"He won't hesitate to do what needs to be done."
— Thelonious Jaha, "Twilight's Last Gleaming"
The man sat at the table in the interrogation room. He drummed his fingers against the metal table top, tapping out the rhythm of an old fight song from his great-grandfather's alma mater. The room was stifling. Sweat beaded against his forehead as he waited patiently. Outside, he could see a tall, muscled man at the door. The back of his neck had a tattoo on it that disappeared into his sweat-stained shirt. The man watched as two others approached. He recognized the older one from the parapet. He had shot the girl next to him. He looked distraught. They were close, he thought.
Kane looked at Lincoln who stood by the door. "Has he said anything to you?"
"Not a word," Lincoln replied. "He's been sitting there, humming some annoying song."
"If we need to discuss something inside, we only use Trigedasleng." Kane reminded them. Bellamy and Lincoln nodded. "Let's go."
Lincoln opened the door and Kane walked through. The man perked up and stopped drumming his fingers. He placed his hands over each other on the table. Kane sat down across from him. Lincoln and Bellamy stood behind Kane's chair.
"Good evening, Chancellor Kane," the man said. "It's nice to finally meet you."
"How do you know my name?" Kane asked, clasping his hands together on the table.
"I know a lot about you, Marcus Kane," the man said. "You were born to Edward and Vera Kane on the United Ark Federation Station in 2108. You crash landed on the east coast on October 11th, 2149. You fought what you call the Grounders, but you have since made truce with them as evidenced by the young man behind you. You moved your people here on April 25th of this year. You live with Abby Griffin and her daughter from her first marriage, Clarke Griffin. You have two adopted children, Benja and Madi, both from native tribes in the south. Abby is nearly six months pregnant with your child. You have lasting wounds from numerous encounters with natives and your own people. You are living in my grandparents' home and their pictures are still on your refrigerator. Did I miss anything?"
Kane's mind went blank as the man finished. He heard Bellamy draw in a deep breath behind him. He could only look at the man, who smiled. He continued, "I'm sorry, perhaps I should have withheld some information. It's just that I have been waiting to meet you for months now. My leader asked me to watch your encampment, but to pay particular attention to you. You have managed a lot in these four short months since conquering my homeland. Please take your time to digest this information."
Kane had lost all control of the interrogation before he had even started. He stared at the man for a few moments before he was able to say anything. Bellamy and Lincoln waited patiently behind him. Kane finally managed, "You know so much about me, yet I know nothing about you. You grew up here?"
"Pardon me, Marcus," he said, "I was too excited to reveal my information about you. My name is Matthew O'Donnell. I did not grow up in this town, but I grew up nearby. This was my father's hometown. Your son, Benja, sleeps where my father slept."
"Why did your people leave?" Kane asked.
Matthew smiled as he said, "Bad memories." Kane waited for him to elaborate. Matthew continued, "Let's think about those happy pictures on your refrigerator. That family ice skating, that family at the beach, that boy on the swing, that girl on the horse. They were, of course, my grandparents, Martin and Louise, my aunt, Sara, and my father, Paul. They were happy here once. What do you think happened?"
Again, Kane waited. Matthew made him wait a little longer. He watched Kane with his unnerving, light eyes. He said after several, lengthy minutes, "Not much of a thinker today? I understand you are still in shock from earlier. Clearly, something bad would have to happen for an entire town to leave. Do we have any guesses, Lincoln or Bellamy?"
Neither were taken aback by him knowing their name. Lincoln sighed and said, "War."
Matthew shook his head. "War came later, though it was short-lived and rather one-sided. Bellamy?"
Bellamy said, "Famine."
"Are we just naming the Four Horsemen? I have read the Bible, too. War, Famine, Pestilence, Death. All happened in due time. But what started it?"
The three men blanked.
Matthew tutted and said, "It all started with a little madness. Five years after the bombs, people went a little...crazy. No one was coming for them. They didn't know if there was anyone else left in the world. They weren't prepared to rebuild an entire civilization, they had been doing the bare minimum to continue on. People started to walk out into Lake Michigan and never came back. Others exposed themselves to the radiation outside of our protective field. Ten years after the bombs, our population was halved."
