I really don't know where this idea came from, I really don't.

Also, this is the first time I've written in past tense since *checks fics* June 2021. Sometimes things just want to be written in a certain way and I just go along with it.

Merlin blinked at Lancelot.

Lancelot, in all his white furry glory, blinked back at him. His ears twitched.

"Oh no," Merlin said.

So, in Merlin's defense, he hadn't meant to turn Lancelot into a rabbit. It had just happened.

That was a lie.

Well, the first part was the truth. The second part was the lie.

What really happened was that Merlin had been sitting on the floor in his bedroom, attempting to turn one of Gaius's slugs into something actually useful—like a piece of parchment, or perhaps a rabbit (useful for its adorableness)—when Lancelot had barged into the room. Merlin had had a noticeable spellbook open on his lap and had reasonably panicked in response to an intruder in his private space. Before he fully registered who the intruder was, he uttered the spell that had been on his mind at the time, and Lancelot had transformed into a rabbit.

An adorable, snow white rabbit with beady black eyes that seemed to see more than they were supposed to.

Anyways, again, in Merlin's defense, the spell hadn't exactly been working on the slug, so he couldn't have possibly expected it to work on a human being.

Evidently, he had been proven quite wrong.

Lancelot jumped up to him and tried to stare at him menacingly. He hit Merlin's leg with his two front feet and tilted his head angrily.

"Alright, alright!" Merlin said, flipping vigorously through his spellbook. "I'll find a way to fix this," he muttered. "Can't be that hard."

He stopped at a promising page and skimmed through its contents, then frowned and flipped to another page.

His frown deepened.

Lancelot somehow jumped onto his shoulder and nudged the side of Merlin's head with his tiny nose, as if asking, What?

Merlin swallowed, looked at Lancelot, and mustered up a deceptively bright smile. "It looks like you and me are going to be spending a lot of time together," he told Lancelot.

Lancelot roughly patted Merlin's cheek with a foot. Explain, he seemed to demand.

"Good news is I found a potion that will work," Merlin said. "Bad news is the potion takes a week to brew."

Lancelot glared at him, entirely unimpressed.

Merlin started the potion brewing process. The next day, he went to serve Arthur breakfast, late as always.

He came back to his chambers to see Lancelot ransacking his room.

"Hey!" he said, lifting Lancelot from his bed where he had previously been entangled in Merlin's only, flimsy blanket, now with a few tears and holes. His clothes and various papers were strewn about the floor, but at least his spellbook was still under the floorboard. Lancelot was, after all, a generally decent person...rabbit...rabbit person...person rabbit?

Lancelot kicked his tiny legs, trying to escape from Merlin's grasp.

"Y'know, I would've expected this from Arthur, but not you!" Merlin said, mildly annoyed.

Lancelot twisted his head back to stare at Merlin accusingly.

"Okay, I suppose that's fair," Merlin said. "But no more."

He carried Lancelot out of his room and into Gaius's chambers, sat him on a table, and placed a plate of carrots in front of him that he had smuggled from the kitchens.

"Stay," Merlin said, pointing a finger at Lancelot. Lancelot tilted his head and seemed to frown at him. After a moment, he looked down and began munching on the food. Merlin had never feared rabbits' front teeth before, but he sure did now.

He went back to his room to tidy up. When he heard Gaius enter, he ran out of his room and skidded in front of Gaius, blocking his view of Lancelot the Rabbit.

Gaius, in the middle of setting down his bag, narrowed his eyes at Merlin suspiciously. "Merlin," he said flatly.

"Yes?" Merlin said with a wide smile.

"What are you hiding?"

"Who says I'm hiding anything?"

Gaius sighed. "I know you by now, Merlin. Tell me. It better not be anything dangerous."

"It's not dangerous," Merlin said, and then felt like slamming his palm into his forehead. He had just admitted to hiding something! This is what happened with Gaius around. Merlin really couldn't hide anything from him, no matter how many times he tried.

"Merlin," Gaius repeated.

"Uh, I- I'm hiding my magic," Merlin said, nodding his head vigorously. "From Uther."

"Unless you have forgotten due to your many injuries over the years," Gaius said, "I know about your magic. You need not hide it from me in my own chambers. In fact, you revealed your magic to me not a minute after we first met."

Merlin sighed. "Gaius, you're always telling me to be more cautious, but when I am cautious, you're telling me to be less cautious! It seems I can't win!"

"Move," Gaius said, pushing him aside with a hand on his shoulder and a surprising amount of force for a man his age. Merlin whirled around to explain, only to find an empty plate with no rabbit in sight.

"It's just a plate," Merlin said sullenly.

Gaius blinked, glanced at Merlin, and said, "I will find out."

Merlin decided to believe him.

He still wasn't telling Gaius until he had to, though.

