Chapter Text
Walking in that room when you had tubes in your arms,
Those singing morphine alarms out of tune
Kept you sleeping and even, and I didn't believe them,
When they called you a hurricane thunderclap.
When I was checking vitals I suggested a smile.
You didn't talk for a while. You were freezing.
You said you hated my tone. It made you feel so alone,
And so you told me I ought to be leaving.
"Kettering" by The Antlers
The sound of Octavia’s frantic, shallow breathing was nearly as loud as that of Helios’ hooves rapidly beating against the dirt. Octavia’s hair was hanging loosely down her back, but it was mussed up and knotted at the nape of her neck from spending the night before dozing against her bedroom wall. Her eyes were red-rimmed and narrow, squinting against the light of the sun at the midpoint in the sky. In the far distance, she could see what she assumed must be Kane, another figure on a horse within the invisible line of the blockade. He was moving at a much slower pace, but, due to his distance from her, one that was still too fast for Octavia to outstrip. She drew her breath to scream but cut herself short; there was no point. She was still too far away for Kane to hear her. She silently urged Helios faster, slapping her heels against him as she leaned further forward over his neck. She was not going to get to Kane in time. Her brows knit, and her mouth twisted downward in a grimace. He was almost at the tree line. Again, Octavia opened her mouth to scream. She knew she was still too far away, but there was no more time. She had to try something-
Octavia nearly cried with relief as the figure that she could only now barely begin to visually identify as Kane pulled his horse up short. She didn’t slow Helios, unable to see why he had stopped and fear painted on her face that he may resume his forward motion before she could catch up, but Octavia released the breath she had been holding when she made out Indra’s figure stepping out from the trees towards Kane.
“Clarke.”
She jerked up out of sleep as though waking from a nightmare. She panted for a moment, eyes wild as she got her bearings, before she turned to find Bellamy standing quietly just inside her cell door. “Bellamy?” she replied, more a question than an answer, her voice soft and hopeful.
“We need to talk.” He hadn’t moved from his position. His hands were folded near his hips and his expression was severe.
“Let’s talk,” Clarke agreed, eager to placate him and quickly adjusting her tone to match the severity with which Bellamy spoke.
He crossed the room, finally, to stand in front of her, looking for all the world like he wanted to take her by the shoulders and shake her. “The Commander.” Bellamy growled as though Lexa’s title alone was a complete sentence. He let the silence weigh heavily in the room. “What is she planning?”
Clarke heaved a sigh and dropped her head. She shifted along her little cot, allowing her legs to dangle over the side while her hands sought solace in their firm grip on either side of her hips. “I already told you. She’s not planning anything other than to wait us out. She’s already set up a blockade five miles beyond our walls, just past the trees."
“And then what?” Bellamy was unimpressed. He began to pace across the room, arms crossed tightly across his chest.
“And then nothing!” Clarke responded, head jerking up and voice irritated. She had already lost her patience with Bellamy’s distrust. “That’s it! She’s not going to do anything else.”
“Except maintain the blockade,” Bellamy retorted with a sneer, throwing an arm out towards Clarke.
“Yes,” Clarke agreed grimly.
“Until?” Bellamy asked, ceasing his pacing to turn to her, but she was already shaking her head.
“I can’t, Bellamy, I told you I can’t.” Clarke expression was drawn, eyes sparkling with wetness from her genuine distress at keeping this secret.
“Clarke,” Bellamy hissed, and he dropped to his knees a few feet from her.
Clarke startled back instinctively at first but then quickly leaned towards him, hopeful.
Bellamy nearly shook as he muttered the truth to her. “Please. I’m trying - Pike’s gonna interrogate you soon. I can’t stop that. I’m trying to do what’s right, Clarke. Where have you been? Where did you go? Why did you g-” He cut himself off and shook his head hard, pulling the hands that he had been holding out to her tightly back into his body. “What will end the blockade?”
Clarke watched this display, thin-lipped and nostrils flaring with her eyes locked on his, but she looked away when she began to speak. “I was in the woods on my own. I hunted. I traded. I survived. I had to get away from this, from them, but I’m sorry I left you, I-”
Bellamy climbed back to his feet and turned his back on her. He crossed the room as though he meant to leave, but when he reached the cell door he circled back around and resumed his pacing. “It doesn’t matter now. You left me here.” He winced violently at his own words, “but it doesn’t matter. What do we have to do to end the blockade?”
