Under My Skin
by starryeyedparadise
Chapter 2: Poquoson Clan
Bellamy wants to strangle the grounder when she leaves him there tied up.
He's livid, he's furious, he's downright ready to kill her until he falls asleep and all he can think about is staying that way because he's not hurting. The sleep is nice and he doesn't dream or at least he thinks he doesn't and it's the first time in too long that he hasn't seen one of their faces.
Octavia's face. Jasper's face. Monty's face.
Clarke.
He says her name, he realizes because it wakes him up and the candles in the bunker have almost burnt out. But he can still see, and he spots the grounder hovering over a table with a pencil in her hand as she scribbles in a notebook and he's fucking livid again.
"Untie me," he's demanding and she seems to expect him to say something like that because she just ignores him, her pencil still scribbling and her brow still furrowed like she's concentrating or some shit and now he wants to strangle her again.
He's pulling on the bindings which causes the bed to shake and if she's not going to acknowledge him then he's going to annoy the shit out of her until she does.
And she does when she slams down the book and stands up with her hands on her hips and he realizes she's tall for a girl, not that he still couldn't take her because she may be tall but he's still taller. But it's not a fair fight and until he has use of his hands back so he's just going to bide his time until he does.
She contemplates it, he can see it and it's slightly amusing watching her expression change as she argues internally with herself about whether or not to trust him. She can't trust him, obviously, but he's not about to tell her that.
She eventually decides to until him from the cot but his hands are still tied together and he's about to ask why when she points to the long red line across her neck. He recalls the knife incident and attacking her in the shower and how easily she subdued him then. It's only been a few hours but he's sure he's stronger. Or at least he thinks he's sure until he tries to sit up and everything gets dizzy.
She pushes him back down, gently he notices and it takes everything in him not to slap her hands away with his bound ones. She's looking down at him now with an expression he can't place. He decides it's pity and that only pisses him off further so he looks away.
And then she speaks.
"Who's Clarke," she says like they're friends and she can ask him anything but they're not and she can't and she especially can't ask him about Clarke and so he finds his hands, bound as they are, wrapped tightly around her tiny little throat.
And this time she flinches.
"Don't fucking say her name," he says louder than he means to but it gets his point across as he straddles her to the ground and squeezes again.
That's when she hits him in the balls and he keels over like his soul has been ripped out of his body and he can't breathe. And everything hurts. And there she goes, standing up like he didn't almost strangle her to death and she brushes off her shirt and just stares at him like he's an idiot.
Maybe he is.
"Are you finished?" she says and this time he can hear her accent and it's not like the others he's heard before. It's refined English. Almost too perfect.
He coughs. But he nods too because he is starting to realize that in his current state he cannot take on this girl, easily or otherwise. And so she helps him back into the cot for the third time and then she pulls her knife. But it's to cut his bindings so he only freaks out for maybe a split second before the ties are ripped free.
But she sees the freak out, even if it was only for a split second and she laughs as she walks away. Or at least she starts to before he says something that stops her.
"Please," he says politely, or as polite-ish as he can. He's pretty sure it doesn't come off as polite as he thinks it does because she's glaring at him. "Just tell me where my people are."
"I don't have your people, Spaceman, and I don't know where they are."
"Your people took-" he starts to say but suddenly something flips and she's the one yelling this time.
"Those aren't my people!" she's shouting but she regrets it because she clears her throat and looks at the ground. And then she says it again this time it's calmer and she's not looking at him.
"I spoke to one of your men," he reminds her. "He told me the other grounders took my people from our dropship and then a map he drew us lead us into a fucking trap. Sound familiar?"
She doesn't say anything about the trap or the man but she frowns and says "Grounders?" like she's never heard it. Maybe she hasn't but he doesn't have the patience to explain it.
"A hundred of my people came down from the Ark and we tried to make peace with your people," she's glaring at him so he corrects himself though he's not even sure what to correct it to so he just says grounders again which she seems to figure out without further explanation.
