Raven is finally here!
Per FF rules the full quote that inspired the banter in this chapter is too long to be a tittle "Laughter is the shortest distance between two people". It belongs to Victor Borge (1909-2000), Danish comedian, conductor and pianist, affectionately known as The Clown Prince of Denmark.
- Polis Tower -
When Anya stepped into the darkened bedroom, a dagger embedded itself in the wall beside her head. The blonde rolled her eyes in annoyance at the greeting she received.
In the dim light, Anya could just see the imposing shape of the bed and the dark outline that was Lexa. She had sat up abruptly, probably with another dagger in her hand.
"Really, Lexa?"
"You could have been anyone; I'm not taking any chances"
The blonde tugged the small dagger out of the wall beside her -it was not the first hole in the plaster and it certainly wouldn't be the last- and stepped towards the bed, sitting at the Commander's feet.
"Who else do your guards allow to come into your room in the middle of the night?" Anya asked wiggling her eyebrows, her previous irritation already forgotten.
"Why are you here, Anya?". She purposely ignored her friend, hoping that she would let the subject go.
"It's been that long that you can't even remember?" The blonde said with unconcealed mirth.
"Anya" The exasperation in her voice would have made many grown warriors cry yet it only fuelled Anya's determination.
"You need to get laid grouchy pants"
If anyone else had something like that Lexa would have already had them flogged for their insolence but Anya was her best friend and she used that title to get away with things that others wouldn't dare to even imagine.
"I do get laid"
Anya raised her eyebrow in such a way that it made Lexa feel like she was ten years old again, training under her and lying to get out of archery duty for the day. The brunette excelled as a trainee, Anya had told her so many times, but archery had always been her one weakness. She was proficient enough with a bow but she would never be a master of the art.
"Sometimes" she mumbled under her breath
"What was that? I didn't hear you"
"Sometimes… I said I get laid sometimes"
"If Heda can't get a date, what hope is there for the rest of us?"
"I can get a date; trust me that is not the issue, I just…" Lexa trailed off unsure of telling Anya what was holding her back from taking up on the many offers she received.
"You just…"
The brunette sighed in frustration; Anya wouldn't let it go until she got a satisfying answer.
"I'm tired of the women who only want Heda; I want someone who likes me, for me… not for my title or whatever benefit they might get"
"Don't lose hope, you will find your dream girl someday" The blonde said sympathetically
"I know but thanks anyway"
"In the meantime don't let this huge bed go to waste"
"Anya!"
"What, I'm just saying"
"You are incorrigible!"
"Thank you"
Of course, Anya would take her admonishment as a compliment, Lexa thought shaking her head in amusement.
"Besides you know I don't let anyone sleep in my bed, not since…"
"I Lex, I know" In a rare display of affection the blonde held Lexa in a hug and gave her a brief kiss on the forehead. No words were needed between them.
"We need to talk." The seriousness of Anya's voice broke the silence that had enveloped the room.
"The maunon?" Lexa asked suddenly alert. All traces of friendliness gone from her voice, Heda had taken over.
"No, they are surprisingly quiet"
"Good"
Suddenly Anya dropped the weapon on the fur blankets next to Lexa's hands. "Imagine how awkward it would be to explain if you ever hit me with one of these"
"I never miss." No pride could be heard in her voice; it was just a simple statement of fact.
"You are the best second I have ever had, did I ever tell you that?"
"Anya you are stalling"
"I am" The blonde sighed and sucked a bit of breath to steady herself "Another sky thing landed last night, I am unsure of what it means but I already sent Tris to investigate"
"Do you think they are a threat?"
"I don't know, Lex, I honestly don't know"
"Keep me informed of any developments"
"I will, I need to get going now if I want to make it before the sunrise" Usually it would take her little more than an hour and a half to reach the camp they had established to keep surveillance on the intruders but traveling at night was already dangerous enough and this time she couldn't risk being caught so she needed to move silently and at a slower pace than what she was used to.
Lexa watched Anya go and immediately regretted not opening up to her friend; she was tired of the many women vying for her attention as a way to further their social standing, that much was true, but the real reason she kept avoiding her potential suitors was the damn prophecy.
