A/N Next chapter! Yay!
Thanks for reading and following!
58 years later…
A.L.B.I.O.N Headquarters –The Main Library/Gwaine's tank –December 6th
10:08 PM
Mozart played over the stereo as Morgana sat reading in her usual place beside Gwaine's tank. The half-fish, half-man floated by the glass over her shoulder, humming along to the tune.
"Fay!"
Morgana looked up to see Agent Julius Borden and Agent Gwen Smith walking through the front door. Both wore frustrated looks on their faces, though Borden's could be better described as furious. He placed a folder on the table in front of her and frowned. "We need to talk about you-know-who."
"Voldemort?" Gwaine asked in his usual snarky tone.
"Shut it, fishface." Borden opened the folder and pulled out an array of pictures, spreading them across the table. "Look at these. Did you know about these?"
The pictures were all taken in different places, at different times of day, but somewhere in each was a red-skinned boy with small horns and glowing golden eyes. In some of them, he was blurred, moving too fast for the camera to get a good look, but in others…
"He posed for this one!" Borden exclaimed, pointing to a picture of the boy smiling and waving at the camera. "And signed an autograph. He hates me."
Gwaine laughed from the tank, but Morgana just rolled her eyes. "No, he's just… enthusiastic. He's proud of what we do and wants people to know."
Borden looked like he was going argue, but Gwen laid a restraining hand on his shoulder and spoke up. "We know that he doesn't mean any harm, but it costs a lot of money to suppress these pictures. Then they're on the internet and the videos pop up on YouTube –"
"God, I hate YouTube." Borden groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose.
"–and it's not just the money." Gwen continued. "The public is very fickle. We don't want someone to cause trouble."
Morgana pursed her lips. "I'll have a talk with him."
"Good. Thank you." Gwen nodded. "So, how are things with him and Arthur?"
Gwaine snorted. "How do you think?"
"They're…adjusting." Morgana explained. "You know, they've started living in the same room, so they're getting used to each other. They have their good days and their bad days."
They were interrupted by a rumble in the corridor outside, followed by loud shouting and suddenly the door was blown in and a red figure was thrown across the library by a ball of fire.
"And then there are the really bad days." Gwaine commented as Merlin stood up off the floor and started patting out the flames on his clothes.
The demon turned to see the Morgana, Gwaine and the two agents and a wide grin grew on his face.
"Hey, Gwen … Borden." He grumbled, dusting the ashes off his knees. "Watch it, everyone. He's on fire today."
"Merlin!" Arthur's voice echoed from the corridor Merlin was thrown from. He rolled his eyes and snorted.
"What?"
The handsome blond charged into the room, covered head to toe in flames. "We are not done talking!"
"Talking? Who's talking? All you've done is shout for the past twenty minutes!" Merlin yelled back as he turned to face his boyfriend. "I have two rules. Just two. Don't touch my stuff and clean your own messes. That is all I ask."
"'Don't touch your stuff?' Everything's yours!"Arthur argued, the flames growing outward another inch. Gwen, Borden and Morgana all took a step away from the pyrokinetic, but Merlin stood his ground.
"Really? Well, what about your clothes that are littered all over the floor that you just expect me to pick up? I am not your servant!"
"Well, if you would just make some room for my stuff, I wouldn't have to leave it lying everywhere!"
Merlin's nostrils flared, but before he could respond, he heard Gwaine clear his throat. Merlin glanced over his shoulder to see him, Morgana, Borden and Gwen all staring at the arguing couple with scared and slightly awkward expressions on their faces. When he turned back around, Arthur clenched his jaw and took a deep breath. The flames died down.
"Merlin," the blond sighed. "I just… I need my space."
Merlin quirked his head in curiosity. "Space?"
"Yes, space. Between the cats and the crappy television sets and the damn 8-tracks –"
"Hey, one day the world is going to realize that 8-tracks were the way to go." Merlin interrupted.
