Fic: London, Said He (4/12)
Title: London, Said He
Rating: R
Genres: Science Fiction (Time Travel), Humour, Romance
Era: Mix of canon-era and near-future (22nd century) reincarnation era
Pairings: Merlin/Arthur, one-sided Gwaine/Merlin, implied Gwaine/Percy
Wordcount: 4400 (this chapter); 45k total
Betas: percygranger, messyangel81
This really hasn't been Merlin's day. Or week. Or month, really. Seeing his best friend die in front of him was bad enough. But magicking himself into the future in order to save Arthur? Probably not as good an idea as it seemed on paper. And this future version of Gwaine will not stop hitting on him. Even in front of the future Arthur - talk about embarrassing. Especially since Merlin needs to get to know this Arthur if he's ever going to figure out how to save his.
Chapter 1: Camelot
Chapter 2: Let's Do the Time Warp Again
Chapter 3: Gwaine
Chapter 4: Getting to Know You
Gwaine had been a right git when Merlin had woken up in the middle of the night, knocked on the door to his room, and asked if perhaps he had a change of clothes since Merlin’s were starting to smell, and mentioned that, by the way, he really wasn’t kidding about the whole wizard-from-Camelot thing.
“You’re still drunk,” Gwaine said, and slammed the door in his face.
To be fair, it was still before dawn, and Gwaine had never been known to be a morning person.
“So,” Gwaine said, chewing thoughtfully on a flat, square-shaped pastry covered with peculiarly flavoured honey of a thin consistency, “I have a confession to make.”
Merlin hummed around his own “waffle with golden syrup.”
“I know you. Knew you. Before you came into the cafe, I mean.”
Merlin looked up from his waffle. “What?” he said. Or at least, he would have said, if his mouth hadn’t been full. Instead, it came out more like Wuff?
“I knew you before we met.”
This time, Merlin swallowed before he spoke. “What are you talking about?”
“I wasn’t sure at first. I mean. You looked familiar, of course, but so do a lot of people.” Gwaine took another bite. “But I’ve dreamt about you.”
“You… dreamt?” Merlin glanced suspiciously at his waffle, wondering if Gwaine had dosed it with something. “Sorry, what?”
Gwaine’s face split into a grin. “You’re the man of my dreams, Merlin.”
Merlin just blinked in response.
“Okay, I admit, that was terrible.” Gwaine cleared his throat. “But that’s besides the point. Look, I’ve been having these bizarre dreams for the past few months. My mate Percy’s there too, and he’s all medieval looking, we’re both all dressed up in armour, and we’re tromping about in some fields. And you’re with us, cracking jokes and generally spewing nonsense.”
Gwaine shook his head, setting down his fork. “In the dreams, I know you, we’re… friends. Good friends. Proper mates. Then I wake up and I realise I’ve never met you before.” He waved a hand in the air towards Merlin. “But here you are.”
Merlin chewed on his lip for a moment, before swallowing and pushing his plate away. “So, what you’re saying, is… you’ve been dreaming about me. And that’s supposed to mean, what exactly?”
“Look. Merlin. You don’t know what a waffle is. I mean, some things you can excuse, but waffles?”
Merlin rolled his eyes. “Oh, come on.”
Gwaine shifted in his chair. “I’m just saying, maybe…”
“Maybe it’s not so inconceivable that I’m a wizard?” Merlin asked, lifting his eyebrows reproachfully.
Instead of having the desired effect of chastising Gwaine, he giggled. “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means,” he said, in an odd accent.
“What?” Merlin asked, scrunching his eyebrows.
“Oh my God,” Gwaine said, adopting a look of horror, “you’ve never seen The Princess Bride. You must be a time traveller; there’s no other explanation.”
Merlin threw his waffle at him.
Merlin was starting to regret the loss of his waffle.
Gwaine was lying on the floor, laughing his arse off, having narrowly dodged the syrupy confection, and in so doing, tipped his chair over and lost his balance.
And to make matters worse, Merlin still hadn’t gotten the use of his magic back. At least, he assumed he would have saved Gwaine from collapsing onto the floor if he’d had his magic.
Maybe not. He was being a git.
“Fine!” Gwaine managed between guffaws. “I believe you! Only the great wizard Merlin would have such uncanny waffle-flinging skills!”
“Oh shut up,” Merlin said irritably, and stole the rest of Gwaine’s waffle.
“You teleported yourself into an alleyway in West End?”
After breakfast, Gwaine had shoved Merlin into one end of the sofa and collapsed on the other side, nursing a small tankard of something called tea, and started his interrogation.
What is Camelot like? Have you slept with the Gwaine in Camelot? Why not? Is that why you won’t sleep with me? Have you slept with Arthur, then? Is Arthur king yet? Who is king? Why can’t you just off this Uther fellow if he’s so bloody obnoxious?
Merlin had rolled his eyes at Gwaine’s less than subtle attempts to tumble him, and awkwardly stuttered through the leering interrogation about Arthur. He had explained the ban on magic. He had mentioned Gwen, and how Arthur was in love with her. He had talked about his own magic, and how he couldn’t seem to control it anymore (at which point Gwaine rolled his eyes and muttered “how convenient”). He told of how Arthur had died, and how Merlin had cast a spell to transport himself and find a way to save him.
Merlin sighed. “I don’t think it’s supposed to work like that, you know. I ended up in Arthur’s chambers, the first time I tried.”
Gwaine took a sip of his long-cold tea, and made a face. “Whatever. The point is, you’re here now, and you think there’s something here that will help you prevent his death.”
“I hope so.” Merlin ran his thumb across the seam of the sofa cushion underneath him.
Gwaine made a humming noise in the back of his throat, setting his tea down on the floor. “So what does your Arthur look like, anyway?”
“About my height, with blond hair that falls to the middle of his forehead, and blue eyes. His teeth are… well, they’re a bit wonky, but when he laughs his whole face lights up. He doesn’t laugh nearly often enough, though. Normally he’s all grumpy and stern and a bit of a prat.”
“Right,” Gwaine drawled. “So how long have you been in love with him?”
“How long have you been in love with Percy?” Merlin snapped, automatic, and Gwaine froze.
“What the fuck,” he swore. His entire body was suddenly tense.
