So, I'm updating a bit early. It will be explained in the bottom notes! This is another sort of Murphy-centric chapter (from the POV of Clarke and Bellamy), so not so much a 'Bellarke' chapter, but still I think important. And I just wrote a really adorable Bellake scene in a chapter coming down the line, so no fear, we are getting there!
Thank you so much to my reviewers: Words are My Weapons, Vicky Tzalachani, AcademyAddict, justforfics, and guest!
Guest: Interesting good I hope XD
Six Years After Start of Project
"Got any threes?" Jasper asked with sly eyes, the only thing visible above the fan of cards in his hand.
Clarke begrudgingly handed over her three. Jasper made a big show of picking out the card from his hand and matching them down on the table with his many, many pairs. He then scooted slightly to the left, turning toward Bellamy.
"So…got any sixes?"
Bellamy cussed, and handed him a six. The entire rest of the table groaned.
"We need to adjust the rules." Raven announced, "You've literally had twelve turns in a row!"
"Yeah, how do you know what everyone has?" Monty agreed, glaring at his friend and looking at his meager pile of cards, "If I didn't know better, I'd say you were cheating. But since I'm here playing against you, I don't know who you've roped into it to pull it off."
"Murphy." Jasper replied, totally straight-faced.
"Yeah, right." Raven rolled her eyes, "I know that he's decided you're worthy enough to be his friend, but he has to know I'd whoop his ass if he was playing against me." She raised her voice, daring him to come out.
"I'm just joking." Jasper adjusted his big goggles on top of his head, a recent birthday present from Monty, "I guess I'm just that good." He winked. The table shuddered in unison.
"Just what your ego needs." Clarke shook her head, knowing it was a moot point since he had at least triple how many pairs everyone else did, "Remind me to get on your side if we ever play poker. Are you good at that, do you reckon?"
"Well, maybe." Jasper shrugged, "I've never actually played."
"Me neither." Monty said, and Jasper began to look around the table. Clarke shook her head, only ever seen her father and Jaha with some other men play when she was supposed to be sleeping.
"Who do you think would have taught me?" Raven asked when he looked at her.
"My mom taught me once." Bellamy said, "But I don't remember."
Wells just raised an eyebrow, and that was enough of an answer.
"Dang. I'm sure someone in the group knows how to play, though." Jasper raised his head above their circle, "Probably Sarah, or maybe Benny…"
"I know how to play." Bree's quite voice shocked everyone.
"Jesus!" Jasper jumped a foot in the air, "I for-," He broke off when Wells gave him a harsh look. But Clarke knew what he was about to say, that he'd forgotten she was even here. But it was hard to recall she was, since she was so quiet and hadn't even gotten a single pair yet.
"You do?" Wells even seemed shocked. Her pale skin blushed as red as a tomato.
"Well, sure." She said, and her voice shook, having so many eyes on her, "My dad and mom like playing with a deck they made, in their free time. They play for money, to get enough to get by. They're pretty good." She spoke mostly at her hands, which were situated in her lap, only meeting Clarke and Wells' eyes.
"Will you teach me later?" Jasper grinned, pushing himself across the table, "I mean, I gotta see if I'm as good as that. And if I can get some extra money, ca-ching!" He rubbed his fingers together.
"Sure." She said, "What kind do you want to learn how to play?"
"There are different kinds?" Jasper sounded dumfounded.
"Black jump or something, is one…" Bellamy trailed off. Bree almost smiled at his mistake.
"Black Jack." She said, and sighed, "I'll try to get my deck from home. It's easier to show you than explain it verbally." She said.
"Can we play for money?" Raven said, "Because you know, I could always use it."
"I'd just win it all, but sure." Bree said, smiling innocently. The entire table was stunned, never having Bree speak so plainly or make a joke like that, and she seemed almost surprised at herself, retreating back behind her wavy ginger hair, "But whatever, you know." She shrugged.
"How bout we all bring a little something, and we re-group tomorrow?" Bellamy said, "And you can teach us."
"Sure." She said softly, and excused herself quickly, "Tomorrow." She said almost to herself.
"Well…" Clarke waited until she was gone, "I've never seen that side to her."
"She's not a robot, Clarke." Wells muttered, "She does have a personality, you know."
