only choice

five

     Murphy rolled over, leaves crunching beneath his blanket. He checked to see if Emori was awake. Her breathing was steady and her eyes shut. His fingers traced the hollow shape of her cheeks. She had grown so thin and weary. Not so far away, he could hear wimpering. Clarke.
    Murphy walks slowly, careful not to wake any of the others. Clarke is only a few feet away from him and he can see she's been crying. Emotion being uncomfortable for him, he considers a retreat. But before he can fall back, his foot crunches a twig and Clarke turns, moonlight glistening off her face.
     "Not to be insensitive, but how am I supposed to sleep with you making so much noise?" He asks, sitting next to her. She rests her head on his shoulder, much to his surprise. He guesses 6 years is plenty of time for forgiveness, and plenty of time for forgetting.
     "It hurts. Doesn't it?" Murphy asks, "Being on the outside?"
     "Yeah, it does," Clarke sniffles, "What happened to Emori up there?"
     "Raven said something about radiation and the atmosphere and lots of other things that only Raven understood. But basically, she got space-sick. And I thought maybe the fresh air, the sunlight-," Murphy chokes, "I thought she would be better by now."
     "She'll get better," Clarke promises, "We just have to get into the bunker. My mom can fix her. I know it."
     "But can she fix Bellamy?" Murphy chuckles, painfully, "He's been having fits like that for years. Sometimes, he'd be really drunk and just like, fucking things up, and he would fall over and just like that, be this weak, pathetic thing. It was so weird to see this almighty tough guy, just helpless at your feet. And sometimes, he'd yell for you. That's true."
     Clarke swallows hard. Bellamy and Echo are fast asleep not to far away. Bellamy is cozied up against her, safe and content.
     "Sometimes, I think I am death," she whispers.
     Murphy shrugs her head off, "You didn't give Bellamy seizures, Clarke."
     Her face cracks, tears streaming now, just like they had before. She looks to Madi, and tries to muffle her own screams for her sake. Murphy rocks her gently from side to side, shushing.
     "Its okay. He's okay. You're okay," he whispers, but Clarke finds no comfort in words. In all her time alone, she never felt a loneliness quite like seeing Bellamy next to Echo.