"The Trigeda are the grounders you speak of," she says, stressing his term for the earth born savages they've been at war with for the last month and she sighs. "I'm not part of the Trigeda Clan. I'm not part of any of the Woodland Clans so I wouldn't know who has your people," she clarifies and it makes sense why she looks cleaner and much less savage than the others.
"Well if you're not a woodland grounder then what the hell are you? You're clearly not from the Ark," he says and she laughs but she doesn't mean to and he can tell because she's composing herself and looking away again.
"I'm Poquoson, we're from the coast, far from here and far from your quarrel with the Trigeda," she explains and he remembers Lincolns book and Finn talking about a grounder clan that was safe and he wonders. He hopes.
"There is a clan there, a woman named Luna leads it," the name seems to spark something in her eyes because she is looking at him, her eyes are locked on his and she walks towards him.
"How do you know about Luna?" she asks him, crossing her arms over her chest as she shifts.
"Lincoln told us we would be safe there. We tried to make it there when your-" he stops because he remembers she's not one of those grounders or so she says and he doesn't feel like getting yelled at again. "-when the Trigeda grounders came to our camp and tried to massacre us."
She thinks about this for a while, his words, because she's pacing and then she shakes her head, stopping right by the bed so he has to strain his head to look up at her.
"Sky People wouldn't be welcomed there, not now. Not after what happened," she says but her eyes have a far-off look about them.
"But they might have gone there. If one of them had Lincoln's map-"
"Lincoln was wrong to send you there," she says forcefully and there is anxiety in the way her fingers fidget and her foot taps. "If your people walk into Poquoson territory, Spaceman, I would give up any hope of seeing them again."
Sinking. It's the feeling in his stomach, deep down in the pit of it and he doesn't understand what he's hearing. For all he knows this is the first Poquoson grounder he's met and so why the fuck would they have a problem with the hundred because when have they ever been more than a days walk away from camp?
"Why?" he says and it comes out as a shout. "What have we done to you?! Lincoln says Luna was a friend. Maybe she'd protect us."
"She wouldn't."
"And how do you know!?" he's shouting again and he wishes she was shouting too but she's not and she's just standing there calmly like he's the one overreacting or something.
"Because she's my mother," she replies like it's an acceptable answer. But it's not.
"And why would Lincoln tell us she would take us in if she wouldn't?"
"She would, or she would have before. But not now. And they have good reason."
"What. Reason." he grounds out because there is no good fucking reason for mass murdering his people and her eyes can't meet his.
"Your people killed my brother Jericho, and-" she pauses and sighs heavily. "And Michael, who rules the Poquoson with my mother. His son was murdered as well."
"And the grounders killed a lot of peoples' sons! And daughters!" He was angry and he didn't care that she saw it and when he tried to stand because he hated feeling small and beneath her, she just gently pushed him back down. And he really needed her to stop treating him like a child.
"Stop getting up before you rip your stitches again. I won't sew you up a third time," she warned him and he believed she was serious so he didn't move even though he wanted to. He wanted to leave but every step was agonizing and no matter how hard he tried to hide it the grounder in front of him wasn't buying his bullshit.
"For what it's worth," she says and he scoffs because the word of grounder is worth less than nothing at this point and time but she keeps talking. "It's unlikely your people would have reached Poquoson territory before the Trigeda or even Mountain Men found them first."
Mountain Men.
It sends chills up his spine and he doesn't know why he hadn't remembered it earlier. They'd been warned about the Mountain Men and at the time Bellamy hadn't been thinking of anyone but the grounders for weeks. He remembers that grounders fear them but there is no fear in this grounder's eyes. Only something indiscernible.
"For your sake, I hope it's the Trigeda," she says and he only confirms his thoughts.
When she walks away he is angry but not as angry as he was before. But something has changed in her demeanor and for whatever reason he doesn't try to argue with her any longer. And he believes her, which might be the worst part of it all.
