you had a demon in you
He cuts the chip out of Raven and she doesn’t even flinch. The blood wells up to her neck, and then a liquid that looks like molten silver seeps out. He catches it with a cloth, and then shows it to her. To her credit, she doesn’t throw up. “How do you — feel?” he asks. Wants to compare her symptoms to his own self.
She kind of shrugs. “Headache,” she says. “It feels really spiky, like someone drove something sharp through my brain. You’re sure it’s out?”
“I don’t know,” he says. “You’re still bleeding, but it’s not gross anymore, so, probably?”
“That sounds like real science,” she mutters, and levers herself up to sit on the table, so she can face him. “So you want the Commander to take the chip,” she says. “You just wanna fuck with her, or is there an actual reason? Like, I know you hate being lookout whatever, so do you just want to take her down with you? Because that’s fine, whatever, I don’t care, but I think we could actually destroy the City of Light, Murphy. I think we could do it, if you took the edited chip.”
Her eyes are bright and a little wild. “No,” he says, and he almost regrets saying it. “Like, the Commander has her own chip. She’s also A.L.I.E. The Flamekeeper, what Titus was before he betrayed the Commander, he was responsible for putting the chip into the Commander and taking it out when they died. And they call the chip ‘the Flame’. But you can only have the chip put in you if you have nightblood, right, which is why only kids who have black blood are allowed to be the Commander.”
“I don’t get it,” says Raven, which is fine, he doesn’t really get it either. “How did the Flamekeeper get the chip?”
“The first Commander had it,” he says. “Becca prom heda. I think — I think she was Skaikru. I think she was from the thirteenth station.”
Raven kind of whistles through her teeth. “That’s really cool,” she says. “But why do you want the Commander to take the City of Light chip? That’s not going to help anybody.”
“Except I think it will,” he says, firm. “And I know that because A.L.I.E really, really doesn’t want it to happen.”
—
Prosper catches him by the elbow right before he goes to bed, mind full of chips, of the City of Light, of plans for the future. He flinches, and Prosper says: “So it’s actually you.”
“Yeah,” he says, rough. He yanks his arm out of Prosper’s grip. “It’s really me.”
“You need to apologize to Moss,” says Prosper, harsh. “I assume you’ll have to use a translator. I won’t do it.”
“I —“ what.
“You don’t even know, do you?” Prosper says, and his bark of laughter is disbelief. “You fucked up, Mofi kom Skaikru. You fucked up for real this time, and you have to own up to it —“
People like you don’t have breaking points. They have flash points. He backs Prosper into the wall, his good hand on Prosper’s chest. “I didn’t kill Moss and I didn’t kill the other nightbloods,” he hisses. “I never hurt your brother, not if I could help it. Tell me what I need to apologize for and leave out the bullshit.” God, he wishes he had his knives on him.
Prosper carefully removes Murphy’s hand from his chest, but stays backed up to the wall. “When you had the kripa inside of you,” he says, even. “You spoke to Moss in Trigedasleng, told him he was a failure, that nobody would ever love him, that I didn’t — care about him.”
Murphy takes a deep breath. He — kind of remembers some of that. “Okay,” he says, slow. “Well, I don’t believe those things, I don’t think they’re true. So I will apologize to Moss. In the morning, though, yeah? Is that gonna make us even?” Takes a step back, gives Prosper room to breathe.
Prosper straightens himself out. “That will make you and Moss even,” he allows. “You and me — that’s something else.”
That’s fine, honestly. Murphy doesn’t give a shit about what Prosper thinks of him anymore.
“Then go,” he says. “I’ll get Bellamy to translate for me in the morning. I won’t ask you for help again.”
Prosper nods once and gets out. Murphy is pretty sure he falls asleep before his head hits the pillow, but in the morning, he doesn’t remember at all.
—
Murphy finds Moss while Bellamy packs and assembles whatever his ideal roadtrip team is. He brings Octavia with him for translations. He did look for Lincoln, but hadn’t gotten any luck; Octavia had answered tersely when he had asked, so he dropped it. He’s guessing a break-up, or maybe a fight. Hard to keep your relationship going in an underground cave in the middle of winter. Look how it turned out with Emori.
“Heyo, Moss,” he says, lifting a hand in a half-greeting. Moss looks up. He glances to Octavia, back to Murphy, wary. Something kind of shifts in his chest, painful. “I understand that I said some mean things to you, and I want to apologize, but I don’t speak Trig very well, so Octavia’s gonna translate for me, okay?”
Octavia repeats that back to Moss, and Moss looks again to Murphy, nods slowly.
“I don’t think that you’re a failure, or that your brother doesn’t love you, or that you’re a worm.” He’s just deflecting, he has to replace those things with good things that he does think. Come on, Murphy, you like Moss, this shouldn’t be hard. “I think that you’re great, and that your brother is very proud of you, and I don’t think you’re weak. I think you’re very strong, to leave your home where you had lived for your whole life to come to Polis, even though you didn’t want to. I’m — glad that you’re my friend.” Stops. Looks down at his hands. “That’s all.”
He looks away while Octavia translates. Then: Moss’s cool hand on his face, and he suppresses the flinch, turns it into a concealed shudder. Doesn’t want to — offend. Moss says something back, and Octavia waits a beat, then translates to English. “You had a demon in you,” she says. “So I will forgive you. I am glad you are doing better now. I am glad you are free. We are — still friends.”
“Thank you,” says Murphy, relieved, feeling Moss’s hand on his cheek as he speaks, against his jaw. Touches his fingers to the inside of Moss’s wrist, feels that fluttering of a pulse.