[open]

[wrackful]

CHARACTERS: Murphy & OPEN
WHERE: Various around the Station.
WHEN: DAY :042 - :045 (see headers for specifics).
SUMMARY: Some misc downtime stuff and nightmares.
WARNINGS: Nightmares/memories of violence, death, gore.

( SCAVENGE | DAY :042 )

[The ship they'd stolen to get off of Shril looks out of place in the Station's hangar. It isn't elegant or sleek, or has any of the geometric lines which would put it in keeping with the honeycomb textures around it. Dark, aged and patched in places with newer metal, the bulbous shape of it more resembles a vegetable than anything else. It didn't match the store it had been built into, either, but the links were all too clear if examined for a moment. People coming to a new place, building a business and a life out of the shell of what they'd been before, but still keeping it. Remembering it.

Murphy doesn't think about it. If he did, he'd have to think about how that family were destroyed now, torn apart by Murphy and the group he'd led through their store, through them, to this ship. To survive, he tells himself, but that stopped making it less bitter to swallow a while ago.

It doesn't make him feel bad about searching the innards of the ship. Thievery had been easy, and he'd rather make what they'd done worth it than leave what might be useful stuff to rot over some misguided idea like respect. The ship is full of stuff, alien items varied from the bizarre to the mundane, and it turns out "useful" doesn't apply to a lot of it. Hunting through definitely isn't boring, though, and he's been at it for a few hours by now, the odd clatter or crash echoing out from the ship's open door. There's a slowly growing stack of items by the door: a small pile of books, two pairs of boots with a stray solitary companion, an embroidered case holding rows of tiny silver balls, and a large framed painting of a six-limbed alien reclining on a green-sanded beach.

The last is balanced pride of place, and almost definitely there to screw with people.]

( COOK | DAY :043 )

[He still hasn't dug through the whole of the ship, but he's rescued every book he's come across so far. Most of them don't interest him on first look, set aside to probably be dropped on Bellamy at some point, but two had been recipes. Pictures of food. He'd flicked through idly just to see what the meals looked like, but after stopping at a few, realised the instructions hadn't sounded that difficult. Simple stages to follow, point A to B to C, and a decent reward at the end.

The ingredients he'd found in the kitchens hadn't been exactly the same as what was pictured, but they seemed close enough. There's something soothing in the process: cut things up, combine, apply heat. What's simmering on the hob right now isn't quite the same colour as the dish in the book, but it smells good. It tastes good, too, when he stops to check, and the low sense of surprise spreading outwards from him isn't because it's all alien. It's at his own success.]

( RUN | DAY :044, MORNING )

[Running laps is not Murphy's idea of a good time. The opposite, really. But as much as he'd dug his heels in when Annie and Bellamy had first pushed it on him, the logic behind it was sound. Train now, survive later.

That still doesn't mean he enjoys it, and this morning Bellamy's tolerance for his constant mental complaining has worn out. He's opted for a checkpoint system, timing how long it takes Murphy to do each loop through the corridors and past him. It doesn't work to inspire, though, and right now Murphy's taking a breath. Hands braced on his knees, he's dripping sweat, chest heaving, totally unfit and looking it. Feeling it, too, and what had truly been intended as just a breath abruptly turns into a full break.]

Screw this.

[He spits, and then drops, ungainly, to sprawl out on his back on the floor. Bellamy will come looking, eventually. Right now he doesn't care at all.]

( DREAM | DAY :042 - :045, NIGHT )

[Awake, Murphy's control is strong. It has been from the start, some kind of intrinsic understanding regarding his own mind and how to keep it removed from others. Memory and emotion pierce that, often, closeness with some leeching through in smaller ways.

Nights are different. Especially since Shril. His nightmares are the same from the ground, following him here, but they bleed outwards now. Pain, fear, loss, death. Dark trees with warpainted warriors stalking amongst them, sickness spitting blood from a dozen young faces, stifling desert heat and the stomach-knotting tension of death waiting underfoot, a cloaked priest with raised fists, a woman splattered with black blood sat on a throne with a child's head in her hand. The visions mix, blur, sometimes don't come to shape at all. But they come every night. There's never been any freedom from them.]

