All across the globe, man and beast alike were reacting to the activation of technologies that had not been active for millennia, technologies that were meant to shape the earth and sky and sea, and the lives of all that lived within them in turn.
Deep in what had once been South America and Sri Lanka, within the jungles that had survived the nuclear fires by dint of holding no value for destruction, monkeys had shrieked and chittered as temples -ones that had been forgotten to everyone but they and those that studied them for centuries even before the Final War- crumbled away to reveal spires and pillars. Spires and pillars that rose high into the sky and began to disperse a white a shimmering, glittering white mist that was carried farther and wider than any natural fog could ever dream of.
In the heart of what had once been called the Sahara, where the sand had glassed in great swathes from saturation bombardments and the scorpions and lizards that eked out an existence amongst the ruins were the only witnesses to behold it, the rolling waves of fine sand split apart and flowed like rivers. Vast obelisks of dark stone that seemed to drink in the sun’s light, etched with symbols that were ancient when the first pyramid was young, thrust upwards into the sun-baked sky. They vibrated like tuning forks, a low, resonant tone that traveled through the bedrock for hundreds of miles, and hundreds off tiny well-springs sprouted suddenly from the ground as they began to expel a thick, dense fog. Shielding those fragile oasis from the sun’s searing heat, shielding the small hope they represented.
In the deep, dark waters of what had once been the vast and untameable Pacific, where coral reefs had been bleached to skeletons and the leviathans of the deep had long since fallen silent in their migrations, vast structures stirred upon the seafloor. Domes of that same dark stone, each of them encrusted with millennia of barnacles and silt, cracked open like flowers. From within them poured forth swarms of smaller devices, each no larger than a man’s fist, that swam outward with purpose. Their task: to consume all within the ocean that caused the death of life, before reseeding that self-same life back into Earth’s waters.
From beneath the titanic ice in the deepest parts of Antarctica, great shafts opened up from the heart of the Earth itself, shafts that disgorged their own contents. Rockets, no larger than a human torso, soared high and far before detonating, quelling vast storms and stabilizing the atmosphere by force until such a time that the world was healed.
And on it went, in locations scattered across the wounded face of mankind’s cradle. In the high, ragged peaks of what had once been the Himalayas, where the snow had turned grey with century-old fallout. In the swamps that had grown over the bones of New Orleans, where the alligators had given way to far stranger things, mutated and unpleasant and always hungry. In the highlands of what had once been Scotland, where the heather still bloomed defiantly between blasted craters. In the deserts of what had once been Australia, where beasts famous world-wide for their disturbing and deadly nature had become the stuff of nightmares.
Thirty-two locations, thirty-two ancient sentinels, all stirring back to life at the command of a young woman who had only just begun to understand the weight of what she had inherited. They had waited, untouched by time in the way that only machines built with the technology of a race that mankind had once seen as gods could be, to fulfill their purpose. Waited to rebuild the world in the wake of a cataclysm, as they had time and again in the forgotten past, but now their wait was over.
Now, at last, they would do their work. Now, at last, the world would begin to heal in earnest, rather than at the painfully slow crawl that nature alone could manage.
It wouldn’t be an instant process, of course. It might not even be quick one, by human reckoning. Even the technology of the Isu had limits, and the damage that had been done to Earth was not insignificant. It would take months for the first true changes to be felt, years for them to be measured, and likely decades before the full restoration was complete. But it would happen. The course had been set, the engines of restoration had been turned, and nothing short of catastrophic interference would stop them now.
And there was no one still alive that could perform such interference. The denizens of Mount Weather lacked the knowledge and the means, even if they could ‘see’ the power sources with what few satellites or other information-gathering apparatus they still possessed. The Clans of the Coalition, and what other pockets of humanity still survived across the rest of the globe, lacked the ability to even be aware that something was happening, never mind do anything about it. No sword or axe, no matter how well-forged, could destroy that which the Isu had built. The Ark? They had the knowledge, and the means, but were trapped in orbit. Thousands of miles away and helpless to do anything even if they had wished to.
So it was that, for the first time in longer than recorded history, the Earth itself exhaled. Not metaphorically, not poetically, but in a very real and measurable way that those few capable of measuring such things would soon notice. The atmospheric pressure shifted, even if only slightly for the moment. The jet streams, which had been chaotic and unpredictable for a century, began to find their old patterns again. The radiation that had saturated the upper atmosphere, slowly bleeding back down to make life on the surface so very difficult, began -ever so slowly, by steady increments rather than leaps and bounds- to dissipate.