“I can handle Pike,” Clarke said instead, head high even as she continued to refuse to meet his eyes.
“What’s your plan then, Clarke?” Bellamy bit out, frustrated. “If the Commander’s not doing anything but something has to happen to end the blockade, who’s going to do it? Murphy?”
Clarke laughed. “Like Murphy would take orders from me.” Bellamy’s steely gaze didn’t soften, so Clarke sighed and shrugged. “He hasn’t even been in Polis. Ask Jaha. He’s been off with a Grounder named Emori mugging people in the streets.”
Bellamy deflated slightly but quickly puffed back up his chest. “I will. I’ll ask Murphy as well, make sure your stories corroborate with one another.”
“They will,” Clarke replied, unconcerned. “Tell Pike I’m ready for him as soon as he’s ready for me. I’m sorry, Bellamy, but-” and she faltered here. The mask dropped and when she looked back up at him, she was vulnerable. “I can’t tell you anymore.”
Bellamy stared for a long moment and then heaved a sigh. He shut the cell door behind him with a slam.
“Are you sure you two will be okay without me here?” Monty, with his arms crossed, pointedly asked Miller.
“I, for one,” Murphy loudly interjected from across the room, “am personally offended that you even have to-”
“We’ll be fine,” Harper sighed without so much as a glance towards Murphy who had trailed off in mock-offense.
“Stop picking at the bandage,” Abby scolded Jasper as she walked him across the med bay towards the door. “We’ll update you on the plan,” she reassured them both as Jasper left and Monty trailed after him in timid silence.
As soon as they were gone, Miller groaned. “If we ever get a plan,” he grumbled.
“We’ll have a plan,” Abby insisted. She had returned to her station and was busying herself with cleaning up the supplies she had used on Jasper. “We just need to set up a meeting with the Commander and explain to her that we’d love to comply but, unfortunately, our governments are set up in a completely differ-”
Murphy barked out a laugh, and Abby cut herself off to frown at him.
Before Abby could say anything more, Harper was nodding. “I don’t know that I’d argue with the Commander about this,” Harper agreed, and she stood and stretched as she thought. “I mean, as far as the Grounders are concerned, we’ve shorted them out of justice once before.” She looked up to the startled faces of the other three and shrugged apologetically. “It’s true. But Clarke was there to smooth it over. Pike’s responsible for a lot more deaths than Finn ever was, and I doubt the Grounders will be so quick to forgive again. I can’t blame them. Honestly, they’ve already well situated on the moral high ground by not demanding Bellamy’s head, too.”
“We can’t just hand him over to be executed!” Abby snapped, a roll of bandages gripped tightly in one hand.
“Why not?” Murphy asked from where he leaned against a door frame. “You and the rest of the council would have had no problems executing us once we turned 18. You did it with all the older kids in the Skybox who were not so lucky-” he paused to let his dripping sarcasm sink in, “as to make it down here before their birthdays.”
“He’s right,” Miller added and looked almost surprised that he was saying it as Murphy was to hear it. “If we were still in the sky, I’d already be dead; I turned 18 about a month ago. Clarke, too. Bellamy was already 18 when he attacked Jaha. You would have floated him then without another thought.”
The thin line of Abby’s lips indicated that she was not much closer to budging her position on the subject, but she was letting them talk, although her arms were clenched so tightly her tendons were visible.
“And it was pre-meditated,” Harper continued as though she had never stopped talking in the first place, now pacing the length of the room. “300 people sent to protect us, slaughtered in their sleep.” She looked up and caught Miller’s eyes. “I don’t know if I’d be able to forgive that if I was the Commander. Could you?”
Miller shook his head, and they both turned to look at Abby.
“Even if -” Abby started, and then preemptively held out her hands as though cutting off an expected a celebration, “Even if I agreed to this, there’s no way to get him to the Commander. He’s surrounded by his guards. We’d have no support.”
