Chapter Text
Bellamny’s hands were clenched tight as he watched over the bloody, yet still seemingly unaffected Lincoln on the second floor of the Dropship. The hatch opened behind him, Bellamy forcing his hands into a relaxed position asMiller crawled through the hatch.
“Did you talk to the Ark,” Miller asked, voice strong as confident as always, dirty hair sticking up in every direction as Bellamy watched him cross the space. “I talked to Digg’s mom, told her the news. John’s dad, and I’m supposed to talk to Roma’s parents later.”
“Thanks,” Bellamy mitered, nodding his head, ignoring the greasy curls falling against his forehead. “I owe you.”
MIller turned to face Lincoln, his face still impassive, yet vaguely angered by the sight of a bloody Grounder on the floor of the ship the Ark had sacrificed them on.
“Telling all these parents that their kids were murdered by Grounders,” Miller said, crossing his arms. “I just wish I could say we were getting them some justice.”
“We’re not killing him.”
“You were a lot scarier when you had that face paint on.” Miller said, reaching out and smearing a glob of unknown substance on Lincoln’s face.
Lincoln’s forehead shot up, headbutting Miller backwards, sprawling the younger man backwards across the floor of the Dropship. Bellamy stared at the Grounder his sister had taken to defending so fiercely, furrowing his eyebrows and crossing his arms in disdain and worry.
Clarke was sitting in the uncomfortable chair in front of the rigged up radio and video communicator Raven had set up, waiting to attend the Council meeting.
“Tell me about the Grounder,” Jaha demanded, his voice serious. “Can he provide any insight into how to survive winter?”
“We’re doing everything we can to prepare here,” Clarke said, her voice firm but high and reedy with nerves. “We’re gathering nuts and berries, cutting meats, digging for roots, but the truth is,” Clarke paused, frowning with worry. “We’ll freeze before we starve.”
“There’s good news on that front,” Councillor Kane interjected. “Accoriding to civil defense plans from before the war, there’s an old emergency aid depot not far from the landing site. Here are the coordinates.”
“In addition to supplies,” Jaha continued, his voice crackly from space. “It could provide shelter for the hundred and thousands of citizens coming down from the Ark.”
“And what makes you think it's intact?” Clarke asked, the fear of deceit heavy in her voice.
“It was designed to withstand nuclear warfare.” Kane said, his voice staticky and slightly disconnected.
“All right. It's worth a shot.”
“Chancellor,” Councilwoman Diana interrupted, her voice farther away from the radio than Clark would’ve preferred. “I have to object. Project Exodus is under way, the kids should sit tight in their camp until the first dropship launches.”
“Even if everything goes without a hitch, the hundred would die from exposure before relief arrives," Jaha said, his deep baritone serious. “I’d like a moment with Clarke alone, please, and I know there's a line of parents waiting to talk to their children. Clarke, we all are very proud of what you’ve done down there.”
Clarke nodded in acknowledgement, her hair matted slightly at the back of her head, pulling her tension headache tight against her corneas.
“Your mother…” Jaha continued.
“I don’t want to talk about my mother.” Clarke said firmly, clenching one fist tightly.
“Please, Clarke,” Jaha said, his voice going softer with a note of pleading. “Its time to forgive. Let me schedule a time for you and Abby to sit down…”
“Look,” Clarke interrupted. I know you both think that betraying my dad… killing him, was an unavoidable tragedy. But I don’t. I never will. So just tell me who'd be next and let someone who actually wants to talk to their parents have a turn.”
Clarke stood and turned to face the tent clap, striding to the exit and looking for the next person in line.
“Dax!” Clarke called, looking for the boy that was supposed to be next for speaking to his parents.
Clarke walked to Jasper after that, finding comfort in the scrawny boy’s familiar presence. Monty was with him, both of them cracking and eating some of the gathered nuts for winter.
“Hey,” Clarke greeted, her posture loosening within the comfort of her friends. “You guys seen Dax?”
“Over there,” Monty said, shoving his thumb to the meat crew.
Clarke nodded her thanks, striding over quickly, her boots squishing in the slowly softening soil of the camp. “Dax, you’re up.”
