atomic man, john murphy.

God Complex

The rain poured outside of Becca's lab, although the thick walls made it easy to ignore. Everybody was trapped inside, not willing to risk finding out whether it was black rain or ordinary rain. It had been a mere few hours since Abby had injected the fake Baylis with nightblood and now came the hard part. Jackson was in the process of strapping the man down inside of the radiation chamber and the clicking of the buckles on the straps were the only noise in the room. 

"Jackson, seal the chamber," Abby commanded. 

"Copy that," Jackson responded. He took a step back and pulled the rounded glass lid shut. The chamber sealed shut with a sharp hiss. "He's ready."

"Yeah, but are we?" Raven asked lowly. She was staring at the man but looked up at Clarke when she spoke. Everybody in the room shared guilty, unsure expressions with one another. 

"The guy's a monster," Emori stepped forward and reminded them. 

"We've been over this. None of us wants to do this," Clarke looked around the room. "But the death wave will be here in 10 days. Luna's stem cells grafted successfully. Baylis is making nightblood on his own. This really is our only hope."

"We really still talking about this?" Murphy spoke up and crossed his arms. "Black rain is already here. 18 people died in it yesterday at Arkadia, so if nightblood can let us walk around in it, I, for one, want to know about that."

They looked around at each other again and Abby finally sighed. "Okay. Jackson, proceed."

"Initiating," Jackson announced. He flicked a couple switches and the chamber began emitting a strong white light accompanied by a low humming. Clove stared at the man in the chamber intently as she reached for Murphy's hand. Their fingers slowly intertwined and Murphy gave her hand a small squeeze. "500 REM... 850. This is where we'd see symptoms in a non-nightblood." 

Clarke knelt closer to the chamber, examining Baylis' body. Abby read out his stats and Clarke nodded. "No visible effects," She noticed. 

"1,000 REM. 1,500. 2,000 REM, the level of black rain." 

"Still nothing," Clarke said. "It's working." 

"2,500."

One of the machines then began beeping. "Wait," Abby spoke. 

"No. Turn it off!" Clarke shuddered.

Baylis began screaming in agony. His body was quickly painted red and covered in boils from the radiation. Clove gulped and squeezed Murphy's hand even tighter. He began spitting out black blood all over the glass on the inside of the chamber. Murphy pulled Clove's body around and into his chest, putting his free hand on her back, but she kept her head turned to watch the events unfold in horror. After a few more moments of pained screams, the man fell silent and his body became limp. Everybody remained silent as the monitor flatlined, indicating that Baylis was dead.

"What have we done?" Abby whispered. 

The group slowly dispersed among the room, shuffling noiselessly as they all tried to regain their composure. Clove let go of Murphy's hand then hugged him instead and dug her head into his shoulder. "I think I might throw up," She admitted. 

"You'll be okay," He mumbled, although his shaky voice suggested he thought otherwise. "We do what we have to so we can survive, right?" Clove exhaled deeply and stepped back out of the hug before nodding with her eyes closed. Murphy reached his hand up to rub her cheek. "That's right." 

Raven turned the giant screens on which allowed everybody to see the incoming death wave and the radiation levels. Roan stood beside her as they waved the eerie green cloud roll forward. Clove and Murphy walked out of their corner and towards the other two. "How close is it, Raven?" Clove questioned.