A/N: Oh, guys. First of all, thank you so much for all the comments, bookmarks, faves, etc. Truly, Elyza Lex and Alicia Clark take me forever to write but I love them.

Also, I had always planned on two chapters, one for each POV, but Alicia's took me FOREVER to write, and I rewrote a bunch so I could switch it to 2nd person, like Elyza's was. I'll say this, despite having never watched FTWD (I tried, guys. I couldn't get past one episode), Alicia is SO much fun to write.

Also, coming down the pipeline there may be a canon universe Clexa story. It was honestly this conversation that played out in my head

Rational me: writing takes you forever and you're never satisfied with what you write and writing for Clexa hurts you

Also me: okay but: clexa wherein Clarke comes down first, so you don't have to include any of her "people"

Rational me:…..I will allow it.

So yeah. Be on the lookout for that. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy this. I've stuck some of my favorite Buffy quotes in there because I love them.

(*)

But I want you to know I did save you. Not when it counted, of course, but…after that. Every night after that. I'd see it all again, do something different. Faster or more clever, you know? Dozens of times, lots of different ways.

Every night I save you.

(*)

Look, things in your life pretty much sucked. And the worst kind of sucked, they sucked with no hope of getting better in the offing.

Life had become less what it used to be (Matt, fighting with your mother, annoying Travis, pretending Nick didn't exist) and more about just surviving.

And you'd thought (you'd stupidly thought) you were at all capable enough to get off the ship and go on a supply run. You'd somehow got it inside your head that if things went south, you'd be remotely capable of defending both yourself and Nick.

Which is how you now find yourself cowering in the corner of a gas station minimart, alone, making yourself as small as possible so that the walker doesn't turn its wet growls on you.

It was, you assume, the smartest thing to do, given the situation.

And here's the thing – normal as Alicia Clark purports to be (you are. Have you seen your family?), there's been these…moments. Since you can remember, you see things when you close your eyes. Flashes, memories, someone who is you but isn't, rumblings of words in a language you don't recognize.)

You've pushed it down as long as you can possibly remember, but it feels like a beast inside of you, hungrier with every new vision, just waiting to claw out.

So you push it down further, because Alicia Clark has bigger things to worry about. Like how to keep from being very, very eaten by cowering in a corner, alone at a gas station minimart (again, it seems like the safest move).

Evidently, not to everyone, because the door opens and you see a flash of blonde jet inside the door. You hear the cooler doors open, and is this person stupid or suicidal?

(*)

You're more than a little proud that you manage to swing the bat at a hard enough angle to kill the walker (again).

You clean the brains of the baseball bat with a rag you find behind the counter, and the girl introduces herself as Elyza Lex, "badass zombie hunter extraordinaire".

Everything in your survival instincts tells you not to trust this complete stranger, and you must not have listened, because an hour later you're on the back of said stranger's bike, heading to god knows who's house in god knows where.

(It seems comparatively safe, and it's where you spend the next week, amid copious sarcastic retorts and eye rolls on your part.)

(*)

Elyza is the most confident, flirtatious person you've ever met. She openly checks you out and more often calls you "doll" or "cupcake" than your actual name.

And sometimes you blush and you don't know why.

Being around Elyza feels…different. You can't really explain why. It's just different. Familiar, somehow. Comfortable.

(*)

Elyza always insists you take the bed.

She'll gather some blankets on the ground, say something along the lines of you feel free to come down here if you get cold, cupcake and drop off to sleep.

Except she isn't sleeping.

You discover that one night when she wakes up what you'd estimate is only about an hour after she falls asleep.

Usually a heavy sleeper, a muffled noise wakes you.

You can't quite believe the source at first.

You shift carefully and peers down at your companion.

Elyza is shaking. She's crying. Her face is muffled by the pillow, but you can see, even in the dark room, her shoulders heave and she is sobbing something into her pillow. You strain to hear.

"Lexa. Lexa, please…no, not her! Come back, Lexa, come back!"

Something you don't understand inside you breaks, aches to comfort this relative stranger.

And that name, it triggers something on its own.

What's your name?

Lexa.

(*)

Something feels…. different about Elyza. It's something about the way the older girl's eyes train on you, as if she's searching for something.

And the way you want to give it to her, but you have no idea what it is.

You're separated from your family. They're dead, for all you know, and you're left with this girl who you know nothing about and it shouldn't be comfortable but it is.

You understand so little about anything nowadays.

All you know is you saved this girl from a walker, this girl took you in and you're reluctantly grateful.

