Title: Just For The Record
Author: EachPeachPearPlum
Rating: T
Warnings: swearing (it's Gwaine. I physically cannot write him without the F-bomb appearing). Little bit weird.
Pairings: Lance/Gwen, very vaguely implied Arthur/Merlin, Morgana/Someone.
Disclaimer: Dear Merlin. Please consider yourself firmly disclaimed. Love, Peach.
Notes: As I said, little bit odd. Started writing this months ago (we're talking May, maybe June. Certainly no later). Kind of hoped something more would happen with it, but as yet it hasn't. Figured I might as well post it, at a lovely one thousand, one hundred and eleven words (entirely by coincidence, but I think it merits mention). Purely to see what people think, and if anyone has any ideas as to where to take it...pretty please share.
Just For The Record
Gwaine would like to state that, just for the record, he was not actually that drunk. Tipsy, yes. Completely and utterly wasted, no. And he's not just saying that to get out of trouble (honestly, he wishes he could use alcohol to explain this colossal fuck up. It would all be so much easier if he had that as an excuse). The police breathalysed him when they brought him in; he really wasn't.
He glances uneasily at the door, and tugs at the cuff on his right wrist. They really didn't have to cuff him; he hasn't done anything that terrible, he thinks. He hopes. Oh, fucking hell. This is all bloody Merlin's fault.
Except it isn't, not really. This one is all on Gwaine, and his bloody ridiculous ability to get himself in as much trouble as humanly possible. This time, though, he swears inwardly as he thunks his head onto the desk that, aside from his chair and another, is the only furniture in the gloomy room. This time he'll give it all up. If he makes it out of this without jail time, he won't ever break the law again.
Hell, forget illegal; if he makes it out of this one, he won't even do anything immoral again. A boring life, on the straight and narrow, from now on.
Gwaine looks up as the door opens and Lance's girl walks in. He likes Lance's girl. She's sweet. A little bumbling, but in a good way. Pretty, too, which never hurts his appreciation of a person. Be so much easier if she weren't a cop, though.
"Gwaine," she says, not quite smiling. "I'd say it was nice to see you, but, well, we both know I'd be lying. Not that I have anything against you as a person, but Merlin is still missing, Arthur's in hospital, Lance, for some stupid reason, thinks it is all his fault, and you're our chief suspect."
"See your point. Don't look too great, does it?"
"Not at all good, no." She flicks back from cop-Gwen to his-best-mate's-girlfriend-Gwen, but Gwaine can see how quickly the change will reverse if he says the wrong thing. "Now, you swear you didn't do any of this," she gestures to the charge sheet on the table before her, which is terrifyingly long, "and I'll believe you, then we can see about getting you out of here."
This, though, is the problem. Gwaine wants to leave, to get back to his scuzzy flat and his bar- and bed-hopping life, but if he lies and says he didn't do anything he's fucked, 'cause Gwen is a good cop and Merlin – if he ever shows up again – is even better, and they'll find out the truth at all costs. So he sighs and meets her eyes, with difficulty. "Can't, Gwen. Love to, but can't. You wanna read the charges and we'll see if there's anything on there I can deny?"
X
The list of charges is against him is just as long as it looks to be, and entirely without order.
"Drunk and disorderly."
"Disorderly, maybe. Drunk, no. They tested me."
Gwen smirks slightly, and mutters, "first time for everything, I suppose," before continuing. "Kidnapping a minor."
"Sorry, what?"
"Mordred. You've been accused of kidnapping him."
"I'm what? By wh- Arthur, right? This is all 'cause I punched him, isn't it?"
"The identity of the accuser is irrelevant, Gwaine." She is back to scary cop-Gwen again, just for a second. "Though, yes, I have to say, he is not remotely happy about that. You did break his nose, in all fairness. And I take this to mean you agree to the charge of assaulting a police officer?" She crosses out something disturbingly far down the list. "Now, Mordred?"
"No, I didn't kidnap the kid. Morgana asked me to watch him. Had to go out, so I took him with me." And it had seemed like such a good idea at the time, too, so much more sensible than leaving a five year old alone in the house.
"Can anyone confirm this?"
"Merlin can. Or could, if we knew where he was." Gwen purses her lips, and looks down at the sheet. Gwaine's stomach sinks. "You're kidding? Please, tell me you're kidding. I'm not being charged for that as well, am I?"
Gwen just nods.
"Okay, give me that list." He grabs it from between them, fairly sure that that's bad prisoner etiquette, but if they didn't want him moving they'd have cuffed both wrists rather than just one. He turns it the correct way up, at which point a great deal more than the writing becomes clear. "That bastard wrote this! Don't deny it, Gwen, I know his handwriting. Thought you said he was still in hospital."
"He is. He's just worried about Mer- DI Emrys. He told me to come in when we knew something, and so when I heard you had been brought in, he wanted to know the charges. And then," Gwen swallows, and looks as though the disloyalty to her boss is making her sick. "Then he wanted to make sure there weren't any left out."
Gwaine digests this for a moment. "So, what am I actually charged with, before he got his hands on this? No, let me guess." He scans the list carefully, "kidnapping Mordred is a lie, and Merlin." He wishes he had something to do with Merlin's disappearance, he really does, because then he'd know where to find him. "Although I suppose you wanted to talk to me about that, anyway. Jaywalking? Really? That isn't even a crime in this country." He is about to embark on an anti-Arthur rant of extreme proportions, when he sees the last thing on the list and is speechless for a moment. "Does that...?"
"Yeah, it does. He was fairly certain that one wouldn't stick, though, if it makes you feel any better."
It doesn't. It really, really doesn't.
"The actual charges, then. Assaulting an officer of the law." Gwaine opens his mouth to protest this, but Gwen doesn't give him the chance. "Yes, it counts, even if he was off duty at the time. Resisting arrest. Theft. And you are a person of interest in the disappearance of DI Merlin Emrys, although that isn't a charge, as such."
"That's not too bad, then." Gwen raises an eyebrow, as if to ask, how, precisely, any of the conversation is to be construed as not too bad. "Really, it isn't. I can explain all of that."
"You can?"
"Yeah. It starts in the bar."
She shakes her head, but there's something almost fond about it. "Of course it does."