Addendum Three – Murphy

T/W – A reference is made to the non-consensual sex that happened in season 3 between Ontari and Murphy.

Emori shrieks a bit when she sees her younger son, and as soon as he hears her, Murphy comes running. He too, upon first glance at Dominick, thinks it's blood – and horrible memories of their time on earth instantly return. But Murphy is soon flooded with relief instead when he realizes, as Emori does, that it's clearly not blood. The red liquid all over Dominick is the juice of what they call the "bitter berry", a harmless berry with an unrelenting tart flavor (the group sometimes uses it to jazz up a bowl of acorn mush or even a piece of fish, but it's too bitter to be eaten on its own).

"Dominick! You're covered in bitter berry," Emori says, squatting down next to him and pulling him into her arms.

"Reyes did it," Dominick says straightforwardly. The red streaks are mostly on his chest and back, though his face and hair pulse with plenty of red as well.

Murphy makes a face while Emori asks Dominick, "He did, did he?" Murphy can tell his wife is keeping the question light and casual, and he's trying to keep his own reaction…measured.

Murphy joins Emori in squatting by Dominick's side. He looks at his younger son. He seems fine overall. Dominick goes on to tell his parents that he was playing with his brother and Reyes thought it would be "fun to paint on me".

"Uh-huh," Murphy says. "And did you think it was fun?"

"Not really," Dominick says. "It was okay I guess."

"Come on," Emori says, rising to her feet. "Let's go get you cleaned up."

Murphy and Emori exchange a look, and Murphy goes off to look for Reyes while Emori escorts Dominick towards the lake for a bath. This is not the first time Reyes has decided to do something stupid to his little brother. Some of it is roughhousing that happens during their play, roughhousing that works to Dominick's disadvantage because he's smaller than his brother. Sometimes it's things like Reyes telling Dominick "Mom's really mad at you! You're in so much trouble!" just to see his reaction.

Taking a few steps into the forest, Murphy finds Reyes. He is now playing a game of tag with Madi, and he doesn't want to interrupt them. So he turns back. Murphy knows he's mildly angry now anyway and determines that this might not be the best time to talk to his son. He decides to return to the work he'd been doing before he heard the commotion – shifting compost and turning the compost pile. Bellamy has been at his side for his gardening duties this morning, and Murphy decides to tap into Bellamy's experience.

"Okay, you're the only person here with experience being a big brother. Is this normal?" Murphy asks. He keeps his eyes on the compost pile but is eager to hear Bellamy's reply.

"Hard to say what normal is," Bellamy answers, sounding bemused.

"Oh come on. You can do better than that," Murphy chides.

Bellamy takes a breath. "I don't know, Murphy. I never did stuff like that to Octavia, but our circumstances were so different." He takes a step closer to Murphy. "Just from my own perspective I….I sometimes feel uncomfortable with how Reyes treats him. Maybe it's normal big-brother teasing, maybe it's not."

"I asked Madi about it the other day," Murphy admits. "She said among her clan it was common knowledge that older siblings can get jealous when they get a younger sibling. And that they did a lot of teasing."

"Maybe. I never felt that way, and teasing was definitely not my thing." Bellamy pauses. "Tavia's being a good big sister to Gail, but they're younger than your kids. Maybe that will change when they get older." He adds, "I hope not."

Murphy takes another stab at the compost pile, heaving another portion from the bottom to the top. "Most of the time Dominick seems okay though," he says. "We talk about it with him."

Bellamy puts his hand on Murphy's arm. "I think that's good. Maybe talk to Reyes about it more too. Maybe a good time to re-hit that boundaries discussion. You know how it is with kids. Sometimes they just don't remember and you have to repeat stuff."

Murphy nods. "Thank you."

The discussion goes well, at least it seems that way at first. Reyes seems to understand it. "Repeat back to me, buddy," Murphy says towards the end. "How do we treat our brother?"

"Same way we treat everyone else," Reyes says, and he's smiling and not looking exasperated. "Love and respect and kindness."

"And the examples we talked about…" Emori gently prompts.

"No hitting, no lying, don't say things to make him cry. Uh, there were more but I can't remember all of them."

"Let's try to remember more," Murphy says. "Something about….putting yourself in Dominick's place?"

"Yeah. I gotta think about how he feels about stuff, not just how I feel."

"That's good," Murphy smiles. "Come on. Let's get back to spelling and writing now."

Murphy stands, ready to escort Reyes outside for his lesson. It's easier at this stage to teach the kids reading and writing using a stick and either dirt or sand, since paper is such a rare and valuable commodity. Just as Murphy is about to take the boy back outside though, he glances at Emori and sees something in her face. He hesitates.