“So we look for an opportunity,” Murphy pointed out, and all three heads turned to him. He shrugged. “Pike’s gotta be alone sometime, right? I mean, does he shit with an armed guard?”
Harper wrinkled her nose, but Miller seemed to consider the idea.
Abby was willing to jump on any solution that didn’t involve marching one of her colleagues to his death. “Fine: if an opportunity arises, we’ll talk about it. But, in the meantime, we have another problem we need to get to the bottom of.”
Lexa stood on the balcony in the back of her throne room watching over the city of Polis. It was mid-day, and the city streets were still busy with the people of the city doing business amongst themselves. She found herself watching the stables with her head tipped to the sides and her eyes narrowed with the intensity of her gaze as though willing Clarke to ride up astride Lexa’s horse and dragging along the man who had ruined the coalition’s peace. Instead, the stables were quiet; the vast majority of the warriors had been sent to man the blockade, and the people left in their stead were almost exclusively untrained city dwellers. Behind her, a throat was cleared pointedly, but Lexa allowed herself several more beats of tranquil, quiet watching before she turned to face whatever new problem was demanding her attention in her throne room. She took a half step back in surprise, her heels edging close to the broken edge of the platform, to find Titus standing there.
His hands were clasped behind his back and his head was respectfully bowed. He still wore the robes of his position, but Titus stood with exponentially less presence and grandeur than he had less than a day ago. He was visibly uncomfortable and deferential; the twitching of his hands and the trembling of his shoulders clearly betrayed the terror he was fighting off.
“Titus,” Lexa said, and her voice was clear and steady. She walked to him with slow, measured paces and stopped several feet before him. She clasped her hands behind her back and then almost immediately released them and stood instead with her chin firm and her shoulders squared.
“Heda,” Titus answered when the silence stretched on for longer than he could bear. “I have come as you requested. It has been a full day.”
“Ai get em in,” she said, a hint of irritation with his redundant condescension creeping into her tone. “I would like to wigod yu op, Titus,” she told him frankly, and she tried to hold her gaze steady on his down-turned face but, even with his eyes averted, her own eyes flickered down and away. The quiet stretched on for several moments before she spoke again. “Yu get klir ai no wigod yu op.”
”Sha, Heda,” Titus agreed quickly, and his shoulders relaxed and his head drooped further with the relief of, at least, knowing his fate. “Ai get em in.”
“Do you know what you think your punishment should be?” Lexa had regained herself. She held tightly to her bubbling disdain for him and slipped back into the guise of Heda, the Commander who rules without emotion.
“Sha, Heda.” He swallowed hard and, for the first time, looked up at her through the top of his bowed head. “The punishment for attempted murder is the same as if I had succeeded. Ai bilaik de fraga. Wamplei.”
“Sha,” Lexa agreed. Again, she allowed the silence to stretch on as she turned and firmly lowered herself onto her throne. She took time to settle herself, outwardly unconcerned. She smoothed the folds of her jacket around her and crossed her legs.
Compulsively, Titus dropped to his knees and upturned both his face and his hands towards Lexa. “Jus drein jus daun.”
“Nou,” Lexa said instantly, voice firm and the muscles in her jaw flickering. She uncrossed her legs and sat forward in her throne now, chest low and arms hanging from where they balanced on her knees. “Jus drein nou jus daun.” She waited for his response to her mercy. Lexa sat peaceful, pensive, and patient, but Titus remained silent at her feet.
His trembling had begun anew. “Nou?” He finally asked.
“Nou,” Lexa agreed and heaved a sigh that told of the weight she carried. “You will not go without punishment, but no: jus drein nou jus daun. You will be stripped of your title; you cannot expect to maintain your position while bearing such a stain to your reputation. Wanheda would not stand for it, and neither would I. I will, however, spare your life as I believe she would wish me to. Wanheda has been nothing less than a second chance to me, so despite your attempts to take her from me, you will be given a second chance in kind. You will be given the opportunity to stay on as shouna of the natblidas.” She shifted in her chair with the slow onset of discomfort; he was quivering violently, staring up at her with wet, wide eyes. “This will be your chance to redeem yourself.”
“I will, Heda, I will,” Titus said, with all the passion of a zealot. “And I will see to my replacement as fleimkepa immediately.”
