6
Safe Passage
CLARKE
"I'm telling you..." Raven said in an exasperated voice, momentarily taking her eyes off of the winding dirt 'road' to glare at Clarke in the rover's rearview. "I have the whole thing memorized. It's all about ALIE 1 and ALIE 2 and the city and the code. There's nothing in there about the blood. At least nothing useful."
For the third time Clarke just ignored her words, still stubbornly flipping through the worn pages of Becca's journal like a sinner searching the scriptures for salvation. The rational part of herself knew Raven was probably right. There was no point in her going through the journal again. She had already searched its entirety. It was full of calculations and notes and scribbles and code that made just as little sense to her as Raven's chicken scratches had. Still, the other part of her refused to quit looking.
"It doesn't make any sense." Clarke complained again. "She's so detailed in her notes. So meticulous. She recorded everything. How could she have not written down anything about the blood? How she created it? Why she created it? How to duplicate it? She must have written the procedure somewhere. I mean... She must have tested it, right? She must have conducted experiments on it before just injecting herself with it. Where are all of her notes? Her observations and measurements and data and findings and all of that crap? Where the hell is it all?"
"There must be another journal somewhere." Raven answered simply. "Because, you're right. She was painfully detailed in her records. I'm the only freak who appreciates such boring detail."
"Of course!" Clarke answered. It made complete sense. "You're right, Raven. There has to be another journal... But then... We're going the wrong direction! If there's another journal it has got to be in Polis." She exclaimed, thinking of the strange room where Becca's old pod still sat rusting in the darkness.
"You're getting ahead of yourself, Clarke." Abby cut in. "We don't even know for sure if the nightblood is any better at metabolizing radiation than our own. We have to test it before we bother trying to find a way to make gallons of it and start injecting it into people. One step at a time, Hun."
"Right..." Clarke mumbled. "One step at a time... First Luna."
But the words were perfunctory. Because Clarke was already planning. And she was already steps ahead of Abby. Because Abby didn't know that, for Clarke, testing Luna's blood was just a formality. It didn't matter what results Abby and Raven found. Well... It mattered for the rest of the world. But even if Luna's black blood was useless for saving the world, even if it could not metabolize any more radiation than Clarke's scarlet blood could... It didn't matter. Because Clarke had already made up her mind... She was going to find a way to make nightblood either way. Even if it could not save her from the radiation, Clarke was going to pump the blackness into her veins. Because if she only had seven more months to live, she wasn't going to sit around drinking. She wasn't going to sit around knitting. She wasn't going to sit around. She was going to spend every day, every hour, every minute working to find a way back to Lexa.
"You're getting ahead of yourself too, Abby." Raven spoke. "We can't TEST the blood until we GET the blood. Any thoughts on how we are gonna convince Luna to be our lab rat?" She asked.
"Clarke, you met her once before." Abby pointed out. "What's she like?"
"Stubborn." Clarke answered, simply.
Abby and Raven exchanged a look and both women suddenly burst into laughter.
"What?" Clarke asked, leaning forward to pop her head into the space between the laughing women. "What are you two weirdos laughing about?"
"Nothing." Raven croaked. "It's just you're one of the most stubborn people I've ever known. So to hear you call someone else stubborn..."
"Hey! I'm not the only stubborn woman in this car." Clarke argued. "You know you're as hard-headed as I am, Raven. Don't deny it."
"She has a point, Raven." Abby chimed in. "You're the most stubborn patient I've ever had to deal with, including the four year-old who shoved chunks of raw potato into her ear canals and wouldn't let me remove them until I addressed her as 'Mrs. Potato Head.'"
"I don't know what YOU'RE laughing about, Abby." Raven retorted. "You're the most stubborn doctor I've ever had to deal with."
"Yeah, Mom." Clarke agreed. "Where do you think I get my stubbornness from in the first place, huh? I learned it all from you."
"You're both right." Abby conceded with a smile. "We're all three of us stubborn as hell. But... You know what? The world needs stubborn women. Can you imagine if we let the men make all of the decisions? Where would the world be without stubborn women?"
"Probably falling apart." Raven laughed. "Melting down... By the way, do you think we should tell Luna about the world melting down? Will that convince her to help?"
"I don't know." Clarke admitted. She had been wondering the same thing. She didn't know how Luna would react to the news. Would it convince her? Or would she just turn her back on the world again? More importantly, would she tell others? Clarke didn't want to start a panic. Not yet, anyhow.
"Maybe we won't have to tell her." Even as she said it, Clarke could hear the doubt in her voice. "Maybe she'll just give us some blood if we ask nicely."
"And if not?" Raven asked.
"We try asking not so nicely?" Clarke suggested. "I guess we will just have to take it one step at a time, right?"
"One step at a time." Abby agreed.
"One step at a time." Raven echoed.
...
Clarke hopped down from the rover onto the spongy forest floor. It seemed they had left the sun behind in Arkadia. Here the dying afternoon was gray and cold. She breathed in the misty air and tasted just the hint of salt on the tip of her tongue. She could hear the distant sound of the ocean greeting the shore, like the swaying of the firs in the wind, only more steady, more rhythmic, more determined.
"We're close." She announced, slamming the rover's door shut behind her.