"Reyes, you go on ahead," Murphy says.

"But what they're doing is too easy for me," Reyes protests. Clarke is currently outside with Tavia and Dominick, conducting their spelling and writing lesson.

"That's okay. I'll be back out in a minute."

Once he's alone inside the cabin with Emori, Murphy goes up to her and puts his arms around her. "Hey, hey," he says quietly. "What's wrong?" He saw the tears forming in her eyes a second ago.

Emori falls into his embrace, resting her head on his shoulder. She's crying quietly. Murphy is melting a bit inside at Emori's tears. She doesn't cry often. She's everything to him. Well, the boys are everything to him too, but ever since the day Murphy laid eyes on her all those years ago, his life has orbited around her and he is trying to not flatten out like a squished berry right now because seeing her cry is devastating.

"You can let it out," Murphy whispers. He shifts to a more teasing tone, thinking it might help. "Come on, just do it. We put in all those back-breaking hours making two more cabins so we could have privacy, so why not really let loose with the crying?"

Emori gives a slight laugh at his attempt at humor, and then lets the tears take over.

Murphy is right; at this point, Skyring's inhabitants have a bit more privacy for things like loud crying. The group had agreed a while back that they needed more room with all the children, so they decided that they wanted a total of three cabins. They put a plan together and started out simple: first, a small cabin for Jackson and Miller. Once it was finished, they built a cabin for Murphy, Emori, and their kids. It has two bedrooms. Clarke, Bellamy, their kids, and Madi ultimately remained in the first, or main, cabin. The group has agreed that they will continue to cook and eat together inside the first cabin - economies of scale demand that cooking still be done communally, and besides it doesn't make sense to build kitchens inside every cabin. Building the two additional cabins has meant months and even years of backbreaking labor, but right now they are reaping the benefits of it. Emori is free to cry without worrying about anyone walking in on her.

"So what's on your mind?" Murphy asks softly, once Emori's tears seem to be subsiding.

"That I'm a big baby," Emori says. Her voice has a smirk to it but she's shaking a bit. She swipes at her eyes.

"Oh come on," he says playfully. He then takes a more serious and insistent tone. "Really. Why are you crying? Are you worried about Reyes becoming a bully?"

Emori shakes her head. "It's not that. I think he's gonna be fine. It's me – I hate that I get emotional like this. I'm feeling sorry for myself, and that's why I was crying. Something I told myself back when I was a kid that I'd never do." She clears her throat, trying to get her breathing back to normal.

"Self-pity?" Murphy gently teases. "Sounds like fun."

Emori playfully swats him. "It's stupid. But I was just thinking how happy I am with you and the boys, and how I never had any of that growing up. How I didn't have a goddamn family."

"Hey, hey. You got every right to be sad and upset over that. And that doesn't make you self-pitying or weak." He shrugs. "Just makes you human."

Emori is reaching for him again and hugging him closely. Murphy feels his heart swell again. Partly with sadness over the fact that Emori is so hurt by this wound – this horrible thing that happened to her when she was a child when she was cast out, the kind of injury you never really get over. His heart is also filling up a bit because he can tell that his words help her a bit, just like his talk with Reyes earlier today seems like it actually was working, like Reyes might be coming around to taking a gentler approach with his brother.

Several years later, Murphy and Emori are alone inside their room together. They are engaging in an activity that has always been a mutual favorite of theirs. The boys are old enough to play with little or no supervision, and they left them to enjoy their tree house, saying only that "Mommy and Daddy are going to have some quiet time inside our room now".

Murphy knows that his sex drive has dipped a little bit. He's no longer a 17 year old with raging erections. And he and Emori have been together for so long now that their days of just devouring each other have waned a bit too. There are also the two energetic sons and the endless stream of work to zap some of their energt. So this afternoon, Murphy is pleased that he and Emori still desire each other, still reach for each other this way even if it's not as frequent as it used to be.

He's lying on his back right now as she straddles him. That has always been her favorite position, and he's never had any complaints over it. It's kind of fun to just lay back and enjoy the ride, sometimes reaching up to kiss her lips or touch her breasts, mostly just watching her move on him. Ever since her first pregnancy, Emori's breasts have filled out nicely, and Murphy has greatly appreciated that. They've been more sensitive ever since then too though, so he has to be extra-gentle in his appreciation of them.

