It was chaos. They found Jaha's body, Murphy was nowhere to be found and now Anya and Indra came to Kane, looking deeply worried. "Have you seen Heda and Clarke?" Indra asked, not wasting time with a greeting. Kane looked confused, "Aren't they at the meeting?" Anya just scoffed, "Obviously they're not. Clarke left to get some fresh air. When Heda realised, that Quint was gone as well, she went after Clarke to make sure nothing bad happened to her. But they didn't come back. The only thing left is blood and parts of a torn apart body."

"And if they are not here, the Pauna probably got them," Indra added.

Still confused Kane asked, "What is a 'pona'?"

"A giant bloodthirsty monster," Indra explained, "It kills our people since forever. And it has gotten some of our best warriors already."

"Some say, Pauna lives forever, because it can't be killed," Anya added. But Indra could just roll her eyes at this superstition.
"Sorry, but I can't help you right now. We kinda have to deal with our own corpse," Kane said.

Indra and Anya left again and Kane got back to calming down the crowed and assigning people to investigate the death.
Hours later Kane had sent out a team to investigate the crime scene, stored Jaha's body and calmed the crowed down enough for them to not do anything stupid. But it was harder than expected since Abby was needed at medical, Clarke was gone and Bellamy was off to get into the mountain. Ruling alone was hard.

When he finally could sit down he closed his eyes and sighed. But his peace didn't last for long as Anya approached him. "I wanted to update you on Clarke and Lexa. All guards are out searching the woods and Indra left to TonDC since it's closer to the Pauna's hunting grounds. I am here in case they return. We currently can't do more." But even though Anya tried for a stoic expression, Kane saw the worry in her face. "Thank you. I better go tell Abby," Kane sighed again and got up to tell Clarke's mother.

Anya was left in the chancellors room standing there a little lost. So she decided to go to the one person she really knew here. So she went to search Raven.

When Kane reached medical, Abby was busy with a patient, but after a few minutes she went over to Kane. "What is it, Marcus?"

"It's about Clarke. But I don't think, we should discuss it here," Kane said quietly. Abby looked worried and immediately took Kane to her 'office'. The most secluded space she had here.

Immediately she asked, "What happened, Marcus? Is Clarke okay?"

"Clarke and Heda are nowhere to be found. Right now Heda's guards are searching form them and Clarke will probably be okay. Clarke is strong and she has the leader of all grounders with her," Kane stopped for a second. He was not comfortable bringing Clarke's mother this news.

"But...?" Abby got more and more worried. "Tell me what happened to my daughter!"

"There have been signs of an attack," Kane continued, "Anya and Indra said, they know the monster and they seemed  worried about them."

"I need to go search for my daughter!" Abby exclaimed and hurried out of the room. Kane hurried after her and after a few steps he caught up to her and took her arm, "Abby, you can't just get out there. You don't know the woods at all. You can't help your daughter right now. You have to trust that she can take care of herself and that the guards will find her."

"But I need to do something. I can't just leave her behind. Not again." Abby started to cry.

Kane just pulled Abby into a tight hug. He patted her back and whispered, "Hey, she'll be okay. I know, you worry. But your daughter is stronger than you give her credit for."

"But she shouldn't have to be," Abby sobbed.

"It is what it is, now," Kane whispered and caressed Abby's back. She just continued sobbing into Kane's shirt.

At the same time Anya had found Raven at her workstation fiddling with who knows what.

"Hey, striksora, what are you doing there?" Anya asked as she was stepping closer. But since Anya moved quiet as a warrior, she startled Raven, who dropped her little project.

"Fuck, shit! You startled me, Anya," Raven said turning around, "You can't just sneak up on me like this." She glared at Anya, but at the same time a smile tucked at her lips. "What are you doing here anyways?" Raven turned to pick up her project, "Don't you have to be at the scary people meeting in the woods? By the way, be glad, that I wasn't working with gunpowder. Though the explosion would have been awesome." Raven looked at the dark, burned spots on her workbench.

"Why are you working with fayogon pauda?" Anya deflected Raven's questions.

"It's mainly a hobby right now, since Kane already started restricting access to guns, but I also want to prepare for Mt. Weather," Raven explained, "Our gona need guns to fight the mountain with the other clans. So, why are you here?"

Anya, again, deflected the question, "What are you working on? Isn't it boring, if it doesn't explode?"

"Normally, I'd agree," Raven started, "that if things doesn't explode, they're boring, but this actually is more complicated than it looks like and I like the challenge for a change. I'm a mechanic after all, not a gun expert."

"I thought, you were a genius," Anya chuckled.

"Oh, I am a genius, indeed. That is why I noticed, you're dodging my question. Not that I'm not happy to just see you, but why are you here? Something clearly bothers you, cheekbones."

Anya went over to the only other chair in the small room and sat down after removing Raven's staff from the chair. She leaned it on the second workbench and started to explain, "Clarke and Lexa vanished not too long ago. They were probably chased by the Pauna," when Anya looked up, she saw Raven's confusion and explained, "A giant bloodthirsty monster. No warrior could kill it and only few have survived it's attack. And I know, Heda is strong and Lexa is smart. I know, Clarke is resourceful... But I'm still worried, that they might never come back. And I stayed back to see if they return, but... If i am to just walk around here aimlessly, I'd turn koken (crazy) and I can't train with my swords in here, so..."

"So you came here. To me," Raven finished the sentence. She had never see Anya so worried. Okay, granted, she only knew Anya for a few days. Like, really know her and talk to her, but this few days were enough to establish a relationship and some trust in each other. Maybe it was their personalities. But she knew, Heda and Clarke vanishing was a big deal. Especially, if Anya was this worried. Raven wanted to comfort her, but she didn't know how, so she did, what Finn had always done when she needed a friend. She moved her chair closer to Anya and hugged her.

At first Anya was stiff in her arms, but then her posture dropped and she relaxed into that hug.

A little while later Anya straightened her posture again and got out of the hug.

"Thank you, Raven. Now, you didn't tell ma about your little project there."

Ans so Raven started to explain and Anya could just take her mind of the worries about her former second...

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A/N: I actually took a look at my notes and in the story only ten days passed between the first chapter and Clarke and Lexa heading for TonDC. If I think about it, it's crazy, because I'm over 30 chapters in and like almost a year of writing. And a lot more character development happened than normal for ten days, but I think it's acceptable, since a lot happened in this days.

Now we' slowly getting closer to the attack on the mountain. It's the next big goal everyone is headed, but I know me, it will probably still take 30 chapters to actually get to the assault, because the war chiefs have to assemble at TonDC, the armies have to arrive, there will be more Grounder and Skaikru interaction and culture, so yeah. And even if the Mountain is taken down, there is still so much to explore in the world. How peace comes, how everyone lives, what happens to Murphy. Lexa will get into more conflicts with Azgeda... There is just so much to tell and a lot more days to come to form deeper bonds between characters and rise conflict and there is death to come in the upcoming war.

So, yeah, thank you all for reading my story and hopefully still enjoying it. I hope you'll stick with me for the next 30 chapters as well, I really enjoy writing this and exploring more of the grounder culture than we've ever seen in the show.

Until next time...

PS: Who also is excited to see TonDC and Niko and Alura again? And who was Alura again? And when will Dr. Lahiri make his entrance in this story...