Doctor G. Orwell.
Merlin stood in front of the door nervously. He glanced down at the piece of paper in his hand before knocking tentatively on the door. A voice sounded from within the office.
"It's open, come in."
Merlin opened the door, there were books lying all over the floor and every visible surface, herbs stacked onto shelves. Merlin looked up where a loft/catwalk around the north edge of the room had been filled with bookshelves. Merlin took a deep breath; it smelled like home, books, herbs, and a faint smell of old man.
Speaking of old men Dr. Orwell emerged from a wardrobe carrying a heavy chest.
"Ah… Sorry about the wait. How can I help you?" He smiled setting the chest on the heavy oak desk.
"G-Gaius?" Merlin stuttered.
"That's Dr. Orwell to you."
"Yes, of course sir." Merlin smiled.
"Now, what do you want, why are you here?" Dr. Orwell said squinting in the direction of Merlin before rummaging through some books.
"Uh… I'm Colin… Colin Grace, I applied for the assistant's position…" Merlin said. Dr. Orwell nodded.
"You're not meant to be here till Wednesday." Dr. Orwell said turning suddenly and looking at Merlin. This caused Merlin to grin.
"It is Wednesday." He said. Dr. Orwell jumped.
"Oh, bless me twice and call me a Afanc," Dr. Orwell bustled around the room clearing off a chair, "Sit down, sit down, I must confess, you weren't quite what I expected."
"Who were you expecting?" Merlin said not sure if he should be offended.
"I'm not sure myself, you just seemed older as we communicated through e-mail, but you're just a boy. Of course I knew that, being that your age is on your application and all, but I guess I just wasn't expecting someone so young. I was very impressed with your transcripts young man, I should say, I am expecting great things of you." Dr. Orwell shuffled over to a pile of papers.
"Thank you Sir." Merlin replied. Dr. Orwell pulled a measure of the papers from the stack.
"Now, these are papers that I have to grade, the answer key is on top, just go through and check the ones that are wrong. For the essay questions… well I trust you know this material well enough to figure it out, these are just first year students after all. If you have any questions don't hesitate to ask, I'll be working on my own stack over here." Dr. Orwell said gesturing to his desk, "Feel free to use any space you can find, it's a proper mess this room. We'll have to work on cleaning it up before too long."
Merlin smiled and nodded surveying the room for a clear spot. The only other clear spot was across from Dr. Orwell. Merlin sat tentatively at the desk and began going through papers, Dr. Orwell gave him a familiar smile from across the desk as they proceeded to grade.
(this is a line break. This has been public service announcement from YFC)
"I can't stress this to you any more than I already have, you need to get a tutor!" Arthur raged glaring down at Gwaine, "You're failing calculus and when you fail a class, I can't keep you on the team! It's honestly not that hard! Go talk to your professor, ask him to recommend you a tutor, you go to the tutor, you get help, you don't keep failing calculus and you keep your spot on this team. You're part of this round table Gwaine, one of our best, now stow your foolish pride and do the work. How are you even failing? We've barely been in classes for two weeks!"
Gwaine gave an easy smile.
"Well you see, it was this beautiful…"
Arthur threw a shirt into Gwaine's face.
"That was rhetorical." Gwaine continued to grin,.
"Don't worry, I'll find a tutor." Gwaine smiled.
"See to it that you do." Arthur growled walking off as practice ended to the showers. He was sick of Gwaine's attitude, yet, every year he managed to pass all of his classes, Arthur suspected bribery of some sort, yet he knew Gwaine could do the work, it was a question of applying himself.
The shower erased the sticky feeling of sweat on his body as Arthur stood thinking under the cool spray. As he cooled down he washed his body, his hand running over his torso pausing over an irregularity in the skin.
Stopping he felt the mark, just under where his ribcage ended, a slightly raised birthmark. Strangely enough there were no nerve endings in this area, Doctors always mistook it for a stab wound. Arthur shook his head and continued washing dunking his head under the water and letting it cool his thoughts.
The sound of Gwaine entering the locker room shook him out of his stupor with his loud banging.
"Hey Princess!" Gwaine yelled banging on his shower door, "You're girlfriend is here to see you, stop showering like a woman and get out here!"
"I haven't even been in here for three minutes, and don't let Gwen or Morgan hear you say anything like that, they'll have your head, and then mine." Arthur shouted from inside the stall rinsing the last of the soap off of his body before turning the water off.