Dax nodded, heading over to the tent immediately, Clarke’s gaze following him for a brief moment before sitting down on one of the logs surrounding the massive fire pit one of the crew had completed just yesterday.
Bellamy’s hands were sore with muscle tension as he climbed down the ladder leading to the second floor of the dropship, his watchful eye catching Octavia sitting nearby.
“You’re still here?” He asked, one eyebrow raised as his boots, Ark Guard-issued soles landing with a clang on the metal floor of the ship he’d attempted to mil to be on.
“I’m not moving until you let me up there to see him,” Octavia said firmly, her arms crossed tightly.
“Get comfortable,” Bellamy said, turning away for a brief moment, only letting his eyes trail back to his sister once. “I let him live. Isn’t that enough?”
“He saved my life and yours.”
“I know you see it that way, but—”
“That's the way it is.” Octavia said, her voice lowering into an uncharacteristic growl of sorts.
“And he’s still dangerous.” Bellamy shot back, his core tensing with righteous anger and annoyance.
“Only because of what you did.” Octavia shot back, rising to her feet in outrage.
“Whatever twisted connection you think you have with that animal, forget it,” Bellamy ground out, his fists clenching. “You don’t get to see him, end of story.”
Bellamy’s boots pounded against the metal of the Dropship’s floor before Octavia bit out her next question. “Why do you even care if I ruined your life?” Her voice boomed, rising in volume but deepening with anger. “You should want me to go up there. Maybe you’ll get what you want, get lucky and he’ll kill me. Problem fucking solved.”
“Octavia, you know I didn’t mean that.” Bellamy bit out, his face twisted in agony just as Clarke entered the Dropship.
“Bellamy,” her melodic voice flowed through him, somewhat easing the tension of the fight she didn't know she interrupted.
Bellkamy walked over to her, the intent to leave strong, his strides meaningful. “The answer is still no. I won’t talk to Jaha.”
“Hey,” Clarke said, reaching out slightly. “Relax,” Bellamy stopped dead turning on one heel to face Clarke, one eyebrow raised with morbid curiosity. “That’s not why I’m here.”
“What then?” Bellamy asked, his voice considerably softer than before.
“The Ark found some old records of a supply depot near here.”
“What kind of supplies?”
“THe kind that might give us a chance to live through the winter,” Clarke said, her voice quiet and determined, Bellamy already knowing what she was going to ask before her plush lips reopened. “I’m gonna go check it out. I could use some backup?”
“Why are you asking me?”
“Well, because right now, I don’t feel like being around anyone I actually like.”
Ouch. Bellamy looked down and huffed a small laugh, a smirk finding its way onto his face. He glanced back at Octavia and then back to Clarke, his head bobbing in a nod before he could overthink it.
“I’ll get my stuff,” He said, already turning to the tarped door of the Dropship. “Meet you in ten.”
Clarke nodded, leaving as Bellamny sent one last glare to his still death-staring sister. Bellamy stalked out of the dropship, his jacket tight with the coiled strength of his clenched forearms.
“How are you feeling?” Clarke asked, her hands steady over Finn’s wound, even with Raven watching over his shoulder.
“Weak… bored, the usual.” Finn responded, his voice flat, still wincing as CLarke rebandaged the massive stab wound. “And grateful to be alive.”
“Well,” Clarke said, standing from her crouched position at his bedside and rubbing her palms on her pants. “If you want to stay that way, you need to rest.”
“I’ll tie him down if I have to,” Raven vowed, speaking up for the first time since Clarke had entered the tent, an awkward silence falling and Clarke started packing up.
“I’m going to be out of camp today,” Clarke said, stretching her neck out, turning fully to Raven and handing her a roll of gauze. “Can you change his bandages in a few hours?”
“Wait,” Finn interjected, reaching out a hand to Clarke’s arm, which was, thankfully, too far away. “Where are you going?”
“Just a little mission from the Ark. Nothing to worry about.”
“Its not safe out there,” Finn insisted, trying to sit up.
“Finn, Clarke is a big girl, she can take care of herself,” Raven said, frowning, which she was grateful for, as Clarke herself was no longer obligated to respond.
Even more thankfully, Bellamy poked his head in through the tent flap. “Clarke. Let's move on.”
