Author: Wednesday's episode. That is all.
The Person (I should have been)
Chapter Eleven
"There are no innocents. There are, however, different degrees of responsibility."
Stieg Larsson, The Girl who Played with Fire
Bellamy doesn't tell Clarke what Lincoln said to him until after the gathering at the pyre and once she forced broth down. He's chewing on a potato; the one hundred mistook the root for a collection of pretty flowers when they first crashed on Earth.
"What does he mean 'promises'?" She slurps and doesn't feel ashamed. What about eating is shameful anyways?
"Princess, if I knew, we wouldn't be having this conversation," he sighs, putting the remainder of his potato on a dented metal plate, disinterested.
Clarke frowns. "You should finish that. It'll give your the body the energy it needs to heal."
They sit on their cot in the drop ship. They're alone unless you count Quinn. Hillary asked to leave the infirmary this morning, explaining she can't stand being beside a comatose Quinn. "It's just too damn depressing," she said. What does she want Clarke to do about it though? His vitals are solid and his eyes react when she shines a light on them. Does Quinn think he's 10 feet under? Clarke gritted her teeth and told Hillary she would be around to check up on her arm.
Bellamy snorts, "You really can't be saying that type of crap to me."
She elongates her spine. "It's true."
"So what? Can't take your own advice?" He nods to her cup of broth. "When was the last time you had anything solid?"
Clarke isn't often honest with herself but she has always been honest with Bellamy. "Before the accident."
Their knees are touching and they have been doing that a lot lately, touching. Clarke is grateful for it. It helps keep the craving and desperation at bay because she is able to remember that she feels alone, but she isn't. Sometimes that's enough.
He sighs out her name.
She looks to the entrance. An extra layer of fabric hangs heavy and rocks were strung to the bottom so it was weighted down instead of fluttering in the wind. Clarke asked Ulric where he got the extra fabric from; he said Bellamy. She likes having him in the drop ship with her. Giggles drip down from the floors above them. Although she isn't sure if she likes having to share all the space with everyone else. (Everyone else: those who doesn't see her more than a pair of hands to heal him or her with.) Finn hasn't joined them inside. Raven tries to convince him otherwise and Clarke is grateful his stubborn streak holds in more places than just in his love life.
"I can't keep anything down," she admits. "I can eat it and then it settles into a hard ball in my stomach and it hurts so much that I force it up."
Bellamy can't keep his breathing quiet. He doesn't talk and gives her the chance to get this all out because it will be the first time she's admitted her problems. "And I don't know when it started, Bellamy, but I don't think it's just because we got buried. When it is my turn to have an egg, they go down easier, but I couldn't do meat unless it is burnt after Wells and it got harder and harder putting that down." She catches his eyes and holds it, dares him to laugh, to feel pity. To call her weak.
He grins and says, "I can't drink Monty's moonshine. I feel lightheaded and out of control before I even take a sip. The smell of it makes me anxious and my hands shake and my heart pumps. I end up just hovering over Octavia if I get a strong enough whiff of it because I feel wired and terrified. And I don't know why Clarke. I don't know why."
She doesn't know why either, not really at least. She might be able to dig up some spotty knowledge on what they are going though, but why name it? It helps them pretend it isn't real and that they can make it through. She puts the cup down. The broth is cold and fat floats on the top. She won't be able to drink any more without getting sick.
Bellamy breaks the last half of his potato and hands it to her. "You eat this half. I eat this half. A good compromise?"
She lifts her eyebrows. "And what if I don't care for potatoes?"
He scoffs, "Then you came to the wrong place, Princess."
Her face softens and the headache behind her eyes loosens into a throbbing. It takes her a long time to finish the potato, but they talk about arranging another meeting focused solely around these Reapers and Mountain Men. Lincoln was cryptic, making them suspicious. The Grounders hated these people so much they warn even the Sky People about them.
When their group of seven arrives at the meeting place, it's Ricky who identifies the ruins they stand under. "The Lincoln Memorial, holy shit." He skirts around the Grounders so he can touch the lichen covered stone. Maureen, elected by the one hundred as a representative to keep the leaders in-line, grumbles that it's no big deal and directs her face to the ground, but Clarke sees her glancing up every once in a while. They are all awed by the fact their ancestors built something like that. It seems like such a waste to people who can't even build a place to live, but it also speaks of the great prosperity their ancestors might have once lived in because they were able to waste their resources to built something as grandiose as that.
Octavia joins Ricky and soon the four gathered Grounders are telling myths about the man sitting in this chair.
