Chapter Text
I ran a hand over my face, urging myself upright. Next to me, Clarke lay and for a moment I thought she was dead, but then my eyes rested on her chest as it rose and fell and I leant against the wall with a sigh of relief. Clarke’s eyes fluttered open and they landed on me in confusion.
“I saw the rocket— how— the others?” Her eyes flashed with hope briefly but I could only manage a small smile in reply.
“Just me,” I whispered, holding out a hand to help her to her feet. Part of the lab had collapsed, but the rest of it was seemingly left untouched. Since we weren’t dead it was safe to say the nightblood worked, and that the radiation wasn’t going to kill us.
“How?” She asked again, blinking to make sure I was real and not just part of a radiation-induced dream.
I held up my hand, the black scab from where I had sliced my palm showing the dark blood underneath. “I may have done that as soon as we got here. I didn’t plan on going to space with the others. I didn’t really plan on anyone being here, to be honest.”
“I didn’t really plan on being here, to be honest,” she laughed, her voice cracking slightly.
“What do we do now?” I asked, looking around and pulling off the radiation suit to leave me in my regular clothes. Packets of food dropped to the floor in the process and she raised an eyebrow at me.
Clarke sighed, “For the next five years, we survive. If we try to get to Polis, we may be able to get into the bunker?”
“Then let’s go,” I smiled half-heartedly, “I have food, by the way.” Then I realised the issue, “It might require water to be cooked. There might not be much water out there.”
“We’ll figure it out,” she shrugged.
I reached into my pocket and when I pulled out the MP3 I was surprised to see it flicker into life. I pressed shuffle and put one earbud in as I tried the door, prying it open, forced to climb through part of the lab’s wreckage on the way. When I finally got out, the world around was completely barren as Radioactive began to play.
I’m waking up, to ash and dust
I wipe my brow and I sweat my rust
I’m breathing in the chemicals
I’m breaking in, shaping up.
Then checking out on the prison bus
This is it, the apocalypse
I’m waking up, I feel it in my bones
Enough to make my systems blow
Welcome to the new age, to the new age
Welcome to the new age
~
49 Days After Praimfaya
“It’s two hundred and ten miles to Polis,” Clarke reminded me.
I laughed, looking out at the deserted landscape, “Well at least we don’t have to swim.”
She pulled her bag on her back and I did the same. “We got this,” she assured me. “We got this.”
“We’ve survived this far, haven’t we? Now let’s find that rover,” I nodded.
We retraced our steps to where the vehicle had been parked, but the surrounding area was completely covered in sand. Clarke pulled out a shovel and began to dig, and I helped with my hands until she hit something hard. Pulling the sand away, the gun at the front was revealed and we began to dig faster.
After an hour, and a five-minute break somewhere in the middle, the rover was up. It was still partially charged, and it was pretty light outside so we chanced it and began to drive across the wasteland that used to be our planet.
Yet again, I was in the passenger seat because someone refused to let me drive. “I’m a better driver than Bellamy!” I protested.
“You are not a better driver than Bellamy,” she raised an eyebrow at me.
“I’ve never hit a person with a car. He has,” I pointed out.
She deadpanned, “Congratulations on not having committed vehicular manslaughter.”
“Fine,” I raised my hands in surrender. “But at some point I want to drive.”
“I can deal with some point,” she sighed, but her eyes looked past me into the distance and I turned around to see what she was focused on.
“That’s… one hell of a sandstorm,” I whistled.
Clarke rolled her window up and I did the same with mine as we tried to outrun the storm, getting inside the walls of Polis just before it arrived. She hopped out, slamming the door behind her and my eyes widened in disbelief. Less than a week ago, this was a thriving city filled with Grounders from different clans. Now?
The tower had fallen and the entrance to the crypt was covered in rubble. It was almost impossible to get in. She groaned as she tried to pull away one of the larger pieces of concrete, and I tried to help but neither of us were strong enough to pull its weight completely. Clarke grabbed a pipe and used it to lever it out of the way, but the structure seemed to be increasingly unstable. She grabbed a large rock from inside and brought it out of the makeshift door before going back in and retrieving another. “A little help?” She grunted as I helped her with a larger one.
“Be careful,” I warned, “This whole place could come down on top of us.” I climbed through the hole after her and she passed me rock after rock to toss out. My arms were aching but I continued. If we wanted to survive, we had to get to that bunker.
Clarke began to bang on the door, desperately hitting it with a rock, “I’m here! We’re here!” She screamed, “Mom!”
It was no use, so we took a break before going back, pausing to have lunch. She divided up the crackers equally and I had a small portion, licking my lips to get rid of any of the crumbs. We got back to work, using the shovel and anything we could to try and clear some of the wreckage.
