Chapter Text
It’s a stupid decision, something Murphy happens to excel at. But no one could stop him from leaving the safety, hope, probably best shot of survival that is the rocketship and putting on one of those damn radiation suits. He really hopes that it can handle the amount of radiation heading his way.
Monty had grabbed his arm to try to stop him, Raven had tried to talk him out of it, Clarke had done both-goddamn overachiever-, Emori… Emori did none of that. Because even though she’s known him for the least amount of time out of anyone on that ship (besides Echo), she knew there was no point. Murphy had made up his mind. And Bellamy was out there fixing the satellite, risking his own damn neck to save all of them. Like he always does.
So here he is, tearing through the trees and then the clearing as fast as he can to get from the lab to the satellite. The radiation storm is a constant in his peripheral, but he ignores it, focusing on making it to Bellamy.
He’s gasping and heaving for air by the time he gets there. For a guy that’s been running for half his life, he sure isn’t in shape. He rests his hands on his knees for just a moment, willing himself to not hurl. He releases a heavy sigh before straightening, looking up to where Bellamy is now descending the satellite tower. Well, no wonder he’s running behind if he had to scale the damn thing to fix it.
He’s not sure what the practical purpose of it is, there probably isn’t one to be honest. He just wanted Bellamy to know that he’s here, that he’s not gonna die alone out here. So, he calls out to him, “Bellamy!” Upon realizing how muffled the suit makes his voice, he’s surprised Bellamy heard him at all.
Bellamy nearly loses his grip at the sudden sounding, whipping his head over his shoulder to confirm what the hell he just heard. His eyes widen as he gets his confirmation, because yep, there he is. Murphy. Standing there, standing out here when Bellamy purposefully chose to go alone so no one else is put at risk.
“Murphy ! What the fuck do you think you’re doing out here?” He shouts or maybe screams, it’s hard to tell.
But Murphy’s face scrunches. Because you’d think the guy would be grateful that Murphy came all the way out here for him.
Bellamy drops down from a couple feet off the ground, and Murphy knows then that if the radiation doesn’t kill him, then Bellamy will.
Bellamy storms over to Murphy, getting in his face as he screams- yes definitely screams, much easier to tell up close.
“Answer me! You always pick whatever’s best for yourself, but now of all times you get yourself stranded here?”
Murphy full on scowls now and shoves Bellamy back, “Back off! I just didn’t want to leave you behind. The fucks wrong with you?”
Bellamy’s expression turns to one of disbelief before becoming even angrier, grabbing Murphy roughly by the shoulder and shaking him, “I put my life on the line so that the rest of you could be saved. Including you! You fucking dumbass!”
Murphy winces as Bellamy grips and shakes him, the dude really doesn’t know his own strength. Or maybe he does and he just doesn’t care to hold back since they’re both dead. Well, actually-
Murphy grabs Bellamy’s wrist. The intention was to pry him off but holy hell that is not happening, so Murphy settles for digging his fingers into Bellamy’s wrist, “Settle down, jackass. The rocket hasn’t taken off ye-” Murphy should really learn to keep his mouth shut, because of course before he can actually finish the sentence, he hears the rocket launching.
Murphy sighs and slumps into Bellamy’s grip. He doesn’t need to see the rocket leave to know their fate is sealed, but he looks back anyway just to see the spectacle for himself. Not like he’ll get the chance to see a take off in person again. It’s a sight to behold, truly. He swears he can feel the heat of the blast from here. Or maybe that’s the radiation storm quickly closing in-
Bellamy watches as well. It’s amazing, striking. Makes him think of how people built that thing about a century ago. And now his friends are on it, getting launched into space, to safety.
The anger towards Murphy’s stupid actions ebbs away, getting replaced by the desire to protect the dumbass. He releases Murphy’s shoulder to instead grip his wrist, firm but not too tight like before, “We need to move.” He starts running without waiting for a response.
Murphy stumbles after him, not as fast and still a bit winded from his previous marathon. He’s glad Bellamy’s no longer screaming at him, but part of him honestly wishes they could just sit down and let the whole thing be over. He doesn’t though. He keeps running, because if anyone’s going to survive a radiation storm, it’ll be him.
“Where are we going?”
“To the lighthouse.”
Murphy does freeze then, feet planted on the ground. The sudden stop makes Bellamy stumble, which in turn causes Murphy to fly forward and slam into Bellamy.
Bellamy growls, his anger returning. What is with this guy and trying to get himself killed? “What the hell are you doing?” He glances back at Murphy, eyes ablaze, “We need to go.” He punctuates his sentence with a tug on Murphy’s arm, pulling him towards the lighthouse.
Murphy plants his feet again, fear gripping him. Then he irrationally tries to pull his arm away, pull himself back, towards the radiation storm . “I can’t go back in there.”
