Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Thump, thump, thump, thump.

The sound of the rubber-soled running shoes on the hardpack dirt reverberated up his legs. A falcon called out somewhere in the distance, searching from the skies for the prey that would become its breakfast. The pink rays of the sunrise bathed the red-colored stone formations, giving them an unnatural orange glow. Wild yucca plants with their tall flowering stalks and long, thick, green spines stood out in contrast against the gray, almost fuzzy appearance, of the rabbit brush that lined the rust-colored path. It was just after six a.m., but the nightly chill of the high-mountain desert was already burning off and giving way to what would easily be a one-hundred plus degree day...with barely a cloud in what would be an azure sky.

Turning on another path, with more rocks than dust, the sound of his footfalls began to crunch more than thump, with the gravel underfoot. He passed through a section where the scrub brush and succulents gave way to Douglas Firs, intermingled with white-barked, deciduous trees. A hint of a breeze caught the arrowhead shaped leaves and shook the branches. The sound they emitted reminded Gwaine of their name...'Quaking Aspen'.

A few of the trees had already begun changing from the pale green of summer, with their light, almost silvery undersides, to the bright golds and yellows of fall. He'd forgotten how much he enjoyed the colors and the rustling sound that only the Aspens would make. Although similar to the Trembling Poplar in the UK, it was never the same.

The sound of the poplars was older, hollow and haunting, amidst the wetter climate that surrounded Camelot. Here, in a much dryer region, it sounded as if they were welcoming him home.

For the past five months since Gwaine returned to the twenty-first century, his life had been a whirlwind of catch-up games. Today was the first morning he took the opportunity to get back to some semblance of normalcy.

The Base, the hospital, and subsequent trip to the UK filled the first few weeks as he adjusted to the changes...Merlin's wedding having been the climax of that period. Not long afterwards, he arrived back stateside, able to walk again; though the nightmares of his final days in Camelot still clung to his memories. It was hard not to fall into drinking as he had done when he found himself in the sixth century, but forced post-mission counselling actually helped...though he was reluctant to admit it.

A few weeks of physical therapy and he was soon on his way to merging the man he had been and the man he had become.

His friend Percival was adjusting quite well, from what he heard. The tall man had elected to stay in the UK for the time being. Although wanting to stick with Gwaine, he had panicked at the idea of flying. Merlin and his new wife Martha, were heading out for a honeymoon with plans to move to New York, where Martha was still stationed with UNIT.

A modern friend of Merlin's named Mickey Smith, offered to take Percival on as a flatmate. Mickey's job with Torchwood allowed him to access resources that could help the knight of Camelot acclimate. Merlin, Gwaine, and Percival had all agreed it might be for the best. It would also be a way for someone to stick close to Avalon and help, in case Lancelot's hinted prediction came about. The three men also agreed that, although not the same man, there were some aspects of Mickey that reminded them of their long lost friend Elyan.

Phone calls, video calls, and...amazingly...even texting from the man born in the Dark Ages, helped to keep them in touch with one another.

Gwaine took a trip up to Wyoming, about a month after returning stateside, to his family's ranch. A moving company was hired to deal with the majority of the family possessions. The rest was packed up in a large U-Haul, with a mural of Alaska on the side panels. He moved his grandfather, his sister, and her three boys down to Colorado.

They finally agreed to rent out the family home instead of selling it outright. Boyd's herd of cattle was sold off to a nearby neighbor, who also agreed to lease the land. The new place was southeast of Colorado Springs and only offered a scant forty acres of land, instead of the nearly one-thousand acres of the family homestead.

Boyd grumbled and 'bitched' about it, but Gwaine and Laney were in agreement that it would be plenty of room for a small herd that their grandfather could keep as a hobby, and not needing to worry about actually making a living from it. When the bank deposit came in from Gwaine's back pay from his time of being MIA, he was able to buy the lot of land outright and pay off a lot of his grandfather's growing medical bills.

