I've been meaning to write this forever. This is a missing scene for 3X09.
Here And There Again
The rumor reaches her in the depth of the medical bay where she is hiding but Abby refuses to believe it. Nobody tells it to her directly. She hears it. Like whispers in the wind. From mouth to ear. Frightened murmurs. Dreadful possibilities.
She refuses to believe it.
He was caught, that much she knows for sure – the whole camp knows for sure, a failed coup doesn't exactly go unnoticed – but surely Pike won't be enough of an idiot to do something so…
"Ma'am."
She startles, the pack of unused syringes she was about to place in a drawer forgotten in her hand. In truth Medical doesn't need to reorganized but she finds the mindless task soothing. Restocking, making sure everything is on hand, making sure they will be ready for the next emergency bursting through the doors…
The bay is deserted. There are no patients and she asked Jackson to take some time off when he started hovering too much around her after the rumors first reached them. The bay is deserted aside for her and Bellamy Blake who stands next to the door and looks sheepish, guilty and a thousand things in between.
She wants to feel surprised but she doesn't. She just feels dread. Cold, paralyzing dread.
He used to be a regular visitor in Medical either as a patient or because he needed her for Chancellor matters. He hasn't been in there on his own volition since Pike was elected.
Her voice is harsher than it should. She knows Bellamy, she knows he doesn't have bad intentions, she knows… But the road to hell is paved with good intentions – she cemented a few of those herself. "Do you need something?"
He takes a few steps inside and carefully closes the door behind him and Abby stills even more. She knows what this is about. She lived through it once before.
He only stops when he is next to her, close enough to touch – not that he would dare. He can't even meet her eyes.
He clears his throat and chances a glance at her, waiting for her to speak. She doesn't.
She has no intention of making this easy for anybody.
"Abby." he says eventually and his voice falters as if he's unsure of being allowed such a familiar address after everything. "They're going to…" He stops and lifts pained eyes to hers, silently begging her to finish for him but, again, she remains silent and so he has no choice but to wince. "Chancellor Pike decided to execute them."
The slap surprises her because she isn't a particularly violent person.
It happens too fast for her to think.
Her palm tingles and Bellamy rubs his cheek, eyes downcast, shoulders slouched. Defeated.
"I didn't know…" the boy tries and she snorts.
She snorts and it's so bitter and so unlike her he stops talking and looks up again, eyes full of painfully restrained tears. Her reply Did you think it was a game? dies on her lips. Didn't she make the same mistake once? Trust a friend to do the right thing, trust that no blood would be shed only to find herself responsible for her husband's death? Where is the difference between what she did and Bellamy's role in all this?
She can't cast blame.
"I won't let it happen." Bellamy swears, reaching for her hand and squeezing her numb fingers. "I promise I won't let it happen."
She knows what she is supposed to answer to that. Do nothing, don't put yourself in danger…
She stares instead. She's waiting for the emotions to rail their ugly heads. She waits and waits and all she feels is this cold hollow detachment.
"Chancellor Griffin." the boy insists. "We will find something…"
"I'm not Chancellor anymore." she counters at last, and shakes her head at him. "Tell me when you have a plan. I want in."
"I think you are again now." he says when she places the pack of syringes in the drawer and steps around him. "Chancellor." It's on the tip of her tongue to remind him he can't pick and choose, that he made his bed and now has to lie in it but she swallows it back because of everything they've been through together and because Marcus is Bellamy's mentor – or was before Charles Pike came and stole him from them. The pin should have been Marcus', she almost says but that too she keeps silent. There is no point adding to Bellamy's guilt. Not now. She doesn't even want to think about Octavia's reaction if they don't find a way and Lincoln… A mess, this is all a mess. "Ma'am, where are you going?"
"I owe our Chancellor a visit." she answers and leaves Medical, barely aware of his worried attempts at dissuading her.
She's numb when she leaves Medical, still in a state of denial and shock.
She's three corridors away from the war room when she feels it. Not the sorrow, not the terror, not the guilt and the grief… The wrath.
She passes by Harper who stops to stare at her like she has grown a second head. She must have been a sight, she figures. She almost orders the girl to give her her gun because that would be a solution, wouldn't it? A definite end to this story. The Grounders would have his corpse to burn as they please and they would be free to retake Arkadia. It's nothing Marcus wouldn't have done. They gave Pike a chance and he didn't take it.
She goes on without the gun.
She's no warrior.
She knows how to heal and mend, she knows how to protect and defend but murdering someone in cold blood is more than she can do.
She hates that she needs to hammer on the closed door and waits there like the war room didn't use to be hers.
She hates it even more when the door finally opens and Pike doesn't look surprised to see her there, simply resigned.