We were there for days, weeks, probably a month at least. One day, I pulled on one of the rocks but it came away faster than I expected, and I stumbled backwards into part of the crumbled wall. Clarke steadied me and I thanked her, but her attention was elsewhere. I followed her eyes to see a part of Lexa’s throne, the rest of it damaged by the wreckage. Clarke pulled a piece out, and it was just the right side for a walking stick.
I don’t know how, but it appeared to have been keeping the whole structure together and Clarke tackled me out of the makeshift door before it fell down behind us. We tumbled down the remains of the stairs as the crypt collapsed in on itself, only just making it out of the way in time. “Thanks,” I breathed. “Again. What now?”
“We could have lived in the bunker, with the others, with my mom… Now I’m not so sure. We could be digging for years before we reach them. At least we know they’re safe down there,” she sighed.
~
Two months after Praimfaya
We decided to go to Arkadia, but it was horrifying to see that it was just as decimated as everywhere else. I ran a hand through my hair in disbelief, not wanting to admit that we were really, truly alone. I gasped, “It’s like… we were never even here.”
“Maybe we never should have been,” Clarke replied quietly as she began to sift through the wreckage.
I took a small sip of the water bottle as the sun went down, and Clarke finished it off. That was the last of our water. “How the hell are we going to make it five years?”
“We’re here looking for food and water, but I don’t think there’s anything here,” she sighed.
“I have nothing apart from one noodle pack left, and I think it’s got a hole in it,” I moaned. “Find anything useful?”
Clarke pulled out a few items she’d picked up from the wreckage, and I showed her some of mine. Nothing decent, just a couple of knives that had survived the death wave. She pulled out a small box, but it was shut with a padlock. I looked around for something to unlock it with but she beat me to it, going at it with a mallet and breaking the clasp completely.
She pulled the box open and her face fell. The box had belonged to Jasper.
It only contained three things. His goggles, a small MP3 player that belonged to Maya— it had her name on the back— and an envelope addressed to Monty. My eyes filled with tears and Clarke reached for my hand, squeezing it reassuringly as we both sobbed.
“Maybe Jasper had the right idea,” she whispered through the tears. “Maybe we were the problem. What’s the point if there’s only pain and suffering?”
I quoted Raven, “What’s better than a little pain to remind you you’re still alive?”
“You still have hope?”
“I know that they’re alive, up there,” I pointed to the sky. “And for as long as they are, then yeah. I still have hope.”
Once Clarke was asleep, I grabbed the radio and sat on top of the rover to keep watch. I wasn’t sure what I was keeping watch for, or who I was waiting for, but I did it all the same. I never liked sleeping that much anyway. Clarke talks to Bellamy through the radio. She doesn’t know if he can hear her or not, but she does it to stay sane. I get it, I do the same thing every night once she’s asleep. She calls once every day, and when I can’t sleep I climb up on top of the rover and I listen to the static noise during the gaps of when I try and decide what to say.
I took a deep breath, “Hey. It’s me again. I’m still counting the days, just like back on the Skybox. Nothing like some numbers to keep you sane, right? Nightblood’s good, I’m still kicking. Still a bit of radiation burns on my arm but it’s nothing I can’t handle. How’s the algae? Monty enjoying himself? We found some of Jasper’s stuff today, there’s a letter for Monty. I’ll keep hold of it until we see you guys. Five years is a long time, but it’s only a few years longer than my Skybox time.” Tilting my head back, I looked at the stars and imagined where the ring would be. “I can’t see you guys, but I know you’re up there. I know you’re alive. If you’re still breathing, then so am I. You give me hope,” I whispered. “You always have.”
~
I plugged my MP3 into the rover, sending a smile in Clarke’s direction as she changed gears. “Got any preferences?”
“I’m going to have to put up with your singing for five years, Lyss, just pick a song,” she laughed.
It was the first time I’d heard her laugh in a way that sounded natural. Since Praimfaya, I mean. Before today it was always forced, or like self-deprecating, or whatever else. But this was a genuine Clarke Griffin laugh.
“Okay, okay,” I conceded, “You’ll like this one though.” Fast Car by Jonas Blue began to come through the speakers and she shrugged, not loving it, not hating it yet.
“Alright,” Clarke smiled, “Good enough. Just don’t start—”
“You got a fast car
I want a ticket to anywhere
Maybe we'll make a deal
Maybe together we can get somewhere
Any place is better
Starting from zero got nothing to lose
Maybe we'll make something
Me myself I got nothing to prove…”
“Five years of this,” she rolled her eyes, “How am I gonna cope?”
I suggested, “Improve your karaoke skills?”
She snorted, “If it comes to that, then we have officially hit rock bottom.”
“From the bottom, the only way is up,” I winked. The rover cut through the sand as we drove across the desert. I was singing along to raise spirits and Clarke refused to join me, but she was tapping the steering wheel in time to the music and I declared that in itself as a personal victory. “I don’t mind not driving,” I decided, “I can dance in the passenger seat.”
