~ Chapter 4: Testing ~

Dr. Nimueh's words were drowned out by the big, rugged, gasping sobs coming out of Hunith. She clutched Merlin's hands tightly now. Merlin's face was eerily blank as if what Dr. Nimueh had said short–circuited him or something. Arthur was every bit as blank as Merlin, but it was entirely for Merlin's benefit.

Dr. Nimueh was in no rush to leave. Between sobs, Arthur caught her saying that she was sorry, that they didn't know anything for sure, that a specialist would be able to give them more answers than she could.

Arthur climbed to his feet. He felt like he needed to do something or he'd climb out of his skin. He turned to face Merlin and met his gaze. Merlin was his best friend. He'd heard of kids getting cancer, but it wasn't anything he'd expected his best friend to get. It wasn't fair. He wanted to fall to pieces.

Instead, he turned to Dr. Nimueh. "This doctor. He'll be able to help Merlin? He'll tell us what to do?" He felt like he sounded like a little kid desperate for a false reassurance.

"My cousin works over there. Dr. Gaius. He's one of the best oncologists in the country. I can probably get you in to see him today. He won't be able to give you answers right away, but he'll get the ball rolling."

Arthur looked over at Hunith and Merlin. Hunith was in no position to say yes or no to anything, but she nodded, which was good enough. "When can Merlin see him?" Arthur asked.

"I'll make the call."

Once she was gone, Arthur turned his focus to Merlin. His heart was breaking for Hunith and for himself; he couldn't imagine the world without Merlin. It was a world he couldn't wrap his head around. As scary and lonely as that world seemed, he couldn't imagine how Merlin must be feeling. His whole world had just changed.

"Talk to me," Arthur said softly.

Merlin glanced at his mom and shook his head. "Not yet."

Shayla came in with a box of tissues. She gently touched Hunith's hand. "Do you want to go for a quick walk?"

Hunith nodded and accepted help from Shayla. Arthur could still hear Hunith's sobs after she left. He felt so helpless, but when he saw Merlin's crumbled face, he got to him just in time for him to fall to pieces. He wasn't as loud as Hunith had been, but he sobbed into Arthur's shoulder. When he calmed down, he whispered, "I'm not ready. I'm not ready to go."

Arthur didn't have to ask what he meant. "You're not going anywhere, okay? You're going to be fine. It's probably not even cancer. One little test like that can't be a diagnosis."

"But what if it is? What if I –" His question got caught off my Arthur's embrace.

"You're going to be fine." Arthur wasn't sure who he was trying to convince, but he repeated the words over and over again until they felt true.

They were still embracing when the nurse returned with Hunith which resulted in a whole nother set of sobs. "Oh. Oh," she cried.

Arthur desperately hoped Dr. Nimueh would be back soon because he felt like the best thing for all of them was to get far away from this place. As if his wish summoned her, she reappeared with a business card.

"I'm sorry. I know that this wasn't what you expected when you came in. I wish I had better news, but I needed to prepare you for that possibility." She looked like she was close to tears herself. "Whenever you get there, give them this business card. He'll see you the first chance he has. You might have to wait a while, but he works until 8 today, and he promised he'd see you before he leaves."

Hunith took the business card and nodded.

Dr. Nimueh took her hand. "As a mother, I know how scary this is. I wouldn't wish this on anyone, and I hope we're wrong. From the bottom of my heart, I hope we're wrong. We're not going to charge you for your visit today. Good luck."

"Thank you." Hunith shuffled, clearly not wanting to be there anymore.

Arthur carefully helped Merlin to his feet, and they followed Hunith out to the car. The hospital wasn't too far, but they were stuck in traffic which made Arthur antsy. He just wanted to get this over with because part of him knew there had to be a mistake; Merlin couldn't have cancer. This was something that might happen to other kids but not Merlin.

When they got there, Arthur directed Merlin to a seat near a huge aquarium. He knew Merlin loved animals, especially aquatic ones, so he hoped the exotic looking fish would be a distraction. Arthur did spend nearly an hour listening to Merlin point out different fish and tried to feign as much enthusiasm as he could when Merlin realized it was a saltwater aquarium.

Their reprieve was a temporary one. The fish could only distract Merlin for so long before his anxiety moved back in. Arthur wished he'd thought of something to bring with him; Bananagrams probably would've gone a long way toward distracting all of them.