“Make sure he stays in bed,” Clarke told Raven, ignoring FInn as he rolled his eyes and laid his head back down in displeasure, probably at who she was leaving with.
“Sounds like a plan.” The other girl responded confidently, sitting down by Finn’s bedside.
Clarke nodded one last time before grabbing her packed bag and heading out the tent, pointedly glancing back and forth between the abundance of rations in Bellamy’s pack and her own, noticeably lighter one.
“That’s a lot of rations,” she said, pointing at the quite literally overflowing pouches. “You know this is just a day trip, right?”
“A lot can happen in a day,” the older man replied, pointedly not looking as Octavia exited and reentered the Dropship.
Clarke started out of the partially built gates, hoisting her pack over one shoulder, her worn boots squelching in the post-rain mud of last night’s thunderstorm. Not long after, Belammy’s heavier footfalls followed her, the jingle of the metal hooks and buttons of his stolen Guard jacket loud in the thick silence of their journey.
Clarke’s feet were sore and begging for rest a few hours into the hike through the irradiated forests on the ebay to the supply depot.
“You know,” she said, unable to bear the silence any longer. “Preety sure the first dropship is coming soon. You can’t avoid Jaha forever.”
“I can try.” Bellamy responded, voice dry and tight with annoyance at her sudden speaking.
“The depot is supposed to be around here somewhere,” Clarke said, swiftly changing the subject to avoid tense silence. “Theres got to be a door. Maybe he'll be lenient.”
“Look,” Bellamy said, stopping flat and turning to her. “I shot the man, Clarke. He's not just going to forgive and forget that. Let’s just split up, cover more ground and stay within shouting distance.”
Bellamy was kneeling searching for a door when he heard Clarke shout that she found a door.
He was walking over when Clakre shouted in frustration, turning the corner to see her cradling her hands together, both of them red and raw.
“I think the door is rusted shut.” She said, her voice strained and tired.
“Here,” Bellamy said, reaching out and softening his voice to a more helpful, less aggravating tone. “Watch your foot and let me give you a hand.”
“Oh! Here.”
“Really think this place hasn't been touched since the war?” Bellamy asked, skeptically peering into the voice of the door they’d pulled open.
“A girl can dream,” Clarke said dryly, rubbing her palms over the annoyingly tight jeans she’d been wearing since they’d landed on this godforsaken planet. “Come on.”
He pulled out a flashlight from one of the loops on his belt and clicked it on, heading down into the abyss. As Bellamy walked forward he nearly tripped over a skeleton with ragged clothing, the bones fragile and balanced precariously on the stairs.
“Hell of a place to die.” He muttered, swiping the flashlight across the rest of the darkness.
“So much for living down here,” Clarke muttered, her voice barely echoing through the vast concrete stairway. “This place is disgusting. Damn it.”
Bellamy frowned, unused to the frustration and genuine distress in Clarke’s voice, used to her calm and constant composure. “Anything left down here is ruined.”
“They must have distributed most of it before the last bobs went off,” she said, the flashlight sweeping over her, hunched over a crate, her blonde curls creating a curtain around her face, which Bellamy was sure was pinched in conversation. “Hey! I found blankets.”
“Excited about a couple of blankets?”
“Well at least it's something.”
“How about a canteen or a med kit or a decent fucking tent,” Bellamy said, frown deepning as the flashlight illuminated empty box after empty box. “Ugh!”
Bellamy kicked the nearest barrel, seemingly filled with oil, jumping back a bit after a dozen or so automatic guns fell from the dark abyss of the drum.
“Holy shit,” Bellamy muttered, ignoring Clarke’s starked ‘What.’ “This changes everything! No more running from Grounders with spears. Ready to be a badass, Clarke?”
“Look,” she said, standing directly in Bellamy’s eyeline now, looking beautiful, haloed by the hundred-year-old dust in the air. “I’m not gonna fight you on this, I know we need them, but don’t expect me to like it.”
“Wouldn't dream of it, Princess,” Bellamy said, too excited to keep the grin from creeping onto his face. “We’re lucky these rifles were packed in grease. The fact they survived means we’re not sitting ducks anymore. Which also means that you need to learn how to use them.”
