Episode Three, Part 1:
Exile.

The three siblings approached the top of the hill again, no one more relieved than Quill that they would be walking down it instead of up.

"It looks so much steeper from up here," Quill said, hovering at the top beside Elara as Wynn took a few moments to gaze out at the view in front of them - half in wonder, half to try and figure out how big the island was.

"You're such a wimp," Elara teased, playfully pushing him a little, glad that she still had the energy to mess around after the walk up.

"Hey, you can't push me. That's not fair," Quill argued. "I can't do it back."

"I know. That's exactly why I did it."

Quill huffed in amusement. "When you're recovered, you've got a lot of payback coming your way, you know that?"

"Hmm, I think I'll be fine," she said, mimicking being in deep consideration. "I'll let Izzy loose on you. Plus, Kodiak's giving her a lot of training lately, so I'd be careful if I were in your shoes. She may be tiny but she's feisty."

"Believe me, that, I know."

"Did you guys here that?"

"Huh?" Elara looked over at Wynn was was pulling the pair of binoculars down from his eyes and scanning their immediate surroundings. "Hear what?"

"I could have sworn I heard something... Get your weapons out. Both of you."

Elara shot Quill a nervous look as they both obliged by their brother's command, pulling out their blades they had been given and holding them at the ready.

"We should just start walking back," Quill suggested. "At least we'll be closer to everyone else if we need help."

"No. No one moves. There's attackers out there; four, I think."

Quill gulped, turning around to pull Elara closer to where he stood, but his eyes lit up in fear, seeing someone jumping out from the trees and landing behind his sister, immediately grabbing onto her.

"Elara!" Quill yelled out of instinct, already attempting to reach her but another attacker did the same and grabbed onto him.

At the panic in the voices, Wynn turned and ran over to them only to end up being stopped by another one of the people who came right between them, holding up a sword and pointing it directly and Wynn's chin, causing him to stumble backwards as the man kept pushing it forward.

"Not so fast," the man growled, chuckling when Wynn walked backwards into the final attacker who latched his arms around him, meaning all three siblings had been caught.

"Didn't you hear what we said at the beach? I thought we made our instructions quite clear-"

"We're not on your side of the mountain," Wynn argued. "We're not near your territory. That was the instruction. Let us go or you'll face your own consequences from my people."

"I don't like your tone," the man grumbled. "Nor do I like you thinking you have the right to threaten me. You want consequences? I'll give you one for your attitude, and seeing as you're acting like you're in charge here, I'll even let you choose: which one of you three should we kill?"

Wynn glanced over at his brother and sister, seeing the notable panic in Quill as he took a gulp against the blade held up to his throat, trying to breathe deep in spite of it so the trembling of his hands would still. He knew what he was thinking; that Wynn had just made a promise to him to not trade his life up to protect them and now he was about to break it so easily; he was going to tell the attacker to kill him and let Quill and Elara live because that's what he had always done; sacrificed himself... But not today.

"None of us," Wynn declared, his voice low and dangerous, barely having time to settle before he leaned forward towards the ground, causing the person who had him in a headlock to fall over him, face-first into the ground. At the same time, the man who had been talking to Wynn lunged forward to get a good swing at him, but Wynn ducked under his attempts and pushed him forwards, causing him to thrust his sword into his friend.

He looked over at his siblings to see them fighting off their own attackers and had a few seconds to run over to help before the man with the sword picked himself up and came back for him. Quill had just managed to get free of his guy and was moving over to Elara's, trying to figure out the best way to get him off of his sister.

Seeing as Quill hadn't finished his guy off, Wynn took over and whipped his blade out, killing his assaulter before he could harm one of them.

"Quill, I got this," Wynn said, readying himself to lunge at the guy holding Elara, but Quill had other ideas.

Of all the things he knew he could do to kill his sister's attacker in an instant, nothing sufficed Quill quite as much as throwing his fist into the man's face. He yelled out in pain, letting go of Elara who was pulled out of the way by Wynn, and fell to the ground, spitting out blood.

Once Elara was safe, Wynn pulled out a blade from his back pocket and held it his hands, turning around just in time to pierce it through the stomach of the man who had previously been speaking to him. Wynn didn't even flinch or have to wait a moment for his move to work and the guy on the end of his weapon heaved for a dying breath, glaring at him in a mixture of shock, fear and confusion before he stumbled backwards to the ground, ultimately succumbing to his wounds.