The world was stirring from its scarred, bloodied slumber.
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Dante Wallace liked to think of himself as a pretty steady man, and one that knew how to handle the curveballs that life seemed to delight in throwing at him. Curveballs that had certainly been growing rapidly in number and frequency for the last few months, and God knew that it was probably only going to get worse if members of PROJECT: ARK were still alive and coming down to Earth, but he rather thought that this took the cake.
This being the sole survivor of the expeditionary team that was sent to retrieve the two ARK inhabitants before the outsiders could find them, Siobhan Myukulak -the mother of one of his assistants, young Keenan, he recalled. Lovely girl, cheerful and friendly, if a touch scatter-brained at times- who was sitting in front of him, finally cleared sufficiently by the infirmary to leave isolation and debrief with him personally.
“Now, Siobhan, let me first say that I, that we,” he gestured around to the room, to the other members of his leadership team, all seated along the long table of a conference room that had once been meant for the Joint Chiefs. “Are very glad to see that you not only survived the savage attack, but are in good health. Allow me also to express my extreme regret for the lost of your fellows in that same attack.”
“Thank you, Mister President.” Siobhan murmured, her voice steady despite the obvious exhaustion that lined her face and the faint tremor in her hands as she folded them in her lap. She’d been thoroughly debriefed by his medical team and, more discreetly, by his intelligence people, but this was the first time she’d been brought before him directly. He’d made certain to wait until she was ready, both physically and mentally, because what she had to tell him was almost certainly going to require her full attention and presence of mind.
And his, for that matter.
Besides, he wasn’t a cruel man, only one willing to make hard decisions when he had to…and in regards to letting her be properly examined and have some time with her family before the meeting, he didn’t have to make a hard decision.
“Of course, of course.” Dante waved a hand dismissively, though his expression remained intent rather than being as relaxed or indulgent as the rest of his body language would imply. “Now, I’ve been told the broad strokes of what happened, and read the write ups that the nurses made while they were chatting with you, but I’d like to hear it from you directly. In your own words, in your own time. Take us through it, from the moment you arrived at the airport to the moment you returned home. Don’t leave anything out, no matter how small or insignificant it might seem.”
Siobhan took a slow, steadying breath, her eyes flicking briefly to the other members of his leadership team before opening her mouth and starting to speak.
“Yes, Mr. President. There weren’t any issues driving over, outside of some trees fallen across the roads that we had to move out of the way quickly, but that didn’t slow us down for more than a few minutes. We replaced a few camera blinds and set up some new ones as well, Emerson suggested it before we left and gave us the equipment for it.” she explained, and Dante resisted the urge to raise an eyebrow at her while he made a mental note to chastise the man for it. And his son, who had doubtlessly passed along that particular ‘brain wave’. Neither of them thinking about the fact that any delay could prove significant or, as in this case, nothing short of devastating. “When we arrived at the ARK landing craft, we found a drop pod, one originally designed for one person from the looks of it, but jury-rigged to hold two. We found some storage bins as well, empty, and some stripped down branches. We weren’t sure why until we found the people from the pod. One of them had a sprained leg, they used branches to make a make-shift splint.”
She paused to take a drink of water, leaving him a moment to consider what she had said so far. Nothing was particularly surprising, even the issue with the cameras, thanks to the reports he’d already read and received. What was a bit more interesting, perhaps, was the clear and obvious admiration in her voice for the ability of those that had come down. Not surprising, of course, even under these circumstances. The ARK and its people might not be as directly the heirs to Earth as his own were, but they’d still survived a century in space, and had clearly maintained their mechanical and technological prowess in all that time.
He could use those sorts of people. Not only to help maintain the mountain fortress his people called home, but quite frankly to bring some fresh blood into the gene pool.
“We spread out to look for them, one team guessed that they would have headed for the nearby airport terminal for shelter, and ended up finding evidence that they’d entered through an old emergency exit. Before we could all meet back up and get inside, however, the tribals arrived and attacked. Ryan Masterson went in to find them, which he did, in the old ATC tower.”
“Two young women, correct? A ‘Raven’ and an ‘Octavia’?” he asked a question that he already knew the answer to, and she nodded in confirmation, blushing faintly. He knew why, she’d reported that the girls had been both naked and covered in marks that indicated that they’d recently had…quite the passionate encounter with one another. Whether they’d been lovers already or had been feeling particularly celebratory after surviving to make landfall, he didn’t care to guess, but he’d make note of the potential leverage all the same.
