I've said this before, but I genuinely hope you do. I think if anyone can, it's you. [Calm. Solid. Understanding. Clarke doesn't have the way with emotions and empathy that he has, and she can't hit someone's heart with her belief and care the way that Markus can. The way that Bellamy can. That emotional reach is so hard for her to grasp, no matter how hard she tries. Her head betrays her heart all the time, even when she tries to make it seem as if it's some other way.
More than anything, she knows better than to think that people can't change. Can't be brought beyond the brink.]
Bellamy's sister accomplished something like that. In the final hours before we knew that the world would end up being destroyed again, she managed to unite all the warring people. [It's this that acts as a transition. Bringing up Octavia, admiring her—and then choosing to separate.] She did it even though I didn't believe she could. I doubted her, but I know that she can handle it. [Does she? Or is Clarke only saying that? She knows the people are trapped in the bunker, unable to escape.
And that Bellamy is in the same situation.]
The thing is ... Bellamy. Octavia. They got separated from each other and from me. Seeing Bellamy here was kind of a ... relief. That I could see him again.
[Markus isn’t always certain he deserves any kind of praise, nothing that would define him as so able, so assured in his victory. But as always, it’s appreciated, and it’s used to bolster his determination moving forward — tempers the steel in his spine, keeping own self-doubt forever locked in a cage kept in shadow. Such is a leader’s burden; such is what Clarke would understand, too.
But this isn’t about him. He listens about Bellamy, the friend of hers that’s gone missing, one believed to not return to this world. His sister, able to bring people together. Brows cinch.]
Clarke, you said there was more to what you needed to talk about, more than just Bellamy gone from this world. Is it... guilt that he’s gone?
It's what I just said. [It's not like she minds that he doesn't get it. How could he? Grasping her world is a difficult trial, to say the least. Very little of it can make sense without trying to understand that all of the atrocities and flaws of humanity can come to the forefront.]
I was alone. I am alone. When I say that I don't know when I'll see Bellamy again, I mean it. He's in space, leading what people made it up there. And everyone else ... including his sister, including my mother, is in a fallout shelter.
[That makes it clearer. Or she hopes.]
I already lived fifty days without him before I got here. Now I have to begin counting again.
[The clarification makes it obvious, makes it clear just how deep the sense of being alone truly runs. Bellamy's departure must've felt like something permanently swept away from her life. Markus, if he were to return to Detroit, at least had the faces of North, Josh, and — later in his future — Connor to see once more. (Simon, left up on the snowy rooftop, white dotted blue with Thirium. He still wonders at his fate, cold claws of memory raking at his insides.)]
But you wouldn’t wish this place on him again.
[It isn’t even a question. He thinks, that despite a longing to a see a familiar face, Clarke is not so selfish to hope for that much.]
Still, I understand what you mean. It’s hard to think of your time spent together here as an unexpected... blessing, but in a way, it was. [And yet—] But you’re not alone, Clarke. While you’re here, with all of us, you’re never really by yourself. For what that's worth. I know it isn't the same, but it's still true.
The Bellamy that was here doesn't know the future he has ahead of him. But the people who ended up in space with him need him. [They needed his heart, someone to keep them together, to remind them of the life they would be able to return to. Bellamy wouldn't let them give up, whereas Clarke might. She knows the difference there. She can push and make a thing happen, but her resilience has its limits. It's Bellamy who often pulls her through, who strikes the match to keep her fighting.
Without that ...]
If that's where he's returned to? To get on that path? That would be ideal. [For all people involved.]
For me ... I know it sounds like I need to be reminded, but I don't. Being here has given me everything I needed. I'm not—[She cants her head to the side. Clarke has a tendency to wrinkle her chin ever so slightly when she's thoughtful, and she does it here. Her brow matches it, right before she speaks.]
I'm not sure how long it'll take us to crack the mystery of being here, but I don't know if I'll ever be ready to go back. Or if I'll want to. [Clarke knows she openly struggles with absorbing these people as her people. While she's spoken of it as if he's happened with Markus, it always grows difficult.] I don't expect it to be the same for anyone else, but I'm not sure I can live ... survive five years without something like this. [The stress. The motivation. Things to keep fighting for.]
[He finds himself leaning forward with his elbows on the table, as if his nearness would keep him more closely connected to Clarke and all that she’s saying.
