Chapter 3: Perchance to Dream
"To die, to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause."
- Hamlet -
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
Lexa woke to darkness.
She gasped, chest heaving as she sucked in her first desperate breaths of stale dry air, limbs thrashing as sensation returned to her in a sudden wave. Her eyes blinked against the blackness, straining to find anything that could help her gain her bearings, seeing nothing but the spots which floated across her vision. She was standing, she realized, her body wedged awkwardly between hard surfaces all around her; a stiff, tangled webbing holding her upright and trapping her legs and left arm. Lexa's free hand grasped awkwardly around her as she struggled to stave off the panic she was feeling, first tugging at the straps which held her fast, then sliding along the smooth, cool surface of the wall at her back. Blind, confused, she focused on taking long, even breaths, her mind working frantically to discern just where, exactly, she was…
And, more importantly, how she had come to be there.
Lexa's head felt fuzzy and strangely full, the beginnings of a severe headache making it feel as though her brain had been recently smashed and reformed like wet clay. The right side of her neck ached with a slight, sharp pain, and she reached up with her free hand to feel the tender skin, surprised when her fingers discovered something thin and hard protruding from the flesh of her neck. Her confusion mounted as she quickly realized what the object was. Grimacing, Lexa carefully pulled the needle of the medium sized syringe out of her neck, going slowly so as to avoid harming herself further. Holding it in her hand for a moment as she examined it with her fingers, she confirmed her fear that the plunger had already been fully depressed. Of course, whatever the syringe's contents had been, she couldn't do much about it now. She considered what to do with the thing before finally just letting it drop to the floor beside her where it struck with a sharp, metallic clatter.
Did someone drug me? She wondered, confounded as to how she had come to be in this strange, dark place with a used needle in her neck. She tried to remember what had happened just before she lost consciousness, her mind strangely blank and uncooperative. Her inability to recall any recent memories was more disquieting than the situation itself. A sudden fear filled her as she considered the possibility that the drugs could have done something seriously harmful to her mind.
Calm down, Leksa, she told herself. Think… What is the last thing you remember?
…Clarke's face filled her mind's eye, her pale hair tousled across Lexa's pillow, her blue eyes laughing back at her as Lexa placed teasing, lingering kisses against the skin of her bare stomach…
That's right, I woke up with Clarke just this morning. We spent the night making love… She told me she had already forgiven me for betraying her, she recalled, the beautiful memories immediately soothing her like a healing balm to her soul, the rawness of it bringing happy tears to her blinded eyes. As long as she could remember her love for Clarke, for everything they had shared that day, then surely the rest would soon follow? Taking a steadying breath, Lexa focused on her feelings for the other woman, letting them fill her soul once more and wrap her heart in their protective armor. As long as she had this truth within her, this love for Clarke, she knew she could find her way through any possible hardship.
Tearing her thoughts away from the other woman despite the desire she felt to escape into them forever, Lexa focused on putting some order to her thoughts, her mind working to organize the events that had followed. She'd woken up with Clarke in her bed, it was true, but her responsibilities hadn't allowed her to linger for long. Slowly at first, then with gaining speed, the events of the last day unfurled in her mind, each new memory bringing with it an increased sense of foreboding.
Training with the Nightbloods, arguing with Titus, then returning to the tower just as a storm began to cover the city in thick clouds and rain. The battered face of the prisoner, the young Skaikru man they had questioned, staring up at her as he told her strange tales of a mysterious island, a lighthouse bunker and a City of Light. Confronting Titus in the corridor afterwards, and the relief she had felt when he finally ceased in his objections and conceded the argument to her.
Pain. Endless pain exploding in her chest. It crippled her, bringing her down to her knees, uncaring of the fact that she was Heda and bowed to no one. (No one besides the woman who possessed her heart, that is.) Titus standing over her, a weapon so heretical in his hands that she was amazed at the ability of the pious man to even hold it.
Clarke's face above her, her tears on Lexa's cheeks as she kissed her one last time and begged her not to die.
Die… She had died… She remembered the coldness filling her body, Clarke's vibrant face receding from her vision. Lexa sobbed, her body now shaking violently at the memories which, so unresponsive moments before when she had been striving uselessly to summon them, now couldn't be stopped. They hammered through her, relentless and terrible, and Lexa didn't even try to control the tears that now fell from her eyes as she again experienced the sensations and emotions of her recent death. The sheer agony of leaving Clarke, the woman she loved beyond all hope and reason, alone in the world again.
