Chapter 21 - Camelot and Its Epic Nerf Battle of Doom

While Camelot had been preparing for battle, Merlin and Lancelot had been scurrying through the Darkling Woods as fast as they could go. Merlin had been delighted to be on a mission alone with Lancelot, not necessarily because he enjoyed the man's company but because he was finally with someone that knew about his magic. For once Merlin could use his magic to speed up their journey, fight, and of course, do what they came to do – sabotage Cenred's arsenal of guns.

When they came upon the army's camp in the woods, Merlin and Lancelot had stopped and watched as the various black-clad soldiers worked to pack up camp. It had been a terrifying sight, so many enemy soldiers with dark intentions toward Camelot. The scariest part of the scene had not necessarily been the soldiers (with King Cenred not in sight; apparently he had opted to stay in his castle with Morgause and let his "knights" do all the work and risk their necks) but the vast store of weapons they had. Guns of all sizes were being loaded and readied for use on Camelot's defenses. Merlin and Lancelot had exchanged worried glances that confirmed what they were both thinking: if Merlin's plan didn't work, Camelot would be reduced to rubble and everyone in the city would by holey (and not in the religious sense, either!).

"They're getting ready to set off," Lancelot had hissed. "If you're going to do something, you should do it now."

Merlin had nodded. "Right." He hadn't been able to find a spell that had anything to do with modern weapons so he was just going to have to improvise. Closing his eyes, he had outstretched his hand and muttered, "Newid y tu mewn y gynnau, yn cadw y tu allan yr un fath, newid bwledi marwol I mewn I nerf dartiau!" It was a terribly complicated and long spell but the words spilled almost effortlessly from Merlin lips. There was a flash of light but thankfully it was only in Merlin's palm so none of the enemy noticed.

Lancelot had glanced cautiously at Merlin. "Did it… work?"

Merlin grinned. "Yes, look!"

They both watched as uncertainty quickly spread across the war camp. They had listened for a while to the small snippets of muddled conversation between the soldiers that were scratching their heads and examining their changed weapons with confusion and awe.

"What just happened?"

"I could have sworn my weapon was black. Why is it blue and yellow now?"

"My bullets are orange and have blue tips on them. What's up with that?"

"Wow, my gun turned green – my favorite color!"

"Aww, no fair! I want the green one! I'll trade you – I've got blue!"

"Should we go on?"

"Cenred and his girlfriend will kill us if we don't. They're still guns, so I'm sure they're just as lethal."

Merlin and Lancelot had exchanged elated glances before melting back into the woods and heading back to Camelot.

o.O

They decided to meet Cenred's army in an open field that was in between the Darkling Woods where they knew Cenred's men would be emerging from and Camelot. Arthur wanted to be away from the lower town and the citadel, to try and hold off Cenred's army for as long as they could without any citizen getting hurt. Maybe some people would even be able to flee the city before the enemy army got to them. Arthur thought about Gwen, who he had ordered to stay away from the battle with Morgana. He wondered if he would ever see her again. And he thought about Merlin. Where was that idiot anyway?

And then the time for thinking, worrying, and lamenting was over. Cenred's army was charging out of the woods, waving their guns around… their Nerf guns. Arthur stared. Now this put an interesting twist on things. Grinning almost maniacally, the prince hefted his Nerf axe and Nerf machine gun and said, "It's on." A pause.

Somewhere beside him he heard the newly knighted Gwaine declare, "For Camelot!"

Arthur stopped in his tracks. "Hey," he complained petulantly. "That's my line."

Gwaine shrugged. "The early bird gets the worm."

Arthur rolled his eyes. "That doesn't even make sense. I don't want a worm, I want to say 'For Camelot!'"

The eyes of both armies roved between them, watching the tense drama between the two knights unfold. Gwaine sighed long-sufferingly. "Fine," he groused. "Say it."

Arthur grinned triumphantly and hoisted the Nerf axe in the air. "For Camelot!"

Gwaine cut in, pumping his pink Nerf sword above his head. "And for Bubbles!"

"Yes," Arthur said. "For Bubbles. CH—" He started to give the order to charge but Gwaine interrupted again.

"And for G-Man the Epic," Gwaine announced.

"Yes, him too," Arthur ground out a bit impatiently. "Now, CHAR—" He almost got the whole word out before his fellow knight jumped in again.

"And for the Doctor!" he hooted. Arthur glared at him and Gwaine stared blankly back. "Well, what are you waiting for, Arthur? You gonna give the order to CHARGE! or not?"

