CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
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     WHEN THE NEWS REACHED HER EARS, she didn't believe that it was remotely within the realm of possibility. She stomped into the dropship where they were setting him down on the floor. Word was that Octavia was first to get there and bring him in, but she didn't see Octavia anywhere.

     She pushed a few of the people who had assisted Murphy out of her way and grabbed him by the collar of his shirt violently. His face was coated in dirt and blood, cuts everywhere to be found.

     "What the hell are you doing back here?" she demanded, pushing him against the beam that he had been leaning against.

     "Taylor!" a voice called out in a reprimanding tone. She looked over her shoulder and saw Clarke standing there with a tense look. Taylor didn't care if Clarke wanted her to step back, she was going to get her answers and if anything, make sure Murphy would never step near camp ever again. Her along with Bellamy, Finn, Raven, and others had gone out for the day to investigate a crashed dropship that had plummeted down to Earth after their meeting with the Grounders.

    She had decided against going after the arguments from the previous night and the bickering she heard just before they left.

     "Why are you back here?" she hissed, her voice rising dangerously. Murphy didn't respond. The only thing that happened next was Murphy coughing blood in her face. The warm liquid now coated her cheeks and nose.

     She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and pulled her right fist back while keeping the other on the collar of Murphy's shirt. Taylor punched him as hard as she could, his grunt echoing through the ship.

    "Taylor, no!" was one of the things she heard in the midst of the yells that followed her act of violence. Someone grabbed her arm and yanked her back, her grip on Murphy faltering, which caused him to fall back onto the floor with a thump.

     Everything calmed down and Murphy was lying on the ground moaning in pain. Not only had she just injured him, but he had arrived in bad shape. Clarke didn't let go of her while Bellamy stepped up and glanced at Connor and Derek, the others who had brought Murphy into camp from the gates.

     "Everyone but Connor and Derek out, now!" he ordered, not taking his eyes off of Murphy. Taylor had finally gotten a hold on her breathing and relaxed her tense muscles, Clarke eyeing her warily before releasing her grip on her.

     "He claims he was with the Grounders," Derek finally explained. It was a mystery to Taylor as to why he hadn't at least attempted to tell her the exact same thing. Though, she would admit, she came in like a storm, a storm that was seeking to wreak havoc on Murphy.

     "We caught him trying to sneak back into camp," Connor added.

     "I wasn't sneaking. I was running from the Grounders," Murphy defended weakly, his voice still dripping with pain from Taylor's rather rough way of greeting him.

     "Anyone see Grounders?" Bellamy inquired, glancing from the two guards down to Murphy's bloodied and beaten figure. Both boys shook their heads in denial, Bellamy raising his gun as quickly as they did. "Well, in that case —"

     "Hey, what the hell is wrong with you?" Finn interrupted, pushing the barrel of Bellamy's gun away from Murphy, who shifted uncomfortably at the rapid interaction.

     "We were clear what would happen if he came back," Bellamy snapped. Taylor now stood closer, feeling a horrible churning in her stomach as she watched. Murphy being back gave her an unsettling feeling, like anything could and would go wrong if he was there. It already had, evident by the blood dripping from her face and the heated disagreement between Finn and Bellamy.

     "No," Finn protested, standing in front of Bellamy completely, blocking any shot he could possibly take at Murphy. "If he was with the Grounders, then he knows things that can help us."

     "And you're all of the sudden okay with getting information on the Grounders for a war?" Taylor spoke up, taking a step forward toward the two and stopping just short of Finn, right next to Bellamy. "A war I'm pretty sure you were completely against two days ago!"

     Bellamy nodded in agreement. "Help us? We hanged him. We banished him. And now, we're gonna kill him," he retorted officially. "Get the hell out of my way."

     "No, Finn's right," Clarke chimed in, suddenly striding over to where Murphy was slumped over and crouched down beside him.

     "Like hell he is!" Bellamy retaliated loudly, taking another step forward indignantly. "Clarke, think about Charlotte!" The memories of that night came barreling back through Taylor's mind, visions of running through the woods, Murphy with a knife to Clarke's neck, and Charlotte jumping.

     "I am thinking about her," she responded, glancing at those behind her before turning her full attention to Murphy. "But what happened to Charlotte was as much our fault as his." The thought made Taylor sick, but she knew that it was true, Charlotte's last words ringing in her mind.