Oh spirits, Clarke! I am so, so sorry…
How could this be? How could she have allowed herself to be betrayed, killed by the man who had been friend, teacher, and almost-father to her all in one? How had she possibly allowed herself to be taken from Clarke so soon after they had finally found one another, finally accepted the feelings they shared?... When there was so much at last for her to begin living for. So much yet to be done to keep her people and the woman she loved safe. Had this, this abrupt and senseless end to all she had striven and sacrificed for, truly been her fate all along?
Lexa let herself cry for several painful minutes, alone in the strange darkness. Let herself feel the emotions unrestrained as they flowed through her. Let herself mourn her own death.
But wait… How was this possible? If she had died and her spirit was now free, then should she not now be released from all suffering as the teachings promised, her spirit readying itself to help choose the new Commander? Perhaps she had not really died? Perhaps this was only yet another of many Trials, and she would soon open her eyes and stand up from her meditations in the Chamber, her Fleimkepa standing ready at her side as he always had been each time before. The very thought of the possibility pulled her from her grief, calming her, starting her mind to thinking and analyzing her current situation once more.
The reprieve was brief, however, as a moment later all thoughts of the spirit world ceased as she was startled by a loud, knocking reverberation sounding all around her. It thrummed through the walls and floor, shaking her bones, and was quickly followed by several loud clicks and a shrill, scraping wail of metal on metal. Lexa tensed at the unusual sounds, her mind unable to place them as anything remotely familiar. The closest she could come in comparison was the occasional creaks and groans the tower's mechanical elevator sometimes made when the chains and pulleys were especially in need of greasing.
The moment the noises ceased, Lexa felt the most unusual sensation come over her all at once. As though the very air that surrounded her had become as buoyant as water, she felt herself float up off the floor, body swaying and bouncing lightly in its tight bonds, her feet no longer tethered to the ground as they ought.
This has to be a Trial, she thought, overwhelmed and confused by the strangeness of everything she was experiencing.
Or, this is some strange, unknown technology that Skaikru possesses, and they have taken me captive with it somehow, she considered alternatively, recalling all of the teachings she had received as a Natblida about the mysterious dangers that technology could pose.
…Or, you have truly failed completely, and it is the Entity who holds you captive, working to discover your greatest fears and weaknesses even now so that it might better torment your mind.
This last thought came unwanted from a darker, more fearful place in her mind, and her black blood ran colder at the possibility.
The webbing holding her began to vibrate as the walls and floor around her slowly started to shake. Slightly at first, then with rising force and volume, until the sound was a roaring cacophony louder than even the greatest of waterfalls she had ever seen. She was pushed backwards, her back now pressing against the wall as an unseen force began to build and throw its weight against her. Soon it shifted, however, and rather than pressing against the wall, she was now sliding upwards towards the perceived ceiling above, the straps of the webbing digging into her shoulders. It was uncomfortable, but she was glad for the bindings holding her now, as she was sure without them she would have been sent tumbling around the small enclosure she was in, likely hurting herself greatly in the process. Incredibly, the noise was still building, so loud now that it drowned out her own screams as she shouted into the dark, her mouth parting into a defiant snarl as she raged against… whatever hell this was.
The ship's accelerating and beginning to hit atmosphere, an inner voice that sounded exactly like her own informed her, rising unbidden with an answer.
Lexa was no stranger to voices. As the current Commander, she often felt and heard the spirits of the previous Commanders within her on an almost instinctual level, and they often offered her advice and comfort when she needed it most. However, this had felt different, at once strange and yet as familiar as her own face. Lexa knew – without knowing exactly how she knew – that not only was it her thought, but that it was also true.