"It is believed that his statue is made to reflect his stature and deeds. A great man and great accomplishments. Peace reigned because of him," informs a grounder.
Ricky opens his mouth, ready to correct them that Lincoln never reigned because he was a President of the United States and that yeah, this guy was tall, but you really think he was a giant like his statue? Oh that actually, during his time as president he was at war with the other half of the country over states rights and he was assassinated before he was able to enjoy any amount of peace. Bellamy shakes his head at Ricky. How can these people conceptualize being at war with their own country covering thousands of acres of land when they don't even have states or Capitalism? Ricky enjoys the stories anyways, and Clarke begins to bounce her leg. Miller heaves a sigh, ready to get this over with as much as Clarke. He doesn't have a gun with him, only a knife at his waist. They stored his gun in an evergreen tree, deciding walking into a meeting with the grounders looking ready to blow their heads off might not be the impression they want to give if they are trying to garner information. Monty hangs back with Clarke, smiling so his dimples indent his cheeks. She is happy he smiles as he does, that he takes the time to smile.
The conversation about the Reapers and Mountain Men go smoother than Bellamy and she predicted, but doesn't start until after camp is set up and dinner roasts over a fire.
"Reapers raid and kill and eat," Doug, a scout, says. He wears a hood made from a fox's head. The blue of dusk manipulates the. Its eyes have been replaced with dull stones. The blue of dusk manipulates it into life, watching the Sky People as it balances atop Doug's head. Clarke finds herself starring more at the fox than paying attention to what's being said.
"So what makes them such a big deal?" Miller asks.
They all sit on the ground and Bellamy braces his hands against his knees to help support his aching back. She looked at it this morning and most of the contusions were changing color at this point. A good sign, but for him it was not good enough. He wanted to twist, move, and sleep normally without having to be conscious of protecting his back so he can avoid unnecessary pain. Clarke tells him it will be a few more days. She does not tell him that it will actually take another week and a half before his days are not accompanied by pain because of the rib he broke. She knows her wrist will take longer to heal. With so much skin sluiced off at once... she estimates it to be a month, but sometimes she gets this tingling sensation in her fingers or tries to move them and it takes a few moments longer than normal to get them working. This is something she also hasn't told Bellamy.
"They eat their prisoners," Lincoln says, adding fuel to the fire. Octavia puts her hands up and scoots her toes closer. The cold will be worse on the way back to camp.
"Cannibals?" Maureen whispers. Her long face drawing down and the blood peels away until not even the tips of her ears and nose are red with the cold.
"Beware of the tunnels to the East, that is where they like to live. If you plan on excavating any other tunnels like you are the one's at your camp, then you must tell us first. Some of our older people know which tunnels connect to what. Some we have purposefully blocked," Doug continues. His beard is not long like Nyko's. He is young. Maybe close to Bellamy's age. No-one corrects him that the tunnels failed and they're not likely to continue working on.
Bellamy readjusts. He has trouble keeping still for even short periods of time right now. He says he never had problems with it before. He has never been so restrained by his physical body. Clarke pretends to use his shoulder as balance as she stretches her legs out from underneath herself. She doesn't squeeze, but just reminds him that she is here. She settles back down as Jessa, their story teller, regales them with bed time horrors about the Reapers. Ricky in enraptured. Maureen turns her head away and Miller yawns. Octavia smiles at something Lincoln. Clarke watches them over the tops of the flames.
"What of the Mountain Men?" Monty asks. Doug's fox focuses its eyes on him. Bellamy shifts closer to Monty, rubbing his nose to make it seem more casual and less defensive.
"The Reapers work for them. We think," Wayland says, a thinner grounder who has a limp. She likes his green eyes. "The Mountain Men...we don't know what they want, but they abduct and most the time our people don't come back. Often, the Mountain Men make promises. About babies and lovers and such things that can't come true but you hope they do."
Clarke listens to Justin and takes what he is saying as seriously as if Bellamy was the one telling her these things. This skinny boy has trouble keeping his eyes raised and he stares over their heads, looking for something that they can't see. He's been there before, she thinks. He speaks from experience.
"What did they promise you?" she risks asking. The fire crackles. Jessa frowns and Ricky seems confused that a person who smiled and joked about Reapers flips into a growling warrior.
Wayland's cheeks twitch. Clarke marvels at the many reasons a person smiles. It represents hopelessness or disgust as much as happiness. She sees broken promises in his smile. He admits, "I don't remember, now."
