Operation Rescue

Part 1:

All Fades to Black

"Octavia, I don't know about this," said Jasper. "It seems like a bad idea. Especially after what happened with Wells."

"Charlotte murdered Wells," Octavia reminded him, gripping his hand tightly as she led him through the dense thicket of trees, "not the grounders. There hasn't been any sign of them since their attack on you, so I say that the coast is clear and that we're free to explore wherever we want."

"Your brother would say differently," he pointed out, causing Octavia to scowl. Everyone in the Hundred knew that things between the pair of siblings had been tense since the whole 'Atom' situation; Octavia was done letting her brother dictate her actions. "If Bellamy knew I allowed you to come out here at night by yourself, he'd kill me. And just because the grounders haven't made an appearance lately, doesn't mean they won't. And let's not forget about your brother's psycho lackey!"

"Murphy?" Octavia questioned as she pushed aside some branches to clear their path. The billions of twinkling stars in the darkened sky were their only light to go by, cutting through the forest's foliage like tiny laser beams. "Murphy was banished."

"Doesn't mean he's still not lurking somewhere. He's never exactly been one for the rules."

Octavia shook her head, letting loose a few strands of hair that she had tucked behind her ear. She turned to face him, still holding his hand although they had slowed to a stop so it was no longer necessary, and Jasper suddenly felt very nervous, out here in the woods with a beautiful girl, alone, a girl who had kissed him once and who he was insanely attracted to. Out here in the dark, bathed in moonlight, she appeared the equivalent of a goddess. His hand felt sweaty and awkward in hers, and he resisted the urge to nervously wipe his palms on his jeans. He wished he could be suave and charming while he was around her, like Finn.

Then again, word circling around camp was that Finn was actually a bit too charming, and he was apparently nothing but a 'two-timing jerk' (Clarke's words, not his).

"Murphy won't come back," Octavia was saying, a slightly amused smirk on her face. "He's too scared that my brother will follow through on his threat to chuck him off the side of that ledge."

"Would he?"

Octavia considered that for a moment before shrugging. "Probably."

She was well-aware of what everyone thought of her brother. They all thought him to be a power-hungry maniac who only cared for himself. But Octavia knew better. He may have been controlling, and at times a complete jackass, but under that tough exterior he put up was a good heart. Like how he had protected that girl, Charlotte. She wasn't aware of exactly what went on that night by the ledge, but she did know that Bellamy had felt responsible for Charlotte, and had for some reason felt obligated to protect her.

Poor Bellamy. The one time he actually allowed himself to care for someone that wasn't her, and they went and threw themselves off a cliff.

She shook those thoughts away as she looked at Jasper, who was standing much closer than she thought he'd been before. She could almost feel his breath on her skin, sending tingles through her body. Her chest felt warm as she looked at him, all pale and looking so nervous, brown hair falling into his eyes. Her chest tightened, and suddenly all she wanted him to do was touch her. She wanted to feel his hands on her bare skin. She knew what this feeling was, she had felt the same way briefly with Atom; it was desire, lust, her teenage hormones kicking into overdrive. All these feelings were completely unfamiliar to her. She had been locked up her entire life, and had hardly ever been around a boy who wasn't her brother. All these new feelings were scary… and exhilarating.

Her tooth dug into her bottom lip, and her eyes were inexplicably drawn to Jasper's mouth. God, how she wanted to kiss him again.

The same trance that held her seemed to have taken ahold of Jasper as well, for he stared at her, mesmorized. Slowly, he reached out to brush a strand of dark hair from her face.

She kissed him.

She didn't know what had come over her, but suddenly she was pressing her mouth to his, and he staggered back, shocked. And this was no simple quick-and-sweet kiss like the one on the drop-shift, this was a full-on lip-lock. Heat surged through her body as Jasper came out of his frozen state, kissing her back with equal fervor. Her back was pressed back into the trunk of a tree as she reached up to wrap her arms around his neck.

But, before it could escalate any farther, Jasper pulled back. Both of their breathing was labored, their faces flushed, and Jasper rested his forehead on the tree trunk Octavia was pressed against, letting out a breathy chuckle. "Wow," was all he could manage to say.

