Work Text:
Arthur didn’t know when exactly when he’d started hearing it, just that it was faintly bitter, slightly cynical and always accompanied by a mocking smirk.
“I don’t need your help, hero.”
“Go away, hero.”
If he had to put a time stamp on it he’d guess it started after their mutual opposition and dislike ended and they began to tolerate each other. Hero. A nickname, Arthur guessed. It wasn’t exactly affectionate, but affection was hard to come by around here. But it wasn’t an insult.
“Where are you going, hero?”
“Hey hero, how’d you sleep?”
Arthur hadn’t asked about it, it felt off limits almost. But he had no idea what it meant.
“Come on hero.”
It was an unspoken rule not to wander too far from camp. Bad things were out there. People driven crazy from grief, or mutilated beyond recognition from the radiation. Stay with your camp, because if you disappeared, you probably weren’t coming back. And then one day, Merlin had been stupid enough, desperate enough to push along that boundary to scavenge for just a couple more herbs. He’d been ambushed and Merlin had fought and struggled and screamed but he’d never been a particularly large human and his attacker had at least a foot and a half on him and, Merlin noted inanely, only half a face. He was dragged for a mile into an abandoned office building and Merlin had been afraid. Afraid like he had never been before. Not when they were being evacuated, not when his mom died, not when he’d been alone on the street. But he was afraid. And then, there was Arthur. Slamming through the door followed by a burst of light too bright for his unadjusted eyes. Swinging a baseball bat like a sword, hair shining like spun gold and eyes flashing bright sapphire.
Hero.
With one massive swing, Arthur knocked out Merlin’s captor with an audible wet sounding thunk and on his heels Morgana and Gwen and Lance and Freya. He knelt down and pulled the gag out of Merlin’s mouth.
“Are you okay?”
Hero.