They don't speak for a long time and the silence seems awkward after their near shouting match, though Bellamy remembers he was the only one shouting. He realizes why she wasn't letting him get out of the bed because maybe it was for his own good but he doesn't admit that, not even to himself because he knows the first moment he gets he's leaving no matter what condition he's in. Because he has people to find and Clarke is out there and Octavia and he's not letting this grounder keep him from them.
He wants to ask her about the coast though, about the ocean, because maybe there's a safe place to go when all this shit is done. He's having a complete lapse in judgement when he starts to open his mouth but suddenly there is a loud banging on the hatch door and the grounder girl is only slightly less startled than he is.
She's frowning when she looks out the hatch door and he notices the change in her stance and the worry in her eyes which is a look he hadn't seen before and that makes him sit up even though she told him not to. She grabs the knife at her waist, her grip tight and it makes Bellamy think he might need a weapon too because clearly he can't protect himself from a grounder girl how the hell is he supposed to protect himself from something she's scared of?
But there is nothing aside from a candlestick and it's insufficient but it will have to do. So he grabs it and the hatch is opening and before realizes what is happening the grounder is pinned to the floor by another grounder, this one is a guy. He's big, maybe as big as Bellamy but right now the grounder is at a hundred percent and he's only at fifty, maybe sixty if he could find something better than this fucking candlestick.
The grounder guy looks at him and it's clear he isn't happy about what he's seeing. It's the first time that Bellamy notices that even though the grounder girl is being pinned down by the grounder guy, she's got her knife very roughly against the grounder guy's neck and neither one of them are trying to end the stalemate they've created.
And Bellamy has a pretty good idea that whatever the hell is going on right in front of him is most assuredly his fault. But he wouldn't know because when they start shouting at one another it's not in English and he can't understand a fucking word of it.
"What the hell is this?" Sol is hissing and Lux just wants him to shut up and get the hell off of her because he is heavy and overreacting.
"Get off of me," she's shouting in English and then again in her own tongue and he doesn't obey her in either language so she presses the knife harder to his throat. This time she thinks he gets the message because he rolls off of her quickly but he's standing over her and he's staring down at her with that look.
"I knew you were lying. But I never thought this-" he whispers and he's not only pissed but he's betrayed and she can't bear to look in his eyes when he's looking at her like that. "What the hell are you thinking bringing this Sky trash here?"
She briefly looks at the space between Sol and the boy with the brown eyes and she knows they both see her take a step between them, but she only see's Sol's reaction and it's not happy. He's furious and she expected that but what she wasn't expecting was for him to find her here with one of the Sky People and very little room for explanations.
He doesn't want explanations. He wants blood but she's not giving him that.
"He was dying," she's saying and it's a mistake because now her brother thinks she's weak. "He was dying Solomon," she says again, this time with more force. "Was I supposed to keep walking, watch him suffer?"
"Yes," he tells her and she wants to roll her eyes because of course that's what he says and she should have known. "He's one of their leaders, Lux. His kind, his people are the reason Jericho is dead."
Jericho. Jericho was dead because of his own hubris, because of his own stupidity and it had nothing to do with Sky People. But she doesn't say that because she has before and it didn't go over well then and it won't go over well now.
"Jericho made his choice. He went against the council and against the clan."
"Like you are now?"
"Don't let your hatred blind you," she warns because he often does. He has every reason to hate them. But he won't get anywhere near this one.
"My hatred?" he asks her condescendingly. "I know you haven't forgotten what his kind did to Axil. You may not care that our brother is dead, but expected Axil's death to stir something in you. It's his kind that killed your lover. Remember him?" he reminds her like she needs reminding but she certainly doesn't. She's angry and she tries to hide it but they still know each other too well.
Axil's death was as much her fault as the Sky Clan's. She begged him to protect Jericho, even though it was not their fight. And both of them had died for it. Her guilt was enough of a reminder, she didn't need Sol's reminder as well.
"You need to leave," she says simply but he doesn't budge. "Just go home, Sol. This one doesn't need to die. None of them need to die."
"You're putting an outsider before your clan, Lux. That's not how we do things," he warns her and she's done being calm.
