1 + 2 | EMBERS TO FIRESTORM | THE 100 | JOHN MURPHY

ELEVEN

E L E V E N

When Murphy enters his tent, he is greeted with the immediate sight of Althea sat there with her hands in her lap just staring at him with her cold eyes. Those eyes he could stare at for hours upon hours now stared at him as if he were the worst man to walk the ground.

"If you wanted to get in my bed, all you had to do was ask," He laughs, but her lips don't even twitch in amusement. Her face was stern, but not emotionless like he had seen her before. The way she held her jaw taut showed emotion begging to be released, pushing to over flow. It simmered in her veins hotter and hotter as she watched him analysing her lack of response and what it could mean. "Why are you here?" He asks her.

The lantern flickered in the slight breeze, dancing across their skin to no melody. Althea ducks her head, looking to her hands balled in her lap. Her teeth grit together firmly as she thinks of what he has done; she looks up and stares him straight in the eyes. "I know what you did to Wells."

"What do you mean?" He shrugs his jacket from his shoulders and throws it to the side.

"I saw you restraining him whilst you ripped the wristband off him, I saw it with my own two eyes." Her fingernails dig into her palms, cutting. His aura overpowered her with great ease. It was strong, but vile in its ways as it filled her mind with an indescribable sensation.

"He refused to take his wristband off so we helped him out," He says flippantly. "No big deal, Thea." His idea of a big deal must have been completely different to Althea's, but she bit her tongue as he sat down next to her and slid his shoes from his aching feet.

"It was wrong to do that to him." She speaks quietly, as if she were holding something back within her. It was on the tip of her tongue. She wanted to tell him how stupid and reckless he was being, but there was no way she would get through to him like that.

"He was helping the Ark. You really think they're going to come down here in two months time and forgive us for everything we've done? If you do, you're delusional."

Althea unclasps her fingers from one another and pushes her hands down her thighs, breathing out slowly as she does so. "That's your belief, but you shouldn't force others to comply to your beliefs," She tells him, but his blue eyes did not seem fazed by her words one bit.

"And you're siding with Wells?" Murphy asks, his frustration clear as he roughly grabs a hold of her empty wrist and holds it up. "Even though you took your own wristband off."

"I didn't take my wristband off for you or Bellamy. I took it off because there's no one on the Ark that I care about to keep it on, to keep helping them. So, no. I'm not siding with anyone, Murhpy," She seethes, her eyes narrowing slightly.

Murphy uncurls his fingers from her wrist, dropping his hand down into his lap. "You have no one too, huh?"

"My dad died due to Abby Griffin's reluctance and my mum decided she hated Doctor Griffin enough to attempt to kill her. She got floated for it," Althea confides. The memory of the day her father died still burned strongly in her memory, but what burned brighter was that Abby Griffin didn't even try to save him.

"What happened to you? What did you do to get yourself locked up?" Today, he was filled with questions for her and she seemed inclined to answer, even though it hurt. But this was a way he found he could avoid the subject of what he'd done to Wells.

"I was convicted of attempted murder." That conviction ruined her life, sent her to her death here on the ground. The ground where they would all die. Two already dead before they'd gotten out of the drop ship or planted their feet on the ground.

"You tried to murder someone?" Murphy asks in disbelief. His eye brows were raised; he knew she didn't care all that much but he never thought she'd feel enough to try to end someone's life.

"According to the supposed victim, yes," She grumbles distastefully. She looks closely at Murphy, but he was already watching her just as closely. The way she had spoken of her experience, despite it being short, interested him greatly.

Althea's eyes search his face, her teeth bite at her bottom lip much more softly than when she'd clamped her teeth to her lip in an attempt to hold back a trembling scream. "What about you, what did you do?"

Murphy takes one look at her lip between her teeth before swiftly looking away. "I murdered someone."

"Oh," Althea breathes, not knowing what to say to him now he'd told her what he'd done. "Down here, we're all criminals, Murphy." Seeing that he'd looked away from her, she places her hand over his. Her previous burning anger replaced with pure sympathy for him and his past.

Althea was unbelievable to him. The way she spoke was eloquent and simple; he felt he impulse to lean toward her, to connect his lips with hers and let his hands roam every inch of her skin. And, as he moved so slightly and gradually toward her, Althea felt her heart rise into her throat and her fingers pressed into the back of his hand.

They were moments away from one another. Murphy could feel the warmth of her breath ticking his lips. His eyes were locked onto her lips, but he didn't move. Althea kept her eyes open, watching his every move and questioning. In this moment, she saw a softer side to Murphy. A side that she knew had always been beneath his harsh exterior, but finding it was always going to be a task.

But that was her task. She knew it due to the pull she felt whenever she was around him. Murphy's aura was angry, but it drew her in like a moth to a flickering flame.

"I shouldn't be here." Her voice is soft, delicate to the ear.

"I don't care," He replies shortly as he tries to force his lips upon hers roughly, but she pulls back.

"Murphy, please," Althea whispers and Murphy retracts from her, leaving the air around her cold. His hand is pulled from underneath her much daintier one. "Thank you," She mutters quietly.

He doesn't look at her as she leaves the tent, exiting into the night. The dark embracing her in its icy arms, pulling her in and filling her lungs with shards of ice. Cutting into her heart, ripping her open from the inside out. Leaving her corpse for the crows.