Chapter 2.
Mutant Pet Please
The six teenagers marched through the woodland together, admiring the scenery.
Clarke was at the front, walking at a much faster pace than everyone else. While Ariella positioned herself at the back due to her constant need to stop and literally smell all the flowers. Monty had confessed that the pretty purple plants were poison sumac after Finn had put one in Octavia's hair. As soon as Ariella heard of the calming effect it was supposed to have, she had to sneak some for herself.
Oh and of course she spent the entire time humming (and occasionally belting out) her favourite songs.
When Ariella caught up close enough to hear the conversation of how everyone got imprisoned in the Sky Box, she immediately knew where it would lead.
"Okay I've got to admit, I've heard stories but they've all been so different that I can't decipher which is true or not." Finn turned back and smirked at Ari, "So are you going to tell us what you actually did to get yourself locked up?"
With a sigh, she noticed that the group (minus Clarke) had all slowed down, interested to hear the story that had been changed so much over the past year.
"My official charge was 'assaulting several officers and public figures." She shrugged, "There was only one public figure, okay?"
Back on The Ark, on the 19th of December of the year before the current, Ariella's crazy grandma had just turned 100 years old. This apparently warranted a massive party, even though Grandma Trippy (her self given nickname, by the way) couldn't even stand up from her wheelchair to greet anyone.
This also meant that, because of this rare occasion, The Chancellor was allowed to crash the party. To be honest, there was a tiny possibility that he was actually invited since Grandma Trippy had a huge crush on him, but for the sake of the story; he crashed the party.
About an hour into the night, Ariella was pretty wasted, which was strange because she hadn't had any alcohol - sometimes a girl has got to sacrifice her wild ways when the Chancellor's about - and she was pretty sure she hadn't visited Monty at the gardens for a while. This left one conclusion, Grandma Trippy had spiked her fruity-flavoured juice. And Ariella's theory was proven correct when the older woman winked at her granddaughter and waved her little flask sneakily from across the room.
There was only one person who could properly look after Ariella when she was drunk, and that was Jaxon. Her voluntary and unofficial 'AA sponsor' who pretty much didn't help at all. In fact, he definitely encouraged it. Anyway, he was working with his dad that night so he couldn't come to the party to look after her, leaving her free to do as her intoxicated mind pleased. And apparently it pleased to cause havoc.
Fast forward to about half an hour later, she was running from four guards through the empty corridors, the sacred Eden Tree in her arms, yelling something about her 'just wanting to look after it'. She almost tripped a few times, but luckily managed not to let it fall and eventually deposited it back into Vera Kane's arms, who just smiled kindly at her as she flew off in another direction to avoid the guards. Unfortunately, Ariella hadn't had much practice in the activity of exercising, so was quickly running out of breath. She could easily tell you the science behind the pain she was getting in her side when sober, but drunk and oxygen-deprived, she probably could even read her own name. So the big question is, was she really deserving of the blame when she ended up accidently smashing into the Chancellor and trying to karate kick the guards that were forcefully pulling her all about? I'm gonna need a 10,000 word essay on it by tomorrow.
"It was an accident." She shrugged as the rest of the group were almost rolling on the floor laughing. "It wasn't my fault!"
Jasper was the first to recover, and he turned to Octavia. "Think you can beat that one Octavia? What'd they get you for?"
"Think that wasn't fair? I was in for being born." The mood had changed dramatically, and the awkwardness was still simmering in the air as she walked away from the group.
Ariella quickly caught up to Octavia, "Hey, are you alright?"
She nodded her head but kept her eyes forward, "Yeah, it just pisses me off sometimes. The Ark, that is." She smiled suddenly, "Glad we're gone."
Ariella nodded, but didn't get a chance to reply because everyone rushed over to a kneeling Clarke. She followed and stared as soon as she spotted the dear everyone was looking at. This was the first animal they'd seen on Earth, and it looked exactly like the photos in Earth Studies.
"No animals, huh?" Finn laughed, and then tried to step closer. By doing this, he accidently stood on a twig that snapped loudly. The deer looked up and over to the group, showing it's extra head protruding from its neck. And then it ran off.