Since the day Vada recited to her those fateful lines, confusing dreams had been plaguing her mind; no discernable features could be seen but electric blue eyes and hair as yellow as the midday sun hunted her. Whenever she tried to take a new lover a pang of almost unbearable guilt seeped through her bones, trampling whatever lust she might have felt. One time she even thought out a woman with blue eyes and light blonde hair but after sleeping with her the sadness in her heart was so overwhelming that she simply got dressed and left without looking back.
Lexa recited in silence the words she had committed to memory; The sky and the earth joined as one, an unmatched force shall they become. What did that mean exactly? At first, she had simply attributed it to a political alliance with the sky people, to keep them under her rule could only benefit her in the long run but maybe it hinted at more than that, it seemed that her love life and her reign as Heda were closely intertwined Death will bring love and a long-lasting reign… could her blue-eyed blonde be among the sky intruders? And even if her dream girl was from the sky, how was their supposedly foretold love connected to death?. This is why she simply hated prophecies or any other type of divination; they were more often than not downright confusing passages, full of vague and nonsensical words.
The brunette had tried to dismiss the dreams; she had always been ruled by logic, very rarely letting emotions get in her way but it seemed the more she tried to forget the more vivid the dreams became; she had found herself distracted in the middle of audiences, a faint wisp of vanilla scent invaded her senses and made it unable for her to focus on anything else, whenever she was anxious and couldn't sleep she could swear that she heard a sensual voice singing in her ear and lulling her to sleep and one time she was sure she saw a beautiful blonde woman sitting in her windowsill, looking intently at the bustle of the street while… drawing it?.
After realizing that her efforts to deny whatever the dreams tried to show her only served to make her hallucinations more powerful she decided to wholeheartedly embrace the visions; maybe they were premonitions or maybe she was simply becoming insane but whatever it was she couldn't deny that she looked forward to them every night.
- Arker Camp -
Getting to the landing site had been relatively easy; she knew the terrain and the exact place where she needed to go. The first time around it had taken her and Finn about 5 hours, mostly because they kept getting side-tracked by kissing and frolicking in the woods, this time she walked in a straight line and didn't allow anything to distract her from her goal.
The pod was still burning when they arrived so Clarke waited for the flames to settle down a little but as soon as it was safe; she made her way around the fallen trees and came to stand beside it.
Charlotte instinctively reached for the door but Clarke grabbed her arm and held her back, without needing to touch it she knew the metal door must be boiling and getting burned, or permitting Charlotte to do so, was not on her to-do list of the day. The older blonde quickly took off her jacket and carefully wrapped her hands with it, signalling for Charlotte to do the same with hers.
They quickly pulled the door up and scanned for any survivors. When she didn't see anyone inside Clarke's heart pummelled to her feet; did someone else steal this pod and tried to launch it to earth? Did Raven die on the impact?.
Maybe it was a coincidence or maybe somehow Charlotte noticed the beginning of her panic attack but before she could spiral any further the little blonde grabbed Clarke's hand and squeezed it while pointing at a lump in the far right corner.
Clarke rapidly closed the distance between herself and the unknown figure, letting out a huge relieved groan when she realized that it was indeed Raven.
After a quick check-up she determined that the brunette was unconscious, she had a few gashes in her face and arms and her right leg was trapped under a big piece of metal. The circumstances were not exactly great but not the worst scenario either, all things considered; she realized that Raven had been incredibly lucky.
"I will lift the metal bar pinning her leg down, grab her arm and see if you can move her a little to the side," The older blonde said while she showed Charlotte how to grab Raven to avoid aggravating any injury that she may have sustained when landing.
Clarke noticed the mechanic was gaining consciousness so she used her jacket to make an improvised pillow for the brunette. When Raven finally opened her eyes, the older blonde smiled at her, trying to put her at ease.
"Hi Raven," She said, almost whispering, as to not frighten her.
The mechanic was completely disoriented at first but once she regained her mental faculties she started registering everything around her and realized that the woman next to her must have been from the Ark, as she somehow knew her by name.
"I made it?" The brunette asked, immediately realizing that it had been a pretty stupid question but she was still recovering from her rough landing so if anyone were to point it out, they could go fuck themselves for all she cared.
"Yeah, you are on earth" The blonde replied with a smile, completely unaware of Raven's monologue and subsequent swearing.
"Who are you and how do you know my name?"
