A/N: Apologies for the short delay between chapters - we've been using this time to revamp the story's blog and add some cool new extras. Hope we'll see you there!
'Sword & Shield'
Marlow's hands clasped instinctively to her mouth. The sound of Alfie's fist connecting with the bone and cartilage of Efren's face was something she had only heard in old movies. She always thought they had exaggerated the sound for the film's sake, but if anything, it sounded grossly worse in reality.
The crowd roared at deafening decibels the moment Efren hit the ground. Just get up and walk away, she willed him. End this now.
Efren rose with the same shit-eating grin from before spread proudly across his face. The way he enjoyed this made Marlow feel sick.
The boys charged each other again. They locked together, each trying to get the advantage to strike again. Marlow stood back, ill-equipped to break up fights. Every second that passed had her feeling more and more helpless. Her feet paced uncomfortably around them. The stronger the boys pushed and pulled at each other, the more Marlow began to see them melt into one singular unit. Alfie and Efren had become an overheated kicking and spitting machine right before the crowd's eyes, and they were being encased by walls of cheers and screams.
Alfie kicked Efren's left foot from under him and reaped the advantage. He jerked his fist back for another blow when Marlow leapt into the inner circle. After years of tinkering and putting things together, Marlow knew a thing or two about taking things apart as well. She grabbed Alfie by the middle and yanked him aside, and like a bolt being unscrewed, or a wire unplugged, the boys fell apart.
Efren fell forward, catching himself just before he hit the ground. Alfie continued to thrash, ready to add whoever had interrupted them into the fight in his blind rage. Marlow ducked under a punch and clamped her hands on his shoulders.
"Alfie, please — it's okay. Just calm down."
"Oh, Blondie wants to fight too, huh?"
Marlow's words caught in her throat. The sound of that idiot's voice was unbearable to her ears. He had caused this. She whipped her body around, a knife flicking into her grasp like a card in one of her magic tricks. "Oh my god, will you just shut up?" His eyes grew wide as she held the sharp tip just under his was the thing about the rest of the One Hundred — they couldn't read Marlow enough to know she always had something up her sleeve.
Efren looked down at the knife, breathing a little harder. He licked his lips nervously and looked as though he wanted to say something, but she wasn't about to give him that opportunity.
"You're nothing. Why do you insist on opening your ugly mug when I might've just saved it from being beaten in? And trying to take my wristband? Dick move, man. Dick move."
The crowd were going ballistic now, all of them like children throwing a fit from having their toys taken away. She wanted to scold them all. They had wanted a fight, but she wasn't going to allow them that sick, sad pleasure.
Alfie was at her side, watching the scene with glassy-eyes as the adrenaline left him.
"Would you mind grabbing his knife for me?" she asked him. "It's in the left cuff of his boot." She made sure to give Efren a sweet, twisted smile as he rolled his eyes and huffed. Alfie circled him almost robotically, and tugged the knife away. Marlow pretended not to notice as he clipped Efren's leg with the blade. He swore loudly.
"Hey, watch your mouth around me," she scolded. "I'm a lady, asshole."
Alfie stalked back to her side, watching her the whole way. Truthfully, she didn't know why he was staring. If anything, she thought he should be focused on Efren, but she wasn't able to step outside herself to see how absurd the view was – her cold eyes unshaken, a knife she'd normally use only for carving gripped tightly in her hand, and the fact that Alfie had actually listened to her for once in his life. His shoulder brushed against Marlow's when he rejoined her, and she took the time to offer him a small glance of gratitude. Alfie was a steel-plated shield strapped to her arm – even if she didn't need it, it was nice knowing it was there.
"Why?" Alfie commanded the bully, the confiscated knife pointing in the region of Efren's stomach. "Why did you want to take her wristband?"
The boy didn't seem to know which one of them to look at. His eyes darted between them and their knives in a display of nervous tension.
"We've all been taking them off." He gestured to the group behind him, all of them wristband-less. "The Ark doesn't own us anymore. What are we to them? We're doing all their dirty work just to be their prisoners again the minute they follow us down here."
Marlow bristled. "Well it's my own damn right if I want to keep-"
"I'm just telling him why," Efren cut her off, holding his hands up innocently. Blood was still trickling slowly from his nostrils. "He asked why, so I'm telling him. Now can I have my knife back? It's the only one I have."