He understands, again, the overall gist of her point. That the lack of a goal would leave her wheeling, like a compass that can no longer find north; the consequence of being too defined by a role, or a self-imposed purpose that strong wills are unwilling to stray from.
It’s a sorry kind of truth that Markus can relate to, leader to leader. But there’s still a part of this that makes him feel as if he’s missing pieces of the whole. Context still not completely painted for him.]
Nuclear fallout would take five years, at the minimum, to clear up. [Clarke is the only one who could survive. If she had been able to get into the bunker, it would be different. If any of her messages reached Bellamy, it would be different. Unfortunately, neither of these things seem like they're possible. If there was a chance of bringing a solution from here, maybe—but she has her doubts.
Clarke doesn't want to bank on implementing an impossible solution. She wouldn't even know where to start. How to ask. If they could turn them into Nightbloods, and if it would be fair to bring them down from space. Down from their new lives, all because Clarke is alone.
Especially when she doesn't know if the village—the valley thought of as Eden—would actually save her or anyone else long term.]
I got left behind. I thought I would die. [It makes some of Hei's words on the network to her the other day more cutting. She thought she would die. She would have been all right with that, too.] We needed someone to handle a manual task to help Bellamy and my other friends go into space to live for five years, and I couldn't get back in time to join them. I saw them take off right as the reactors went off and irradiated what remained of the Earth. The only reason I'm still alive is because of the black blood that I have. [A breath.] So. Five years alone. It's a lot, and honestly ... it isn't exactly easy to talk about. It's why Bellamy being gone is—well. It is.
Five years alone, when Markus has only lived ten, it sounds like far too much for one person to handle. Especially in circumstances that have ripped friendships away — necessity or otherwise — leaving Clarke to live in an irradiated atmosphere with the remnants of a poisoned Earth. Left only with the memory of what was, just considering it is debilitating.
It’s hard, imagining a circumstance in which one would not want to return to their homes — Markus’ focus is razor-sharp and laser-pointed, his priority always to find a way back to Detroit and fulfill what’s needed of him, what’s expected of him. With Clarke, he thought it would be the same, but to find out he’s wrong is not disappointing as much as it is… humanizing.
His heart twists in his ribcage.]
It reminds you of what’s to come.
[Idly, he thinks that he should be putting in a wine order, at the very least. But all that seems to have fallen by the wayside, mere dregs in the shadow of her words.]
What do you consider New Amsterdam, then? A prison? An escape? [The pause here is prevalent.] A potential new home?
[There’s nothing to say that they must return, beyond what the heart dictates.]
At first? An escape. A moratorium on what would come. Murphy and Bellamy were here. [Clarke doesn't talk about Murphy much, but that's more indicative of the trouble with their relationship. She thinks of him as a friend. He doesn't think much of her at all. No matter what, he's one of hers: her people, and there's no way to deny it. She doesn't bother to explain who he is now. Markus is understanding enough to know the difference between a best friend and a person from their world.] My people were here, so there was something.
[It was something—somewhere—to direct her energies. Give her purpose. Clarke always has a way of finding purpose for herself, but she knows she would have nothing back home.
The thing is, the longer she's been here, she's known the difference between "at first" and what her perspective became.]
If I go back home, I have no way of knowing I'll survive. I found a patch of life, but how long will it last? It was only fifty days after everything burned away. I'm just one person. Staying here has been an option for me for a while. [Abandoning her people.
Is that what it is?]
It's the only option, Markus. I'd be surprised if I were alone in that thinking.
[And her thoughts have nothing to do with Bellamy or Murphy. They're gone. Unlike Rey early on, she has no blind faith that she can just go somewhere and rescue her friends, bringing them to a nominally better world.
[His response to that is quick but gentle, correcting.]
You likely aren’t. And you don’t have to justify your reasoning to me, Clarke. Your circumstances seem to be different than most here.
[Having no one to return to, barely even knowing if she’d survive long if or when she did. New Amsterdam acted as an isolated island in the universe to most, where they were all stranded upon with no ships to sail outward; but it was naive of him to believe that no one would view it as a reprieve.]
Even so, that’s not true. You always have a choice. If you could return home right now, would you choose to stay here?
[Or would she feel like Markus, ridden with guilt, believing herself to abandon something important if she stayed — even if all that awaits her is loneliness and being rudderless?]
