Octavia
It took a while for Moira to convince her to sit down again, and even when she did, Octavia was tense and hostile. She gripped the fork in her hand and ate nothing, using all her concentration to heave large breaths of anger.
"Please," Moira said gently, watching her. "I mean you no harm."
"Yeah, you keep saying that," Octavia snapped, turning blue eyes like steel on the redhead. "But if that was true, I wouldn't be your prisoner."
"You're not my prisoner," Moira protested. She seemed genuinely hurt, or at least good at pretending. "You're a guest."
Octavia continued to glare at her. "Guests can leave," she said evenly.
With a soft sigh, Moira stayed silent for a moment before saying, quietly, "I understand your feelings, Octavia. But-"
"Yeah right," she interrupted.
Moira tried a different tactic. "Your friend Lincoln… is he also a Sky Person?"
"No," she said, her voice soft as she thought of him. "He's Trikru."
At that, Moira seemed to brighten significantly. "What village is he from?"
She frowned, trying to work out whether the woman might have ulterior motives for asking, but she couldn't think of any. "TonDC," she said carefully.
"Oh yes," the older woman answered, her voice full of sympathy. "I heard about the missile… I'm so sorry. I have family in Lingto, not far from tonDC."
Octavia wasn't sure what to question first so she just asked everything, "How did you hear about the missile? What family? Have you been to tonDC?"
Moira smiled softly. "I've never had the pleasure," she said gently. "I'm sorry to say I have never set foot outside this mountain… unlike you, we can't survive the radiation."
So, they were like the mountain men back in the forest. Octavia wondered what else they had in common- where was their harvest chamber?
"What about the missile?" she asked.
"We were in contact with Mount Weather until they went radio silent," she explained. "President Wallace- Cage Wallace- told us he planned to use it."
"And you did nothing," Octavia said, grimacing. Moira and Clarke had one thing in common.
Moira let out a sigh. "Raven Rock may appear close to Mount Weather on a map, but believe me Octavia, it's far away."
"I've never seen a map."
"Well. It would have been no small feat for us to have sent help in time, even if we'd wanted to."
"So you didn't want to," Octavia pressed.
The older woman frowned at her. "You're clearly a very strong-willed girl," she said, her patience seeming to wear thin. "Do you enjoy being so stubborn?"
"What I enjoy is being outside, with my family, holding my sword," she said honestly, naming her three favourite things.
"Yes, your brother… Bellamy, right? You said he was sick?"
"Yeah, and that's why I have to get out of here." Octavia said nothing else, gave no further details. Bellamy was hers; she wouldn't share him with this woman.
"You can't go out," Moira answered, firm.
"You keep saying that, but I don't know what it means," Octavia answered. "The doors obviously open, and I don't have to worry about radiation, so let me go."
"It's not that I can't let you go," Moira explained bluntly. "It's that I won't."
"But why?" Octavia asked, her face falling as her anger crumbled and gave way to fear. "Why won't you? If you're going to steal my blood, just get it over with."
Moira shook her head. "No, that's not what I want at all," she said gently. "I told you, we aren't like Mount Weather. We don't participate in the harvest program."
"But you need outside blood to survive, right?" Octavia asked suspiciously, not buying it.
"Yes, that's right," Moira agreed. "But we use what's donated to us. There's no need to force people into cages."
"Who donates it?"
"Well, people like my husband," she answered, and she smiled softly. "You assume so much about us, Octavia, and I understand why, but if you would just give me the benefit of the doubt for a short time, I could show you so much. I know I could change your mind about us."
"Your husband… he's Trikru?" she asked, avoiding having to commit either way to her request. "How did you two even meet?"
"He was brought here, by slavers."
Octavia stiffened. "What?"
"How much do you know about the Plains Clan?"
She shook her head and admitted, "Nothing. Lincoln said not a lot is known about them. Which I guess is why he didn't know about you… this place."
Moira nodded. "When the war happened, and the bombs were dropped, there were some places harder hit than others," she explained. "The landscape of this place used to be very different, but now it's little more than a dust bowl. It's hard to grow crops, and the radiation is much more severe. People have had to resort to some less scrupulous ways of making a living- like the bounty hunters who brought you here, and the slavers who captured my husband."
"So you bought him?" Octavia asked.
"No, no," Moira assured her with a small smile. "We liberated him. And in exchange, he stayed here for the rest of his life."
"In exchange?" Octavia shook her head. "No, you're saying you took him as a prisoner. You saved him from the slavers only to force him to stay here out of some sense of debt."
"Octavia," Moira said softly. "Things aren't always as simple as you might like to think. I know you're young, but you're oversimplifying things. Why don't you have breakfast with my family? I'll introduce you to my husband and our children, and you can ask him these questions yourself."