“Sorry!” Merlin blurted. “Oh gods, I can’t believe I said that. I’m so sorry, Gwaine.”
Gwaine relaxed fractionally on seeing Merlin’s spooked expression, and drew his legs up to his chest, his bare toes digging into the blue fabric underneath him. “How did you know? Did Kay tell you? I will murder him, I swear to God.”
“No, no,” Merlin said, waving his hand about, “Kay didn’t say anything. It’s just that my Gwaine is in love with Percy. It was more of an automatic reaction than anything. Like elbowing you when you tried to kiss me.”
Gwaine lifted an eyebrow. “You and your Gwaine have an… interesting relationship, sounds like.”
Merlin grinned back, stretching his leg out to nudge Gwaine’s ankle with his toe. “That we do.”
Gwaine smiled for a moment before twitching and pulling his black rectangle out of his pocket. He tapped at it, frowned, and started swiping his finger in loops and swirls. “It’s Percy,” he mumbled, apparently in explanation. “He just opened the cafe; he works Tuesdays.”
Merlin cocked his head, peering at the rectangle in Gwaine’s hands. “I thought that was a key.”
Gwaine stopped touching the rectangle for a moment before his face broke into a grin. “This, my friend, is the future’s version of magic.” He tossed it towards Merlin.
On closer inspection, the rectangle had a translucent black cover moulded to the back, raised bumps and various oddly shaped holes along the sides, and the word “Virgin” printed in shiny silver lettering on a red background. There was the faint outline of a transparent screen, covered with smudges left behind from Gwaine’s fingerprints. “What is it?”
“That is a mobile phone.” Gwaine leaned back, lacing his hands together behind his head and letting his legs fall open. He leaned over and pressed a button on the short side, and an image flickered to life. A drawing of a tree swayed gently in the background, little drops of rain falling, and overlaid on top were neat rows of colourful images with single-word captions beneath, like “Email” and “Maps” and “Angry Bird.” In the top right corner, the date was displayed as September 12, 2137. Merlin dropped the thing in his lap, jerking back his hands, even though there had been no physical pain.
Gwaine laughed, a short sharp burst, his head thrown back against the sofa cushions. “It doesn’t bite.”
Merlin blinked, gingerly picking the thing back up, pinched between forefinger and thumb. “Can it lift objects?”
“What?”
“You said it was magic,” Merlin said. “Magic can lift things. So can this lift things?”
Gwaine’s eyebrows scrunched together. “No.”
“Can it light fires?”
“No.”
“Can it stop time?”
“What? No.”
“Can it heal wounds?”
“No! It’s… not that sort of magic!”
“Well, what use is it, then!”
Gwaine scowled, snatching the mobile phone away from Merlin’s grasp.
“It lets you talk to people, no matter how far away they are. Um. You can take photos. Bollocks, you don’t know what those are. Right, what else. It lets you look up random shite… that is, it’s like having a library in your pocket. It has maps so you never get lost. I have a key app so I can use it to open the flat and the cafe. And, uh… it has Angry Birds. That’s pretty fun.”
Gwaine tilted the phone to show Merlin. The Angry Bird image was a drawing of a fat, red bird with expressive eyebrows.
“Um.”
Gwaine sighed noisily. “No fair. You time travelling lot are supposed to be impressed by the wonders of modern day technology. I feel cheated.”
“Whatever,” Merlin said, flopping closer to Gwaine on the sofa and kicking at his shin. “I’m sure your tiny box is… impressive.”
“It is!” Gwaine said, scowling. He leant over the device, hair swinging to cover his eyes, and he brushed it away absently with one hand, tucking the loose strands behind his ear. His other hand tapped out commands on the mobile phone’s surface. “Besides, I haven’t seen you do any magic.”
Merlin scowled. The truth was, since coming to this place, he still hadn’t managed to successfully harness his power. Since trying to make the leaves fly in the alley two days ago, he’d had little opportunity to practice. He could still feel a tingling in his fingers and an occasional thrumming in his belly that he associated with his magic.
He eyed Gwaine’s coffee cup. “Bune, cume mec.”
When the mug immediately flew from the floor into Merlin’s waiting grasp, he wasn’t sure who was more shocked - him or Gwaine.
“Bloody fuck!” Gwaine shouted, leaping up from the sofa.
Merlin would have said something similar, but he was too busy coughing and wiping tea off of his face.
After Gwaine had stopped hyperventilating and Merlin had resumed breathing, it was decided that Merlin needed new clothes and a bath while Gwaine cleaned the sofa and the rug.
The bathtub, like the sink at Gwaine’s cafe, had been superficially strange, but ultimately not terribly different from taking a bath in Camelot. He’d stripped, poured heated water into the tub, noticed that it was all draining through a hole in the bottom of the tub, sealed it up with the attached black stopper on a silver chain, waited until the tub was full of hot water, and slipped in. There was a white circular cake with an astringent scent sitting at the lip of the tub, and when he rubbed it against his wet skin bubbles formed, which was quite lovely. When he brought them up to his mouth, he discovered that they tasted terrible.
After a few minutes, he pulled the stopper out to let the water drain, and, dripping on the oddly warm tile floor, grabbed the nearest towel to scrub himself dry.
At least the basics of washing still hadn’t changed.
He towelled himself dry and trudged out to the bedroom. Lying on the bed in a haphazard pile, he found a thin tunic, a pair of stiff blue breeches, and a round piece of cloth, approximately the size of his head, but with two holes in it. After several aborted attempts to pull on the tunic, he gave up and tried the breeches. But there was no visible lacing, and the stupid thing would not slide up his hips.
“Gwaine,” Merlin called. “A little help?” He looked around for something to cover himself, and grabbed a floppy white pillow from the bed.
“One moment!” A strange set of thuds emanated from outside the door, and then it burst open, Gwaine looking half-crazed. “What did you - wait. What in god’s name are you doing?” He gestured weakly toward Merlin’s knees.
“Trying to put these on?” Merlin hopped up, trying to tug the breeches further up his hips one-handed while still preserving his modesty, and ended up losing his balance and flopping onto the bed.