She could feel the anticipation pulsing through her veins as they hiked through the forest in the direction of the sea. She was not the only one excited. Raven's chocolate brown eyes were wide as she followed Clarke, limping through the tangled underbrush. Abby walked beside her, always ready to lend a helping hand, though Raven never asked for it.
At last they broke through the trees and the vast gray ocean appeared before them. Feeling like a child on a playground, Clarke leapt onto a thick log of driftwood and wobbled down its length, her arms thrown out from her side for balance. Just as she began to fall, she jumped onto the ocean's stony shoreline. Raven and Abby did not follow and Clarke laughed as she glanced back to see them still standing frozen on the edge of the trees, staring in awe at the ocean. Clarke had been here once before, but for Raven and Abby this was their first glimpse of the sea.
As always, Clarke was immediately drawn to the water's edge. Unlike the steady flow of the river, these waters advanced and retreated and advanced again. She let the waves wash gently over her boots, feeling them tug the tiny pebbles out from beneath her each time the waters receded. She watched the colorful pebbles tumble in the current, then settle beside her feet, then tumble again. Then she looked out across the vast waters, searching for the horizon. The endless gray ocean so perfectly mirrored the endless gray sky above that it was hard to say where sea and sky met, where air became water and water became air.
Clarke loved the ocean. Just like the view from Polis Tower, looking out on the endless sea made her feel small. So small. But on its edge, she didn't feel lost. She felt... Found.
She wished she could run out into the churning waves. Far... Far... Out until her feet couldn't find the bottom anymore. She wanted to let the waters carry her and she wanted to give in to their push and pull. She wanted to tumble weightlessly and powerlessly in their depths. Again she wished she could swim. And more than anything else... As she stood on the edge of the sea, the edge of the world... She wished Lexa was standing beside her. She wished she wasn't alone.
"It's incredible." Raven said in a reverent whisper, suddenly appearing by Clarke's side.
"Incredible." Abby echoed from Clarke's other side as she wrapped an arm around Clarke's waist.
"Incredible." Clarke agreed. And she was smiling. Because she was not alone.
They stood in silence for a long moment, listening to the rhythmic sighing of the sea. Then Clarke slowly pulled her blue eyes from the gray waters and turned them to the rocky shore.
"We need to build a fire." She said, scanning the shore for driftwood.
...
The acidic green smoke rising from the flames made Clarke's eyes sting and left a sour taste on the back of her tongue. She threw another branch on the dancing flames, choking against the fumes, waiting.
It didn't take long. The Grounders rose from the water silently, ominously, like living ghosts. It seemed overly dramatic to Clarke. Why didn't they just use a boat like normal people? The first man approached the fire, removing his breathing mask and fixing Clarke with a silent stare as she stepped forward to meet him.
"Ai laik Clarke kom Skaikru," she began, remembering the words Octavia had instructed her to use... The words Lincoln had taught her. "En ai gaf gouthru klir."
"You sky people do not know when to quit, do you?" The man replied in English. "Sister Luna has already spoken to your friends this afternoon. Her answer remains unchanged. You waste her time with your arguments. You waste your own time. You will not convince her."
"We are not here to convince Luna to become Commander." Clarke said.
"The man eyed her with a skeptical, suspicious frown. "Do all members of Skaikru suffer from a penchant for deceitfulness?" He asked.
"I do not know what you are referring to." Clarke answered, confused by his hostility and slightly offended. "We only wish to speak to Luna. The content of the matter does not concern you. We aren't hostile." She added, eyeing the pointed tip of the man's long fishing spear. "We come in friendship."
"Like I said," The man replied. "A penchant for friend came dressed as Trikru and identified herself as such but I was not fooled. I could smell the stench of space on her as clearly as I smell it on you."
"I'm sorry..." Clarke replied. "Have I done something to offend you?"
"You come to disturb our peace and uproot our way of life." The man answered. "You seek to bring our crew into your quarrels and wars. You say you come in friendship, yet you bring strife. The last time we gave Skaikru safe passage you brought pain, suffering, and death onto our vessel. We lost seven brothers and sisters. Because of you, their spirits have been returned to the sea. Now, I advise you to leave the banks of our sea and return to your home. Sister Luna wants no part of your struggles or your wars."
"I told you that is not why we have come." Clarke pressed on stubbornly. She was not intimidated. This man, looming menacingly before her in his dark wetsuit was not going to stand in the way of Clarke and her mission. Luna's blood was the key to getting back to Lexa. She was sure of it. And no one was going to keep her from obtaining it.
"We need to speak with Luna." Clarke repeated. "It is a matter of extreme importance and urgency. The safety and survival of Floudonkru depend on our meeting with her. So once again... Ai gaf gouthru klir."
The man narrowed his eyes at her, clenching his jaw, as he procured three small vials of liquid from a pocket of his militaristic diving jacket. Raven and Abby stared nervously at the vials as Clarke uncapped hers.
"You may want to sit down." She warned them as she dropped to her knees and choked down the bitter liquid.
"I've granted you safe passage onto our vessel, Sky girl." The man spoke from above her. "But bring death upon us again and you will not receive safe passage back to shore. I will return your spirit to the sea, myself."
Clarke stared into the man's narrow eyes and knew he meant every word he spoke. But she was not frightened as the man's face grew blurry before her and she felt her own face slam into pebbles and stone. She was getting back to Lexa and no man was going to stand in her way. She swore it to herself as the darkness took her.