"Could have fooled me." Jasper threw his feet onto the table, "I think that's the first time I've ever heard her tell a joke. Really."
"She just is shy." Wells said in frustration, "She only opens up to those she trusts."
"Is that anyone?" Raven scrunched up her nose.
"Obviously Wells." Bellamy said, eying him up, "You're speaking from experience, right?" Wells' gaze seemed to harden as soon as Bellamy put that upon him, and his expression soured.
"Being nice to people isn't a crime, Blake." He said. Clarke could have sworn that when Wells looked away, Bellamy muttered something along the lines of 'you should take your own advice'. She rolled her eyes; the constant pissing contest between these two for no apparent reason she could see was totally annoying. And whenever she confronted either of them about it, they'd claim they liked the other 'just fine' and Clarke was 'imagining' things and they weren't trying to compete with each other. She wasn't fooled though, and she legitimately had to wonder whenever they said that if perhaps they really didn't know that they were doing it?
She asked Raven about it later, Raven claimed not to have noticed.
The next day, she met up with Raven and Bellamy and a handful of loose change in her pocket. To her, it wasn't really all too much to lose, but she knew for others this might buy them a whole meal. Since being put into this program, she'd become strikingly aware of the difference of the stations and she hated it with a burning passion.
"Where's Wells?" Bellamy asked, surveying the area around Clarke suspiciously.
"He's with Bree, helping her bring the stuff." Clarke said. Bellamy sniffed.
"Good."
"You see?" Clarke sighed in exasperation, motioning to Bellamy whilst looking at Raven.
"What?" Bellamy asked, frowning.
"That you and Wells are obviously in some ridiculous contest to better the other." Raven said casually, and Bellamy scoffed in offence.
"We are not!" He said, "But if we were, I'd obviously win."
Clarke ran her fingers through her hair, but only looked at Raven with a half-crazed look. Raven was stifling laughter.
"You're right, I see it now."
"Women." Bellamy shook his head, "Don't know what they're talking about…"
"Oh! Before we pass by his area, can we pick up Murphy? He'd kill me if he missed out on a chance to make some money off people." She giggled, and Clarke tilted her head.
"Where has he been? Now that you talk about it, I haven't seen him in class a couple days." She felt guilt for not noticing.
"Well, uh…" Raven twirled her fingers; "You know things have been hard since last year, right?"
"Obviously." Bellamy nodded, sharpening his attention.
"His mom…she's in a bad way, you know? It was just kind of going off the handle once or twice a month at first, but now she's drunk just all the time. I don't even know where she's getting that moonshine from, but Murphy hasn't been able to eat meals some days. I share what Mrs. Collins gives me with him."
"Stars, Raven, shit." Bellamy cussed, "Why didn't you tell us? We would have helped?"
"And let it get out? That this is happening?" Raven straightened her back, "No. He's too proud to let anyone else help. And I understand it, what it's like. My mom's the same. You can't…" She tapped her foot, "It's really something between me and him. You might just make things worse." She said, looking at Clarke. Clarke realized she'd likely come to the same conclusions as Clarke had about becoming an orphan and those sorts of ramifications.
"Is he okay, though?" Clarke asked softly.
"He's managing. He's actually stronger than even I think I am sometimes." She gave a grave smile, "Especially since his mom wasn't always like this. My mom is all I've ever known."
"What was his mom like before?" Clarke asked as they made their way to his place.
"She wasn't great, you know. I don't get what his dad saw in her, but whatever. His dad's love for him was so clear, and I think Murphy's even a semi-good person because of his father's influence. His mother though…" Raven shook her head, "I shouldn't speak ill of her, never mind."
Bellamy and Clarke shared anxious looks.
When they reached his door, there wasn't any sound coming from behind the door.
"Murphy?" Raven banged on the door, "You still alive, buddy?" She chuckled, trying to lighten the mood, "C'mon, you should come out. We're playing poker for money. I'll cover your fee." Clarke knew this was a generous offer on her part, since she already had so little.
They waited a bit longer, but still no answer.
"Maybe he's out?" Bellamy said, sticking his hands in his pockets, "We should go."
"No, I'm checking up on him." Raven said boldly, fishing a key from her pocket to his door.
"How did you get a key?" Clarke asked.