"Also, Leon is thinking of going for pizza, invite the new recruits, scare the hell out of them." Gwaine continued leaning on the outside of the stall as Arthur grabbed his towel from the side.
"Excellent plan. Tonight?" Arthur inquired.
"No, this weekend. Leon has a hot date tonight, and for that matter, so do I." Gwaine continued. Arthur opened the stall pushing Gwaine out of the way as he did so, towel wrapped around his mid-section.
"When don't you have a hot date Gwaine?" Arthur said with a roll of is eyes.
"Well… this weekend, but only because Leon swore if I wasn't there he'd take my manhood." Gwaine said as Arthur reached his locker.
"Same old Gwaine." Arthur sighed opening his locker and pulling out clothes.
"Oi! I just had a thought… my roommate is this big brainy guy, strange as hell… anyway, maybe he could tutor me, then at least I wouldn't have to make any extra effort to go see a tutor." Gwaine said.
"Well, stop going drinking," Arthur started as he pulled a shirt over his head, "and maybe you'll get something out more out of your schooling."
"Arthur, Arthur, Arthur, it's like you don't know me at all." Gwaine tutted.
"Worth a try." Arthur shrugged with a smile as he pulled on some pants.
"Poor effort." Gwaine criticized as Arthur pulled on some trousers.
"Go tell Gwen I'll be out in a minute." Arthur said exasperated.
"Aye sir." Gwaine said saluting and sauntering out.
Arthur sighed pulling on his socks and taking out shoes, he then pulled his bag from the locker and shouldered it walking out to meet Gwen.
"There you are." Gwen smiled, "Been waiting out here for hours now, I've worked up quite the appetite."
"Gwen." Arthur smiled, "Nice to see I'm missed." He took Gwen's hand, "Lunch?" he asked.
"Lunch." Gwen agreed walking out with him.
(We're not gonna stand is silence!)
Merlin looked up as his roommate made a noisy entrance to the room.
"Gwaine?" Merlin asked.
"Colin…" He cocked his head to the side, "How do you know my middle name?"
"Your… oh. Right… musta been from one of your friends." Merlin covered.
"Right. I suppose his royal highness has come calling before." Michael, now revealed to also be called Gwaine, shrugged.
"Must have. I've been busy as of late, a bit scatter brained." Merlin said gesturing to the piles of books surrounding him and the papers scattered about the couch.
"Yeah… I know that. But I was hoping you'd do me a favor." Gwaine said plopping into the beanbag he'd supplied to the room.
"Yeah… depends, what is it?" Merlin answered.
"The thing is Colin…" Gwaine took a deep breath, "I'm failing some classes, I was sort of hoping you'd be able to help me out."
"Yeah… what classes?" Merlin said glancing up from his own pile of homework.
"Well… Calculus for starters." Gwaine winced.
"I've always hated Calculus." Merlin grumbled shifting some papers around, "Fortunately for you I also happen to be good at it." Merlin gave him a grin from his papers.
"Oh, thank you Colin, you're a life saver." Gwaine smiled, "Also… I'm failing a class called… Camelot, Crusades and Witchcraft." Merlin raised his eyebrows.
"Really?" Merlin raised an eyebrow.
"Yeah, funny, I thought it would be a fun class, I've always been fascinated about Camelot and the Knights, I thought it would be a fun class especially at this school… but the way the professor teaches it is so dry." Gwaine complained.
"Yeah… A'right." Merlin nodded.
"You're the best Colin." Gwaine praised.
"It's good to be the best." Merlin joked turning back to his papers. Gwaine smiled.
"Right… I think I'll turn in for the night." Gwaine said as if he were really going to bed.
"Give your new girlfriend my regards." Merlin nodded knowingly. Gwaine smiled leaving the room, as the door closed two extra pencils picked themselves up and began to scratch words across two different papers. Merlin's eyes darted to the different books around him and sighed. Tomorrow was going to be a long day.
(We're not gonna live in fear!)
Arthur was having a bad day.
His father had called that morning going on about Arthur's performance, it seemed no matter what he did, it was never good enough for the man.
Afterward some underclassmen had thought it would be funny to flush all of the toilet paper down the toilets in the dorm loo the night before, which had far from amused him. He'd spent the entire morning tracking down the miscreants that did it yelling and punishing them until their smug looks turned to shame.
