Work Text:
There is an emptiness to the world, Gwaine has come to believe. The world is much less full of goodness than he thought as a child, and all the rest of it, cruelty selfishness, they have no substance.
Gwaine has learned the art of giving in, letting the emptiness carry him, bending with the flow. To not do so is ignorance, it is ignoring the futility of honor and so called “nobility”, buying the lies they peddle.
But then there is Merlin, and then there is Arthur, and Gwaine finds himself wanting something more than the emptiness. He wants to believe in them, even if it is foolish, wants to believe that Arthur really is something different, that he really could mean what he says and be capable of following through. That Merlin’s goodness really could survive, clear eyed as it is in the face of all the ugliness he has seen.
This is defiance, to face the chaos and not be blind to it, to stand your ground nonetheless. And Gwaine finds for the first time, he thinks he has the strength for it.