"Copied it, but shh…" Raven waved her hand, ignoring the fact that this was technically a crime. She opened the door, and cautiously pushed it in.
The room reeked of alcohol. It was trashed and dirty, and even though it was small, it seemed to hold an insurmountable amount of just garbage.
"Wow…" Bellamy whispered, "Is it always like this?"
"No." Raven said, and took a step forward. Something crunched underneath her foot, and she screamed and jumped a couple inches back. There was a blanket thrown on the ground, and Clarke cautiously lifted it back. Bellamy made a retching nose, holding back vomit.
"Holy fu-,"
"Is that Murphy's mom?" Clarke asked Raven. Down on the ground was a woman with the palest skin Clarke had ever seen, bloodshot eyes, and vomit dripping from her parted lips. Her skin was cold, and she was dead, and had been for awhile. Raven had tread on her hand.
Raven was covering her mouth with both hands, and nodded.
"She wouldn't let me touch her. I couldn't…save her." A voice sounded from the back of the room. Bellamy stepped over the body, squinting into the darkness.
"John?"
"Hi." Murphy's voice was flat, and he uncurled himself from the ball he'd been holed up in.
"How long has…" Raven's voice came out muffled, hands still covering her lips.
"Not that long, it doesn't smell yet." Clarke said, having seen death a couple times in the clinic.
"Only half an hour, not long." Murphy's voice was so devoid of anything, no anger, and no sadness it was so different than when his father had died last year. Something was off about it.
"We need to get rid of her body, John." Clarke said as softly as she could.
"Okay, fine." Murphy shrugged. Raven's face was deeply knit with worry, and she went over to sit on his bunk with him. Clarke instructed Bellamy to stay behind too, just in case, and she ran back to find her mom.
Two hours later, Karenina Murphy's body was taken away, and his house sealed up to be deeply cleansed and eventually given to another family. Murphy was led to the Chancellor's room, where he now sat on the couch, staring off into the distance.
Clarke couldn't help but feel her heart clench when she looked at him…he was an orphan now.
Mrs. Collins and Mr. Collins had shown up with Finn not soon after, since all news traveled fast upon the Ark. A death like this was especially juicy.
"You're not going to send him to the Sky Box, are you?" Clarke asked Jaha, "Please, don't."
"Of course not." Jaha said with only a minor hesitation, "It's a tragedy what happened, and I'm sure something can be worked out." Clarke didn't comment upon it, but he seemed really unsure.
Raven was sitting solidly by him, and Murphy even let Finn sit on his other side, something he hadn't let Bellamy or Clarke do.
"We want to adopt him." Mrs. Collins' voice rose from near the wall, and Jaha turned to look at her along with Clarke's parents.
"What?"
"We…we want to take him in." Mr. Collins said a little louder, confirming his wife's statement, "It's rarely done, sure, but it has been done. It will be tight but we'll make it work." He said, and in that moment Clarke truly understood what kind people they were.
"As you said, it's just a tragedy. He deserves something good in his life, don't you say?"
Jaha, Abby, and Jake were all equally stunned.
"But…why?" Jake questioned, "Do you even know the kid?"
"We know Raven is fond of him," Mr. Collins smiled in his direction, "And Raven's hardly fond of anyone. She is like our daughter too, and if she thinks so highly of him, he defiantly deserves another chance."
Clarke slipped away as the adults continued to discus how this would go, and how her parents could help with the new addition to her their family. She saw Bellamy standing guard protectively over Murphy, and nodded to Clarke. He may not like to admit it, but he cared deeply about all his friends, and she was sure losing a parent knocked some other things loose inside his head.
Finn was in the kitchen, grabbing some water for Raven and Murphy. Clarke pushed herself onto the counter top.
"I hear you're getting a new brother." She said, tilting her head, curious to how he would respond.
"Oh, thank stars." He said, running a hand over his forehead, "I was the one that brought it up, you know." He said.
"Really?" This truly surprised Clarke.
"Yeah. I'd do anything to make Raven happy. And losing that kid to something that would have come out of this would kill her." There was a tinge of longing in his voice, something that Clarke had heard in someone else's tone somewhere, but couldn't place it.
"And you're getting a brother." Clarke repeated, raising an eyebrow. The word felt foreign on here tongue.