In addition to this he had nearly failed the first test in his Criminology class and if his own disappointment in himself wasn't enough, his professor, an old friend of his father, had taken it upon himself to express his expectations and to inform Arthur that his test score had failed to meet them.
He had then pushed himself during his morning work out, training over and over, spending hours in the gym and running to push his mind off things, and shockingly, he had become sore. More sore than he'd been in ages.
Yes, it would be more than fair to say that Arthur was having a bad day.
So when some bumbling idiot fell in front of him causing Arthur to trip over him and resulting in both of them to be a tangled mess, Arthur was far from pleased.
(dun dun dun)
Merlin trudged across campus holding a pile of books in his arms trying to shove half of them into his bag, the other half balanced precariously in one arm and a tea balanced dangerously between the books and the crook of his arm. It had been a long week, better than some, worse than some, but still long. He cast a distracted look upward and what he saw caused him to loose grip of his books. Unfortunately, what he saw did not quite cause him to freeze and Merlin took a step forward tripping over his fallen books. Still in shock he blinked a few times before trying to get up when a terrible pain erupted in his side and he suddenly found himself unable to breathe.
"Are you and idiot?" came a familiar tone. Merlin gasped, partly from recognizing that voice, partly from the fact that the owner of the voice's knee was still firmly planted in his side. Both young men struggled to get upright, with Merlin's gangly legs only managed to make matters worse.
"Oi! What are you doing?" came that voice again, Merlin continued to struggle and as the two became disentangled and blue eyes met blue. Merlin's breath caught in his throat.
"Are you deaf as well as dumb?" the blonde growled. Merlin scrambled to pick up the spilled books.
"Are you usually such a prat?" Merlin responded. At this the blonde became sarcastic.
"No, not usually, but for you I'll make and exception." the blonde was holding his shirt away from his body, Merlin realized that the wet stain that has spread across the shirt was the sad remains of his tea.
"I've spilled tea on you." Merlin balked.
"Really? I hadn't noticed?" The blonde scoffed. Merlin finished shoving books into his bag, the seams straining in protest.
"Are you alright?" Merlin asked.
"Other than being drenched in hot tea, fabulous." The blonde griped, trying to dry his shirt.
"I'll have that cleaned for you… I am so sorry." Merlin apologized.
"Yeah… fine…" Arthur sighed.
"I'm Colin." Merlin said holding out a hand.
"Arthur." Arthur returned the handshake briefly before angrily glaring down at his shirt and rubbing it with the palm of his hand.
"Let me," Merlin dug through his bag bringing out an old neckerchief and attempting to sop up Arthur's shirt.
"You're terrible at this." Arthur grumbled.
"It's a bit hard to wash a shirt when it's on a person." Merlin quipped back.
"Follow me to fencing practice, when I change then you can wash the shirt." Arthur said pulling the shirt back.
"Right… ok." Merlin nodded. Arthur led him briskly through campus.
"So… what are you majoring in?" Merlin made conversation as they walked.
"Criminology. My father is the chief inspector, he expects me to follow in his footsteps." Arthur said curtly.
"Do you want to be an inspector?" Merlin asked.
"What? Of course I do! Not just because it's expected of me mind you. I want to be able to help people. Its something I've wanted to do since I was a child." Arthur defended.
"Admirable." Merlin said with a nod, Arthur gave Merlin a glance over, thinking that Merlin was being sarcastic.
"What do you want to do Col-lin, surely they don't offer degrees in stupidity." Arthur teased.
"Well seeing as they offer degrees in being an arse I thought I'd go for one in combating arseholery. I'm actually studying to be a doctor." Merlin responded without missing a beat.
"Did you just call me an arse?" Arthur paused giving Merlin a strange look. Merlin stopped as well looking Arthur up and down. The same sandy blonde hair, the same aristocratic blue eyes, the same posture, the same everything. But this was not his Arthur. Merlin sighed.
"Just a bit, yeah." He responded turning his gaze away.
"Well I suppose I earned a bit of that." Arthur responded, Merlin raised his eyes to Arthur's giving a smile, "But you're still an idiot." Arthur said as not to seem too nice while he opened the door to the locker rooms. Merlin laughed.
"And you're still a prat."
Seems like a good place to leave off.
Sorry for the long wait in the update. Don't expect another one too soon.