RAVEN POV
16 October 2150
"It's been 200 days, princess," I hear Bellamy's voice from down the hall. He's called her like clockwork every day for 200 days. I wonder if he'll keep calling her every day for the next four and a half years. I consider stopping to listen through the door of the comms room, but I decide against it and continue on to the mess hall. There, I'm greeted by my five friends, each of them wondering why I asked them to meet me here without Bellamy.
"We've got a problem, guys," I start.
"Raven, I don't know if you've noticed this or not, but we have a lot of problems. Which one are you referring to this time?" Murphy clearly isn't in the mood to be having this meeting, but I doubt he ever will be.
"We don't have enough fuel to get home."
"Do we have enough fuel to launch me into the sun?" Murphy retorts, as Emori scoffs at him from across the table.
"Are you being facetious?" Monty asks.
"Maybe."
"It's a yes or no question, Murphy."
"Not if you don't know what that word means."
"Focus, guys," I interject before things get even more out of hand. "Bellamy is slipping. He's not eating, he's not sleeping. He's going to kill himself from sheer exhaustion. He's falling apart and unless we can give him some semblance of hope to cling onto for the next five years, we're going to lose him. He's done too much for every single one of us for us to abandon him when he needs us most. We have to do this for our friend, for our leader. We owe him this."
"I just don't understand why we have to worry about this now. Can't it wait? It's not like we don't have four and a half years left to fix it."
"Oh, shut up, John. You just can't stand the thought of getting off your lazy ass and doing anything to help the group, can you?" Emori's voice is venomous. Judging by the look on Murphy's face as he stands up and pushes his chair away from the table, it's clear she's struck a chord. "Yeah, walk away John. Run away and hide somewhere like the damn cockroach you are."
A silence falls over the room, nothing to be heard but the echoes of Murphy's footsteps down the hallway.
"Well," Monty says, "I guess we'd better start problem solving."
That night, I can't sleep. We spent hours brainstorming and running simulations, but to no avail. Clarke's sacrifice made things easier for us, logistically, in terms of how much sustenance is necessary to support us for the next five years. The truth is, though, that we didn't only lose Clarke all those months ago. We lost Bellamy too. I know he's never handled separation from her well. Not while she was in Mount Weather, not while she was in Polis, and definitely not now that she's stranded on that scorched planet. Or, rather, she was stranded. None of us wants to admit it, and I haven't brought it up to anyone since I tried approaching the subject with Bellamy a few months ago, but we all know that there's no way for Clarke to have survived Praimfaya.
I know that we have years to find a way home but seeing Bellamy falling apart like this is really taking a toll on everyone. I guess we're all so used to him and Clarke holding everyone together that we don't quite know how to do it ourselves. Harper is really trying to rally everyone, but especially with the tension between Murphy and Emori, it's proving to be more difficult that she was expecting.
Bellamy isn't the only one of us who is grieving though, we all are, to some extent. Monty just lost his best friend. The difference is that Monty has Harper to help him through it, and he has the algae farm to focus on. Bellamy isn't opening up to anyone, he doesn't want us to see him fall apart, and he doesn't have anything to busy himself with but radioing Clarke every day and waiting to hear something back.
After we stopped our little brainstorming session, I spent the rest of the day teaching Emori about mechanics. She's been eager to learn, and I'm glad she is. It'll be good to have another person who knows how to handle some mechanical repairs up here. It's been nice to see her becoming more confident around us. She spent so much of her life isolated, but she's really been coming into her own since we've been in the Ring. Between her background in fighting as a grounder and now her training as a mechanic, she's becoming a huge asset to the group, as well as one of my closest friends.
As I walk through the Ring, I can't help but notice that Murphy is awake as well, sulking in a room on his own. I don't know what exactly when down between him and Emori, but from what she has told me, I feel like they grew apart more than anything else. While she's using the aftermath of Praimfaya and our time on the Ring to learn and better herself, he's shutting down. It's classic John Murphy. When he doesn't have something to fight for, he shuts down. I know that Emori breaking up with him hit him pretty hard, and I feel bad for him. Despite everything that has gone down between him and I, I can't help but feel... I don't know what I feel.
My thinking is interrupted as I hear Emori walk up next to me. I feel myself blushing, having been caught staring at John Murphy, of all people. Emori hold one finger to her lips, encouraging me to stay silent, as she takes me by the hand and leads me away from Murphy's room.
"Emori, what's going on?"
"How long?" She asks.
"I'm sorry?"
"How long have you had feelings for him?"
"I don't know what you're talking about," I insist.
"I know what it looks like to be in love with John Murphy, Raven. Look, I know how hard he tries to hide it behind his stupid sarcastic exterior, but I know that you're one of the people on the very short list of people John Murphy cares about. Things between us just weren't meant to work out, and that's by no fault of mine or his. I loved him once. Maybe he loved me too, but I know now that he loves you. He just won't admit it to himself. You're both my family and I want you to be happy. I want him to be happy. It's been three months and he needs someone. He needs you."
"I don't know what to say. Doesn't this go against some kind of girl code?"
Emori chuckles, saying, "Not if I'm giving you my blessing, which I am. Now, go to him." And with that, she walks away, leaving me with my thoughts.
For a few minutes, I don't move. I can't be in love with Murphy, I hate Murphy. Or at least I used to. But as I stand there, immersed in my thoughts, it dawns on me that Emori was right. As soon as I admit it to myself, I take off, sprinting down the hallway as best as I can. I stop in front of his door, take a breath to steady myself, and knock.
"Go away," his gruff voice calls from inside the room. I knock again, and he opens the door. "Raven?"
His eyes immediately soften when he looks at me. Before I have the chance to talk myself out of it, I take a leap of faith and press my lips to his. For a few seconds, he doesn't respond, and I worry that I might've read things wrong. But as soon as I start to pull back, self-doubt sneaking into the back of my mind, he grabs the back of my neck and brings me even closer to him.
Eventually he pulls away from me and runs his fingers through his hair, trying to make sense of what just happened between us.
"Where did that come from, Reyes?" His voice isn't abrasive when he speaks. In fact, it's the opposite. He isn't trying to deflect attention away from the emotions between us, he's genuinely trying to understand.
"I've been doing a lot of thinking today, and I realized something..." I begin, treading carefully as if the slightest misstep will turn him away from me.
"And?"
"And I... John, I need you." The shock from my confession is evident on his face, but I think I may have shocked myself even more. Did I really just admit that I need someone? I've never needed anyone, at least, not since I landed on Earth and discovered that Finn wasn't just mine anymore. But here I am, telling John Murphy that I need him.
"You called me John," he states.
"What?"
"You called me John. You've never called me John before, it's always been 'Murphy' or 'Cockroach.'"
"I guess I, well I just, I meant—" I feel heat rise to my cheeks, unable to stop myself from blushing as I stammer to correct myself for using his first name. Seeing how flustered I'm getting, he steps towards me and puts his hands on my shoulders, calming me and bringing my attention back to him.
"I didn't say it was a bad thing." With those simple words, he places his lips to mine again in a chaste kiss.
I stand for a few moments just looking at him, feeling unsure of myself, unsure of what to do. Finally, just to break the silence I say, "Okay. So I, uh, I guess I'm just going to go to bed."
I turn away from him, ready to make a break for the door. I take a few steps forward, only to feel John's hand grasping mine. He spins me around to face him again, holding me close to him by my waist, and says, "Stay with me."
With those three words, he leads me over to his bed and there I stay, wrapped safely in his warm embrace all night. I thank Emori for her encouragement silently in my head before letting myself relax into him, feeling calmer and more content than I have since I landed on Earth a year ago.