(*)

You're a hypocrite.

No, really.

You're a hypocrite, because you accuse Elyza of crying every night, of going somewhere else in her mind, and you say nothing of yourself.

You see the pain in Elyza' entire body, her whole being screaming out for someone she sees in you, and block her out.

All the while, in your dreams, your own kohl-rimmed eyes stare at you and you wake up feeling for the delicate braids in your hair and it feels like you but it's not and you don't understand it.

You can't tell Elyza.

(What would she even say? You don't understand what's storming inside of you, why should this stranger?)

(*)

Sometimes, Elyza looks at you like she's trying to will memories into you, like she is dying to see that person she loves in you, but you aren't her.

And there are times where you'll say thing to Elyza, things that pop into your head from places you can't quite see, and they make Elyza's whole face darken with sadness.

You hate seeing Elyza like that, but you also hate having all this that you don't understand inside you.

(*)

You're straight.

You had a boyfriend.

You like boys.

You kiss Elyza, one day, when you can no longer ignore the voice, that same one that feeds on the scraps of memories, that screams at you to kiss her, kiss her.

Really, you don't know anything.

You don't know anything except kissing Elyza feels more right than anything, so you do.

And when you figure that out, you kiss the arrogant smirk right off her stupid face.

(The next day, you kiss her again. And then again, and again, until one day you don't stop and that tiny pocket of peace you find in her arms would be enough for you forever, you think.)

(*)

They find your family on a boat and you are ecstatic.

(Ecstatic, but you do notice the way Elyza's fingers slacken just slightly in yours, as if she's already preparing to let go).

So you pull the girl forward and introduce her and fight with your mother for Elyza's right to stay.

You said we were only taking necessary people.

Yes, I did.

She's my people, mom. She's staying.

(*)

You patrol together one day, two months after you meet, by your estimation

You raid an old WalMart and you'd think by now you would have stopped panicking as soon as the door opens and you hear footsteps on the floor but you never do.

Elyza shoves you behind her, ever the self-sacrificing idiot you love so.

Whoa. Love?

You hear no growls but walkers can be sneaky as they seek their prey.

Elyza lowers her gun with a shocked exhale first, and you follow on instinct, because you trust her.

They're not walkers.

(Shouldn't that be a good thing?)

It's a man and a woman.

Imagine your surprise when two pairs of eyes attached to actual living people, an older man and woman, scan Elyza up and down, before the woman pulls her into a tight embrace and Elyza doesn't fight it.

"You're here," the woman breathes into the girl's hair. "We found you."

Elyza grips the woman's leather jacket so tightly her fingers turn red. "I'm here."

Clarke?

I'm here.

(*)

You're surprised to see tears in Elyza's eyes as she pulls away

You touch Elyza's arm lightly and the girl laces your fingers together, pulling you face to face with the two strangers.

(Why do you feel like you're meeting the parents?)

(*)

"Guys, this is Alicia."

Paige looks her up and down as well, eyes opening in shock.

"Elyza, she's…."

"No." The word is firm, rough, fraught with sorrow and regret.

Alicia doesn't understand and Elyza doesn't offer.

The woman is Paige, you learn. And the man, Henry.

Two people that seem to simultaneously make Elyza light with happiness and warmth, and cause the most wrenching of pain to fill her eyes.

You yearn to know more, but Elyza says nothing.

They're staying near to here, they tell her. They've stolen a set of radios and they give one to Elyza.

"So we don't lose you again," they tell her.

She holds it like it's the most precious thing she's ever been given, which alone makes you steal her a jacket so she has a pocket to hide it in. Nobody will take this from the girl who has so little. You vow it.

(*)

It's weird for Chris.

You don't really know why, only knows that he avoids both you and Elyza like you are actually poisonous.

To be fair, you and Chris were never what you would call close to begin with, but nonetheless, you don't understand why he suddenly can't even be in the same room as either of you.

The two of you are not often outwardly affectionate, but you are always touching in some way. Pinkies linked (like 12-year-old schoolgirls, you know), feet twisted around each other's, holding hands, any way you can be touching, you usually are.

It gives you a sense of satisfaction to see how your touch seems to calm Elyza, particularly because the older girl carries so much pain that she will never show.

You're not sure at first but by the second week you definitely catch him mumbling some choice words under his breath.

Your heart beats a frantic tattoo and you are so furious, but Elyza is so amazingly, devastatingly calm.

And as the one widely regarded as the calmer of the two, you are confused.

