Title: "Down to the River to Pray"
Author: Lila
Rating: PG-13
Character/Pairing: Clarke, Clarke/Bellamy
Spoiler: "Human Trials"
Length: one-shot
Summary: Finn might have pulled the trigger, but they all have blood on their hands.
Disclaimer: Not mine, just borrowing them for a few paragraphs.
Author's Note: Many things to finish, but one plot bunny that wouldn't quit nagging at me. Just a short tag to the most recent episode. Title courtesy of Alison Krauss. Enjoy.
It's the sounds that stay with her.
There's the echo of gunfire, smoke still hissing from the muzzle of Finn's rifle, the villagers' keening grief catching in the charged air.
Clarke sees Finn's hopeful face and familiar eyes, hears his voice through the fog, "I found you." He reaches her with the same arms that once held her close, with the hands that made him the monster she never thought he could be. A tender smile breaks out across his face and it's all she can do not to shudder.
Once upon a time, their ancestors used bombs to destroy themselves. Clarke swallows hard as she scans the field of the fallen, children's blood seeping into the cold, wet dirt.
Her people don't need nukes to wreak the same devastation.
Bellamy tries to help with the bodies.
The Grounders are no strangers to death and they brush aside their tears and bury their grief to lay their people to rest. It's a small village, mostly old men and small children, their daughters and mothers tasked with digging their graves.
Bellamy reaches for a girl no more than ten years old with a long dark braid and empty eyes staring blankly at the darkening sky.
Nyko is on him in a flash, springing away from his dead son to push Bellamy into the mud. His eyes flick to where Finn's leaning against a hut, vacantly watching the proceedings. "Don't think about touching her."
Bellamy pushes to his feet, holds up his hands in supplication. "I'm trying to make this right."
Nyko's scans the yard, fixes on the growing pile of bodies, the tear-stained faces that mark the living. "Nothing will make this right." He turns his attention to Octavia. "You saved my son's life once and for that I am forever grateful." He drops back to his knees, brushes dark hair off his child's brow. "I hope to never see you again."
Clarke tugs on Bellamy's jacket. "We should go." He nods and sighs heavily, dark eyes sliding closed as they concede another loss. She shifts a little closer, so her hip brushes against his, and he opens his eyes so their gazes lock. This isn't on you, she says without words, thinks he understands when she feels his fingers twine through hers.
Murphy rounds up Finn and Octavia follows, head bowed as she leaves behind people she had hoped would be her friends. Clarke and Bellamy pick up the rear, hands free, but shoulders bumping as they walk together, side by side.
They're less than fifty yards from the wall when a wail pierces the still air, sharp and agonizing and young. This time, Clarke doesn't hide the shudder.
She wonders if there will come a time when death isn't her parting gift.
The silence clings as they make camp.
Bellamy barks out tasks but no one has anything to say once they've been given their orders. Clarke makes a fire and Murphy gathers more wood and Octavia stares blankly at the nuts and dried berries that will be their dinner.
They don't eat much either, except for Finn. He munches on his nuts and watches the fire and brushes his hair back from his brow. His hands are muddy but clean of all the blood he's spilled. Clarke keeps her eyes focused on the ground so she doesn't have to look at him.
"I can take first watch," he says brightly and a collective flinch vibrates through the camp. Even Murphy looks like he might be sick.
"It's handled," Bellamy says and reaches for his rifle. "Just…just stay there."
"I'm a member of the 100," Finn reminds him. "I can take a watch." He turns his gaze to Clarke, begs her with his eyes to take his side, to act like nothing has changed.
Clarke swallows hard and shakes her head. "Please don't do this, Finn. Don't make it harder than it already is."
Finn pushes to his feet but Bellamy's quicker, finger curling around the trigger of his rifle. The safety clicks off with an audible snap. Finn just stares at them, all of them, but mostly at Clarke. His eyes are wide, his expression wounded. "Don't you get it?" he asks. "I did this for you."
"You mowed down an entire village. Do you understand? You murdered innocent people!"
"It's not like I wanted to do it." He pauses, eyes hopeful as he keeps staring at her. "But I'd do it all over again if it meant getting to you."
In the firelight, he looks like the boy she fell in love with, the same boy who broke her heart. She used to think she understood him but now she knows that she never knew who he was.
"I didn't ask for this," she says, closes her eyes and it's Charlotte on the cliff and Myles in the woods and the thirty-four lives she lost in the war. It's the dropship again, Bellamy's face as she closed the door. It's more blood on her hands.
Clarke does something she's never done before. She runs.
Bellamy finds her by the river. It's really a stream, a creek at best, but the water is cold and clear and feels good as she washes the grime from her skin.
It's just mud, but it feels heavy and thick – clotted – as she scrubs her hands raw. No matter what she does, all she can hear are Finn's words in her ears.
There are footsteps in the leaves and then Bellamy is kneeling beside her, dipping his fingers into the river. He splashes water on his face and rubs the back of his neck, rinses his hands until even his fingernails are free of dirt.
"It's not your fault," they say in unison and Bellamy even laughs, a deep chuckle that kind of rumbles its way up Clarke's spine.
She sits back and pulls her knees to her chest, keeps her attention fixed on the moon's reflection in the stream. "I'm the reason he killed all those people."
"I gave him the gun."
"When we came back from the bunker, he told me that in your hands, guns are the same as nukes." She shivers and wraps her arms tighter. "He was right even if he got the shooter wrong."
Bellamy shifts closer so they're pressed together shoulder to hip. "You can't blame yourself for other people's actions. I might have shot Jaha to protect Octavia, but it was my choice. It felt impossible at the time, but it was my choice all the same." He leans in closer, tilts her chin so she has to meet his eyes. "No matter what he claims, it's not on you."
Clarke stares up at him, sees nothing but moonlight shimmering in those dark eyes. "How do we come back from what he did?"
"I don't know," he confesses and it scares her, because she's lost and he's Bellamy – they can't both be without answers. He brings up his arm to drape over her shoulders, so her cheek slides easily into the curve of his neck. "But we'll figure it out together."
A star falls from the sky. She breathes in Bellamy and makes a wish.
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