Safe Place | j.h

7: Story Time

Emery let arrow fly one after another at the target. A perfect shot. It was always a perfect shot. After years of working on a task force and being the only one whose weapon of choice was a bow and arrow, she had a lot of practice.

"Don't you think that a little to easy of a target?" Alec said from next to her. Emery grinned, she liked shooting with Alec. Usually they just shot in silence, not saying a thing.

"Yeah, but it never hurts to start from basics." That was one thing that she learned while on the task force, that taking time for basics was important. Shooting for food was the best way for basics.

"You don't talk about it, do you?" Alec asked her, hitting moving targets without flinching. Alec thought about about all he had experienced during the war, thinking only the worst for Emery while working under the Clave.

"Talk about what?" Emery asked, not letting her eyes move from the target. She was still more focused on the target then on what Alec was saying.

"Whatever happened while you were on the task force." Now Emery was paying attention. She lowered her bow, making eye contact with Alec. To her it looked like he looking right through her, she cleared her throat. Emery then lowered her head slightly. Alec noticed how quiet she got, "Emery I'm sorry-"

"No." Emery said shaking her head, "No it's alright Alec, you're right." She didn't talk about it. It wasn't a good time for her that she wanted to remember. Sure the team was great, mostly made of experienced Shadowhunters and a few her own age. Sure she made friends, but being in a war is an experience that she didn't want to relive. "I don't talk about it, I don't like reliving that time."

"Right. Yeah, that makes sense." Alec licked his lips and looked back down at his bow. There were times that he too didn't like to think about, things that had happened. Like when Jace had died, by the lake and he wasn't there. His parabatai rune had faded and his body was in pain. Like when Izzy nearly died. Like when Max had died. Like when he found out Magnus had been with hundreds before him.

Neither one of them said anything. There was silence, both of them just stared at their bows or at the ground, but not at each other. The only noise was the turning of the generators and fans above them, but that was white noise not actually noise.

"The first place we go," Emery started, licking her lips. "We were stuck in the Alaska, alone, without any help from the Clave with only the shirts on our back and our weapons. The Clave had told us that it was too dangerous to bring any help or supplies to us, because no one was supposed to know that the task forces existed." Emery paused, her eyebrows drawing together intensively, "For six days we were alone. Just the eight of us. Without anything. This one guy cooked, these two girls made shelters and I hunted. It was terrible, everyone bickered and attacked each other." Then she started laughing really loud.

Alec wasn't sure what he was supposed to do say. Was she done? Was he supposed to comfort her or something?

"And," Emery started again, "it was all a fucking joke. It was a fucking training exercise that they sent us one in order to get us to be a team." Emery shook her head, staring off into space. Thinking about those six days made her head spin and stomach churn.

"Thats... terrible." Alec said after a few minutes of silence between them. Emery nodded before pulling her bow back up.

"Yeah everyone was pissed," Emery laughed, a smile played on her face. One that Alec didn't recognize. "But it was a war we believed in, despite what the Clave had done to us. We used our anger to fight." She said letting arrow after arrow fly.

Alec laughed, his chest vibrated and he put his hand on his chest. His head was throw back and his mouth was wide open. He wasn't surprised that the Clave did that. The Clave always did things that made no sense, without reason and explanation. Then Emery started laughing too, her head thrown back like Alec's. Both of them laughed till their faces turned red and it hurt to breath. They didn't even knew what they were laughing about any more.

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A/n
Word Count: 764