Murphy also appreciates the fact that he's still able to get and stay hard, despite the dip in his sex drive. Emori's movements are growing faster and faster and she's making progressively more and louder noises. Murphy is glad for this too, that she still wants him and still enjoys this. He murmurs some words and phrases to her, stuff he knows she likes to hear when she's getting close; they both like it and they find that they soon are both fulfilled.

Not long afterwards, they are cuddling together. This is another thing that hasn't much changed. They both like to spend time together after they're satisfied, snuggling together. She's stroking his beard leisurely. It's a little on the long side now. The men on Skyring mostly all are sporting lush beards and mustaches; only Miller keeps his facial hair closely-cropped. The rule seems to be as long as you or your spouse doesn't find it unappealing, let it grow.

"Bathroom," Emori whispers after a bit. Murphy nods, Emori plants another quick kiss on his mouth before she throws on her sundress and leaves the room.

Not long later, Murphy hears sounds from their cabin's main room. The boys apparently are back from their tree house and from what Murphy can overhear, they are starting up a very serious discussion with their mom. He senses he should be part of it, so he pulls on his trousers and shirt and joins them.

"It's okay," Emori is saying, when Murphy enters the room. Since their cabin doesn't have a kitchen, the main room is sparse. It contains little more besides a fireplace, chairs, shelves, and a few decorations like wildflowers hanging in baskets and new curtains for the windows. "We discussed this before but it's okay to have questions. Your dad and I want you to feel like you can discuss this anytime with us."

"Are we talkin' about sex?" Murphy asks, keeping the tone light and pulling up a chair.

"Uh-huh," Emori confirms with a smile and a nod.

"We were kinda worried because mom was making so much noise," Reyes says. As usual, the kid is straightforward. He doesn't, as far as Murphy can tell, display any artifice. Not too many filters either though. He certainly says what's on his mind.

"Ah," Murphy says. "Noise sometimes happens during sex. Like we talked about, it can feel pretty intense so that's what that's all about."

"She sounded like she was in pain." Reyes does not look happy.

"That's not what happened," Emori says, leaning towards Reyes and touching his arm. "Sometimes things aren't what they seem. What your dad said was right. I was making a lot of noise because it felt really good."

"Okay," Reyes says. "I'm glad you're ok. We were just worried."

"Do we need to re-hit the basics?" Murphy asks. "I know we covered it before but – well, I know when I was a kid, I didn't remember everything I was told the first time. The first time my dad had 'The Sex Talk' with me it was too much information and I didn't remember half of it."

"No, I got it."

"Dominick, what about you?" Murphy turns towards his younger son. "Should we re-hit some of the basics?" He wants to add a smarmy comment like 'Let's talk about the beautiful miracle of life' but he knows full well there are some things you don't joke about. The kids don't understand sarcasm either, which really blows, Murphy jokes silently.

"I'm good," Dominick replies simply.

"Okay, cool. Well, any time you have questions or want to go over it again, just let us know," Murphy says, keeping his tone light. "We're at your service!" he adds, this time eliciting a disproving look from Emori. Right, cut the sarcasm, he reminds himself.

Murphy thinks that overall they've been handling the topic of sex well. The Ark had a hundred problems, but candid discussions about sex wasn't one of them, so that helped him with how he and Emori approach the topic with the kids. One day not too long ago, Reyes began to play with himself in a public spot. Murphy tried to keep it casual, went up to his son, and said, "Hey, remember what we talked about? You gotta do that in private. Not where other people are around." He had wanted to add, 'You don't see any of the other guys whipping our dicks out in front of other people' but caught himself in time.

The joys of parenting, Murphy muses, where you get to censor your sarcasm a hundred times a day.

Reyes is older now. The entire second generation of Skyring is here; Clarke and Bellamy's youngest is now old enough that she's begun training under Jackson and Clarke to be a healer. The first generation understands fully that they won't live forever, and that their kids need to master the survival skills.

The first generation has discussed the topic many times, the topic that they began thinking about way back when Emori first got pregnant. Looming parenthood made them speculate on what the rest of their lives might be like given that it didn't appear they'd ever be leaving Skyring. They have talked about the fact that for most people – though Madi interjects not for herself – the desire to do things like find a mate and have sex is a strong one. And now most of the second generation has hit puberty, some of them years ago.

"Reyes is definitely starting to notice girls," Clarke begins the conversation that evening. It's a warm evening, and the group is building a fire so they can eat outside. Some might sleep outside too – it will get cool when the sun goes down so the fire will be needed then.

