Title: Just One, Big, Happy Kingdom

Summary: Merlin's in for a world of facepalm when an old, batty version of himself decides to teach him a lesson by sending him to an alternate universe. One where he has to deal with his friends' evil alter egos. And if Merlin's here, where's bad!Merlin...? No slash.

A/N: Hey! So, this is going to be a multi chapter, and it is going to be a combination of serious and crackish. And it will include a bitter Gwen and a lecherous, creepy Arthur. As well as (hopefully) some of that bad!Merlin and normal Camelot. And whatever else I decide to throw in there. I have a basic plot for this, but it's pretty sketchy at the moment, especially since I'm not planning on posting any more of this for a week or so... I want to finish Of the Wooded Land first, and perhaps start my next story. So, if you have any advice or ideas for the rest of the fic, please PM it or put it in a review! This is set in Season Three. Other chapters will be longer. This is just the hook, the teaser, the prolouge.

Without further ado, ladies and gentleman, my story.

An old man leaned back and stroked his expansive beard, grunting a bit as his bones creaked.

"Happy eightieth birthday," he muttered to himself, smiling. No one answered him back, since he was alone in the room.

In his old age, he had begun talking out loud to himself. Yes, sometimes people looked at him funny. Not often, though, since he was very powerful. But he was old enough not to care either way.

"Eighty years old, Merlin," he said, looking around at his walls and smiling a little. He might be old, but his memory was good. As good as ever. Mostly. "I believe it's the time."

He stood up and walked over to his old spell book, limping a little, just like he remembered his old friend Gaius doing back when Merlin was still young.

Picking it up, he flipped to the page he remembered so well, since he'd been flipping to it for weeks. The other spell that he would need shortly wasn't in the book, but that was alright—he had it down pat, all ingrained in his memory.

There it was. The time traveling page. And written on it in thick black script in the corner: NOT FUNNY.

Merlin grinned to himself.

"That's what you think," he said to the book. "It's going to be hilarious."

He read over the time travel spell while running his fingers through his straight white beard and nodded when he thought he had it.

"Well," he said, "time to stop myself from making the worst mistake of my life."

He stopped.

Paused.

Thought.

"And," he added as an afterthought to his old self once again, "I should probably warn him – oh, just listen to me; I mean me – against any funny business with Morgana."

He smiled painfully, because his joints ached, and had to force himself not to cackle mischievously.

He began to chant.

As he looked down at the page and read, his golden flashing eyes fell upon the letters written there one last time. That note from himself to himself.

NOT FUNNY.

TBC