"Had," Marlow corrected. She looked towards Alfie, hoping for some kind of lead, but found him staring at his own wrist in a state of deep contemplation.
"Show me how to take this thing off and you can have the knife back," Alfie said, taking a sudden step forward in what seemed like a deliberate attempt to hide his face. But Marlow didn't need to see his eyes to know what thoughts were swirling within them. The Ark had crossed him one too many times. Up there he was no one, he was expendable. It was the same for her, but she couldn't keep the orphanage out of her head. If the wristbands were how the Ark was determining the condition of life on Earth, keeping them on and surviving down here was the only way to save all those innocent children.
The question wasn't simple, but it was hard to shake from her locking bones. Would the council's jurisdiction change on Earth? She had to believe so. She had spent too many hours on the Ark dreaming of this planet. The daily fight for survival wouldn't end down here, nor would it ever with human mortality dripping away their time like a leaky faucet. But the fight for air would change, and Marlow knew her bracelet had to stay. She hadn't told Alfie about the Ark's crisis, but the wristband was to him more shackle than tracking device. She knew his argument by heart. Of course he wanted it gone.
Efren was grinning again. "Well, I can take it off for you, but I'll need my knife to do it," he said, casually now, and reached out for the blade.
Marlow snatched the weapon before he could grasp it. Both boys looked at her in surprise. "Yeah, no, I don't trust you." She slid the weapon into her makeshift satchel, then turned to Alfie to say, in a hushed tone, "He tried to take mine off… and from what I can tell, it doesn't take much. I'll do it for you."
The crowd were gathering, trying to get closer to hear her quiet words. Efren was huffing and rolling his eyes again. Marlow wondered how long it had taken him to make that shit knife anyway. "It's a piece of scrap metal, not a family heirloom. You'll get over it."
She tugged Alfie's arm, pulling him a few steps away. "I swear, I'm not playing you. I'll take it off if that's… if that's what you really want."
"You'd do that? For me?" he asked, in a voice just as quiet and sincere as hers.
"Of course." Her eyes broke away to quickly scan the crowd. The flock of teens were growing restless, whispering amongst each other and gesturing to Alfie. They were eager to see someone so infamous take off his wristband. "But, please, somewhere… alone?"
His eyes followed hers around the crowd. They were still looking for a show, but this wasn't one Marlow and Alfie were willing to give them. "Come on, let's go," he said.
She took the lead, the jeering of the crowd following them all the way out of the clearing and into the thicker wall of trees that she only hoped would shield them.
"Okay," she said, trying her best not to sound anxious. "Based on what that asshole tried to do to me, it seems like they just pull off. Then, I'm guessing it opens once the bracelet is detached from your vitals. But Alfie, if I do this… Julia's going to think you're-"
"Dead?" he said sharply. "I've been dead to her for four years, no matter how quickly my heart's been beating."
Marlow didn't say anything. She knew there was nothing she could say to make any of it better.
She sat down cross-legged beside a tree-stump and gestured for him to sit at the other side. She took a different knife from her bag, the same dull tool she'd brought with her from the cells. It was perfectly safe for chopping soft things – or, in this case, cutting Alfie's ties to his past life forever. "Not that pain bothers you, like, at all. In fact, sometimes I think you even enjoy it, but this is going to hurt. It'll feel like a large seed is being pulled through your pores, which is probably the epidermal equivalent to birthing a child out of your… It's just not going to feel good, okay?" She took a deep breath. Her hands were shaking.
"Hey," Alfie said softly, his eyes trained on the quivering knife. "I trust you, you know."
The words robbed her of her worry. Coming from Alfie, that was high praise. Sure, he might have been her friend – her only friend – but that didn't mean he had to trust her with a knife to his wrist."I… well, thanks."
He didn't seem to hear her soft gratitude, concerned as he was with laying his arm across the tree stump between them. "Now hurry up, Drift. My insatiable thirst for pain makes your description sound irresistible."
Despite herself, she chuckled. He was so goddamn eager, and he wouldn't have even known about this if it wasn't for her. Yet, here he was, trying to rush her. "Watch it," she grinned, tossing the knife between her hands to stall him even more. He wanted to be impatient? Let him.
