a/n: in academia, it's called a deadline because by the time you turn your work in, you're dead. right?

anyway - motivation is hard, uni is hard, online learning is exhausting, and i'm also currently applying for an internship in norway and, let me tell you, writing a +100k fic is a whole lot easier than that. seriously. want a novel? sure. want a cover letter? i'd rather do another semester with my asshole marketing prof, thanks.

regardless: have fun! four chapters to go!


Her head hurt. Like her skull had been recently split open with hammer and nail and left like that, every nerve raw and aggravated, exposed. It made her think of a rotten corpse, for some reason. Ugh.

Around her, near-deafening noise, which only made the pain worse the longer she focused on it, trying to find out where she was until she couldn't take it any longer.

Darja blinked, opening her eyes, squinting at the bright light. Shit. How much time had passed? Too much, in any case. Then again, there wasn't much she could do about it when she had been unconscious, was there?

Slowly, she inhaled. It suspiciously looked like an air plane. And it suspiciously sounded like one, too, now that she was thinking about it.

She didn't know if she was upset about it or not. Somehow, it wasn't the worst thing that had happened to her – at least technically it wasn't, but being stuck in a plane against your will usually wasn't a testimony to how well things were going.

Her stomach dropped and curled, white and hot and angry, one way to get past the fear threatening to settle in her bones. There was no time for that. Fear wouldn't help her getting out of this.

Alright. She flexed her muscles. Some strained, nothing major. Her knives were still there. As was her gun. That was … highly unusual and possibly a very stupid move, but good for her. People normally didn't let you keep your weapons when they knew you were a hitman. Sure, she could strangle someone with her bare hands, if she had to, but in her current situation that didn't seem like the smartest move she could make.

She checked the magazine, realizing that it was empty – right. Right. She remembered.

Swallowing, she glanced around. Small plane, no one else back here but her. Probably, that meant that someone was flying this thing. If not … well, she'd rather not think about that.

Maybe, if she remembered enough about how flying worked, she could keep this thing in the air for a while. But that didn't solve the problem that she didn't know where she was, where it had taken off, and where it was going.

Fuck.

Darja breathed in deeply, calming her heartbeat. First, she needed to find out what had happened and why she was here. If there was a pilot, she was going to get that information from them. She could worry about the rest if she got to it. She'd been trained to do this – to kill – for years, she'd been trained to cut off all unnecessary emotions and thoughts and focus.

She undid the seatbelt, attempting to listen past the roar of the engine. Older model then? Or it was saying some unfortunate things about the construction.

Silently, she stood, before checking the cabin thoroughly. Just to make sure. It was odd that anyone would leave her alone, armed, and give her a whole lot of advantages that way, but it did seem there were no traps set, nothing to hinder her. So either she was missing something painfully obvious or she was dealing with one of the most stupid people she had ever met.

Fine. No distractions. She needed to pull this off convincingly. She couldn't doubt herself.

Carefully, she approached the cockpit, limiting the amount of noise she made – it was probably swallowed by the engine anyway. It was messing with her, the lack of absolute quiet. Even the thrum of her own heartbeat was lost.

Darja drew one of her knives, putting the other hand against the handle. Cold. The door swung open.

One pilot. Didn't seem to notice her. Too good to be true. Was she missing something? She had to be.

She approached regardless, holding the blade against his throat.

He froze. Surprised. Not shocked. But he made no move to attack. He looked familiar; the man who had seemed so guilty just from standing next to her.

"Here's the deal," she said. "You get me back where I need to be and I maybe don't kill you." It was a promise she could keep, because she had said maybe – he was creepy, looking at her like he thought he knew something significant about her that she didn't.

"I can't," he replied.

Darja pressed the knife into his skin until it drew blood. "You will." She glared, swallowing the panic and fear; it was out of her control whether he fell for it or not and she hated it so much that it made her sick. This was probably one of the greatest gambles she had taken, playing on someone's guilt rather than their fear and unwillingness to die. The latter were much more predictable, much easier to manipulate.

"That would be suicide," he argued.

"I wasn't making a suggestion." Cold and angry. Good. She meant it, meant to sound like that. If she was right and he felt bad enough, it would work out just fine. So, she just needed to be right. Didn't stop her heart from beating hard.

"My name is Dmitri," he said.

"I know. I don't care." Patience – she needed to be patient, silent, wait this out, no matter how much her instincts were telling her not to, no matter how much she wanted to rush it, because she had an awful feeling about the situation. Rushing could ruin it. Yet, she had the nagging feeling of running out of time.