“Okay,” Gwaine said, once he had stopped laughing, “first off, you need to unfasten the flies. And secondly, you really need to put the pants on before you do the jeans.”
“Oh,” said Merlin. “Which ones are pants?”
As soon as Merlin had successfully replaced his outfit, Gwaine herded him outside, through the corridor, and down the stairs.
“Your first lesson,” he proclaimed, “will be purchasing the ingredients to cook dinner.”
Merlin looked over at Gwaine, a pained expression on his face. “I’m making dinner?”
“Feeding yourself is an essential skill, Merlin. Plus, I don’t like cooking all the time, and if you’re not paying rent, you’d best work for your room and board. Since, you know, I’m never letting you back in my cafe.”
Merlin grimaced. “So where are we going?”
“The store.” Gwaine sighed. “We’ll have to work on getting you dressed faster in future.”
“Well, now that I know what a zip is-“
“Yes, yes,” Gwaine interrupted, his cheeks flushing a faint pink.
Merlin looked down at his new outfit. Once Gwaine had gotten him into the strange white undergarment termed pants they had wrestled on the wretched jeans. Even after unfastening the button and strange metal teeth called a zip, they’d been difficult to pull on. Merlin had to hop a bit to tug them on, and Gwaine had still frowned and commented that they looked a bit loose. Merlin wasn’t sure how the blasted things could be loose when they squeezed his thighs like… a thing that squeezed thighs.
Gwaine strode ahead of Merlin, pushing impatiently at a button on a long pole that sat at the corner of two large stone-paved pathways.
“Stay on the pavement until you see the little green man appear.”
Merlin rolled his eyes. “I’m not an idiot, Gwaine.”
“Could have fooled me,” Gwaine muttered, not entirely under his breath.
Merlin resolved to change Gwaine’s entire wardrobe to an unflattering shade of puce when they got home.
The sun was just starting to peek over the roofs of buildings, now. Buildings here were taller by far than any of the ones Merlin had seen in Camelot. The warm light streamed over Gwaine’s shoulders, casting a golden glow to his hair and a soft cast to his face. It would have been terribly flattering if not for the accompanying squint.
“So how do I make this house pie?”
“Cottage pie,” Gwaine absently corrected. “You chop up the ingredients, mix them in a bowl, squash it into a baking dish, and toss it in the oven for an hour. Oh, and don’t forget to cover it with tin foil.”
Merlin quirked an eyebrow, though the effect was entirely lost on Gwaine, since Merlin was holding up a hand to shield his eyes from the glare. “Toss?”
“Don’t literally toss it, Merlin. You place it in the oven. Gently. With both hands.” Gwaine grinned over at him. “We’ll need to buy minced beef, instant potatoes, and an onion. I have frozen veg and seasoning back home. Oh, and cheese. For the top.”
Merlin’s lip curled as he contemplated the ingredients list. “This sounds horrid.”
Gwaine shoved him as they walked up to the doors leading into Tesco’s. “You’ll eat it and you’ll like it.” Gwaine blinked. “Bloody hell, I sound like my mum.”
Merlin nearly jumped out of his skin when the glass doors parted for them as they approached. Gwaine just laughed.
Inside was a sprawling market with shiny floors and colourful boxes. Merlin stopped in his tracks and Gwaine nearly crashed into him. “Christ, Merlin, stop looking like a deer in the headlights. We’re just here for three things.”
Merlin numbly filtered in the sights and sounds as Gwaine tugged him bodily through the store. They picked up meat first, great slabs of it ground into an unappetising paste, stuck on a flat black plate and wrapped in a shiny transparent screen. Next came the potatoes - not from actual vegetables, apparently, but from a box with a painting of brown tubers on the outside. Finally, they picked up an onion - and that, at least, seemed normal, although it was completely wiped clean of dirt, much larger than he was used to, and Gwaine tossed it into a transparent bag for some inexplicable reason.
They paid for their goods, not by bartering with actual people, but by conversing with a machine. Gwaine showed Merlin a strange device almost as tall as he was, with a glass plate and shelves, next to thin blue and white bags made of the same substance as the transparent sheen entrapping the meat and the onion. Gwaine called it a “chip and pin machine” and waved his three items over the glass plate, dumping them into one of the bags, before shoving a payment rectangle through a slot in the side and pressing at the screen above the glass plate.
Merlin spent the walk back to the flat in silent contemplation of the strange city around him. He occasionally asked Gwaine for names of things (That’s the kerb, that’s the pavement, that’s the road, now shut up and look where you’re walking, Merlin) and touched the sides of buildings as he passed. The brick and stone brushing underneath his fingertips were familiar textures, but certain walls were slick where he expected roughness, cool where he expected warmth.
When they reached the flat, Gwaine dumped the bag on the counter next to the white box (furge? He’d have to ask Gwaine again) and pulled out a small glass dish. “I’ll set it up, you go use the chamberpot or something.”
When Merlin returned, he eyed Gwaine as he puttered about the kitchen. Sitting on the counter were a blue and green bag labeled “Four Cheese Blend” containing orange-coloured shavings; a canister of salt, and two bottle of green flakes labeled oregano and parsley (herbs, apparently dried, and not so different from what Gaius used in his remedies); a translucent jug of milk, helpfully labeled as such (because clearly Merlin wouldn’t be able to tell without a label); a bag of Tesco Mixed Vegetables, helpfully decorated with a picture of a bowl of chopped up vegetables, and proudly proclaiming that they had been “Freshly Frozen!”; an assortment of tools (the glass baking dish Gwaine had retrieved from the cupboard, an array of metal measuring tins and spoons, an ugly green rectangle Gwaine termed a cutting board, and a number of dull looking knives); and the bag from the trip to Tesco’s (with the unappetizing meat, box of potatoes, and large yellow onion).
“So what else can you do?”
“Sorry?” Merlin looked up from the meat slab, glistening unnaturally in the cool lights of the kitchen.
Gwaine was smiling, the corner of his mouth twisted up, as he used a knife to slice open the translucent screen on the meat slab. “Magic. You can move coffee cups with your mind. What can you do besides accio?”
Merlin swallowed. “Loads of things.”
“So show me.” Gwaine pulled open one of the cabinet doors and removed a shiny silver circle set atop a shiny black base, inset with some shiny buttons. Why was everything so shiny?