“That won’t be necessary,” Lexa said, and she rose her hand to dismiss him.
He stood and turned to go, but there was a knock on the door and then it was shouldered open.
Lexa licked her lips. “Haihefa Roan,” she greeted.
Roan grinned and only briefly dipped his head before looping his arm around the shoulders of Ontari, who trailed broodingly beside him. “Heda,” he responded. “I’ve brought you a gift.”
“Hey Corrigan!” Miller called as he headed down the hall towards the guard. “Out to gate duty, I’ll take over here.”
Corrigan frowned, looking back to the Grounders in the cell behind him.
“Aww, don’t worry about it,” Miller said with a grin as he got up to the gate and bumped Corrigan playfully with his shoulder. “If you want, you can head to mess and get dinner early.”
Corrigan nodded and hesitated only a moment longer before going down the same hallway that Miller had used.
Soon after he turned the corner, Murphy and Abby rounded it themselves, and Miller gave them a thumbs up from his position in front of the cell door to let them know it was all clear.
“What’s going on?” Lincoln asked through the cell just behind Miller’s shoulder.
Miller, in turn, startled violently. “Jesus, Lincoln. Abby and Murphy have some questions for you. Here you go, ask them yourself.”
Murphy mockingly saluted to Lincoln as he stepped up to the bars. “Long time no see,” he said, voice monotone.
“Agreed,” Lincoln said with disinterest, his eyes on Abby.
She smiled fondly at him. “I’ve got good news, Lincoln. Well, good news and a couple of questions.”
“Heavy on the questions,” Murphy interjected as he stepped up to the cell and wrapped his hands around the bars. “You know, a setting like this really takes me back. I-”
“Enough, Murphy,” Abby snapped, and Miller snorted. “We’re short on time.”
Murphy pointedly glared at Miller, then turned back to Lincoln with a sigh. “Look, we’re juggling about a dozen balls right now, and you’re our best shot at one of them while we wait for the others to fall.”
“This hasn’t got to do with-” Miller cut himself off, turning to double check that the coast was clear before he turned back to Murphy. “With Pike?”
“No,” Abby replied before Murphy could, seeing the irritation on his face. “We have to wait a little while, at least until some of the suspicion of Clarke blows over, so I can get in to see her.”
Lincoln had been watching all of this calmly, face placid as he waited for Murphy to arrive at the point, but now he was interested. He leaned in and wrapped his hands around the bars just outside of where Murphy’s hands rested. “What can I do to help?”
“We have some theories,” Abby started, “but mostly we just need to know more about your culture - specifically your religion.”
Lincoln shrugged. “That’s a big topic. Aren’t you short on time? I don’t think I’m qualified to give you a sermon.”
“We’re not looking for a sermon,” Abby quickly reassured him. “We’re just looking for a little information. Have you ever seen one of these?” From the depths of her pocket, but not before surreptitiously checking around her for anyone coming despite Miller’s cautious watch, she produced one of Jaha’s chips.
“No,” Lincoln answered without hesitation. He held out his hand for it, and Abby dropped it into his palm to allow him to inspect it more closely. “This is higher tech than I’ve ever seen with anyone other than Skaikru. I recognize the symbol on it though.” He looked up and peered, narrow eyed, at Abby through the bars. “Where did you get this? This is sacred. You shouldn’t have it.”
“Haven’t I heard that before?” Murphy sighed and rested his head against the bars of the cell. “Jaha gave them to us. He’s been giving them to everyone, one by one. Says you’re supposed to take them like a pill, and suddenly you’re connected to this mystical city where all your problems magically disappear.” He shrugged. “It sounds pretty great to be honest which means it’s definitely a lie.”
“So we need to know,” Abby interjected, attempting to drag the conversation back on track with her hands lightly looped around the bars of Lincoln’s cell, “why your sacred symbol might be on a piece of what looks like our tech.”
“I don’t know.” Lincoln sighed as he passed the chip back to Abby. He brushed the back of his hand along the stubble on his chin as he thought seriously for a moment. “Bekka Pramheda was our first Heda, and the symbol began with her. It speaks to reincarnation, to the flame of Heda. Our Commanders never truly die, as your Chancellors do. The flame is merely passed onto whichever natblida wins the conclave at the passing of the preceding Heda.”