She hates the patronizing way he steps aside with a sigh and glares at people in the corridor who stopped to watch.
She hates that the first thing she sees is the couch – their couch – and that instead of feeding her anger, it punches her in the guts with an unhealthy wave of helplessness. The room is different now. It isn't the refuge it became after Mount Weather. There are no traces left of the time she and Marcus used to spend in there. Everything is gone and suddenly it's like a bad omen, like the rest of her life will be like just this room very soon, with only memories to keep her company.
"You can't do this." she says as soon as she hears the door closing behind her but her voice is weaker than she would like.
"The decision is made, Abby." Pike shakes his head. "You won't change my mind."
"That's not how we do things on the ground." she hisses, turning around to face him. "We don't…"
"In accordance with the Exodus Charter…" he insists and her sight flashes red.
"Fuck the Exodus Charter." she snaps in an unusual bout of vulgarity. "That's not how we do things down here. We…"
"That's not how you do things." Pike cuts her off. "But you're not Chancellor anymore, Doctor Griffin. I warned Kane. I warned him plenty of times. They're traitors and we're at war. Examples have to be made."
She shakes her head. She wants to be strong, to sound strong, to be the leader she is supposed to be and not… this. Not the wife pleading for her husband's life. She's been there before. She's done that. She knows there is no positive outcome waiting at the end of the meeting. "Not like this. Not like this. Keep them under locks or…"
"I do not take advices from you, Doctor." Pike interrupts her, a hand lifted to force her into silence. "You're not a member of the Council anymore. The decision is made. They will be executed tomorrow."
That's a dismissal, she knows, but she doesn't move from where she stands. She stays there and stares, searching what else she can do or offer. She would kneel and crawl and beg. She would do this and a thousand other things.
"Please." she whispers. "Don't do this. He's your friend."
That too is a familiar line she used once upon a time, right before Jake was forced into the airlock.
His face softens but she detects no wavering in his resolve. "I'm sorry, Abby. Really. I wish it didn't have to go down like this."
I could kill you, she wants to say.
There's a paperknife on the desk. Something Marcus brought back from Mount Weather and they never really had a use for. It's not far. She's a doctor, she knows where to hit. She could.
But she's no warrior and he would see her coming, he would stop her, and she would be thrown in jail with Marcus and the others. What help would it be to anyone? None. She's more useful out there.
She considers it though.
And it's shocking enough on its own.
"He requested to see you before it happens." Pike declares, clearly uncomfortable. "It's against protocol but…"
"Family is allowed to say goodbye." She hears herself say. "We're allowed to be there for the execution. According to your precious Charter."
Her sight is blurred but she blinks back the tears and bites on the inside of her cheek until the urge to cry disappear.
It won't be the same thing.
It won't be an airlock, it won't be his body being dragged in space, it won't be instantaneous and there won't be Clarke in her arms to remind her she at least has that much left.
"But you're not family." Pike argues.
She almost laughs.
Almost.
"I'm all the family he has and if you think you can keep me away from him…" she growls.
"I will allow a meeting." he cuts her off. "But you won't be there for the execution." She glares and he shakes his head. "For your own good. A bullet in the head is never pretty."
She flinches at the words.
She didn't spare a thought to how they would do it.
She wants to throw up.
She barely notices him opening the door or awkwardly waiting for her to leave.
Jaha had the decency to sit her down and provide some alcohol last time she did this. He listened to everything she had to say even though she knew at the time it wouldn't make a difference, he was kind when he told her the decision was made.
Pike isn't a kind man. He used to be, she supposed, once. Before the Ground. The Ground changed everything. The Ground changed them all.
"You will regret this." she warns as she leaves the war room.
"Don't threaten me." Pike retorts. "He swore you had nothing to do with this conspiracy but I've seen enough to know your Chancellorship was a two heads thing. Traitors will pay with their lives from now on. Keep that in mind."
She clenches her jaw and walks on, her head high. The corridor is full of people that have no business being there and who aren't being very subtle in their curiosity.
Privately she thinks Pike doesn't want a public execution because nobody will stand for Marcus being killed, not after everything. They will be scared into submission, maybe, but fear is not a reliable way to rule. All Pike will succeed in doing is turning Marcus into a martyr. And it will bring her no comfort.
She's four corridors away from the war room and not quite sure where she is headed when Bellamy falls into steps with her. "Are you alright?"
She answers that stupid question with a look that always prompts Clarke to do as she is told – or at least it used to make her do as she's told. "Do you have a plan yet?"
"Working on it." he promises.
"Work faster." she demands, quickening her steps to leave the boy behind.
Her head is high and her eyes are dry.
This won't be like last time.
She has nothing to lose now.
She will save him if it's the last thing she does.