AN: Hello! I don't know if I've said this anywhere but for this story each chapter is an episode (Except chapter 5 which is episode 5&6 together) so this is Murphy's Law. I feel like I've written this scene a billion times even though it's only been twice. Also this is my least popular story but the only one I've been able to focus on for days so... enjoy y'all.
After Jasper woke up we all crowded bedside for a while, letting ourselves revel briefly in the miracle that he was still alive. I guess not everything is horrible… just most things. We aren't allowed much time before the next horrifying thing happens. In this case, it's some girl stumbling (literally) upon Wells' dead body. It's sad that he died, even if he was kind of annoying. I think he really just wanted what was best for everyone. It's not his fault his dad was a horrible person. Clarke, especially, is broken up about it.
After we bury Wells, Bellamy announces that it was Grounder who killed him and we'd better work hard on the wall today. I still asked Dax, just to double check, but he said, 'Who the hell is Wells?' so I guess it really was Grounders.
"Shaw, pick up the pace." Murphy shouts at me. I don't care if he's Bellamy's second or whatever the fuck, I'm gonna kill this kid. He's been shouting at everyone all fucking morning and he's driving me crazy. Bellamy standing around and staring everyone down isn't helping either. Connor dropping a log was apparently the last straw and Murphy charged over to him.
"Hey! You think the Grounders are just gonna sit around, and wait for us to finish the wall? Maybe we should let the little girl do the lifting for you, huh?"
"I just need some water, okay? Then I'll be fine." Connor tries to placate Murphy. Murphy scoffs until Bellamy steps in.
"Murphy, get this guy some water." Murphy stomps away. Bellamy looks over at a little girl that I'd honestly never noticed before. "Hey, you got this?" The girl makes a determined face and reaches for the tree before Bellamy stops her with a grin. "I'm just kidding." She smiles at him and Bellamy carries the tree away. That was cute, I'll have to tell Harper about it later.
As soon as Bellamy is out of earshot Murphy storms back over to Connor, who's still slumped on the ground. I actually thought he was getting Connor water for a second. I'm an idiot. Instead, Murphy unzips his pants and starts peeing on Connor's back. Teenage boys are fucking gross.
"What the hell is wrong with you, Murphy?" Connor stands up and tries to hit Murphy but three guys step in and hold him back. I don't know why they won't let Connor hit Murphy. He totally deserves it.
"You wanted a water break." Murphy turns back to crowd. "Get back to work!" Connor jerks against the guys grip again when Murphy turns his back and walks off but gives up. He sheds his soiled jacket and throws it on the ground.
"Atom's jacket is in my tent, if you get cold." I offer quietly. I don't want anyone else to know that I still have his jacket. I couldn't' just let them add it to the clothing pile though. Connor manages to nod at me but he's still visibly furious and glaring at Murphy.
Everyone goes back to what they were doing. With all the drama around camp it's a wonder we get any work done. Trina would be having a field day, if anyone could find her. Shit, she's probably dead too. That sucks.
"No water till this section is up! What? What are you staring at, huh?" Shut up, Murphy. I'm grieving. He smacks a cup of water out of a boys hand and when the boy tries to defend himself Murphy and Mbege get in his face. Murphy really wants someone to punch him, doesn't he? Clarke comes storming out of a tent and shoves Murphy.
"You son of a bitch!" I wasn't expecting that but I like it. I drop the log I was carrying to watch Clarke and Murphy. A few other kids follow my lead and form a crowd.
"What's your problem?"
"Recognize this?" She holds up a knife made from dropship metal.
"It's my knife. Where'd you find it?"
"Where you dropped it after you killed Wells." Hm, I doubt it.
"Where I what?"
"No way Murphy killed anyone." I object. Murphy nods at me. "Look at him, he's scrawny." His nod turns to a glare and he looks back at Clarke.
"The Grounders killed Wells. Not me."
"I know what you did, and you're gonna pay for it."
"Really?" Murphy says disbelievingly. He shifts his focus away from Clarke. "Bellamy? You believe this crap?"
"You threatened him. We all heard you. You hated Wells." Clarke says.
"Plenty of people hated Wells. His father was the Chancellor that locked us up." He has a point.
"Yeah, but you're the only one who got in a knife fight with him." Clarke also has a point.
"Yeah, I didn't kill him then, either."
"Tried to kill Jasper too!" Octavia adds from her spot in the crowd. Obviously no one had filled Jasper in because he looks shocked. Murphy scoffs and tries to find support in the crowd.
"Come on this is ridiculous. I don't have to answer to you. I don't have to answer to anyone."
"Come again?" Bellamy asks with a dangerous tone. Murphy looks to Bellamy, trying to plead with him.
"Bellamy, look. I'm telling you, man. I didn't do this."
"They found his fingers on the ground with your knife."
"Seriously? That knife doesn't mean anything. My initials are on weapons all over the camp." I know I said I wanted to kill Murphy but not literally. He's not so bad under all his abandonment issues! Clarke completely ignores me.
"Is this the kind of society that we want? You say there should be no rules. Does that mean that we can kill each other without… without punishment?"
"I already told you, I didn't kill anyone!"