“The conclave?” Abby asked.
Lincoln shook his head. “No one but those close to Heda and the natblidas, of course, know exactly what it entails, but it decides the Heda whenever the current one passes away.”
“Not a long lifespan for Hedas, then, I’m guessing,” Murphy said idly.
Miller, despite himself, chuckled.
“So, you believe in reincarnation,” Abby clarified with the edges of derision clear in her voice.
“More or less,” Lincoln agreed, as friendly as ever. “We believe that the keryon of Heda chooses and guides the Hedas that follow her.”
“Then we’re back where we started again. What’s an ancient, spiritual symbol like that doing on a piece of tech like this?”
Murphy asked as he took the chip from Abby’s fist, “Unless your Becca was part of Polaris?”
“Polaris?” Lincoln asked and then smiled gently in realization. “You mean Polis.”
“No,” Abby corrected. “He means Polaris. It was our 13th station; it was shot out of the sky before the Ark was formed, in the early days just after the bombs.” She hesitated. “But, it’s possible, that if Becca was on board Polaris and knew that the Ark’s attack was coming-” Abby trailed off in thought.
“But she still couldn’t have survived the radiation, especially so soon, even if she made it back to the ground,” Miller continued.
Lincoln seemed to consider it and then shrugged. “My ancestors did. Why couldn’t she?”
Jackson waved to the patient leaving the med bay and then turned to face the empty room with a vague sort of smile. He waited, standing perfectly still, until the sound of footsteps had faded completely from earshot before he moved across the room to drop to his knees and begin to dig through a cabinet. Neat and methodical in his search, Jackson placed each thing he set to the side and then replaced it where he’d found it. Eventually, towards the back of the cabinet, he found what he was looking for: a brown, drawstring bag that clinked like salvation in his hands.
He replaced everything in the cabinet, double checked to make sure that everything was as it had been, and then stood. Jackson dropped the bag down into his pocket, closed the cabinet, and left the room with the same vague smile that had been plastered across his face the entire time.
Indra spotted and recognized Octavia before she was within speaking distance. She raised her hand to give Octavia a brief wave, causing Kane to look back towards Octavia and do the same, but continued to speak to Kane.
Octavia spurred Helios forward, leaning forward in the saddle, even as her frantic panting slowed. “Hey,” she called out as soon as she could be heard. “Thank God you were here, Indra.”
“He is very lucky,” Indra agreed, tipping her head thoughtfully towards Kane with the edges of a smile on her face.
Kane, for his part, shrugged. “I’m very grateful to have people watching out for me.”
Octavia gracefully dismounted, walking the last few steps towards Indra and Kane tugging Helios’ lead behind her. “It’s not safe out here,” she told Kane, and Indra nodded.
“That’s just what I was telling him.” Indra agreed.
“Besides, you have work to do back at camp,” Octavia continued.
“Oh?” Kane asked, shifting Selu’s lead anxiously from hand to hand. “What’s wrong?”
“Pike,” Octavia said darkly, and Indra, unable to contain her distaste, scoffed. “This blockade Indra has protected you from; it’s Heda’s doing, and it’ll stay up until she has Pike. She demands reparations for his massacre.”
Kane licked his lips and looked away, nervous. “We can’t just hand him over to her brand of justice. It’s…” he trailed off, unsure of the right word, especially in front of Indra.
“As inhumane as killing 299 protectors in their sleep?” Indra hissed, and she took a step closer to Kane. “I have protected you today, Marcus, and now it is your turn to protect me and my people.”
Kane looked up at her through the top of his head and nodded. “You’re right, Indra. Arkadia is clearly not dealing with Pike’s crime, and Heda would have cause to go to war against us for,” he paused, still anxious, “what happened.”
“I can’t go back,” Octavia suddenly interjected, stepping back to run her hands through Helios’ mane in a carefully constructed front of nonchalance. “The only reason I’m here now is Miller and Monty found me. As soon as I entered the gates, Bell dragged me away and cuffed me to my bed.”
Indra stepped back, affronted on Octavia’s behalf, and Kane just briskly shook his head in irritation.
