Ah... sorry it took this long. I've been... distracted by other fics... and well, I also had surgery, a plethora of medical issues, and then a cancer (CANCER! CANCER!) scare OH MY GOD but I don't have cancer so !
And here's a chapter
Merlin was part of the old school mindset where he avoided confrontation. He had, over the years, especially avoided confrontations which could be especially painful and/or result in death for himself or anyone else. While he had found himself in those places a few times, he was generally not eager to do it again. Arthur did not have such reservations. This was about the eighth time since they'd walked in the building that this had happened.
Arthur had the secretary up against the wall, pinned with his claw-like hand wrapped tightly around her throat. "He's here to work with Gaius," Arthur stated darkly as the model-esque vampiress scrabbled and kicked. "He is not your snack."
The vampiress' nails slammed against Arthur's wrist but instead of digging into Arthur's skin the nails bent backwards. She let ut an unholy howl with the little air she had. Arthur dropped her.
Merlin swallowed and tried to abate the goosebumps which erupted like mines along his spine. "Was that... a little excessive?"
"She just needs to keep her teeth to herself," Arthur replied. He put his arm on Merlin's shoulder and proceeded to continue down the path they'd walked two nights before.
Merlin glanced behind him. The vampiress was nonchalantly fixing her business style skirt. She noticed Merlin looking at her when their eyes met and she quickly looked away. "Is that how you always treat employees?" Merlin asked.
"Just the ones who like to sink their teeth into things that are off limits. Arthur stopped at the door to the lab. "I'll come get you for lunch?" He asked.
"It's a date," said Merlin.
Arthur smiled. "It's only Gaius in there, so you don't need to worry. I'll leave introductions to you." He gave Merlin a swift, parting kiss and left him with a smug, "Goodbye, Merlin."
Merlin was in a rather perplexed mood when he opened the door. He stepped past the exhibits of now sleeping creatures and was halfway toward the Flordia Bonneted Bat when he stumbled over a folder on the floor. He knelt to pick it up.
"That's mine, that's- oh. You're not a nosferatu." A flushed, wide-eyed old man appeared from the corner of the room. "I don't see why Arthur found me a helper now off all times, I've worked here forty years since Chives..."
Merlin stood up and blinked at the man in front of him. Oh, his mind said, of course.
Gaius squinted at Merlin. "Hunith's boy?" He asked, "What are you – it's dangerous here! What are you doing here?" Gaius bristled with indignation.
"I...I work here," Merlin said, stammering as he tried to recognize the old, vibrant, vampire-knowing Gaius to the friend of his mothers whom he hadn't seen since he was eight.
"How could you let yourself do something so irresponsible?" Gaius' face was turning red. The bat in the cage beside them bristled and hissed in its sleep.
"Who are you to say I'm being irresponsible?" Merlin countered strongly, "I needed a job. I got one."
"With bloodsuckers? You?"
"I'm your assistant," Merlin replied.
Gaius rubbed his temples like he was getting a headache. "How did you end up here? You were a bright kid, shouldn't you be in college?"
"Too expensive," Merlin said stubbornly, "which is why I went looking for a job. Arthur offered to-"
"Mr. Pendragon," Gaius corrected.
"What?"
"Mr. Pendragon, you shouldn't be calling your employer by his first name, and the Pendragons are powerful people-"
"First of all," Merlin snapped, "I'm not five fucking years old. Second, I work for you whether you like it or not. Third, I'm dating 'Mr. Pendragon' so I think I can call him whatever I want."
"Merlin, you're an idiot," Lance said strongly.
"I know it sounds crazy," Merlin said, his voice hardly louder than the annoying jazz music at the bar. Will picked the oddest rendezvous, but Lance never seemed to mind, which left Merlin wondering if he was just odd. Of course, he was dating a vampire and his new boss could hardly say a word to him and he had spent his evening watching a marathon of an American television show. Perhaps he was odd, and a boring person, because when it came down to it, yes, he saw the future and yes, he was now dating a supermodel-eque, billionaire vampire, and he spent his free time eating popcorn with kittens while trying to beat Sean Spencer to the murderer.
"No," Will said to the sound of saxophone, "it is crazy." A pretty waitress, who in Merlin's opinion should not have dyed her hair blonde since darker tones would look better with her skin color, dropped off the three beers and said she'd be back with their meals.
"So is seeing the future," Merlin replied.