"I say we float him!" Connor suggests. A few people in the crowd agree.
"That's not what I'm saying." Clarke backtracks.
"Why not?" Connor asks. "He deserves to float. It's justice!" Oh no. I know where this is going and I don't like it.
"Connor," I take a step between him and Murphy and try to keep him from escalating the situation even more, "revenge isn't justice." It doesn't work.
"It's justice. Float him!"
"Float him!" The crowd repeats, turning it into a violent chant. Murphy tries to make a run for it but someone trips him and everyone around jumps at the chance to kick him. The few people protesting are no match for the mob and soon they have Murphy beaten to a pulp, tied at the wrists, and gagged. Connor leads the group and soon they have him strung up in a tree, his toes dangling just barely above a box from the dropship. I don't have time to react before Dax has my arms behind my back, preventing me from intervening with the violent show. Clarke pleads with Bellamy to stop them but he won't.
"Bellamy, you should do it!" Connor suggests, gleeful with the thought of killing Murphy. The crowd starts chanting Bellamy's name. Murphy begs him with his eyes while Clarke tries to reason with him but nothing works. Bellamy steps forward and kicks the box away. Murphy's body drops with a sickening noise. I feel like I'm going to puke. I can't believe people are actually enjoying this. Finn comes running out of the forest.
"What the hell are you doing? Cut him down!" He pushes his way through the crowd until Connor pulls out a knife to stop him.
"Just stop, okay? Murphy didn't kill Wells!" The little girl from before shouts, making everyone freeze. "I did." Clarke is the first to react, grabbing an ax and chopping the rope Murphy is hanging from. Finn helps him take the gag off. Dax's grip on my arms doesn't loosen until Bellamy breaks from the crowd, grabs the girl, and carries her away. Murphy pushes himself up and follows them. The crowd follows Murphy.
Clarke and Finn go into the tent and everyone else stands around, mostly in shock. The four people in the tent stay silent while Murphy paces outside, shouting and cursing Charlotte and trying to get the older three to bring her out. I push my way to the front of the crowd and stand with Octavia, Monty, and Jasper.
"Bring out the girl, Bellamy!" He paces. "Bring the girl out now!" Murphy's bloodlust doesn't make him very convincing. "You want to build a society, princess? Let's build a society. Bring her out!" Finn pokes his head out the tent flap but quickly turtles back inside. Seconds later, Bellamy comes out of the tent.
"Well, well, well. Look who decided to join us." Murphy states condescendingly.
"Dial it down and back off." Wow, that was convincing. Bellamy hasn't spent much time with murderers, has he? Words don't really work.
"Or what? What are you gonna do about me? Hang me?"
"I was just giving the people what they wanted."
"Yeah. Yeah, that's a good idea. Why don't we do that right now? So, who here wants to see the real murderer hung up? All in favor?" Murphy asks the crowd. A few people, namely Mbege, raise their hands.
"I see. So, it's okay to string me up for nothing, but when this little bitch confesses, you all let her walk?"
"She's a child, John." I try to reason. He scoffs in my face.
"Cowards! All of you are cowards!" He screams. The rest are uncomfortable with the idea of hanging a child. Shocking.
"Hey! Murphy! Murphy, it's over." Murphy takes a step back from Bellamy and shrugs.
"Whatever you say boss." Bellamy accepts this and turns his back to Murphy. A bad idea, that gets him a log to the back of his head.
"Son of a bitch!" Octavia shouts at Murphy. She lunges for him but Jasper shoves her back which earns him a punch to the face. Jasper falls down. I shoot forward and punch Murphy, who punches me back so hard that I fall into the pile of logs. Not my best moment.
"Come on, let's get the girl." Murphy says, and Mbege and his goons follow Murphy's orders and storm the tent. The tent is empty and Murphy shouts in frustration,
"Charlotte! Charlotte, I know you can hear me! And when I find you, you are gonna pay!" The new mini mob goes searching for Charlotte in the woods. Octavia helps her brother off the ground. I push myself up and try to help Monty get Jasper up. Once Jasper was on his feet I help Octavia get Bellamy into the dropship.
"Octamrphwher'mkkillm." Bellamy mumbles. We get him into a semi comfortable position just as he starts to wake up.
"What was that?" I ask. I grab a rag and a cup of water someone left out and give it to Jasper to wipe the blood off his face.
"Octavia?"
"I'm right here, Bel." She tells him. She sits on her knees next to him and clings to his arm. Jasper flops down and leans against the wall and Monty goes back to his electro-thingy. When the blood is off his face, Jasper hands me the rag and I wring it out as best I can without leaving the comfort of the dropship. Bellamy groans again and everyone turns to him. He blinks his eyes all the way open and grunts, touching the back of his head gently.
"Where's Charlotte?" Hmm, awkward. I'm gonna let Octavia deal with this one. Monty turns away from Bellamy, obviously having the same idea. Jasper looks at his hands, then turns to me and gets the rag. He's not pointedly ignoring Bellamy like Monty and I are but he gets the point. Bellamy gives Octavia a pointed look and she sighs. Jasper hands me the rewetted rag for some reason.