Octavia smirked, feeling oddly smug that her kiss had made him speechless. She seemed to have that effect on him. "That bad, huh?" she joked.

Jasper's eyes widened in a way that was almost comical, seeming unaware that she had been joking, horrified by the suggestion. "No, no, of course not! It was wonderful, really! Great! One of the best kisses I've ever had… though, granted, I haven't had many but…"

She laughed, cutting off his rant. "Jasper, relax! I was joking!"

"Oh." Jasper's cheeks flushed in embarrassment, and Octavia giggled. But then Jasper frowned, giving her a nervous glance. "Octavia, what about Bellamy?"

"What about Bellamy?"

"Well…" Jasper hesitated. "He's very protective of you. Won't he get mad when he finds out I kissed you?"

The corners of her mouth turned up when she realized that Jasper was nervous because of her brother, but he wasn't nervous for himself despite the fact that Bellamy could quite easily beat him to a pulp without breaking a sweat. No, he was nervous for her. It was cute.

"First of all," she began, "I kissed you, not the other way around. Because I wanted to. The only thing you're guilty of is kissing me back. Second of all, screw Bellamy. He's my brother, and I love him, but he needs to learn that I'm not a little girl anymore. I can make my own decisions. Including who I want to kiss."

Octavia smiled at him and entertwined their fingers. Jasper stared down at their enterlocked hands, a smile slowly forming on his face as well.

Behind them, a twig snapped.

They jumped apart, both of them wildly alarmed as their heads swivelled in the direction of the noise. There was the sound of leaves rustling, as if someone were moving quickly through the trees, but from what they could see, there was no one there.

Icy fear bloomed in Jasper's chest, and his heart jumped into his throat. He knew this had been a bad idea. Why hadn't he just listened to his instincts?

"It's probably nothing," Octavia tried to reassure, but her voice was shaky and she sounded as if she was more trying to reassure herself. "It's just some stupid kid trying to play a joke."

Leaves rustled again, this time closer, and Jasper gulped down the lump that had formed in his throat. "Octavia, we should go. We need to get out of here."

But Octavia was shaking her head, eyes scoring the trees above them. "It's nothing," she muttered. "It's nothing."

"Octavia, we need to leave," he tried again, "now." The last thing he needed was another spear through the chest. And if anything happened to Octavia… well, the grounders wouldn't need to kill him, then. Bellamy would do it for them.

Octavia turned, looked back and forth between him and the place where the noise was coming from, before nodding. There was fear in her eyes. "Yeah. Okay."

She shuffled closer to Jasper's side, holding onto him by the material of his jacket as he began to push through the branches of the surrounding trees, searching for the path that would lead them back to camp, where they would be safe surrounded by the others. They had cut through the woods this way… he knew the path back had to be close by…

And suddenly, all those thoughts flew from his mind as Octavia let out a small shriek beside him. She was yanked away from him roughly, and suddenly she was being hurtled through the air, her surroundings a useless blur of colors as her limbs flailed wildly, searching for solid ground when there was none to be found.

She hit the ground with a hard thud, the impact vibrating through her body like a dozen knives. She skidded across the leaves and twigs, digging her nails into the dirt to halt her sliding. Her head spun as she raised it to look for her attacker, her body aching. She swayed as she tried to sit up, and she saw double; two Jaspers ran toward her in alarm, shouting her name.

Her eyes widened as she looked at him. Jasper! she tried to shout, but the words wouldn't come out. The hulking figure that had come up behind him brought down his arm hard on the back of Jasper's head.

Jasper staggered forward, his eyes rolling into the back of his head, and Octavia let out a piercing scream as he crumpled to the ground, face planting into the dirt. The man who had hit him stepped over him carelessly, walking over to her, looking her over as though she were an object he wished to buy. At his side, appeared two more figures, both just as bulky, all wearing identical armor and hunting gear that concealed their faces. But despite this, Octavia had no difficulty putting together who they were.

Grounders.