"That was 90 years ago," Bellamy said.
Matthew nodded. "Good math. Let's move to more recent times. 30 years ago, we abandoned this town. The Earth was regrowing, radiation was lifting. The waters were clearing. 60 years of bad memories, 60 years of death, chaos, starvation, and despair. People left. It started slowly. My grandparents didn't leave until the end, but it was too late for them. They were old, they couldn't stomach the radiation. Grandpa walked out into Lake Michigan and drowned himself rather than die of sickness. Grandma hung herself. My aunt died on the way out of town, thrown off of that horse she loved so much. My father was the sole survivor until the invaders came."
"What invaders?" Kane asked, leaning forward slightly.
"The ones you call Azgeda."
Lincoln asked, "Why are you telling us all of this?"
Matthew shrugged. "Why would I need to hide this information? This tells you nothing. Nothing more than a sad family history in a town with a sadder history."
"What about Azgeda?" Lincoln asked. "When was your father killed?"
"Five years ago," Matthew replied.
"Where?" Bellamy asked.
"South of here."
"Daun flosh oso don hon | The massacre we found," Lincoln muttered.
Kane gave him a slight nod.
"They spoke that language, too," Matthew said. "It didn't do them much good. Their bows and arrows were nothing compared to our guns. We killed them all while they slept."
"Oso don sen disha sontaim fou in | We have heard this story before," Bellamy muttered. Kane nodded, thinking of the same massacre.
"This is all fascinating," Kane admitted, "but why did you attack today?"
"I have my orders," Matthew replied, leaning back in his chair. "I was told to make you suffer. That girl today. She was not your child, but close enough, yes? She was my target. I'm sorry about the boy in the woods, he fought too much."
Kane clenched his hands together under the table. Bellamy warned, "Chil au. | Stay calm."
Kane breathed through his anger and replied, "Who gave you those orders?"
"He would prefer not to be named," Matthew replied.
"Why target Kane?" Lincoln asked.
Matthew smiled. "The easiest way to stop a war before it starts is to take out the leader. Not necessarily in a literal sense, by killing, but crippling them so they can't think clearly. I can see his blood boiling. I know that he wants to kill me. If he does, that's okay. It will kick-start the war with my people. They expect me back two weeks from today. You have that long to decide what to do." Matthew smiled at them. "Now, am I to return to that lovely jail cell you have for me?"
Kane's chest was heaving. Matthew's whole cavalier attitude made him uneasy. His flippant comments about Rebecca and Justin Giles were the last straw. His hand went to his hip and he drew his gun.
Bellamy reacted first as Kane raised the gun at Matthew. He grabbed Kane's wrist and Lincoln wrestled the gun from Kane's grip. Kane struggled against the two younger men and pushed his way to his feet, knocking over the chair.
"Oso na nou frag em op! | We can't kill him!" Bellamy yelled, gripping Kane's shoulders with his hands.
"Em-de laik baga! | He's the enemy!" Kane yelled, thrusting his finger in Matthew's general direction. He could barely see through his rage, but he could make out the man's unnerving eyes.
"Dison laik yu strat? | This is your plan?" Bellamy screamed. "Oso nou bis! Yu don tel ai op! Oso nou frag op! Oso nou torchplei! | We're not animals! You told me that! We don't kill! We don't torture!"
"Oso sou du nau, | We do now," Kane said firmly.
The door to the room burst opened and Scanlan, Costa, Helm, and Nelson ran in. They looked at the scene and turned to Kane, ready for orders.
"Take the Chancellor away!" Bellamy yelled. Everyone in the room looked at him. "I am head of security! Remove the Chancellor from this room!"
The three guards looked at Scanlan, unsure of whether to follow the order as he was head of law and order. From Bellamy's pointed look, Scanlan said, "Take Chancellor Kane."