Laney's boys were ecstatic about moving somewhere closer to a city, and meeting their estranged uncle...or they were until Old Uncle Gwaine caught thirteen-year-old Toby sneaking off with a cigarette from his mother's stash. Not only did the boy completely despise his uncle for a time, but it also caused a heated argument between brother and sister over the habit. At one point in history both siblings and their grandfather had smoked, but a pact made between brother and sister had the two of them quitting around the time Gwaine joined the Special Forces.

Boyd was forced to quit after his third heart attack, Laney had explained. However, it was around that time that her husband had run off. In an effort to deal with the stress and not kill someone at the time, she had fallen back into the habit.

It had now been two months since the move and the heated discussion. Laney was trying to quit again and Toby was finally talking to his uncle once more. As of yet, the boy had not been caught red-handed since.

Laney was beyond thankful to have her brother back. It not only lifted the weight of taking care of Boyd, but it also gave her boys a father figure to look up to. The family was settling into their new lives together. However, Gwaine made certain not to hide the fact from his sister and the kids, that as soon as he had the medical and psychogical clearance: he was going back to work.

An inclined slope in the path forced Gwaine to bring his thoughts back to his run. He could feel the sun on his bare skin, as the glowing orb climbed higher into the sky. It had been years since he was able to run like this; out on a path with few others, where he didn't need to wear armor or carry a sword. If he had exercised in Camelot the way he had done before being stranded, he would have found himself as bandit bait, mocked by the other knights, or worst of all...teased relentlessly for his indecent exposure.

The satiny polyester gym shorts were black with a thick red stripe down the outside seams, and ended just above his knees. A logo-marked T-shirt from the local Air Force Post Exchange, or PX for short, waited for him back in the parking lot at the base of the trail, in his vehicle. He relished in the feel of the elements on his bare skin as he ran. A brand new pair of Oakley sunglasses wrapped around his eyes and shielded them from the glare of the morning, as he cut in and out of the long shadows cast by the curious rock formations in the Garden of the Gods.

In 1859, a couple of surveyors happened upon the place. Originally intent on calling it "Beer Garden" by one of the men, his companion had promptly corrected his friend and hailed it as a place for the Gods to assemble. Somehow, during their debate on names, the geological formations of red spears of stone and seemingly unbalanced boulders nestled between enormous sandstone and limestone ridges, the Garden of the Gods was named.

The oral history of the native Ute tribes proclaimed their peoples' creation in the area. Before the Spanish arrived in the sixteenth century, the Old Ute Trail ran through it, where the tribes had left petroglyphs illustrating their passage. Out of all the places Gwaine had traveled, on Earth and off, this stone garden always felt more like home than anyplace else.

A buddy of his, first brought him to the place about a month after he was first stationed at the Creek Mountain Complex, more commonly known as Cheyenne Mountain to the locals, and NORAD or Stargate Command to those who worked out of the mountain. The trails hadn't changed much since he was last here, nor had the sense of serenity he felt as he jogged them.

The gravel gave way once again to a flat stretch of packed dirt, and then merged onto a paved path. He turned onto the concrete and finished his morning run back at the parking lot where he had started.

Gwaine wiped off the sweat with a towel, pulled his shirt over his head, and drank heavily from a bottle of water as he let his pulse slow back to a normal speed. Once he caught his breath, he climbed into the driver's seat of the nearly ancient Scout, that he was borrowing from Pops. The old man had bought the 'orange beast', as Gwaine's nephews took to calling it, brand new back in 1978. Gwaine fired it up, feeling the power of the old Harvester's engine and headed home, ready to face the busy day ahead of him.

Shower and breakfast were first on his agenda, and then he was off to the Base to finish getting all his paperwork signed off. By that evening, he hoped to be assigned back to one of the teams that went through the Stargate on a regular basis. If Cameron Mitchell had his way, Gwaine knew which team he would end up with.