Clarke ducked her head and rolled her eyes, traces of the smile still remaining on her face as we cut across the land. That night, we slept in the rover on the flat land near the top of a hill, with a few of the surrounding area. I lay on my back on the roof, watching the stars as I drifted off, putting the radio down and breathing slowly. I closed my eyes, not expecting something small and wet to land on my forehead.
I shot upright, blinking and trying to figure out what it was and where it came from. Water. Another droplet landed on my hand, and I felt it wet my hair as I grabbed the radio and stowed it inside the rover, jumping down and shaking Clarke awake.
“What’s up? What’s happening? Are we under attack?” She sat up, startled.
“First of all, there’s no one to attack us, we are literally the last living souls on this planet that are above ground. Second of all, you gotta see this,” I pulled her out of the back door of the rover and she tilted her head back as we both stood there in the cold water for a moment.
She grinned in relief, her tears of joy mixing with the rain as it fell as we opened our mouths and let the refreshing water land on our tongues. We set up our bottles to collect the water and stood there in the rain until we were completely drenched, loving every minute of it.
~
The sandstorm had damaged the solar panels too badly for us to continue. The rover refused to budge so we were forced to continue on foot through the dead trees. Clarke scoffed, smiling. “Think you can kill us?” She asked the surrounding area, “Have at it.”
Wind whistled as we walked through the desert. We had been out of water for at least a day and I couldn’t take one more step. My lips were chapped and my face and hands were burnt almost raw from the unrelenting sun. “Hope,” I whispered, “I still have hope,” before I pitched sideways into the sand, unable to even think any more.
I woke up to the sound of Clarke screaming and it terrified me to think that something could’ve happened while I was blacked out. I saw her on her knees about two hundred metres away, and I wondered if I could get there, if I could get to her. “I’m done! Do you hear me?” She shouted, “I’ve lost my father, my mother! I lost my friends!”
I stumbled over, collapsing next to her, “Not all of them,” I whispered, my throat hoarse. I grabbed her hands, “We’re family, remember? We got this.”
“We got this,” she whispered. “How do you know?”
“We survived landing, Mount Weather, wars, A.L.I.E and a motherfucking death wave. Hell yeah, we’ve got this,” I squeezed her hand.
“We got this,” she whispered, more firmly this time. “We got this. We fought together, now we survive together. Easier said than done.”
I mustered a smile, “Since when has any of this been easy? Some of our best decisions have been made in chaos, remember?”
Before she could say anything else, a bird flew over our heads. Clarke and I locked eyes for a second before scrambling to our feet, following it desperately across the wasteland. She climbed the dune and I was close behind. I stopped in disbelief inches away from her, pinching myself and blinking my eyes to make sure that this wasn’t some sort of dehydration symptom.
Clarke gripped my hand tightly as she raised the gun and shot the bird that had led us here. We had food, and we were safe.
We had hope.
After cooking and eating dinner, we went exploring. Clarke was the first to spot it— the water— and I almost broke down in relief there and then at the top of the hill, but that would’ve meant I wouldn’t have been able to experience it, so I held myself together long enough to make my way down to the water’s edge next to her.
I took one look at Clarke before I began to shake off my jacket and remove the knives from it, laying them on the side as I kicked off my boots. I took off my cargo pants and I was left in my tank top and underwear as I dived into the clear water before remembering that I didn’t actually know how to swim. I tread water, kicking my legs to stay afloat as Clarke jumped in next to me. I splashed her, and she pulled a face before sending a wave of water back in my direction.
“Not fair! You hit me with way more!” I protested, splashing her back.
We had reached our sanctum. Our salvation. Our… Eden.
Upon further inspection, we realised that we had reached Shallow Valley. There wasn’t anyone left, and the village was a ghost town, but it was filled with wildlife and wooden huts and… and… hope.
“It’s like the death wave jumped over the entire valley,” I laughed.
She frowned, “Unfortunately, the radiation didn’t.” There weren’t any skeletons, but there were remains of Grounders, men, women and children, slumped over tables and chairs. Dead. Grounders burned their dead, we decided. So that’s what they deserved. It took three different small fires to do them all. We didn’t want to make anything bigger in case it got out of hand and we ruined the last survivable land on the planet.
~
58 days since Praimfaya
“By now, Monty should have the algae farm producing,” Clarke said into the radio on her daily chat with Bellamy. “How bad does it suck?” she laughed. “No offence, Monty. And we found berries, a whole field of them. They’re not very sweet, but they’re beautiful.”
I grinned down at her from across the village. It had only taken a giant death wave of radiation, but I had finally found a new favourite tree since the original one that I had at camp when we first landed on the ground. There weren’t any dropship seatbelts for me to strap myself into, so until I found something secure I couldn’t sleep up here, but it was comfy all the same.
