But with the beast inside, there's nowhere we can hide. No matter what we breed, we still are made of greed. This is my kingdom come, this is my kingdom come
28th June 2019
"I am so sorry" Morgana apologised. At nine months old Amhar was at the prime age for separation anxiety and he certainly was experiencing it.
"Mama" Amhar wailed as he clung to Morgana. "Mama".
"It's okay baby" Morgana soothed. "Bye-bye".
"Mama!" Amhar repeated.
"Time to go now" Morgana said in the baby voice. "Bye bye!".
Amhar wailed and clung to Morgana as she passed him over to his key worker as he sobbed, she quickly walked out the nursery as she heard his cries and walked to the car.
"Separation anxiety is tough isn't it?" Kara smiled sympathetically.
"Ah sorry! Didn't see you there".
"How are you? Haven't seen you in a while" Kara commented.
"Yeah not too bad. We had to quarantine because Amhar had hand foot and mouth so that was ... interesting".
"Oh yes! Noah had that too. Quarantine with a baby is a pain. Never realised how much we actually left the house!" Kara exclaimed.
"Same with us! Except Merlin, the buffoon—had bought the SIXPLUS calpol and newborn formula instead".
"You know follow-on formula is a con, right?" Kara checked. "Marketing plot like all those extra added profutra shit in Aptamil, although if it's cheaper for follow on its fine. All formula's the same, except the Kendamil and SAINSBURYS one which don't have palm oil".
"So Merlin had the right formula all along!" Morgana exclaimed.
"More or less" Kara shrugged. "Channel four did a dispatches documentary on it. Also, if you half the amount of Calpol SIXPLUS it's fine too, as it had double the amount of paracetamol".
"Parenting's fucking confusing" Morgana chuckled.
"You'll get used to it" Kara smiled. "The first few weeks when Noah was born we were clueless! Had to ask the midwife how to change a nappy".
"It was the same the first time Merlin and I babysat" Morgana agreed. "I had a falling out with him so he had to change the baby, he peed on his face".
"Mike had that too" Kara laughed. "When was Amhar born?".
"Thirteenth September 2018. Noah?".
"Fourteenth" Kara grinned. "Maybe they can have a joint birthday party".
"That's be nice" Morgana agreed with a smile. "Sorry I have to head to work. See you later?".
"Sure" Kara smiled. "Number exchange?". After they had exchanged their numbers they headed off to their jobs once more. For many years it was leisurely seeing as the exams were over and they only had over a week left until it was time for the summer holidays. In the afternoon there was a meeting from DofE bronze group. Given that they couldn't properly scrub the trangia's down during the expedition or fold up the tents properly, after leaving the tents to dry and scrub down the trangias which was rather hard for most of them—although tents were easy. Morgana ended up missing the bronze expedition given that it had clashed with quarantine.
Shortly after they had to distribute the group kit between the silver group seeing as they were due to leave in a couple of days—and (unlike bronze) as they had to get there extremely early in the morning it made more sense.
30th June 2019
When Merlin woke up he heard Morgana grunting, muttering under her breath "stupid hair, just fucking work!". He rolled over and checked his phone—four in the morning. Why on Earth was she awake so early? And why were the lights on? Merlin never slept with the lights on, neither did Morgana. He heard a cry over the baby monitor and walked across the hall to the nursery. As usual, Amhar stood up in the cot crying.
"Mama" Amhar cried. "Mama!".
Merlin rolled his eyes at the baby and took him out of the cot, before going towards the bedroom.
"What are you doing?" Merlin chuckled.
"Pig tail braids" Morgana replied. "I am almost done...hold on".
"Mama" Amhar babbled as he wriggled in Merlin's arms. "Mama". Merlin put him down next to the bed. Amhar used the furniture to pull himself up—he had been doing that a lot as of late and even was walking while holding onto things; walking sideways like a crab often and he would walk with the push-along baby walker that they had at nursery.
He hastily took a step, Merlin shouting "oh my god!" as he grabbed his ohone and quickly got the camera up while Amhar grinned as he took another step towards Morgana.
"Oh my god!" Morgana gasped. "You're walking. Come here baby!". Amhar gently fell onto his back in Morgana's arms with a giggle and toothy grin, babbling "mama".
"I got it!" Merlin exclaimed as he rewatched the video. "I got it!".
"Let's see" Morgana smiled as she watched the video. "Now he can come on DofE after all".
"Just some hills" Merlin shrugged. "And 16km per day is it? He'll love it".
"I think so too" Morgana agreed. "Now, I am going to give a detailed step-by-step on how to make formula without making a complete and utter mess". After Amhar had his bottle he quickly went back to sleep, leaving Merlin and Morgana awake at the kitchen table.
"Why are you awake?" Morgana asked.
"Honestly?" Merlin sighed. "I've been thinking".
"About what?" Morgana frowned.
"We just saw Amhar's first steps... Amhar's first word a few weeks back. It just doesn't feel, well—fair".
"I get it" Morgana agreed. "I mean, as his aunt I knew I'd likely see many of these sort of things anyway, but having it happen like this ... first steps at four in the morning, being the one to be called 'Mama', I mean, y'know?".
"I know" Merlin nodded. "I know".
"Are you going to go back to bed then?" Morgana asked.
"Can't be bothered" Merlin shrugged. Merlin stayed up with Morgana and watched as she kept packing and unpacking her backpack. She left at around quarter to seven as they had to leave before half seven so they could avoid traffic given it was a few hours up north. It wasn't too bad and they arrived at the car park shortly after eleven thus beginning the expedition. It didn't go too badly in the end. Morgana was assigned to Lucy and Harriet's group as group leader—and apart from arriving to camp late it went rather well even if Harriet did keep having nightmares and dreams about Camelot, although it wasn't anywhere near as bad as Morgana had expected.
After the expedition, Morgana drove to the graveyard given that it was on the way back to her new "home". She quickly found Arthur and Gwen's graves given that it was only recently that they had been buried.
"Hey bro" Morgana greeted. "It's uh ... been a rough few days. One of the pupils is probably Mordred and it's so damned complicated. I don't know how to deal with it". She sighed as she looked down at her brother's grave before she went to Gwen's, reading her headstone.
"The past doesn't define you. Only now does. Don't dwell on the mistakes, learn form them".
Merlin had had a rough few days to put it lightly. Amhar was teething, again and was rather fussy, cried whenever Merlin carried him and refused to sleep again unless he was in Merlin's bed. He had to ask his mother to come down and help him with the baby given that he was being rather fussy most of the time—either crying or being grizzly when normally he was a rather happy baby. It turned out in the end that the baby was teething again—Hunith had frozen some strawberries and given them to the baby. While the first day was mired in chaos, in the end Merlin was getting on rather well with the baby, holding his hands as he walked and happily playing.
Nonetheless, this didn't exactly cheer Merlin up. He wasn't sleeping too well, and often felt rather lost without Arthur. He had no destiny. Yet as he looked down at the baby who flashed him a toothy-gummy smile, he knew. Everything would work out.