“Are you fucking serious?” Bellamy glares back at him again in disbelief, the thing breaking through his anger this time being the defined fear in Murphy’s eyes. Fear that’s apparently not directed at the radiation about to give them an agonizing death.
“We can make it to the lab.” Murphy insists, but he knows that’s not true. He can see his reflection in the window of Bellamy’s suit. He can see what’s behind him as well. The radiation storm, already on the island. Right behind him, getting closer. But Murphy can’t bring himself to go back into the lighthouse.
Bellamy sets aside his frustration once more and makes the decision to grab Murphy, hauling him over his shoulder. He wraps an arm around Murphy’s waist to keep him secure as he runs towards the lighthouse.
Murphy yelps as Bellamy grabs him and throws him over his shoulder, the world spinning and making him disoriented. Then he processes he’s hanging over Bellamy’s shoulder as the guy hauls ass. And said ass is closer to Murphy’s face than he’s comfortable with. He grunts as he pulls his head up, eyes widening as he sees the storm approaching at a concerning pace.
“Bellamy!” He shouts in fear. He doesn’t know what else to do. He doesn’t want to watch as the storm overtakes them, but he really doesn’t want to see as they enter the lighthouse either. So, Murphy wraps his arms around Bellamy’s torso and presses his face against the older’s side, though he’s mostly pressing his face against the head of his suit. He scrunches his eyes close, jaw clenching, and whole body tensing up.
Murphy’s grip hinders Bellamy’s movement a bit, but he keeps pushing himself forward. He’s going so fast in fact, that instead of attempting to slow down (he decides that would be the deadlier option), Bellamy just slams right into the door of the lighthouse. He keeps himself from falling over by gripping the handle, using his momentum to turn it and push the door open in swift succession.
He practically throws himself into the building in his panicked hurry and then hastily drops Murphy onto the floor to put all his effort into quickly shutting the door. He sees the storming racing towards him, consuming everything else from view. His breath catches in his throat as he pushes the door closed and hears it click in place.
He closes his eyes, knowing they’re not in the clear. He hears as the storm hits them, feels it make the building tremble. He cracks open his eyes to look at the door, sighing and his shoulders drooping in relief as he sees no radiation getting in.
He then turns his head to Murphy, who’s lying still on his back against the ground. “Shit,” Bellamy mutters, quickly falling to his knees by the younger as thoughts race through his head. Did he hit his head? Did he land on his head? Fuck, is his spine fucked up? Or was his suit compromised?
He grabs at the head of Murphy’s suit and shakes lightly, he can’t see his face very well because the window is fogged up. “Murphy? Are you with me?”
One hand comes up, shaking heavily. “fine..” comes his weak, muffled voice before his hand drops with a thud. He can’t see Bellamy from the fogged glass. His heart is pounding, his vision swimming. Why is his vision swimming? He should probably tell Bellamy. But he feels so tired…
Bellamy relaxes slightly at getting an answer, “Lets get you sitting up.” Bellamy pulls Murphy up into a sitting position and leans him back against the wall. Then he sighs, feeling exhausted as well now that he’s crashing from his adrenaline rush.
He leans against the wall beside Murphy, his vision getting fuzzy, a few black splotches appearing. Oh shit-
His hands tremble slightly as he works at unlatching the head of his suit, struggling to get it off. He panics, which just makes him breathe faster and get more lightheaded. He’s going to die. He’s going to die because he can’t get the stupid suit meant to protect him from radiation off. He considers just tearing his way out, but knows they’ll most likely need these suits later.
He wills himself to calm down, carefully working at the suit before removing the head of it. He gasps, taking in a few deep breaths of air. He turns to Murphy, cursing under his breath as he starts to undo his suit. It’s thankfully much easier to do.
He removes the head from Murphy’s suit and carefully grabs his face, lightly patting his cheek with his other hand, “Murphy, come on.” He can tell that Murphy is luckily breathing, but he doesn’t relax this time until Murphy takes in a deeper, shakier breath, his eyes blinking open, looking a bit more alive than dead.
Murphy groans as he cracks open his eyes, looking up at Bellamy.. who’s really close now.. and not fogged up. He swallows, his mind is sluggish and his body feels warm and itchy. What the hell happened?
Murphy unintentionally verbally slurred those words, Bellamy taking a couple seconds to decipher them in his head, “We were running out of oxygen in the suits.”
“oh..” Murphy murmurs, tilting his head, which he just now realizes is being cradled in Bellamy’s hand, to look at their surroundings.
If he wasn’t so worn out, a fresh wave of panic would be washing over him. Because, oh right, they’re in the lighthouse. The one Murphy was stuck, isolated in. For three months. He almost wants to cry.