Merlin shook his head and muttered “Léoht,” and a blue orb appeared in his palm.
“Huh,” said Gwaine, pausing midway through setting a bowl on top of the shiny machine. “Not bad.” He tilted his head towards the orb. “Though you’d get better light with a torch.”
Suddenly, the orb flickered and blinked out. Merlin frowned. He hadn’t done anything to turn it off yet. “Léoht,” he commanded. This time, he felt nothing more than an irritated twitch of power in his fingertips. “Léoht!” he tried again, a bit more forcefully, but his magic simply buzzed under his skin.
Gwaine snorted and turned back to the bowl, pouring in the contents of the box of potatoes a bit at a time.
“It’s not normally like this,” Merlin said. “It’s been acting strange ever since I got here.”
“Got where? The future?” Gwaine tugged on Merlin’s wrist, placing the box of instant potatoes in the hand that had been holding the orb of light. “Pour until that number reaches two hundred,” he said, waving his free hand at the black base which was now adorned with a glowing white 12.8 g.
Merlin frowned as he poured potatoes and the number slowly ticked higher. “I don’t know why my magic hasn’t been responding. Sometimes when I’m learning new spells, it has trouble. But never this bad.”
“Well, you had no problem summoning that mug.” Gwaine bumped Merlin’s shoulder lightly as he unwrapped the meat. “Maybe you’re just having trouble maintaining things.”
“Are you saying I have a problem with stamina?” Merlin quirked his eyebrow.
“Practice makes perfect,” Gwaine said. “I’m happy to help with that.”
Merlin snorted, and turned back to the potatoes as the number ticked steadily towards two hundred. They stood together in silence as Gwaine scooped the meat into a pan with a long handle. “It’s done.”
“Good.” Gwaine motioned towards the cutting board with one hand while the other prodded at the meat with a spatula. “You know how to chop an onion?”
Merlin sighed. “I hate onions. Cutting them always make me cry.”
“Sadly, even in the future, they still haven’t figured out a way to fix that. Well, other than buying pre-chopped onions.” Gwaine tossed the yellow-skinned onion at Merlin. “Good job I have you to do it for me.”
An hour later, Gwaine and Merlin were sprawled out on the sofa once more, eating forkfuls of cottage pie. Merlin was pleasantly surprised by the taste. “This is better than I expected. My Gwaine’s a rubbish cook,” he said around a mouthful.
Gwaine just grinned and took another bite. “I own a cafe, Merlin. It’s one of my many talents. And I do mean many.”
“Do you ever stop thinking about sex?”
Gwaine paused in his chewing. “No.”
“That’s what I thought.”
They chewed in silence for a few minutes when Gwaine startled, reaching into his pocket and pulling out the mobile phone. “Percy just closed the cafe,” he said, seeing Merlin’s questioning eyebrow. “Oh! That reminds me.” He squinted down at the box in his hands, performing a series of taps and swipes. “This wouldn’t happen to be Arthur, would it?”
He tossed the mobile to Merlin, who barely managed to catch it. Displayed on the tiny screen, like a miniature painting, was a perfect likeness of Arthur, his arm slung over Gwaine’s shoulders, the two of them wearing dark, close-fitting tunics and smiling broadly. They looked younger than Merlin had ever seen them, Gwaine not even sporting stubble, and Arthur’s face was not creased with worry.
“How…” he breathed.
“I think that one’s a video,” Gwaine said, ignoring Merlin’s incipient panic. “Press the triangle button underneath.”
Merlin tapped on the triangle, and the mobile rumbled under his fingertip. The figures in the portrait began to move and sound emanated from the device.
“Happy Christmas!” Gwaine was waving his free hand frantically, his left arm still slung over Arthur’s shoulders. He glanced to the side, jostling his hip against Arthur’s. “Go on, say something, princess.”
Arthur rolled his eyes, but his mouth was tweaked up in a smirk. “Something.”
Merlin nearly jumped as Morgana’s disembodied voice emanated from the mobile. “Oh, Arthur,” she chastised, “you can do better than that.”
“Nope,” Arthur said, his smirk softening and his eyes crinkling at the corners. The sight made Merlin’s breath catch. “I’m completely out of Christmas spirit.”
Gwaine twisted and planted a kiss on his jaw, and Arthur’s cheeks flushed pink. Morgana started cackling and the frame jerked, the sound cutting out and the picture freezing once more, now showing Gwaine and Arthur’s legs. Their feet were bare, and Gwaine’s ankle was hooked behind Arthur’s.
Merlin sat motionless, staring at the image. Arthur had looked happy. The only times he had ever seen Arthur - his Arthur - that contented, it had been because Merlin had been the one to put the smile on his face.
Gwaine lifted the mobile away from Merlin’s stiff fingers. “We were flatmates in uni,” he said, his voice hushed. “We lived together, I mean. Until about five years ago.” His hand came to rest lightly on top of Merlin’s. “You all right?”
“Fine,” Merlin said, but his voice came out strangled.
“Do you…” Gwaine removed his hand, leaning back on the sofa. “Do you want to meet him?”
Merlin blinked, his eyes refocusing on where Gwaine was laying back against the sofa cushions. His legs were splayed open, his arms thrown back, elbows hooked over the top of the sofa. Everything in his posture hinted at relaxed nonchalance, but Merlin knew Gwaine too well. His jaw was tight, his fingers twitched restlessly, and his thigh muscles clenched faintly.
“Why are you nervous?”
Gwaine froze, his eyes widening and his mouth falling open slightly, enough to show a sliver of pink tongue. “What-“
Merlin grinned. “You were doing your I’m completely relaxed pose. You always do that when you’re nervous.”
The laughter that bubbled from Gwaine’s lips cut through the tension that had been hanging between them, and Merlin let his shoulders droop. “I guess you do know me, after all.”
Merlin bit back his smile, leaning forward with his elbows planted on his knees. “Yes.”
“Yes, what?”
“Yes, I want to meet him.”
“Oh.” Gwaine recovered his grin. “I’ll see if I can arrange something. You want to go back to that pub?”
“As long as you don’t try to tumble me at the end of the evening.”
Gwaine stuck out his tongue.