Yes. [No need to pretend otherwise. Others have noticed it, have latched on to it. Clarke wants to give people that choice. She's been open about her world, but it's primarily to show the stark contrast to everyone else's. For people who have suggested this is a dream, or have said similar things—she needs to point out the contrast. The situation. It's less of an issue now versus how it had been when they first arrived, pulled from separate worlds and different situations.]
Are you prepared to leave everyone behind? When this is all over, we'll be as much your people as the ... ones you need to lead there. [The ellipsis marks Clarke slowing down her speech, careful not to say anything related to AI.
She doesn't point out that returning home may not be an option. There's no need.]
Though ... admittedly, things are going better for us here. [Her eyebrows raise and shift with the acknowledgement, the final note.]
Am I prepared? [He echoes the question, and it trails off like a weak thing, because he already knows the answer.]
I won't be prepared to say goodbye. To leave all my friends behind, unable to see anyone ever again. But I don't have a choice; I have to, there's too many people relying on me back home.
[But the choice being made for him doesn't make it any easier. Just the thought alone saddens him, makes him wonder how deeply affected he's been by the people here, and how he can ever detach himself from it.
Idly, while these thoughts churn in his head, Markus makes a wine selection. A Sauvignon Blanc.]
You could come with me, you know. If your world has nothing for you, what does this one have once everyone is gone?
[Maybe it's a fool's errand, a long shot, just wishful thinking. But there's something sincere about that offer, easily spoken.]
[There is a long moment where Clarke doesn't know what to say. It's because she hadn't considered an alternative to staying here or going home. Making those connections had never been a goal of hers, but she knows that it was foolish to pretend otherwise. Her alliances have almost always turned into friendships. Deep connections. People she would fight to protect. Her people. Even as she slips in and out of that, defining it different ways time and time again here.
No matter what, Markus definitely fits that.
And even though he has more than a hint of knowledge of what she's capable of, he offers her this. Risks bringing Wanheda to his world. But if it's anything like this one, Clarke knows she'll struggle to make as big of an impact. That's good.
And he is right. Once everyone is gone—assuming that would be the case?
She would have no one.]
Do you think that's possible? [A basic answer, but the fact that it's all she has to say is proof that the offer hit something deep inside of her.]
[Why leave her here? If she was to lead a normal life, potentially a peaceful life, after being detached from her old world, why would Markus ever feel inclined to leave her alone? He extends generosity to those who need it — he extends it tenfold to those he considers his friends, those he considers his people as much as the ones back home.]
There’s nothing to say that it’s impossible. [They simply don’t know. Who’s to say that they can't return to worlds that aren’t their own? With so little in the way of answers, it may be possible. There’s hope to dole out to Clarke.]
But you’d be welcomed. If you can acclimate to this city, Detroit wouldn’t be an issue at all. But more importantly… you wouldn’t be alone.
No. I wouldn't be, would I? [It'shard to explain, exactly, what this means to her. What it means to have somewhere to go, to have a friend that she can rely on. It's why she reached out to Markus in the first place, and why she thinks so highly of him. He may not buy into everything that everyone else sees in him, but that doesn't matter. It would be strange if he did, anyway.]
If it turns out I can, I'll definitely be open to it.
[The issue is that he believes Clarke can be at peace. Even she isn't certain that she can.]
[He'll allow himself some optimism, that stringent spark of hope, so she can find such peace. To let it nestle and grow; or at least give it a chance to.
He might not be the same as a face from her own world, he might not be able to truly relate to her circumstances, being so departed from them. But a friend is a friend is a friend -- Clarke is one of his closest, and he only wants to see those around him happy. It's simple, really.]
Well, you'll have plenty of time to think about it. But the offer will continue to stand, no matter how long it takes for us to unearth all the answers we need.
[He leans back in his seat, smile gone lopsided.]
You'd be able to eat real meat without having to empty your bank account, too. Detroit isn't perfect even on a good day, but I think there'd be a multitude of things about 2038 that you'd like.
You know, before Praimfaya hit ... [Although the word isn't translated—Clarke doesn't speak Trigedasleng enough for it to be translated, not yet—it sounds exactly like how one might expect: "prime fire," with a little more emphasis on the R in the fire sounding like a Y. She doesn't think twice about using it, about speaking it. Referring to it as she's come to think of it comes naturally in Markus' presence.] ... before then, when we all hit the ground in the first place, we used to hunt for meat. I got pretty good at it.
[Smoking was never her strong suit. She could do it when needed, but coming to rely on Niylah had made her life easier. Her struggles on her own were comical at first.]