Finally, an elderly looking man with long, white hair approached them. "Hello. I am Gaius, one of the oncologists here." Merlin and Arthur exchanged surprised glances; they hadn't expected to be greeted by an actual doctor. "You must be Merlin?"

"Y – yes," Merlin agreed. He shook the hand Gaius had extended.

"Why don't you all come back with me, and we can chat?"

Gaius ushered them into a small, crowded office. There was an assortment of stuff that ranged from teddy bears to playdoh to small rocks that seemed to crowd every surface. There was a long sofa against one wall and several chairs in front of a desk. It wasn't like any doctor's office Arthur had ever been in.

"Please sit down." Dr. Gaius didn't sit; instead he started to examine Merlin.

"My name is Hunith. I'm Merlin's mother. Dr. Gaius –"

"Please, just call me Gaius," he interrupted. "Dr. Gaius was my father and my grandfather and my great grandfather."

"Oh. Uh, Gaius, then. What happens now? Dr. Nimueh told us you'd be able to tell us our next steps."

Gaius pushed up his glasses. "That entirely depends on you and Merlin. I can tell you what I'd like to do, but this is your show. You get to call all of the shots."

"Then what would you like to do?"

"I'd like to admit Merlin. Not because of his CBC results but because he is clearly very ill. We need to get him on fluids and likely some antibiotics to get the infection." Merlin coughed loudly again. Arthur had almost started to tune out the cough as background noise because it didn't seem as serious as cancer. "That upper respiratory infection sounds pretty bad. It's hard for the human body to fight off more than one thing at once, especially when one of those things is cancer."

"So, that's what you think it is? You think it's cancer?"

"I can't say for sure, but in my experience, when blood counts look like this, it's usually cancer. I hope Merlin will be the first to prove me wrong." It took several seconds for his words to sink in. If Merlin would be the first… then it was always cancer. "If you agree to run some more tests while he's with us, I'll be able to tell you for sure whether it's cancer and which specific type it is. Then we can discuss treatment options."

"What tests do you need to run?" Arthur had expected Hunith to be overcome with sobs, but maybe she'd cried herself out because she'd pulled herself together. There was no trace of the woman driven to hysterics earlier.

Gaius went through a list of tests he wanted to run over the weekend. With every test, Gaius explained in depth what they were looking for or measuring, and he had Hunith sign something to say she understood and consented.

Once he'd gone through all of the tests – Arthur and Merlin hadn't tried to keep track of them – Gaius told them he'd be right back.

"Ms. Hunith?"

"You're never going to call me Hunith, are you?" She'd asked Arthur that question a thousand times, but Arthur could hear the desperation under her voice this time.

"No." Arthur usually tossed back something about her age and how it wouldn't be right to disrespect the elderly, which always earned him an eye roll. He didn't have it in him to do that today. "Can I borrow your phone? I want to let my mom know where we are?" Arthur had been begging for a cell phone, but his mom was sticking firmly to her no–phones–until–high–school rule, and Hunith had adopted the same rule for Merlin.

"Of course." She handed her entire purse over to Arthur. It felt like it weighed about a hundred tons. Arthur had seen what she'd been able to pull out of her bag – bandages, snacks, water bottles, a sewing kit, so he wasn't surprised. "It's in the side pocket."

Arthur fished it out and stepped out of the room. It took a couple of clicks before he found his mom. He wasn't thinking clearly, so he'd originally looked under 'm', and had stared at the contacts for Mike and Muriel for a long time trying to figure out why she wasn't there.

Igraine answered on the first ring. "Hey, Hunith. How's Merlin? Do you need me to come get Arthur?"

"Mom." Arthur's voice broke.

"What's wrong?"

"We're at the hospital. It's Merlin." There was a long pause and the sound of something heavy falling down. "You okay?"

"What happened?" Igraine sounded slightly breathless.

"They tested his blood, and there was something wrong with it. He's being tested for…" Arthur needed a second. He could feel tears burning in his eyes and couldn't fathom how he was supposed to tell her; cancer seemed like so much more than a word now. He took a deep breath. "He's being tested for cancer."

He wasn't sure he was audible, but his mother somehow caught every word of it. He heard the squeak of something in the background and the unmistakable sound of her engine turning on. It took him a full minute to understand that she was driving.