The ship, if that's what it was, shuddered in an entirely new way than before, and Lexa felt the direction and intensity of the pressure on her skin again change, this time lessening enough to allow her feet to touch the ground once more. No longer feeling like her arm was pinned beside her, she managed to lift her hand and swipe at the sweat on her brow, the stress and uncertainty of the last few minutes causing her body to respond appropriately. It had also become noticeably warmer, she realized, the pleasant, if perhaps somewhat cool atmosphere she had awoken to quickly becoming replaced with a stifling heat. The wall felt warm against her back even through the strange materials of the clothes she had only just now realized she was wearing. The unrelenting darkness she had been living in was also changing, giving way to a dim light that just allowed her to barely see her surroundings for the first time. What little she could see didn't reveal much, only the dull gray of metal walls all around her and a tangle of pipes and dangling wires whose purpose and function she couldn't dare to imagine.
Though Lexa felt she had reached a level of confusion and alarm that should have left her incapable of being further surprised, she still jerked in her bonds when the next rapid series of explosions sounded.
It's just the first set of parachutes firing open now that the landing jets have slowed us down, her own voice told her, again answering a question she hadn't even known she had asked.
"What? I don't understand… Who are you?" she asked out loud, clutching her head with her free hand as the intensity of her previous headache suddenly multiplied. There was no answer, though she hadn't really expected one. It felt like her head was cracking open now, and some of the fogginess and mental confusion she had initially felt when she first gained consciousness momentarily returned.
Why hasn't the landing chute opened yet?! If it doesn't open really soon then we are just going to crash and die, and this will all have been for nothing, she thought, relieved when just a moment later there was another loud bang and the ship jolted, its descent now slowing to a speed hopefully safe for landing. The jets would keep firing until they touched ground, but it was mostly the large parachutes doing the work of landing them safely now.
She felt it when they finally struck earth an unknown number of seconds later. She was so turned around and anxious that she wasn't sure how much time was truly passing. It could have only been seconds ago when the first noises started, or it could have been many minutes. But as the ship shuddered and settled and the landing jets finally sputtered out, leaving her in a deafening silence once again, Lexa knew with certainty that she had just returned home. To the ground.
Where was I before, then? She wondered. Was I somewhere up in the sky, like Clarke and the other Sky People who grew up among the stars?
The thought was strangely exhilarating. She had never told Clarke this, but from the moment she had learned of the Sky People and their true origins she had been both mystified and fascinated by the unbelievable journey they had taken to return to the ground. To think that there had been people up there living among the stars all this time, people just like her, who had succeeded in returning to the Earth despite the incredible dangers of the journey, had always struck her as a truly poetic and fantastic story. One worth cherishing and retelling so that it might never be forgotten by future generations. It was also one of the other reasons why she had always wished to see their people be at peace with hers. To have come so far, from the stars themselves, only to be slaughtered in a useless war, to her seemed a regrettable, unnecessary tragedy. One which she would avoid if she could.
The dim light which had briefly allowed her to see had vanished, and Lexa's eyes again strained against the darkness. She fumbled awkwardly with the straps holding her immobile, now desperate to get herself free from them and find a way out of this place. Her blind fingers could make no sense of the knots and tangles of the webbing holding her, however. She needed light, and without thinking her hand moved to a place on the left side of her chest. Clipped to the front of the stiff material of her jacket was a small, hard object. Her fingers pressed down on it instinctively, and with a soft click a white light immediately burst into existence in front of her, its brightness making her eyes water.
Lexa looked down at her body, truly able to see herself now for the first time. She was wearing black, tight fitting boots laced over dark, slim trousers, a thin black shirt tucked into her waistline. Over it she was startled to discover she was wearing the thick, protective jacket that she had seen many of the Skaikru warriors wearing during their attack on the Mountain. There was a strap running diagonally across her chest, and it occurred to her that the object which had been digging into part of her back and side this whole time was in fact the small pack she was wearing over her shoulder. Fastened to the front of her jacket was a flashlight, the bright glow from which was lighting the wall in front of her and allowing her to see. Everything she was wearing were things she had only ever seen among Skaikru or the Mountain Men, and it felt strange seeing those clothes against her own skin, although they did feel oddly comfortable as well. Like she had always worn such things. Always known how to turn on a flashlight, despite the fact that she had never used one before in her entire life.