For a long moment, there was silence. Her skin crawled. Her nerves were strained and raw and each breath felt like a thousand needles under her skin, digging into her muscles before grinding to a halt – she had been afraid before, she had been terrified before, and she had worried about herself dying and other people dying but neither of these things had ever taken such a toll on her like this right now did. In the back of her mind, she remembered a conversation she had had a long time ago, and wondered if she only now had something she was legitimately scared of losing.

"I have to tell you something."

"I figured," she answered and glared at him. "I don't want to know."

He sighed. "I am your father."

"So?" she replied. "There's a chance you might, but there is also a sizeable chance that you aren't. Why should I give a shit when you've never done any fatherly thing in my life, except show up all of a sudden and be a creep about it?" Anger burned through her throat, white-hot-raging, back from where she buried it as a kid.

He stammered.

"If you keep talking, I am going to kill you," she told him and he shut up. "I don't give a shit about a single thing that could come of your mouth."

For now, the best she could do was pretend that this had never happened until there was a good moment to deal with it, which was probably never, since there was never enough time to breathe in her life, but she didn't care either way. It didn't matter, to her.

After another long moment, he turned around the plane, adjusting some settings.

Her heart proceeded to beat harder against her ribs; she didn't trust him but she did have to, to some degree here, because she had no way of making sure that he wasn't going to screw her over. Fucking great.

The silence persisted.


Bone-deep agony shook him from unconsciousness, slowly forcing him back into the waking world. His memories were fuzzy, incomplete, parts of a monochrome five thousand piece puzzle he had to put together but trying only made his headache worse. It already felt like someone drilling a hole into his skull.

Merlin breathed, deeply – once, twice, three times until the pain subsided. Briefly. The moment he thought about something, it returned with full force.

Carefully, he opened his eyes: a room with bare walls, fractured light beams. No lamps, nothing else. Just the cold and hard ground and him.

He sat up, surprised not to find himself restrained. However, when he checked, he found he had been left without weapons. Reasonable to expect, yes, but that did little to calm him; he had been captured once, when he had been a field agent during the Cold War. Harry had gotten him out. Now, he needed to get himself out.

A sharp pain shot through his head. He stilled, waiting for the moment to be over.

Gently, he reached up, touching the back of his skull. Dried blood. It matched his memories: a shattered wind-shield, the world having turned ninety degrees. Dread lurched in his stomach at the sudden realization that he was alone. The fear settled into his marrow, the worry, the doubt.

He swallowed. There was no time for that. Merlin was confident that he could salvage this situation, somehow, he had not made it this far without his quick thinking, so he couldn't allow himself to cloud his judgement and limit his options with these emotions. Still, they persisted, with every beat of his heart like a knife thrust through his skin.

He pushed himself to his feet. Slowly, steadily, standing motionless for a moment to make sure he kept his balance. The room itself did not strike him as anything remarkable, nothing indicating where he could be.

Most importantly, he still had his mind, which was, technically, all he needed. Now, he just had to find a starting point from which he could get to a solution – yet, the bad thoughts were already gnawing at him again, sinking their teeth into him until he found himself wondering how he was going to deal with any of this.

Merlin breathed. And waited. And checked the walls, attempting to reach the small window with no success.

What were his chances, in this mess? If he was right and this was indeed the doing of a man he had thought dead for nearly two decades, he truly had no idea what to expect. Something about revenge seemed reasonable, but this had been brewing for years and he got the impression that it was going to be a cruel affair. And – it wasn't like he didn't understand, his mistake had costed the lives of people an agent had held dear, but why wait so long? The man had not seemed to hold it against him at the time.

It would not be fair judgement, and while he was ready to accept what he had coming for a foolish mistake – as ready as someone could be who still felt guilty about it – yet, even considering it, made his stomach curl like barbed wire. No. That wouldn't be right.

For the moment, though, he could do nothing except wait. And so he waited, waited and waited and waited until it all turned into an eternal loop, stretched so thin he was beginning to slip through the cracks; it felt as if the world stood still. The light barely changed. Perhaps he had lost his perception of time, perhaps it was a deliberate act. He knew little about the thought process of cruel men, as he wasn't one.

Eventually, his eyes shut and he fell asleep, the pain and exhaustion overwhelming him – his dreams were nightmares, all blood and dead bodies and a shattered wind-shield, world spinning, and the bitter taste of panic in his throat.

The ache in his head had become duller when he woke up, instead spreading to his joints and limps, now stiff and brittle like ice, thoughts numb. Every nerve in his body was raw and exposed.

He wasn't alone any longer. There were two bodies on the floor; Merlin recognized them. His heart sank in his chest. Was it concern, seething through his veins? Or was it fear?