"Where are you going?" The moment he asked, he knew the answer. "Sorry. You're coming here, right? Is that okay? Don't you have a thing tonight with your book friend? It's the book you've been complaining about. The one with the serial killers and the sunflowers and, uh, wasn't one of them an artist who was killing people with his paintbrush?" He knew that wasn''t quite right; his mom had been complaining about it all month, but he felt like he could only remember snippets of it.

"Honey, I know you're scared, but you have to breathe. You're doing that thing you do when you're nervous."

"What thing?"

"The thing where you talk really fast about something completely unrelated to what you're going through. Breathe and tell me what's happening in your head."

Arthur let out the breath he didn't know he was holding. "What if he dies?" He couldn't fathom his life without Merlin. Their moms had raised them on stories about their childhood – how they'd shared a bassinet the day Merlin was born, how they played together when they were kids, the time that they'd drawn over one of the doors in Arthur's house with permanent marker. He was practically Arthur's brother. Merlin's school picture hung on the wall right next to Arthur's and the family photo hanging in his foyer was the four of them: Merlin, Arthur, Hunith, and Igraine all adorned with silly Santa hats. The idea of Merlin's presence being reduced to memories instead of new moments made Arthur's chest ache.

"You have to believe that he will be okay."

"But what if he's not? What will I do?"

"Listen to me, Arthur. You cannot think like that right now. We'll figure this out as we go along, but you can't lose the time you have with Merlin because you're focusing on having lost him. That might happen; I'm not going to lie to you, but Merlin needs you to believe in him. One day, you're going to want to look back on this and remember the time you spent living with Merlin. Living, Arthur. And hopefully, you'll be looking back on this with him."

"I don't know if I can do that."

"If you don't have faith in him, he won't have faith in himself. If you can't do it for yourself, do it for Merlin." Her words were sharp, but Arthur knew he needed to hear them.

"I know I have to be brave for him. I just… I can't lose him. I can't. I don't know who I am without him. He's my best friend."

For several minutes, they listened to the silence on the other end of the phone. "I'm parking by the main entrance. Meet me there?"

Arthur practically ran through the hospital to get to her. His mom would fix everything; she always knew exactly what to do. It was her super power.

Igraine was standing in front of the security guard's desk when Arthur got to the lobby. "Mom."

She spun to face him; her arms were already outstretched as some maternal instinct knew what he needed before he even did. He willingly threw himself into her embrace. He'd always been close with his mom, but Arthur felt like he hadn't hugged her in years. At some point, they'd traded hugs for time spent together. Arthur wasn't sure why they'd ever stopped, but he was so grateful for the familiarity and safety he felt in her arms. She was his tether as he fell apart and then slowly pulled himself back together.

When he felt like he'd gotten everything out, Arthur pulled back. He wiped his eyes as embarrassment crept through him. He wasn't a little kid anymore. He avoided looking at his mom as he said, "I can bring you back to them. They're in onc –" Arthur couldn't finish. It was strange to him that he hadn't known what oncology meant this morning, and it already had the power to leave him speechless.

When his mom was diagnosed with breast cancer, the word had never come up. Her experience with cancer was nothing like this. She had to get surgery and do a few weeks of radiation. Then she was fine. She'd never been as sick as Merlin.

"Sweetie, wait." She pulled Arthur back toward her. "It's going to be okay. No matter what happens, you're going to be okay." She kissed his forehead. "Lead the way."

Wordlessly, he started to head toward Gaius's office. When they got there, he found the room abandoned. Igraine hunted down someone who didn't look like a doctor but certainly walked around with an air of command. He led them to the room Merlin would be staying in.

The door was ajar, and Arthur could see Merlin being stuck with another needle.

Arthur went in and sat down on the empty bed in the room. Igraine went over to Hunith and put her hand on her shoulder. Hunith jumped and when she realized it was Igraine, relaxed her grip on Merlin's free hand.

The room was eerily silent while a nurse drew blood from Merlin. Arthur wasn't sure how Merlin had that much blood in his body. When she finished taking the blood, she put another needle in his arm and taped it down before she connected it to an IV.

"That's all I need right now. I'll be back soon so you can figure out dinner."

When the nurse left, Hunith rose. "I won't be long. I promise."