But wait… No, that wasn't quite true. In fact, she remembered pulling those pants up her legs and quickly lacing up these very boots that morning. Remembered shrugging into the jacket, pulling it over the t-shirt she was wearing, clipping the small flashlight to the front pocket, then fastening her hair back and out of the way in a somewhat loose bun at the nape of her neck. She remembered regarding herself in the small mirror of the bathroom she was standing in, taking a moment to make sure everything was in place, trying to settle her slight nerves and gather herself for what needed to be done. Pulling the cap onto her head and low over her eyes to partially conceal her face, her pulse beginning to hammer with anticipation and nerves, the cold steely resolve that always overcame her when she was doing something dangerous, something that needed to be done, filling her with a heady and driving confidence. There was no time for second guessing. This was the only way. She would not fail.
Lexa shook her head at the unusual memories that played before her mind, stunned by the clarity of them. Was that how she had come to be wearing these clothes? What had she been preparing to do, and why did she feel like she was an actor stepping into a story already halfway told? She was well accustomed to encountering the difficult and inexplicable within her own mind, of course. She had survived the Conclave, after all, and many Trials since her Ascension, but this didn't have the feeling of any of those. This was something new. She had died, and now something unexplained and unexpected was happening to her, and she must do her best to unravel it and find her way through to wherever it might lead.
Able to see now, Lexa began working herself free of the bright red straps and ties that had kept her from injury during the ship's landing. After undoing several latches and clips, she shrugged free of them awkwardly, the confined space she was in making it difficult still to move. As soon as she was loose, she began shining the light all around her, eyes searching for a way out. She had obviously gotten in here somehow, so there must be a way out. She tried to remember where the source of the dim light had been earlier, turning off her flashlight again to see if any cracks of light emerged.
There, behind her, just to the left of where she had been pinned was a small seam of light along the floor. She crouched next to it, turning the flashlight on once again to examine the metal panel of the wall, hands pressing against it as she searched for a weakness. After a minute of useless pushing and scraping with no real result, Lexa paused to press her face against the wall and take several long, calming breaths. The stifling air of the enclosed space was beginning to work on her already stretched nerves. If she didn't get out of here soon, she feared she would be reduced to kicking and screaming, beating against the surrounding walls and pipes in pure impotent fury at her predicament.
Wait… are those voices? She wondered, the hum of what sounded like people talking reaching her through the hard surface of wall. She pressed her ear against the metal, barely breathing, and was rewarded by being able to hear faint voices beyond.
"This is stupid," someone was saying, "Someone is already dead, and we can't just stay in here forever or the rest of us will be soon too! I say we open the damn door now and take our chances."
Other voices rose at this as people shouted their support or objections, and she was unable to make out any specific words for a time. Another voice rose loudly over the din.
"I agree! We can't stay in here. If we are going to die, let's get it over with already… Dying of radiation can't be any worse than dying of starvation. At least out there there's a chance we can make it. Go to Mount Weather and get food and supplies, like the Chancellor said."
"Surprise, surprise… the little prince wants us to do what his daddy says," the earlier voice responded, several others laughing at his words. The sneering confidence in his voice sounded oddly familiar, even muffled as it was through the wall, and Lexa wondered at that familiarity. They were speaking Gonasleng, the enemy's language, which meant her unseen companions were almost certainly either Sky People or Mountain Men, the first option seeming more likely as there was only one Mountain Man left alive in all the world, as she well knew.
It sounded like they were getting ready to leave, and as had always been one of her true strengths, Lexa quickly weighed her options and came to a swift decision, knowing that she might only have a short window of opportunity to act. She needed out of here and right now the faceless people beyond were likely her best chance.
Taking a deep breath, Lexa began shouting loudly, kicking the wall with her booted feet and hammering it with her fists, making as much noise as she possibly could. She did so for a handful of seconds then paused, pressing her ear back against the wall to listen.
"… No, I heard it too… I swear I just heard someone shouting… Everybody, shut up!"
"Where was it coming from? I don't hear it now…"
"Over here, I think, somewhere behind there. Hey you, give me a hand here!"
Lexa resumed her pounding and shouting assault on the wall, confident now that they could hear her. After a minute she began to hear answering knocks, then a tumult of banging and scraping followed. She stepped back as much as the cramped space would allow when the sounds increased, anticipation filling her when she saw the crack of light near the floor get larger, then a square panel of wall begin to shake and rattle as the people outside worked to break it loose. Suddenly, with a tired groan of metal, the panel was pulled free, and the voices outside were abruptly clear. A head popped into the opening, someone crouching to get a look inside, and the boy's head swiveled up and around for a second before he saw her, a grin stretching across his handsome features as his eyes met hers.