Octavia scrabbled away from them, rocks scraping away at her palms. She shook her head wildly, panicked, and the grounder who had knocked out Jasper grabbed a fistful of her hair, yanking her up, her feet dangling in the air beneath her. She let out a hiss of pain and tried to glare at them, but all she felt was the overcompassing fear.

"What should we do with 'er?" one of the other grounders questioned. "Kill 'er? She was trespassin'."

Grounder #3 cocked his head at her. " 'dis one's a girl," he said. "We can use 'er."

Octavia felt a shudder go up her spine at that. Grounder #1, the one who held her up by the hair, appraised her for a moment, considering. Then he nodded. "Yes. We'll take this one. Leave the boy."

Octavia's eyes widened. "No,"she pleaded. "No!" She thrashed in his hold, not caring about the unbearable pain it caused her scalp. "Please, let me go, don't do this…!"

Tears ran down her cheeks as she struggled against his hold and, giving her a disgusted look, the third grounder hit her hard across the face. "Shut up!" he ordered, and the force of the blow caused her to fall to the ground.

She whimpered, spotting Jasper's crumpled form only inches from her. "Jasper…" she croaked, attempting to crawl to him.

Pain suddenly exploded in the back of her skull. She gasped loudly, choking, and someone grabbed ahold of her ankles. Her fingers dragged vainly in the dirt, and she shrieked as they pulled her away.

The scream echoed through the camp, sudden and shrill. Bellamy's eyes immediately shot toward where his sister was supposed to be stacking firewood, but he already knew - and dreaded - that he wouldn't find her there where he had seen her last. He would recognize the voice of the person who screamed anywhere.

Octavia.

And she wasn't there. Jones, one of the boys who had agreed with Murphy in his expedition to kill Charlotte, was stacking the firewood along with another kid whose name Bellamy couldn't remember, but where Octavia was supposed to be working beside him, there was no one. He should have known; she'd been dead set on disobeying his every order lately.

Marching purposefully toward Jones and grabbing him by the lapels of his jacket, he gave the younger boy a hard shake. "Where's my sister?!" he demanded, trying not to show his panic. Anything could have happened to her. "Well?! Where. Is. She?! Tell me, or I swear to God, I'll-"

"I-I don't know!" Jones stuttered. "I swear I have no clue! She went off with that kid, what's his name, Jasper, a few moments ago! I didn't-"

Bellamy gritted his teeth, resisting the unbearable urge to punch him. "And you didn't stop her?! I told you not to let her out of your sight!"

Jones paled, most likely remembering what had happened to the last guy who had disobeyed Bellamy's orders when it came to his sister, and how he had ended up strung up in a tree for the rest of the night. "Bellamy, I swear, I didn't see…"

But Bellamy was no longer listening. With an angry and worried mutter of "Damnit, Octavia," he was bolting off in the direction where his sister's scream had come from, the worst case scenarios running rampant in his mind as he reached the line of trees. He couldn't help but notice that the scream had come from passed the wall they had built to keep out the grounders, and shook his head. What the hell had she been thinking?

If anything had happened to her on his watch, that Jasper kid was so dead.

"What the hell was that?" Raven exclaimed after the scream split the air.

Clarke shook her head, worried and bewildered as she raised herself out of her makeshift hammock. "I have no idea."

Ever since Raven's pod had landed on Earth a few days ago, she had been sharing a tent with Clarke. They had no extra tents - the members of the Hundred had taken up all the supply to use for themselves - so Clarke had offered to share with the outgoing girl. Though Clarke was ashamed to say, that when the girl had first landed on the ground, Clarke hadn't taken to her well, especially after the bombshell of learning that she was Finn's girlfriend; his very serious girlfriend. But upon the realization that she had been taking her feelings of pain and anger towards Finn out on Raven, when she no doubt felt just as betrayed as Clarke did, she had been horrified by her actions and had went out of her way to make amends with Raven.

They weren't exactly friends - it was hard to form a friendship with the girl who your boyfriend had cheated on you with - but they were getting there.

"What do you suppose is happening?" asked Raven, pushing herself out of her own hammock as she followed Clarke to the tent opening to investigate. She was wearing the same clothes she was when she took off from the Ark in the hundred-year-old escape pod, except for the wire necklace that Finn had made for her, which was notably missing from around her neck (being that she had thrown it in a creak while confronting Finn about Clarke the day after her arrival).