Once they were gone, Arthur sat at the foot of Merlin's bed. "How many times did they prick you."

"Too many. They wanted to make sure they had enough before they put me on antibiotics and this stuff." Merlin pointed at his IV.

"You're not starting chemo already, are you?"

"No. They won't do that until they confirm I have cancer and figure out what type I have."

"When will that be?"

"Gaius is calling in a favor, so they're going to take a bone marrow sample tomorrow. Given my blood counts, he thinks it's probably leukemia. It's apparently a blood cancer. If it's not that, they'll do a scan to see if they can find a tumor and then they'll biopsy it. I'm gonna be their guinea pig until they figure it out."

"How long can all of that take?" Arthur didn't like the idea of Merlin being a guinea pig.

"Probably Tuesday or Wednesday."

"And you'll be here that whole time?"

Merlin shrugged. "I dunno. It's not the cancer that's keeping me here. They just figured they should knock out all the tests they need to do while I'm here." He sighed. "Apparently a fever of 104 is unhealthy, and Gaius thinks I'm trying to quote cough up a lung unquote, and I'm dehydrated." Merlin rolled his eyes. "The list goes on, but my mom thought it would be better to make sure that I'm fighting off whatever this is so I'm ready when it's time to start treatment." He shivered. "It's going to cost her so much."

"All that's wrong with you?" Arthur had known about the cough, but he couldn't fathom how he had missed so much in the maybe fifteen minutes it took him to call his mom and wait for her. It seemed they had thrown a ton of information at Merlin. Arthur could tell Merlin didn't want to think about it anymore, so he did what he did best. He distracted Merlin. He talked about anything and everything he could think of – how Sophia and Valiant were caught kissing behind the trailers during lunch break today, about the fight he'd never told him about earlier, about how much school sucked, about the movie they would go see the following weekend once he was better, about how much school sucked, about how they could convince Igraine that they should get a dog (she was firmly against it), and about how much school sucked.

At some point, Hunith and Igraine walked back in. Arthur could tell his mother was pleased about something, but he couldn't begin to figure it out. He made a mental note to ask her later.

Too soon, they were told visiting hours were over. The nurse asked Hunith if she wanted them to bring a cot in but, surprisingly, Merlin refused. A look of stony resolve settled on his face. It was rare that he truly put his foot down about something but when he did, he wouldn't waver.

Arthur and Igraine left first. Arthur had only taken a few steps before he was gripped with terror. What if something happened tonight? What if this was his last chance to see Merlin? "Can I ask Ms. Hunith for a ride home? I just want a few more minutes."

"Tell her I said thank you." She squeezed Arthur's shoulder. "I'll see you at home."

Arthur ran back to Merlin's room and hid behind a spare bed in the hallway. He didn't mean to listen in, but they weren't being quiet and their voices flowed through the open door.

"– have to leave," Hunith said.

"You do. You have work in the morning," Merlin reminded her.

Hunith let out a deranged laugh. "They'll figure it out."

"No," Merlin said. "You have to go in. This is going to set you back far enough."

There was a long silence. Arthur could practically picture it growing and growing with every passing second. "Exactly what is that supposed to mean?"

"Mom, I know how hard things have been for you. I know that you work so much because you have to, and I know that this… this is not going to be cheap. I'm so sorry. I didn't want this to happen, but you can't lose out on more hours just because of me."

"Oh, baby." Arthur couldn't see them, but he was sure that Hunith was holding him as tightly as she could. "It's not your job to worry about that. We'll get through this."

"How?" Merlin demanded. "Things were tight before; they're going to be impossible now."

"Igraine's helping us out."

"She – what?" Merlin asked. "She'd really do that?"

"She considers you her son every bit as much as I consider Arthur mine. Of course, she'd do this. I didn't want her to. I want to be able to give you this myself, but if it's a choice between your life and my pride, I choose your life. No questions asked. So, don't worry about me or how we're going to pay for this. Just focus on getting better, okay?"

Merlin must've nodded because they didn't say anything after that. Hunith spent ten more minutes with him before she left. The moment she disappeared around the corner of the hall, Arthur snuck into Merlin's room.

"Arthur? What are you doing here?"

Arthur sat down in the empty bed and pulled his feet up. "I don't know what you mean. I'm not here."