"That looked nothing like the photos I've seen." Ariella voiced as everyone stood up and began walking again.
"It was terrifying." Octavia agreed, "But kind of beautiful in a weird way. I can't explain it."
"No need, it was ugly; sure. But I think it was pretty cute. I might have to find another one to keep as a pet." Ariella grinned.
"Hey, you know what I'd like to know? Why send us down today after ninety seven years? What changed?" Finn asked after a few minutes of hiking through the forest.
Octavia shrugged and skipped off in front, "Who cares? I'm just glad they did. I woke up rotting in a cell, and now," She span around a tree and smiled at Finn. "I'm spinning in a forest." He walked passed her and she glared slightly. Ariella nudged her shoulder encouragingly.
"Maybe they found something on a satellite, you know, like an old weather satellite or..."
"It wasn't a satellite." Clarke declared loudly, gaining everyone's attention, "The Ark is dying. At the current population level, there's roughly three months left of life support, maybe four now that we're gone."
Everyone paused for a moment. Damn, everything was always so serious around Clarke. Ariella probably would have preferred not even knowing. She didn't really have anyone else up there except for Jaxon. Grandma Trippy had died peacefully in her sleep while Ari was locked up. She had no more family left - after her mother died during labour and her dad was floated a week before that for illegally setting fire to a candle for her mother's birthday. She had never even met any of her parents. It was a good thing she was good at making friends, or she'd be really lonely now.
The group had a lovely, enlightening conversation about death some more, before they continued walking and eventually found themselves at a river.
It seemed that Ari and Octavia were both thinking the exact same thing as they looked at each other, sharing the same excited grin.
They started stripping out of their clothes and Ariella jumped in first, wading in the water and wallowing in the unfamiliar sensation. She'd never had a bath before, they only had showers on the Ark.
Finn and Jasper were cheering, but Clarke - yet again - was still being serious. "Ariella!" To be fair, she was trying to keep them safe, but Earth couldn't be that bad could it? "Octavia, what the hell are you doing?"
Octavia smiled at the blonde, before joining her new friend in the river with a splash. Everyone rushed over to the ledge to get a better look at the girls, who wet smiling mischievously. "We can't swim." Monty called when he noticed the two friends were neck deep in the water.
"I know," She smirked, and then stood up so the water only came up to her hips, "but we can stand." Everyone laughed and began taking their clothes off to join in.
Ari giggled and fell back into the water, wetting her hair and pushing it all off her face. "Just call me Ariel from now on, because I want to be a fucking mermaid."
She distantly heard Clarke say something about there not being a river on the map, just to quickly be shut down by Finn. Ari decided that maybe if Clarke was already wet, she wouldn't mind coming in the water - which led to her deciding to splash the blonde mercilessly. Finn let out a laugh, but Jasper's face fell as he saw something in the distance.
"Ari, Octavia, get out of the water." He said and everyone turned to see what he had seen.
"Get out of the water now!" Ariella trusted Clarke's judgement since she had a higher vantage point to see whatever it was they were worried about, so she started making her way to the shore.
Octavia, however, didn't seem to act as quickly. When Ari turned to look back at Octavia, she was already being dragged down by a monster under the water. She was screaming, everyone else was screaming.
"Fuck!" Was all Ariella could think to say as she scrambled up onto the rock with help from Finn. "Octavia!"
"What the hell is that?" No one knew the answer.
"We have to help her."
"No shit, hero." Ariella rolled her eyes.
Clarke seemed to be ahead of them all, "If we distract it, it might let her go." She ran over to a big rock and everyone followed. "Help me."
Everyone pushed on the boulder and it soon caved and fell into the water. And it actually worked. The monster let Octavia go and she immediately stumbled to the shore, where Jasper helped to pull her out. "I got you." He told her as she gasped for breath, wet strand of hair struck around her face. She thanked him a few times as Clarke examined her bloody gash on her leg, who decided it wasn't fatal yet.
"Think I've decided I don't really want a mutant pet anymore." Ariella tried to calm her breathes as Octavia laughed with a nod, before looking back to Jasper as if he was a god.
Monty patted Jasper's back, "Note to self, next time, save the girl." Everyone had a nice little laugh after that fucking scary ass moment.