Chapter 5: Arthur
Rating: R
Genres: Science Fiction (Time Travel), Humour, Romance
Era: Mix of canon-era and near-future (22nd century) reincarnation era
Pairings: Merlin/Arthur, one-sided Gwaine/Merlin, implied Gwaine/Percy
Wordcount: 4400 (this chapter); 45k total
Betas: percygranger, messyangel81
This really hasn't been Merlin's day. Or week. Or month, really. Seeing his best friend die in front of him was bad enough. But magicking himself into the future in order to save Arthur? Probably not as good an idea as it seemed on paper. And this future version of Gwaine will not stop hitting on him. Even in front of the future Arthur - talk about embarrassing. Especially since Merlin needs to get to know this Arthur if he's ever going to figure out how to save his.
Chapter 1: Camelot
Chapter 2: Let's Do the Time Warp Again
Chapter 3: Gwaine
Chapter 4: Getting to Know You
Gwaine had been a right git when Merlin had woken up in the middle of the night, knocked on the door to his room, and asked if perhaps he had a change of clothes since Merlin’s were starting to smell, and mentioned that, by the way, he really wasn’t kidding about the whole wizard-from-Camelot thing.
“You’re still drunk,” Gwaine said, and slammed the door in his face.
To be fair, it was still before dawn, and Gwaine had never been known to be a morning person.
“So,” Gwaine said, chewing thoughtfully on a flat, square-shaped pastry covered with peculiarly flavoured honey of a thin consistency, “I have a confession to make.”
Merlin hummed around his own “waffle with golden syrup.”
“I know you. Knew you. Before you came into the cafe, I mean.”
Merlin looked up from his waffle. “What?” he said. Or at least, he would have said, if his mouth hadn’t been full. Instead, it came out more like Wuff?
“I knew you before we met.”
This time, Merlin swallowed before he spoke. “What are you talking about?”
“I wasn’t sure at first. I mean. You looked familiar, of course, but so do a lot of people.” Gwaine took another bite. “But I’ve dreamt about you.”
“You… dreamt?” Merlin glanced suspiciously at his waffle, wondering if Gwaine had dosed it with something. “Sorry, what?”
Gwaine’s face split into a grin. “You’re the man of my dreams, Merlin.”
Merlin just blinked in response.
“Okay, I admit, that was terrible.” Gwaine cleared his throat. “But that’s besides the point. Look, I’ve been having these bizarre dreams for the past few months. My mate Percy’s there too, and he’s all medieval looking, we’re both all dressed up in armour, and we’re tromping about in some fields. And you’re with us, cracking jokes and generally spewing nonsense.”
Gwaine shook his head, setting down his fork. “In the dreams, I know you, we’re… friends. Good friends. Proper mates. Then I wake up and I realise I’ve never met you before.” He waved a hand in the air towards Merlin. “But here you are.”
Merlin chewed on his lip for a moment, before swallowing and pushing his plate away. “So, what you’re saying, is… you’ve been dreaming about me. And that’s supposed to mean, what exactly?”
“Look. Merlin. You don’t know what a waffle is. I mean, some things you can excuse, but waffles?”
Merlin rolled his eyes. “Oh, come on.”
Gwaine shifted in his chair. “I’m just saying, maybe…”
“Maybe it’s not so inconceivable that I’m a wizard?” Merlin asked, lifting his eyebrows reproachfully.
Instead of having the desired effect of chastising Gwaine, he giggled. “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means,” he said, in an odd accent.
“What?” Merlin asked, scrunching his eyebrows.
“Oh my God,” Gwaine said, adopting a look of horror, “you’ve never seen The Princess Bride. You must be a time traveller; there’s no other explanation.”
Merlin threw his waffle at him.
Merlin was starting to regret the loss of his waffle.
Gwaine was lying on the floor, laughing his arse off, having narrowly dodged the syrupy confection, and in so doing, tipped his chair over and lost his balance.
And to make matters worse, Merlin still hadn’t gotten the use of his magic back. At least, he assumed he would have saved Gwaine from collapsing onto the floor if he’d had his magic.
Maybe not. He was being a git.
“Fine!” Gwaine managed between guffaws. “I believe you! Only the great wizard Merlin would have such uncanny waffle-flinging skills!”
“Oh shut up,” Merlin said irritably, and stole the rest of Gwaine’s waffle.
“You teleported yourself into an alleyway in West End?”
After breakfast, Gwaine had shoved Merlin into one end of the sofa and collapsed on the other side, nursing a small tankard of something called tea, and started his interrogation.
What is Camelot like? Have you slept with the Gwaine in Camelot? Why not? Is that why you won’t sleep with me? Have you slept with Arthur, then? Is Arthur king yet? Who is king? Why can’t you just off this Uther fellow if he’s so bloody obnoxious?
Merlin had rolled his eyes at Gwaine’s less than subtle attempts to tumble him, and awkwardly stuttered through the leering interrogation about Arthur. He had explained the ban on magic. He had mentioned Gwen, and how Arthur was in love with her. He had talked about his own magic, and how he couldn’t seem to control it anymore (at which point Gwaine rolled his eyes and muttered “how convenient”). He told of how Arthur had died, and how Merlin had cast a spell to transport himself and find a way to save him.
Merlin sighed. “I don’t think it’s supposed to work like that, you know. I ended up in Arthur’s chambers, the first time I tried.”
Gwaine took a sip of his long-cold tea, and made a face. “Whatever. The point is, you’re here now, and you think there’s something here that will help you prevent his death.”
“I hope so.” Merlin ran his thumb across the seam of the sofa cushion underneath him.
Gwaine made a humming noise in the back of his throat, setting his tea down on the floor. “So what does your Arthur look like, anyway?”
“About my height, with blond hair that falls to the middle of his forehead, and blue eyes. His teeth are… well, they’re a bit wonky, but when he laughs his whole face lights up. He doesn’t laugh nearly often enough, though. Normally he’s all grumpy and stern and a bit of a prat.”
“Right,” Gwaine drawled. “So how long have you been in love with him?”
“How long have you been in love with Percy?” Merlin snapped, automatic, and Gwaine froze.
“What the fuck,” he swore. His entire body was suddenly tense.