"Bell, she uh- Charlotte, she's gone. Clarke and Finn took her. Murphy went after them." Bellamy lets this sink in for a moment.
"Are you gonna wipe the blood off your face or not?" Jasper asks me. Oh shit there's blood on my face? I touch my chin where Murphy hit me and cringe in pain. Jasper huffs and takes the rag back, taking pity on me and wiping the blood off. Bellamy stands quickly, swaying for a split second.
"What are you doing?"
"Going after them." Duh. I could have told Octavia that. Bellamy walks past her determinedly, almost crashing into Harper as she walks into the dropship. Bellamy just goes past her. Harper gives me a surprised look before her eyes widen even more as she looks between me and Jasper.
"You look like an owl." I point out. She narrows her eyes. Jaspers hand drops and he gives me the rag before joining Monty, who quickly looks away from me, on the other side of the room. "Is there still blood on my face?" Harper shakes her head yes and I offer her the rag to help. She plops down next to me and wipes the rest off.
"You know Murphy pretty well." She starts quietly. She still gets the attention of Octavia, Monty, and Jasper though.
"Almost three years, I guess. Why?" Harper stops wiping and lets her hands drop to her lap.
"Is he gonna kill Charlotte?"
"No." I don't even have to think about it. "Murphy's an asshole, sure. But he's not heartless. He couldn't really hurt a little girl."
"He tried to kill Jasper." Octavia reminds me. As if I could forget, he punched me then too.
"I've fought Murphy a hundred times. The second he gets the upper hand, he gives up. If he couldn't kill me, there's no way he could kill Charlotte." They seem to accept this for the most part. Except Octavia, of course.
"Why did you fight Murphy?" She asks.
"Grudge match." I shrug.
"What the hell is a grudge match?" I've always wondered if other sections had it too. I guess not. Maybe our bad reputation was deserved then.
"Whenever someone does something to piss you off, instead of bottling it up until you finally snap and beat them to death with a metal bar from under your bed, you fight it out." I explain. They stare at me with a mixture of intrigue and fear. The fear mostly coming from Harper and Jasper. "Sometimes we just do it for fun, too."
"That's fun?" Harper asks. I shrug again.
"Yeah. If you do it right. There are rules." They don't react and I sigh. "We started like, 6 years ago, when some girl got so mad at her neighbor for stealing her food that she beat them to death with the metal bar from under her bed, I was like 10 or 11. A few of the older kids decided that we couldn't let that happen again and we needed a safe way to work out our grudges. It's not like the guards are going to step in and give us emotional support. A lot of kids in our section had… issues. So they made up a list of rules and then had kids fight out any grievances they had with each other. After the fight is over, they're usually not mad anymore." They let this sink in for a while.
"That sounds awesome." Octavia finally breaks the silence. "Can you fight?" I nod.
"Despite how fucked up I probably look right now, I can. The girls in my section made sure I could handle myself, since most of them were way older than me."
"Cool." I think she really means it, too. She grins at me and I smile back despite my aching face. The adrenaline from the day starts wearing off and the five of us settle into a semi-awkward silence. Eventually we're all crowded around Monty as he tinkers. It's so cool that he can take all the metal and wires and make it like, do things.
We stay like that for nearly an hour until Clarke, Finn, and Bellamy come back. They gather everyone around the fire and explain that Charlotte died in an accident and they banished Murphy. Bellamy ends the speech with a gruff 'Anyone got a problem with that?' like even if we did, we would tell him to his face. Then they dismiss everyone, going either to bed or to gossip and destress around the fire.
I go back to the dropship with Clarke, Finn, Monty, Jasper, and Octavia. Monty's made a big break in the wristbands apparently.
"Will we be able to talk to them?" Clarke asks Monty.
"No. More like morse code." Monty answers her then turns to Jasper. "You want to do the honors?" Jasper accepts the wire Monty hands him. "That port right there."
Jasper cautiously puts the wire where Monty pointed. For a second nothing happens, then the wristband sparks and shouts are heard throughout the camp.
"What happened?"
"It didn't work. I think we fried all the wristbands." Finn storms out of the ship. Clarke follows after him. Jasper takes it the hardest, slumping down on the floor dejectedly. Octavia is quick to comfort him, kneeling in front of him to talk. I stay on the bench next to Monty, unsure if he needs to be comforted or not. Not that I'm particularly good at it anyway. I don't think he does because he goes back to working on the wristbands.
"Sit there at your own risk. I think I might be cursed."
"Then call me a risk taker. And Jasper, you're not cursed."
"Unlucky then."
"No. Brave."
"Brave? For getting my face bashed in or for ruining any chance to contact the Ark?"
"No, for standing up to a bully and trying to help everyone."
"Yeah. And failing. Both times."
"I don't care how things turned out. You were brave to try. And bravery is always rewarded." She leans forward and kisses him. I tap Monty's arm and point to the two of them kissing. It's cute! When Octavia pulls away Jaspers eyes are huge. I can't help but grin at him when Octavia stands up and leaves the dropship. Monty gives Jasper a thumbs up and Jasper smiles at him. Harper is going to lose her mind.