“Bellamy’s out of control,” Kane said quietly. “If only we could get him out from under Pike’s thumb, I think we could make him see the light.”
Octavia scoffed. “Bell hasn’t seen the light since I was born.”
Kane again averted his eyes, feeling the guilt of Octavia’s words weighing heavily on his shoulders.
Octavia, for her part, seemed unconcerned by the unhappy memories.. “I’ll be staying out here tonight and for the next few nights until it’s safe for me to go back. If I went back now, Bellamy would just lock me up again. I’ll keep between the blockade and Arkadia’s gates, find somewhere to stay.”
“I don’t know-” Kane started.
“She’ll be fine,” Indra interrupted. “I can give her some extra supplies. It’s safer for her out here than it is in there with her foto bro.”
Octavia nodded. “But you,” she said to Kane, “need to go back. I don’t know if Clarke…You need to get Pike to Heda. And somebody has to watch out for my brother. The idiot might just wander over the line without someone looking out for him.”
Kane cracked a sad smile. “They’ll just throw me in jail too.”
“Then you can conspire with Clarke,” Octavia said dismissively with a wave of her hand. “That’s where I hear she is, anyway.”
“Clarke’s home?” Kane asked, surprised, and Octavia shrugged.
“So I’ve heard. Hardly anyone’s seen her. She stepped in the gates and was thrown directly into lock-up, apparently. Either way, you’ll get to see her. Do you still have your walkie?”
Kane nodded and fished it out of his saddle bag to show her.
“Me too,” Octavia produced hers from the pocket of her jacket. “If things change, or you need something from the outside, then you know how to contact me. If you ever get out of the box, that is. Get Pike to Heda, get Lincoln out of lock-up, and keep an eye on my brother.”
“Tall orders,” Kane grumbled, but he was already awkwardly scrambling back up onto Selu. “Thank you again, Indra.”
“You’ll be fine,” Indra reassured him, and she patted the flank of Selu as he wheeled her around to head back to Arkadia. She stood together quietly with Octavia and Helios, watching Kane trot away a moment before she turned towards her second. “You will be, too.”
“Hmm?” Octavia hummed without looking away from Kane’s retreating figure.
“I said that you will be okay, Octavia.”
“Oh, I know,” Octavia said and turned to focus a bright smile on Indra. “I’ve slept out below the stars plenty before, with Lincoln and-”
“That is not what I mean,” Indra interrupted, her face stern.
Octavia’s smile fell only slightly. “Oh,” she said quietly, at a loss for words.
Indra reached out haltingly with her good arm and brushed it across Octavia’s shoulder. “You will overcome your brother. You will surpass his hatred.”
Octavia’s brows knitted. “I hope so,” she murmured.
“Hey,” Murphy said as he slid into the empty seat at the cafeteria table across from Bellamy. “Not hungry?”
Bellamy, who had been picking listlessly at his plate with his chin braced in his free hand, looked up towards Murphy suspiciously. “Murphy,” he said by way of both greeting and threat. “What are you doing here?”
“Eating dinner,” Murphy said slowly, his eyebrows raised and voice thick with mocking before he dove into his own meal. “What’re you doing? Moping?”
“I am not-” Bellamy started and then sighed, glared down his fork, and started over. “I mean, what are you doing here? The Ark? Last I knew you’d wandered off into the desert.”
Murphy shrugged. “Been there, done that. It was really not ideal, so I decided to come back to this shit hole instead. At least there’s steady food and water here, you know?”
Bellamy frowned at him, eyebrows knit.
“You just don’t realize how important reliable water is until you’re handing the last of yours to the first pretty girl that you see,” Murphy continued without apparently noticing Bellamy’s hesitation.
Bellamy was blankly staring now, lips parted and eyes worried.
Murphy heaved a sigh that could only be described as long suffering. “Look, I didn’t plan on coming back either, okay, and I’m sorry to bother you with my existence, but we obviously can’t all get what we want.”
The corners of Bellamy’s mouth flickered up at that. “Fair enough,” he allowed, and he finally resumed picking at his food. “Have you got plans to run off again any time soon? Just so I can, you know, brace myself this time?”
Murphy grimaced. “I’d like to, but my partner in crime is MIA.”
