Life Begins

Bellamy didn't understand what was going on with his mom, but he knew that it couldn't be anything good. For the past few days she would wake up early and run to the bathroom, where he could hear the sounds of her retching. Yuck. He made a gagging face and took a deep breath to control his own queasiness as he heard the familiar sound yet again. He wished Dad were here. Dad always seemed to know what to do.

But Dad wasn't here anymore. Bellamy didn't know exactly what had happened to his father, but he knew that his dad's job had been to catch bad people, just like in the superhero stories that he had told Bellamy before bedtime. Bellamy knew that when he grew up, he wanted to catch bad people, too. After all, his dad was like Batman, and Batman was awesome…except…Batman never met a bad guy he couldn't beat, and Dad had.

After he heard his mom vomit for the fourth time, Bellamy threw off the blanket that had been covering his head and swung his feet over the side of the bed. He couldn't help the small intake of breath as his feet met the frigid floor. He padded over to the bathroom door that his mom had not fully closed and peeked his head through the crack. His mom was on the floor, head resting on her arms that encircled the toilet bowl.

Carefully, he walked in. His mom's eyes were closed. The worst seemed to have passed, but her hair hung in damp strings down her flushed face. Bellamy reached out his small hand and gathered her hair in a knot behind her head. She opened her eyes at that and managed a small smile. Her hand caressed his arm lovingly as she said, "Bellamy, you should be in bed."

"Mom…are you okay?"

Her hands reached up to smooth his dark curls away from his concerned face. "I'll be just fine," she answered as she tweaked a finger down his freckled nose. They were the same freckles as his father's. "Now go back to bed, Worry Wart. You have school later."

He nodded and leaned down to wrap his arms around her. She returned the hug and kissed his cheek, and Bellamy was relieved that she didn't seem to feel any warmer than normal. He remembered the last time he had been sick with a fever, and his mom had taken him to see Dr. Griffin, who explained to him what that meant. He stood up and walked back to bed. But if she didn't have a fever…then what was wrong with her? He thought about it more as he pulled the blanket back over his head.

The next time he knew something was seriously wrong was almost two months later. He came home from school excited because he had just started to learn a little bit about life before the Ark at school. He couldn't wait to talk to his mom about it, but he knew he'd have to wait for a couple hours until she came home from work. Until then, he'd have to do his homework with Mrs. Meghann, the old woman who lived next door. She was nice enough, but she was just…so…old.

Expecting Mrs. Meghann to be waiting for him in the Blake cabin, he was surprised when he opened the door and saw his mother sitting at the table. She cried in silent sobs and she jumped when Bellamy said, "Mom…you're home early."

Bellamy's mother quickly wiped the tears from her eyes, which did nothing to calm the swelling and redness. "Hi, Sweetie. How was school?"

When faced with his mother's despair, his joy at what he had learned that day completely vanished from his brain. He couldn't have answered the question, even though he wanted to.

"Mom…"he asked hesitantly, "Are you okay?" He had been asking that question a lot lately.

Something seemed to change in his mom then. She took a deep breath, squared her shoulders and plastered a smile on her face. "I came home early because I wasn't feeling well and was going to go see a doctor, but I'm feeling much better now."

Bellamy just nodded his head in acknowledgement. His mom held out her hands to him. "Come here, Bellamy. We have a lot to talk about."

Placing his small bag with his school tablet on the opposite chair, he walked around the table and let his mother pick him up and place him in her lap. Remembering her tears, he tried not to squirm, even though at nearly seven years old he knew he was getting too old to be held in his mom's lap. She placed her chin on his forehead and hugged him snuggly to her body. "Bellamy, you're getting to be quite a big boy, now, aren't you?"

Bellamy nodded emphatically once his mom raised her chin. "Uh huh. I'm the tallest in my class. My teacher also says I'm very…uh…mature…for my age. I don't know what that means, though."

"It means you act more like a grown up than the other kids in your class," she explained.

"Oh."

"That's good. Right now I'm going to tell you a grown-up secret. It's a happy thing, but it's very important that you keep it a secret…okay, Bellamy?" She leaned over his shoulder to look him in the eyes and he could tell that this was very serious.