With only Elara's assailant left, Quill sauntered over to him and set his foot on the man's chest before he could get up. "No one hurts my sister and lives," he growled, crouching down low as he adjusted his blade in his hand, surprising both of his siblings at how intimidating he was being. "No one."

Before the man had a chance to worm himself out of Quill's capture, he brought his weapon down and stabbed it into his chest, pushing a little harder for extra measure.

Quill let out a frustrated breath before he pulled his weapon out and wiped the excess blood on the guy's shirt, turning around to face his siblings. "Everyone okay? Ell? How bad did he hurt you?"

"I'm alright," she said, encouraging Wynn to let go of her so she could prove to them that she could stand on her own. "Just a little shaken... That should have been an easy kill for me; I thought I was doing better. My instincts are still telling me that I could have taken all of those guys on by myself, but I guess not."

"Don't beat yourself up," Quill said. "You'll be able to do it again one day, but not anytime soon if you keep pushing yourself."

Elara nodded sorely. "I have Izzy now; I didn't before. I've got to be able to defend myself because if I can't, that means I can't protect her. Me being capable matters now more than ever."

"You are capable," Wynn assured her. "That has nothing to do with anything; you're hurt; you went through severe trauma; you died and came back; that's the difference."

"I know you're right," Elara confessed, "but it's hard to accept it. It's hard to patient when what you're waiting on is a part of yourself to return."

"It'll get better, Ell. I promise."

She nodded, smiling tiredly at Wynn. "Thank you," she said, then, turning to Quill, "and thank you for saving my life."

"Yeah, I don't know what came over you just then, but that was really impressive," Wynn said. "You were almost scary for a moment."

"Like I said," Quill smiled. "I had to step on Neptunum. I have to protect you guys, just like you do for me, and I'm going to keep on doing it."

"Well," Wynn said, brushing his hand through Quill's hair to mess it up. "Keep it up and you might be able to give Izzy some competition in training."

"That's the 'thanks' I get?" Quill exclaimed, laughing along with his brother, knowing that no one was ever going to let him forget about the one time Izzy had knocked him to his feet when they were practicing in the Bunker. "I'll let you fend for yourself next time those people come after us."

/////////

Wynn, Quill and Elara made their way back to the beach, beyond relieved when the first of their people came into sight and they knew they weren't alone anymore.

As if he had been pacing around in anxiety ever since their departure, Kodiak suddenly looked twice in their direction to convince himself that he wasn't just hallucinating them out of fear just like he had done countless times when he was on Neptunum and the fear caught up to him as he remembered how long he had gone without seeing them.

He began walking over to them, eager to hear if they had found anything else in the greenhouse that could be of use to them, when he noticed Wynn's arm wrapped around Elara like he was supporting her or trying to keep on her feet. He picked up his pace and jogged over to them, frowning in concern as he reached them.

"What happened?" He asked, reaching out for Elara and gratefully taking her into his arms. "You got hurt?" He bent down a little to face her.

"Not really," she said. "But you guys were right; I can't fight; I'm not strong enough; I'm not healed. I'm not myself yet."

"Terra Firma found us," Wynn clarified. "Quill and I had to help her out."

"I've never been this defenceless before."

"Well, it's a good thing you're never going to be alone out there," Kodiak reminded her. "Maybe you've just tried too much too soon. You've dived right in instead of taken it slow."

"I don't take things slow."

"You do at the moment," Wynn told her. "And no more leaving camp again until you've got your strength back. They had a knife to your throat and you couldn't do anything about it; you're scared straight."

"I think you sit down for a while," Kodiak said. "I'll get Aeryn to come check on you, then I bet Izzy will want to show off the new tricks I've taught her."

"Can you hold her off for a little while longer?" Elara asked. "I'm... I'm shaking a bit, that's all. I don't know if it's because of shock or one of the side effects from the combination and, you know, being brought back to life not too long ago."

"Sooner or later, Ell, you're gonna have to tell Izzy about what happened to you on Neptunum," Quill told her, knowing that everyone was worried about how intensely she was trying to avoid having that conversation with Izzy. "She deserves to know. She loves you."