The adults have told the children that they want a bit of privacy now, so they suggested that "the kids" (who are mostly teenagers now) go enjoy the lake. Miller and Jackson volunteered to keep an eye on the kids, though they truly don't need that much direct supervision. Tavia, in fact, has taken to telling anyone who will listen that she feels smothered by the way they live. She has built herself a primitive shelter in the forest, constructed out of leaves and twigs, and she spends much of her time there. Which she is permitted to do, as long as she completes her chores. She often sleeps there when it's warm enough, though on a rainy night she will return to the room she shares with Madi.

"Yes," Emori says in response to Clarke's statement.

The fact is fairly obvious to anyone – Reyes is definitely interested in girls. Murphy listens and thinks back to history class for a second. Is this how parents in the old world discussed things like arranged marriages? Well, Murphy tells himself, ever since they decided to have kids that meant that plenty of awkward conversations would have to follow over the years. So here we go with another one.

"We've had the discussions with him," Murphy says. "We talked to him about consent and respect." That is a topic Murphy has never dodged and never will; he talks about it with the boys more than even Emori does. He shudders, remembering having a collar around his neck, being forced into Ontari's bed, lying to himself about how terrible the entire experience was.

"He, uh, hasn't crossed any lines, has he?" Emori asks. Murphy feels pretty certain that they would know if Reyes had, but agrees with Emori that it doesn't hurt to ask.

"No, no," Bellamy responds. "He's been respectful. Eager, but respectful."

"Tavia has told him that she's not interested, and he respects that," Clarke adds. She then seems to swallow and says, "Gail told me yesterday that she's interested in him."

Murphy's instinct is to think that this is news to him, and that he should know this. But "the kids" are mostly in a phase where they seem to want their privacy or their autonomy or just their own headspaces away from the adults. Tavia's taking to spending much of her time in the forest is just one example. Dominick is quiet and seems to prefer spending his free time drawing or studying soil instead of speaking to anyone. Gail tends to bury her face in her sewing. So maybe it truly should be a surprise that Gail returns Reyes' interest.

"But she's really shy about the whole thing," Bellamy adds. "She just said she wants to take things slow."

"Okay, cool, that makes sense," Murphy says. "So do you think….like do you think she should talk to him about that? Or do you want us to remind him that if anyone ever returns his interest that he should take things slow and listen to the other person?"

Clarke and Bellamy look at each other, and simultaneously reply with, "Both." Clarke then continues, "Yeah, let's do both those things."

Bellamy looks down and then adds, "We gotta talk about something else. Pregnancy."

"Yeah," Clarke adds. "Our kids are too young to become parents now. But you know what can happen when young people start to fool around, and one thing leads to another. Sometimes they end up in a place that they didn't mean to get to."

"We'll re-hit that discussion too," Murphy says. He inwardly cringes just a bit, knowing he's going to be facing a very exasperated teenage boy who will throw his hands up in the air and complain that they've discussed this a million times already. Last time the subject was broached, Murphy believes that Reyes' response was 'I could teach a damn class on the topic now and I haven't even had sex yet!'

"Maybe," Emori begins tentatively, "depending on how it goes, we should see if he wants to start drinking the herbs too. Just in case." Emori is referring to the herbs that Murphy and Bellamy steep and drink to keep their sperm count low, working as a form of birth control.

Clarke nods, perhaps a bit enthusiastically Murphy thinks. "I think that would be a good precaution," Clarke says. "I could see things…progressing between Gail and Reyes."

Clarke sounds fairly certain, Murphy notes. Interesting. Perhaps Gail really is quite interested. If that's true, Murphy knows, Reyes will be beyond thrilled. Murphy reminds himself to do what he's always urged Reyes to do with his brother – see the other person's standpoint and empathize with them. Clarke and Bellamy are right to be concerned; Reyes is so eager and sometimes hormones take over from solid judgment. Gail's still pretty young, and having a pregnancy at her age could risk both her mental and physical health. So Murphy understands where Clarke and Bellamy are coming from.

Their discussion seems to be winding down, which is fortunate. After not long, several footsteps are heard, the group is returning from the lake, and Reyes is asking when dinner will be on because he's hungry. Murphy's eyes widen when they come close enough to the fire to be seen better: Reyes and Gail are holding hands.

Yeah, we probably want to get him started on those herbs right away. Welcome to the world of a daily cup of bitter tea, Murphy thinks. He's glad though too. If Reyes and Gail can make a real go at it, Reyes would definitely be happy. Maybe they can find some of the love that their parents have been lucky enough to find. He glances at Emori and once again, his heart fills.

THE END

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