Alfie shot her a wide smirk. He shifted his weight from one bent knee to another. She finally put the knife to his skin, and he wet his lips in anticipation. His arm was tense, his fists clenched so she could see the cords of his veins all along it. She snaked the knife under the bracelet and took a deep breath.
"You know," she said, pulling away suddenly. Alfie let out a low growl of frustration. "I'm pretty sure a poet somewhere, some time, said pain is art. And art takes time. I feel like that resonates with you because…" Without warning, she flicked her hand down, and like a see-saw, the knife pulled the thick needles of the bracelet out through Alfie's now broken skin. He hissed like a viper, and grabbed at his wrist. " - because you're an artist of pain, right? I'm pretty sure that weasel's gonna be whining about his broken nose for a week."
She grinned and tossed Alfie the deadened wristband. Its blinking lights were now nothing but blind eyes. Alfie let it fall into his lap, before picking it up with his one good arm. He marvelled at it, his eyes full of wild elation. "You did it." He shot her a grin. "You actually fucking did it, Drift. I'm – it's just… well thanks."
Outside of a fight, it was rare for her to see him looking so alive. She hid her proud smile as she searched through her bag. With no medicine chest, there was no hope of a proper bandage, but she found a scrap of material that would do the trick.
"You know," Marlow said, carefully wrapping his wrist. "If I was on the Ark right now, unaware of the Earth mission, I would be thinking you were dead." She paused for a small moment and glanced up at him. "Happy belated-birthday, by the way."
"I suppose I should be mad at you for forgetting, but this is a better gift than anything the council had planned for me." He tried to grin at her even as his wrist throbbed. "I'll take epidermal abrasions over a lungful of space junk any day."
"Well, it's not like we've had a whole lot of time to bake cakes and blow up balloons, Alfie. Your next gift is going to be a knife to the chest if you keep lunging at people like that." A small smile flit across her features before she tore the gauze with her teeth and secured the bandage. "But, I'm glad you showed up when you did."
"Look at that, the Suicide King came through for you," he smiled, teeth gritted.
She looked up at him suddenly, a sharp memory bled through her mind.
"Yeah, I hadn't forgotten," Alfie continued, obviously relishing the surprise on her face. "Seems like you've shed some of your disapproval since back then, based on how you held that knife. Efren damn near pissed himself."
"That feels like ages ago..." Marlow stood up and brushed her clothes off, though she wasn't sure why. If anything, the mud and debris helped cover the blood stains left by the deer, but Marlow was still getting used to being dirty. To being imperfect.
"I get it now," she said softly, bringing herself back to the dark day she had almost disowned him. "I get that you had to protect people like Sascha from people like Jareth, and I'm afraid that's not subject to change down here. You've got your freedom now. You're not the Ark's decision anymore, but your own. Don't waste it by doing something out of control...or I'll have to stick the card to your forehead next time."
"Here," he said, reaching into one of his pockets. What he handed her was a card. It wasn't one of hers, she could tell that in an instant, but it bore the same design: the king with a dagger through his head. "Consider it a promise. No wasted opportunities. No hot-headed decisions. Whatever trouble I get into on Earth, I'll always have a reason. If you think I'm doing otherwise, carry on and stick the damn card to my forehead, if that's what helps you sleep at night."
Marlow eyed each side of the card as she flipped it around between her fingers. Her deck had felt incomplete since that day in the visitation room, but at least now it could have a replacement. "I'm not even going to ask how you got this." Knowing him, he likely peeled it out the hands of some reluctant criminal, started a lunch riot in the process. "I can't recall the last time you made a promise to anyone, and this isn't exactly chocolates past curfew… but okay."
Alfie flashed her a grin before wrenching back his good arm and throwing the broken wristband out into the forest. They didn't even hear it land.
Marlow let Alfie lead the way back to camp. She held her stinging wrist with the other hand the entire way, praying her wristband would continue to work. As the sky grew darker, the silhouette of the Ark watched them like a ghost, and Marlow couldn't fight the sinking feeling as she pictured a thousand hearts of a thousand Julias shattered in an instant. The supposed death of Alfie Seabrooke was not just the death of a son, or a criminal, but it was one step closer to the death of a nation.