"I don't hate him, not completely." Finn said, "I tolerate him like everyone else. But second chances, right?"
"Your whole family seems to have a thing about second chances." Clarke snorted; grabbing the extra glass he couldn't carry himself.
"It's not done often on this Ark, so we try to make them happen wherever we can."
The legality of the choice went quicker than usual; Clarke knew Jaha had a heavy hand in that, and although it would be unfair for the Chancellor to play favorites, it was quite unusual that Murphy was able to bunk up with the Collins so quickly. A construction worker who had been friends with Alex Murphy built a bunk above Finn's and Clarke's somehow managed to procure John's old mattress from his bunk.
Clarke took it upon herself to organize people to routinely check up on Murphy. While Finn didn't dislike his new 'brother', it wasn't fair to expect him to be mentally there for him every hour of the day. Plus, Murphy had grown on her, and she'd be damned if she let him go through this transition alone. Many others agreed.
"He's sort of like mold. Grows on you over time, and also pretty interesting." Jasper said, which wasn't exactly the comparison Clarke would have had, but it was acceptable.
Raven spent more time with the Collins than she ever had, but on the times she was unavailable, a few people who had offered would hang out with them too. Clarke started it up, Bellamy joined a second after, Jasper and Monty agreed quicker than she'd expected, and Miller was the last to say he didn't mind going over there. It was three more people than she'd thought she would get, so she was relieved. It was imperative to her that they prove to Murphy that he would never be alone, even if his parents were dead.
Somewhere, Murphy knew what they were all doing, but he'd never said anything about it, and Clarke thought maybe he sort of liked it.
Bellamy took a lot of the 'shifts' that Raven couldn't make. He wasn't sure if it was because he understood the problem Murphy faced on a deeper level, or if he felt a twinge of sympathy for Finn. Finn wasn't his favorite person, and on any given day he'd actually chose Murphy over Finn, but the sudden appearance of a sibling was something he understood well…even if he could never say. He figured Finn was his job to watch as well as Murphy's. If Octavia had been shoved at him at the age she was now, he might have gone mad.
Nine days after his mother had died, Bellamy found himself trailing the familiar path to where Raven, Finn, and Murphy lived. Raven was dragging her mother out of some awful place to bring her back to her apartment, so she couldn't be there with them.
The door was open, and he saw Finn twisting metal figurines on his bed, his past time.
"Where's John?"
"Uhh…" Finn looked up, wincing, "I got a little involved in my work. He said he was going out…somewhere…" Finn bit his lip, "Dunno, I'm sure it's just to get some more water or something, my mom said we'd run out today." He shrugged, not worried.
Bellamy was not quite so convinced. He bit the inside of his cheek in annoyance, and spun on his heels. He checked the water station first, but found no Murphy, and no one said anything about him coming by in the last half-hour.
He ran into Raven in the halls.
"Did you find your mom?" He asked. She winced, but then frowned.
"Aren't you supposed to be with John?"
"He wasn't there when I arrived. Finn was too busy making a zoo to notice him leave."
"What?" Raven's eyes widened, and Bellamy felt a swell of relief. Someone else understood that John wandering off after an event like this wasn't something to be calm about, "We need to find him."
"What about your mom?"
"She can wait. The worst that will happen is she'll have another flask of moonshine…whatever." Raven waved off is concerns with an air of blasé, "My concern is John."
"Where do you think he'd-," Bellamy began to ask, but his eyes lit up with realization the same time Raven's did. They exchanged looks, "No…you don't think."
"If everything was taken away from me so quickly, I'd want to try to get it back too, wouldn't you?" Raven asked softly.
They ran through the halls back to Murphy's old station, ignoring three people that berated them for nearly knocking people over in their haste.
The yellow warning tape that had been pinned up over his old house's door had been ripped down, and the door was open. There was nothing munch in the house at this point, everything taken out to be re-sold, taken by the Collins, or burned because it was beyond use, but the carcass of the house would obviously remain.
"John?" Raven pushed open the door without waiting, "He's not here." She spun to Bellamy angrily, although he realized her anger was a projection of her fear.
"But he was here." Bellamy touched the broken tape, and saw a couple drawers on a build-in-desk were ajar.