[[NOTE: I haven't written up set specific nightmare scenes for this one, but I can craft something more solid for anyone who tags in on it!]]

Comments

run

[adamance]

[Lexa had, for all terms and purposes, done all that she was willing to do to reach out and make amends with Murphy. He had designated some clear narrative in his head about her intentions, and hadn't seemed willing to leave that path. What it told her is this: that no matter what intentions she had to use these circumstances to her advantage, they would always be viewed as if she was doing something wrong because it wasn't what he wanted her to do. That meant he would lash out, that he would dislike her, that he would make things difficult—and for that, she had given up on him.

Or more precisely: she had given up on diplomacy.

Some part of her recognizes that for both Bellamy and Clarke's sakes that she can't just give up on him entirely. If he wishes to be reckless, she'll be a choice to come help him out of that trouble. It's just the way he is. After all, she knew he had a tendency to get into those situations. How else was he a tool for her people to utilize multiple times? He wouldn't be, not otherwise.

So, he will be a tool here. One that she'll preserve, even when that tool is being an idiot and lying down on a floor without water.

Thankfully, there is that matter of preservation. She sets the water beside him, and barks an order:] Drink. [And then, a beat later:] It's not poisoned. I know how likely it is that you would suggest it.

dream

[hymnals]

[ Adrasteius is not a heavy sleeper. His thoughts race too close to the surface, and he rarely falls into deep dreaming. He finds it even more difficult since coming here, fresh and still untrained in navigating the tendrils of the minds that brush constantly against his own. Their thoughts and emotions seep beneath his feet, press against the backs of his eyes. That night, as he drowses halfway between sleep and waking, he feels a sudden weight harden in his gut. A flash of a foreign image, soaked with blood and fear.

Who is it, and where are they? He cannot guess it just yet, just now. He can only witness. ]

dream... with a twist : 45

[inflori]

[ Petre doesn't do so well with nightmares. He's better off with darkness every night, a whole lot of nothing in deep sleep before he's up the next day, too much energy in his hands and teeth desperately aching for a way out. There's not much to do around here, other than eat, train and bitch. It's a wonder he can fall asleep at all with how little he actually does.

Come nighttime - this particular night - there are finally images behind his eyes. Things that would feel like terror to anyone, but they're closer to the terror Petre inflicted on others. It's what he remembers, blasting through cults, watching the blood of believers drip through gaping holes all over their bodies, guts spilled, wildly dead gazes above slack jaws. It's not hard to blend the two, it's just the sense of invasion that makes him stir and complain until he snaps to wakefulness. He knows it's Murphy making it happen, it practically reeks of his presence in the aftermath of unconsciousness.

Petre gets up and makes his way to his room, storming right in. No permission is required among hosts, right? ]

Hey, asshole! Wake the fuck up, you're shitting all over my sleep.

cook

[ergane]

[ annabeth follows her nose.

she'd been pretty unsure of the food around here at first, concerned about getting trapped by any binding contracts. paranoid, maybe, but it's happened before -- just ask persephone. she didn't stop worrying about that so much as give in to the fact that she actually does have to eat. then a new kind of uncertainty set in: alien food. some of it's kind of okay, she guesses, but a lot of it's pretty weird. it's enough to make a girl crave a regular cheeseburger.

what she smells isn't cheeseburgers, but it's appetizing enough to make her stomach grumble. she looks around when she gets into the kitchen, nodding approvingly at murphy. ]

That smells amazing.

[wrackful]

[Of course it's this particular moment that Lexa chooses to reintroduce herself to his life. Not that he's been avoiding her - and he sincerely doubts she's been avoiding him - just that they've been lucky, not bumping into one another again. Now, still splayed flat on his back on the floor, Murphy makes no move except to roll his eyes.]

Nah. Poison's not your style. Nowhere near enough blood and gore.

[Though that doesn't necessarily mean he wouldn't have still suggested it, if she hadn't beaten him to it. Intentionally being a dick to Lexa was practically a given by this point.]

