Hey all! Here's the next chapter for you!
Warning: Plenty of cameos ahead, plus several instances of time travelling, not specific to Doctor Who. You'll see ;)
Man, I'm really in a crossover phase, aren't I?
This chappie shall be for humor purposes, just in case anyone needs some cheering up.
Merlin is 9 in this chapter.
Never Quite Lost: Achoo
It was evident from the moment he woke up that Merlin was, indeed, sick. His nose was clogged and runny, his eyes were bloodshot and watery, his skin was pale and his cheeks, flushed. His voice sounded hoarse and raspy and he refused to leave his bed.
"Mamai, I don't feel," he sneezed loudly, looking dazed afterwards, "so good. I'm going to sleep again." And with that, he fell asleep, deep into dreamland long before his head hit the pillow.
Hunith sighed and pulled his sweaty blankets more comfortably around him, wondering whether or not Gaius' services would be required.
Throughout the cold winter's day, he was awoken constantly by a variety of symptoms, including- but not limited to- vomiting, stomach pains, hiccups, temperature fluctuations, coughing, overproduction of mucus, and sneezing. Oh, the sneezing. That was by far the worst, when he would sneeze so hard and loudly that his eyes would get glazed over and it would sound more like a scream than anything.
"Mama," he told Gwen as she rubbed a cold cloth over his heated forehead, "I feel really sleepy." His eyes started to flutter closed, his angelic face relaxing.
Then he shot up and sneezed again, a mighty, thundering roar that shook the whole castle and left a fleck of blood in Merlin's hand from his raw throat and nose.
"Ah… CHOOO!" Then he sniffled his nose and passed out again.
Smiling sadly in pity, Gwen stood and left the room to give the boy some peace and quiet.
As soon as she opened the door, however, she had to immediately shut it, as there was a big commotion in the hallway that could wake him up. Making sure he was still sleeping soundly, she exited and closed the door again, this time more slowly to avoid the slamming noise it would make.
Then she marched over to her husband, who was dealing with a growing line of people dressed in varying styles of the strangest clothing she had ever seen.
Arthur was making a placating gesture with his hands, silencing the group- all men, Gwen noticed- and demanding authoritatively that they speak one at a time.
Instead of the first person in the line, however, Arthur nodded towards the window, where a large golden snout was fogging up the glass with its warm breath.
"I have received a distress signal from my dragonlord." Kilgarrah rumbled. Arthur approached the window, unlatched it, and leaned out towards the dragon.
"Merlin is fine, Kilgarrah, he's just caught a mild winter illness. He'll be fine." He soothed, making a shooing motion. "But only if he gets his rest, which he won't get if you're making lots of noise outside his chambers!"
The dragon sniffed in annoyance, grumbling about the rudeness of it all before taking off into the snowy skies.
The first two people in line, wearing matching uniforms, began to speak.
"We picked up an energy fluctuation and had the Enterprise break Warp 12 to get here and assist." Said the taller one, a man with pointed ears, big brown eyes and upswept eyebrows, wearing a blue shirt.
"The what?" Arthur asked. The man in the gold shirt with matching golden hair and stunning blue eyes stepped forward.
"Our ship, the Enterprise. Now, where is the danger?"
"I apologize that you traveled so far to help us, but there is no danger here. Only a little boy who sneezed." Gwen said softly.
"Captain, I did inform you that this was most likely a waste of precious time and resources." The pointy-eared man said. His counterpart mock-glared at him, punching his arm.
"No need to get all 'I told you so' on me, subordinate." He warned without conviction. The other man raised his pointed eyebrow and made to leave, his friend following close behind and saying to a thing on his arm, "Scotty, beam us up." In a flashy show of light, they vanished into thin air.
Gwen had called on the second ones in line by then. There were two of them, dressed similarly in trousers made of strange blue material and some loose-fitting shirts, each carrying a strange bent stick with holes in the ends.
"Yeah, my brother and I were sent here to assist some kid in danger. Anyone here fit the bill?" The shorter of the two asked in a strange accent. The king and queen exchanged confused looks.
"Well, there's Merlin, but he's just got some sort of cold. He'll be fine." Gwen informed them. The taller brother snorted slightly while his shorter sibling started swearing grumpily about their luck.