“Partner in crime?” Bellamy questioned semi-seriously but without looking up from his plate. “I’m on the guard now, so if-”
Murphy waved his hand dismissively. “It’s just an expression, Blake, come on. Be cool. You know me,” he smirked, “I’d never commit a crime.”
Bellamy chuckled genuinely, a smile spreading across his face. “The pretty girl who conned you out of the last of your water?” He guessed.
“I’m telling you, give a girl something for her to drink in the desert and she’s yours forever. After she knocks you out cold once or twice.” Murphy hid his smile in a long swig of water, but couldn’t hold back his chuckle when Bellamy began to belly laugh.
“I don’t know if you’re making this up, and I don’t know that I care,” Bellamy said once he caught his breath. “So you’re saying that we’ve been here, barely scraping by, and you’ve been out romancing?”
“Something like that,” Murphy said with a shrug and the edge of a smile. “Don’t tell me you haven’t been doing the same. We all know you sleep around, and you have plenty of water here, so don’t act like there hasn’t been a lady.”
Bellamy instantly sobered, setting his metal cup down with a clank and scraping his chair back as though to leave. He hesitated when Murphy only watched quietly and made no move to stop him and finally scooted his chair back in with his shoulders slumped towards the table and his hands limp in his lap.
“Sorry,” Murphy murmured. “I didn’t know, I…” he trailed off. “Clarke?” He hazarded a guess.
Bellamy scowled as he forced out a laugh. “Of course not. That’s disgusting. She’s almost like Octavia to me.” The subject of his sister was, unfortunately, not that much less sensitive; Bellamy hadn’t righted his posture and now a curl of his lip showed his current irritation with the subject of the two women.
Murphy smirked. “You wouldn’t go for that? Because I could definitely-”
“Shut up, Murphy,”Bellamy said, but he was back to almost smiling again.
“So, just to clarify, that’s a no on Griffin?” Murphy waved his hand in a grand gesture aimed somewhere towards Bellamy’s face but that ended up with Murphy rubbing his chin. “Because if you’re not gonna go after th-”
“Murphy,” Bellamy grumbled, back to eating his stew with a smile around his spoon. “Shut up.”
“Alright, alright,” Murphy relented, smiling smugly as he, too, returned to his meal. “Man, hearing you tell me to shut up is really taking me back. It’s just like old times around here. Except earlier today I said ‘Whatever the hell I want,’ and Miller just about jumped down my throat.”
Bellamy waved his spoon absently at him. “He’s been upset with you ever since you left. He’ll come around.”
Murphy sighed and pushed his chair back from the table. “Will he though?”
Bellamy quirked an eyebrow.
“Come around?” Murphy was playing at being disinterested, stooping over the table and to gather up his dishes and his tray.
Bellamy leaned conspiratorially towards him across the table and laced his hands together as he thought. “We’ll see,” he said after a moment’s consideration. “Either way you’ve got me, though.”
Murphy huffed out a laugh. “Yeah, I guess I’ve got you.”
Kane rode into the Ark fighting down nervousness that showed nevertheless in the curled fists of his hands and the nervous flicker of his eyes. He was allowed back through the gates without fuss, but Miller came down from the guard tower almost immediately to intercept him. Neither one looked please to see the other.
“I’m gonna need you to come with me,” Miller said quietly, as one of the other guards took Selu’s reins from Kane. Miller’s mouth was close to Kane’s ear, and Kane nodded.
He was stoic; his brows were furrowed and his eyes blazed, but his expression was relaxed. “Of course,” he said loudly and pointedly.
Miller looped his hand around Kane’s bicep, more for show than with any real force, and began to lead him into the wrecked depths of the Ark. They walked in silence. Kane’s head was deferentially lowered, and Miller was making eye contact with and nodding at everyone they passed. They reached the converted cell room next to the public lock-up quickly, and Miller muttered a few quiet words to the guard outside the door as Kane respectfully looked away.
The door was opened, and Kane strode confidently inside.
Clarke scrambled to her feet as the door closed behind Kane with a weighty click.
“Clarke,” Kane said with a genuine smile. “It’s so good to see you; I just wish we had met under better circumstances.”