"You're going to get in trouble."

"It'll be worth it. I don't want you to be alone."

Merlin looked up at the ceiling. "Thanks. I wasn't crazy about the idea of staying here by myself."

"The way you didn't want your mom to stay here, I would've thought you wanted some alone time."

Merlin rolled his eyes. "How much did you hear?"

"Not too much. Just enough to know that my mom's helping out." Arthur grinned. "I always knew my mom was great but… wow."

Merlin sighed. "I still can't believe that."

"I can. You're worth it."

Merlin looked deeply uncomfortable. "Maybe."

"So, why'd you make her leave?"

"I feel bad. Part of me wanted my mom to stay, but I couldn't do that to her."

"What do you mean?"

"I've never stayed in a hospital before."

"Sure you have. When you were born."

"You know what I mean."

Arthur did, so he didn't try to argue. "Then why didn't you let her stay?"

"I guess…" he sighed. "I'm about to make her life so much harder. Even with your mom helping. I hate that this is going to hurt her."

"Mer, you have cancer… maybe. For all we know, Gaius is as old as he looks and is wrong."

"He's one of the best oncologists in the country," Merlin said glumly. "He knows cancer better than he knows himself. That's a direct quote."

Arthur really didn't want to hear that. "Whatever. It doesn't matter. You're not making your mom's life more difficult. Cancer is. If you're going to blame anything, blame cancer."

"Yeah. Screw cancer," Merlin agreed.

"Screw cancer," Arthur echoed.

"Do you thi – hide!"

Arthur acted on instinct as he dove off the bed and hid behind it. He'd missed the voices outside Merlin's room and couldn't express how grateful he was that Merlin had been paying enough attention. This whole thing would be for nothing if he got caught.

The nurse checked on Merlin and switched out his IV bag. She explained what was in it, but she might as well have been speaking a foreign language for all Arthur understood.

Once she left, Arthur peeked around the bed. Merlin's door was closed, and Arthur didn't see anyone else. "Are you sure about this?" Merlin asked. "If you get caught…"

"Relax. I won't get caught."

"But –"

"No," Arthur cut him off. "Besides, how would I even get home at this point?"

Merlin didn't have an answer to that, so he decided to drop it. "Then what's the plan?"

Arthur honestly hadn't thought this far ahead. "What do you want to do?" Arthur moved so he was sitting at the base of Merlin's bed. At Merlin's dumbfounded expression, Arthur suggested, "wanna play 'And Then'?"

'And Then' was a game the two of them had invented years ago when they'd been stuck in a salon with their mothers. There had been absolutely nothing to do and Arthur, in a huge theatrical demonstration, had plopped down in a chair and glumly proclaimed, "and then they died of boredom."

Merlin had immediately retaliated with, "and then they haunted the nail salon."

To which Arthur had added, "and then one night they decided to take their revenge."

They'd gone on and on and on, creating an elaborate tale of exactly how they would haunt the nail salon and exact their revenge. They were so caught up in it, they were barely aware of time passing. This became the way they'd pass time when they found themselves in a situation where they had nothing else to do. They rarely found themselves playing it anymore because they were old enough to stay home by themselves, but Arthur felt like they could use the distraction of that make–believe world.

Sure enough, Merlin grinned. "It's been such a long time. You start."

Arthur frowned as he thought for a minute. "And then Merlin left the hospital, happy and healthy."

"And then Merlin broke Arthur out of prison."

"Why am I in prison?"

"For breaking into a hospital. Duh."

Arthur couldn't help his snort. "Sure. Okay. And then Merlin and Arthur were on the run from the law."

"And then they went to Canada."

"And then they decided to live in barrels by Niagara Falls."

They didn't know how long they went on for, but they wove a detailed plan of how they would live off the land and would only dive deeper into their world of espionage and crime. At some point, they fell asleep. In the middle of the night, they were awoken by a nurse and a furious Igraine. Igraine seemed at a loss for words and merely let out frustrated grunts as they left the hospital.

When they got in the car, Arthur told her, "it was worth it." He knew it would only make her angrier, but as he leaned his head against the window, he felt it in every fiber of his being. He didn't know what was going to happen to Merlin, but he was going to take advantage of every second they had together. It was worth it, he thought to himself. Anything and everything was worth it.