I miss having that option. I don't know that I'd take it up again, but meat stands alone pretty well.
[Says a teenager sent to earth wildly ill-prepared by "Earth Skills" classes.]
[An impressive skillset to have, though Markus considers that of everything that he cannot do. It further illustrates just how well-rounded they are as a group; the potential of so much between them.]
It sounds like hard work, and probably not easily learned. The most ‘hunting’ I ever did was trying to weave through busy crowds at the grocery stores before a big holiday hit.
[She opens her mouth to speak, and since the conversation seems less intense, less like one of them (Clarke, it's Clarke) is about to cry, their server comes over and takes their drink order. It's obvious from Clarke's expression that she hasn't bothered to read her menu. Honestly, she wanted Markus' company more than she wanted food, so the pairing part of it has gone out the window. It just—it seemed like a thing. A thing to enjoy.]
Praimfaya ... It's a word in Trigedasleng, which is the language of the people on the ground. [Of the tree people, in theory, but she knows that every nation speaks it. Clarke has learned a lot of their history, but never as much as she'd like. If she had been given more time with the Flame, she'd know. But that's neither here nor there.]
My ground. The ones who somehow survived the apocalypse. It means the first flame, the point when rebirth happened. There's a chance it's connected to a cult that believed that people would rise from the ashes. [This is a time when she wishes she had spoken to Jaha about it more in theory than in terms of trying to find a solution. Maybe if she'd been in the bunker with him. Maybe.]
Somehow it's come to refer to the act of the planet burning itself. It feels more encompassing than, well. "Nuclear reactors broke down."
[The wine is definitely meant to be enjoyed, and eventually they’ll have to decide on the food, too — but regardless, he’s of the same mind of Clarke. It’s the company that matters. His ability to provide support when needed, an ear that’ll listen, a friend to be near.
Her explanation only feeds further into the imagery he has of her world, some harsh apocalyptic reality that he’s sorry she has to live through. The planet burning itself. Nuclear reactors failing and setting the world alight.]
How was everyone able to adapt once a disaster like that happened? That would be… an impossible amount of radiation sweeping over the planet, wouldn’t it?
[That's because there is no real way to view her world in a more pleasant light. It's all that and more. People at war. People believing that because they were lucky enough to have certain abilities (skills, not powers), they should be allowed to succeed. (Clarke had been talked into that once, believing that it was also better to save some people than all people. She would never do that again.)
She shakes her head.]
The first time? I don't have the whole picture, but Becca—she was ALIE's ... ["Creator." As much as Clarke knows their conversation would be strange to overhear, talk of AI would be even worse in a place like this. Plus, it's Markus' work. She doesn't finish the thought. She's certain he can piece it together.]
She wanted to make up for what she did. The Flame I described to you and Connor before—it was originally meant to sync up with the Ark where I grew up. That didn't happen as planned, so she went down to the ground with it and some additional technology that she had developed. Blood that could withstand radiation. Black blood.
[Which she has mentioned before, and might again. Her golden ticket to another Insomniac's Ball.]
This blood changed people permanently, and it eventually became a recessive gene, passed on. And thus, so did the Flame. [And for those who didn't have the blood itself, they were still changed, albeit to a lesser extent.]
[Black blood. A subject that’s come up more than once, even applied to her. Markus, in his limited knowledge, had surmised that it might have been a mutation prevalent in her world, something twisted into the genetic code by way of impossible radiation — her explanation is not too far off the mark, though more dependent upon technology, if he’s understanding correctly, than being warped by the environment itself.]
The same blood you mentioned that runs through your own veins. Even now?
[Untouched, unmarred, by their arrival to New Amsterdam? Where some harbored complete changes, some were more unfortunate than the rest.]
It does. I got it through different means, though. [Yet another case where Clarke has to conceal the whole story. For as much as she's told Markus about her life before, the fine details slip through the cracks. What if she had told him that? Told any of them that? What would they think?
She can just recall Connor's approach to Jason, and how much she's aware that she may be the most dangerous of them all. If pushed, Clarke knows the full extent of what she's capable of on any given day.]
We tested a solution involving it. I say "we," as if I had any involvement in it. We eventually realized that bone marrow was the key. [It always is in her world.] Anyway, we needed a live subject. I needed a live subject.
[Clarke is good at that, introducing general ideas or wide tracts of information where the details might not shine through. Where they become lost in the general weave of the tapestry itself, and Markus is pulled along with the narrative at the pace in which she dictates.