“Sorry!” Merlin blurted. “Oh gods, I can’t believe I said that. I’m so sorry, Gwaine.”
Gwaine relaxed fractionally on seeing Merlin’s spooked expression, and drew his legs up to his chest, his bare toes digging into the blue fabric underneath him. “How did you know? Did Kay tell you? I will murder him, I swear to God.”
“No, no,” Merlin said, waving his hand about, “Kay didn’t say anything. It’s just that my Gwaine is in love with Percy. It was more of an automatic reaction than anything. Like elbowing you when you tried to kiss me.”
Gwaine lifted an eyebrow. “You and your Gwaine have an… interesting relationship, sounds like.”
Merlin grinned back, stretching his leg out to nudge Gwaine’s ankle with his toe. “That we do.”
Gwaine smiled for a moment before twitching and pulling his black rectangle out of his pocket. He tapped at it, frowned, and started swiping his finger in loops and swirls. “It’s Percy,” he mumbled, apparently in explanation. “He just opened the cafe; he works Tuesdays.”
Merlin cocked his head, peering at the rectangle in Gwaine’s hands. “I thought that was a key.”
Gwaine stopped touching the rectangle for a moment before his face broke into a grin. “This, my friend, is the future’s version of magic.” He tossed it towards Merlin.
On closer inspection, the rectangle had a translucent black cover moulded to the back, raised bumps and various oddly shaped holes along the sides, and the word “Virgin” printed in shiny silver lettering on a red background. There was the faint outline of a transparent screen, covered with smudges left behind from Gwaine’s fingerprints. “What is it?”
“That is a mobile phone.” Gwaine leaned back, lacing his hands together behind his head and letting his legs fall open. He leaned over and pressed a button on the short side, and an image flickered to life. A drawing of a tree swayed gently in the background, little drops of rain falling, and overlaid on top were neat rows of colourful images with single-word captions beneath, like “Email” and “Maps” and “Angry Bird.” In the top right corner, the date was displayed as September 12, 2137. Merlin dropped the thing in his lap, jerking back his hands, even though there had been no physical pain.
Gwaine laughed, a short sharp burst, his head thrown back against the sofa cushions. “It doesn’t bite.”
Merlin blinked, gingerly picking the thing back up, pinched between forefinger and thumb. “Can it lift objects?”
“What?”
“You said it was magic,” Merlin said. “Magic can lift things. So can this lift things?”
Gwaine’s eyebrows scrunched together. “No.”
“Can it light fires?”
“No.”
“Can it stop time?”
“What? No.”
“Can it heal wounds?”
“No! It’s… not that sort of magic!”
“Well, what use is it, then!”
Gwaine scowled, snatching the mobile phone away from Merlin’s grasp.
“It lets you talk to people, no matter how far away they are. Um. You can take photos. Bollocks, you don’t know what those are. Right, what else. It lets you look up random shite… that is, it’s like having a library in your pocket. It has maps so you never get lost. I have a key app so I can use it to open the flat and the cafe. And, uh… it has Angry Birds. That’s pretty fun.”
Gwaine tilted the phone to show Merlin. The Angry Bird image was a drawing of a fat, red bird with expressive eyebrows.
“Um.”
Gwaine sighed noisily. “No fair. You time travelling lot are supposed to be impressed by the wonders of modern day technology. I feel cheated.”
“Whatever,” Merlin said, flopping closer to Gwaine on the sofa and kicking at his shin. “I’m sure your tiny box is… impressive.”
“It is!” Gwaine said, scowling. He leant over the device, hair swinging to cover his eyes, and he brushed it away absently with one hand, tucking the loose strands behind his ear. His other hand tapped out commands on the mobile phone’s surface. “Besides, I haven’t seen you do any magic.”
Merlin scowled. The truth was, since coming to this place, he still hadn’t managed to successfully harness his power. Since trying to make the leaves fly in the alley two days ago, he’d had little opportunity to practice. He could still feel a tingling in his fingers and an occasional thrumming in his belly that he associated with his magic.
He eyed Gwaine’s coffee cup. “Bune, cume mec.”
When the mug immediately flew from the floor into Merlin’s waiting grasp, he wasn’t sure who was more shocked - him or Gwaine.
“Bloody fuck!” Gwaine shouted, leaping up from the sofa.
Merlin would have said something similar, but he was too busy coughing and wiping tea off of his face.
After Gwaine had stopped hyperventilating and Merlin had resumed breathing, it was decided that Merlin needed new clothes and a bath while Gwaine cleaned the sofa and the rug.
The bathtub, like the sink at Gwaine’s cafe, had been superficially strange, but ultimately not terribly different from taking a bath in Camelot. He’d stripped, poured heated water into the tub, noticed that it was all draining through a hole in the bottom of the tub, sealed it up with the attached black stopper on a silver chain, waited until the tub was full of hot water, and slipped in. There was a white circular cake with an astringent scent sitting at the lip of the tub, and when he rubbed it against his wet skin bubbles formed, which was quite lovely. When he brought them up to his mouth, he discovered that they tasted terrible.
After a few minutes, he pulled the stopper out to let the water drain, and, dripping on the oddly warm tile floor, grabbed the nearest towel to scrub himself dry.
At least the basics of washing still hadn’t changed.
He towelled himself dry and trudged out to the bedroom. Lying on the bed in a haphazard pile, he found a thin tunic, a pair of stiff blue breeches, and a round piece of cloth, approximately the size of his head, but with two holes in it. After several aborted attempts to pull on the tunic, he gave up and tried the breeches. But there was no visible lacing, and the stupid thing would not slide up his hips.
“Gwaine,” Merlin called. “A little help?” He looked around for something to cover himself, and grabbed a floppy white pillow from the bed.
“One moment!” A strange set of thuds emanated from outside the door, and then it burst open, Gwaine looking half-crazed. “What did you - wait. What in god’s name are you doing?” He gestured weakly toward Merlin’s knees.
“Trying to put these on?” Merlin hopped up, trying to tug the breeches further up his hips one-handed while still preserving his modesty, and ended up losing his balance and flopping onto the bed.
“Okay,” Gwaine said, once he had stopped laughing, “first off, you need to unfasten the flies. And secondly, you really need to put the pants on before you do the jeans.”
