Chapter I: Hope

I was sitting on a stoop, burying my face in my hands.

"It happened again, didn't it?"

I looked up when one of my mom's closest friends, and my uncle, stopped beside me. I nodded hopelessly and he sighed, sitting beside me. He placing a comforting hand on my shoulder.

"He cries when she cries, you know," I told him in a hoarse whisper.

He sighed. "Hope, you know your father loves your mother very much. He did long before you were born. Seeing her so hurt hurts him. Very much." He almost looked like he was going to cry. Almost. "It hurts me, too. She's like a sister to me."

I shook my head. "You know, if you'd tell me why our history upsets her so much—"

"You know I can't do that, Hope." He ran a hand through his thick brown hair. "Now, if you'd stop badgering your mother, maybe she wouldn't cry so much."

I stood up defiantly. "I have a right to know!" He gave me his most disapproving face; my stomach churned. I hated upsetting him. He means so much to me! "Uncle Jasper, please!"

After several agonizing seconds, he finally nodded. "Alright."

I sat down, eager. This is what I've been waiting for, for all these years.

"As you know, I'm not really you're uncle."

My head snapped back. "What?!"

"You're mother only thinks of me as a brother." I nodded, still confused. "You have an actual uncle."

"Wait—what?"

"His name was Bellamy. He is—was—excuse my language, a cocky ass. But he'd do anything for his baby sister, your mother. He raised her and cared for her. He wanted to win the Mountain War for her—the war between the Mountain Men and the Alliance. And he did. He won the war for her, that cocky kid. But she was his biggest fault, his sister."

"What are you talking about?"

"He loved Octavia too much." He shook his head, trying so desperately to fight the tears. "She was a strong child. Samurai of the Sky People, warrior and leader of the Grounders. She didn't need his protection, but he didn't care. He figured he owed her his life. And he kind of did. 'I'm not a kid anymore, Bell!' she'd say. 'I don't need you to protect me like that anymore! I can take care of myself.' But he didn't care. 'It's my job,' he'd insist. It was a pattern. She was his baby sister. 'I'd do anything for you, O.' He was willing to fight for her. To die for her, even. And he did."

A tear rolled down my cheek.

"Now you see why your mother cries herself to sleep every night? When Bellamy died, everything bright and beautiful in her life died with him."

He was crying. My stomach churned. Uncle Jasper was the strongest person I know!

"You want to know something special?"

Sniffling, I asked, "what?"

"He's the one who named you. He thought that you being born would give us all hope."

I shook my head.

"You were born on March first at five-twenty one in the morning. Bellamy Blake died on March first at approximately one-thirty something at night. Your birthday is the anniversary of his death. His sacrifice."

I hugged my scrawny knees to my chest. "No." I shook my head. Why? "Is that why Indra hates me?"

Uncle Jasper nodded solemnly. "She blames you for Bellamy's death, and how Octavia changed afterwards."

I was now completely, utterly confused. "Why me?"

"He went back. Bellamy. He was safe; his job was done! He shut off the acidic fog, freed the Grounder prisoners, and helped the rest of the people including me, and let the armies in. He succeeded. He took off and raced back to the little rebuilt village of Tondc, where your mother was. It was the safest place, as you were due. He got there just as she went into labor. Just like he delivered his baby sister, he delivered his niece. When he saw your tiny hands and your sweet, innocent face, he went back to battle. He left you mother with an insistent kiss on her forehead and an 'I'll be back by nightfall.'

She waited for her husband and brother, holding you in her arms.

I got to Tondc first, with Maya, Harper, Monty, and Fox on my heels. Then Miller. Then, little by little, the armies came together, victorious. Lincoln was last to return. I remember this so clearly—I was sitting with her while we waited."

I didn't think I wanted to hear the rest. It felt like my lungs were closing.

"She jumped up, nearly dropping your fragile body. I was prepared to catch you if she let you go. 'Bellamy?!' she cried out.

Lincoln spun on his heel and ran back to the Mountain, at almost super-human speed. Before he reached it…the left side exploded. Bellamy was in it. Octavia found his jacket in the rubble. No one said it—we all knew he was dead. And those of us who didn't…well, we knew from Octavia's screams. She screamed and cried. Lincoln carried her crumpled body back to camp that night.

A year later, we moved into what remained of Mount Weather. Our enemy's base became our home. I remember the words she uttered that first night in the place that her brother died at. 'I am become death, destroyer of worlds.' She said that, clinging to the sooty jacket, what remained of her dearly departed brother."