"It can't be true." Clarke thought to herself. Reality was already a feeble concept at the moment, as she debated the fate of the world with two forms of A.I, but one of them, Alie was telling her that the earth, the ground, would not make it past six months.
"If this is true, why not tell people this instead of torturing them?" Clarke questioned, hoping to rationalize her way out of this.
"The last time I warned my creator, she locked me away and started working on my replacement" Alie replied in a way that implied a malice she couldn't possibly feel.
The logic was sound, Clarke determined. Alie was trying to save the world, even if it was in the most destructive way possible. A body would be lost, but the soul would live forever. But how could Alie make this decision? Clarke knew Alie was a computer program, but how could she have thought taking away free will was the way to save the world?
Clarke decided the rationale behind Alie's choice was not important for the moment. With this new knowledge, Clarke had to make another decision that affected hundreds of lives, again. How can she decide again what is best for her people?
It was as if Alie read her mind.
"In the city of light you don't have to bear the burden of making decisions like this one. You don't have to live with the pain of the things you have done. the lives that you've taken, the things that you've lost. you will be at peace. you will live forever."
Clarke knew Alie was trying to appeal to the part of her that could barely hold it together; the part of her that was ready to run at a moment's notice to escape the pain of all that she had endured. But Clarke had was familiar with this already.
"I've tried running away from my pain. It doesn't work." Clarke tried to explain to Alie. Clarke wasn't sure what she expected when she went on the mission to destroy the City of Light, but it definitely wasn't the knowledge that the earth was going to cease to be inhabitable in six months' time. Now she stood here, debating with an A.I. and the first commander of the grounders about whether or not the City of Light is the best solution to their problems.
"Your people don't agree." Alie logically reasoned. Bringing up Jasper and how much happier he is, now that he has forgotten about his first love and the source of his agony. Seeing Jasper thrive in the City of Light just made this so much harder for Clarke.
A life without agony was so tempting but Clarke couldn't forget. She couldn't let the City of Light take away the memories of Lexa, of Finn, of Wells, and of her father. Losing the memories of the ones she loved would be losing part of herself.
Maybe the City of Light could be a solution, if she could keep all of them in her memories. If everyone could choose this fate and remember the pain they feel and the ones they lost. Perhaps Clarke didn't have to make this choice.
"Give them a real choice and I won't pull this lever." She heard herself saying to Alie "Give them back their pain and their memories. Let them decide for themselves."
There. Now the decision could be informed and it could be a choice for more than just hers to make.
"She can't." Becca responded. "Her core command is to make life better for mankind; she still thinks she is doing that."
"Would you really condemn the human race to die in 6 months?" Alie asked her.
Why is it always me? Clarke couldn't help thinking to herself. Why do I always have to make these choices for everyone? Why do I bear these decisions alone?
But she isn't alone. Since she came to the ground, she has only been alone when she exiled herself from the people she loved and needed.
"We'll figure something out. We always do." Clarke replied. She isn't sure how, but she knows they will fix this.
"Let me ease their pain, Clarke." Alie stoically pleaded "We can ease their pain, together."
Together. Together. A promise she had made Bellamy. They would fight together; they would live with what they have done together. They would face their pain together.
"You don't ease pain, you overcome it." Clarke poignantly stated.
Clarke put her hand the lever. She had made her decision, but she couldn't stop thinking about the last time her hand was a lever very similar to this and it gave her pause. She had known what she had to do and was prepared to do it alone. But she didn't have to then; Bellamy was there to share the burden in the massacre of Mount Weather. She tried to bear it alone, but he bore it too. The deaths at Mount Weather haunted him just as they haunt her.
She hadn't thought of it much before now, but she needed him by her side at Mount Weather and she wished he was here now.
And suddenly Bellamy was standing next to her in the control room of the Ark. A creation of her mind, of course, as the real Bellamy was fighting to keep her safe in Polis. Like her father's watch, Bellamy was brought there to guide her in her choices.
Clarke was flooded with relief, just as she always was when she and Bellamy would reunite after being apart. Bellamy was unscarred, clean and much better nourished than the Bellamy that she knew him to be. She wanted to hug him, but now was not the time to hug.
"This is what I have to do." She told Bellamy, hearing her voice crack. Clarke almost never allows herself to be vulnerable, but she knows she can be with him.
"I know." He replied, sounding more assured than she was. "But you don't have to do it alone."
He looked at her with such trust and determination, Clarke finally felt at ease with her decision. She smiled at him. Bellamy half smiled back and put his hand on top of hers.
"Together?" he said to her.
"Together." She replied just to him.
She then turned to look at both Alie and Becca, unsure if they could see Bellamy.
You don't ease pain, you overcome it, she thought once again.
"and we will." She said as the two of them pulled the lever together.