"I will tell her," Elara told them, "but not until we're someone safe and there's no one else trying to kill us and there's not a bunch of explosives in the ground that she thinks is her responsibility to set off. She's just a kid; the last thing she deserves to hear is that something terrible happened to me. For now, she still thinks everyone is a little invincible, even after losing her dad. I want her to have that feeling for as long as possible. I want her to stay a kid."

"Okay," Kodiak calmed her down, squeezing her tight to assure her. "I'll make sure she's occupied. I'll get Bas to see if her and Harlow want to roughhouse with each other, then I'll stay with you until Riv gets back with the others. Then Quill can wait with you while we talk to them."

"Wait, Sol's still not back yet?"

"No," Kodiak shook his head. "Dreea got back a few minutes ago. She's freaking out because Chessca went with them."

Wynn sighed, feeling like everything was hitting all at once, but he didn't quite know what to do. "Okay. Well, we'll wait a little while longer but the minute it starts getting dark, I'll go with Dreea to try and find them."

/////////

Wynn sat anxiously beside Dreea and Kodiak, waiting for Sol's eminent return with Chessca and Atlantis, not sure how much longer he could sit around before he eventually caved and went after her.

"Hey, I'm sure they're fine," Kodiak said, knowing just how worried the two Sovereigns at his side were. "They went in the completely opposite direction of Terra Firma; I doubt any of their people would have even gone that far."

Wynn chewed on his lip and let out a deep breath, debating whether to tell them about the second clan he had discovered or it if would just make them as unnecessary worried as he was; if it would do no good that all three of them were freaking out.

"I should have never let Chess go," Dreea mumbled. "They said they'd be back before me; I don't understand why Riv's been gone so long with them. Something must have happened. Chess is probably terrified, and Atlantis - she can't defend herself if something's happened to Riv and Chess isn't a strong fighter, either-"

"Hey," Wynn said nudging her arm with his own as if to remind her that him and Kodiak were still there beside her. "They'll be back soon-"

"Sooner than you think," Kodiak interrupted, nodding his head over in the opposite direction when they both turned to face him, standing up to begin walking over to the three girls who had finally made their return.

"Chess!" Dreea sighed in relief, hurrying to her feet and over towards them. "Are you alright? You were gone for hours!"

"Hey. I'm sorry," Chessca apologised, surprised by how tightly Dreea was hugging her; Dreea wasn't one to be overly affectionate in front of others, nor let people see how afraid she was, so Chessca knew that she had to have been really worried to be acting that way in front of so many of her people that were watching on.

"It's my fault we were gone so long," Sol spoke up, not wanting Chessca to feel guilty for their prolonged absence.

"Did something happen out there?" Wynn asked as he and Kodiak reached them, glad to see that they all appeared to be fine.

"You could say that," Sol said, almost ready to elaborate until she saw the state of Wynn; his features weighed down by stress, dirt on his jacket; blood dried on his many visible areas of his skin. "What about you?" She asked, clearly concerned. "Someone attacked you, didn't they?"

Wynn nodded nervously, knowing there so was much that he needed to inform them about only, he couldn't wait much longer. "The four of us need to go somewhere private. I have something important to tell you," he said, already beginning to gesture them in the direction of the Sovereigns' Tent. "Atlantis, Chess - can you sit with my sister and make sure she's doing alright? Distract her for a while? She's a little shaken up."

"Of course," Atlantis smiled, nodding reassuringly at him and Kodiak, grateful to have the opportunity to finally sit down and rest in the safety of Basilisk.

"Whatever it is," Sol began, falling in line beside Wynn as the four Sovereigns began to walk in the opposite direction, "it'll have to wait. My news is more important. You guys have to hear-"

"Sol, I'm not messing around on this," Wynn interrupted, holding open the flap of the tent as the others walked inside. "I have to tell you-"

"So do I!" Sol exclaimed, frustrated with Wynn that he wasn't seeing how intense she was being.

"Oh my gosh, you guys, one of you just spit it out already," Dreea whined, sharing an annoyed look with Kodiak as they listened to their bickering, feeling like they were back in the good old' days when neither Wynn or Sol could tolerate each other.

"There's another clan!" Both Wynn and Sol raised their words at each other, speaking in unison and barely recognising that the other had said the exact same thing as them amidst their fierce determination to be the first one to speak.

"Wait... You know about the other clan, too?" Sol asked, completing forgetting that Dreea and Kodiak were beside them both, in complete shock over the news and having a mountain of questions of their own that needing answering. "Were they the ones that attacked you?"

