They've been on the ground for months now. So many days filled with so many things that could have gone wrong. So many things that have. A stray spear. A piercing bullet. The grounders, the mountain men, their own people. Both of them had been so close to death before Clarke can barley remember a day she hadn't feared for her life. Or for his.
It must have been years ago now. Before she had been locked up in the sky box.
Those memories seem like a dream, or more like a ghost. Haunting her mind, just like her father had, like Finn had. Dead, that part of herself was dead. The person she used to be, the person she would have become on the Ark. Part of her is thankful for that. The Ark was no way of life, but neither is this.
She had spent so many sleepless nights wondering whether she would make it through the next day. She spent those nights trying so hard to think only of herself. That's what her mother would have wanted. That's what her father wanted for her back on the Ark. To stay out of it, to be selfish in the most basic. human way. To stay alive.
Clarke had happened upon this role. And the weight of it was crushing, but a little less so with him.
Bellamy.
And that's who she tried so hard to forget those nights when she curled up alone, eyes open but not seeing. Instead she watched, imagined, that grounder killing him in front of the dropship, or the blast blowing him away; a grounder's sword piercing his gut, or him hanging lifeless in Mount Weather's medical facilities. They were scarier than the images of her own death. Because she had seen so many of the people she cared about, loved, die in front of her. Because as much as she fears it, death would be an escape from the constant fear, the unending and unyielding pressure to make the right call. His death would do no such thing.
So when she finds herself running after him she isn't quite certain what to do next. Does he know that she fears his death more than her own? Does he know that she couldn't possibly bear the weight of it all without him? She isn't quite sure what that all means herself, so she makes a bet that he doesn't either.
She sees the gun there on the man's hip. Without thinking she grabs it, and without a plan she follows after Bellamy. She knows that if that door is opened the best bet for the survival of the human race is gone. The Grounder's have no concept of this complex technology. Without the people from the Ark they won't last a month. The agrarian system, the water tanks, the air ventilation structures all need maintenance and possible repairs. This wasn't a choice Clarke wanted to make. And it most certainly hadn't been easy. She'd mulled it over, looked at it from every vantage point, and God does she know that if she were in Bellamy's shoes she would be doing the exact same thing he was.
So what had them on such opposite sides? Other than circumstance and chance. Any other day she would be with him, pulling that lever, opening that door. But today is the last day of this life, and she couldn't risk losing the entirety of mankind.
She needed Raven. She needed Kane. She needed Octavia. In a multitude of ways, for personal, and for logical reasons. But sacrifices had always been made in the name of survival. At least that's what she kept telling herself anyway.
Perhaps if she kept telling herself that the visions would fade, and sleep would finally take her at night. Clarke could rest until morning without the pain in her head, and her fist clenched in her blankets. Perhaps if she let herself believe she could pull the trigger no matter who was on the other side she would be free of this guilt. But she knew that wasn't going to happen, even if she wanted it to.
He meant too much to her. In ways that scared her, and in ways that brought a calm to her. Bellamy was a great friend, a strong leader. A partner in the truest sense. He could be stubborn and impulsive, but he had a quick instinct that was rarely wrong. He had a compassion that people on the ground, herself included, were lacking. Bellamy held his conviction, and devoutly clung to his promises. He had made mistakes, just as she had. He felt the pressure and the guilt that she did, and yet he still found a way to use that pain to lead their people. She found in him all the parts of herself she lacked, or hid away. And even if he didn't feel what she did, Clarke clung to him like a raft in a stormy sea. He had such a good heart, even if he couldn't see it. Clarke wasn't so sure she could say that about herself, not anymore, but when it came to Bellamy she was certain.
"Bellamy stop!" She rushed through the door, just in time to see him stop on the metal stairs, his hands shooting up as she points the gun at him. He doesn't look frightened, more like he's trying to talk her off the edge of a tall building. That's what it feels like. Gasping for air, her blood rushing, pounding in her ears. Like one wrong move and everything could come crashing down.
"We don't have time for this," Bellamy yells, "the radiation is getting worse and people are dying up there!"
He moves toward the door again, and without another thought to her shaking hands, or to her fading resolve, she fires a warning shot.
The shock runs through her body, and she watches him duck, shielding his face. He looks at her, and she feels a newfound sense of shame rise in her.
"Clarke," He gasps, "what are you doing?" She doesn't know. She's never imagined this scenario before. Yes she had sent him to Mount Weather; she could have been the cause of his death there, or anywhere on the ground in actuality. They've been fighting for so long that Bellamy's death on her command had been an inevitable factor for so long. But then they had found their way back together, and she had tried her best to keep him safe. She now had to face the possibility of his death at her own hands.
Clarke looked up at the man who had stood by her since the beginning, even when she messed up. Even when she had to make the tough choices, and people had to die. The look of betrayal on his face brought tears to her eyes. Hours ago he had told her that he understood what she had done. She had believed that because he was the one who told her. She was hoping he would believe it too.
"What I have to. Like always." She hopes that he understands. She hopes that Bellamy sees that she doesn't want to make this choice without him. That with him by her side Clarke has led her people, and together they've made horrible decisions that they only made because they had to. This wasn't any different. "Now get away from the door."
It wasn't a question, or a command, but a plea. But he doesn't even let her finish, "No."
"This isn't like shutting the dropship door," He continues, "Or pulling the lever in mount weather, or in the city of light! We knew what we were stopping then. Now we know nothing!"
It stings, hearing all the things she had done in the past. All the sacrifices she has made. And even with Bellamy at her side, the pain stuck with her, ate away at her. Clarke came down to the ground with a death sentence looming over her head. It feels now, as though that is her destiny regardless of all that has happened. Like the things she has done are fated to tear her apart from the inside out, until who she was on the Ark is unrecognizable, even to herself.
And despite this, Clarke clings to the only thing that has ever gotten her through her pain. Survival. They need to survive, if only to find another justification for all the pain she has caused to others. If she helps them live, find happiness - then wasn't it all worth it?
"We know that if that door stays shut, the human race survives." Her voice sounds shaky, even to her own ears. She isn't convincing him, she can tell by the look in his eyes. "Please."
Bellamy looks into Clarke's eyes the way he had so many times before. Like she held to answer to the universe in them, like she could make this one call and they would figure it all out later. Together.
She wonders why Bellamy Blake is enough for her. Because the guilt of leaving them; Kane and Octavia and Raven and all the others, it will surely find her. Slowly chip away at her sanity and whisper doubt and hatred and shame into her ears until it festers in her heart. But for some reason, in this moment, she knows the only people she needs to survive all of that – they are on this side of the door.
He stares her down, "You're going to have to make it a kill shot." His brows furrow, his voice is barely above a whisper, "It's the only way you're going to stop me."
Her hands shook. She didn't notice. Clarke couldn't feel the cold steel beneath her fingers anymore, her pointer ghosting over the trigger. He looks like her father. Nothing about him physically of course, Bellamy was all dark. His hair, his skin, his eyes. But those eyes are what made her think of her dad. The way he had looked at her mother before the airlock had opened. He had looked so defeated, so betrayed.
That's how Bellamy looked at her now. Like she would do it. She watched him shift on his feet, his eyes dart from the gun to her face, the way he took in frantic shallow breaths. Bellamy Blake thought that she could shoot him. And she should've been able to. The fate of humanity rested on this choice, and yet she found herself breaking. The tears flowing freely as she lowered the gun. He turned from her without a second thought and she let him go. He was running from her, from her choices, from who she had become. Clarke knew that Bellamy thought he was making the right choice. And maybe he was. If this is what she would have to do to survive, if this is who she would have to be. Did she even deserve to?