But it doesn’t always quell his curiosity. The occasional question that seeks out those same particulars rise to the surface, and he has no reason to not ask them.]
And what happened?
[A “live subject”, a phrase that never really implies anything pleasant.]
Is this solution the reason why your blood changed, or something else?
[Point of clarification. Slow down. Clear it up. She nods, realizing that she has to do it so that he understands.]
We called it the Nightblood solution. There was only one known one left in the world, so we worked with her to figure out the best means to make the serum. It was clear that we needed a zero gravity environment to do it, so we had to try other resorts. The Nightblood would allow us to survive the radiation outside, though once I injected myself, my mom wouldn't ... she didn't accept my choice, and she destroyed our testing equipment.
[Clarke wouldn't have survived that particular scenario, however. It needed to be radiation over a longer period of time.]
I did what I needed to for my people. [A thing she believes Markus may understand too well.]
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More than anything, she knows better than to think that people can't change. Can't be brought beyond the brink.]
Bellamy's sister accomplished something like that. In the final hours before we knew that the world would end up being destroyed again, she managed to unite all the warring people. [It's this that acts as a transition. Bringing up Octavia, admiring her—and then choosing to separate.] She did it even though I didn't believe she could. I doubted her, but I know that she can handle it. [Does she? Or is Clarke only saying that? She knows the people are trapped in the bunker, unable to escape.
And that Bellamy is in the same situation.]
The thing is ... Bellamy. Octavia. They got separated from each other and from me. Seeing Bellamy here was kind of a ... relief. That I could see him again.
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But this isn’t about him. He listens about Bellamy, the friend of hers that’s gone missing, one believed to not return to this world. His sister, able to bring people together. Brows cinch.]
Clarke, you said there was more to what you needed to talk about, more than just Bellamy gone from this world. Is it... guilt that he’s gone?
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I was alone. I am alone. When I say that I don't know when I'll see Bellamy again, I mean it. He's in space, leading what people made it up there. And everyone else ... including his sister, including my mother, is in a fallout shelter.
[That makes it clearer. Or she hopes.]
I already lived fifty days without him before I got here. Now I have to begin counting again.
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But you wouldn’t wish this place on him again.
[It isn’t even a question. He thinks, that despite a longing to a see a familiar face, Clarke is not so selfish to hope for that much.]
Still, I understand what you mean. It’s hard to think of your time spent together here as an unexpected... blessing, but in a way, it was. [And yet—] But you’re not alone, Clarke. While you’re here, with all of us, you’re never really by yourself. For what that's worth. I know it isn't the same, but it's still true.
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Without that ...]
If that's where he's returned to? To get on that path? That would be ideal. [For all people involved.]
For me ... I know it sounds like I need to be reminded, but I don't. Being here has given me everything I needed. I'm not—[She cants her head to the side. Clarke has a tendency to wrinkle her chin ever so slightly when she's thoughtful, and she does it here. Her brow matches it, right before she speaks.]
I'm not sure how long it'll take us to crack the mystery of being here, but I don't know if I'll ever be ready to go back. Or if I'll want to. [Clarke knows she openly struggles with absorbing these people as her people. While she's spoken of it as if he's happened with Markus, it always grows difficult.] I don't expect it to be the same for anyone else, but I'm not sure I can live ... survive five years without something like this. [The stress. The motivation. Things to keep fighting for.]
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He understands, again, the overall gist of her point. That the lack of a goal would leave her wheeling, like a compass that can no longer find north; the consequence of being too defined by a role, or a self-imposed purpose that strong wills are unwilling to stray from.
It’s a sorry kind of truth that Markus can relate to, leader to leader. But there’s still a part of this that makes him feel as if he’s missing pieces of the whole. Context still not completely painted for him.]
Five years?
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Clarke doesn't want to bank on implementing an impossible solution. She wouldn't even know where to start. How to ask. If they could turn them into Nightbloods, and if it would be fair to bring them down from space. Down from their new lives, all because Clarke is alone.
Especially when she doesn't know if the village—the valley thought of as Eden—would actually save her or anyone else long term.]
I got left behind. I thought I would die. [It makes some of Hei's words on the network to her the other day more cutting. She thought she would die. She would have been all right with that, too.] We needed someone to handle a manual task to help Bellamy and my other friends go into space to live for five years, and I couldn't get back in time to join them. I saw them take off right as the reactors went off and irradiated what remained of the Earth. The only reason I'm still alive is because of the black blood that I have. [A breath.] So. Five years alone. It's a lot, and honestly ... it isn't exactly easy to talk about. It's why Bellamy being gone is—well. It is.
