Merlin never thought this would happen. Of all the possible things in the world, this was at the end of his list.

He was sweaty and shaky and he couldn't look anyone in the eye. Arthur looked like he was about to crack, but Merlin couldn't utter a single word to him under the pressure.

"Are you ready?" asked Essie, a mad glint in her eyes, raising her inevitable weapon.

"Do it," he answered through gritted teeth, digging his nails into the wooden chair as he prepared himself for the ultimate sacrifice, screwing his eyes shut.

"Snip, snip, and snip!" she hollered, as her rusty scissors cut through his waist long pony tail.

"This is hilarious," laughed Arthur, finally cracking, as he picked up the ponytail on the ground by Merlin's feet, "this is the size of my arm! My friend- you waited for me, and I respect that, but you couldn't have gotten a haircut?"

Essie laughed along with Arthur as Merlin scowled at them.

"You two are bullies," he accused. This made them laugh harder.

"C'mon Artie, let's go play tug on a rope," Essie suggested, taking the pony tail from Arthur and twirling around her head, "wanna join us, Granny?"

"I'll pass," said Merlin as he ran his fingers through his newly-cropped hair, "I don't like associating myself with dung heads."

"One thousand years, and your insults remain the same," said Arthur, raising an eyebrow in good humour.

"The sentiment remains," sighed Merlin, as he leaned back into his lounging chair, taking a deep breath of the outdoor air.

"Fine, c'mon you beefy loser," said Essie, punching Arthur's arm playfully as she ran out near the lake. Arthur joined her and very soon they were playing tug of war, which Arthur obviously won.

This turned into a game of catch when Essie snatched the hair from him and he ran after her to get it back. Merlin watched on, laughing at them. This isn't what he thought he'd be doing when Arthur came back.

Eventually Arthur called time-out and rejoined Merlin, leaning against the porch railing.

"Old Man," he teased. Merlin merely rolled his eyes again.

"Immature twits," he bit back, smiling his old goofy smile. This time Arthur rolled his eyes, as Essie arrived, panting because of all the exercise.

"Look on the bright side," she told Merlin as she took a long draught from the bottle of water balanced on the railing, "now you have your own individual look! The Gandalf thing wasn't working out anymore."

"Yeah, now you don't resemble a stereotypical druid either," added Arthur.

"My dear King, I technically am a Druid?" reminded Merlin.

"Yes, but now you don't look like one."

Suddenly a shrill alarm blared, issuing from Essie's pocket.

"Crap," she sighed, reaching into the pocket of her sweater and pulling out an old Nokia mobile. She fiddled with it until it turned off.

"Shop duty," she huffed, before tossing the cut-off pony tail back to Arthur and marching into the house, calling, "reserve the game for later!"

As she disappeared through the back door, Arthur sat himself down next to Merlin on the only other cheap lounge chair. It creaked weakly.

"So," Arthur said, looking to Merlin's newly troubled expression that didn't owe completely to having his hair cut off. He always resumed this expression as soon as Essie would leave, "what have you been thinking?"

It had been two weeks since killing off the Elder Mother, and Essie was still very satisfied by it. Merlin, on the other hand, understood that there was a reason he tried to avoid conflict like that for such a long time, investigating possible situations and solving them and the such- because once you start again, you can't stop. It's an obsessive game that can get you killed.

Merlin sighed and answered, "The thought of the Old Religion resurfacing bothers me greatly. They had virtually died out throughout the years but… the Elder Mother is proof that they've returned to some extent."

Upon finding the symbol of Morgana le Fay (also known as the tree of life and the Old Religion sigil) carved into an Elder tree, as well as the Elder Mother boasting about powerful and restless spirits returning from the next world, Arthur and Merlin had been on the lookout for anything else that came from beyond the veil and also had a taste for blood, as they usually seem to. But they hadn't found anything yet.

Merlin turned to his satchel by his feet and pulled out several clippings of the last two week's news. He handed them to Arthur who examined them closely.

"Nothing too suspicious has been going on in Cameron specifically, but there's definitely unrest," he droned, closing his eyes and setting his forehead on his folded hands, "throughout all of Avalon, the people have grown uneasy- several reports reflect that."

"What's this one?" interjected Arthur, holding up one from a few days before. Merlin opened his eyes briefly to peer at it.

"A little boy has drowned," he replied , "his mother swears he could swim, but authorities are saying that as he was ten years old so he couldn't have been able fight something pulling him under."

Arthur skimmed it with the sky blue eyes Essie described to 'reflect who he really is.' Arthur didn't know what to say to that because quite honestly he had no idea what she meant by who he was.

"This didn't happen here specifically."

"No, it happened in a small pond just a little way closer to the mountains," murmured back Merlin, whose eyes were closed again, "I suspect it might be something other than what they predict."

"And they think it's…?"

"Probably something trivial, like seaweed," muttered Merlin.

"But you don't think so?"

"Not in the slightest."

Arthur digested this as he stared back down at the article, when Essie burst out the house again from behind them, making him jump. Merlin barely moved.

"Be back in about…. Oh god, it's Monday," she sighed, before blowing a strand of her dark hair out of her face unveiling a darker expression, "which means five hours for the next five days, kill me now."

"If you hate it so much, why don't you just do something else?" suggested Merlin for probably the 101th time since they met.

"Because it's satisfying," came Essie's unchanging response, as she took a deep breath, and marched off to the little shack-like store that was rooted by the dock where her boat was parked.

"Can I accompany you?" called Arthur, who was bored and in need of something to do. He needed to be constantly moving or he was sure he'd go insane.

"Your funeral!" she hollered back over her shoulder without stopping. He picked himself up and jogged after her.

Merlin reached for the newspaper clipping that Arthur left behind and looked at it once more:

GILLAN POND TRAGEDY by Mary Xhu

Austin Tyler, 10, meets a horrid end last Thursday on July 24th, when he drowned in Gillan Pond under the watch of his father, Fred Tyler. He was playing with his toys by the seemingly nonthreatening pond as his father worked nearby.

"He was just playing," says Papa Tyler, 37, through a thick Cockney accent that suggests he has very recently migrated from the main land, "He was playing his violin by the pond on the docks- he loved to do that because his brothers are players as well."

His tone quite stoic for someone who had lost their son, the late Tyler's 34 year old mother, Dana Tyler, issued a much more fierce statement akin to a mother bear.

"He could swim," she shouted at me and my team from her porch as her two unnamed older sons held her back from smacking me upright with a pan, "he could swim and he was good at it! He was strong for a boy his age, he would cut wood! Can your son cut wood? Can he?!"

I'm quite sure that if I personally did have a son, he wouldn't have been playing by a pond virtually unsupervised.

Authorities still dispute the cause of Austin's death, but have told us that it may have been because of prior asphyxiation. They haven't released any other details, however.

I think all would agree with me when I say- the incident could have been easily diverted.