Prologue
Welcome to Earth, heathen.
I'm waking up to ash and dust
I wipe my brow and I sweat my rust
I'm breathing in the chemicals
::
Clarke woke with a weak gasp, instinctively letting out a panicked: "Dad!"
The blonde medic-student winced and reached her hand up to cradle her throbbing head. She felt a wet substance. Automatically, she brought back down her hand and managed to make out the substance to be her blood.
It was then she noticed one very important thing.
She wasn't in her room.
She was in a small space which she quickly identified to be the inside of a pod.
'Where am I?' Clarke wondered, mindful not to make any more sudden movements, lest her head injury gets worse. She tried to bring forward her last lucid memories, desperately trying to piece together her current situation while remaining calm, because any respectful doctor needed to be able to stay calm under dire situations. The fact that she wasn't really a doctor didn't matter.
Resolutely, she ignored the small childish part of her that screamed out that she was just seventeen and deserved to be distressed.
She needed to focus.
The last thing she remembered was—
"It's okay. It's okay. It's okay. Here. Keep that for me."
Clarke whimpered in distress, not bothering to hide her sobs. No one seemed to be around to hear them anyway, so she didn't have to pretend to be strong.
"Dad," she choked out, finally noticing she was wearing her father's watch.
She remembered everything clearly now. Her father had found a glitch in the system and figured out that the Ark was dying. At best, they had two years of oxygen left and only one year at worst. Her mother and father argued about whether or not to let the others know and Clarke, being the too trusting and foolishly naive that she was, had confided in her best friend Wells.
That was her biggest mistake, she found out as soon as the guards had arrested her father.
As soon as she watched helplessly as her father was floated in front of her eyes for 'treason'. What treason, she wanted to scream out. Before her eyes, Jaha had went from her kind but stern uncle to a cold leader who was willing to murder his own friend for wanting to do the right thing. Wells had went from being her best friend, the only person in the Ark whom she could tell everything, to a treacherous coward who strove to suck up to his equally treacherous father.
Jaha didn't even have the decency to let her grief her father's death for more than five minutes before ordering her arrest as well for assisting in treason. She remembered how she had reflexively tried to fight off the guards even as her mother tried assuring her that she would only be sent to the Sky Box and once she turned eighteen her case would be reviewed and they'd release her.
Her mom had almost managed to convince her to go calmly when Jaha shot down her mother's reassurances.
"I'm afraid that isn't possible.." Jaha had dared to sound regretful.
Her mother had of course been shocked. "W-what?"
(Wells had been shocked too, but Clarke didn't want to think about that traitor.)
"Clarke poses too much of a threat to simply be sent to the Prison Station, regardless of her being in solitary confinement or not."
"You can't float my daughter!"
"I'm not floating your daughter Abby."
"Then what are you planning?"
"Death by Earth. You have five minutes to say your goodbyes. You too, Wells. I'm sorry Clarke."
Clarke forcefully shoved away the memories of the last few hours from her head as she furiously wiped away the tears from her eyes.
Death by Earth. Out of all the things Jaha could have done, he chose that. He was too hell bent on keeping the law of not floating those younger than eighteen that he would rather stick her into an old pod and launch her to Earth to die. Aside from the gossiping that would ensue, no one would really question her 'decision' to commit suicide. Now, both her and her father were no longer a threat to Jaha and his precious council that would rather pretend everything's okay than let the others know that the oxygen was running out.
It was okay anyway, Clarke spitefully thought.
She'd rather die on the Earth she spent her whole life dreaming about instead of by being floated or lack of oxygen.
She'd rather die on Earth instead of on that death box in space.
Wait...
Clarke's eyes widened as she finally realized something. She was still alive.
"I'm on Earth," the girl uttered breathlessly, still shocked.
Any other person in her position would quickly get out of the pod to see Earth and breathe in a way the Ark would never be able to let them breathe. Clarke, however, really wasn't any other person. She knew that the air was toxic and would kill her.
The cold and detached part of her pointed out that if the air was toxic, she'd be dead either way then wouldn't she? If so, wouldn't she rather at least see Earth before she died?
She would.
She didn't even have to think between choosing to survive perhaps an extra hour or die within five minutes without ever seeing Earth up close.