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Five years alone, when Markus has only lived ten, it sounds like far too much for one person to handle. Especially in circumstances that have ripped friendships away — necessity or otherwise — leaving Clarke to live in an irradiated atmosphere with the remnants of a poisoned Earth. Left only with the memory of what was, just considering it is debilitating.
It’s hard, imagining a circumstance in which one would not want to return to their homes — Markus’ focus is razor-sharp and laser-pointed, his priority always to find a way back to Detroit and fulfill what’s needed of him, what’s expected of him. With Clarke, he thought it would be the same, but to find out he’s wrong is not disappointing as much as it is… humanizing.
His heart twists in his ribcage.]
It reminds you of what’s to come.
[Idly, he thinks that he should be putting in a wine order, at the very least. But all that seems to have fallen by the wayside, mere dregs in the shadow of her words.]
What do you consider New Amsterdam, then? A prison? An escape? [The pause here is prevalent.] A potential new home?
[There’s nothing to say that they must return, beyond what the heart dictates.]
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[It was something—somewhere—to direct her energies. Give her purpose. Clarke always has a way of finding purpose for herself, but she knows she would have nothing back home.
The thing is, the longer she's been here, she's known the difference between "at first" and what her perspective became.]
If I go back home, I have no way of knowing I'll survive. I found a patch of life, but how long will it last? It was only fifty days after everything burned away. I'm just one person. Staying here has been an option for me for a while. [Abandoning her people.
Is that what it is?]
It's the only option, Markus. I'd be surprised if I were alone in that thinking.
[And her thoughts have nothing to do with Bellamy or Murphy. They're gone. Unlike Rey early on, she has no blind faith that she can just go somewhere and rescue her friends, bringing them to a nominally better world.
They're gone. And she's here, alone.
But at least she isn't really alone.]
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You likely aren’t. And you don’t have to justify your reasoning to me, Clarke. Your circumstances seem to be different than most here.
[Having no one to return to, barely even knowing if she’d survive long if or when she did. New Amsterdam acted as an isolated island in the universe to most, where they were all stranded upon with no ships to sail outward; but it was naive of him to believe that no one would view it as a reprieve.]
Even so, that’s not true. You always have a choice. If you could return home right now, would you choose to stay here?
[Or would she feel like Markus, ridden with guilt, believing herself to abandon something important if she stayed — even if all that awaits her is loneliness and being rudderless?]
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Are you prepared to leave everyone behind? When this is all over, we'll be as much your people as the ... ones you need to lead there. [The ellipsis marks Clarke slowing down her speech, careful not to say anything related to AI.
She doesn't point out that returning home may not be an option. There's no need.]
Though ... admittedly, things are going better for us here. [Her eyebrows raise and shift with the acknowledgement, the final note.]
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I won't be prepared to say goodbye. To leave all my friends behind, unable to see anyone ever again. But I don't have a choice; I have to, there's too many people relying on me back home.
[But the choice being made for him doesn't make it any easier. Just the thought alone saddens him, makes him wonder how deeply affected he's been by the people here, and how he can ever detach himself from it.
Idly, while these thoughts churn in his head, Markus makes a wine selection. A Sauvignon Blanc.]
You could come with me, you know. If your world has nothing for you, what does this one have once everyone is gone?
[Maybe it's a fool's errand, a long shot, just wishful thinking. But there's something sincere about that offer, easily spoken.]
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No matter what, Markus definitely fits that.
And even though he has more than a hint of knowledge of what she's capable of, he offers her this. Risks bringing Wanheda to his world. But if it's anything like this one, Clarke knows she'll struggle to make as big of an impact. That's good.
And he is right. Once everyone is gone—assuming that would be the case?
She would have no one.]
Do you think that's possible? [A basic answer, but the fact that it's all she has to say is proof that the offer hit something deep inside of her.]
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There’s nothing to say that it’s impossible. [They simply don’t know. Who’s to say that they can't return to worlds that aren’t their own? With so little in the way of answers, it may be possible. There’s hope to dole out to Clarke.]
But you’d be welcomed. If you can acclimate to this city, Detroit wouldn’t be an issue at all. But more importantly… you wouldn’t be alone.