"No," Wynn shook his head. "It was Terra Firma. We went to the greenhouse and found a mine - a deactivated one - and when I looked back at the map in the journal, I realised that whoever wrote the markings of the mines had been guessing them; there's question marks beside some of them which wouldn't be there if the people who set the mines are the same people who wrote in that book. What about you? How did you figure it out?"

"Not in a way that's as smart as yours," Sol sighed, recovering from her frustration for him and letting out a sharp breath. "Two of their people tried to attack us; kids - a little older than Izzy and Harlow."

"What happened to them?" Kodiak asked, suddenly more sensitive to the answer now that he had a child of his own to protect; even if the people attacking were enemies to him, he could emphasise with how the parents of the children would feel knowing their kids were out in the forest, or how they would feel if something happened to them.

"I let them go," Sol said tenderly, reaching out of grabbing onto Kodiak's arm, running her hand up and down to soothe him momentarily. "Nothing happened; I had a hold of one of them and made them disarm before they left. Then we followed them back to see where they came from."

"Did you find their camp?" Dreea asked, hoping that her assumptions about her were correct and of course she had found it.

"Yeah," Sol nodded. "They look a little smaller in numbers than Terra Firma, but still bigger than us."

"That's not all," Wynn said, frowning as he studied her, trying to figure out what she was holding back.

Sol sighed, somewhat annoyed that she couldn't hide anything from Wynn; they were an open book to each other, completely void of any secret. "It's their name," she said, wrapping one arm around herself for comfort. "Their clan name."

"What is it?" Dreea wondered, but Sol couldn't quite bring herself to answer.

"Wynn, do you know what it is?" Kodiak asked.

"No. I just knew there was another clan."

Kodiak scrunched up his eyebrows in concern, turning back to face Sol - his hand resting on her back, this time, him being the one to comfort her. "Riv, what is it? What's wrong?"

"West of The City Exile Allegiance..."

Everyone paused for a moment, taking a few seconds to process her words and understand what was making her so afraid.

"...The City of Targo," Wynn sighed and dropped his head, finally understanding what was weighing her down so much.

"Are you sure it's them?" Dreea asked; even she was unable to keep the confession from getting under her skin.

Sol shrugged. "No," she admitted, "but it makes sense and Chess is convinced it's them."

"How is she after hearing it?" The worry in Dreea's voice only seemed to grow. She knew what Chess was like. She knew how devastated she would be to hear their name again. She couldn't even keep count of the amount of times she had woken up in the Bunker to Chessca crying beside her, scared out of her mind at being confined in a place full of people without Sol around.

"Terrified," Sol was crushed, completely heartbroken at the idea of having to see the same horror return to Chessca that she had been trying to protect her froy for so long. "She wouldn't let go of me the entire walk home. And I know her; she's not going to feel safe anywhere anymore; not unless you or me or Atlantis are at her side every second. And Elara," she breathed out heavily, flickering her eyes between Wynn and Kodiak. "I don't know if you want her to find out about it, but I think the news should come from one of you guys if you do."

"I don't know," Kodiak shook his head. "Her and Quill went with Wynn to find the greenhouse and she's a little on edge after what happened out there."

"Wait, didn't you get attacked!?" She exclaimed, suddenly recalling what Wynn had told her upon her arrival back to the beach.

Wynn nodded at her question, feeling like everything was about to come piling down on his sister if they weren't careful. "She's not hurt, she's just scared because she couldn't defend herself and you guys know her; she's a fighter; she's never not been able to protect herself from attackers until-you-know what happened to her."

"Still, I don't think hearing about The City of Targo will help her at all. If anything, she'll be more determined to push herself physically because she'll feel the same instincts as Chessca about not being safe, and she'll want to do whatever she can to make sure she can fight off anyone that comes across her, even if she's not ready," Kodiak said, although, it was clear he was still conflicted about something.

"But?" Wynn asked. "There's something else, isn't there?"

Kodiak nodded. "Izzy's from The City," he reminded them. "I don't know. She might feel nervous about that, especially after what happened with Quill and Hannah right before you guys went into the Bunker. I know it's completely differently because you guys are the only family Quill has ever known; he was raised by you, grew up with you and has been with you even before Elara was born, but Izzy's eight. That means she has eight years worth of memories of The City and her family and everything that was before us. It was hard enough for Ell just processing the idea of who Hannah was; I think she'll believe she's in the same situation again this time, with Izzy, and I don't know if she can take that after everything that's already happened. After Neptunum."