“Yes, sir. They were…disoriented, probably because they were barely awake when we found them, and obviously frightened, but they came with us willingly enough once Masterson explained who we were and that we were there to help them. We got them moving back towards the trucks, I was able to talk with them a little.” she shook her head, an expression of mingled awe and disbelief crossing her face. “They asked me about the first person to come down. I tried to figure out a gentle way to tell them she was probably dead, but Octavia…she just shut me down. She said that Clarke was the best of them all, that if the crash didn’t kill her outright, she was still alive. I didn’t really believe her…”
She shook her head again.
“We’d just barely reached the trucks when the tribals attacked. The military escort tried to fight them, but…it was hopeless sir. It only took a couple of minutes at most before they were all dead and we were captured.”
“I see. And the leader of these tribals, this ‘Lexa’ that you mentioned in your preliminary report?”
Siobhan’s hands tightened slightly in her lap, and she took another sip of water before continuing, clearly gathering herself. Dante didn’t push her, simply waited with the patience of a man who had long ago learned that information given freely and completely was always more valuable than information extracted under pressure.
“She arrived after the fighting was over, sir. On horseback, with what looked like more warriors as reinforcements, though by then they weren’t needed. She…she knew the girls’ names, sir. Knew them before they’d said a single word. She knew exactly who they were, just based on descriptions from Clarke, who according to her has been a personal guest ever since she landed, and has been sharing stories of the Ark and everyone on it since.”
A ripple went through the room at that, quiet but impossible to miss. Cage Wallace, seated to his father’s right, leaned forward slightly with a sharp glint in his eye. Doctor Tsing, on the other side, frowned thoughtfully and made a quick note on her tablet. Emerson, standing by the door as he so often did rather than sitting at the table proper, shifted his weight from one foot to the other, his jaw tightening visibly. Dante himself simply folded his hands atop the table and waited, his expression carefully calm, even as his mind raced through the implications.
That the first ARK arrival had survived was, in and of itself, surprising. And significant. The fact that she had not only managed to survive, but ingratiate herself with the leader of the tribals to the point that she was a ‘personal guest’ of their leader, was frankly impressive.
The fact that that self-same leader had personally ridden out with a large force to retrieve two more Ark arrivals, fighting his own men to accomplish it? That spoke of some manner of relationship.
“Please continue, Siobhan.” he invited quietly, silencing the room, after a moment, and she bobbed her head an submission.
“Yes, sir. So Lexa, she...she was very calm. Very collected. She spoke to the girls almost gently, in a way I didn’t expect. Like she was reassuring them that she wasn’t a threat. And then there was an interruption, and Clarke arrived. On a beast of a black horse, with two enormous wolves alongside. Wolves the size of small ponies, sir, I swear to you that I’m not exaggerating.”
“Wolves.” Cage repeated flatly, and Siobhan nodded firmly.
“Yes, sir. They were obedient, completely, and seemed to be extremely well-trained. She gave them a command and they sat to guard. As for Clarke herself, she was…very comfortable amongst the tribals, and was equally comfortable giving them orders, sir. And they listened. Even when she told them to load up the dead so that their families could say good-bye and give them proper burials.” the RN confirmed, a tenor of approval and appreciation and something else lurking in her voice. Something like wonder, perhaps, and Dante wondered at it even as she gave a small, slight shrug. “Other than that, sir, she thanked me for being there for her friends, told me that she wouldn’t question me, and gave me a message for the President.”
Dante’s brows rose slightly, an expression of genuine, if measured, interest crossing his features. This hadn’t been mentioned in her earlier reports, and he had to imagine that it’s absence was deliberate. Curious.
“And what was that message, Siobhan?” he asked, making a permissive gesture with one hand.
Siobhan straightened in her chair, taking a deep breath as if to gather herself for what she was about to say, a hint of nervousness in her bearing. When she spoke, her voice was clear and steady, the words obviously committed carefully to memory. She’d probably spent the entire drive back repeating them to herself to make sure that she was able to repeat them to him perfectly.
“She said, and I’m quoting her directly, sir: ‘This is his freebie, since he didn’t know I’m here and he tried to make sure my girls were safe and healthy, so I owe him. Tell him that the Ark is mine, it’s people are mine, and I’m not going to let them come to harm. If he wants to talk, I’ll do it happily, but if he tries to take any more of my people, I’ll burn that Mountain to the ground around his ears.’ End quote, sir.”