"Could it be these 'grounders' that you guys were talking about?" she asked.

Clarke bit her lip, unsure. It could be the grounders, but they hadn't heard anything from them since the attack on Jasper. It would be odd for them to attack so randomly now after hearing nothing from them for so long. Still, they knew nothing about these humans who had survived on Earth for all these years. They knew nothing of what their motives were, or when they would strike. They were running blind.

Both exited the tent, weaving their way through the camp ground and the trees, feeling oddly alarmed when she noticed the camp was mostly empty of people. Had something happened? Or had all of them just been attracted toward the scream as she and Raven had been?

Only becoming more alarmed upon seeing that the scream came from beyond the wall used to block out grounder territory, Clarke broke out into a sprint, Raven right on her heels. They soon found themselves in a small clearing. Members of the Hundred stood there as well, eyes locked on the two people standing in the center of the small field. The shorter of the two seemed to be bleeding and injured, while the taller held the other up by the jacket, yelling something indistinguishable at him.

Next to her, Raven's eyebrows furrowed as she struggled to see above the crowd. "Is that…"

"Bellamy," Clarke finished for her, her mouth pressed into a grim, disapproving line. "And Jasper." Without another word, she forcefully pushed her way through the growing crowd of teenagers, shoving and squeezing until she was standing up front, only a few feet from Jasper and Bellamy, and now had no difficulty making out what he was saying.

"What do you mean they took her?!" Bellamy yelled at goggle-boy, giving him an extra shake for good measure. The ironic thing was, before now, Bellamy had actually been under the impression that Jasper was an alright guy - he had saved his sister's life, after all, so Bellamy figured he owed the kid - but now he saw he was sadly mistaken. "How could you just let them take her?! Why were you even out here alone with her in the first place?! Do you have any idea the danger you've put her in!"

"Bellamy! Stop it!"

And Clarke came pushing through the crowd like a raging hurricane, glaring at him with those blue eyes that flared with that self-riteous fire that Bellamy both hated and admired. "Let him go," she ordered, her voice level. It was something else that he admired and yet was annoyed with to no end; the fact that she had the guts to order him around and actually expected him to do as she said.

He glanced at her fleetly, before turning his glare back to Jasper. "I'm not letting go of him until he tells me what those soon-to-be-dead creeps did with my sister."

Clarke's confusion showed on her face, but then understanding dawned in her eyes. His sister. "Octavia?" she questioned, concerned. "What's happened to her?" Concern for the girl ran through Clarke. She had become a good friend to her these past few weeks.

"Ask him," Bellamy snarled, directing another heated glare in Jasper's direction as he reluctantly let go of the boy, unfisting his hands from the wrinkled material of his jacket. "Octavia's missing. I heard her scream. And he," he jerked his thumb in Jasper's direction, "was the last one to see her."

"Wait." Clarke glanced at him disbelievingly, trying to make sure she understood correctly. "You're accusing Jasper of doing something to her?!"

"I would never hurt Octavia," Jasper declared with a surprising amount of bravado. "She took me out exploring with her, and we were ambushed. They took her."

"Who took her?" Bellamy demanded ferally, stepping forward threateningly. But Clarke placed a hesitant hand on his forearm, giving him a warning look. If it had been anyone else, he probably would have shook her off and advanced toward Jasper anyway. But something about those blue eyes drilling into his made him pause. Her eyes held his, and against his better judgement, he stepped back from Jasper, all while wondering why he'd listened to her. Her presence seemed to have a calming effect on him; it was odd, and he didn't like it.

Trying not to show her immense surprise that Bellamy had actually listened to her, Clarke asked in a calmer tone than her co-leader, "Who took her Jasper? What happened out here?" She surveyed him worriedly, taking into account the scraped left side of his face and the blow he seemed to have sustained to the back of his head, judging by the dried blood that flecked his brown hair.

