A/N - After getting fed up with the mess that season three has turned into since about episode 3 (Pike, Blood will not have blood, Bellamy's face heel turn, 307 etc. etc.) I decided to turn my hand to a bit of writing. Rather than picking up from the end of season two or somewhere within season three I thought I would take the story into a completely AU direction from the beginning.
Some warnings on the tin before we begin: The ground is more cosmopolitan than what we see in the show. Original Characters will crop up periodically. The plotline of the series is NOT going to be respected. Some main characters from the show will die(Not Lexa obviously). The main action will take place three years after the landing. The story will unabashedly focus on Clarke and Lexa.
I will endeavour to keep the A/N's short and sweet from now on. Updates (hopefully) every weekend.
Blanket Disclaimer - The 100 and characters/locations associated with it are not mine and reside under the copyright of CBS.
Prologue – Fiery The Angels Fell
"Earth, Clarke. You get to go to Earth."
It was the last thing she remembered before slipping into the black nothingness of a drugged sleep. The jolt of the drop-ship's separation stirred her roughly back to consciousness. The acrid vapours of the hundred year old air scrubber system, the collected humanity of the other prisoners, and the trace fumes of the ship's fuel system all conspired to make her headache into a full blown migraine. As the scene swam into view the fear began to claw its way up into her throat. They were really on their way to Earth. Making matters worse her fellow prisoners were all chattering merrily as though they were on a field trip and not on their way to execution. A sharp pain from her wrist seized her attention as she noticed the metal bracelet that had found its way there as she had slept – no doubt a parting gift from the powers that be on the Ark.
"Welcome back." It was her one time friend, the chancellor's son Wells. She frowned at him in confusion.
"Wells, why the hell are you here?" She demanded.
"When I found out they were sending prisoners to the ground I got myself arrested."
That's almost romantic, Clarke thought to herself.
"I came for you." Wells punctuated that comment with one of his silly smiles that he imagined to be winning.
Scratch that, nauseating.
A bump shuddered through the ship as it began to skip across the upper atmosphere. As Clarke opened her mouth to question what was going on she was interrupted by the soft voice of the Chancellor.
"Prisoners of the Ark hear me now. You've been given a second chance. And as your Chancellor it is my hope that you see this as not just a chance for you but as a chance for all of us, indeed for mankind itself. We have no idea what is waiting for you down there. If the odds of survival were better we would have sent others. Frankly, we're sending you because your crimes make you expendable."
Expendable indeed. Clarke mused to herself. Kill two birds with one stone; decrease the burden on life support while scouting out the ground for future habitation.
Jaha continued on despite the catcalls that greeted his assessment of the prisoners. "Those crimes will be forgiven and your records will be wiped clean."
Clarke tuned out at that particular moment because it reminded her all too well of the elder Jaha's winning way with words. His ability to twist them to convince people to support the death of their peers had always sickened her. The sacrifice of innocents was something that leaders seemed to do with an almost giddy abandon. Speaking of the innocent, several of the prisoners had freed themselves from their restrains and were floating about the cabin, giddily ignorant of the impending return to gravity.
Clarke was about to open her mouth to yell at them when the ship bucked fiercely. A sharp metallic shriek echoed throughout the cabin as gravity returned sending the floating prisoners slamming into the walls of the ship.
"The parachutes!" Wells shouted over the groaning of the ship. "They haven't deployed."
He was right. The ship was falling too fast. He was out of his seat before Clarke could move to stop him and down the ladder to the lower level a moment later. It was a miracle he was even able to move with the erratic movement of the drop ship. As Clarke moved to follow him she was slammed into her seat as the parachutes deployed. The other prisoners were screaming in terror as the ship began to slow. Smoke began to suffuse the cabin as the stress of the re-entry began to rupture the pipes and conduits that formed the vessel's internal plumbing. Another couple of moments later and the retro-rockets ignited with a deafening roar. All Clarke could do was grit her teeth and hold on to her restraints as the dropship screamed through the sky. She couldn't stop herself from whimpering softly in fear, so sure was she that this was the end.