"Bellamy…" Raven's voice quivered, "The fuel line for the kitchen is broken." She was standing next to the cabinet that was usually locked, and it had been broken into. The fuel line for the stove was snipped, and gas dripped onto the wood floor, but mostly, it was empty.
"Matches!" Bellamy said suddenly, "I remember seeing them in this drawer. I mean, it could have been taken out, but if it wasn't….oh, fuck." Bellamy said running both his hands through his hair.
"We got to find him!" Raven pushed past Bellamy, "He's making a mistake."
"If I were going to do something like this…what would I do, though?" Bellamy thought out loud.
"It's obvious, Blake!" Raven huffed, "He's going to the guard that took his dad in."
It wasn't obvious to Bellamy, but he trusted Raven's words. They knew the guard lived somewhere on Agro Station, and they pushed through the crowds of people. Dinner rations had just been released, and the station lay behind them, so they fought against entire families from the Agro Station of people eagerly getting their dinner.
"There!" Bellamy pointed to someone turning a bend a couple yards in front of he and Raven. John Murphy looked shifty, with his hands stuffed into his pockets and his hood thrown up on his head.
When they caught up to Murphy, they found him staring at a puddle of liquid on the floor that flowed under the doorframe and a singular match between his fingers.
"John!" Raven flung herself between the door and her friend, "What the hell are you doing?"
"Move aside, Raven." Murphy muttered, "I need to do this."
"What? Make the biggest regret of your life? Have the blood of three people on your hands?" She demanded.
Murphy recoiled as though he'd been slapped.
"You think I'm trying to kill him?" He asked, sounding shocked and very much offended, "He's on duty, his wife is getting dinner, and his son is in school. I'm not a murderer!"
"We never thought you were." Bellamy said softly, trying to diffuse the situation. John swung around, noticing Bellamy there as well.
"Ah, King Bellamy is here to save the day." He sneered, "Where's your Princess?"
"She's not my-," Bellamy began to object, but stopped, realizing he was straying from the main focus, "John, what's this going to accomplish?"
"It will take away their home, everything they have. It's what happened to me, shouldn't they deserve that to?" He asked dully, twiddling the match between his fingers.
"It's not his fault he arrested your dad, John. He was just doing his job." Raven said firmly, placing two hands on either side of his face. He stared at her, and his stony façade began to shatter.
"If it's not his, then his death is my fault. It has to be his, Raven." He said, shaking.
"I'm not going to try to tell you it's no one's fault." Raven said softly, logically, "But it's not between you or the guard. And even if it were, do you really think doing this would make you feel any better?" She asked, "They'd figure out it was you. Is your revenge worth the rest of your life, because you're going to end up in the Sky Box and then you'll be floated." Her voice was shaky and very close to tears.
"I know it would." Murphy said, "Because I can't stay feeling like this, so I have to do something, and this is what I should do." Despite his tense tone, he didn't push her away.
"You still blame yourself." Raven said, and Bellamy watched as something was shared between their eyes, something he couldn't understand.
John spoke after a long moment, his voice raspy, "How could I not? Do you know what my mom told me…the day she died? She told me it was my fault, she blamed me, and if I hadn't gotten sick…my dad would still be around. She told me she hated me and she'd rather I had died than my dad."
"Fuck, John." Bellamy murmured, "You never-,"
"Told you guys? How could I? Maybe she's right. Even so, I didn't want your pity!"
"No." Raven's fury in her voice startled Bellamy, and it seemed to have the same effect on Murphy, "You're worth a thousand times more than what your mother said. You can't help getting sick, and your father loved you enough to risk everything for you. She's jealous because of how much he loved you. And you are never allowed to say that you deserve to die, okay?" She said.
The waver in her voice seemed to break Murphy, and he dropped the match as his legs buckled under him. Raven caught him gently, helping him to his knees on the ground, holding him steady.
"I didn't even know if I could do it." He admitted, "I was trying to convince myself to just light the damn thing when you arrived."
"You're a good person, that's why. Your everything your father was." Raven whispered, trying to hide her own tears by burrowing her face into the top of his head.
Then, for the first time since his father had been floated, Murphy cried.
Bellamy excused himself, feeling embarrassed, as though he'd stumbled upon a deeply intimate scene. And perhaps he had.