"–there's no place for me." He finished, ignoring the comment. A red light started flashing around them and their mission siren sounded, ending the conversation and Arthur turned to walk back down the corridor towards the loading bay, leaving an awkward silence in his wake.
Borden broke out of it first and nudged Gwen, who took the hint and ran to Merlin's side "Merlin, we need to have a talk."
"Can't it wait, Gwen?" he groaned, following Arthur's path to the loading bay to prepare for the mission.
"Not really." She replied, walking in step beside him. "Since being promoted to head of this department, I have had to deal with over 19 incidents of you being photographed or videotaped, not to mention the 32 eyewitness accounts we've had to silence. You are a government-funded secret and every time your picture shows up on the news or on someone's Facebook, it's Borden and I that end up getting blamed. The public cannot know about you and you cannot be seen."
Merlin nodded without looking in her direction, so she grabbed his arm and pulled him around to look her in the eye.
"Merlin, I'm serious. The world isn't ready to know about you. About us. Not everyone is like the agents here. They don't like people who are different, no matter how wonderful of a person you are on the inside. I don't want you to get hurt. So please, be careful out there."
Merlin smiled and nodded again, this time with sincerity. "I'll try my hardest, Gwen."
The agent smiled back. "Good."
Blackwood's Auction House- Manhattan
10:45 PM
The darkened auction house creaked eerily as the group of agents entered, swinging their flashlights around and looking for signs of life.
"Over seventy guests reported. No sign of any of them." Gwen whispered, taking the lead. She peered over her shoulder at Morgana, who nodded in understanding and removed her glove. She closed her eyes with a calming breath.
"Let's see what happened here." Her mind was taken back to fifteen minutes before, when the room was filled with over seventy of New York's most wealthy.
Blackwood's Auction House
10:30 PM
"And here we have a Pre-Celtic sculpture of a fertility goddess, dating all the way back to 700 B.C." The gray-haired auctioneer motioned to the twelve foot statue beside him. "Let's start the bidding at $200,000… thank you, sir – Do I hear two hundred and seventy-five, and... we have three hundred, thank you Mr. Van Hausen - Three hundred thousand once-And Three hundred and fifty thousand, thank you Mrs. Bernstein."
"Now, moving onto our next piece," A steward brought out a small velvet box and opened it, revealing an eight-inch arch of gold. "A once-in-lifetime opportunity. For the first time in auction. A piece of the Royal Crown of Bethmora... A precious artifact dating from the Atrebatean period. Exquisite workmanship in 24 carat gold. The reminisce of a long lost civilization."
Suddenly, the lights cut out, plunging the room into semidarkness.
"Lost? No." a female voice echoed through the room and a beautiful woman with long, blond hair and cold brown eyes strode dramatically out of the shadows, clutching an elegantly carved spear in her right-hand. "Forgotten, perhaps. But never lost."
"Excuse me, madam." The blond woman turned her head to the auctioneer, her disgust obvious. "But who exactly are you?"
"I am Princess Morgause, the rightful owner of the crown piece." She approached the nervous steward holding the box and took the piece, chuckling when the auctioneer pushed a red button nearby that read 'Security'.
The wooden doors at the end of the hall were suddenly thrown open and two guards flew into the room, landing with a sickening thud against the wall behind the auctioneer.
An eight-foot troll stomped in after them, carrying two boxes with a carving of a tree embossed on the sides. The auction guests rose from their seat and screamed in fear at the creature, but were quickly silenced by Morgause's commanding voice.
"Sit down and be silent!" she roared, smirking when they obliged. The troll approached the princess and handed her one of the boxes. "May this remind you," she addressed the crowd, "why you once feared the dark."
She waved a hand over the tree carving and the box opened with a click.
Blackwood's Auction House
10:54 PM
Morgana gasped. "There was a woman and a troll, carrying two boxes embossed with the royal seal of Bethmora."
Merlin, Gwaine and Arthur, who stood just in front of the psychic, turned and raised an eyebrow in unison.
Gwaine clicked his tongue. "Okay… let's just pretend for a moment that we have no idea what that means."
