WE MET AGAIN (WILL YOU STAY?)
Chapter one: A familiar soul
Clarke was leaning against the big, cold tree. Her blonde hair was hanging in stripes down her face. It was covered in wet from the rain that had occurred earlier during the day, mixed with dirt and moss from the huge tree behind her. Her deep blue eyes were fixated on the little, pathetic fire in front of her. It was fighting to keep alive, but it was to no use. It was too weak and it didn't take long before it gave up and died and only left a thin cloud of smoke that reached for the sky after itself. Clarke cursed and leaned forward to poke in the remains of the fire with a stick. She sighed loudly; it had taken her forever to make that little fire. There was no way she was going to be able to make a new one. Absolutely not a big one enough that would be enough to keep her warm through the night that crept closer and closer.
Frustrated, Clarke stood up on unsteady legs; she was tired, so incredibly tired. What had she been thinking when she left Camp Jaha? That she would be able to make it by herself out here? She had never been so naïve before, has she gone out of her mind? Back when she made the decision to leave, she hadn't given it much thought; she just needed to get out of there. She needed to be alone for a while, maybe a day or two. It hadn't been a part of her; not very thought through, plan to be gone for so long. The fact that she had been gone for soon two weeks now was a mistake. She had just walked into the forest without any destination goal what so ever and eventually she gotten lost. Of course she would get lost in a huge, never ending forest. She should've seen that coming. Now she was stuck in there with only her thoughts as company and she was pretty sure she would go crazy soon.
Food hadn't been a big problem the first couple of days. She had at least been clear enough in her head to not leave the camp without packing some food and water in her little backpack. But the food wasn't meant to be enough for two weeks, only four or five days if she was careful with it, so after a week she had to start hunting for food. Animal or plants, whatever she stumbled upon that was eatable. That was easier said than done and a lot of days, Clarke's stomach had to settle with some roots and nuts, maybe a little wild rabbit if she was lucky. Her hunting for food had also been the biggest reason that she had gotten lost in this stupid forest. Clarke mentally slapped herself for leaving the camp in the first place.
Clarke had left because she couldn't handle being around other people, to keep them alive and to be in charge. The weight on her shoulders was overwhelming her, chocking her until she was scared that she wouldn't be able to make the right choices for her people anymore. And the guilt burned inside of her like a hot piece of metal. She had killed hundreds of innocent people; she had so much blood on her hands and the voices inside her head where screaming at her, they would never leave her be. All those innocent people had probably been scared out of their minds. Mount Weather had been their only safety, the only place where they could be safe and survive. In the blink of an eye, Clarke had literally let them all melt away from radiation exposure; they had absolutely nowhere to escape and now they were all burning her from the inside of her thoughts, overflowing her with guilt. She tried to fight back. I did it for my people, she kept thinking. I did it to save my friends, my family. But what if there was another way? What if you just had thought a bit harder? There were children in there. You killed them.
Then there was Lexa's betrayal. She had tried really hard not to think about that, it hurt even more than the burning guilt. She tried to push it away as far as she could. It had broken her heart into a million pieces; she had never felt so broken before. Even though a part of her understood Lexa's act, she understood that she was only doing what was best for her people. Clarke had killed off hundreds of people to save her own, she wasn't much better. But that didn't take away the fact that Lexa could've stabbed her right in the heart instead and that would've been less painful than the pain she felt from her betraying her. She had thought Lexa cared for her. She had been such a fool to think that.
When she had first met the Commander of the Grounder people, she had been hard as a stone and cold as ice. She strongly believed that feelings only were weakness, that they would prevent you from making the right choices. You had to think with your head and not your heart. But as time passed, Lexa's ice cold heart had started to melt and she opened up to Clarke. She had opened up enough for Clarke to see right through her, Lexa was weak from hiding from her feelings, not the opposite. It made Clarke feel pretty special to be honest, that Lexa trusted her and dared to show her feelings around her. She had been foolish to believe that Lexa would completely break down her stone wall though. Lexa would never let go of her belief that feelings were weakness when making decisions, especially when it concerned her people. Clarke wasn't special enough.
Clarke quickly turned around and stabbed her knife into the barque of the tree behind her. She let out a loud scream of frustration and pain as she pressed the knife further into the defenseless tree. Maybe it wasn't the greatest idea to stand in the middle of the forest and scream her lungs out while the sun was slowly climbing down on the sky, making the already dark forest even darker. She didn't care for a second though, if the beasts of the forest heard her. She leaned her forehead against the hard surface of the tree and let out a weak, hoarse whimper as a lonely tear rolled down her dirt covered cheek. She couldn't do this anymore.
She had stood against the tree, supporting her forehead against it, for a while. It was completely quiet and peaceful around her. The only sound that could be heard was the sound of the wind playing with the leafs up in the many trees surrounding her. But then she suddenly she heard a small, almost unnoticeable crack behind her. Slowly she turned her head around, then her whole body followed. With a firm grip around her knife, which she out of instinct had dragged out of her pocket, she stared out into the dark of the forest. Her eyes were darting around her, looking for whatever could've made that sound. The sound of her blood rushing grew bigger in her ears as adrenaline was darting around in her blood. She might've not cared about the beasts living in the forest some seconds ago, but when she heard the sound; her mind had jumped straight to the time when Lexa and she had fought that enormous gorilla together. She had been terrified and she still was terrified of that damn animal.
When Clarke had stood completely still and just stared into the dark for a while, she started to relax in her body. She shook her head a bit; she was probably just being paranoid. It wasn't weird that she was though, she was all alone out in a big and dangerous forest and she had been really paranoid during the days she had been out there, but she had never heard sounds that hadn't actually been there before. Clarke sighed at herself; she had enough on her mind, why did she have to start having hallucinations too? She was just about to put her knife back into her pocket when she swore that she had detected a movement in the corner of her eyes.
Quickly she turned around and held her knife ready to defend herself. She stopped in mid-movement though and a loud gasp escaped her mouth. Her eyes widened when they had met a familiar figure standing in front of her. She couldn't believe her eyes.
"Hello Clarke." It was a familiar sound that both made her feel happy, but also an intense anger built up inside of her. She let her hand, which was holding tightly on to her knife, fall to her side. She felt completely numb in her body and she didn't know how to react. "Lexa…" she whispered.