Rook {B.B} (3)

•••29•••

Demons (12,1)

After a whole night of riding, Loukas and Tyra considered themselves lucky that they had gotten sleep when they did. Because every time they even dared close their eyes to catch the smallest wink of sleep, their world shifted under their feet and made them feel queasy all around.

So, the siblings rather kept their sleepless night and not let them vomit their insides out, though being awake wasn't much better in that aspect either.

Though Loukas didn't complain at having to stay awake, he knew that as soon as he closed his eyes he'd see his father's face again, and Tyra's terrified expression as she watched from the side how Loukas strangled the life out of him. That was, after all, the dream that he always had plaguing him day and night.

Which is why he refused to even sit next to Tyra after his secret had been revealed, Loukas didn't want to know what version of disappointment he'd get from looking at her. Or even what pang of guilt he'd receive from Tyra's similarities with their father.

"Becca's journal is amazing,"

Raven had gotten her hands on the first Commander's journal thanks to Clarke, and while the Trikru siblings didn't exactly agree with her even touching such a sacred object to them. They would be lying if they said they weren't even the slightest bit curious about what exactly the journal said, after all, Titus had always said he had never managed to make sense of the numerous scrolls in them.

"At twenty-six, she found a pathway to access a human mind. That same year, she had to lock up A.L.I.E because her answer for what was wrong with the world was too many people. She was twenty-seven when it launched the bombs."

"You shouldn't be reading that." Raven waved Tyra off, too invested in the journal to care to listen to her speech about how sacred the journal was.

"What did she write about the flame?"

"A.L.I.E. 2.0. She saw it as a way to atone for her sins. She designed it to not just access a human mind, but to merge with one. It could never wipe us out because it would be one of us. She would put it in herself first, altered her genes, so her body wouldn't reject the implant."

"The first Commander."

"Bekka Pramheda." Clarke nodded, sometimes Tyra and her were on the same page with subjects.

"The gene therapy made her blood black, didn't it?"

"Yeah." Tyra didn't miss Octavia suddenly staring at Tyra at the mention of black blood, the cogs twisting in her brain.

From what Tyra could gather from Octavia's confused look, it appeared Indra hadn't exactly educated her on how they chose Commanders and who could become one. Tyra could only hope she kept her promise from the Mountain and continued to have full discretion when it came to her carefully guarded secret.

"How did you know that?"

"Nightblood. That's where it came from. Somehow it became hereditary. Luna has it. That's why we have to find her. If she can access A.L.I.E. 2..."

"She can tell us how to stop A.L.I.E. 1." Octavia was still staring straight at Tyra, though no one aside from the two women seemed to notice. All far too invested in their own thoughts.

"Bekka Pramheda gets her second shot at atonement."

"Get back to the mind pathway. If A.L.I.E. uses it to upload our minds to the City of Light, then there's a chance my Mom's still alive."

"That depends on your definition of 'alive'." Monty hung his head once more, just like he had spent the entire ride back.

The guilt for killing his mother was obviously eating him alive, but they all could do little to help him if he didn't open himself to their help.