A/N: Content warning for descriptions of the dead
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She kept watch.
What she watched was bodies masquerading as grass.
Octavia navigated her way through the dead, tip toeing rather than walking. She stumbled across a body she recognised as someone she had only talked to a few days ago.
She was told to keep her eyes darting across the perimeter - listening, looking, and feeling for changes in her environment. This was not how she had been trained to keep watch. Instead, her eyes were trained to the ground, finding places for her feet to go. Places without the dead.
She'd look up, she'd look down. She wanted someone to fight, but all she found were flies. Their incessant buzzing made her chest tighten. She slapped the air around her. Swatting each scavenger that dared to include her among the dead. With everything they had to feed on, they still sought her out, claiming her as one of the fallen.
She stopped for a moment. Swearing in her adopted tongue, she wanted them to know that a grounder was angry with them, that a grounder wanted them to stop. Between her inflamed insults, and accusations, the sky was the only one to reply. Thunder rumbled in heavy waves above her, and rain began to fall.
Octavia looked at the clouds, and shook her head at the sky she had come from.
"Is this your answer?!" she yelled to no one in particular. "Is it?"
She took in short breaths, choking on the humidity of the rain soaked air. She pulled her hand against her nose, smelling the drips of fresh water that fell. She tried to smell anything but the death around her. Closing her eyes from the carnage, she tried to remember her friends. She had expected to see the faces of the 100. All of the young souls that had fallen from the sky with her, but she couldn't see any of them.
In her mind, the ground was empty - empty and red. In this place she was alone. Keeping watch, keeping her eyes to the ground. When she looked to the grass ahead of her she saw patches of green. But as she stepped closer her feet sunk, and the ground was moist. Water rose beneath her. It coagulated and darkened, bubbling to the surface, the water became blood.
Choking again, she turned around and was awaken from her nightmare only to be back in the reality that triggered it - a field of bodies.
"Octavia!"
The voice came from behind her and suddenly she was a soldier again. Octavia straightened her posture and held her sword tightly. She turned around and saw Clarke standing in the distance. Placing her sword back in its holster, she retraced the path between the dead. The steps she made were not as sickly thick with blood as in her waking dream. But the rain created mud, and the mud fused with the blood - softened it, making its gaping wound that much deeper.
"I've created a path," she mentioned to Clarke, as she noticed the other woman's eyes wander.
Clarke just nodded in that knowing way that she did. Not keen to offer sentiment, she let Octavia know that Indra was doing better, and she informed Octavia of Lexa's plan. She expected more of a response from Octavia, but the other woman just raised an eyebrow and scoffed at her message. Pointing her head towards Lexa's tent, Clarke let Octavia know that the Commander had requested to speak with her.
Octavia opened the flap of the tent and looked first for Indra. She passed one of the Commander's guards who let her know that her mentor had been moved to a second tent set up for her recovery.
"The bodies will be moved in the morning. It's a difficult task, but it'll take a while for additional troops to arrive. I will need everyone's help to move them."
Octavia nodded her head. Not looking at the Commander. All she could think about was the task before her, and how many times she might be asked to do it in the future.
"Is this what we do now? Collect the bodies of our friends." Octavia replied.
Lexa had become accustomed to defiance. Her own people had questioned her military strength, while the sky people had questioned her ability to maintain peace. Octavia had questioned everything.
"War leaves casualties," Lexa offered.
She knew as soon as she said it that her flat statement would only act as a trigger for the other woman's anger.
"You dismiss your people's lives like they're just numbers, and not people with names and families. It's just like Tondc all over again."
It was hard for Lexa to hide the pain that memory offered her. But while she quickly glanced over to Octavia, she stiffened her jaw and made sure her eyes reminded the young soldier just exactly who was in charge here.
"It's not the same," Lexa offered. "No one knew this would happen. I wouldn't have left them here if I knew—"
Octavia walked the extra steps towards her Commander. "Someone always knows when a slaughter is about to happen."
Lexa breathed in and stepped away from Octavia. She went to her table and focused on pouring a drink, instead of the angry woman behind her.
"Them or us, the blood still soaks the ground. And there's always bodies for us to move. I thought you were a coward…"
Lexa whipped around, ready to reach for the sword she left on the stand. Waiting, she saw that Octavia had more to say.
"At Tondc you let them die, and for what? For a battle you decided not to fight any way. Clarke told me about your plan for peace. How long do we have to wait before someone else gives you a better offer?"
Lexa smacked Octavia across the face. Turning away, Octavia could taste the familiar flavour of blood in her mouth. She washed it around her gums, quick to discover a loosened tooth. She swallowed the blood, and looked back at her commander.
"I earned that, but it felt good saying it," Octavia said rubbing her cheek. "I said I thought you were a coward. But who isn't?"
Lexa walked back to the table and lifted up her drink once more. Maintaining order was important as Heda, but keeping the peace with Clarke was vital. By leaving her hand to hold her drink she at least hoped she'd be taking away the temptation to hit Clarke's friend again.
"Arkadia is full of cowards. Full of people whose only experience with grounders has been violence and death. So they vote with their fear, and let warmongers like Pike take control. They think this slaughter, and the next one, and the next one will make up for the people they've lost."
"Blood will have blood," Lexa added.
"Yeah, the ground is soaked in it."
Lexa looked down at Octavia's shoes. Bits of grass shards from here and from Arkadia had attached themselves to her boots. Incased by mud, they held traces of blood, and if she looked closer, she thought she saw a piece of flesh.
"My brother can be an idiot. My people… the people I came from can be foolish, but they want to survive. Everything they did up there and down here, was about survival. They may be scared, and it may make them act like idiots. But if you make survival more appealing than vengeance, then they'll have to listen."
Lexa passed Octavia her drink. "You won't live to call me a coward again Octavia, remember this."
Octavia carefully took the drink from her commander and nodded her head in an act of acceptance. Taking the drink she felt the warm liquid mix with the blood that still stagnated in her mouth. It had begun to dry but the drink had loosened it again. She covered her disgust and swallowed it quickly.
"Thank you Commander," she added, passing the drink back to Lexa.
"You should get some sleep Octavia. Clarke will need to be replaced on watch in a few hours."
"I'd prefer to stay watch if you don't mind. Clarke will need sleep more than I will."
Lexa mumbled something in her native tongue. It was unfamiliar to Octavia and she questioned it's meaning.
"It's an old saying. It means, who watches the watchmen?" Lexa added, "Some people once believed that someone in the sky watched us."
Octavia tried not roll her eyes at that sentiment. There was no one in the sky now to watch anyone. And if her Commander was going to get metaphorical on her, she doubted the stars gave a damn either. Even the clouds she'd yelled at only responded in rain. Nobody watched them. Nothing remained. Everything had fallen to the ground.
Octavia walked to the exit of the tent. She peeled open the flap and saw Clarke trying to move bodies in the fading light. The ground smoothed out as the bodies slid against the sickly floor of grass and blood. In a few days time, after all the bodies were moved and the rain fell again, she imagined the area as dense and green as it once was. What flesh and blood remained would sink beneath the surface, feeding and nourishing the soil. The ground would remember, but fed and nourished the grass would be eager to sprout again.
Octavia looked back at the Commander. Tired, she shrugged her shoulders.
"There's no one in the sky watching us Heda. Only the ground watches us now."
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A/N: This was my first ever 'The 100' fic, so I hope I got all the details accurate. Thanks for taking the time to read :)