his feathery arms in triumph. Merlin sees Arthur's lip twitch. The Lib Dem does respectably, but Aredian-something from the Referendum party won't be getting his deposit back.
“Pendragon, Arthur Tristan,” the Returning Officer announces. “Conservative Party, nineteen-thousand, two hundred and sixteen.”
There's a smatter of uncertain applause and a sudden murmur of interest from the room behind him, and Merlin starts adding up frantically on his fingers. That's lower than it should be, much, much lower.
“Simmons, Elizabeth Jane, Christian Democrat Party, one hundred and thirty two.”
A single cheer from the back of the hall on screen, and Morgause takes a sharp breath behind him and lays her hand on his shoulder. Merlin's still trying to get the numbers clear in his head.
“Walsh, Anna Mordred, Labour Party, twenty thous-”
On screen and behind him, cheers drown out the rest of the count. Morgause is squeezing his shoulder so hard he can feel her nails biting down, and Merlin's got his hands in his hair, staring as the camera zooms in slowly on Arthur's face.
Arthur doesn't look surprised, just shakes hands with the chicken and kisses the- the child who's defeated him on the cheek when she comes to shake his hand.
She makes a pretty victory speech, but Merlin doesn't hear it. He takes in bits of Arthur's, the grave courtesy of his thanks and congratulations, the steadiness with which he speaks of the future of his party, his regrets that he won't be there to help them.
“He never hinted-” Merlin breathes up at Morgause.
“You've seen the polls, Emrys,” she tells him tartly, but there's compassion in her fierce eyes.
The BBC cuts away to somewhere in South Wales, and Merlin tries to breathe and thinks, Arthur, Arthur, Arthur.
Arthur just lost an election and, glancing around to check nobody's watching, Merlin surreptitiously pinches himself.
It hurts, but that's not necessarily proof that this isn't a dream, is it?
There's a lull in announcements, and they go back to the studio for pundits to blather about landslides and stunning defeats. Then suddenly, they switch again and Arthur's standing in front of a breeze-block wall and smiling stiffly at a microphone.
The reporter is blathering on, but Merlin's not listening. He's studying the set of Arthur's shoulders, the corner of his mouth, the lines at the corners of his eyes, and the more he looks, the more convinced he is that Arthur was expecting this.
“-your leadership ambitions,” the reporter says.
Arthur gives her a practised smile and says something about offering the party his full support.
“And I know it's early to be asking this, but do you know yet whether you'll be running again in the future?”
Arthur's shoulders lift a little, and his smile is more honest than it's ever been in public. Merlin yells, “Shut up!” at the conga line developing behind him and snatches the remote from the hand of an octogenarian theologian so he can turn the volume right up.
“I won't be seeking re-election, no,” Arthur says, the speakers dancing a little on top of the cabinet as his voice crackles and booms. “I see this as the end of my parliamentary career.”
“Oh, no, no, no!” Merlin shrieks at the telly as Arthur starts in on issue politics. “Even you are not that big a moron! Don't mention global warming! Or Europe!”
But Arthur's laying on the charm, at least until the reporter asks, “You've been in parliament for a long time, Mr Pendragon.”
“Eighteen years,” Arthur agrees.
“Any worries about how the change is going to effect you on a personal level?”
“It's certainly going to be nice to have a personal life after all this time,” Arthur replies smoothly, but Merlin can see the sudden tension in his stance. Back in 1974, Arthur and Morgana actually came to blows over whether the personal should ever be political, and Merlin hadn't been the only one to flee that dinner party with trifle in his hair.
“Any specific plans?” asks the nosy cow behind the microphone.
“Not as yet,” Arthur says, but then hesitates. Then he smiles, and in a flash he seems twenty years younger, some great weight lifting off his shoulders. Merlin knows what that smile means, has seen it a handful of times before. He knows, deep in his gut, that Arthur's about to do something stupendously, spectacularly reckless and probably idiotically glorious.
He's right.
Because that's when Arthur Pendragon comes out on live national television.
#
Twenty minutes later, Merlin finally gets through to someone at Arthur's constituency office. They pass him to Morgana, which is unexpected, given she's working for the other side.
“What the hell just happened?” Merlin demands anyway. His hands are still shaking and his brain's generating a constant, rather squeaky background loop of Arthur's gay. Arthur's gay. Oh, God, Arthur's actually gay.
“I can't hear you!” she screams down the line. It sounds as if she's in the middle of a riot or a rave. “Merlin, is that you?”
“I want to talk to Arthur,” he bellows.
There's a sudden click and the noise level at Morgana's end dies down considerably. “The press have gone insane,” she informs him. “I think they're about to start eating each other.”
“Where's Arthur? What happened? What are you doing there?”
“Everyone's here,” she says. “We only booked the local pub for Anna's victory do. We weren't expecting anything like this, so when Arthur disappeared his people agreed to just move everyone back here.”