"Frikkin' Cas!" He scowled, grabbing his chuckling brother and marching away.
Arthur blinked. "Well, then."
"Now, what do you need?" Gwen asked the next person in line. He was a young boy slightly older than Merlin, with black-blue hair and one blue eye. The other was concealed with an eye patch. In his hand was a walking stick. It was also hard to miss his extremely tall shadow, an older man with black hair and red eyes, dressed in black compared to the boy's blue.
"I was made aware of a time anomaly involving a warlock crying out for help. Is our assistance needed?" The boy inquired in a mature tone, sounding more like an adult than a child.
"Um, no, as we were just saying, Merlin is going to be fine. What sort of 'time anomaly' are you talking about?" This was when the man in line behind them jumped up, raising his hand and pushing past them to stand before the king.
"They're talking about the cry for help emitted from this particular time period, on this particular day." He explained. He was dressed in a strange plaid version of the red-eyed man's outfit, with a red butterfly-shaped cloth on his neck and a cylindrical red cap resting on his head. He thrust his hand out for them to shake. "King Arthur and… Queen Guinevere, I presume?"
Ignoring the boy, who was annoyed at being interrupted, and his apparent servant, the man took out a leather scrap and opened it, showing a piece of parchment inside with many circles on it.
"My psychic paper received the following message from Merlin, son of Pendragon: 'Ah Chu.' This just so happens to mean 'help me, I'm in trouble, I need help, I'm dying,' in Gallifreyan. So I came to help."
"Excuse me, sir, but I believe my young master was before you." Said the tall servant with a flowing voice.
"Just a moment, butler, this is of utmost importance and I'm the only one who can help."
"Could you all please be quiet?" Gwen shouted, silencing the bickering men. "Merlin is absolutely fine. He's sick, but it's not severe, and he doesn't require your assistance."
All three of them looked surprised.
"So what was the distress call about, then?" Asked the man with the strange hat.
"Honestly…." Gwen grumbled impatiently, "That was a sneeze, gentlemen. Now do be on your way before I get a headache." With that, she motioned for them to leave.
"Oh, well. Come, Sebastian. Take me home." Said the boy regally. The servant nodded and bowed slightly, picking the boy up and suddenly disappearing in a cloud of swirling light.
The king and queen remained relatively unfazed, being used to sorcery and all its oddities by now.
Still, Arthur said, "I had no idea that a man from the future could be a sorcerer."
The remaining man, however, shook his head with a knowing smile.
"He isn't. He's just one hell of a butler."
At Gwen's unimpressed look, he straightened up a bit and began walking away.
"Do give Merlin my best! Tell him The Doctor stopped by." He requested. Gwen nodded and swore she would.
As the man got further down the hallway, though, he seemed to remember something and ran back to them, pulling a square device from his pocket.
"Oh, I forgot!" He exclaimed, jumping between them and holding the device up in the air above their heads. "Amy didn't believe I was really here last time, so I need to get her some more proof. Say 'selfie'!" The flabbergasted couple could only stare at the thing holding their image with suspicious looks, while The Doctor smiled widely and pressed a button. There was a bright flash of light, then the man started to walk away again, reviewing the image he had caught.
"Oh, this is a great one! I can't wait to tell the Ponds about this. King Arthur and Guinevere! What a day." He closed the door behind him and the blue box that the royals hadn't noticed before started wheezing and fading into nothingness.
Gwen sighed in relief and began trudging in the opposite direction, Arthur following.
"I am so glad that's over." Her husband nodded in agreement. On their way to their chambers, Gwen stopped and peeked into Merlin's room to make sure he was still sleeping after all that noise.
She froze when she saw the two men in there, one analyzing the room and the other poking and prodding at a groggy Merlin.
"Oh, come on!" She exclaimed in frustration, storming into the room and startling the men.
"See, I told you we should have left him alone." Said the taller of the two, wearing a long black coat and a mop of ebony hair similar to Merlin's. He looked very bored.
The older and shorter one, wearing those weird blue trousers and a fuzzy shirt and sporting very sandy-colored hair, shot a glare at his companion and continued looking at Merlin's eye as he shone a tiny light into it.