At the word "charge" from Gwaine, Camelot's army began to surge forward. Arthur glowered furiously at Gwaine.

"Your line again?" Gwaine asked in a small voice."

"Go, Gwaine. Just… go."

They moved forward with the army.

Just moments later, the two armies clashed.

o.O

Arthur took down the first man with his battle axe, whacking him over the head with it. The man fell on the ground, moaning, and didn't move. Arthur hadn't hit him hard enough to knock him out, but Cenred had had all his knights up all night discussing how to turn on the safety when not shooting and the fallen knight was just sleepy. When he hit the ground he just decided not to get up again. He didn't have anything better to do than sleep anyway. He hadn't wanted to fight in this war. He hadn't even wanted to be a soldier. He wanted to be a dentist, which Rosco had informed him was someone who fixed people's teeth. The prince stood over the fallen warrior with tears in his voice and yelled vindictively, "THAT WAS FOR ROY!"

Arthur hefted the machine gun and managed to shoot about ten Nerf bullets at the oncoming enemies, hitting a few eyes, a nose, and even dead on the heart. Bullets sailed past him and someone hit him on the shoulder with a foam sword. He dodged another sword, knocked someone over with his axe, and caught a Nerf bullet in midair right before it hit his nose. That would have been a nasty mess.

There were screams of outrage and the stench of battle (which in this case was the sweat of a thousand soldiers trying to kill each other with toy weapons) permeated the area. There was the almost constant pop! pop! popping of the rainbow of cylindrical bullets being released from the shiny plastic barrels. Fallen warriors from both sides lay on the ground, clutching their wounds from where the bullets had hit (those little suction cups at the end hurt). A few seemed to have gone mad with battle lust and were shooting everyone in sight, even their own men. The constant pattern on the battlefield was *pop* "OW!" *pop* OOW! *pop pop pop* "OW OW OW! Stop it, that really smarts!"

Arthur ducked under a bright green handled play sword before jumping over a fallen man's last two purple handgun bullets. He dropped his machine gun as he had already exhausted the bullets in the gun and the clips and wrenched a smaller 6-cyllinder revolver – this one bright yellow – from someone's hand. Still dodging bullets and swords and even the odd Nerf brand baseball bat, Arthur cursed as he realized his newly acquired weapon was not loaded, either. He quickly began to scan for dropped darts, grabbing at them and stuffing them first into the slots in the gun before shooting off several bullets.

There were 'corpses' everywhere and if one of them decided to try to get up and fight again, one of the 'dead men' from the other side would pull them back down and hiss, "No fair – you got hit in the forehead. You can't fight anymore – you're dead."

"But I'm fine," the other warrior would protest.

"It doesn't matter. If you would've been dead in a real battle, then you can't be alive now. It's against the rules."

While Arthur was leaping and dodging and running and collecting and sliding and bashing and shooting and hacking (as best he could with a blunt albeit still painful axe), Gwaine and Leon were covering each other's backs. "Camo dart at five o'clock!" Leon yelled. Gwaine used his sword like a baseball bat and hit the oncoming bullet across the field where it took out Sir Owen's left ear.

"HEY!" came the annoyed voice.

"Sorry mate!" Gwaine called back before snapping to attention. "Leon – yellow dart at 5:35!"

Leon stopped, confused, and turned to Gwaine. "What on earth are you talking about? Where did you come up with that number?" Before the other knight could answer, the yellow Nerf bullet had struck Leon in the chest. "NOOO!" Gwaine roared. "LEOOON!"

Leon gasped and stared at the brightly colored dart that was falling from where it had hit him. "I – I've been… hit…" he moaned pathetically, sinking to the ground.

"Leon, no, don't do this to me…"

"It was… my time…"

"No! Do something! Respawn! Regenerate! LIVE, DARN YOU, LIIIIVE!" The last word came out as a howl. Neither one of the men paid any attention to the raging foam war that was going on around them. Also, neither even considered the fact that what Leon had been hit with was in fact a tiny foam dart that weighed less than… well, most anything, really and that Leon hadn't felt at all underneath his armor. But that was okay – they were just caught up in the moment.

Leon coughed a little as Gwaine cradled his head in his lap. "Regenerate?" he chuckled. "You've been watching too much… Doctor…Who…"

"Oh, Leon," Gwaine said sadly, tears filling his eyes at the man's words. "You can never watch too much of the Doctor. Just like you can never stop playing Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2 once you start…"

"Gwaine… you must… go on without me…"

"NO!" Gwaine protested. "I'm not leaving you behind. Knights are supposed to stick together, remember? It's the code."