The silence that followed was profound, the sort of silence that came not from nothing being said, but from too much being thought all at once. Dante leaned back slowly in his chair, his fingers steepling before his face as he regarded the woman across the table with eyes that had gone distant with thought. The rest of the room held its collective breath, waiting for him to break the silence first, because that was the way these things were done. The President spoke first, the President set the tone, and everyone else followed along as respectfully as possible.
It was Cage who broke that particular protocol, however, his voice sharp and incredulous as he leaned forward.
“She threatened us? This little girl, who’s been on the ground for what, a few weeks? Threatened to burn down the Mountain?” he scoffed, shaking his head and looking very much like he’d like to spit in contempt. “Father, this is absurd. She’s posturing, trying to sound important and dangerous for her savage friends.”
Dante didn’t respond immediately. He simply turned his head slightly, just enough to regard his son with a measured, patient expression that nonetheless carried the weight of decades of leadership. Cage, to his credit, seemed to sense the rebuke even before it was delivered, and his mouth closed with an audible click as he sat back in his chair, jaw working silently.
“Cage.” Dante said quietly, almost gently, but with that same quiet weight beneath the words. “When a young woman who has, by your own assessment, been on the ground for ‘a few weeks’ has managed in that time to position herself as a personal guest, well-regarded and able to give orders, of the tribals’ leader, she’s not just a little girl. She’s a capable young woman that understands technology in a way that the tribals don’t. I wouldn’t dismiss her quite so quickly.”
He looked around the room, taking in all of the expressions.
“I want a status report from all sections, and I want every bit of monitoring at our disposal watched around the clock. If she’s claiming that she’s willing to talk, I don’t believe she’ll help the tribals break through our defenses, but I’m not willing to risk our security on that assumption. Otherwise, you’re all dismissed while I consider what to do next.”
The leadership team rose with various degrees of haste, gathering tablets and folders and murmuring quiet acknowledgements as they filed out. Doctor Tsing lingered for a moment, her eyes flicking between each of them with calculating eyes, before she too departed. Emerson held the door for the last of them, then closed it firmly behind him as he himself stepped out with Siobhan, leaving Dante alone with his son.
Cage, quite predictably, hadn’t moved so much as an inch at his dismissal.
“Father—“
“Cage.” Dante didn’t raise his voice, only sighed softly. “I said you’re all dismissed. When I want your opinion on the situation, I will consult with you, just as I will with Emerson and the others. But for the time being, go.”
He went. Unhappily, shoving himself to his feet and stomping towards the door with all the attitude that he’d displayed as a child, and Dante rubbed his face with his hands as the door slammed behind his son. Feathers would have to be smoothed once again, no doubt, with his heir, but for all the Cage was chomping at the bit to take over the Presidency, he still had a lot to learn about leadership.
Such as not dismissing information that didn’t suit him out of hand, and ignoring potential avenues of benefit because of it.
“So, Clarke Griffin…just how much of your ancestor’s descendant are you, I wonder? Will the tribals convince you to kill us all, or will you hold strong to your offer of diplomacy?” he mused to the emptiness of the room, wondering what the girl would say if she heard his words, before sighing and pushing himself to his feet. He had work to do, contemplations and considerations to make, and contingencies to sketch out.
For his people, any and every option had to be on the table. That was the promise he’d made, the oath he’d sworn, and he had no intention of forsaking it now.
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What the girl in question would have said was a mystery, even to herself, because she was not in this moment sparing a single thought for the Mountain or anyone in it. There could be any number of perfectly good reasons for that, given all that had happened in the last few days of her life, but only one of those reasons was valid in this moment.
She was preparing to have a very frank conversation with the young woman whom she had found herself falling in love with since they’d met. The fierce, protective, sensuous and wise Lexa. The young woman who had lied to protect her, been honest when she could, welcomed her with open arms and helped her every step of the way while making sure to respect her independence and desires as much as circumstances allowed. The young woman who had, despite every reason in the world to be guarded and political and calculating, had let Clarke see her. The real her. The one beneath the crown and the title and the expectations that came with being Heda.
No, not even let. Deliberately shown. Made every effort to show it clearly.
Made ever effort to make Clarke feel so close, so comfortable, so fondly of and with her that the revelation that they knew her identity had -once the initial sting had faded and explanations had been given- left her feeling relieved.