Everything stopped with a horrific crash. The ship groaned a few more times as it settled and the hull began to pop as it cooled. Clarke opened her eyes, blinked, and let out the breath she hadn't realized she had been holding in. They had landed and they were all mostly still alive. Something was wrong though – the dropship still seemed to be moving which made almost no sense to Clarke. Clarke slowly undid her restraints as some of the other inmates began to climb down onto the lower level. As Clarke was taking stock of the situation she heard the first shouts.
"WATER!" The first shouts were surprised more than panicked but it didn't take long for the panic to set in.
Clarke was in motion before she even had time to think. If the ship was flooding then it was painfully obvious that they needed to use the escape hatch at the bow of the ship rather than the main doors. Clarke waded through the panicking delinquents to the ladder and the hatch. Already there were one of the surviving spacewalking prisoners and a dark haired man in a guardsman's jacket.
"Well, well, if it isn't the princess from solitary." The guardsman drawled as he worked the hatch open. "Women and children first?"
"Can it." Clarke snapped nervously. "How are we going to get everyone out of here?"
"One at a time." The guardsman snorted as he shoved the hatch open and climbed out. The spacewalker was right behind him. Behind her the crowd of other prisoners boiled towards her like an advancing army. It was only sheer luck that the strong arms of the two others plucked her out through the hatch before she was trampled.
Standing on the top of the sinking dropship Clarke got her first look at Earth – or rather her first look at fog. It was a miserable slate grey fug that surrounded the dropship. She could barely even see the water surrounding them. Looking around Clarke's heart sank into her boots as she surveyed the situation around her.
"Are you going to just stand there and look miserable or are you going to help?" The guardsman shouted at her.
Clarke spun around. "What do you need me to do?"
"The compartment on the other side, it should have a life raft. You get it opened and launched. I'll send some more people over to help you when we get them out." The guardsman's tone was commanding but he seemed to know what he was doing.
"What about Wells?" Clarke yelled over her shoulder.
"The Chancellor's son?" The guardsman sneered. "Forget him."
"He saved our lives!"
"I'll look for him when we get the rest out." The spacewalker interjected before the guardsman could say anything more.
Clarke nodded reluctantly as she set to work pulling open the panel that held the life raft. Following the instructions on the thick plastic container she wound one end of the line around her wrist and rolled the container into the water.
While luck was on Clarke's side as the plastic container burst open and inflated into a large octagonal raft luck wasn't on her side when it came to the length of line that had been attached the raft. In fact the line didn't even come close to stretching from the sinking dropship's top to the water below. The end result was that as the raft had made its journey to the water Clarke had been in hot pursuit.
As she came up spluttering for air some of the more dimwitted prisoners had gathered on the side of the dropship to laugh at her. As she flailed in a miserable attempt to keep herself from drowning she grabbed hold of the line that was still wound around her wrist. Pulling on the line she was able to haul herself towards the raft with a minimum of swimming.
We're going to make it. Clarke was thinking to herself. We're actually going to make it!
How wrong she was. The designers of the dropship had originally intended the vessel to make a hard landing on the ground and therefore had not designed it to land on water. Being that it was commonly known to engineers that shit does in fact happen they had decided to design with safety in mind and made the dropship so that it could at least survive a water landing. What they had not counted on was for it to be used over a hundred years after its best before date. While the prisoners had been desperately trying to escape the water had been pouring into every empty space inside the drop ship. The designers had never intended for the inside of the cabin to become partially submerged in water and had therefore been quite sanguine about using potassium superoxide air scrubbers to replenish the atmosphere inside the dropship. The unfortunate by-product of mixing the two elements was an impressive pyrotechnic display or to the poor souls on the dropship a big explosion.
Clarke was just turning around when the dropship exploded sending her, the raft and most of the survivors perched on the hull flying. The pressure of the explosion seemed to pick her up and sent her skimming across the surface of the water. As she crashed into the water she was completely disoriented. It was like being plunged into an icy darkness that seemed to attack her every sense. She flailed desperately in the murky depths as the water began to steal into her nose and mouth. Against all odds she came rocketing back to the surface – still connected to the life raft.