"Hey there gorgeous… Need a little help?" he asked, and Lexa felt her heart stutter in shock and eyes open wide in complete surprise.
No… it can't be. It isn't possible!
His smile lessened a bit at her expression, his own face now looking up at her with kindness as he shook his brown hair from his eyes.
"Hey, are you okay?" the boy asked her with a concerned voice, but Lexa merely continued to stare back at him.
The young man who had murdered eighteen of her people, whom she had ordered killed in punishment for his crimes… The boy whom Clarke had once cared so much for that she had fought fiercely to save him until the very end, before being forced to mercifully take his life in front of Lexa's own eyes. The one whom the Sky People had called Finn, knelt before her… Alive.
"Don't worry, gorgeous, we'll get you out of here," he was saying, gesturing for her to come towards him. "Here, follow me. Careful though, it's a bit of a tight fit."
Composing herself, not trusting her voice, Lexa nodded to him, then crouched to slide after him through the escape which had been created for her. She could feel the cold, uncaring mask of the Commander stealing over her features, her body tensing and ready for swift action. She had no idea what to expect – what new mysteries waited for her within the brightness beyond – but she was Heda. She would not allow fear or uncertainty to cloud her judgement. If she now knew anything after seeing Finn Collins' face, it was that she was no longer in the world she had known. If he was still alive in this place, then anything was possible. She must be prepared and ready for anything.
Sliding first though a bulkhead and then another thin wall, Lexa slowly stood up from her crouch on the other side. Her eyes travelled up the ring of feet which surrounded her, up legs and torsos to find dozens of unfamiliar faces of all types crowding around her, their features all young and unmarked by tattoos or scars. Finn stood in front of her in an almost defensive posture, his hands up and waving the ring of people back.
"Okay people, back off! Give her some room to breathe," he was telling them, and the circle around her slowly widened. She quickly glanced in every direction while she had the chance, the breath freezing in her lungs as she realized where, exactly, she was. She had only been there once before, and it had looked quite different then, but it had been a memorable visit. It was the day she had first met Clarke, after all, and the memory was burnt into her soul with exquisite clarity. She remembered climbing the ladders before her to find Lincoln dead on the floor above, a look of panicked desperation filling Clarke's face as she saw that they had failed to heal him from his Reaper state as she had promised they could. A sharp disappointment and harsh anger filling her own chest as she accepted what must now be done as a result of Clarke's deceit.
Now, here she was once again. She was on the dropship, and around her were a hundred young Sky People, their faces confused and fearful of what was to come, the great door to the outside world still sealed before them, locking them in.
Lexa couldn't help it, her mind stopped working and her heart raced as she immediately began to search the crowd for that one familiar face… That one soul she was so desperate to find in this strange, alien place.
"Clarke!?" she called out, ignoring the questions and gazes of the young men and women in front of her. She didn't care. She only wanted to find one person… Talk to just one person. If Finn and the dropship were here, then surely… surely she must be here as well?
"Clarke!" she called again, stepping around Finn, moving to search through the crowd. Her heart nearly exploded when she heard and answer to her call, the thin, familiar voice rising above the tumult, the relief so obvious in it that she knew without a doubt she had been recognized.
"Heda!" the voice called, and then he was before her, his slim form slipping between the other larger teens, arms clutching her in a tight, relieved embrace. She stood stunned for several seconds before her own arms reached around to hug him in return, feeling an answering relief at the reality of his presence here, though her mind struggled to accept it.
"Aden…?" she breathed out, hearing the disbelief in her own voice. "Haukom yu kamp raun hir?!" she asked him, confounded by his presence in the dropship.
"Heda!... Em laik yu!"
"Sha, Aden, ai laik hir," she reassured him, wanting to say and ask so much more, but now conscious of the curious faces surrounding them. She pulled back from him, eyes searching out his, and she watched as he calmed himself and released her, a little embarrassment now showing at having touched her in such a familiar way. He was dressed as the others were, in Sky People clothing and a light jacket, and she wondered at that just as she had wondered at her own clothing earlier. She knew that she should be worrying about the Skaikru who were watching. That their situation was potentially dangerous and she should be focusing on trying to figure out what was going on, but she couldn't help herself from asking him one question first.