Leon chuckled weakly. He was beginning to fade, he just knew it. "I thought you… hated the… rules…"

Gwaine blinked. "By Jove, you're right!" he announced. He sprung to his feet, Leon's head falling to the earth with a gentle thud. "See you later, Leon."

Leon sighed mournfully. "If I'm not dead first…"

o.O

Back in the castle, another kind of war was raging between mistress and maidservant. Morgana was armed with a copy of New Moon and a Nerf sword. Gwen had her copy of Breaking Dawn and a Nerf long sword.

"Edward!" Gwen yelled, rapping Morgana over the head with Breaking Dawn. "Because he's pretty!"

"Jacob!" Morgana shrieked, blowing the dust from New Moon into Gwen's face and making her cough. "Because he's a REAL man!"

"No he's not – he's a dog!" Gwen snapped, knocking Morgana's book out of her hands with the sword.

Morgana gasped and lunged for the volume. "You take that back!" she cried out waspishly.

Gwen, encouraged by her ability to rile Morgana so much, went further, "Besides, what was that old proverb Gaius always says? Oh right – 'He who lies with dogs shall get fleas!'"

"Oh no you didn't!" Morgana lunged, dropping both of her weapons and Gwen doing the same. A cliché, annoying, childish, but still highly amusing "catfight" ensued.

o.O

While the two massive battles – one inside the castle and outside – went on, Uther was having a very serious discussion with his advisor. "So anyone can make pictures look magic?" he sniffed, still upset because of his lost Blackberry although he was much more rational now that it had been gone for a few hours. "The boy didn't really make it go away?"

"No," Gaius breathed, relieved that Uther was no longer after Merlin's head. "Rosco was the one using magic, Sire. He duped us all." Technically, it wasn't true but if it would get Merlin off the line Gaius found he didn't really mind. Besides, what was one more lie for Merlin's behalf in the grand scheme of things anyway?

"I've been a fool, Gaius." He took his dead Blackberry Storm and caressed it almost lovingly before tossing it out of the throne room window. "I will never tolerate any of this 'modernization' in my kingdom again. It tore us apart, made us forget what it really is we fight for." Uther still looked very sad.

"Sire?"

"It's nothing, Gaius. It's just, even after everything that this technology magic has put us through, I still miss Sylvia."

"Sylvia, sire?"

"Yes. That was what I named my Blackberry."

"Of course you did, sire. And I'm going to pretend like that's not disturbing in the slightest."

"Thank you, Gaius," Uther almost beamed, feeling much better now. "You are the greatest physician/advisor a sullen, paranoid, murderous king could ask for."

Gaius just smiled. "I know."

o.O

"This has got to be the most ridiculous thing I've ever seen," Merlin snorted as he and Lancelot watched the Nerf battle from the trees. While actually being in the battle was intense and angsty and terrifying, watching it was a whole different story.

Merlin and Lancelot watched as a bunch of grown men wearing armor ran around screaming at each other, Nerf bullets being pelted everywhere, and as they fell to the ground, not even injured in the slightest. There were people lying everywhere, but they weren't dead – in fact, they were propped up on their elbows, watching the battle go on around them, cheering on their fellow cohorts and occasionally tripping someone from the other side. It was ridiculous and petty and very amusing. Merlin was so glad he had come up with this course of action, if only for his own amusement. Hey, a warlock could have a little fun now and then, right?

Lancelot squirmed a bit. "Yeah. Totally… stupid."

Merlin rolled his eyes. "You want to go play, too?"

Lancelot's eyes got comically big. "Maybe…"

Merlin sighed. "Okay, fine. Go have fun."

"Thanks!" Lancelot hurtled out of the trees, scooped up a blue gun that had fallen upon the ground, and entered the fray yelling, "For my WiiMii!"

Merlin shook his head, almost embarrassed for all of these men. They were just acting like big kids really. But he had noticed that the battle was becoming less violent and more fun-geared. Everyone was enjoying themselves, even Cenred's men. Maybe this battle would end in peace instead of more war. After all, if shooting plastic guns and beating the crap out of other people with blunt weapons wasn't the epitome of male bonding, then he didn't know what was.

Merlin sat back, relaxed, and watched the show.

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