He knew what love was, of course. He knew that there were pure forms of love in this world, although rare. His mother's love for his sister and himself, that family love, was in his opinion one of those rare things. But the love that people dreamed about, the love of sharing yourself with someone else and everything that came with that, he didn't really know if he could recognize it. It was never a secret his sister and himself were from two different fathers, and so his mother wasn't a great example on that type of love. When he first met Clarke's parents, he thought maybe this was what it was.
But the realization, looking at Murphy and Raven, that nearly bowled him over was that he had been wrong. This, their love, even if they didn't say it out loud, was the closet thing yet to that pure true passionate love. It wasn't perfect, because it was hard to find pure love, but it was the closet thing he'd even seen, and they were hardly teenagers. He would have never pegged the two grumpiest people he knew to be his example on love, but that was what really told him it was the truth. When they were together, and no one was watching, they were two entirely new people, changed for the better.
Clarke arrived soon, out of breath, with Finn. He'd gone to find her as soon as Bellamy didn't return within a timely manner with John.
Clarke took one look at the puddle on the floor, Bellamy standing and looking awkward with his hands in his pocket, and the interlocked fallen figures of Raven and Murphy. She took action.
She instructed people to clean up the fluid as best as possible, and helped Bellamy drag Murphy away. Raven didn't leave his side that night, and even Mr. Collins let it slide when they fell asleep in his bunk that night.
"I'm so sorry." Finn tried to apologize to Raven, "I was so caught up and-,"
"He could have done something awful. I know it's a hard change, Finn, but did you even notice he felt all this?"
"He's good at hiding it."
She tilted her head, "It's pretty obvious to me." No one had the heart to tell her she was the only one that saw right through John Murphy. Even Clarke admitted to Bellamy she couldn't have seen this coming. No one really blamed Finn.
Later that night, lying in his bunk awake because Octavia's foot was digging into his back, he thought about what might have happened if no one had caught Murphy.
Not even Jaha's protection would have been able to prevent sending him to the Sky Box, and likely on his 18th birthday his execution would have occurred, just as Raven had said. He hadn't really thought through her words until now, when his mind wasn't racing. It made his whole body shiver with a cold sweat for a moment, and then he relaxed, because Murphy was fine…he wasn't going there, not today, not ever. He managed to get to sleep that night, knowing at least in his own thoughts that maybe he they have saved that kid today.
Three days later, Murphy thanked Bellamy privately, and added that if he ever told anyone he was grateful or he wasn't perceived as a porcupine with a headache (Bellamy's own paraphrasing, of course), John would punch him. All things considered, Bellamy was pleased with this, despite his threats. It meant he was beginning to heal. He never told Murphy, or Clarke for that matter, but that day on, he made himself promise he'd watch Murphy in case he ever needed someone besides Raven…Bellamy didn't know if he could lose a friend, and that's exactly what John Murphy was.
So obviously in this chapter I think we really start to see the ramifications of the Project directly affecting the original timeline. Obviously in the show, Murphy would have succeeded burning the house and put into the Sky Box...But what a change that the Collins adopted him!
If you guys liked the bit about the group ALMOST playing poker, you should go check out one of my other Bellarke stories (it's a one-shot) called 'Can't Read My Poker Face'. It's a Season 1 AU on the ground where the delinquents actually do get around to playing poker and naughty things happen ;) Leave a review if you like it!
I mean, I think obviously you all can see that I love the bromance of Bellamy/Murphy but one of my other favorite bromances is also Jasper/Murphy. I mean, you might all be going 'what?' but someone pointed out that in the 'Join or Die' episode when Pike was beating up Murphy, Jasper was one of the first to protest it and try to help Murphy, and on the first day on the ground, Murphy helped Jasper. I think these two are a fun dynamic to do!
Also! If you want to see any specific scenes upon the Ark (not like, big things but the kids doing cute things or something) I'm looking for just a couple things to fill an upcoming chapter or two, so I'd like to year y'alls input about what you'd like to see!
So, why the early update? In three days, I will be getting onto a plane and going to Italy to study abroad for six weeks. I don't really know when I'll be able to update again, I mean I hope I'll have wifi, but you never know...If I get a lot of reviews, it might encourage me to update the day I leave (Sunday) but even so, no promises, but reviewing would certainty help me chose to spend the little time I have left to do that! Next chapter Bellamy chooses his job!
