Dismantle The Sun

Chapter 5

"Gaius!" Arthur cheered, his voice brimmed with sunshine.

"Arthur my boy. Not bought that hooligan with you I hope?" Gaius said affectionately, his harsh words cut off by his tone, as he pulled the Captain in for a paternal hug.

"Gwaine has been instructed to stay aboard. They all have in fact." Arthur replied, his face the serious one of a captain of a spaceship, but a twinkly mirth in his eye and the space between them.

"Is that wise? You're not unknown in these parts." responded the white hair physician, his hands on Arthur's gaping muscular arms in concern.

"It's easier with two." Explained the younger man. Shortly.

"Who's this then?" Gaiis asked, suddenly noticing and turning to his other guest when before he'd only had eyes for the blonde one.

"This is Merlin, Merlin Gais. He's asked for our help." Arthur introduced the two and Merlin smiled at him politely, giving a little wave. Gaius eyed him suspiciously.

"Really?" The old man asked with his voiced laced with amused doubt, and a single eyebrow rised. He was a cat watching a suspicious puddle calculatingly.

"Yes, really. We're taking him home. It's a long story." Arthur brushed it off with a wave of his hand. Gaius turned his penetrating eybrow on Merlin, who gulped nervously.

"I crashed into the side of the ship." he muttered under the incriminating gase of the man. His eyes lingered in silence it felt like burning into Merlin's mind. With a little 'hmph' the eybrow lowered and the inky haired man felt like breathing a sigh of relief. A side glance at Arthur, who still hadn't questioned this, rewarded him with a small, fleeting smile, before the Captain returned his attention to Gaius as he older man spoke.

"That seems like a very short story. I don't see why you need my help." the older man said, not unkindly as he puttered about and poured them both a cup of coffee. Arthur smiled as he took his and passed one to Merlin as he took a brazing sip.

"Merlin's home is the Baedes cluster." Gaius stopped aprubtly holding his mug in hand. He started at them blinkingly, gear whirring in his intelligent mind.

"But that's impossible." He stated.

"Apaprently not." Arthur replied his hands by his hops in a sublicant gesture of surrender and confusion as he threw Merlin an indescribable glance. It was crowded with subtle burgeoning affection, laced through with an inkling of suspicion which wrote the questions of what Merlin wasn't telling him on Arthur's features, but there was something deeper still too, something that spoke of a sole deep understanding of the man being looked at by the man doing the looking.

"Arthur that's impo-" Gauis attempted to repeat, more forcefully.

"Irregardless, it seems to be the case. So, how do we get there?" his hackles abrassed to protect Merlin, even from Gaius's benign care.

"Have you forgotten the meaning of the word 'impossible'?" asked Gaius grumpily, his tone sarcastic as he took a swig of coffee and then pulled a face at its bitterness. Sugar had been in short supply since Spave Commander Agravaine Du Bois had murderd his brother-in-law and annexed the trade routes through the nebula, the coffee too was synthetic and tasted like bitter ash.

"Gaius. We have been friends for years. I have known you to do incredible thing and create wonders. I do not believe this is impossible." Arthur weeded, businesslike.

"Well there's nothing that I can do." Gauis dismisively insisted with his white eyebrow a curve of sincerity that implied something that he wasn't saying.

"But?" the blonde haired man ask, his voice a tightrope of hope dangled precariously above a resonant crevice.

"There is a woman, but she's....fraught. You need to find the Fata Morgana." the shop man explained, his words were like cautious diamonds. He knew that what he was telling his old friend would draw him into danger. Arthur looked unimpressed.

With all due respect Gaius, you are talking nonsene." Arthur flatlined at him unimpression sat in his voice like heavy lead-based polumer.

"How are we meant to find an illusion that can appear anywhere, at any time? And on what planet does this help us?" Arthur continued to ask with sarcasm like a irritable train barreling on the lighttrack.

"Not the - foolish boy. The Fata Morgana! For which the illusion is named!" Gauis turned on his heel shaking him old head at the simplicity of the space captain who stood in his shop. Arthur looked flummonxed. Merlin smiled at him beninly in bemusement at his confusion but liking the way the expressions decorated his already handsome feature.

"The valar who can tear holes in space-time and see into a millions of possible futures?" piped up the black haired man, proudly and gladly to be of help. It didn't work. Arthur glared at him with eyes like a wine-dark ocean, the way a cat eyes a body of water. Merlin grinned cheekily, and Gaius overlooked him with a perspericious eye. The boy seemed to glow in Arthur's presents his very skin alight with a shimmering aspect that flickered and wavered like a gentle white flame. It was very easy to puttwoand two together for the wise old man but Arthur seemed to have no idea yet who or what was travvelling with he.

"Oh. The Fata Morgana. Right. Of course." Arhtur excelled, widening his arms like a sardonic concerto.

"Is this....a bad thing?" Merlin asked sincerely, as he did so cocking his head to the side. His glicious blue eyes gleamed from their cheeks. The blonde man defeated and sighed.

"Not bad just....ripe with untold danger." the captain explained. Sudden concern spiked through his skull like an titamium allow ice pick as he worried for his friends: as he worried for Arthur. Something of his expression showed on his face, and Gaius from where he was eyeing the pair, could swear that Merlin's whole aura dimmed.

"Oh, well, as long as it isn't bad!" Merlin replied, trying to be as cheerful as possible. Arthur looked at him with a grinmace.

"Chin up, it's an adventure!" the blond man smiled.

"Do you know where....this....valar, is?" asked the pale man.

"No, but I know a guy who will. He does not like me." said Arthur.

"Does anyone?" Merlin asked, his joy back and trilling in his voice as he mocked ARthur.

"Oi!" burgled Arthur, faux-offended, and he leaned over to ruffle Merlin's already unruly hair. As he did the room and space around Merlin seemed brighter as Gaius watched on with the indulgent eyebrow and simile of an indulgent paternal figure.