Hello faithful readers
Okay...so this chapter has been long in the making ever since seeing a certain video...haha read on to find out what I'm taking about!
Enjoy,
Bree Z Claire
No copyright infringement is intended. RockBand and Merlin (characters and etc.) belong to their respected owners.
"My God! What is that racket?" Morgana flinched as the elevator doors opened to a flood of electric guitar solos, drums, and a very loud shrieking sound. Arthur couldn't help but think the same as he took out his keys and cautiously pushed open the door to his apartment.
As he'd feared, it was even louder inside than it was outside and the sight was about ten times worse. The large speakers were turned up to the max so the floor shook beneath his feet. The screen was flashing with a multitude of blinding colours. Two receding bars lined the bottom of the screen, each having their own respected tabs popping up with blue, yellow, blue and red, green and red, and etc. while the bar at the top of the screen had an on-going green line running along with lyrics underneath. Arthur pinched the bridge of his nose; it was as he'd feared.
They were playing RockBand.
"I thought you'd hidden everything in the storage unit downstairs," Morgana leaned into him and whisper.
"I did," he groaned back. He mentally kicked himself for lecturing Gwaine and Merlin earlier that day when they were complaining about being bored with nothing to do on a Sunday morning. The building's fire alarm had gone off, tearing the four of them out into the streets.
It wasn't as bad for Arthur and Lance, who already had plans that morning and had dressed and eaten breakfast. For Gwaine and Merlin however, who loved sleeping in till late afternoon, waking up so early in the day meant they had nothing to do now that they were up and couldn't get back to sleep. Arthur had told them to clean out their storage unit in the building's basement, which they obviously did –and now abandoned— if they'd managed to dig up the dusty old game system.
He wasn't exactly sure what had happened the last time they embarked of their adventure to become hypothetical rockstars, but somehow it ended with Lance coming down with a serious case of multiply personality disorder and Gwaine putting a mic stand through the TV – if there was one thing that Arthur never wanted to see again it was Lance with a bandana tied around his head, large aviators on his nose, and how-did-hell-did-you-ever-find-those black army boots. He was glad –for all their lives—that Gwen never found out about it.
Morgana, who had followed him back to the apartment hoping to find the nail polish she'd left behind from her last visit, immediately swiped what she could before darting out. Arthur didn't blame her. He couldn't blame her. He couldn't even find it in him to mutter the words "traitor" because he was itching to do the same.
He walked in with extreme caution, pausing by the large arm chair to ask Lance, "Are you sure this is a good idea?" He gulped when the bassist turned his head, aviators and bandana already in place.
"Sod off, Farnham."
Oh dear…
"Arthur!"
Arthur turned to see Merlin running down the stairs with an armful of bottled water and rolled his eyes. It was typical for the boy to be wearing such a blindingly stupid grin at this moment. Arthur and the others had long hung up their guitars and drum sticks by the time Merlin moved in with them so really this was the first time the bright-eyed boy was witnessing all of them –sans Arthur at the moment—play. And of course, since he was an utter mess with coordination, Merlin remained in the clear zone safe from any rock 'n' roll mannerisms by lack of participation.
But then again, there was probably enough crazy in their apartment at the moment.
"Merlin, I thought I told you to clean out the storage, not drag it up here."
"What?" The boy cocked his head in confusion only to catch on after a few seconds, "Oh don't worry. We cleaned up first before bringing it up," It being the monstrosity burning a hole through his ears. Arthur suppressed a groan.
In other words, they were cleaning, saw the game, shoved everything back in before bringing the game back upstairs. He turned his head to witness Will – "Why the hell is Will here?" "We needed another player so I called him up!" – hollering into the mic while Gwaine and Lance did their thing on the guitars. He knew it would all go downhill soon because the latter (read: doctor) was getting especially friendly with the whammy bar and the former kept going into overdrive.
The drums were out but untouched; they had probably reserved them for Arthur. The lawyer rolled his eyes and decided to head upstairs to get changed; what rockstar wore professionally tailored suits? Not that he was planning to play, no, no of course not. But if either Gwaine or Lance were going to start throwing inanimate objects around the apartment, Arthur wanted to be prepared to duck and dodge as necessary.
Cabal was waiting for him on his bed, fighting the pulls of sleep as Arthur changed into a navy shirt and jeans.
Poor thing. They were out for their daily walk not two weeks ago when the poor champ took a long sniff in a flower bed and had a nasty face-off with a bumblebee. By the time Arthur pulled the rascal away, Cabal had already taken a large chomp out of the bug, yelping out instantly when the angry thing stung the inside of his cheek. By the time they returned home, the little giant didn't look quite as fierce as before; his cheek had puffed out and his eye had swollen shut.
Luckily a trip to the vet proved successful and now the swelling had gone down considerably. The only downside was the drowsiness brought on by of the pills, but at least Cabal was well again, and hopefully the pup had learned his lesson on the dangers of curiosity. And bees.
After giving a few pats on the head, a tummy rub, and putting up with an ocean of licks, Arthur went back downstairs to salvage what he could of the living room. He was relieved to find that the furniture hadn't suffered just yet. Things had, however, advanced to the next stage.
Will, Lance, and Gwaine were in full-focus mode. All three men stood on the couches and Will actually had the audacity to be bouncing around from couch to armchair in all his flailing arms and shaking head of brown hair. Merlin was sitting on the kitchen island enjoying the show with a particularly amused smile.