“Disappeared?” Merlin repeats.
“That's why I couldn't talk to you out in the corridor. The press don't know. He just finished his interview and walked out. Didn't bother informing any of his concerned friends about where he planned to-” She's interrupted by a sudden clatter. “Damn, drawing pins.”
“Where are you?” Merlin says. “More importantly, where's Arthur?”
“I don't know, Merlin. And I'm in the stationery cupboard, so if we get cut off it's because the cable's finally come out of the this cheap piece of shit phone which won't come off the damn wall outside.”
“Do you need me there?” he asks. “I can drive up, or get someone to drive me, because I'm probably too pissed to be behind the wheel-”
“Stay where you are. I'll contact you. There's already too many people in this-”
The noise level suddenly rises again and a clamour of voices start shrieking, “Morgana, Morgana!”
“No comment, I said!” Morgana snarls. Then she hangs up and Merlin is left with his ears still ringing.
For lack of anything better to do, he goes back to the SCR. The numbers are thinning now, and some of those left are asleep. He watches the country swing red, victory after victory falling into place, and if he wasn't so worried he'd be ecstatic.
Blair returns to London and is greeted like a pop star. In the BBC studios, the pundits are heavy-eyed, their voices slowing, though they're still talking about Arthur.
“There have been persistent rumours about his sexuality,” someone's saying, and Merlin thinks indignantly No one told me!
“We'll have to wait and see if the Pendragon camp try to play this down tomorrow.”
“I really don't see how they can at this point, Oliver. His statement was pretty-”
“I'm sorry to interrupt you, folks, but we're going over to Conservative Headquarters, where John Major is about to make a statement.”
Merlin's always considered Major to be a dreary Kermit-lookalike, but he suddenly warms to him now. He's developing an entirely new appreciation for the dignity of defeat, he decides, one that's pure and aesthetic and noble and has nothing to do with the heroic set of Arthur's shoulders.
Morgause takes the glass out of his hand before he tips weak gin-and-tonic into his lap. She then calls him pathetic and emasculated, but that's affectionate from her, so he just grins up and asks plaintively, “Why didn't anyone tell me?”
“We thought you knew,” she says and pats him on the head in a disturbingly maternal way for a geneticist. “Stop using alcohol as a prop to escape your own inadequacies.”
“I wouldn't sleep with his grad students,” he tells her. “If he had any, which he doesn't, so I suppose it doesn't matter. And if he wanted to go to Greenham Common and camp in the mud, I'd go with him and I wouldn't write a single poem about spousal abandonment or have sex with his sister when the divorce papers arrived.”
“Good God,” she mutters, and actually brings him coffee and hobnobs and then crouches down to stare at him as if he's a particularly anomalous mutation of fruit fly.
He dozes off for a while then, and dreams about Arthur, years ago when they were young and brash and immortal. It's only as he wakes up that he realises that Arthur was always tense, even then, always locking something inside. He'd thought it was just Arthur, just his honour and ambition and the horror that was his relationship with his father.
Arthur needs to be okay. The world isn't fair, he knows now, but it's got some justice in it. Arthur deserves to be okay.
One of the night porters is at the door, saying, “Dr Emrys, there's a man in the lodge who says he has to see you.”
Merlin runs, stumbling over his own feet and the Keep Off the Grass sign in the middle of the quad. When he bursts into the lodge, Arthur is leaning against the counter, still in his suit, though he's lost his tie somewhere and his hair's on end.
“Finally,” he says, rolling his eyes as if he's been waiting all night.
“But- what- you-” Merlin stammers.
“And they made you a fellow,” Arthur remarks with a shudder. “Education system's going down the drain.”
“Fault of a Tory government,” Merlin says automatically. “What are you doing here? Morgana's hiding from the press in the stationery cupboard.”
“She loves it,” Arthur says and pushes himself off the side. He stalks along the length of the lodge, and that reckless grin is back on his face. Merlin honestly has no idea what's coming until Arthur grabs him by the lapels and drags him into a hard and desperate kiss.
Arthur's mouth is pressing his open, a little too forceful, and his hands are fisted in Merlin's jacket. He's rough with stubble and tastes like stale coffee, breath gusting into Merlin's mouth in little chokes of desperation, and within seconds Merlin's forgotten everything but Arthur, who isn't lost, hasn't disappeared, but is right here, with him, and who he's never ever going to let go again.
When Arthur finally breaks the kiss, Merlin's head is spinning, and he doesn't think it's from the gin.
“Thank God,” Arthur says distinctly, but his eyes are wild. “I've been waiting to do that since 1964.”
“We met in 1964,” Merlin says, feeling Arthur's hands shaking against his chest.
“You're such a moron,” Arthur says, his face a mess of affection and condescension.
Merlin's mouth falls open, and Arthur kisses him again, tender and exhausted and triumphant in defeat.