"Sherlock, we can't just leave the little guy to suffer, he's got the flu!" He snapped.
"Just what are you doing in here?" Arthur demanded, drawing his sword.
"Obvious, isn't it?" Drawled Sherlock, eyes raking over the defensive king. "I guess that angel was telling the truth, we do seem to be in the presence of King Arthur of Camelot. Hm, time travel, who knew?" His blonde friend stood from the bedside and rummaged through his bag, pulling out a strange orange container with little white pellets inside.
"Here, give this to him once a day and his symptoms should clear up within a week." He handed the thing to Gwen, who inspected it curiously.
"How do we give this to him? What do they do?" She asked. The man looked at her in disbelief.
"You don't know how to administer a pill?" He asked. Sherlock, who was currently at the end of Arthur's sword, rolled his eyes.
"Terribly sorry about him, he's not quite so open-minded. Or observant." He said pointedly. "I'm Sherlock Holmes, this is my friend John Watson. He's a physician, and we're from the future." Ignoring the sword warily held at his chest, Sherlock sidestepped out of Arthur's reach and approached Gwen, taking the bottle from her.
"You just push down on the white part, twist, and the lid comes off. The white things inside are called pills, and they're basically a tonic, but in a solid form, to make things easier. You put it on the middle of your tongue- don't chew it, drink some water, and swallow it all in one go. Only one per day." He explained with a patience that seemed unusual for a person like him.
Gwen nodded in understanding, taking the bottle back and placing it on Merlin's bedside table.
"Thank you, Mr. Holmes. Mr. Watson. How may we repay you?" She asked kindly, shooting Arthur an annoyed glance when he started to protest. She trusted these men; she had seen her fair share of time travellers (thanks to Merlin) and knew they didn't like to mess around with historical figures for fear of changing the future irreparably. Not that she was all puffed up with pride over being a historical figure, but she was a queen, and that had to mean something to the future generations.
John smiled back at her, shaking his head.
"Free of charge. Just help this little one get better, and that'll be payment enough." He gestured towards the sick boy behind him, who was sleeping soundly now.
The queen beamed at the kindness these strangers were showing, and curtsied.
"Thank you very much, sirs. You are always welcome to return to Camelot." Sherlock's face remained impassive, if not a little smug, but John was now gaping openly.
"C-Camelot? We really are in the past?" His face was white as a sheet. His taller friend nodded as if it had always been obvious. "And this is the real Camelot? Like, with King Arthur and Guinevere and Gawaine?"
"It's Gwaine." Arthur mumbled under his breath, grumpy. Gwen subtly stomped on his foot to shut him up.
"Yes, I'm Guinevere, and this is my husband, Arthur." She introduced. John numbly shook Arthur's reluctant hand, followed by Sherlock.
"Wait, if this it Camelot, where's that old wizard, Merlin?" The monarchs looked confused. Old? Wizard?
"Well, I don't know about an old wizard, but we do have a young warlock by that name." She said, gesturing to the sleeping child.
John glanced backwards, gaping.
"No. No bloody way is Merlin a child! He's so much older than you lot in the stories!" Sherlock stepped forward, placed a hand on John's shoulder, and motioned for him to just stop talking. His ranting was waking the sleeping boy.
"Sorry about him. We'll be going now. Our deepest congratulations on Camlann." He led his friend to the center of the room. "We're leaving, Castiel." He called out, and moments later they were whisked away in a flurry of wind.
"Shit!" Arthur cried, running to where they had just disappeared from, searching.
Gwen turned to her pouting husband.
"What's wrong now?"
"Oh, nothing," he said sarcastically, holding up his naked right hand for her to see, "The ring with our royal seal was just stolen by a thieving time traveller, but other than that, everything's just swell."
Oh Sherlie, you pickpocket! Sorry, I kind of had a fandom explosion. Anybody in any of those fandoms? Other than the obvious Sherlock and Doctor Who, does anybody know what shows the remaining visitors were from?
I know, not much of Merlin in here. Oh well, it's not like he's a rare occurrence in the first place.
Did you enjoy? I hope you did.
R&R!