"Hashta Klark?" she asked quietly, hope living within her for a second before it fell to nothing, her throat tightening when he shook his head sadly in reply.
Lexa closed her eyes for a second and took a deep breath, steadying herself, then opened them again and gave Aden a reassuring nod.
"Hey, we're talking to you!" one of the teens was saying, a girl whom she didn't recognize. Lexa looked away from Aden, who then stepped over to her side and turned to face the growing crowd with her, his lean body tensing and beginning to crouch into a defensive stance. Heartened at having the Natblida boy there by her side, Lexa lifted her chin and stared down the others with a cold, unimpressed gaze. These children did not scare her, and she felt the iron reforming in her spine as they crowded closer to the two of them.
"What were you doing hiding in the walls?" someone asked.
"Yeah! And just who the hell are you anyways? That's a guard jacket you're wearing, so don't pretend you're one of us... And who's the kid?" another boy shouted from somewhere in the back, and it was that same sneering voice from earlier that had seemed so familiar to her.
Lexa opened her mouth to answer, the words rising from within with a certainty that felt beyond her control, her voice ringing above the crowd with confidence and authority.
"I am Lexa Black… and this is my brother, Aden."
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The sharp staccato of the councilwoman's low heels sounded down the station corridor as she strode with purposeful steps, the people around her moving out of her way instinctively, some nodding to her with respect as she passed. As both Polaris station's Senior Representative and a member of the Council, Anya Petrova was arguably the second most powerful person on the Ark, and her commanding presence and authoritative manner left little doubt that she was not to be treated with lightly.
Reaching the hatch at the end of the hall, she paused to check the time on her watch before knocking on the door, carefully counting out the numbers and appropriate pauses so that the rhythm was exactly correct.
After a moment, an answering knock sounded, to which she replied, "It's me. Open the damn door, I don't have much time."
The latch turned and the door swung open to reveal Sinclair's tired face, his eyes red and bruised from stress and lack of sleep.
"Councilwoman Petrova, ma'am, please come in."
She entered behind him, stepping immediately up to the various monitors and computers that lined one of the walls of the small room, gaze sweeping across the displays with piercing intensity.
"Have we found him yet?" she asked, hearing him walk over to stand beside her.
"Yes, I think so. It looks like security picked him up yesterday morning, but I haven't had time to confirm it yet. I only got a hold of the camera feeds three hours ago, and I just found him on them a few minutes before you arrived."
"Three hours ago?" she repeated, her tone incredulous. "Aden has been missing for more than twenty-four hours… What could possibly have taken you so long?"
"I am sorry, ma'am. I started working on it as soon as you notified me of the situation yesterday, but I got pulled away for most of the night. Chancellor Jaha's orders. He had the whole engineering department running another series of pre-launch tests on one of the dropships until early this morning," the man explained, and Anya sighed, now turning to face him.
"Another dropship run-up? That's the second time in less than a month… What does Jaha think he is doing? If he keeps running these detailed diagnostics on the Exodus and dropships, people are going to start to wonder why. He won't be able to keep the Ark's life support systems failures a secret for long once the right people start to ask questions," Anya said, her frustrations with the Ark's current Chancellor clear in her voice.
"I know," Sinclair agreed, worry in his own tone, "Some of the work crews were already talking about it last night. You can't pull people from their beds in the middle of the night to do something like that and not expect them to start getting curious. It seems foolish."
"Does anyone suspect you know anything?" she asked sharply, and the man shook his head in reply.
"No, of course not, ma'am. You can trust me not to say or do anything to give it away," he hurried to assure her, his expression earnest.
"I should hope so… Only the Council is supposed to be aware of the current situation on the Ark. You're both the Chief Engineer and a citizen of Polaris, so he is already watching you closely. If the Chancellor were to even begin to suspect that you know, he would certainly put two and two together and use it as an excuse to come after both of us, whether he has evidence or not."
Sinclair murmured his agreement, again reassuring her that he would be careful. She turned back to the displays and the task at hand, knowing time was short.
"So, where is he? And how was he discovered?"