A fluttering sound came from inside one of the nearby walls and Morgana sighed. "Nothing good."
The team split up, Morgana and Arthur going into the sales room, Gwaine and Merlin into one of the corridors and Gwen and Agent Darian into the lobby.
Arthur noticed Morgana shifting more nervously since seeing her vision and laid a hand on her arm to comfort her. "You okay?"
She nodded. "Just a bad feeling."
Another fluttering echoed in the wall beside them and Morgana drew her gun (which she'd demanded to be given after the incident in the subways the year before) and pointed it in the direction of the sound. Arthur tapped his ear-com.
"We've got movement in here, do you copy?"
"Same story here." Merlin's voice responded, before lowering to a whisper. "Are you still upset with me?"
Arthur rolled his eyes. "We are not having this conversation right now, Merlin."
"Look, when we get back, I'm going to clean off an entire area just for you."
"That's not the problem." The blond sighed, moving through the overturned chairs around him.
"Then what is? Do you want me to get rid of the cats?"
"No, Merlin. It's not –" He groaned. "Let's not talk about this now."
He turned and looked at Morgana. She stood near the podium, gun still drawn, but her eyes were closed and her hand was held out in front of her.
"What've we got, Morgana?"
"Carcharodon carcharias."
"English." Gwaine's voice said through the earpiece.
"Also known as 'Tooth Fairies'." Arthur could hear snickering on the other end of the com-links, but they were silenced by Morgana clearing her throat. "I mean like third century, black forest tooth fairies. The reason there are no remains of the guests is because there are no leftovers. Have you noticed the floor?"
Arthur glanced down and gagged. "Aw, crap."
"Exactly. All they do is eat and poop and eat again."
"Sounds like you, Gwaine." He heard Merlin say, followed by a loud smack. "Ow!"
"They feed on the calcium in their victim's bodies," Morgana continued. "But do tend to go for the teeth first. Hence the name, 'Tooth fairies'."
"How many?" Merlin asked.
"Many. Probably over two hundred."
Blackwood's Auction House- The Foyer
11:04 PM
Gwen, who'd been listening to Morgana's intel, nodded. "Okay, what do we do if we see one?"
"I'm not sure. Why?"
"Because Darian and I are staring at one right now."
Darian had his light pointed directly at a small creature, about two inches tall, with an oval shaped head and a wide mouth that cut across the center. It crawled around like a spider on four legs and used the two arms attached to its skinny torso to pick through the… leftovers, on the floor for something edible.
"Gwen, stay right where you are." Merlin yelled. "I'll be right there." Gwen heard loud footsteps hurrying their way, but her attention was firmly fixed on the creature in front of her, who was now watching her and Darian with interest.
The other agent chuckled. "There's no way this thing is dangerous. It's just too cute."
As if sensing his guard lowering, the tooth fairy suddenly sprang forward at him, small wings Gwen hadn't noticed before spread wide as it bared its rather large, rather sharp, teeth at him and scuttled under his shirt. The white material started turning red as the creature ate into him and Gwen quickly drew her gun. Aiming from the side, she fired a round at the bulge in the agent's shirt, blowing the little monster away without the bullet so much as grazing Darian.
"Are you alright?" she asked, rushing to his side. He nodded breathlessly and smiled at her.
Then, without warning, an entire wave of them burst through the wall and charged at the agents. They grabbed at their legs, pulling them to the ground and Gwen started firing at them, making sure she hit one with every round.
Darian wasn't as lucky and no sooner had the fairies descended, he found his teeth being drilled, bit and pulled by the creatures. Gwen grimaced at the sight and continued firing, keeping the monsters away from her face. She screamed when little teeth began gnawing through the skin on her legs and started to kick them away, only to realize that she couldn't move them.
She glanced over to see Darian, now just a bloody skeleton. Her gun clicked and she realized there were no more bullets in her gun.
A/N I already have Chapter 2 written (I'm just editing it now), so I'll probably post it tomorrow. Ummm, hope you enjoyed this chapter!
Please review and tell me if it sucked or not!