Bellamy nodded gravely. "Okay."

Bellamy nearly went into a panic attack as his mother let out yet another muffled scream.

"Mom, please," he pleaded. "Let me get a doctor."

She sat on the edge of her bunk, pants removed long ago, her long shirt pulled up over her protruding belly. For the past five months, his mom had been preparing Bellamy for this moment, but seeing her face contorted in agony, sweat pouring down her face and tears streaming out of her eyes had the boy so completely freaked out that her training went completely out the window.

"No. You can't tell anyone. Tell me what happens if you do," her hands fisted in the blankets on her side as another contraction hit. "Say it!"

"You…you get floated." Even after all this time, Bellamy still didn't understand why his mother would be killed just because she had another baby. That seemed more wrong to him than the crime itself.

"I don't understand. Why is it wrong to have more than one baby?"

"The Ark…" she takes a deep breath as the contraction passes, "it couldn't survive. The chancellor can't allow it."

Bellamy had only ever seen the chancellor on TV. With all that power and authority, he scared the bejeezes out of Bellamy. Whenever he thought about the Chancellor, he couldn't help but think to the book he and his mother had been working through about Earth history.

"He's like the Emperor Augustus…right?" Bellamy had always liked the parts about ancient Rome the best.

"Yes, that's right. This is like the emperor we read about." Bellamy jumped as a new scream ripped through his mother's lips. "The baby's coming! Get the blanket."

He bolted up and reached behind his mother, trying not to notice the awfully painful sounds his mother was making. When he turned back around to hand her the blanket there was a small, bloody baby with strings of dark hair in his mother's arms. She took the blanket from his hands and swaddled the baby in it. The baby cried lightly, just to let them both know she was there. Bellamy's mom looked at the baby with much the same look of adoration that she gave Bellamy and turned to him with a weak smile.

"My brave boy. You have a sister."

She handed Bellamy the bundle, which was lighter than he'd thought it would be.

"You should name her," their mom said wistfully, barely able to keep her eyes open.

He looked down at his baby sister. Her baby-grey eyes looked back up at him. She somehow managed to be both wrinkly and really cute at the same time. A fierce pang of protectiveness coursed through him. He suddenly felt how important picking the right name was. Then it came to him; "Augustus had a sister. Octavia."

That was it. Octavia. The sister of the first Emperor of Rome. Bellamy may not ever be a leader, but he knew that he would protect her with the same fierceness and determination that Augustus used to build and keep his Empire. Just then, baby Octavia started to cry.

Alarmed, their mother reached out for the baby. "Bellamy…you can't let her cry. Here, give her to me."

He was about to hand Octavia to her when her arms fell limply by her sides and her head started to loll to the side. "No, mom…you can't fall asleep." She had warned him that that could be dangerous, but with the full load in his arms, he couldn't shake her to keep her awake.

Sounding completely spent, she turned away from him. "So…tired…Your sister…Your responsibility." Tears trickled down her face and then she went limp from exhaustion.

Octavia cried louder and Bellamy was so frightened for both of them that he managed to readjust her in his arms so he can reach a hand out to shake their mother's shoulder lightly. "Mom! Mom! What do I do? Mom!"

He could see the rise and fall of her chest, so he knew she was just sleeping, but the baby's cries had to be stopped. It was obvious to him in that moment that he was the only one who would be able to do so, and that he had to if he wanted his family to live. With Octavia in his arms, he leaned against the wall and slid down to the floor. He started to gently shake her back and forth in his arms.

"Shh…shh…please," he pleaded. Then it occurred to him what the problem might be. He had been with Mrs. Meghann one afternoon when she was watching her grandson, who was a baby at the time, and every time he was hungry, he would cry. Bellamy had nothing to feed her, but he remembered the bottle that she had used with a tip that looked a lot like the little finger on Bellamy's hand. Putting his finger into Octavia's mouth, she immediately stopped crying and suckled the finger. Relief and pride flowed through him, as well as that all-too-new but powerful protectiveness.

"See?" he whispered to his little sister. The only sister of the human race. "I told you. It's okay. I won't let anything bad happen to you, Octavia. I promise."