Clarke grimaced but nodded. She paused a moment longer but reaches down and grabs one of the grease-coated rifles from the pile, grasping another and throwing it at him, which he barely caught by the worn leather strap.
“So I just hold it on my shoulder?” She asked, hesitantly hoisting the weapon against her already mud and dust-coated shirt, having foregone her usual windbreaker that had more patches than his own.
“Yeah, just a little higher now,” Bellamy instructed, almost reaching out to fix it for her, maybe just desperate to feel the subtle strength and poise in her tensed shoulders. “Yeah, uh, that’s good. Uh, just watch and learn.”
Bellamy hoisted the rifle, chucking the flashlight so it still shined upon where he aimed, swiftly pulling the trigger but the bullet never emerging from the barrel. Bellamy frowned, reloading and trying again, but still no telltale bang of a gun.
“Still watching,” Clarke said, a mocking sarcasm in her words, though Bellamy could tell it was somewhat lighthearted.
“My bullets are duds, Princess,” he fired back, seemingly the only thing to fire as of late. “You try yours.”
Clarke aimed her gun, the pose and stance almost identical to his own. She pulled the trigger and a round fired somewhat to the side of the target.
“That was amazing! Ha,” she cheered, Bellamy’s chest warming at the excitement she rarely offered in his presence. “Am I horrible for feeling that?”
Bellamy shook his head, allowing himself a soft smirk, the darkness hiding it from Clarke. “Try again.”
“No,” she said, the grin seeping out of her voice, outweighed a serious instructive tone she most usually took with Bellamy in close range to herself. “We need to save the ammunition.”
“You need to practice, Princess. No use in ammunition if you can’t hit the target.”
“No,” Calrke said, apparently adamant. “We need to talk about how we;re gonna keep the guns around camp. Where we’re gonna keep them and a list of people who have access.”
Bellamy acquiesced, aiming a new gun he’d gathered from the pile and firing a round that actually managed to hit most of the target.
Clarke, as usual, ignored his success, still pressing. “You left Miller in charge of the Grounder. You must trust him.”
“You should keep him close,” Bellamy said, still peering at the guns, the flashlight still illuminating most of the surrounding space. “The others listen to him.”
“Should I keep him close? Bellamy, what's going on,” she pressed, her voice serious, one hand clasping his forearm. Bellamy tried to focus on her words and not the chill of her ice cold palm on his relatively warm skin. “You’ve been acting weird all day. All the rations you took? You’re gonna run. That’s why you agreed to come with me. You were gonna load up, take the supplies we need to survive winter and just disappear.”
Bellamy grimaced, the guilt eating up his heart, squeezing his lungs, and sucking up the blood from his veins. “I don’t have a choice,” he said, voice loud with pleading and drenched with desperation. “The Ark will be here soon and I’ll be dead.”
“So you’re just gonna disappear? Leave Octavia?”
“Octavia hates me,” Bellamy shouted, his voice echoing, pitching up with the pain of losing the only person he’d truly cared and taken care of. “She’ll be fine.”
Bellamy tried to ignore the way Clarke flinched when his voice cracked in the word ‘fine.’
“You don’t know–” Clarke started, her hand flexing around Bellamy’s arm like she wanted to comfort him but didn’t know how.
“I shot the Chancellor, Clarke! They’re going to kill me. Best case scenario, they lock me with the Groudner and throw away the fucking key, and there’s no way in hell I’m giving Jaha the satisfaction of seeing me in chains. Keep practicing, I need some air.”
Bellamy’s footsteps were heavy against the stairs, his ascent to the ground seemingly slower than the journey to the bunker completely. HIs arms were tense with corroded muscle pulled tight with upset tension, his lips flat with contemplation. Soon enough, his vision sent him sprawling, even the basest sense betraying him as he stared up at Chancellor Jaha. And behind him, their blurry figures slowly coming into tragic focus, were the three hundred and twenty people who died in the Culling that Bellamy himself could’ve prevented if he just left that damn radio alone.
“Bellamy Blake.” Chancellor Jaha’s voice boomed.
“How are you here,” he asked, his voice weak and shaking, almost begging for an explanation. “You’re on the Ark.”
“No. You shot me on the Ark,” Jaha corrected, his hands folded pristinely behind his back despite the cutting words. “But I’ve been waiting, here, for you.”