"That's what I've been trying to tell him," explained Jasper, "I don't know. Octavia wanted to explore the area and she took me with her. I didn't think it was a good idea to be wandering out here unprotected, but I went with her anyway. We heard someone close by, so we started to leave, next thing I know Octavia's being thrown through the air and I'm being knocked out. When I woke up, she was gone."

"And you didn't see who took her?" asked Bellamy, hostility in his tone.

"That's what I just said," mumbled Jasper under his breath. Bellamy looked as if he was trying to restrain himself from punching him, and was losing.

Clarke sighed, exasperated as she ran a hand over her face. "Are you sure?" she asked. "Sure that you didn't see anything that could help identify who they were?"

"No. The guy clocked me from behind. I didn't have time to see anything."

She nodded. "Alright. Let me see your head." She grasped Jasper's chin and tuned it to the side, examining the long scrape on his cheek then angling his head down to examine the wound on the back of his skull.

She probed it gently with her fingers to see the extent of the damage, and Jasper let out a hiss of pain. "Ouch."

Letting go of his chin, she told him, "You should be fine, it doesn't look too bad. Worse case scenario is you could have a small concussion, nothing strenuous. Come with me, I'll help get you cleaned up."

Jasper nodded, trying to hide his embarrassment. He'd only just gotten better from the act of being speared, and now he was already injured again. Octavia was wrong that night on the drop-shift; he wasn't brave, he was a wimp.

Clarke turned with Jasper to head towards the healer's quarters so she could get his cuts cleaned up before they became infected, but Bellamy's hand shot out to grip her arm, halting them. The simple movement sent a flare of heat through her, one she didn't care to analyze at the moment, if ever.

"Wait." Bellamy glared at her, his dark eyes blazing with that familiar intensity that Clarke always found it difficult to look away from. "That's it? Clarke, he was outside the camp boundaries! Grounder territory! Which means that they are the ones who took Octavia, and it's all his-!"

"It is not his fault," Clarke steamrolled over him. "Jasper couldn't have done anything against the grounders, and you know it! Besides, she's your sister! Maybe if you had kept an eye on her then you would have seen her sneak off and none of this would have happened in the first place! So if you want to blame someone, blame yourself!"

It was a low blow and they both knew it.

Clarke didn't know what had come over her. It was nothing less than Bellamy deserved, she knew, especially after destroying Raven's radio a few days back and demolishing their hopes of contacting the Ark in time. But still, it had been below the belt, and was one of the times where she regretted the words as soon as they left her mouth.

Clarke's words slammed into him, having more of a jarring impact than he expected them to. He hadn't expected her biting words to affect him in any way, but for some reason they did, cutting deep. The words rang through his mind, cruel and biting. His fault.

Octavia was gone; captured. She could already be dead. And it was his fault.

He saw the regretting, faintly apologetic look on the blonde's face, but he was having none of it. He closed the guilt off, like he'd been doing pretty much his whole life, and allowed his lips to curl back into an expression of pure rage. Clarke actually flinched back. He looked so angry that for a moment she thought he might actually hit her.

But he didn't. Instead he just tore himself away from her, pushing his way angrily through the crowd that had already started dissipating. Feeling guilty for her earlier words, worried for what he might do, Clarke called after him, "Bellamy! Don't do anything stupid!"

But he was no longer listening.

Bellamy swung the pack over his shoulders only after double-checking he had everything that could be of use to him during his trek. Reaching down, he picked up the few knives he had snatched from the weapons supplies, storing two in the pack and one in the inside pocket of his jacket, where it would be easily excessable if he needed to defend himself ( or hack through anything in his path to get to his sister). A gun would have been his usual weapon of choice when it came these things, much more lethal, but he would have to make due with what he had. He still had the gun he had used to shoot Chancellor Jaha in order to stowaway on the drop ship, but it wouldn't do much use without any bullets.

He didn't care what Clarke said, he was going after Octavia. She was his sister. She was his responsibility. The others didn't understand - couldn't understand - what that entailed, the bond that a pair of siblings shared. And how could they? No one else had a baby sister to look after, one they would lay down their life for, hell, one they would kill for. They just didn't understand. He would do anything for her. Including walking into a grounder-infested mountain range where he'd be risking death at every turn.

