Day 1

Clarke

The little girl woke up to the smell of burning.

Heat seemed to swallow her, an uncomfortable blanket that just kept squeezing and tightening its grip. Maybe if she didn't open her eyes, she would realize this was all a dream. Maybe the blanket would fall away.

Something else wrapped around her, besides the heat. Someone's arms. It doesn't matter who they are. She thought. This is all a dream and I'm about to wake up. So it doesn't matter whose arms are around me.

Her eyes squeezed shut, tighter and tighter, but instead of waking up, more tears just squeezed out of her eyes, dripping down her cheek.

There was nothing to do but open her eyes. She had to face the flames.

She opened her eyes, and turning her head, realized the arms wrapped around her belonged to a corpse.

A scream bubbled from out of her throat, causing her to start hacking and coughing. There was too much smoke in her eyes, too much smoke in her lungs. She was trapped in an inferno, and the last thing she was going to see before she died was a corpse.

She clenched her hand, realizing that she was holding onto a plastic card. Chubby fingers clutched onto it for dear life. "I'm gonna die." She thought. "I'm gonna die."

She was paralyzed by the heat and the fear and the confusion, all of it too overwhelming, all of it seeming to break her down piece by piece. Curling in a ball, she just willed it to stop. Coughs exploded from her throat, the smoke weakening her body, until she could barely move. Until all she could do was crawl and drag herself across the metal floor.

Everything will be fine if I just climb out of the door. Everything will be fine…

But the outside was no better. The smell of burning grass filled her nostrils, and she started coughing up blood. She was dying. She was already dead.

She closed her eyes and started swaying back and forth, back and forth. Everything was spinning, everything blurred, and she was sure she was going to black out-

Until a hand grabbed hers. "Come on." A boy told her, gently and calmly and completely non panicked. She followed him out of the fire, coughing and hacking the whole way.

He must be some sort of angel. She thought. What did I do to deserve an angel?

She ran with her guardian angel, ran on weakened legs, ran as fast as her body would let her. Running on pure adrenaline, pure fear, pure terror. The world was on fire- the heat still seemed to lick the bottom of her feet. Nothing stopped spinning and blurring-

And then, slowly, they were away from it. Away from the monster that was the fire. Clear, pure air flooded into her throat after every deep breath.

They stopped, to the relief of the girl. "Stay." The boy ordered.

"Don't leave me." The girl's eyes overflowed. "I can't…"

"You'll be OK. I promise I won't let you get hurt." The boy's eyes softened. "I'll be back soon."

The last thing she saw before she blacked out were his deep, brown eyes.

The girl woke up to another fire. She scurried to sit up, to escape lest she trapped by more heat, more flames, more smoke, but a hand on her shoulder stopped her.

"Relax." He said. "It's just a campfire. I'm roasting some of the food I could salvage from that metal ship we woke up on."

She stared at the boy. He seemed young… about her age. A mop of hair covered his face, but she could still see the smattering of freckles on his cheeks and nose. Brown eyes poked out from under the disheveled, curly locks of hair.

The girl cocked her head. "You don't look like an angel. Or any sort of protecter, really." The girl blurted out.

"What-" The boy stammered in confusion.

"You look too young. And too wild. And not clean enough." She noticed some dirt on his face. "You just seem too much like a… a kid."

The brown eyes rolled in frustration. "Because I am. I'm not some angel." The boy rolled his eyes. "And excuse me for having dirt on my face. It's not easy saving the life of a bratty little kid."

"I'm not bratty! I was just saying the truth." The girl was taken aback. Who was he to call her bratty? "You don't seem very nice yourself."

"Whatever. Just be happy I saved your life." The boy turned away from her and faced the fire.

The girl squeezed her hand into a fist, and realized the plastic card she was holding when she had woken up wasn't in her hand anymore. Did she drop it?

"Where is it?" She screeched. "Where's the card?"

"What, this?" He held it up over her head.

"Give me!" She swiped the card from his hand.

"What's it say?" The boy asked through a mouthful of food.

"Don't eat with your mouth full! And it says; Clarke Griffin. Age 10. Good luck." The girl said. So. Her name was Clarke.

"Huh. I'm the same same age as you." The boy grimaced. "The card says that I'm 10, too. My name is Bellamy Blake, by the way."

"So, Bellamy Blake, you might not be an angel, but do you have any idea where the we are?" The girl- Clarke, rather- grabbed some meat off the of the spit. Delicious. Her stomach begged for more, but she wasn't going to be rude and take more than her fair share.

"I have no idea." Bellamy sat down and looked into the fire. "I don't really remember… anything."

"I don't, either." Clarke sank back down, still gripping onto the card. The only clue she had to her past. The only key to her clouded memories. A gaping pit seemed to open up in her heart, and she was falling, falling. No idea where she was. All she had was fear.

She had to put on a strong facade, couldn't let this boy think she was weak and small and just a little scared girl. But the truth was, that was exactly who she was. She was terrified. It was dark, and she was alone, except for this one boy she didn't even know. At least, before, she had thought she had an angel to protect her. The only thing keeping her safe now was a 10-year-old kid and herself.

"Hey, we're going to be OK." Bellamy's eyes seemed to cut right through her semblance of bravery, his voice softening. Clarke willed back any witty remarks and stared back at him. They weren't the eyes of a guardian angel, but they were human. And they willed for her to trust him, to trust that they would survive. Together.

"OK." Clarke leaned back and looked to the sky. It was kinda… pretty. If you cared about that stuff. So many stars, framed by tall trees… crickets chirping in the distance, a cool breeze on her face. She could get used to this.

She closed her eyes, laid down on the damp ground, and willed herself to go to sleep.

Clarke was running through metal hallways. She heard a woman's voice in her head; "Go. Go. Run!"

The woman's voice pounded through her body and forced her to keep on going. She didn't know where was was headed, but the monster behind her would kill her if she stopped.

But she was too slow, even with the woman's voice encouraging her. Or maybe the monster was just too fast. It finally caught up to her, grabbing her. Stuffing her into a metal cage, which started dropping and dropping and dropping and dropping...

Clarke screamed, jolting awake. Sweat dripped off of her brow, and she started shaking. It was only a dream, only a dream…

Bellamy scurried over to her and before she could even blink, he wrapped his arms around her. She buried her face in the hollow between his shoulder and neck. "It's OK, Clarke. It's OK."

"It… it was chasing me." Clarke sobbed, shivering into Bellamy's chest. The smell of the smoke of the fire and pine needles on his shirt filled her nose. "And I wasn't fast enough to run away." Bellamy just kept on rocking her, back and forth, back and forth, back and forth… Clarke started to calm down, her dream fading from her mind, and all she could think of was Bellamy. He was real, unlike the dream. He was there.

"No one is going to hurt you." He murmured into her ear. "I won't let that happen. We're in this together."

Bellamy leaned backwards, laying on the ground… Clarke used his head as a pillow. His breath was steady, his chest rising up and down, up and down, up and down. His heart slow. She measured his breaths and the rising of his chest and the beat of his heart until she fell asleep.