Wearily she managed to pull herself back on to the raft. Flaming pieces of debris continued to rain down from the sky as she looked around her but of the dropship itself there was no sign. She was alone at sea on a world that was barren of life.
Clarke tried calling out to the point that she shouted herself hoarse hoping to hear some sort of response but the only sound she could make out was the ringing in her ears. Eventually she gave up and curled in on herself in a desperate attempt to hold on to the last embers of her own body heat. She lay there shivering for what felt like an eternity, drifting, and alone.
Clarke was almost catatonic when they found her. She thought that her mind was playing tricks on her when the raft shook from an impact. Licking her salt cracked lips she looked up from her fetal ball. The first one climbed rather awkwardly from his boat onto the life raft. The man's appearance practically screamed danger from the black beret perched on his head down the rest of his obsidian uniform to the rather intimidating looking rifle slung on his back. Clarke stared at him dazedly as though he were some sort of apparition, a trick conjured up by her own feverish mind.
The soldier muttered something in a guttural tongue which caused his comrades back in the launch to break into laughter. Without any concern he reached down to grab Clarke, ignoring her feeble attempts to bat his hands away. With a practiced ease he slung her into the waiting arms of two of his fellows. Climbing out of the raft he swiftly punctured the rubber hull with a wicked looking bayonet. One of the soldiers wrapped Clarke in a blanket as the rest bent their backs to rowing the launch away. Clarke simply huddled under the blanket. It was all too much for her mind to comprehend.
Despite the efforts of the helmsman at the rear of the launch to get her to say something she remained mute until the launch reached its destination. The black iron hull of the warship heaved itself out of the surrounding mist like some sort of improbable black wall sitting in the middle of the ocean. The launch bumped up against the hull with a dull clang as the soldiers set themselves to work hooking onto the mooring lines of the warship. A particularly burly specimen of soldiery slung Clarke over his shoulder and proceeded to ascend the ladder to the ship. She hung on for dear life as he climbed – not so insensate as to lose her instinct for self preservation.
As soon as they reached the deck he deposited her rather ungracefully in front of his crewmates.
"Pусалка" He laughed to his fellows. They greeted his comment with a nervous titer of laughter.
Clarke stared at them blearily as she swayed backwards and forwards. The faces of the men and women of the crew looked back at her with a nervous mien as though they half expected her to sprout fangs and make an attempt at devouring them.
The crowd shifted as another group of soldiers elbowed their way through the throng of sailors. At the heart of this phalanx was without a doubt their commander. The woman commanded the attention of her subordinates with an easy grace. Everything from her striking navy blue uniform to the sword that she casually rested her arm to the angry crimson mass of braids that made up her hair seemed purposefully engineered to convey a single message – I'm in charge and don't you dare forget it.
She studied Clarke with a sympathetic eye taking in the rather waterlogged Sky Girl before her. Clarke reciprocated by examining the stunning specimen before her. The woman was easily in her mid-thirties and sported a rather vicious looking dueling scare across one eye while the other was adorned with a stylized half sun tattoo. Her eyes were a pair of restless green orbs that were always on the move – as shifting as the sea that was her element.
It didn't surprise Clarke at all that she tried English first when she spoke to her. "Where do you hail from little mermaid?"
Clarke blinked at her half in surprise and half in relief. The commander seemed about to try another tack when Clarke responded in a dull voice, scarcely above a whisper. "The Ark."
A series of hushed whispers ran through the crowd in the foreign tongue. One of the sailors started yelling something from the back and soon it was taken up by her fellows.
"Fallen Angel."
The commander held up her hand to still the chant. "What's your name fallen angel?"
"Clarke."
"Well Clarke, we have a saying about what the sea gives us." The commander purred. "She is a capricious mistress but when she grants you her favour do not doubt her."
"What do you mean?" Clarke asked doubtfully.
The commander looked almost disappointed as she explained. "It means welcome aboard, Clarke."
A/N - Oh Dear, it seems all the delinquents are dead except for Clarke, or are they?
Pусалка - Mermaid(Rus)