Tragedy ✧ John Murphy

• Chapter 5 •

"Who the hell are you?" Bellamy demanded as the three of them walked over to her. "Charlotte." The girl answered.

"I almost killed you. Why aren't you back at camp?" Bellamy questioned as he pulled his axe out of the tree beside Charlotte, where it had ended up after he threw it.

"Well, what with that guy who was dying, I just – I couldn't listen anymore." Charlotte answered and Julia understood. For most people in camp, Jasper's screams were nothing more than a nuisance and a pain, but for the truly decent people and people like Julia – Jasper's friends – it was quite emotionally draining to listen to.

"There's grounders out here. It's too dangerous for a little girl." Atom told the girl, shaking his head at her. "I'm not little." Charlotte shot back before switching her gaze from Atom to Bellamy.

"Come on, Bell. Let her come with us. We're all grounders now, we should all know how to hunt." Julia stood up for the girl and Bellamy glanced over at her before looking back at the girl in front of him. "Okay then... but you can't hunt without a weapon." Bellamy passed her a knife.

Julia looked down at her own weapon. It was also a knife, one that had a red handle. Her brother had given it to her before they headed out to hunt and she had claimed it as hers for the foreseeable future by carving her initials into the handle.

"Ever killed something before?" Bellamy asked the Charlotte, who shook her head. "Who knows? Maybe you're good at it." Bellamy spoke before he and Atom started walking off after the rest of the group.

Julia stayed back for a couple more moments to walk with the other girl. "I've never killed anything before either. I'm Julia Blake by the way." The older girl introduced herself.

Charlotte looked up at her. "I know. Being Bellamy's sister, I think everyone in camp knows who you are." She replied and Julia realized she was probably right.

She had never really thought about it before, but since Bellamy was the leader of the group and everyone knew about the two girls under the floorboards, then it made sense that they'd know who Octavia and Julia were.

"I guess you're right." Julia replied before they fell into a silence, neither really knowing what to say.

~~~

A little while had passed and the group was searching for an animal when they heard the bellow of a horn in the distance. And that's when they first noticed it: a bronze-coloured fog quickly approaching them. Everything about it screamed danger.

Murphy, who had been standing near Julia, grabbed her hand as they all started running away from the fog.

No matter how tense things between them had been, she was still his best friend and he still cared a lot about her. He didn't want there to be any chance of her falling behind and getting harmed.

"Come on! There are caves this way!" Bellamy shouted to the group as he pointed, but his eyes were searching for Julia. His first instinct was always to make sure his sister was safe and when he saw that she was with Murphy, he felt a little more reassured that she would be.

Bellamy glanced back and saw that Charlotte was starting to fall behind a little, so he grabbed her hand, pulling her with him.

Murphy followed in the general direction Bellamy had pointed, but by the time they got there, Bellamy was no longer anywhere to be seen. There were multiple openings to caves there, so Murphy just chose the nearest one and he and Julia ran into it.

They went a fair ways in before finally coming to a stop. They didn't want to risk any chance of the fog getting to them.

Murphy and Julia just stood there for a few moments, panting to catch their breath after the sprinting they had just done.

Once they caught their breath, they both sat down against opposite cave walls, realizing they were going to be stuck there for a while. There was a silence between them for a few minutes before Julia broke it.

"Thank you... for helping me outrun the fog. I know what I did last night irritated you, so I appreciate you still helping me." Julia spoke and Murphy looked at her incredulously.

"Yeah, well, being irritated doesn't stop me from caring about you. You're my best friend. I don't want you to get hurt, I don't ever want that." Murphy told her and Julia was surprised at his words. He didn't often talk about anything even closely resembling his feelings.

"I'm glad. And I feel the same way. But still, I want to get past what happened last night, so I think we should talk about it." Julia suggested.

"Okay. You want to explain why you decided to go against your brother's rules and steal food for Clarke and Finn so they wouldn't have to take off their wristbands?" Murphy questioned.

"The truth? Ever since Clarke told us about the Ark dying, I haven't been able to get it out of my head. I don't agree with taking off our wristbands anymore because I don't want them to think we're dead. I don't want them to die on the Ark because they think the ground isn't survivable." Julia told Murphy.

She could tell her words sparked anger in the boy in front of her. "You actually care whether or not the assholes up there live or die? After what they did to you and your sister? After what they did to your mom?" Murphy demanded, raising his voice as he narrowed his eyes.

"The people of the Ark didn't choose to float my mom. Chancellor Jaha and the council did that. And I would gladly see them go float themselves, but Murphy, there are children on the Ark! Innocent children and innocent people just working for a living trying to provide for their kids!"

Julia's voice had also raised by the end of her speech, the stress in her words in full effect. She was desperate to make him understand. She wasn't standing up for the people that executed their parents, just the innocent people living there.

Murphy was silent. Julia stood up and walked over to him, sitting down next to him. "My mom didn't deserve to die. I'm sure your dad didn't either. And neither do most people on the Ark. That's why I did what I did." Julia spoke softly as she looked over at him.

Murphy had been looking towards the ground and when he finally lifted his head to look over at her, she saw a vulnerability she had never seen before.

"He didn't. My father didn't deserve to die. I got the flu when I was a kid. My father stole some medicine that turned out wouldn't help me anyway, and he got floated for it." Murphy revealed and Julia's heart ached for her best friend.

She moved her body over and wrapped her arms around his neck, pulling herself to his body to hug him. "I'm so sorry, Murphy." Julia spoke softly, sincerity clear in her tone.

Murphy wrapped his arms around her back and the two just stayed like that for a while.