     "He's not lying," Clarke announced, one of Murphy's hands poised in her own while she examined his fingers. "His fingernails were torn off. They tortured him."

     "You and the Grounders should compare notes," Finn commented, sending a less than friendly look to Bellamy.

     "Not the time," Taylor snapped aggressively, the events of the day already making her much more irritable than she would have liked to be.

     "The Grounders know we're at war," Bellamy argued. "What did you tell them about us?"

     "Everything," Murphy rasped, each one of their faces falling. Clarke stood up and stopped in front of Taylor and Bellamy, wearing a hardened expression.

     "Once he's better, we find out what he knows, then he's out of here, okay?" she assured commandingly, before stepping past them to exit the ship.

     "What if he refuses to leave?" Bellamy asked, Clarke stopping in her tracks to face the two looking at her expectantly. "What do we do with him then?"

     She paused for a few moments, looking between the two and Murphy, who was flinching unpleasantly.

     "Then we kill him."

__________

     Throwing the now bloodied rag to the side, she took a deep breath and attempted to somehow see the situation in a positive light. Though, the barely crusted crimson liquid she had just wiped from her face made her think otherwise.

     Raven had just dropped off a few more rounds that could be loaded into the guns. While it wasn't much, she thought she would be useful and load the bullets into the guns that required them. Grabbing a gun and a few of the small metal cylindrical objects, she started to load them in gently. The last thing she needed was an accident as a result of her own nervous energy.

     "Hey...Taylor?" a small voice uttered from around the corner. Lana was barely peeking past a tent and looked more anxious than she had usually seen the girl.

     "What brings you here?" she asked the girl, continuing with her task, setting a fully loaded gun in the storage area and grabbing another one that was running low. Agitation danced on the edges of her voice while she feared that something might be wrong. She wondered if she would ever actually have a chance to sit down and have a break, but severely doubted it.

     "I — well — Connor wanted you to man his post. He said he wasn't feeling well or something," the girl explained, fidgeting with her hands and glancing back toward the gates. Sighing, she nodded and grabbed the gun she had just finished loading, locking up the rest of them and calling out for a nearby guard to sit by them.

     Connor's post was higher up on the platform, so she climbed up carefully and scanned the forest that sprawled out in front of them. Nothing. She wondered what had caused Connor to go so suddenly ill, and it became even more strange when the boy next to her started to claim that he was feeling strange.

     Minutes later she was grasping the weapon tightly, feeling herself start to get light headed. Her hand shot out and steadied herself on the wall, furrowing her eyebrows at this new feeling. She carefully edged herself away from the platform and down, wobbling violently when her feet hit the dirt.

     Someone touched her shoulder and she looked up to find some boy who she hadn't learned the name of yet staring at her in horror. He raised his gun at her, his finger hovering over the trigger slightly.

     "She's sick!" he yelled for everyone in the vicinity to hear.

     Apparently a quarantine was needed for whatever was happening to what appeared to be the vast majority of the people in the camp. The boy looked nervous as his eyes shot between her and the other people who looked on in either curiosity or fear.

     She didn't hesitate in raising her gun back at him. "If you shoot me, I can promise it's the last thing you'll ever do," she threatened. Taylor wasn't about to deal with this. The day had been too much for her and someone threatening her life was the very last straw. "Didn't you learn a thing from earlier? Point that gun somewhere else and let me get to the dropship."

     She turned around as the boy slumped over defeatedly, pointing his gun back to the ground. Nausea overcame her in a wave and she felt a warm substance collect under her nose and just above her lips.

     Taylor felt something sticky, seeing the red substance when she pulled her fingers away. She was almost to the dropship and had to keep telling herself that she was almost there. She coughed weakly and struggled her whole way up the ramp.

     The queasiness became too much and she had to lean over, throwing up off the side of the ramp. She was horrified to see that what she had thrown up was pure blood that splattered across the metal floor.

     Finally, she pushed back the tarp that served as the door and stood in the doorway of the ship. Many coughs and groans of pain could be heard echoing throughout the cramped area.

     A faint feeling consumed her and she dropped the gun that she had still been holding. With one last breath, she collapsed onto the floor right in front of the entrance.