Mount Weather.

It seemed obvious now that the grounders had been the ones to kidnap Octavia. Who else could it have been? And he knew, thanks to Clarke and her little expedition the first day here, that Mount Weather was grounder territory, the river serving as a boundary to them. If they had taken Octavia, it stood to reason that they would be keeping her there (he refused to even think that she might be dead). Which meant that if he wanted to get her back, that was where he needed to go.

It was stupid, reckless, downright suicidal, and about a million other things that didn't count as good in his favor.

But it was his sister.

And he would do anything.

"What are you doing?" Just as Bellamy was about to leave unnoticed, Clarke's voice sounded behind him. She must have slipped through the tent flap when he hadn't been looking. He cussed under his breath, turning to meet her stare.

She frowned, eyes raking over the pack on his shoulder suspiciously. "You're going after Octavia, aren't you?"

He squared his shoulders, meeting her gaze full-on. If she thought he was going to back off, then she was sadly mistaken. "Yeah, so what if I am?"

"You can't!" she told him, crossing her arms. "Besides, you don't even know where the grounders took her."

"I'm betting on Mount Weather." He brushed past her and out of the tent, though of course, she followed.

"Mount Weather?" she repeated disbelievingly. "Even you can't possibly be that stupid." When he didn't respond, Clarke went on, "Bellamy, that spear that hit Jasper was thrown with complete accuracy from feet away. Those grounders are dangerous, and more than one person can handle alone, even you."

He glanced at her over his shoulder, smirking. "Careful, princess. You're starting to sound as if you actually care."

Something in her flinched when he called her princess as she was reminded of Finn. But she pushed thoughts of him away as she focused on the situation at hand. "But I do care." And she realized with a start that it was true, that she did, on some inner level, care about Bellamy. He annoyed her, and frustrated her, and made her want to scream and bang her head against the wall in frustration, but somewhere amidst all this chaos, he had somehow gotten under her skin without her even realizing. "I don't like you, that's true, but I don't want you dead. Which is exactly what you're going to be if you go through with this. It's insane."

"Maybe to you. But I can take care of myself. And I can't just leave Octavia to die."

"And I get that, I do-"

"No, I really don't think you do," Bellamy cut her off. "She's my sister. She's not just my blood, she's me. Octavia is a part of me. She's depending on me. And I would die for her in a second if it meant protecting her from harm. So forgive me, but no, I really don't think you understand what that means. And you couldn't possibly."

Clarke stared at him for a long moment, silent, and he began to feel uncomfortable under her scrutiny when she said softly, "You really would, wouldn't you? You're willing to let over three hundred innocent people die up there on the Ark just so you can continue to live, but when it comes to your sister you'll willingly lay down your life."

"In a heartbeat."

She stared at him, eyes thoughtful. A part of her hated him for his words, for the way he had doomed the citizens of the Ark to death out of pure selfishness, yet another more reluctant part, admired and respected him for his loyalty to Octavia. He would do anything for her in the blink of an eye, would take a bullet for her, be killed, and Clarke could honestly say that when it came down to kill or be killed, she wasn't positive she would be able to do the same.

And that's when she realized that nothing she said was going to dissuade Bellamy from going on this crazy rescue mission. Because it was his sister, and he was going to go no matter what she said to him.

She squared her shoulders and looked him straight in the eyes, letting him know that what she was about to say was non-negotiatable. "Fine, you can go. But on one condition."

He arched an eyebrow, finding her attempt at bargaining with him to be amusing. "Oh really, princess? And what's that?"

"You take me with you."

This will probably only be a short fic, around 5 chapters, maybe a few more. Also, this takes place a few days after episode 5, and since it doesn't air until Wednesday, the events that happened, such as Bellamy destroying Raven's radio, are mostly just speculations from the promo. It will be Bellamy/Clarke, obviously, with a side pairing of Jasper/Octavia, and maybe just the teensiest bit of Raven/Finn, though I haven't decided yet.

Thanx for reading, please review! *hint*, they might motivate me to post the next chapter sooner rather than later! :D

-Phoenix(**