Why were they here? How had they ended up like him?

And what had happened to the other agents: were they bound to show up here, too? Perhaps. It was to be expected, at this point. But, if this truly was about the people he cared for, where was Darja? Her absence was akin to a glaring hole in the fabric of the world, no matter how much he tried not to think about it. She needed no protection, so all he could do now was trust in her.

He sat there, unmoving, attempting not to let his thoughts run wild upon imagining how much worse it could get but he failed to do so – the doubts came crawling again. What if he had failed somewhere along the way, failed to notice all the signs that should have let him to realize the gravity of the situation much sooner? What if he had failed all of them? Merlin had sworn to never let that happen again but now his hands were bound and his options limited and the guilt drowning him, all of it pressuring him to give in.

But he couldn't do that. They would all die, if he gave up.

So he breathed, ignoring the aching of his body and all the small voices whispering reasons why he had already lost, and stood up. The room felt smaller now, as if the walls had moved in.

Cautiously, he knelt down next to the agents, relieved to find that they both were alive – no lethal injuries, no great amount of blood, still breathing. That was good.

Merlin shook them awake. "Easy," he told them, which seemed to do the opposite of what he had intended – their eyes snapped open and they shot up, complaining about the pain the very next moment.

"Merlin," Roxy said and stared at him and he realized that they must have thought him dead.

The need to apologize rushed up his throat, ultimately choked down by the knowledge that this was neither time nor place to do so.

"What happened to you?" Eggsy asked. "Where are we?"

"I don't know," he replied, feeling the words crushing him. No matter. He had to work it out. "How are you feeling?"

"My head hurts," Eggsy muttered, touching the back of his skull – his fingers came away clean.

Roxy reached for her injured shoulder and flinched. "What's the plan?" she asked, both of them looking at him.

He paused for a moment, getting his thoughts in order. He had not thought that far yet and he had too little information to craft a plan on the spot that he would not regret later, so … he was not sure how to proceed. And, while he had filled Arthur's role for long enough, it did not meant that he was any more made for it than he had been a year and a half ago.

"I … am not sure," he admitted, the weight of it slowly crumbling from his shoulders.

The silence that settled in response was heavy enough that he felt it pressing against his chest, pushing the air out of his lungs. For the longest time, he had thought he might as well admit all his weaknesses, because his whole job had been to know everything, but it was only now that he became aware that it wasn't; Darja had taught him as much, without ever trying to.

"Where is everyone else?" Roxy asked, having surveyed the room. "If this is about Kingsman, the other agents should be here too, shouldn't they?"

"It's not," he replied, "about Kingsman."

"No?" Her voice was quiet.

He didn't want to tell them, didn't want to let them in on this secret, didn't want them to know, didn't want … he didn't know.

"It's," he said, drawing in a jagged breath that stung in his lungs, "about me."

"Why do you think that?" she asked carefully, and he was wondering if he should have kept it to himself, because it was neither their business and fault, but, he reasoned, that they should know, because they had ended up in this mess with him, so it was the least he could do. And yet-

"Are you alright?" Eggsy studied him, having probably already realized that he wasn't.

For a moment, Merlin considered answering that, only to fail to come up with words. No, he wasn't alright and this was probably the worst situation he had ever found himself in, because everything about his usual approach had been carefully countered until he was left with nothing, and he hated it and he hated that he felt so strongly about it.

"Merlin," he said in a serious tone, "it's going to be fine."

He managed a smile, only barely, before it flickered off his face like a light bulb dying. Merlin was glad to have them with him, but when he thought of saying it, it sounded all wrong, so he simply cleared his throat instead.

"Right," he said, sorting his thoughts, scanning the room again. They needed to get out of here as quickly as possible. The questions was how. "We need to find a way out."

The two agents nodded, and the three of them got to work. No means of escape had suddenly revealed itself, no exit had suddenly appeared – they were stuck in this perfectly sealed room where the light never changed.

It was to be expected. And, yet, panic started to rise bitterly in his throat until it was choking him, twisting his stomach. Was it all for nothing? Everything he had done, all he had learned? He didn't want it to be true, he didn't want it all to be for nothing-

"Merlin?" Eggsy asked from the other end of the room. There was a grim expression on his face. "A while ago you said something about a spy."

He had nearly forgotten about it, thinking none of the current members capable of treason – he had assumed any traitors would have acted when Arthur had, not be involved with an entirely new scheme.

"Yes," he replied slowly.

"It's either Kay, Tristan, or Lamorak," the agent concluded. Roxy nodded.