"Killing innocent strangers is not how we do things either!" she's shouting back because her brother doesn't understand what an idiot he has become.
"You think he's innocent!?" Sol is shouting now too. "He's their leader. He condemned the Trigeda to death. Hell it might as well have been him who put the bullet in our brother and you want to protect him? We need to take him prisoner. If we take him now-"
"And what would we stand to gain?" she asks and he doesn't respond because she knows she has a point. "This is not our war, Sol," she replies calmly. "I will not bring the Trigeda war to Poquoson. I may be banished but I haven't forgotten my place. I won't bring our clan into a war we will not win."
"Then we will trade him for our men. They've got them, at their Camp Jaha-" he says, desperate because he knows she is right.
"What are you saying about my camp?" the boy with the brown eyes is saying now because it might be the first word he actually understands when Sol mentions Camp Jaha. Sol isn't happy about the spaceman speaking because he's yelling and Sol's yelling and now they're all yelling.
Tensions are high because Sol is now close enough to hit the guy but Lux steps between them and he hits her instead. And then her knife is once again against her brother's throat and they're back where they started.
"Touch him and I will kill you myself," she's saying, this time in English so both of them know to back the fuck off. "He's under my protection."
"Immunity," Sol scoffs, in his English as well. "You're giving this scum immunity?" He's pacing angrily now. "You're abusing your power, Lux. He's a Sky Man!"
"And a human being! Like the rest of us." she counters and both of them are staring at her now because her voice just cracked a little.
"You think Michael is going to accept your decision? You're still banished. He won't accept this even from you."
"I don't care about Michael," and it's true because she wants to hate Michael for the hell he's put her through. But Sol is partially right. But so is she. "Our mother will listen and she will do what is right. And what I'm doing is the right thing, even if you can't see that," she explains and this time she's calm. She thinks he just might be calm too even though he hasn't taken his eyes from the man behind her.
"You're making a mistake," he says and it disappoints her because she wanted him to be on her side, like always but he's not and he's backing away. "These people don't care about us. The second you let your guard down, you'll be in that camp and they won't be talking about peace."
"And you think war is the better way? The Trigeda have lost three hundred, we're lucky to have only lost a few. I don't want war in our territory. And if you're smart, like I know you are Solomon, you will not bring it to our door."
He is smart and he knows it and she knows it. She knows what she is saying is right and no matter how angry Sol is about Jericho he has to think about Clan first. Clan before everything. And that's what she's doing. She's not holding grudges about Jericho or Axil. She's thinking of her clan, and the boy with the brown eyes is staring at her with something other than disgust and she hopes he understands what she's sacrificing to protect him - no, to protect her clan.
"Do what you have to do, Lux."
"Sol," she pleads when he starts to leave but he's jerking her hand off of his shoulder. "Solomon!" she shouts after him but it's to no avail and the hatch closes behind him and she's alone.
No, she's with the space man, the boy with the brown eyes and the confused expression. He's holding a candlestick and she wants to laugh because it's a terrible choice for a weapon. But he just holds it and she stands there and they just look at each other and she thinks.
She thinks maybe they've come to an unspoken understanding but she can't be sure. She doesn't know this man and she doesn't trust him but she's helping him and she's staking everything on being right. And so she just hopes she's right.
And she walks away.
Or she tries to but he stops her with his voice. No, it's his words. One word.
"Lux."
It's her name.
She turns and he's closer than he was a moment ago and he's still holding his stupid candlestick and she's still holding her knife and they stare at eachother.
"Your name is, Lux," he repeats this time and she nods. "I'm Bellamy," he says but she can see he's reluctant to shake her hand so they just stand there awkwardly. She is thinking it's a weird name, even for a spaceman but it's better than 'boy with the brown eyes.' She thinks she just might call him spaceman instead.
And as if on cue they both put their weapons away and an understanding is made, at least for the moment. She doesn't know if he trusts her but she thinks he believes her enough that she won't hurt him unless he tries to escape again.
But he doesn't.
He stays. For now.