Clarke had gotten changed into a pair of trousers and a comfy-looking purple top, and I had found a slightly newer version of my jacket and already modified it to carry weapons. Not that I really need weapons since there’s no one here, but—
Almost no one here.
A twig snapped loudly and I whipped my head around, expecting to see a small animal. Instead, a girl stood just outside of the clearing. She was maybe about six years old? I wasn’t sure, I’d never been good with figuring out people’s ages. Clarke stood up, raising her hands, “It’s okay, we don’t—”
The girl shot off into the forest and Clarke started after her. I jumped down from the tree onto the roof of the broken campervan next to it and then jumped onto the ground, rolling to not damage my legs. My knee still clicked though, and I winced. I’d almost forgotten how dodgy it can get, since I kept getting other injuries that were always worse enough to take my mind off it. Clarke pelted after the girl, shouting in Trig, “Please! I just want to talk to you.”
I followed at a sprint, catching up to Clarke as she looked around and tried to figure out where the girl had gone. She spotted her next to a large tree, peering out from behind it. “Hey,” I said quietly. “Ai laik Alyssa kom Skaikru.”
“We’re not going to hurt you,” Clarke pleaded, but the girl ran off. “Are you alone?” She tried asking her, “Are there others?”
“She must be a nightblood, that’s how she survived the radiation,” I realised.
Clarke nodded, “You are a nightblood, right? So—” She took a step forward and screamed as a bear trap sank into her leg, I gasped, looking around for more traps. The girl ran at Clarke and barrelled her over, swinging a knife frantically.
“Die Flamekeeper!” She screamed, and I realised she thought we had come to take her to be one of the nightblood novitiates. I pulled out a knife and her eyes widened at the sight of it, but I took it to my own palm and drew a thin line with it. Her eyebrows shot up and she ran. Not the reaction I was expecting, but it was the one I got.
“Hey!” Clarke called after her, trying to get her foot out of the bear trap. I helped her hold it open and she pulled her leg free before it snapped shut again, narrowly missing my arm. I slung her arm around my shoulders and we stumbled back to the village.
I cleared the table as Clarke sat on it, pulling off her boot and grabbing the small medical supply kit. She threaded a needle and moaned in pain as she stitched her leg back together. I knew I’d be no help because I definitely wasn’t anywhere remotely as skilled with medical procedures. I think I’ll stick to knives and guns instead.
I fell asleep on watch by the door in case the kid came back to take another shot at trying to kill us. Not that I’d blame her, I mean, we did sort of come into her home and take up residence. In our defence, we didn’t think there was anyone left alive in the first place. I woke up with a jolt and realised the knife that I had been holding was gone. I cursed, why the hell had I even fallen asleep in the first place? I burst inside to get to Clarke, who had just woken up as well. All her weapons had disappeared and so had her bag of belongings from next to her on the table. She slid down onto the floor and grabbed a wrench, ready to use it as a weapon as I joined her, pressing my back to the table beside her.
Once the light began to creep through the trees, there was no sign of the child. Clarke told me she wanted to clean her bear-trap wound in the river and I resolved to help her get there. She was stubborn, not entirely wanting my help and mostly relying on her good leg and the piece of Lexa’s throne, but I walked behind her and spotted her in case she tripped.
We got to the river and there the girl was, standing knee-deep in the water with a large spear. I watched as she thrust the spear into the water with a speak, impaling a nearby fish and bringing it up to the surface, smiling.
“Can you teach us how to do that?” Clarke asked, and the girl spun around, panicked. She ran for it.
“Stop! Give us back our things, please!” I called her, but no luck.
Clarke leant against the rock and pulled up her trousers, dipping her injured leg into the water and sighing in relief when it made contact. “Last three people on earth and one of them happens to be the child from hell,” she sighed.
I laughed, “You gotta hand it to her, kid knows what she’s doing.”
After Clarke had finished cleaning her wound, and the sun was almost directly overhead, we moved slightly into the shade of the trees, still sitting on the rocks. I put my earbuds in and turned the MP3 on, pressing shuffle and listening to the first song that started. Clarke sat next to me, sketching on a piece of paper for a few hours. I relaxed slightly. Not completely— that kid was still out there, and she was ready to fight— but enough.
It got late and we decided to go back to the village, so I waited for Clarke to put her boots back on and put my MP3 away. She had finished her sketch, and I smiled after looking at it. It was beautiful, like the rest of Clarke’s drawings, but it was also of the little girl. She weighed it down with a stone and left it on the rocks for her.
Two hours later, she hovered at the edge of the village while we ate dinner, not running away but not coming any closer either. It took one or two more days until she finally introduced herself.
Then, we welcomed Madi to the family.