Lance sighed. "Merlin, you're not pulling anything are you?"
"Of course not!"
Will took a swing of his beer. "Fine, I believe you."
Lance stared at Will. "You're not serious."
"I'm completely serious," Will said. He smiled at Merlin. "After all, I was the one who recommended the Bite, wasn't I?"
Merlin blinked at his old friend. "You... you told me to go to a vampire dating sight on purpose?"
"It worked," Will shrugged, "and vampires are really, really hot. Sierra's a vampire."
"Sierra?" Merlin asked without really wanting to know the answer.
"My girlfriend," Will said, "she's extremely sexy."
"I thought you were dating the girl from the coffee shop," Merlin said, unamused.
"Well, one at night, one during the day," Will told him.
"There is something chronically wrong with you," Lance said.
"Not all of us are knights in shining armour." Will took a large gulp of his beer.
"Some are assholes?" Lance took a swig of his drink. "Who are encouraging something ridiculous?"
"Vampires are real, shit head, I have the love bites to prove it," Will challenged.
Lance sighed, running his hand through his hair. "Ignoring the fact that you two are insane, I don't care what Merlin thinks he's dating as long as he's not getting hurt. Now, the football match is on, so lets make a nuisance of ourselves."
"Here, here," Will seconded the motion.
There was a dark man sitting on a throne of spikes and claws that reached down as if to appease him. It was frightening, it was dark, the scene was lit by a dull white light that seemed red from the color of their surrounding. Everything was stained the color of blood.
Merlin stirred in his sleep.
"You're either drinking the human or converting the human," the dark man said as the shadows on the floor leaned towards him, "the professor has stood up for the human, of course, but the human knows too much already."
"Trust me," another shadowy figure insisted, "the human won't give us away."
"I've spent years hiding my people until the proper time to strike, if our enemies get a hand on that weak human creature... if my kingdom is overturned because of some pitiful worm, then I swear, you won't survive the night," the dark man threatened. His throne seemed to shake.
There was a thing lying on the floor. Blood from it was spilling over the ground, seeping into the floor. The shadowy figure speaking with the enthroned man stood in the center of the blood. And then it was sitting. Two of the shadowy figure's fingers reached into the blood and were raised to its lips.
"It loves me," the shadowy figure said, "and you need a Seer or you'll never defeat your enemies."
"Is the human aware that we know who it is?"
"No," the shadowy figure replied calmly. It made a smacking noise before reaching into the blood again. "We could always tell it."
"Nonsense," the dark man said, "we don't want it on guard."
"But we need it's visions."
"Not as desperately as you think, Morgause," the dark man said to the shadowy figure in the blood, "we have time."
"Less than you think," the shadowy figure countered, "Uther has his own Seer."
The dark man threw his head back and laughed. The sound echoed in his room before it was suddenly swallowed up by his voice, "Uther?" He shook his head. "Uther murders Seers, that blind fool is too overcome with his wife's death to understand the usefulness of foreseers."
"And you tortured your last one into oblivion," Morgause said mercilessly.
The dark man chuckled. "She refused to continue to See for me. After all, she was a bloodsucker."
Morgause dipped her fingers in the blood and drew them again to her lips. "And I am just a Witch," she said.
"My people have always had... estranged relationships with Witches, but I did hope you and I could repair it," the dark man looked at Morgause with a hungry glare.
"Perhaps," Morgause said, lowering her head and smiling, "when you bring me Uther and young Arthur's heads."
"And Uther's daughter, Morgana?"
"I have something else in mind for her.
The dream ended, and Merlin opened his eyes. He blinked for several moments as the dream committed itself to memory, and rolled back over and fell asleep.
Merlin spent the morning arranging files for Gaius, who hardly spoke to him. For lunch, he found some takeout on his desk and a note from Arthur saying he'd be by at five to take Merlin home. After lunch, Gaius finally let Merlin read the case study reports.
And so Merlin found out the whole purpose of the bats.
Gaius was experimenting the cause of 'extreme abilities', something so reminiscent of twilight that Merlin actually had to take a moment to facepalm. Shit. Twilight got something right. But then again, Arthur had said something about Stephanie Meyer being an actual vampire.
The sparkling was way off though, unless Arthur sparkled under the copious amounts of sunscreen he wore during the day. And, Merlin might be homosexual, but he didn't want to date a sparkling vampire. Frankly, the only person in the world who ever wanted a sparkly vampire was probably Stephanie Meyer.
