"Are you sure about this?" Clarke asks again, biting her lower lip and looking down at Raven, her voice full of doubt.
The mechanic rolls her eyes, letting out a little snort of annoyance.
"Yes I'm sure. For the gazillianth time. If you ask me again I'm just going to have Bellamy do it."
The look of horror and mild jealousy on the blonde's face is worth making the cringe worthy suggestion.
"Okay. All right. Okay." Clarke mutters under her breath, more to herself than to Raven.
She doesn't move though, poised over Raven, sweaty fingers clenched hard around metal and body stiff.
"For shit's sake, Griffin!" Raven grumbles, reaching behind her and pushing at Clarke's shoulder, making as if to get up.
The blonde doesn't budge, blue eyes wide and a bit frightened but also determined.
"You, you're really sure?" She asks again, and there is something different about her voice now. It is quiet with something like wonder, and maybe something like want.
Raven would prefer to be flippant - sarcasm is as natural to her as breathing, especially when she is feeling vulnerable or exposed - but her words come out just a tad hoarse and completely earnest.
"I want this. Okay?"
"And you... you'll go to Bellamy if I don't?" Clarke sounds like the idea physically pains her.
Raven shakes her head, expression solemn even though she is facing away from Clarke.
Maybe a week ago, when she first approached the younger girl about her idea Raven wouldn't have cared about who did this. But after almost seven full days of the blonde agonizing over details Raven would never have thought of, of Clarke shyly joining her in her work space so she could talk things out with the mechanic - 'I want to make sure I'm getting it right, y'know?' - Raven couldn't imagine letting anyone else be involved.
Of course this doesn't mean the last hour of Clarke's false starts haven't been frustrating.
Raven turns her head.
"Look, Princess," the older girl chuckles as Clarke pulls a face at the nickname, "I won't let anyone else do this one. Just... just let me know when you're ready, okay?"
Again Raven makes as if to move, and again Clarke stops her, this time with a gentle hand on the dark haired girl's shoulder.
"This one?" The blonde asks.
"Yeah."
"But you'll let someone else do another?"
Raven hesitates, frowning a little.
Her desire had started out as an impulsive thing - watching some of the delinquints do stupid, ill-thought out shit had been amusing, and joining in the fun was appealing to her. By now no less than a dozen have done it, and the older girl is getting antsy.
"I... it's just a stick and poke, Clarke..." Raven says, mouth quirking ever so slightly in shame.
"Oh." Clarke says, and that one word speaks volumes about disappointment.
"Not this one though. This one is, it's special." Raven wants to reassure her, take away that sad gleam in her eye. "I wouldn't let anyone else near your design."
To be honest, Raven doesn't think anyone else could pull off reproducing the intricate matrix of dots and slashes Clarke had painstakingly created anyway.
When she had first approached Clarke, and the younger girl had asked what she had in mind, Raven had just shrugged and said, 'whatever.' Having none of that, Clarke had badgered the mechanic for a full day about how this would be permenent and should reflect things important to the dark haired girl, and blah blah blah.
Raven had responded that literally everyone else that had done this had chosen the image or words in the moment - which was sort of the point. Shit was real on the ground, there was no guarantee for tomorrow, so why not live it up now?
Clarke had not been amused, only pursing her lips and giving Raven that disapproving look that the mechanic knew she had gotten from her mother. Abby would be proud to know it was as effective on her daughter's face as it was on her own. Which is to say, it made most of The 100 cower, and Raven grin and want to push buttons.
After it was clear that Clarke was set on doing something more personal though, Raven rattled off a bunch of things she happened to like. There was no rhyme or reason to her list, which included things like elephants, zero-g, torque wrenches, combustion engines, the little knife Clarke had made her from a broken piece of the dropship, and windmills.
For some reason, Clarke latched on to windmills, grilling Raven about it until the older girl admitted that, more than their appearance or even the mechanism involved (which was an amazing feat of primitive engineering in Raven's opinion), what had drawn her to them was Cervantes.
"You read Don Quixote?" Clarke had sounded surprised, but also pleased.
Any other time and Raven would have bristled, snapping at such a condescending question. But Clarke had this little excited smile on her face, and so instead Raven had just shrugged, annoyed but not angry.
"They did, in fact, teach us how to read in Mecha Station," she had muttered, crossing her arms over her chest to play up her irritation.
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean... It's just, the only other person I knew who read Don Quixote besides me and my parents was Wells. And he... he did it because I did. He wanted us to have a secret code. We used to talk in quotes whenever... it's, uh, it's a good book."
Clarke had sounded far away then, and so unbelievably sad and lonely that it had broken Raven's heart. Whatever residual bad feelings were between them because of Finn seemed to melt away, if just for the moment.