[adamance]

I usually ask others to draw blood for me, when I can. [That isn't to say that she has any trouble drawing the blood herself. But Lexa is at a point where conceding anything to John Murphy would be a failure on her part. And she doesn't find any particular pleasure in harming another person. It's just that there are occasions where it proves necessary.]

Poison is cleaner. Subtler.

[wrackful]

[The flamekeeper is a tall man in a heavy cloak. Bald, a circular array of symbols tattooed over the peak of his head, there is a sharp strength written into all the lines of him. He's a grounder; they're all like that, like they've been carved out of the earth and never forgot the violence of it.

Murphy doesn't need to perceive his strength from his appearance, though. He's experienced it first hand. Bare-chested, hands tied, deep gashes ooze blood beneath his collarbone. His skin's split across his cheekbones, bruising already swelling one eye shut. The pain is a constant, a steady thrum pulsing through him from each wound. He doesn't even flinch as the flamekeeper makes another demand, surrender evident in the droop of his shoulders and spine.

That's all I know.

But it isn't enough. It never will be, and he knows that. The flamekeeper backhands him, whole body snapped with the force of it, practically enough to wrench him off the chair.]

[wrackful]

[Murphy snorts.]

Like I said. Not your style.

[Subtle especially. He thinks Lexa's idea of subtlety was probably downgrading from a battering ram to a hammer. Still, he doesn't actually have any concerns about drinking the water, and he levers himself half over with a groan to grab the bottle.]

Probably the only way you'd get around the killswitch, though. [He says, twisting the cap off.] If you were actually trying.

[wrackful]

[Even when Murphy's mind is occupied with past horrors, that doesn't mean it forgets the chances of current ones. A hyper-awareness that extends into sleep, just the sense of someone storming into his room has him jolting awake, half upright and fumbling for a weapon before Petre's words even register as a working language to his brain.

And then they do, and Murphy groans, the spurt of kneejerk reaction abruptly slowing. He drags a hand over his face, head dipping low between his shoulders.]

Thanks for that. [Half muffled, but apparently he doesn't need to be long awake to start managing his usual dry, sarcastic drawl.] Great wake up call.

[adamance]

At least you acknowledge that this isn't something I'd try to do. [Lexa has her doubts about the success of the killswitch, but she knows that Aoba had managed in spite of its existence. Was it different if the symbiote could sense that it was something that was desired? It's hard for her to say—and uncomfortable for her to judge, as her flirtations with death (aside from the literal recognition of it being a likely, probable path for her back home) were always the result of inevitability. All spirits must pass on and the like.]

Do you train alone, or is someone helping you?

[wrackful]

[There are a few things which Murphy still has a bit of a problem processing. They'd only really started to crop up in his life since he'd met Emori, and then with even more frequency since he woke up on the station. Gratitude he might almost have a grip on, even if his usual reaction is dismissal. Praise, though, that one definitely still has the power to blindside him.

Especially when it's coming from a stranger (as much as any of them are strangers), and he was already wrongfooted with surprise at himself. So, for a beat, all he does is stare at her. Then his gaze drops back to the book, head ducking a little with it.]

It's, uh. [He turns the book on the counter to face her, points at the title.] Whatever the hell that says.

[Alien. He could half kind of understand it, like dim whispers in the back of his head offering vague translations, but he definitely couldn't say it.]

Or as close to it as I could get, anyway.

[As he glances at the pot still bubbling, reaching over to turn the heat down.]

[inflori]

'The fuck are you complaining about, you're the one who woke me up.

[ This is just fair payback, he'd say. Not that they've had any reasons to treat each other kindly, so it's not like Petre would be heading over to comfort Murphy into gently freeing himself from a nightmare. ]

[hymnals]

[ Adra flinches. He's witnessed horrific violence; war upon war, suffering upon suffering. But no amount of blood and bones, no amount of pain felt or observed has ever desensitized him, not even a little. He stalks towards the chair, jaw clenched, eyes narrowed. ]

Stop --

[ But can he affect anything in this scene? Can he change the dream, redirect the memory? He's not sure. He doesn't know how to navigate this connection, or what it means for the dreamer. Even so, he has to try. ]

[wrackful]

What, kill me? [His mouth tugs, sharp at the corner.] The results you'd get wouldn't be worth the effort.

