It's here. We've done it.

Thank you all for sticking with me as long as you have! I love you all (lurking lurkers, too)!

I'm gypping you with this very short coda-like ending, but my beta Love is a strange thing made me promise very early on that I'd end this with something clichéd and happy. I have. I figured everyone deserved it.

So, for the last time:

Arthur comes home from work to photographs spread across the entire flat, all with little colored bits of paper stuck to their corners. He picks his way through the wash of glossy images and finds Merlin in the kitchen on the only clear patch of floor. Arthur sits on the counter next to the fruit juicer and stares.

"What are you doing?" he asks eventually, because the suspense is killing him.

"I'm publishing a book," Merlin says, his bored tone implying that it should be obvious.

Arthur blinks and shuffles closer to the breadbox, setting the butter dish on his knees and making a butty sandwich with his fingers. "Of?"

"Everything."

He opens his mouth to ask another question, but Merlin shoots him an exasperated glare over his shoulder and Arthur decides against it. Setting his half-formed meal aside, he quickly texts Gwen and arranges to meet her for tea at his favorite touristy café, pausing to drop a kiss to Merlin's (overgrown, starting to curl in a fascinating way at his nape) hair on his way out.

"Get me some lemon pasties," is the grumbled response he gets to this display of affection.

"Did he not tell you?" Gwen asks with surprise as she watches Arthur stir lump after lump of sugar into his already white tea.

"Tell me what?" he growls, clacking his spoon on the saucer violently. Gwen flinches.

"He's—Merlin is—composing an autobiography using photographs from when he was a child until now," she said carefully, twisting a dark curl around her finger and looking at Arthur in concern. "He's been planning it for a few months now."

When he returns with the bag of sweets the floor is free of photographs and Merlin is sprawled on their black leather couch with a self-satisfied smile on his face. He shoves a pasty into his mouth and takes Arthur's hand, bouncing excitedly as he gestures to a folder on the table.

Arthur sits him down, resting his hands on Merlin's shoulders when the younger man seems like he might shoot up to the ceiling in his exuberance, and carefully opens the folder across their laps.

The shots are categorized into four separate groups.

The first photograph in section one is of Will, but a younger Will than the ones Merlin has shown him before. This Will is perhaps fourteen, and curled on the end of Merlin's front porch with his forehead resting on his knees. There is a counterpart on the next page of an empty room speckled with dust motes, and Merlin's reflection in the wardrobe mirror, the flash of the camera blurring out the lower half of his body and highlighting his empty face. The caption beneath the two is the same, Left Behind, the title of the section. Arthur squeezes Merlin's knee.

The pictures after that show Merlin growing progressively older, from infancy to around ten years, and Arthur notices that the style of photographs is similar but slightly different from Merlin's, more precise and pristine but at the same time warmer somehow. There is a note on these, Courtesy of John Balinor—Merlin's father. His professional photographs melt into the low-quality experiments of a recently fatherless Merlin.

The frames get steadier. There are several more shots of Will, and some of Hunith, each growing more and more wounded in the eyes. There are the photographs of Will that Merlin showed him, and one of them kissing that makes Arthur's jaw clench a bit. The last photograph in this section is of a corpse, and his fingers jerk away. It's Will's, pale and blue and stiff, and beside Arthur Merlin tenses. Arthur flips the photograph over quickly.

The next section begins with a self-portrait that makes Arthur want to cry. Merlin's eyes are shockingly light in the photo but milky and blank. His skin appears waxy, and his lips are chapped and in a straight line of pain. The caption here is Lost. The photographs that follow are painful for Arthur to look at, and a glance to Merlin shows that he is choosing to watch Arthur instead of the images.

There is a wash of faces, different lovers with a range of emotions on their faces. Arthur can tell from the start who actually loved Merlin, and who was just as broken as him. None last long. Morgana and Gwen and Gaius flit through the empty faces, all looking concerned and slightly afraid, reaching out to the camera.

The last photograph is of a coffee from Costa, and Arthur lets out a short laugh when he realizes that it's the cup they shared in the park the day he lost his job. He reaches for Merlin's hand and twists their fingers together.

The penultimate section is titled Arthur, and starts with a photograph of simply that. He is sleeping, his eyelashes throwing shadows over his cheeks and his lips parted softly. In the unfocused foreground, Merlin's hand lays palm-to-palm against his.

What comes next is a montage of his face, their shoes under a table, his back, their shoulders, them kissing, them making music, him, him, him, them, them, them. Gwen and Morgana are here too, more properly displayed than in their short role in the Lost period, but always with Arthur.

The very last photograph is loose from the others. It's of their hands again, locked much like they are now, fingers laced tightly and palms pressed close together. The caption is missing, and now Merlin presses it onto the image like a coda, a reprise of the main melody, sweet as it brings the composition to a satisfying ending. Arthur squints to read the messy handwriting and makes out one word.

Future.

He breathes in, relishing his breath much like he did the first time he met Merlin. This isn't simply what Merlin foresees in the months or even years to come, Arthur knows that by the way Merlin suddenly shakes next to him. He wants commitment.

"Yes," he says quietly, touching their linked hands to the hands in the photograph. Merlin makes a soft noise, somewhere between a gasp and a sigh, and then he is laughing, dropping the folder to the ground and catching Arthur in his arms.

"This is forever, you know," Arthur says between gentle kisses. "I'm not having you run off with Lance next spring."

"Yes," Merlin says peacefully, brushing his lips to the curve of Arthur's cheek.

Arthur pinches his arm playfully. "Yes, you're going to elope with Gwen's white knight?"

Merlin's gaze is clear and sure when he catches Arthur's chin and holds him still, blue eyes boring into blue eyes. "Yes, I want you forever and beyond, and all of the other sappy sentiments that couples say when pledging their lives to each other, too."

"Oh," Arthur smiles, stealing another kiss. "Then: you had me at 'Hello.'"

Merlin grins against his mouth. "I believe what I said was 'watch out.' You were about to get hit by a car."

Arthur's free hand flaps noncommittally in the air, catching Merlin's shoulder lightly and curling where it lands. "Details, details."

They're clichéd and they know it, but frankly, my dears, they don't give a damn.

Come on, honey
Fly with me!

-Queen

~xoxo Ally