"I'm Clarke Griffin. My father, Jake, used to tell me a lot of stories about his job. He was extremely proud of you; Raven Reyes, the youngest Zero-G mechanic in 50 years"
Raven smiled in fondness, Jake Griffin had been an amazing man and even better boss. The day he was floated she took the day off to mourn him in the solitude of her room "52, actually."
"Even more impressive then" Clarke felt a little hand grasping hers and she felt like smacking herself; she had been so overwhelmed with the happiness of seeing Raven alive that she had completely forgotten that Charlotte was with her.
Clarke pushed the little girl to stand in front of her and after putting her hand on the younger blonde's shoulders she turn to look at Raven again.
"This is Charlotte; she helped me in finding you and taking you out of the burning pod"
"Thank you blondie"
The nickname made both blondes laugh loudly; prompting a confused Raven to ask what was so funny.
"It's usually Clarke who people, well Murphy to be more exact… I'm not sure others are brave enough to do so… who they refer to as blondie" Charlotte explained between bouts of laughter.
"Brave enough? If blondie junior's words are to be believed you seemed to be kind of a hot-shot here Miss Griffin"
"Well, I don't know if a hot-shot but…"
"She is, she totally is!. Clarke and Bell are the official leaders of Arkadia… that's our camp's name by the way" Charlotte chimed in, her adoration for Clarke shining through her words.
"Someone had to take charge," The older blonde said, somewhat embarrassed by Charlotte's praise.
"Humble too, I think you and I will get along just fine Miss Griffin"
"I really hope so Miss Reyes," Clarke said playing along with the mock formality displayed by the mechanic.
Raven grunted suddenly and touched her forehead.
"Fuck it. This is not good." She said looking at the blood on her hand.
"I found no life-threatening wounds but you should try not to put unnecessary weight on your right leg, it could be broken"
"Not only a badass but a doctor too?"
"I used to help my mother in the Ark's clinic"
"Wait. You are Clarke Griffin"
"Mmm yeah, I introduced myself. Don't you remember?. Maybe you suffered a concussion in the fall I should…"
"No, no, I mean yeah, I remember your name but I just didn't make the connection… you are Abby's daughter, your mother helped me to steal this pod"
"Ohh, I had no idea," She said, trying to sound surprised by the revelation.
"Yeah, she helped on the condition that as soon as landed I had to try and find you to tell you that she loves you and she is sorry for everything that happened"
This time her dumbfounded expression was completely real, in the first timeline Abby had sent no message with Raven. Clarke couldn't help but wonder if it was the absence of any physical reminder that prompted her mother to uncharacteristically display her usually closely guarded emotions. Clarke would never know why she did it but she chose to simply find comfort in her words and remind herself that despite their sometimes antagonistic relationship her mother did love her.
"Do you have a radio we can use to contact the Ark?"
"There should be one to your left"
"Ok, I think I found it" Clarke touched a few buttons but nothing happened "How do you make this work? I touched… well… everything… and it's dead silent"
"That's delicate equipment Griffin; you can't just randomly press things and hope for the best"
"Jeez sorry, I know nothing about machines"
"Clearly," The mechanic said in a dead-pan tone "just… don't touch anything else, I'm gonna give it a try"
Raven used a few banged-up levers to pull herself up and resting most of her weight in the metal walls very carefully walked towards Clarke.
The brunette spent a few minutes tinkering with the knobs and pushing buttons but no matter how hard she tried the machine stayed as responsive as before.
"Fuck, Fuck!"
"What is it?"
"The cables are fried"
"What does that mean?" Charlotte asked
"It means we are totally and utterly fucked"
Clarke felt dread settle in her stomach, she had counted on arriving early to stop Bellamy from sabotaging the pod's radio and now it seems it hadn't even been working in the first place.
"We are fucked!"
"Breathe deeply Clarke, don't let panic overtake you"
"I can't! What if Raven can't make a radio? What if we can't contact the Ark?
"CLARKE!"
"I…"
The blonde found herself completely paralyzed. She tried moving her hands and legs but her limbs were completely unresponsive; she couldn't even raise an eyebrow or twitch her lips.
"Listen to me Clarke Griffin, you have faced worst situations than this, there is no need to panic"
Clarke forced herself to relax. Her breath had finally even out and her heart no longer felt like it would jump out of her ribcage,
"Can you undo whatever it is that you did to me?"