He escaped Gaius's chambers and found Lancelot a little ways down the hall. When Lancelot noticed him, he hopped over to Merlin, and Merlin reached down to pick him up.

"Thanks," he said solemnly. "It seems you'll always have my back, even when I do stupid things like this."

Lancelot patted him on the cheek much more softly than he had earlier.

Merlin liked to think he was forgiven.

"Oh! Who's this?" Gwen asked with a warm smile when they later passed in the halls. She set down her laundry basket and stroked a hand down Lancelot's back.

Lancelot, in Merlin's arms, seemed to like this very much, stretching his head back and doing the rabbit equivalent of smiling, which was pretty much baring his teeth for everyone to see.

Merlin still wasn't convinced Lancelot wouldn't use his teeth as a weapon against him.

"A rabbit," Merlin said. "I think he likes you."

"What's his name?" Gwen asked, patting Lancelot on the head. Merlin frowned. When he had tried to do that earlier, Lancelot had scratched his hand in retaliation.

"His name?" Merlin asked absently, stalling for time.

"Yes!" Gwen said. "Don't tell me you didn't name him." She frowned. "How do we know the rabbit's a he?"

"The rabbit's a he," Merlin confirmed. "I know...being the royal physician's apprentice and all."

"His name?" Gwen reminded him.

"Um. It's Sir La- Sir Fluffles."

Gwen's frown deepened. "You just came up with that, didn't you?"

"Yes?" Merlin said.

She sighed and smiled again. "Well, I like it. Sir Fluffles. How adorable!" She held out her arms, and Lancelot jumped straight towards her. He looked absolutely peaceful, like nothing could be wrong with the world.

"You traitor," Merlin muttered.

"Is it okay if I take him for a bit, Merlin?" Gwen asked pleasantly. Merlin nodded his head, because Gwen really was doing him a favor. "Perfect!" She placed Lancelot on top of the clothes in her laundry basket, picked up the basket, and turned to walk down the hall past him. "See you later, Merlin!" she said. And then, to Lancelot, "We're going to do laundry together, Sir Fluffles. I promise it won't be too boring."

Merlin slumped his shoulders in relief, and then tensed up again upon hearing Arthur's voice ringing through the castle halls.

"MERLIN!"

"What is that?" Arthur asked when Merlin brought him his dinner.

"What is what?" Merlin asked innocently. He placed the tray of food in front of Arthur.

"That," Arthur said, pointing at Merlin's bag. Lancelot was poking his head out of the bag when Merlin had expressly told him not to do so in Arthur's room, because then Arthur would ask questions, and despite having magic in the heart of Camelot, Merlin was well aware that he was not that skilled a liar.

Ah, well, he couldn't have everything, he supposed.

"A rabbit," Merlin said.

"I know that," Arthur said flatly. "Why do you have a rabbit?"

"I thought he'd make a cute pet," Merlin answered.

He looked down at Lancelot. Lancelot glared up at him.

Lancelot then jumped out of the bag and onto the table. "Merlin!" Arthur said. "Get it out of here! You can't possibly expect me to eat in peace with a rabbit on my table."

Merlin shrugged. "Why not?" he asked, moving to other parts of the room and attempting to tidy up. "You eat rabbit all the time and seem quite peaceful doing it."

He saw Lancelot still out of the corner of his eye, as if just now realising his own mortality.

"That's different," Arthur said. "This one's quite alive."

"He has a name, y'know," Merlin said.

"Don't humanize animals."

"His name is Lancelot," Merlin said.

Arthur frowned. "I don't think Lancelot will be happy to learn that there is a rabbit named after himself. Speaking of Lancelot, where is he? I haven't seen him all day. He was supposed to lead a training session this afternoon for some of the newer knights, actually, and he never showed up, which is highly unusual."

Merlin's eyes widened. "He told me that he's visiting someone, actually, and won't come back until the end of the week!" he said hurriedly.

Arthur narrowed his eyes at him. "He told you, but not anyone else?" he asked skeptically.

Merlin shrugged. "I suppose he only saw fit to tell me because I'm his best friend." Lancelot, who had been sniffing at the ink drying on a piece of parchment, suddenly looked up at Merlin, as if to say, Best friend? Best friend no longer.

"And he hadn't informed me so I could adjust things appropriately," Arthur continued. "Lancelot is a relatively high-ranking knight, Merlin. He is normally more responsible than this."

"He had to leave quickly," Merlin blurted out. "It was an emergency."

"Is he missing?" Arthur wondered. "Do we need to send a scouting party out to find him?"

"No!" Merlin said quickly. "No! He's just, visiting his sick...lover, that's all!"

Lancelot turned his head to glare at Merlin. No doubt Merlin was going to pay for this later.

