In peace, may you leave this shore.

In love, may you find the next.

Safe passage on your travels, until our final journey on the ground.

May we meet again. —


Not her.

Never her.

Somehow it was never going to be her. So resilient, strong. Kind too. So much kindness in the face of warring atrocities. And though she knew it was weakness, the teachings did not make her immune to her charm. She had, more than once, scoffed at the notion. Unbelievable. She was not weak, after all.

And yet here, in the harsh light of her tent, she was stunned; floored, by the absolute burst of colour and sound and feeling that this person bought. The way that even the walls, the ground, seemed to shriek and move and want to touch whenever she was here. So used to grey. Years of grey. All was grey; except for her. Eyes of the ocean and a gentle quirk of the flesh pink mouth. A tongue coming out to wet at lips. Hair the colour of straw on mid-summers morning. The whole of her life, littered with grey; Titus. Anya. Gustaf. Her mother – and this girl. This Commander of the Sky. She did not match. Costia, dead now, had been similar. Colour. Life. But not like this. No. Clarke did not fit the grey.

Lexa approached. Shifted. Nervous. A twist of her stomach as it burst into a thousand fluttering wings. Too much to take in all at once; and yet not ever enough. Feet moving without consent. Forwards. Backwards. Wherever Clarke was, she followed. Tentative, shaking hands busied with tightening armour. Gauntlets.

Indignant Clarke, angry. A voice inside chided, a shaking finger at the choices she had made. She had sent her solider to kill Octavia; wrong, the voice told her. An inward scoff. She was not willing to risk this all, this war, on feelings. The voice chided at her again.

"Yes, you say having feelings makes me weak, but you're weak for hiding from them. I might be a hypocrite, Lexa, but you're a liar."

A tightening of her stomach. The wings of butterflies settling; a roiling, angry sea taking its place. She felt sick. Each name of those she had loved, another knife in her gut. Pressed against the wooden table, hands grabbing for purchase. Terrified. Angry. A hissed order, ignored.

The colour flowed from every inch of Clarke. Every pore, every strand of hair; a hundred thousand shades of everything Lexa admired. Fell weak for. Another stab. Her face mere inches away. The numbers spat, the furrowed brow.

"Not everyone. Not you," a surprise her voice worked. The ocean in her stomach settling to a gentle lap against the shore. Waiting, watching. It was no more than mere seconds of wait, but it may as well had been an eternity; for all the colours were concerned.

The way their breaths mingled in the air. A cacophony of smoke to water. All it would take was a yes. A confirmation. A kiss in the hard light pushing through a tear in the fabric. A side of Clarke's face lost in it. A future reflected in her eyes; shattered with a shaken breath and denial.

Lexa watched her go. Back straight, a hand grasping at the tables wood before curling in on itself. Eyes cast skyward. A shaky breath. In. Out. Eyes closed to the grey collapsing in around her. A tongue wetting her lips and bringing them in. The voices in her head, chiding once again. A mistake. This was a mistake.

Shaky legs collapsed under her; forcing a seat upon the cold ground. Knees twisted under her. A hand splayed out for balance, security. The other reaching to scratch at her the base of her neck; feeling the raised surface of the Holy Mark. She felt sick again. The roiling currents crashing against her shore without pause.

Love is weakness. Love is weakness. Love is weakness. Love is- colour.

Love is the colour of the ocean reflected in the eyes of Clarke.

Love was weakness and for the first time in her grey life, since the muted colours of Costia, she allowed them to flow back to her; browns and yellows and reds touching at her fingers from the floor below.

A start.


Air surged back into Clarke's lungs. Pushed back from being hunched over the computer chip below. Its tendrils unwrapping from her fingers, gently moving across her skin before withdrawing into its shell. It pulsated with light; like the slow thrum of a beating heart. Doing so only when Clarke was nearby. Feeling her presence and revelling in it like a lover beneath lips.

Gently, slowly, as if moving any faster would break her, or it, Clarke moved her fingers along the edges of the small device. Its tendrils did not move for her. The pulsating quickened a moment. Nobody understood why Clarke had demanded to keep it. Defunct now. Useless. The A.I within having served its purpose. A leader chosen by vote – not by blood.

Clarke covered the symbol with her hands, feeling the tendrils stroke at her palms. A shaky breath let out as she closed her eyes again. The thin strings tying themselves around her fingers. A smile graced her features as she allowed herself to be consumed again, the memories pouring at her from within.