With her heart beating loudly, Clarke Griffin took a leap of faith an opened the death trap (pod) that she was in. At the same time, a cold gust of wind blew, causing her to shiver. Despite this, the girl was smiling.
'That's what wind feels like...'
Motivated by childish curiosity and recklessness that she had only indulged herself a handful of times in her life, she quickly stepped out of her pod. Her feet hesitated for less than three seconds before she placed them on the ground and felt the crunch of green-colored leaves beneath her boots.
She had never heard a sound more beautiful before.
"Beautiful," she whispered, feeling like the word was an understatement as she looked around her.
Everything was so green.
How did she not care for this color before?
It was official, green was now her favorite color.
"Dad, mom, I wish you two could see this," she wistfully said without any thought.
She felt her heart ache when her mind caught up to her words and viciously reminded her that one, her father was dead and two, she'd be joining him when the radiation finally catches up with her system.
No, she wasn't a pessimist. She was a realist.
She didn't have a map or anything that could clue her in on where she was. Sure, she could go scavenging for resources, but what was the point if she would die of radiation soon? The Earth after all wasn't meant to be habitable for at least another century.
She'd just enjoy this moment while it lasts.
She'd indulge her inner teenager that she had always ignored and she'd explore what little she could before the radiation kills her off. Who knows? If she was lucky, she could actually see a body of water before that happened.
With a small smile, twinged in both joy and sadness, Clarke started walking forward with no destination in mind. No pressure and no responsibilities. She'd be dying soon, but she hoped that the Ark will manage to survive.
The thought of the Ark made the blonde girl look up to see the sky.
It was so blue, she marveled. It was a lighter blue than the blue she would see when she looked at the Earth from behind the safety of the Ark. She wanted to paint using this type of sky blue. Not only that, but the clouds looked so enticing as well. In the Ark, she was tired of seeing the same old white colors, but maybe she wouldn't get tired of seeing the clouds.
Once again, she wished her loved ones were with her to see it.
Her eyes turned glossy again, but she chalked it up to her eyes being sensitive to the windy temperature. Clarke knew that whatever she would say would never reach the Ark, but she found herself reciting words that she knew by her heart anyway: "In peace may you leave the shore. In love may you find the next. Safe passage on your travels, until our final journey to the ground. May we meet a—
For a fraction of a second, Clarke felt her head explode in pain.
Then her world turned black.
::
Chapter End.
::
Author's note: hahaha, so guess which fandom I'm into at the moment? Hahahaha...
Basically, this story is about Clarke being sent to Earth earlier. What does this change? Everything. (Kind of a fix-it, but not really.)
Q&A
Q: What's the pairing?
A: Hold your horses you Clexa and Bellarke shippers...hold your horses. I guarantee that you guys will see enough Clexa and Bellarke in this story eventually, and even some other Clarke pairings. (I'm not saying that I'm going to write Clarke gettting into a relationship with Lexa and then kill off Lexa so Bellarke can happen. You'll figure out what I mean soon.)
Q: What's the focus of this story?
A: Well, I have three main focuses of this story. First off, I wanted to write a fanfic with the delinquents becoming more of a family with Clarke as the mom of course and explore what Clarke's friendships could have been like with Octavia, Raven, etc without Clarke's decisions getting in the way. Note: Clarke will still make some hard decisions, but in this story she is going to deal with them when she does. Second of all, I wanted to write a fic that's 50% plot, 30% mommy Clarke, 10% delinquents being badass friends and 10% romance instead of the usual 100% romance, 0% plot I read. (I'm NOT saying there aren't good romance stories of this fandom, just that they are rare.) Third of all, I don't know, I just wanted to see what would have happened if the delinquents/100 had more knowledge of Earth instead of being clueless and getting into shit for it.
Q: Clexa or Bellarke?
A: No comment. I'm not tryna die today.
Q: Badass Clarke?
A: Badass Clarke and Clarke using her marvelous brain instead of letting the blonde get to her sometimes.
Q: Characters that will get more focus?
A: Well, here are the names I can give ya without spoiling much: Bellamy, Octacia, Raven, Murphy, Jasper...you know what, basically all the delinquents.
Q: who will get killed off?
A: depends on my mood. There will be some character deaths here and there though.