Arthur frowned. "Lancelot has a lover?" he said. "Well, I suppose he can be forgiven just this once, given that this never happens again."

Lancelot bared his sharp teeth at Merlin, as if accusing him for ruining his reputation. His accusations were not unfounded.

But now Arthur's attention was off of Lancelot the Human, and Lancelot the Rabbit could go on without further scrutinization. Small mercies.

Merlin was one of the most unlucky people in Camelot, so of course a bandit attack had to occur a few days later.

Merlin was out picking herbs for Gaius with only a bag and the clothes on his back, so he had absolutely no idea why a group of bandits decided to attack him, but it wasn't like he was going to ask them.

Lancelot was, fortunately or unfortunately, further off in the woods, frolicking about in nature.

Merlin was doing so well holding his own against the bandits by dropping tree branches onto unsuspecting heads, tripping the bandits, and knocking them into each other. He was doing so well, until one bandit got lucky and tackled him to the ground.

He lay on the ground and watched, eyes wide, as the bandit prepared to strike him down with his sword, when out of nowhere, Lancelot jumped into the bandit's face, causing him to lose his balance and fall to the ground.

Merlin scrambled to his feet and watched, eyebrows raised, as Lancelot scratched at the bandit's face. When Lancelot eventually jumped off of the bandit, Merlin used magic to hit him with a nearby rock, effectively knocking him out.

He turned around to see the last bandit charging towards him.

Before he could do anything, Lancelot jumped in the bandit's way. He tripped over Lancelot and promptly slammed his face into the ground. Merlin walked cautiously up to him and poked the side of his head with his foot, but the bandit did not stir.

He looked at Lancelot.

Lancelot looked back at him, craning his neck uncomfortably up to do so.

Merlin took pity on him and scooped him up. He raised Lancelot to eye level and said, "You're a very scary rabbit."

Lancelot nodded solemnly.

Merlin returned to the castle with cuts and bruises and disheveled clothing, but he did have his herbs, so that was something.

Gaius took one look at him and at Lancelot on Merlin's shoulder and shook his head. "The trouble the two of you get into," he said, taking the bag from Merlin, placing it on the table, and beginning to sort through its contents.

When Arthur saw Merlin, his face tightened up for some reason, like he was worried, though Merlin hadn't the faintest idea why. "What happened?" he asked, voice harsh.

"Bandit attack while I was out picking herbs for Gaius," Merlin answered promptly. It was the truth this time, after all. He leaned down to light the furnace in Arthur's bedroom and decidedly did not look at Lancelot, who was hopping about on Arthur's bed, still full of adrenaline from the fight.

"What happened to the bandits?" Arthur asked, taking Merlin by the arm and looking him up and down.

"Knocked unconscious," Merlin said, brushing Arthur's hand away. "I'm fine."

"Did you knock them unconscious?" Arthur asked incredulously. He gestured at Merlin. "You, with your entirely unathletic physique?"

Merlin rolled his eyes. "I will have you know I'm completely offended by that."

"Tell me, Merlin, really, what happened?" Arthur asked, crossing his arms in front of his chest and seeming concerned no longer, which Merlin appreciated. He had had worse, though Arthur definitely didn't need to know that.

"Sir Fluffles saved me," Merlin said, nodding at the rabbit that was currently ransacking Arthur's bed.

Arthur turned around, resigned himself to the fact that a rabbit was ruining his room, and said, "I thought his name was Lancelot."

"I changed it," Merlin said quickly.

Arthur turned back to him and asked, flatly, "How exactly did a tiny rabbit help you fight off a group of bandits?"

"They tripped over him," Merlin said.

"They tripped."

"Yes."

"Is that all?"

"Sir Fluffles is very capable at fighting. That's why I knighted him."

Arthur raised his eyebrows, unimpressed. "You can't knight people, Merlin," was all he said.

"Can too," Merlin said.

Arthur sighed. "Well, if...Sir Fluffles saved your life, I have no choice but to knight him, I suppose."

"You what?"

Sir Fluffles was knighted and instated as a Knight of Camelot the very next day.

Uther, of course, had no knowledge of it.

Lancelot the Human made a return appearance coincidentally around the time Sir Fluffles disappeared.

Merlin held a funeral for him.

Lancelot resisted the urge to throw something at him.

He still occasionally had the urge to chomp on carrots with his front teeth.

"I mean, at the end of the day, it's healthy, right?" Merlin asked innocently.

"Merlin," Lancelot said quietly, which was Merlin's cue to slowly back away, "you have 30 seconds to run before I come after you."

Merlin, wisely, ran.

But not too quickly.

He knew Lancelot wouldn't hurt him.

Personally, I think Lancelot is a complete sweetheart and wouldn't cause that much petty trouble. But getting accidentally turned into a rabbit by your friend for a week really does change one's perspective.