Arthur winced when they hit the last chorus.
We've got to hold on ready or not
You live for the fight when it's all that you've got
Whooah, we're half way there
Oh! Livin' on a prayer
Take my hand and we'll make it - I swear
Oh! Livin' on a prayer
The song rounded to an end with top scores, and the three men matched their alter egos on the screen as the animated fans cheered. Arthur took a breath before stepping off the last step and walking up to Will. He knew what Gwaine and Lance were like when playing but Will was wildcard so Arthur approached with caution.
"Well well, look what the cat dragged in."
"Good to see you too, Will," Arthur said and the tension in his shoulders eased slightly; no alter ego here it would seem. "Listen, why don't you head off before we start getting noise complaints?"
"Ah," as predicted, Lance threw a drum stick at the interruption. Luckily Arthur ducked in time. "Don't be such a wanker, Farnham!"
"We can't just drop our lead singer in the middle of a world tour!" Gwaine flung his arms up, and thankfully his guitar strap was on or else the drop would've done some serious damage to the fragile toy – although whether or not it was a bad thing, Arthur wasn't sure.
Arthur turned his head to see Merlin watching this exchange from a safe distance and shot him a look. The boy perked up in attention.
"Um," he hopped off the table and walked over. Ever the voice of reason, because if anyone could get a handle on Will, it was him, Merlin spoke up above the speakers, "Will, you've got an early morning tomorrow don't you?"
"Aww, yeah, that's right. Completely forgot about that, thanks mate." Arthur held in a sigh of relief, suddenly thankful for Will's job at the café that kept him busy on most days. Beside him, Gwaine cursed and threw down his guitar and Will had the good sense to jump back as the plastic cracked open, splitting the guitar into its two halves. "Uh…I'm gonna go now." He all but ran out the door, barely managing a 'seeya later' to his friend.
"Damnit Gwaine!" Thank god it missed the table.
"Shit…we're down an axe." The model frowned.
"Bloody brilliant," Lance threw the remaining drum stick somewhere Arthur couldn't see and Merlin, out of some twisted humor or fear, went to retrieve it. The lawyer tried to get a handle on his friends, who were clearly on the verge of a warpath.
"Guys, please—"
"Ten seconds away from our next gig and you go and cock it all up, Farnham! First our singer and now Ga-wain's axe—"
Gwaine just shrugged before saying, "Guess I'll take up the drums, yeah?"
Merlin handed over the drum sticks –all in one piece, miracles do happen!— and leaned in to whisper, "Why does he keep calling you Farnham?" Arthur waved a dismissive hand.
"Shut up, Merlin."
Lance, who was still standing menacingly on the couch, bent over at the waist and pointed his guitar head into Arthur's chest. The blond gulped and wondered for the fifth time since he'd walked into the apartment how such a noble and kind doctor could have such an angry, and for some odd reason British, alter ego. It truly was frightening. The aviators slid down and Arthur could make out the narrowed eyes behind the reflective lenses.
"You know what you have to do, don't you?"
It was rhetorical, of course, but Gwaine answered it anyways. "You gotta step it up, Farnham."
"Arthur singing? Oh this I've got to see!" Merlin laughed, moving back to the kitchen to take up his perch, preferring to watch from afar. He'd entered the danger zone twice already and although it was amazingly entertaining, it was also amazingly scary.
"Oh, no, you don't," Arthur caught him by the collar of his red and black checkered button-down, hauling him back to his side. He growled because there really wasn't anything else he could do, what with Lance staring daggers at him and Gwaine looking about ready to impale someone with a drum stick. "If I'm going down, I'm taking you with me!"
~ oOo ~
The fans cheered as the band geared up and took their place. To his right, Lance adjusted the effects on his pickup switch and secured the strap around his body; it wouldn't do to have another instrument trashed, not before their final performance.
Gwaine was behind him to his left, shirt discarded from the heat. The drummer rolled his ankle and Arthur gave him an encouraging look because after the last song's string of bass drum beats, anyone would be about ready to throw in the towel. He received a nod and smiled, Gwaine was a fighter.
Merlin flanked him, currently pushing up and re-rolling his sleeves. He ran a hand through his hair; the beads of sweat made his brown curls stick up every which way. He adjusted the mic before giving Arthur a wink. The curled smile of his lips hadn't faded since their second number and now Arthur had enough confidence in the boy to let him open their final number. He'd earned it.
We have the chance to turn the pages over
We can write what we want to write
We gotta make ends meet, before we get much older
A small shift, barely noticeable, in the younger man made Arthur step forward. Thanks to Merlin, he had had enough time to grab a swig of water and was ready to take up his place in the spot light once again. He smiled at the bright-eyed boy, blue eyes sparkling and practically drunk with happiness.
We're all someone's daughter
We're all someone's son
How long can we look at each other
Down the barrel of a gun?
The two sings leaned into each other, feeding off one another's energy and heat, and back to back they sang out the chorus. Gwaine twirled his sticks with the final beats of anticipation and Lance jumped up, crashing to the ground and strumming down with a windmill roll of his arm. Arthur knew without a shadow of a doubt that each and every one of them were beaming like there was no tomorrow. The crowd roared.
You're the voice, try and understand it
Make the noise and make it clear, oh, woah
We're not gonna sit in silence
We're not gonna live with fear, oh, woah
Song list in order of appearance:
Livin' on a prayer - by Jon Bon Jovi
You're the voice - by John Farnham
Prompts are currently being taken :)