i do not know if this has been said but i am going to say it bc fuck it almost knocked me off my feet when i thought of it
merlin waiting patiently for arthur for YEARS. mourning him for longer than he knew him. watching everyone he knew in camelot die and himself not age a day. watching the stone of the castle begin to crack, the wood begin to rot, the streets begin to empty. camelot has fallen. he ventures out but not far in case arthur returns. he experiences decades pass by him in a flash, still nothing. humanity advances and advances, yet they are also their undoing. they build themselves up just to tear themselves down a moment later. years and years and years and years and years pass, still nothing. the great dragons words echo in his head and he holds them close in hope, arthur will rise again. a day in spring, merlin catches a whiff of something he can’t place but he’s hit with a wave of nostalgia. it’s not until he’s lying in bed later that day that he remembers it’s what arthur used to smell like. not long after that, he tries to recall arthur’s laugh, but the memory is mute. and fuzzy. why is it fuzzy? stop focusing on the laugh and focus on his face…what did he look like again? oh god. no focus on something small. his eye color. what color were his eyes? blue…right? or were they green?
merlin forgetting the pieces of the puzzle that make up arthur, he can’t remember what he smelled like, what he looked like, what his laugh sounded like, he can’t even recall the way he screamed his name everyday when he needed something. merlin’s loosing arthur again. how long has it been? too long, too long and arthur still isn’t back. the dragon said he’d be back. he remembers that. he’s been repeating the words in his head since they were spoken to him long ago. every morning when he woke, every night before he slept, whenever the world around him seemed out to get him. he’s coming back. arthur’s coming back. why isn’t he back? what had that damn dragon said? he always talked in riddles but merlin had thought his words were clear for the first time since he’d known him. what had he said?
when albion’s need is greatest, arthur will rise again.
he’ll rise again. arthur will be back. and they’ll fight a great evil like they used to, side by side, two sides of the same coin, arthur and merlin together at last. he just has to wait for such a great evil. a great evil that would constitute arthur’s return. merlin’s lived many, many years. he’s seen much evil. arthur never returned then. something bigger and badder then. something worse that anything he could imagine…would it be immoral to instigate the evil to come to pass? (merlin’s tries to recall arthur’s secret smile when merlin made a face at him across the room or whispered something in his ear when visiting noble and royals were acting like fools and comes up empty.) to hell with morals. to hell with the damn dragon. to hell with it all. merlin’s been alive for centuries. arthur’s been asleep for centuries. they’ve been waiting for each other for centuries. merlin’s sick of it. to hell with it all. arthur needs a great evil? he’ll give him a great evil.
