"Hello, Gran!" the Doctor yelped, bouncing into Jeff's room. "Jeff, you're still here, lovely, I've found someone to meet you!"
Jeff scowled and looked up. "Doctor, you've hacked in on a top-secret international call between some of the world's most important people, and you're playing matchmaker? Doctor, the President's been on here! The American one!"
The Doctor looked mildly impressed, then replied, "I'm not matchmaking, Jeff, unless you – well, from what I saw earlier, you're very ungay – sorry, I'm wittering on, could talk for ages about gay people – Oscar Wilde, he was brilliant, what a laugh. Loved a drink. Or eight. Anyway, no, it's not matchmaking. Silly Jeff."
A crackly voice broke the ensuing silence: "Who was your lady friend?"
"Patrick, behave!" the Doctor said, waving a finger at the screen absent-mindedly. "Now, Jeff, don't go fainting or anything. We don't want that. Are you ready?"
"U-um, yeah,"
"Good." The Doctor glanced towards the door. "Merlin?"
Jeff gasped as possibly the best-looking man he'd ever seen walked into the room. He was very tall, and thin – not unlike Slenderman – and he had dark hair that fell casually over adorable, large ears. The bluest eyes Jeff had ever seen pierced out from his face, emphasized by dark eyelashes and the sharpest cheekbones Jeff could ever have imagined. The Doctor's friend was gorgeous.
"Jeff, this is Merlin. Merlin, Jeff, although you know him better by—"
"Percival," breathed Merlin.
"It's, um, Jeff. But Percival's OK."
Merlin shook his head slightly. "You just look a lot like someone I used to know." He laughed slightly. "A very long time ago."
Jeff smiled shyly. "I wish I had known you a long time ago."
Abruptly, the Doctor interrupted, sitting down heavily on the bed next to Jeff. "Right, Jeff, listen. You too, Merlin, we'll need your help. Jeff, listen to me. In ten minutes, you're going to be a legend. In ten minutes, everyone on that screen is going to be offering you any job you want. But first, you have to be magnificent-"
Merlin cut in, "I don't think Jeff will find that a problem." Jeff couldn't help but notice how Merlin's eyes lit up when he said that.
"-yes, Merlin, I'm sure he won't. Jeff, you have to make them trust you – get them working. This is it, Jeff. Right here, right now. This is when you fly. Today's the day you save the world. But before that, Merlin's got something to –" he faltered slightly " – to show you, right, Merlin?"
Merlin nodded slowly, elegantly. "We really, really need your help, OK, Jeff?" his voice had a slight Irish lilt, an almost sing-song quality.
Jeff attempted to mirror Merlin's graceful head-nodding movement. "What is it?"
The Doctor grinned playfully. "Jeff. We're going to make you remember."
He frowned. "Remember what?"
Planting himself carefully on the bed, the Doctor turned to Jeff and smiled softly. "Remember the king."
Sunlight glinting against blond hair and sharp silver. The crunch of knights' boots and horses' hooves on gravel paths, the scent of pinewood and spring foliage carried on the musky spring breeze. A procession of men in chainmail and red, carrying shields emblazoned with golden dragons, led by a boy – a man, even – who seemed to have personified the golden dragon himself, with his courage and strength and the fire that burned in him, the fire of thousands of years of royalty that could be quenched by no mortal hand.
Every image Jeff saw was nearly tangible, wisps of hazy smoke spiralled over it, obscuring the brief glimpses of faces he caught. Blue eyes, bright and clear like springwater, smooth ebony skin and powerful jawlines, the broadest shoulders Jeff had ever seen. Suddenly – before he was ready, before craving for more had been satisfied – the images distorted and curled upwards, twisting and fading until they nearly faded – until they were replaced with different images.
The same men, but in various states of death. Blood smeared the face of the dark-skinned man, whose strength appeared to have been sapped in what looked like battle, like war. The beast of a man with those incredible broad shoulders lay on his side, with wounds that were long and deep breaking various areas of his skin. The owner of those blue eyes, that blond hair, stumbled, alone, through the bodies – both living and dead – of his men, his hand pressed against the spot where a sword had bitten his side. Blood gushed from it, and his face was no longer beautiful and brave, but bruised, bloodied, broken. The entire picture warped and crumpled as the blond-haired man fell to the ground, and the last swirls of life ebbed out of him.
Jeff's vision snapped as Merlin's cool fingers left his temples. They looked into each other's eyes, and Jeff saw a burning intensity in Merlin's that almost scared him.
"Merlin." The Doctor's voice came quiet and kind. "Did Jeff see exactly what you saw?"
"Most of it. The important parts. The Knights, and the Battle of Camlann. Elyan, Gwaine, Percival."
"And Arthur?"
The fire in Merlin's eyes was replaced with water as they flooded with tears. "And Arthur," he whispered, rubbing his eyes fiercely. "I'm sorry," he said, turning to Jeff. "But he –" the Doctor cleared his throat loudly "-we thought you needed to see."
"But—" Jeff frowned. "What was it? That I had to see, I mean."
Merlin bit his lip. The action was adorable, and Jeff felt his stomach somersault with desire.
"It was you, Jeff. Before you came here."
"What?" he looked up the Doctor, then back at Merlin, desperate for either of them to expand, to explain, to tell him what mind games they were playing and why they were so important. That is, if they were important at all, and not just some test of the Doctor's, some sort of trial in which Jeff had to prove his worthiness.
The Doctor and Merlin exchanged subtle nods, and the latter of the two looked at Jeff, his eyes suddenly looking like the ones Jeff had so briefly glimpsed moments before.
"It's time for you to hear your story, Jeff."