Because now she didn’t need to hide anything from Lexa either. Now they could speak with one another, honestly and without any sort of careful wordplay, about what they were…and what each of them wanted to become. Because Clarke wasn’t blind, nor stupid. As ignorant of romance as she’d been -by her own choice- when she’d come to the ground, Niylah had opened her eyes in so many ways. And as much as Clarke had dismissed or minimized her thrallina’s claims that Lexa, Ontari, and Kostia held desire and affection for her, a quiet part deeper inside of herself had started to accept that it was true.
That deeper part of her -thoroughly reinforced by the triple threat of her libido, her emotional and physical attraction to the three of them, and the knowledge that tens of thousands of people expected her to marry them- was now fully in control of her actions. Which was why she had brought herself, at Niylah’s none-too-gentle encouragement, to Lexa’s wing of the palace, taking a deep and steadying breath as she prepared for what was to come.
It was strange. She wasn’t afraid, really. She wasn’t even sure that she was nervous, at least not in the way that most people used the word. She wasn’t uncertain or anxious, after all. She was pretty damn sure that she knew exactly where she stood with the women on the other side of the door before her, where they stood with her, and what it was that everyone involved wanted to see happen next.
Perhaps…perhaps this nervousness came from the knowledge that everything would be different, now. That there wouldn’t be any more taking things slow, any more playing dumb and playing her cards to her chest. It would be her, and them, together. Nothing held back, no more secrets. Just…being engaged, she supposed. A thought that should terrify her, and did when she first learned of her prophesized fate, but after months of Niylah’s efforts -both physically and mentally- and growing closer with the women destined to be her wives…it didn’t.
It just felt right.
Like she was, finally, doing something for herself. Not for the Ark, not for her people, not because of duty or obligation or some grand and weighty destiny written in the stars. Just for Clarke Griffin, who happened to want -very much, as it turned out- to be loved by these particular women, and to love them in return.
She raised her hand, hesitated a moment more, and then knocked.
“Come in, Klark!” she heard Lexa’s voice call from inside, and she huffed in affectionate aggravation even as she opened the door and made her way inside.
“Let me guess, Niylah somehow got a message to you when I left our room, so that you would know I was coming? That little brat is really asking for…” she asked, the question more a statement than anything else, as she shut the door and turned to face the room, only to flush a brilliant crimson at the sight of the other girl. Lexa wasn’t naked, and she wasn’t quite wearing the sort of teasing, near-nude, diaphanous silk that Niylah wore whenever Clarke wouldn’t just let her be naked either.
She was, however, wearing a very flattering robe that clung to her body almost as much as…no, no that was one of the robes that the attendants wore, and Clarke swallowed heavily at the potential implications and invitations in that particular choice of garmenture. Especially since she was quite sure that Lexa wasn’t wearing anything underneath it, and she couldn’t help but remember what Lexa looked like, naked and in the throes of passion as she had been in previous celebrations or moments of observed intimacy.
“Almost. She actually sent one this morning, letting me know that she was going to push you to come to me this evening.” Lexa responded casually, giving no sign that she noticed Clarke’s blush, staring, or near-hanging jaw, though she of course was fully aware. “I’ve been waiting for you since.”
As if to drive that point home, the brunette unfolded herself from the chaise where she’d been reclining, and the way the silk shifted and clung as she moved made Clarke’s mouth go dry in a way that she was rapidly growing happily familiar with. The robe was belted, but loosely so, and the deep V of fabric that fell across Lexa’s chest exposed quite a generous expanse of toned, scarred skin. Skin that Clarke had seen plenty of times in the bath houses, of course, and at other times, but seeing it now -framed deliberately and seemingly offered to her- was a very different thing entirely.
“Lexa…” she managed, the name coming out rougher than she had intended, and she cleared her throat as she forced her eyes upwards to meet green ones that were watching her with a warm, knowing patience. “You’re…not exactly making it easy to have a serious conversation, you know.”
“On the contrary, skaiprisa, I think I’m making it considerably easier.” Lexa countered as she padded forward on bare feet, her steps unhurried and graceful, not quite deliberately sensual but with a distinctly intriguing feminine edge. The flickering candlelight that lit the room caught in her loose, unbraided hair, sending another spike of warmth through Clarke’s core. “You want to ask me if I want you in my bed. You want to ask me if I desire you, if I wish to be your wife, your thrallina, your lover, as much as I have been your friend. Yes?”