"So is that why you speak Trigedasleng?" Octavia asked, again avoiding agreeing or disagreeing to anything.
"Yes, that's right," Moira said with a nod. "And the reason why you hear all our messages in both languages is because the goal of Raven Rock is integration, not destruction. The more children who inherit the genes to filter out the radiation, the better off we'll be. It's our fastest road to freedom… well, other than your bone marrow, I suppose."
"So you know about that," Octavia said, her heart sinking.
"Yes, Mount Weather did share some information about your people with us," Moira said. "But don't worry, Octavia, we aren't like them. We don't plan to hunt your friends down and steal their marrow. If anyone wanted to donate it to us, we'd accept it gratefully, but that's all." But despite saying that was all, she seemed to hesitate for a moment, as though she was considering saying more.
"What?" Octavia asked, immediately suspicious.
"Nothing, it's just… something strange, in your medical file. The doctors told me about it earlier, and this conversation just reminded me."
"Strange how?" Octavia asked, trying not to show concern. "Am I sick?"
"No, nothing like that," Moira assured her. "When Doctor Tsing sent over some of the files she'd prepared on her subjects- I'm sorry, that's the medical term- they had and outstanding ability to process the radiation in the air."
"Yeah, I know," Octavia said. "That's why they wanted to kill us all. And why they did kill a few of us."
Moira shook her head. "No, I know, but that's not what I was going to say. Octavia, when you came into Raven Rock and we had to look after you, we ran similar tests on you to the ones Mount Weather ran on your friends. But your ability to filter the radiation is better than any of theirs. You stand head and shoulders above the other Sky People, and I have no idea why."
The idea was deeply unsettling to Octavia. Of course Mount Weather had never got their hands on her, but if they had… she hated to think what might have happened if they'd discovered what Moira was telling her now.
"Is there anything that makes you different than everyone else?" the older woman asked her curiously.
Octavia couldn't help but laugh. "Yeah, but nothing that would explain what you're talking about."
"Please," Moira urged her. "You never know- it might help."
Hesitating for a few moments, Octavia finally said, "There was a one child policy on the Ark. I was the second, so my mother hid me."
With a thoughtful frown, Moira shook her head slowly. "No, you're right… that's interesting, but it doesn't explain why you'd be better at filtering radiation."
She shrugged. "I spent a lot of time under the floor, if that matters."
"Maybe the containment system was a bit weaker there, but no," Moira said. "No, it wouldn't be significant enough to explain this." She brightened a little. "I'd love to get your brother here. Since you're related, it would be interesting to see whether your uniqueness exists in him as well."
Octavia glared at her. "What, bring him here so he can be your prisoner too?"
Moira cringed, the smile dropping from her face. "You're right, I'm sorry. It's just the scientist in me… I enjoy quirks of nature and intriguing differences between people. I didn't mean to trivialise how you feel about being here. I do understand. Really." She reached out a hand, but Octavia jerked to her feet before Moira could touch her.
She paced to the door, remembered it was locked, and paced back, sitting down again. "I can't stay here," she said. "I'm claustrophobic, because of how I grew up. I need to be outside."
"There are many people here who can help you with that," Moira said, her voice kind. "People trained to listen."
"I don't need a shrink," Octavia snapped, thinking of her own experience on the Ark- Doctor Santos, spending months trying to brainwash her into thinking she shouldn't want or need her brother. She shook away the thought, glaring at Moira. "I need to make sure Bellamy's okay."
"I can send a team to go look for him, bring him here, and make sure he's alive and well, but that's it," Moira said firmly.
"No!" Octavia snapped. "No, don't you dare. You leave him alone."
"As you wish." Moira went back to her meal, and then soon Octavia did as well. A long and charged silence grew between them as they ate together.
Octavia tried to order her thoughts. She decided that Lincoln was alive. That Bellamy was alive. That they had found each other and they were looking for her. She didn't know how much Lincoln had seen of her capture, since he might have been knocked unconscious when the horse fell, but even if he knew absolutely nothing, he would at least remember the bounty hunters on the trail. He was a resourceful man- he could track her down. And Bellamy would be beside himself with worry and insist they start looking for her immediately. So they were on their way- definitely on their way.
Suddenly she thought of Clarke; Clarke who was a prisoner of the Ice Nation, Clarke who was in clear and imminent danger, Clarke who was what had brought them here in the first place. Would they leave her, and go for Clarke instead? Would Echo convince the men to continue north?
No. Bellamy would never abandon her- of this she was sure. And neither would Lincoln. So even if- as the back of her mind whispered fearfully- even if one of them was dead, the other would plant their feet so hard in the earth that nothing could drag them from this place. Not until they had her back.
So Octavia knew that they were definitely coming for her. She just had to be ready to go when they arrived.