“I did what I had to do.”
“To protect Octavia?” Jaha asked, the question more mocking than he’d ever expect from the usually composed official.
“Thats right.”
“Pathetic,” Jaha spat, shaking his head. “Using your sister to justify your crimes. Your cruelty. Your selfishness.”
“If you’re gonna kill me,” Bellamy begged, bowing his head even further. “Just do it.”
“Why should I kill you,” Jaha asked, his voice seemingly farther away, as if his hearing along with his vision was tunneling. “Unlike the others, I survived your treachery.”
“What are you talking about?”
“The three hundred and twenty souls that were culled from the Ark so that others could live,” Jaha explained, his voice condescending. “You knew that they would be sacrificed.”
“The radio,” Bellamy gasped, hanging his head further. “I didn’t know that would happen.”
“It is not my forgiveness you should seek,” Jaha said, his voice going softer with pity. “It’s theirs.”
“Murderer,” one of the culled shouted, soon the others repeating to create a cacophony of misery that surrounded Bellamy’s soul with guilt and pain he’d never quite felt.
“Muderer,” Jaha finally spat, silencing the other voices but causing the ringing in Bellamy’s ears to reach a fever pitch.
“Stop!”
Clarke’s arms were still warped horribly tight around the horribly life-like mirage of her father when she said it. When she admitted that she knew that he wasn’t real.
“I wish I were,” her father muttered.
“How is this possible,” she asked, her voice quivering with unshed tears. “How are you… how?”
“I’m thinking why more important than how,” Jake, because this was not Clakre’s father, said, ever a scientist. “Why me?”
‘Because you’re my dad!’ Clarke wanted to shout. Instead, she said: “Because I miss you.”
“Think there’s more to it than that, kiddo,” Jake said, the phantom warmth of his arms tightening around her.
“You want me to forgive her,” Clarke realized, a sudden burst of chill seeping into the places where his arms would’ve touched, were he real.
“Hey…” he muttered, trying to be comforting. “Your mom loves you, Clarke.”
“She betrayed you,” Cakre said, her voice teetering on a shout. “How can I forgive her for that,” she demanded, watching as her father’s hallucinogenic face twisted in slight disappointment. “And that look isn’t fair. I’m trying. God knows all I do is try, but everyone is counting on me, and it's hard.”
“Come here,” Jake muttered, his ghostly arms pulling her close again. “I know, honey. It's been tough, hasn’t it?”
“I let someone get tortured.”
“Listen,” Jake demanded. “You’re doing the best you can.”
“You want me to say mom did the best she could,” Clarke said, her voice cracking with emotion.
“This is about what you want.”
“You’re dead because of her,” Calrke shouted, voice raw and scraping against her throat. “She doesn’t deserve my forgiveness.”
“Listen to me,” Jake demanded, his voice warping a bit.” “Forgiveness isn’t about what people deserve.”
“I’m sorry,” Clarke said, her eyes filling with tears. “I can’t.”
“Whatever,” Jake said, his voice sounding like it came through a warped microphone or a radio. “Crazy bitch.”
“Dad?”
“Please kill me,” Bellamy begged over the wailing ‘murderer’ shouts ringing through his mind. “Kill me! I deserve it. Please! I can’t fight anymore.”
“Don’t you know,” Jaha asked condescendingly. “Life is a fight.”
“What am I supposed to do?”
“Live. Breathe. Suffer,” Jaha said. “You owe them that. You want the peace of death. You have to earn it.”
Bellamy groaned in pain, clutching at his head, ignoring the grease in his hair and the dirt under his growing nails.
“Fight back,” Jaha bellowed. “Do you think you deserve to be free of your pain? Do you deserve that gift?”
Bellamy shook his head, years gathering beneath his eyelids. “Because you're gonna get it,” Jaha said, his voice warped, sounding younger and more muffled.
A gun cocked in the distance, at the edges of his senses. HIs vision shifted back into reality, Jaha gone, in his place. Dax, one of the machine guns from the bunker aimed between his eyes.
“Nothing personal,” the boy said, hoisting the gun.