“Oh,” said Merlin. “Which ones are pants?”
As soon as Merlin had successfully replaced his outfit, Gwaine herded him outside, through the corridor, and down the stairs.
“Your first lesson,” he proclaimed, “will be purchasing the ingredients to cook dinner.”
Merlin looked over at Gwaine, a pained expression on his face. “I’m making dinner?”
“Feeding yourself is an essential skill, Merlin. Plus, I don’t like cooking all the time, and if you’re not paying rent, you’d best work for your room and board. Since, you know, I’m never letting you back in my cafe.”
Merlin grimaced. “So where are we going?”
“The store.” Gwaine sighed. “We’ll have to work on getting you dressed faster in future.”
“Well, now that I know what a zip is-“
“Yes, yes,” Gwaine interrupted, his cheeks flushing a faint pink.
Merlin looked down at his new outfit. Once Gwaine had gotten him into the strange white undergarment termed pants they had wrestled on the wretched jeans. Even after unfastening the button and strange metal teeth called a zip, they’d been difficult to pull on. Merlin had to hop a bit to tug them on, and Gwaine had still frowned and commented that they looked a bit loose. Merlin wasn’t sure how the blasted things could be loose when they squeezed his thighs like… a thing that squeezed thighs.
Gwaine strode ahead of Merlin, pushing impatiently at a button on a long pole that sat at the corner of two large stone-paved pathways.
“Stay on the pavement until you see the little green man appear.”
Merlin rolled his eyes. “I’m not an idiot, Gwaine.”
“Could have fooled me,” Gwaine muttered, not entirely under his breath.
Merlin resolved to change Gwaine’s entire wardrobe to an unflattering shade of puce when they got home.
The sun was just starting to peek over the roofs of buildings, now. Buildings here were taller by far than any of the ones Merlin had seen in Camelot. The warm light streamed over Gwaine’s shoulders, casting a golden glow to his hair and a soft cast to his face. It would have been terribly flattering if not for the accompanying squint.
“So how do I make this house pie?”
“Cottage pie,” Gwaine absently corrected. “You chop up the ingredients, mix them in a bowl, squash it into a baking dish, and toss it in the oven for an hour. Oh, and don’t forget to cover it with tin foil.”
Merlin quirked an eyebrow, though the effect was entirely lost on Gwaine, since Merlin was holding up a hand to shield his eyes from the glare. “Toss?”
“Don’t literally toss it, Merlin. You place it in the oven. Gently. With both hands.” Gwaine grinned over at him. “We’ll need to buy minced beef, instant potatoes, and an onion. I have frozen veg and seasoning back home. Oh, and cheese. For the top.”
Merlin’s lip curled as he contemplated the ingredients list. “This sounds horrid.”
Gwaine shoved him as they walked up to the doors leading into Tesco’s. “You’ll eat it and you’ll like it.” Gwaine blinked. “Bloody hell, I sound like my mum.”
Merlin nearly jumped out of his skin when the glass doors parted for them as they approached. Gwaine just laughed.
Inside was a sprawling market with shiny floors and colourful boxes. Merlin stopped in his tracks and Gwaine nearly crashed into him. “Christ, Merlin, stop looking like a deer in the headlights. We’re just here for three things.”
Merlin numbly filtered in the sights and sounds as Gwaine tugged him bodily through the store. They picked up meat first, great slabs of it ground into an unappetising paste, stuck on a flat black plate and wrapped in a shiny transparent screen. Next came the potatoes - not from actual vegetables, apparently, but from a box with a painting of brown tubers on the outside. Finally, they picked up an onion - and that, at least, seemed normal, although it was completely wiped clean of dirt, much larger than he was used to, and Gwaine tossed it into a transparent bag for some inexplicable reason.
They paid for their goods, not by bartering with actual people, but by conversing with a machine. Gwaine showed Merlin a strange device almost as tall as he was, with a glass plate and shelves, next to thin blue and white bags made of the same substance as the transparent sheen entrapping the meat and the onion. Gwaine called it a “chip and pin machine” and waved his three items over the glass plate, dumping them into one of the bags, before shoving a payment rectangle through a slot in the side and pressing at the screen above the glass plate.
Merlin spent the walk back to the flat in silent contemplation of the strange city around him. He occasionally asked Gwaine for names of things (That’s the kerb, that’s the pavement, that’s the road, now shut up and look where you’re walking, Merlin) and touched the sides of buildings as he passed. The brick and stone brushing underneath his fingertips were familiar textures, but certain walls were slick where he expected roughness, cool where he expected warmth.
When they reached the flat, Gwaine dumped the bag on the counter next to the white box (furge? He’d have to ask Gwaine again) and pulled out a small glass dish. “I’ll set it up, you go use the chamberpot or something.”
When Merlin returned, he eyed Gwaine as he puttered about the kitchen. Sitting on the counter were a blue and green bag labeled “Four Cheese Blend” containing orange-coloured shavings; a canister of salt, and two bottle of green flakes labeled oregano and parsley (herbs, apparently dried, and not so different from what Gaius used in his remedies); a translucent jug of milk, helpfully labeled as such (because clearly Merlin wouldn’t be able to tell without a label); a bag of Tesco Mixed Vegetables, helpfully decorated with a picture of a bowl of chopped up vegetables, and proudly proclaiming that they had been “Freshly Frozen!”; an assortment of tools (the glass baking dish Gwaine had retrieved from the cupboard, an array of metal measuring tins and spoons, an ugly green rectangle Gwaine termed a cutting board, and a number of dull looking knives); and the bag from the trip to Tesco’s (with the unappetizing meat, box of potatoes, and large yellow onion).
“So what else can you do?”
“Sorry?” Merlin looked up from the meat slab, glistening unnaturally in the cool lights of the kitchen.
Gwaine was smiling, the corner of his mouth twisted up, as he used a knife to slice open the translucent screen on the meat slab. “Magic. You can move coffee cups with your mind. What can you do besides accio?”
Merlin swallowed. “Loads of things.”
“So show me.” Gwaine pulled open one of the cabinet doors and removed a shiny silver circle set atop a shiny black base, inset with some shiny buttons. Why was everything so shiny?