"He has won the battle with himself, and that according to what he's told me, is the greatest victory anyone could want." Raven had offered, smiling and reaching out to touch Clarke's wrist gently.
They had shared a long look then, something sparking between them. Something like friendship and trust and the promise of one day healing.
Raven hadn't stopped smiling all week.
It's truly a thing of beauty - a reproduction of the scene where the companions face the supposed giants on the field of battle, done in hundreds of dots and small etchmarks.
There are three windmills.
The one at the center of the composition looms huge and clear, ominus and almost titan-like. It is bold and dark and has the most lines, and is about as long as the mechanic's index finger and as wide as half her palm. Two others flank it, each about the size of her thumb, the looser collections of dots making them seem spectral, almost dream like in the perspective distance.
The two men and their mounts are tiny, no bigger than Raven's pinky nail, approaching the three dormant sentries from slightly below and to the left. There is a gentle haze of dots and negative space swirling around the windmills.
Clarke had worked on the design in every spare moment she had - when she wasn't organizing hunting and gathering parties, fighting with Bellamy, making sure everyone was fed and had water and shelter and that their defenses were shored up. Raven felt a little guilty, but the blonde assured her that it was how she relaxed - drawing.
Now they sit, staring at each other.
Well Clarke sits, on the edge of Raven's bed, pressed up against the older girl's back. Raven lies on her side, facing away from her friend, naked from the waist up.
Clarke has the bit of paper (one of the few they have) stretched out across Raven's ribs, holding it down with one hand, her other gripping the needle wrapped in thread. There is a small bowl of dark ink off to the side, made with ash and some sort of plant and other things Raven probably shouldn't think too much about. Clarke has already pricked holes into the paper, as a guide and also so she won't get the pulp in the wounds.
"If I admit to something, will you promise not to use it against me?" Clarke asks, light pink dusting the apples of her cheeks.
"Given our history, that doesn't sound good," Raven drawls, knowing this will have nothing to do with Finn.
The younger girl has been so careful to stay away from him, barely looking at him, and never speaking of him - especially not in Raven's presence.
The blush grows darker, but Clarke doesn't rise to the bait.
"I don't want anyone else doing this for you - to you." Clarke says, making sure to maintain eye contact with Raven, who twists a bit - displacing the paper - in order to see her friend.
Raven is stunned, but not into silence. There is something there they will need to talk about, soon, but for now she deflects.
"You say that, but you don't seem to want to do it either."
Clarke readjusts the paper, lining it up with the landmarks she has chosen to use on Raven's torso (a birthmark and two beauty marks that form a triangle that is just the right size and position to align one corner of the paper to).
"I do, want to. I just need to be sure you want this - to have something of mine on your body forever. That it isn't something you'll end up hating."
That you won't end up hating me again, Raven hears the unspoken thought.
The mechanic shifts back down onto her side, facing away from the blonde again.
"Are we to mark this day with a black or white stone," she says, leaving it up to Clarke and settling into the bed.
She feels Clarke's hand - the one holding the paper - curl slightly, like an involuntary spasm.
"From pro's and con's they fell to a warmer way of disputing?" The younger girl breathes, a hopeful question that caresses Raven's side.
"Let us forget and forgive injuries," Raven allows.
She's not really there yet, but the last week has shown her that she wants to be, and with how uncertain life is on the ground, it is enough for her.
Clarke lets out a breath neither of them knew she was holding, and bends at the waist until she is resting her forehead against Raven's temple. Her face is at an angle, her lips softly pressed to Raven's ear. Raven can feel them tremble as she whispers 'thank you' softly, before pulling away and dipping the needle in the ink.
They don't speak again until Clarke is finished. The piece takes over ten hours to complete, and it is some of the worst pain Raven has ever felt in her life. She lets herself cry silently, and Clarke only stops to occasionally run her fingers through Raven's loose hair or stretch out her cramping hand.
When it's done the intricate mark sits perfectly on the the left side of the mechanic's lower ribcage.
Clarke wipes the area down with cool water and slathers salve on it, helping Raven sit up so she can wrap a bandage around her torso. Raven groans a little but just shakes her head and grins when the blonde looks at her with concern.
The area is puffy and red, and there is blood on Raven's sheets, but there is a lightness in her chest and a smile on her face.
Clarke leaves her briefly to get food, bringing back enough for the two of them and setting it between them on the bed.
They smile at each other, giddy with what they have done.
"Sing away sorrow, cast away care," one of them says - it doesn't matter which because it could be either.
Raven's expression becomes mischiveous.
"You're next, Princess."
She expects Clarke to balk, but instead the blonde nods, face open and earnest.
"I can't wait."
The trust reflected in Clarke's eyes is both humbling and empowering.
Raven is warm, for the first time in a long time, inside and out.