"I hear you," Wynn said, deeply wounded by the truth in everything Kodiak had said. "I'm worried about how Quill will handle it, as well. And you, Sol. Are you okay?"

"I'm too busy worrying about Chess to know how I feel about it," Sol admitted. "But... Yeah, I think I'm okay. In their name, it calls them 'Exile Allegiance'. They're exiles. That makes me think twice about who they are and if they're really the same kind of people as those in The City."

"You've got a point," Dreea said. "We have every reason to still be cautious of them, but I think what we're all trying to say is they're not Rhea and Kane. No offence, Wynn."

"None taken," he replied. "I don't even feel associated to the man he was outside of the Bunker. As far as me and my siblings are concerned, the father we knew disappeared after our Bunker was opened and we never saw him again. That's how we see it."

Sol smiled tenderly at his words and moved around to wrap her arms around him, leaning her head against his chest, the four of them all taking a moment to gather their thoughts before they moved onto figuring out what to do.

"There was one other thing I've been worried about," Wynn admitted, surprising himself for how open he was being about it, but he found that he actually liked it.

"What's up?" Dreea asked, doubting anything he had to say could be worse than what they had already discussed. Surprisingly, it came pretty close.

"I think it's safe to assume we've started a war between us and Terra Firma."

"Why do you say that?" Sol asked.

"Because we killed more of their people out there today. We had to. If we didn't-"

"You, Elara and Quill would have been killed. It's okay. We get it," Dreea cut him off, already knowing that he was pinning the entire responsibility on himself. "We would have done the same thing."

"Thanks, Dreea."

"So, we should prepare ourselves for another raid?" Kodiak guessed, trying to understand what Wynn's thought process was. "Have more guards on watch? Extend our perimetres so we can see them early and give ourselves more time to prepare for an attack?"

"That all sounds good to me," Wynn replied, "but now the other clan knows about us, too. They could just as easily decide to come and pay us a visit."

"But in a way, we sort of have an upper hand..."

Everyone looked to Sol, trying to comprehend how in any way it gave them the upper hand.

"Think about it, Calvin and the rest of Terra Firma probably don't realise we know about the Exile Allegiance clan, but they obviously do because of the mines... It's not much, but my guess is now we know something they don't want us to. Something really big." 

Three // Part One
She still thinks everyone is a little invincible. I want her to have that feeling for as long as possible.

Just a little under 4.3K words!!! Idk how this book is already up to 40,000 words when I literally had the hardest time ever trying to plan it out (lol, I haven't even finished planning out Episode Six and Seven)??? At this rate, I think it could even beat Season 6 for my longest book (129,123K)!

There was a lot I liked about this chapter! I don't usually enjoy writing fight scenes as much (because even though I  envision it so clearly in my head, I find it so hard to tell if I've managed to get that same scene into words), but I enjoyed this one between the Bell siblings! I also like the reminders that Elara is still healing and that recovery can be a long process because I think that's important representation rather than just seeing someone injured in a book and show and before you know it, they're completely fine again without having to go through the long mental-endurance that is recovering from an injury. I tore my ACL when I was 15 and had to have surgery and an entire year off of sport which was the most miserable thing for me and it made it worse that I still went to every training and game to watch my teammates. That's kind of what I want to show through Elara this season: the frustration and grief of having to sit back and watch everyone get to do something that you love or that you were the best at.

I'm also very excited about writing the new clan West of The City Exile Allegiance (who'll mostly be referred to as 'Exile Allegiance' because that is a long name) and showing all the connections it has to Chessca, Sol, Elara, Quill and Izzy (important people to watch out for).

Also, I know it was in the last chapter, but can we talk about how smart Wynn is? He figured out that there was another clan from small giveaways in the journal which the Sovereigns had looked over a hundred times and not picked up on. That's my boy!

Last thing! It's so interesting to explain how Sol thinks knowing about EA is an upperhand for them! I wonder how their knowledge about them will help (or the opposite) their position against Terra Firma Tribe! Also interesting to consider how TFT and EA's relationship might be with each other and if this will change because of Basilisk's presence on the island...

17/02/21.