It could also be one of the agents still in the field, he reasoned with himself, but it seemed unlikely. Then again, all options seemed unlikely to him – one of them had slipped past them countless times, lying to their faces and messing with his systems for months on end without raising as much as a single thought of doubt. It made him sick.

"I don't think it's Kay," Eggsy announced. "He's a wanker, but he can't even admit that a woman does a better job than him." His tone conveyed his annoyance so clearly, Merlin couldn't help but snort.

Kay had been someone he had briefly suspected himself, but ultimately disregarded him along with Lamorak because he doubted either of them had enough knowledge of coding to bypass his security despite being highly trained agents, so they could have hidden the ability – Tristan had never been a consideration, always polite and proper, even had given his consolations after Arthur and yet …

He was thinking in circles, locking him into a cycle of 'this didn't make sense and neither did this, but it still could be possible that' he would never solve because there was no answer, no evidence, no way to prove one thing or another. It would only make him go mad, and that was the last thing he needed.

Merlin breathed. Slowly. Steadily. Trying to untie that knot in his stomach, trying to make himself less sick, trying to function. Because, if he stopped to think about why he was so miserable, he would sink like a stone in a lake.

Was there a noise? He listened into the silence, his dreaded suspicion proved right – steps. Approaching steps, gradually growing louder and louder.

The two agents froze, gazes snapping to him; they had heard it too.

What was he supposed to do? A fight would end badly for them, at such a disadvantage as they were, and there was nowhere to run, yet only considering to surrender made him want to throw up. Merlin didn't want to, there was no guarantee that they would be spared if they did.

"What do we do?"

Merlin didn't know because nothing was right-

Decision. Now. Important. His racing thoughts were like daggers sinking into the base of his neck, paralysing him. He didn't know enough, lives depended on him, he needed to make one, it was all so terribly wrong, adrenaline in his veins, he hadn't been in the field in years-

"Stay calm," he uttered. "No sudden movements. Say nothing." Was it the best decision? He was going to torment himself over it if something went wrong.

The door opened.

Merlin held his breath.

A group of people with bullet-proofed vests, helmets, and guns. "Move," one of them said. A man. He didn't sound familiar.

They moved.

Gradually, their surroundings changed: less red bricks, more barren white and steel that reminded him of the underground Kingsman network – it wasn't the very same, luckily, but that would have at least told them where they were. Like this, he still had no idea. What was this place and what purpose did it serve?

More importantly, was there a way of escape that didn't risk their lives? No matter how he thought about it, it seemed like there wasn't; a fight was risky, because, if they didn't disarm their opponents fast enough … well.

The lights were replaced by nearly white bulbs. The atmosphere turned colder, clinical even. Fear nestled itself into his chest, lazily running its claws over his ribs. Throwing a glance behind him, he only found an empty hallway. Worry seethed into his veins; when had they disappeared? Were they all right?

He was so sick of being caught in this twisted game, with no other option than to play along; he wanted to break out of it and check for his agents, to make sure they were save, he wanted to no longer play a part. Perhaps he could overwhelm the guard with the element of surprise on his side, but there was a reason he had done much better when not in the field.

The hallway turned around a corner, opening up into a room with a table in the middle.

He froze.

The man behind the table was the same he had thought dead for twenty years – but he was alive. His hair had turned grey, his eyes had sunken back into his skull, dark and emotionless as he was staring at him: he looked like the very epitome of a ghost. Merlin didn't believe in ghosts, though.

It felt as if all mistakes he had made had culminated in this moment, to sink like daggers into his chest, over and over again. All the guilt and doubt filled his brain, until all he could think was that he screwed up, that he should have noticed it sooner, that it was all his fault and that he could do nothing about it.

He hated it. Yet he swallowed, breathed, pushed past it, because he didn't want to give in, couldn't give in. For all the people who depended on him, for all the things he had left undone. For noble reasons, for selfish reason, for the regrets he held now.

"Hello, Merlin," Barlow said with a pleasant smile. "It has been a while, hasn't it?"

He swallowed the sharp reply on the tip of his tongue; it was so utterly fucked up.

"Sit down," he continued, and Merlin, not eager to get shot, reluctantly crossed the room to sit in the empty chair. The guard hadn't moved with him.

There was a chessboard, set for a game.

"Tell me, Merlin," Barlow said now, perfectly still and content, "have you found something that you hold dear?"

He didn't reply, for he knew that it would not make it any better; if the silence helped, he couldn't tell. Wasn't too sure there were any right decisions he could make here.

"Let's find out, shall we?" he asked eventually with a smile that made his stomach turn.