[Any gain she'd get for removing him as an annoyance wouldn't balance out on the repercussions. Murphy still had one broodmate left, one who'd made it pretty clear she wouldn't be happy about threats on his person, let alone someone actually trying to follow through on them. He was fairly certain whatever arrangement Lexa had with Bellamy wouldn't survive it, either. And that was before he even start considering the general Nest reaction.

He takes a long pull of the water.]

Bellamy's that way [he gestures further down the corridor he'd been heading along] somewhere. Give it another five and he'll come looking.

[Find out why Murphy hadn't completed the lap.]

[wrackful]

[Murphy shakes his head slightly, mouth tugging wry.]

Trust me, it wasn't a choice.

[Like he'd want to be spilling his brain out to everyone every night. And waking Petre up specifically-- well, there were maybe a few people he'd prefer less.]

[inflori]

Like I give a fuck? Whatever shit you've got going on, just keep it in your pants. Brain.

[ ?? ]

Whatever!

[adamance]

[Time—as in, the when of it all, rather than the measurement of it—is the only thing that would lead to her harming Murphy because of him being an annoyance. Lexa is well aware of the number of individuals she's wanted to kill here and back home because they proved to be greater problems than anything else. The fact that he nearly got Bellamy killed would be more than enough—but they are no longer in that period of her doing that. That's not to say that she knows better, but she's seen time and time again the effects of violence begetting violence.

Clarke did get that lesson through to her. In time.]

You have a remarkable skill in ensuring that he comes to you. [The remark is pointed—so much that she doesn't add anything to it.]

[wrackful]

[Murphy laughs, a dry, huffed sound. He can't help it - it's practically surprised out of him by what she's said.]

You've been linked up to his head for how long now? And you seriously think that's on me.

[Like Bellamy wasn't the one that had pressured him into this training in the first place. Who'd made him sign up for the competition on Shril. In general inserted himself into Murphy's life as often as possible, from the moment Murphy had first arrived in Concordia.]

[wrackful]

[For a moment, Murphy just looks at him flatly, bemusement at his weird verbal mistake only a vague edge to the general derision he feels for him apparently missing everything he'd just said.]

Like I said. It wasn't a choice.

[But does he really want to get into a discussion about the hivemind they've been involuntarily hooked into right now? Not really. And not with Petre. He can't imagine there'll be any particularly interesting insight available there. He exhales, rubbing the edge of his thumb against his forehead.]

Look, I'm awake now. You got what you wanted. You can go.

[inflori]

What, like I don't know you're just gonna fall back asleep and piss all over my dreams again?

[ ... Still not the best choice of words. Without permission, he walks on over and drops heavily at the end of Murphy's bed. ]

Pay me back.

[wrackful]

[Well, that's definitely the opposite of what he'd wanted.]

For what?

[Because Petre couldn't seriously mean this.]

[inflori]

Ruining my sleep, idiot. What else?

[wrackful]

[The scene freezes. As if shocked by the interjection, it jolts in place - Murphy wrenched over in the chair, the flamekeeper's hand raised for another blow. Even the flames in the many candles lighting the room hold still.

From somewhere distant, a sense of awareness rises. Quiet and thin, not fully formed, it rises and lingers, an air of uncertainty. As if searching for the interruption, or waiting for it to make itself known again.]

[wrackful]

I don't know, maybe something that was actually my fault.

[How many times did he have to say it wasn't a choice before Petre got it? But then, getting blamed for things which weren't his doing or he had no control over was practically commonplace for him. He'd been doing pretty well without it since waking up here. Maybe he was due a reminder of how shitty it was.]

Just go back to bed already. I'm not doing anything for you.

[adamance]

You're speaking as if you've done nothing on your part. [There's a question hidden within this question. Bellamy speaks as if Murphy has earned his loyalty. Lexa has tried to act on that time and time again, so this is what can be called a "different tack." Maybe it's time for Murphy to realize what that means.]