Anyways, Gaius was experimenting to determine what factors caused different abilities. Merlin guess that his job was to make sure all of Arthur's father's vampire coven got the strongest powers. It made since, he guessed, except Merlin realized that Gaius was basically a mad scientist performing evil experiments on the bats.
"Fuck." Merlin sat back in his chair. He set the file on his desk.
What have I gotten myself into? He wondered, I'm working for the bad guys. I'm sleeping with the enemy! He paused. "Well, actually, not yet." And that could be changed.
Arthur came to take Merlin home. He started talking about his day, telling Merlin in several stories about how vampires could not get anything done. Merlin nodded, laughed appropriately, and when the elevator doors shut he turned and looked Arthur straight in the eye. "Arthur," he said.
Arthur looked terrified. "What's wrong?" He asked, "Is it about Ben's blood habit, because I don't have to talk about that-"
"No," Merlin interrupted. He smiled. He took Arthur's wrists, his long fingers just extending around Arthur's muscular figure, and planted them around his waist. He reached up and rested his arms on Arthur's shoulder as he pulled them close. "Arthur," he said in the voice that had made Gareth fall down the stairs in front of the entire high school.
Arthur stared at Merlin wordlessly, his perfect face in an unreadable expression.
"Aren't you," Merlin said, his hands twirling in the back of Arthur's hair, "sick of taking things slow?" Merlin grinned.
Arthur's face twisted into something between a grin and a frown. "Merlin, there's something I need to tell you about-"
"Mm hm?" Merlin traced his fingernails down Arthur's neck and felt goosebumps rising on the vampire's neck. "Don't worry," he said softly.
Arthur blinked. "Worry?"
Merlin stopped. "Yeah," he said, "you know. 'Cause you seemed like you were worrying."
"And," Arthur said firmly, "what did you think I was worrying about?" Merlin didn't answer, but something in his face prompted Arthur to insist, "I'm not small, you know."
"So it's a vampire thing?" Merlin realized.
"Of course it's a vampire thing!" Arthur looked insulted.
Merlin nodded, the whole situation having grown awkward. Then Arthur's hand grabbed the back of his neck and suddenly hot, sexy lips pressed hard enough against Merlin's mouth to send him spinning.
The elevator 'dinged' and Arthur disentangled Merlin from his body in time to appear cool and collected for the vampire employee who walked in the door. The gorgeous male vampire gave a double take at the sight of his boss and his human companion. His eyes lingered on Merlin. "Take the next fucking elevator," Arthur ordered in retaliation. And he closed the elevator door.
"You jealous bastard," Merlin said as he suddenly found that he couldn't tear his eyes away from Arthur.
Arthur smiled for a moment before sighing and running his hand through his hair. "We need to talk," he said as the elevator started to sink again.
Merlin looked at Arthur with curiosity. "About human/vampire sex, huh?"
Arthur flushed. "Yeah," he told the other side of the elevator.
This is about to get complicated, Merlin realized. "Messy, is it?"
"Not..." Arthur slouched against the wall. "Merlin... it's like..." He clenched and unclenched his hand. "It can't be... sudden, it has to be... approached cautiously," he spoke as if he was describing how to rope a bull.
"You going to destroy the bed?" Merlin asked, remembering Twilight. Shit. He wasn't supposed to remember that scene. Fuck. He didn't watch Twilight. He never saw Twilight.
Fine. He saw Twilight. But he wasn't telling Arthur that.
"It's not," Arthur began. The elevator stopped and someone else moved to step in. Arthur glared at the vampiress with his frightening red stare. She decided to wait for the next elevator. The door shut, and they were almost at the bottom.
"Maybe we should talk about this later," Merlin said to Arthur. The tension in Arthur's shoulders dropped slightly. "At your place," Merlin added, "a bottle of champagne between us or... vampire alcohol. Do you have a bed at your place? Vampires sleep, don't they?"
"We sleep," Arthur said as the tension returned.
"So you have a bed," Merlin grinned.
Arthur stared. "Yes." He swallowed.
Merlin looked at Arthur and realized several things. First, he did not need to try any harder to get Arthur to turn on. Second, unless he had to wear and IV and give blood until he died, he was getting Arthur to fuck him tonight.
We just met
And I know this is crazy
But you already got this far
So review, maybe?
