Word of Advice?

[Clarke Griffin]

Marcus Kane

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Clarke was no strategist, that much had become glaringly obvious during her meetings with the Grounders to solve the problem with Mount Weather. She wanted to help the people. Her focus was on saving everyone, while the Grounders were acting strategic. They saw things Clarke could not even anticipate. She tried to go with it, tried to have her own ideas. At the moment it still worked. Her desire to protect her people gave her ideas to do something, but Clarke didn’t know much about thinking ahead and she was aware her ideas might have backlash. Clarke wasn’t a leader like Bellamy, she might know how to inspire the masses, but she didn’t know how to make the tough decisions. With him in the mountain, Clarke really knew only one other person, who she could go to and whom she could trust with her worries and fears: Marcus Kane.

Marcus had been trusted by her father, her mother trusted him, but most importantly in all of this Marcus was willing to trust and support her so far. He had reined her mother in, with simple words more than once. Now Clarke sought him out actively. “Kane?” The blonde questioned softly. “Do you have a minute?” She might not have a lot of time, but she wanted to talk to him, she wanted to see if maybe he could give her a bit of advice. Maybe he could tell her what he would do if he felt like he was out of his depth with a decision. Clarke hoped he would have answers for her, where she failed and where she didn’t think her mother would have answers.

[Marcus Kane]

Marcus was working on making sure everything was ready. He wasn't sure what it would be ready for, but he just wanted it to be ready! With the way things were shaping up, he knew that it could lead to all out war. Either with the grounders, or with the grounder. He rather be their allies, but he knew sometimes things didn't work out. “Kane?” He looked up when he heard his name and wasn't surprised to see Clarke. She had taken more of a in charge role. So much like her mother. So much like her father too. “Do you have a minute?” He shifted to look at her.

He rested back against the table behind him so he was half sitting on it and thus closer to her own height. "Yeah," He offered, waiting to see what she had to say. He was assuming she was here to tell him what she was planning to do with the grounders. While Marcus no longer saw her as a kid, he didn't think she was ready to lead. He did think that people were ready to follow her, and he wasn't sure she understood the difference. Still, if there was anyone else whom he would trust to understand the weight of it, it was Jake Griffin's daughter.

[Clarke Griffin]

He had time, good. Without realizing she had ever been holding her breath, she exhaled, feeling comfort in him having time already. At the very least she could express her insecurities with him, could tell him how she didn’t know she could be enough, how she was acting on instinct and meaning well meaning towards their people, but still new and inexperienced at leading people. Bellamy was the one with strategic thinking, they balanced each other out while leading the 100. Here things were different. With how everything happened, she just needed to speak to someone. And she had to remind herself that she really had to speak out, otherwise this conversation wouldn’t happen at all. He couldn’t read her mind. 

“I need your advice, Kane. I.. I don’t know much or anything about strategy. When I am speaking to the commander, strategy is hard for me. I try to judge if what they do will be good or bad for us, but I can’t. I have no experiences to go by. So many people expect something from me.” Maybe that was the core of the problem. There were expectations on her from people of another culture, which she barely knew. She wanted to do it justice, but didn’t know how to. Clarke needed help and with the lack of her usual partner, she needed Kanes help. “So basically I need to go over the plan with you, I want your opinion and advice on it. This has to work.”

Marcus Kane