"He's likely in one of the juvenile holding cells for now," Sinclair told her, pulling up several images on the monitors in front of them. "This video was taken on Unity station a few hours before we realized he was missing. It looks like he was trying to get to the hydroponics on Farm Station… you know how badly he has always wanted to see them… But he got caught in a security sweep. Looks like they saw him try to leave and grabbed him soon after. I can't be sure from these images, but if they did scan him, they had to have discovered he was unregistered, and you know what that means as well as I do."
"And the juvenile prison records?" Anya asked, a small part of her hoping that Sinclair was wrong, but knowing that he rarely was. This was something they had feared happening for many years, and her heart felt like ice in her chest as she contemplated what this meant.
"As I said, I haven't had time to get access yet. Aden's smart, though, so I doubt he's told them anything or given them his name. It's only a matter of time before he goes into medical processing, however, so we will need to act fast."
Anya nodded silently, the gravity of the situation pressing down on her. Aden was not only a precious and valuable resource, but he was also a boy she had known and cared for since he was very small. Much of the responsibility for keeping his existence a secret had fallen on her shoulders, and she couldn't help but feel like she had failed him. It didn't matter that it was likely his own foolish decisions that had led to his capture. As the woman in charge of Polaris, and one of the few people remaining on the Ark who was aware of the 13th station's special mission and purpose, it was she who was ultimately responsible for whatever fate befell the boy. Not only that, but if Aden remained in captivity it would only be a matter of time before they discovered his unusual origins and the strange nature of his blood. If that happened, even she would not be able to protect Polaris and its secrets for long.
"Do what you can to find answers, and start coming up with ideas for how to best salvage this. If he has been arrested and detained, we need to get someone in there who can talk to him. We will also need to find a way to delay his medical in-processing, even if only for a short time. Anything it takes, you understand?" she told him, her eyes glacial in their resolve. "I don't care if we have to take down the whole medical section with temporary power outages for weeks… We can't let them discover what he is."
"I'm on it, boss," he told her grimly, "I won't let you down."
"Good," she sighed, "Now, unfortunately, I need to go. Jaha contacted all of the Council members this morning. He is holding an emergency closed meeting in…" she glanced at her elegant wrist watch, "less than ten minutes. Have you seen Lexa?" she asked.
"No, not since yesterday," he replied. "Do you want me to track her down for you?"
"No, no… that isn't necessary," she told him, annoyance at her absent assistant coloring her voice. "She should be here, though. It's her brother that's missing… and I tried to comm her this morning but she didn't answer." Sinclair looked concerned at her words.
"That doesn't sound like her," he said. "She said she was going to look into something yesterday, that she would let me know if she found anything on Aden, but I was called away to oversee the work on that stupid dropship and haven't heard from her since. Maybe she did find something, got in over her head?" he suggested, worry in his tone.
"Lexa is never in over her head," Anya growled, affection warring with anxiety over the young woman's unexplained absence at a time like this. "Maybe you should look for her, after all," she conceded after a moment's pause. "If something is wrong, we need to know sooner rather than later. If we can't save Aden, then Lexa will truly be the last hope we have left. We can't afford to lose her… We can't afford to lose either of them."
The man nodded solemnly, and Anya softened a bit in the face of his determination and loyalty, despite how exhausted she knew he must be.
"Thank you, by the way, for doing this. For being here. You're a good man, and a good friend."
"Thanks, but you don't need to thank me. There's not many of us old guard left on Polaris, you know… We need to stick together. Who else is going to save humanity, if not us?" he replied with a self-deprecating grin, and she smiled back in return, a rare soft expression on her face that not many got to see.
"Alright, then. I'll be back as soon as the Council meeting is over."
Anya gave the monitors one last glance before she departed, seeing Aden's young face frozen in time, looking desperately for an escape as the guards closed in behind him. She didn't know what this secret Council meeting was about, but she prayed Jaha would get it over with quickly. She didn't have time for his political drama. Not today. Her people, and most especially Aden and Lexa, were counting on her. As she had sworn the day she was elected to the position of Senior Representative of Polaris station, she knew she would do anything necessary to both protect them and safeguard their legacy…
… Even if it got her floated in the process.
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
Translations:
"Aden…? Haukom yu kamp raun hir?!" - - "Aden…? What are you doing here?!"
"Heda!... Em laik yu!" - - "Commander!... It is you!"
"Sha, Aden, ai laik hir," - - "Yes, Aden, I am here."
"Hashta Klark?" - - "What about Clarke?"