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If it turns out I can, I'll definitely be open to it.
[The issue is that he believes Clarke can be at peace. Even she isn't certain that she can.]
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He might not be the same as a face from her own world, he might not be able to truly relate to her circumstances, being so departed from them. But a friend is a friend is a friend -- Clarke is one of his closest, and he only wants to see those around him happy. It's simple, really.]
Well, you'll have plenty of time to think about it. But the offer will continue to stand, no matter how long it takes for us to unearth all the answers we need.
[He leans back in his seat, smile gone lopsided.]
You'd be able to eat real meat without having to empty your bank account, too. Detroit isn't perfect even on a good day, but I think there'd be a multitude of things about 2038 that you'd like.
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[Smoking was never her strong suit. She could do it when needed, but coming to rely on Niylah had made her life easier. Her struggles on her own were comical at first.]
I miss having that option. I don't know that I'd take it up again, but meat stands alone pretty well.
[Says a teenager sent to earth wildly ill-prepared by "Earth Skills" classes.]
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It sounds like hard work, and probably not easily learned. The most ‘hunting’ I ever did was trying to weave through busy crowds at the grocery stores before a big holiday hit.
[A light joke, though nonetheless true.]
What’s “Praimfaya” refer to?
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Praimfaya ... It's a word in Trigedasleng, which is the language of the people on the ground. [Of the tree people, in theory, but she knows that every nation speaks it. Clarke has learned a lot of their history, but never as much as she'd like. If she had been given more time with the Flame, she'd know. But that's neither here nor there.]
My ground. The ones who somehow survived the apocalypse. It means the first flame, the point when rebirth happened. There's a chance it's connected to a cult that believed that people would rise from the ashes. [This is a time when she wishes she had spoken to Jaha about it more in theory than in terms of trying to find a solution. Maybe if she'd been in the bunker with him. Maybe.]
Somehow it's come to refer to the act of the planet burning itself. It feels more encompassing than, well. "Nuclear reactors broke down."
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Her explanation only feeds further into the imagery he has of her world, some harsh apocalyptic reality that he’s sorry she has to live through. The planet burning itself. Nuclear reactors failing and setting the world alight.]
How was everyone able to adapt once a disaster like that happened? That would be… an impossible amount of radiation sweeping over the planet, wouldn’t it?
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She shakes her head.]
The first time? I don't have the whole picture, but Becca—she was ALIE's ... ["Creator." As much as Clarke knows their conversation would be strange to overhear, talk of AI would be even worse in a place like this. Plus, it's Markus' work. She doesn't finish the thought. She's certain he can piece it together.]
She wanted to make up for what she did. The Flame I described to you and Connor before—it was originally meant to sync up with the Ark where I grew up. That didn't happen as planned, so she went down to the ground with it and some additional technology that she had developed. Blood that could withstand radiation. Black blood.
[Which she has mentioned before, and might again. Her golden ticket to another Insomniac's Ball.]
This blood changed people permanently, and it eventually became a recessive gene, passed on. And thus, so did the Flame. [And for those who didn't have the blood itself, they were still changed, albeit to a lesser extent.]
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The same blood you mentioned that runs through your own veins. Even now?
[Untouched, unmarred, by their arrival to New Amsterdam? Where some harbored complete changes, some were more unfortunate than the rest.]
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She can just recall Connor's approach to Jason, and how much she's aware that she may be the most dangerous of them all. If pushed, Clarke knows the full extent of what she's capable of on any given day.]
We tested a solution involving it. I say "we," as if I had any involvement in it. We eventually realized that bone marrow was the key. [It always is in her world.] Anyway, we needed a live subject. I needed a live subject.
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But it doesn’t always quell his curiosity. The occasional question that seeks out those same particulars rise to the surface, and he has no reason to not ask them.]
And what happened?
[A “live subject”, a phrase that never really implies anything pleasant.]
Is this solution the reason why your blood changed, or something else?
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We called it the Nightblood solution. There was only one known one left in the world, so we worked with her to figure out the best means to make the serum. It was clear that we needed a zero gravity environment to do it, so we had to try other resorts. The Nightblood would allow us to survive the radiation outside, though once I injected myself, my mom wouldn't ... she didn't accept my choice, and she destroyed our testing equipment.
[Clarke wouldn't have survived that particular scenario, however. It needed to be radiation over a longer period of time.]
I did what I needed to for my people. [A thing she believes Markus may understand too well.]
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