"I don't know, can I?"
"You think you are funny, don't you?"
"I know I am"
Once she regained control of her body she turned to Raven and Charlotte, ready to spiel a somewhat believable excuse for her sudden paralysis. Luckily they were busy inspecting the dropship and hadn't noticed anything.
The blonde knew that the logical thing should be to be terrified of the power that Wanheda seemed to wield over her physical body; the spirit had proved she was able to completely control her if she so desire yet instead of fear or dread, a wave of joy filled her heart. Knowing that Wanheda would always be there to bring her back from the edge whenever she started to panic brought an inner peace she hadn't felt in a very long time.
Clarke decided to approach Charlotte and let Raven rest for a little while. The mechanic was sitting on the floor again; her labored breathing was a clear sign of her discomfort.
"Did you find anything useful?"
The little blonde pointed to a pile of seemingly random junk next to Raven's feet.
"I only need to remove that shiny metal thingy and we are good to go"
"It's a transmitter blonde junior, not a thingy," Raven said with fake exasperation.
When Clarke was helping the younger girl to remove the piece from the smashed keyboard she leaned a bit to the side, so they were roughly at the same height, and whispered conspiratorially "it totally looks like a thingy to me"
"I heard you, Griffin!" Raven howled, making the blonde duo break in laughter.
After securing all they needed in Raven's backpack, Clarke and Charlotte helped the brunette to her feet. When Clarke heard the mechanic wince and curse under her breath she made the older girl lean on her, supporting most of her weight.
"I can walk just fine"
Clarke smiled; Raven's characteristic stubbornness was finally making an appearance.
"Your leg could be broken Raven, please let me help you"
"Fine but only because I have no fucking idea where we are going"
"You are going to be a terrible patient, aren't you?"
"Well, if you ask nicely I might let you play doctor with me… I don't promise to behave though"
Clarke choked on her saliva and her eyes nearly popped out of her head, was Raven flirting with her?. She might be deeply in love with Lexa but she was still a hormonal bisexual teenager, a teenager who not only hadn't gotten laid in months but also battled daily with lust-induced memories and fantasies.
"You should have seen your face blondie, you are way too easy to rile up"
The older blonde rolled her eyes at the mechanic and discreetly pointed towards Charlotte. Clarke had no idea how much the younger girl knew about sex, if anything at all, but she was not about to risk it. She was not ready to give anyone the birds and the bees talk anytime soon.
Raven, for all her playfulness and usual brashness, seemed truly ashamed of her inappropriate comment and sheepishly kept her eyes downwards, avoiding eye contact with the two blondes.
"Well, that won't be a problem. I do not mind if my patients are a little naughty, as long as they are aware that I am the one in charge"
Clarke's light-hearted joke had the desired effect of making Raven laugh, breaking the somewhat tense atmosphere that had settled between them.
Charlotte discreetly rolled her eyes at her companions, if Clarke -or Raven- thought she hadn't understood the jokes they were severely mistaken, she knew what sex was, her parents had explained it to her a long time ago. The little blonde had no plans to tell them anytime soon though, watching her friends, especially Octavia and Murphy, fumble with their words to try and pretend they were talking about something else was downright hilarious.
Sometimes Charlotte had even been tempted to ask Octavia if she could take her on a little adventure outside their camp, arguing that with the many hours the brunette had devoted to exploring the woods that surrounded them, she must be an expert by now. She promised herself that one day soon she would do it; she only needed to wait for the perfect moment to deliver her joke.
While walking towards their camp, they kept chatting, joking, and getting to know each other better and Clarke was grateful that there was no strain between them caused by the 'I'm sorry that your boyfriend cheated on you with me but I love him and I don't want to give him up' situation.
Despite all the mistakes hanging above their heads Clarke had always wanted to pursue a friendship with Raven and by the time the blonde died at the hands of the grounders seeking revenge for Lexa's death, they were, but it was a friendship marred by everything that went down between them; the cheating, Finn's death by Clarke's hands, Raven's torture in TonDC and Mount Weather, and those were only the most important highlights; the list of transgressions, betrayals and faults could keep going for hours.
When she had woken up in her new reality the blonde had promised herself that her relationship with Raven wouldn't be tainted by any negativity, and she wholeheartedly believed that tonight she had taken the first successful step towards achieving her goal.