Kane could do nothing but be pulled out of the room by the four guardsmen. The last thing he saw was Bellamy approaching a smiling Matthew O'Donnell.
Abby stood at the cold table, looking down at Rebecca's lifeless body. She and Jackson had sutured the wounds and redressed her in an outfit Gwen had brought in. Jackson looked up as the door opened. He said, "I think you're needed elsewhere. I can finish up here."
Abby glanced over her shoulder and found Bellamy standing there, his eyes rimmed with red. She touched Jackson's hand before turning to remove her gloves and apron. Bellamy stayed by the door until she had washed her hands and walked to him. He whispered, "Can we go somewhere?"
She nodded. Her office was in an adjacent room. They sat together in the chairs with the door firmly shut. She asked, "What happened in the interrogation?"
Bellamy drew in a rattled breath. "Kane lost it at the end. He tried to kill the prisoner. I had to remove him from the room. I...didn't know what else to do."
Tears dripped from his eyes as he stared hard at the ground. Abby placed her hand on his, running her thumb over the back of it. "You did the right thing."
"Did I?" He asked, looking up at her, the corners of his eyes tightening. "O'Donnell killed Rebecca. He killed Justin. Maybe we should have killed him, too."
Abby shook her head. "We're not murderers."
She glanced out the window behind Bellamy when she heard the door open. Raven, Gina, and Gwen stood in the doorway of Medical. Jackson approached them and motioned to Abby's office. The three women looked at Bellamy.
"Where is Marcus, Bellamy?" Abby asked as Raven made her way toward the office.
"His office," he replied as the door opened. "There was a lot of commotion."
Abby nodded and looked to Raven, who had opened the door but remained silent.
Abby whispered as she motioned to Bellamy in the chair, "Could you..."
"Of course," Raven said, taking Abby's chair as she left. She heard her whisper, "Hey, Bell, come here."
Gwen and Gina had moved to Rebecca's body and Abby gave them one look before exiting Medical. She made her way up to the fourth floor where Marcus' office was. There was a still in the air as she entered the nearly empty floor. Scanlan stood outside of the door, a pained look on his face. He nodded to Abby and stepped aside. Abby knocked softly before pushing the door open slowly. The bottom of the frame scraped against shards of glass.
The room was destroyed. A chair had been thrown against the mirror on the wall. A bookcase lay flat on the ground, its contents strewn over the floor. The globe was split open, one half laying near the door. Paintings littered the floor, strips of canvas pooling in the bottom of the frames. On the center of the desk was a gray, knit hat.
Marcus sat in the middle of the room, his back to her. His arms were wrapped tightly around his legs. Abby called his name and he glanced over his shoulder. He gave her a slight nod and she walked in, shutting the door softly behind her. She watched him as she approached, ready to back off if needed. She knelt next to him on the floor and placed a gentle hand on his shoulder. He leaned his head against it. She whispered, "I'm so sorry."
He nodded against her hand, but remained silent. She moved the litter from the floor next to him and sat down, facing him. His face was blotchy and his eyes were bloodshot. His right fist was swollen and his knuckle was bleeding. Abby just looked at him, her hand on his forearm. He was breathing heavily and staring at the wall.
After a long while, he whispered, "I don't know what to do."
"You don't have to do anything right now."
He frowned and said, "I feel like I need to do something."
Abby ran her hand over his arm and whispered, "You should sleep."
He sighed, but nodded. "Is there anything I can take?"
"I have some medicine that will help."
He nodded and made to stand. On his feet, he held out his hands for Abby. She took them and he helped her up. She looked up at him and he broke down. She pulled him into her arms and he wept.
Author's Note: 9 months later and I'm back! I have been suffering some debilitating health issues and it turns out that I have a compromised immune system and Crohn's disease! As I slowly start to take control of my life back, I hope I can return to writing more in the near future. I truly have missed it, especially this story.
This chapter took a lot out of me, but I wrote it in its entirety today. I hope this was worth the long, long wait.
x Lauren