Dax pulled the trigger. The gun didn’t fire. Bellamy lunged for the nearby gun, his fingers curling around the cold metal in a desperate attempt at arming himself. The gun disappeared.
“Put it down, Dax,” Clarke demanded, her voice peeking through the remaining fog like an angel coming down from the stars and saving him from the damnation he so agonizingly deserved.
“Should’ve stayed down there, Princess,” Dax said mockingly, and Bellamy felt a rush of pure rage at the use of the nickname he’d coined and used, once an insult now endearing, used in such a situation. “I tried to kill you, but here you are, and Shumway said no witnesses.”
“What is he talking about?” Clarke asked him, but Bellamy was at a loss of words for a moment, overcome with a horrible sense of cold dread on Clarke’s behalf.
“Shumway,” Bellamy finally managed to stutter. “He set it up; he gave me the gun to shoot the Chancellor. He got me on the Dropship.”
“Walk away now,” Dax advised, the loaded gun still hovering inches away from Bellamy’s nose. “Walk away and I won’t kill you.”
“Put it down,” Clarke persisted, her voice turning steely, like Bellamy had heard only once before.
“You’re choice,” Dax said, a horrible, evil smile creeping into his voice.
Clakre pulled the trigger of her own gun, one Belalmy hadn’t realized she was holding. The gun misfired. Dax sent off a few of his own rounds in her direction.
Bellamy felt a primal scream rip out of his lungs, a desperate ‘No!’ ringing through the forest’s clearing as he lunged at Dax. Clarke, may Bellamy forever be in the universe’s debt, was unharmed as she scrambled behind a tree, Dax quickly gaining the upper hand over Bellamy as the tussled, the gun strewn across the forest floor, bullets scattered around the two men. Behind the tree Clarke stopped trying to fire the gun, instead using it as a blunt instrument and striking the barrel against the back of Dax’s head.
“Get the hell off him!” Clarke shouted, the brief reprieve of Dax’s weight and fists allowing Bellamy to scramble to his feet.
Bellamy flinched as Dax’s fist drove into Clakre’s stomach, the burst of air from her lungs audible as Bellamy lunged for one of the stray bullets.
He buried the piece of metal in the younger boy’s neck.
Dax fell to the ground, dead before his body hit the damp forest floor.
Bellamy collapsed next to Clarke under a large pine tree, both of them panting with exertion and terror.
“You’re okay,” Clarke said, her hands shaking and her chest heaving, like she had to reassure herself before even daring to check Bellamy’s own slight injuries.
“No,” Bellamy said, his voice shaking almost as much as his blood-soaked hands. “I’m not. My mother… if she knew what I’ve done, what I’ve become— she raised me to be better. To be good.”
“Bellamy—”
“And all I do,” he whispered, voice cracking uncharacteristically. “Is hurt people. I’m a monster.”
“Hey…” Clarke said, grasping his arm with a shaking, cold hand. “You saved my life. You may be a total ass half the time, but I need you. We all need you. None of us would’ve survived if not for you. If you want forgiveness I can give that to you. You’re forgiven. Now come back with me.”
“Like you faced your mom?”
Bellamy watched Clarke’s quick flinch, the loosening of her grip and knew he shouldn’t have said it.
“You’re right,” she responded, her grip fully falling away, to Bellamy's distraught wanting for contact. “I don’t want to face my mother. I don’t want to face any of it, but all I think about every day is who we’re gonna keep alive, and we don’t have a choice.”
“Jaha will kill me when he comes down here.”
“We’ll figure something out.”
“Can we figure it out later?” Bellamy asked, almost pathetically pleading, like a child asking his mother for five more minutes of screentime.
Clarke just smiled and scooted a bit closer. “Whenever you’re ready.”
Belammy swore his heart melted a bit right there sitting on the ground. Bellamy felt bulletproof like he could face any challenge as long as Clarke was there, wearing that smile.
—
When Bellamy was finally pardoned, over the shitty radio Raven had to hodge-podged together he couldn’t even resist sweeping Clarke into a hug so tight that her feet lifted all the way off the tent floor. He spun her around three times, the both of them laughing so loudly that Jasper asked what happened when they exited.
Belalmy felt like he could take anything on so long as Clarke stayed his co-leader. Stayed his, even if he was the only one that felt that way.