Something Old, Something New

30

Quick TW: blood, some gore (it's not super described I don't think but it's there), death, and some suicidal thoughts

Merlin's magic didn't lash out. Not right away. The shock of what had just occurred froze him, magic that had been so ready to strike retreating back inside of him. Merlin was the only one though, a bi-product of him being so sure that his magic could get there in time. The air was filled with the sound of gunfire. 

Merlin came back to himself slowly in the midst of the chaos. It mas a miracle he hadn't gotten shot with all the bullets being fired and bouncing in all directions off of the shield Emma must have conjured. Merlin had to tear his eyes away from Freya's body. She had fallen facedown, but the pool of blood was sizeable and still growing. Emma had taken a step back to avoid getting it on her shoes. 

They were good shoes. Nothing fancy, just sneakers, but they were new, the colors still bright; red and gold. Merlin had gotten them for Arthur, so Camelot colors had seemed appropriate. Arthur had liked them; or at least Merlin thought he had. Apparently he didn't know a damn thing about Arthur.

Merlin's gaze finally made it up to Arthur's eyes. Those eyes that he loved so much. He didn't see Arthur there anymore. They were too cold, glittering with malice that Arthur, kind and regal Arthur, did not possess. 

Someone realized that firing at an invisible wall was doing nothing but getting their own officers shot with the rebounded bullets, and tried to go around the side while Emma was busy staring down Merlin. They were rewarded for this with a careless flick of Emma's wrist and a mumbled short burst of words that snapped the man's neck. 

Where Freya's death had put Merlin into a kind of trance, this random officer's jolted him back to the present. The officers in the room clearly had no idea what to do in this situation. This wasn't something they had every faced before. According to them, magic wasn't real. Some of them had run when they realized they were dealing with something far out of their skill set. Merlin did not blame them.

Others continued to fire, including the Chief, but bullets were not endlessly replenishable, their service weapons only holding six rounds. Most of them kept an extra clip on them, but that was still nothing against a shield built of magical power. 

When the last available bullet had been fired, the silence was louder than the previous hail of gunfire. Emma sighed, and Merlin saw the near-imperceptible shimmer that told of the shield disappearing. 

"Now that that's done," she said. She held the swords with the same confidence that Arthur did, obviously utilizing his training. He hated her. "I have places to be."

Merlin swallowed. "The only place you're going to, is Hell." Merlin was pretty sure Hell wasn't a real place, but it sounded cool, and Merlin needed the confidence. 

"Don't make this harder than it needs to be. You wouldn't want to damage your precious prince," Emma sneered. Merlin had the urge to correct her, to say that Arthur was a King and should be referred to as such, but now was not the time. Merlin glanced down at Freya's body and swallowed. He thought he could hear some kind of commotion outside, but ignored it. 

"Merlin, don't be a hero! Get out of her way!" Merlin didn't look at the Chief, but his words made Merlin aware of the fact that he was now the only person standing in the room, everyone else having taken cover behind desks that had been flipped into makeshift shields. There was no way for Merlin to win here. Either he fought off Emma, possibly killing Arthur in the process and revealing his magic to everyone in this precinct, or he let Emma go, and she would wreak havoc on the world, revealing magic in the process anyway.