Clarke opened her mouth to respond, then closed it again as she acknowledged that, yes, that was precisely what she had wanted to ask. Or had thought she would ask. Or had been working herself up to ask in some carefully chosen, diplomatic way that danced around the actual question while still somehow getting an answer to it. She’d been planning to lead in with conversation about the prophecy, about what they’d lied about, about expectations and reality and what each of them truly wanted versus what they thought they were supposed to want.
And here Lexa had just…cut to the heart of it, with the same directness that she seemed to bring to almost everything else in her life. Everything but Clarke herself, now that she thought about it, and somehow the fact that she was so willing and able to do it now made Clarke feel…happy, on top of all the other riotous emotions that she was dealing with right now.
“…yeah. Not quite how I would have put it, but yeah, that’s exactly what I wanted to do. I just wanted to know what it is you want, Lexa. Fuck the prophecy, fuck what my ancestor had to say, fuck what your people expect. I want you to look me in the eye and honestly tell me: how do you feel about me, Lexa, and what do you see for our future as Lexa and Clarke?”
Lexa stopped just short of her, close enough that Clarke could feel the warmth radiating from her skin and catch the faint, familiar scent of pine resin and something subtly floral that always seemed to cling to the brunette no matter what she’d been doing that day. Green eyes met blue, and for a long moment neither of them spoke.
Then Lexa raised a hand, slowly enough that Clarke could have stepped away if she’d wanted to, and brushed her knuckles along her cheek when she didn’t.
“I want you, Klark. I will not lie and say that the prophecy, that my people and your bloodline do not matter to me. Of course they do, and I won’t insult either of us by pretending otherwise. But I believe, truly and completely, that if we lived in a world where none of those things were true, if we were nothing more than two young women who met by chance or circumstance, I would still have fallen in love with you. And how could I not?” she responded, soft but firm, honest. “How could I not? Setting aside your beauty for a moment, you are everything I would wish for in a lover. Strong, fierce, brave, intelligent, kind, moral. Determined to do what is right and willing to take on incredible burdens for those you care about, and just as happy showing mercy to those that deserve it as you are willing to kill those that don’t.”
Her thumb traced the line of Clarke’s jaw, a featherlight touch that was nonetheless a burning-soft brand on her skin that sent lightning through her veins. A touch that Clarke couldn’t help but lean into slightly.
“You give without expectation of return. You lead without seeking the throne. You came to a world that should have killed you, and instead of letting it break you, you made yourself a part of it. You learned, Klark. You listened. You let yourself be taught, and you let yourself be loved, even when I know it must have been frightening to do so.” Lexa’s voice grew quieter, more intimate, and Clarke felt herself swaying slightly closer to her without quite meaning to. “How could I have done anything but fall in love with you? How could I do anything but want to spend my life at your side when you make me want to be more than Heda. More than a symbol, a pillar, an untouchable example to look up to.”
Her hand shifted to cup Clarke’s cheek, thumb still gently stroking as her fingers framed Clarke’s face.
“I want to be your wife, Clarke. I want to build a family with you, with Kostia and my sisters, with Niylah. I want to spend the rest of my life loving you and being loved by you. I want to watch you guide our people, unified, into a peaceful future. I want to watch you help raise our children. I want to watch you lift our world up out of the ashes, and I want to watch you paint the sunrise. That’s what I want, that’s the future I dream of for the two of us.”
Clarke didn’t even try to resist the urge to do what came next, her own hands craddling Lexa’s cheek and hip as she pulled the brunette’s slender body against her own. Their lips met, soft and tentative, in a languid kiss filled with words both spoken and not. When it finally, broke, leaving both of them short of breath, she couldn’t help but smile with pride at the look in Lexa’s eyes.
“Then let me take you to bed, Lexa. Because I love you too, all of you, and I want that future more than I’ve ever wanted anything in my entire life.”
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Hours after her meeting with the President and his Cabinet, Siobhan Myukulak was quietly making her way through the subterranean halls of her home, her nation, the place she loved full of the people she loved. She slipped into a small room, a storage space that had been empty for years, and met the eyes of the father of one of her daughter’s best friends.
“Alright, Vincent. I never thought I’d say this, but you’re right. The sav…the tribals…the people outside the mountain aren’t what we always thought they were. At least, some of them aren’t. So I’m willing to hear you out.”
Vincent Vie smiled at her in return, and beckoned her closer.