She lets him say these horrible things and unless he says anything about Alicia in general, Elyza lets it go.

You ask her why one day, and Elyza turns to you with a sad smile.

"This is one world you're new in, cupcake, but I've been here awhile. Trust me, I've heard worse."

It hits you all at once: this is normal to her. She's used to being judged like this.

You fold Elyza into her arms and she links her pinkie to yours.

You whisper something about forever, and you're not sure why.

The next time you see Chris mumble something about either of you, you break his nose and you are proud of it.

(*)

They give you separate rooms, and you very nearly laugh.

Elyza has cold feet. You warm her every night.

And the flashbacks don't stop, they only get stronger.

Death is not the end.

And the suspicious looks from your family don't stop, but you will keep her safe. You promise her forever, promise it every night, and you will not break that promise.

She's the only forever you've known.

(*)

And then one day, you break from conversation with Ofelia and they tell you she's gone.

And Strand's ship is not big, yet you can't find her.

(*)

You laugh. That's your first reaction.

You ask your mother, and really, that's when you know.

Madison tells her Elyza left and she has to physically restrain herself from laughing.

Because Elyza would never leave. She promised.

They had lain in bed together and forever didn't mean much in this world but Elyza had promised and Alicia believed her and she wouldn't have just left.

(*)

Nick avoids her as soon as she sees him and that's her first clue.

So you hold a gun on him,

She holds a gun on her brother. She's desperate, moreso than she has been in her entire life.

But he will tell you where she is. You don't care what it takes.

You shove him onto Elyza's bike and hold a gun to his throat and tell him to take you to her.

He does, because maybe he feels some twisted sense of guilt.

(*)

She's in the middle of the road.

This is in a highly visible area. Walkers are everywhere and you've brought few weapons, but nothing, nothing matters more than getting her back.

She's limp, exposed. Your skin burns at the thought that your own family did this to her, tried to take her away from you.

It's not just your bodies that are entwined, you know. It's your very souls.

The betrayal knifes you, but keeping Elyza safe is your only priority right now.

(*)

She's unconscious. You pass your hands over her face, speak softly to her, until those blue eyes that save you over and over finally open.

You mutter something about having to save her too much, but really, you'd save her over and over, forever, if it means that's how long you get.

She smiles and your world rights a little.

You hear your family pulling up behind you first.

You say "first", because it's quickly followed by another, much worse sound.

(Well, worse at least. Your spine stiffens and you can't look at the people who betrayed you so).

You know those growls. You hasten to free Elyza but you're not fast enough.

You're not fast enough.

They're coming. They're coming and your family is pulling you away, so you can't save her. You fight but you can't save her, and the look on her face is so very resigned, but her eyes scream out for you, and then she says it.

"Lexa!"

(*)

Lexa.

What's your name?

Lexa.

Those green eyes pierce your mind, your mind which races through two lives.

We want the same things, Clarke.

Clarke of the Sky People.

Ai gonplei ste odon.

Yu nou trana bash op Klark nodotaim nowe. Swega em klin.

You will never again harm Clarke.

That's why I love you.

(*)

It's you, but it's not.

You are Lexa, and you are Alicia.

You are both.

(*)

It's a whisper, so unbefitting of the situation in front of you.

"…..Clarke?"

(*)

And then you're tearing through the walkers with a stolen knife and it feels like nothing, just as natural as breathing, as if you've done it forever.

(*)

She's crying.

She's looking at you.

And oddly, you think of your first words to each other, in a time where the world forced you apart.

You're the one.

(*)

In the After, Clarke is safe.

For now, and always. You swear it. You swear it as you made Titus swear that Clarke was never to be harmed again.

He was your family, in that time. But sometimes, family is only a starting point.

You think that's a brief comfort as you pack what little you and Elyza own and radio Henry and Paige.

You'll be staying with them, now.

You can't stay somewhere Elyza isn't safe, because she's part of you.

She tries to talk you out if it, but you won't hear it, and her feeble voice suggests that maybe Lexa came back quicker than she expected.

(*)

In the After, the world is still shit.

You live on a boat for three years, until the epidemic dies out, only going out for supply runs.

And you see your family again, but it's never the same.

Paige and Henry become your family.

And Elyza. Clarke.

As the first scraps of the world begin to knit themselves back together, you cling to the family you found, because it's another chance. Another try.

A maybe someday that has actually come to pass.

Clarke squeezes your hand, and you know it's because of her.

She's hope, to you.

That's why I love you.

(*)

Can we rest, now? Can we rest?

Fin.