Merlin shook his head and muttered “Léoht,” and a blue orb appeared in his palm.
“Huh,” said Gwaine, pausing midway through setting a bowl on top of the shiny machine. “Not bad.” He tilted his head towards the orb. “Though you’d get better light with a torch.”
Suddenly, the orb flickered and blinked out. Merlin frowned. He hadn’t done anything to turn it off yet. “Léoht,” he commanded. This time, he felt nothing more than an irritated twitch of power in his fingertips. “Léoht!” he tried again, a bit more forcefully, but his magic simply buzzed under his skin.
Gwaine snorted and turned back to the bowl, pouring in the contents of the box of potatoes a bit at a time.
“It’s not normally like this,” Merlin said. “It’s been acting strange ever since I got here.”
“Got where? The future?” Gwaine tugged on Merlin’s wrist, placing the box of instant potatoes in the hand that had been holding the orb of light. “Pour until that number reaches two hundred,” he said, waving his free hand at the black base which was now adorned with a glowing white 12.8 g.
Merlin frowned as he poured potatoes and the number slowly ticked higher. “I don’t know why my magic hasn’t been responding. Sometimes when I’m learning new spells, it has trouble. But never this bad.”
“Well, you had no problem summoning that mug.” Gwaine bumped Merlin’s shoulder lightly as he unwrapped the meat. “Maybe you’re just having trouble maintaining things.”
“Are you saying I have a problem with stamina?” Merlin quirked his eyebrow.
“Practice makes perfect,” Gwaine said. “I’m happy to help with that.”
Merlin snorted, and turned back to the potatoes as the number ticked steadily towards two hundred. They stood together in silence as Gwaine scooped the meat into a pan with a long handle. “It’s done.”
“Good.” Gwaine motioned towards the cutting board with one hand while the other prodded at the meat with a spatula. “You know how to chop an onion?”
Merlin sighed. “I hate onions. Cutting them always make me cry.”
“Sadly, even in the future, they still haven’t figured out a way to fix that. Well, other than buying pre-chopped onions.” Gwaine tossed the yellow-skinned onion at Merlin. “Good job I have you to do it for me.”
An hour later, Gwaine and Merlin were sprawled out on the sofa once more, eating forkfuls of cottage pie. Merlin was pleasantly surprised by the taste. “This is better than I expected. My Gwaine’s a rubbish cook,” he said around a mouthful.
Gwaine just grinned and took another bite. “I own a cafe, Merlin. It’s one of my many talents. And I do mean many.”
“Do you ever stop thinking about sex?”
Gwaine paused in his chewing. “No.”
“That’s what I thought.”
They chewed in silence for a few minutes when Gwaine startled, reaching into his pocket and pulling out the mobile phone. “Percy just closed the cafe,” he said, seeing Merlin’s questioning eyebrow. “Oh! That reminds me.” He squinted down at the box in his hands, performing a series of taps and swipes. “This wouldn’t happen to be Arthur, would it?”
He tossed the mobile to Merlin, who barely managed to catch it. Displayed on the tiny screen, like a miniature painting, was a perfect likeness of Arthur, his arm slung over Gwaine’s shoulders, the two of them wearing dark, close-fitting tunics and smiling broadly. They looked younger than Merlin had ever seen them, Gwaine not even sporting stubble, and Arthur’s face was not creased with worry.
“How…” he breathed.
“I think that one’s a video,” Gwaine said, ignoring Merlin’s incipient panic. “Press the triangle button underneath.”
Merlin tapped on the triangle, and the mobile rumbled under his fingertip. The figures in the portrait began to move and sound emanated from the device.
“Happy Christmas!” Gwaine was waving his free hand frantically, his left arm still slung over Arthur’s shoulders. He glanced to the side, jostling his hip against Arthur’s. “Go on, say something, princess.”
Arthur rolled his eyes, but his mouth was tweaked up in a smirk. “Something.”
Merlin nearly jumped as Morgana’s disembodied voice emanated from the mobile. “Oh, Arthur,” she chastised, “you can do better than that.”
“Nope,” Arthur said, his smirk softening and his eyes crinkling at the corners. The sight made Merlin’s breath catch. “I’m completely out of Christmas spirit.”
Gwaine twisted and planted a kiss on his jaw, and Arthur’s cheeks flushed pink. Morgana started cackling and the frame jerked, the sound cutting out and the picture freezing once more, now showing Gwaine and Arthur’s legs. Their feet were bare, and Gwaine’s ankle was hooked behind Arthur’s.
Merlin sat motionless, staring at the image. Arthur had looked happy. The only times he had ever seen Arthur - his Arthur - that contented, it had been because Merlin had been the one to put the smile on his face.
Gwaine lifted the mobile away from Merlin’s stiff fingers. “We were flatmates in uni,” he said, his voice hushed. “We lived together, I mean. Until about five years ago.” His hand came to rest lightly on top of Merlin’s. “You all right?”
“Fine,” Merlin said, but his voice came out strangled.
“Do you…” Gwaine removed his hand, leaning back on the sofa. “Do you want to meet him?”
Merlin blinked, his eyes refocusing on where Gwaine was laying back against the sofa cushions. His legs were splayed open, his arms thrown back, elbows hooked over the top of the sofa. Everything in his posture hinted at relaxed nonchalance, but Merlin knew Gwaine too well. His jaw was tight, his fingers twitched restlessly, and his thigh muscles clenched faintly.
“Why are you nervous?”
Gwaine froze, his eyes widening and his mouth falling open slightly, enough to show a sliver of pink tongue. “What-“
Merlin grinned. “You were doing your I’m completely relaxed pose. You always do that when you’re nervous.”
The laughter that bubbled from Gwaine’s lips cut through the tension that had been hanging between them, and Merlin let his shoulders droop. “I guess you do know me, after all.”
Merlin bit back his smile, leaning forward with his elbows planted on his knees. “Yes.”
“Yes, what?”
“Yes, I want to meet him.”
“Oh.” Gwaine recovered his grin. “I’ll see if I can arrange something. You want to go back to that pub?”
“As long as you don’t try to tumble me at the end of the evening.”
Gwaine stuck out his tongue.
Chapter 5: Arthur