They move on to other topics of conversation like technology ("Advanced," Wayland supplies. "More than what you have apparently."), and how often they interfere ("At random intervals." Lincoln shakes his head. The fire glinting off his bald head. "There is no pattern to predict."). Clarke rubs her eyes as Bellamy's questions dwindle and her wrist begins to throb. Clarke realizes how fast darkness settled into the forest. She can't see anyone face, even in the firelight. Shadows encapsulate their voices. It's Lincoln that calls a halt to their discussion.
"We can continue it in the morning if necessary," she reminds Bellamy when he begins to tell Lincoln that he isn't done yet, thank you very much. Octavia leaves with Lincoln. Bellamy frowns and looks away into the darkness of the forest and Miller explains to a confused Ricky that they only set up three tents and that, yes, that means they're going to share. Maureen doesn't like the idea of being paired with Clarke, but likes the idea of sleeping with one of the boys less.
Miller's scoffs, "Jeez, I almost forgot who's the princess here."
Maureen flushes and takes a moment to be ashamed, lingering by the fire as Clarke settles down into their lean-to. She pulls a blanket over her shoulders and wishes she could take off her shoes. It was only an eight mile hike to the meeting place, but with packs stuffed with food and shelter for a night, her feet could use some airing out. It was too cold for that and she finds solace in knowing that she will at least get a full night's without being roused to inspect injuries or answer inquires. (Though, that's happening less and less with Bellamy and she sharing a bed.)
Cold air blows down her side. She gropes for her blanket, finds it, and curls it around her. It is nice not having to share a blanket. She lies on her stomach and tucks one hand under her neck to keep it warm and the other one she protects by having it align with her breast, elbow bent. A corner of the blanket flips up and down with the wind. When she fell asleep there was no wind and now there is. It is nice not having to share a blanket. She doesn't remember what she was dreaming, but she can still taste the garlic paste Monty made to put on top of their meat to add flavor. She knocks her wrist, hisses, and adjusts. but it is nice not having to share—
She opens her eyes and all she sees is dark, dark, dark. Maureen and her had to share a blanket and Maureen refused to be touching. "Well at least get closer," Clarke told her, "The body heat will help keep us warm."
She complained that having her own blanket would keep her warm. Bellamy told her to shut up and go to sleep. Clarke pushes up and cracks her scab. She does not have time to acknowledge the pain, though it makes her fingers go numb.
"Maureen?" she calls. She doesn't try to be quiet or pretend. "Maureen," she shouts. She looks to the camp fire. It's dull and the coals have settled. No one has been guarding it for a while now. Who was the last one to be on shift— "Monty. Monty Monty!" she starts saying because he would not just leave and wander away.
Someone grips her arm and she bucks against them. Miller lets her go only to grab at her again when she gets ready to bolt (Where are her people?) Bellamy shakes a groggy Ricky who can't seem to understand what is happening and how important it is at this moment in time to get up, get up, get up.
Bellamy kicks up the coals and adds anything that he can to the fire to make it brighter. Miller grips Clarke as she strains against him into the darkness as she shouts for Maureen and Monty. Lincoln and Doug and Octavia are there, breathing hard and straining to ask what happened. Bellamy yells at them, accuses them. Octavia stands between the grounders and her brother telling him needs to calm down and stop over reacting and to start thinking.
Clarke stops shouting. She relaxes into Miller's grip. She hears him sigh, but she hears something else too.
"Clarke?" Bellamy whispers.
She hears it—the sniffing and sobbing. She rips out of Miller's hands and is off. She hears it all around her and she trips, but she only stumbles, still searching for the noise. Someone pulls her up and to the left.
"Stop! We have to—" she begins, but Bellamy is not pulling her back towards camp.
"This way." He leads her to the crying.
It is Maureen, collapsed on the ground, weeping and covering her face. She rocks herself. She has nothing with her and for some reason her feet are bare. (Clarke remembers it's because Maureen refused to wear her shoes to bed even through they would help keep her toes warm.) Her hands periodically go up to tear at her short brown hair. Bellamy and Clarke descend on her. Bellamy holds Maureen's hands back and Clarke pushes her fingers around he body checking for any damage.
"What happened, Maureen? Do you know where Monty is?" Clarke swallows the acid in her throat that wishes it was Monty and not Maureen that they found. She finishes with her preliminary inspection by the time the others come with torches and her findings are confirmed: Maureen has a black eye inflicted by someone, but all other damage, such as the scrapes up and down her arms and the clumps of hair missing from her head, are self inflicted.
Clarke steps back so Octavia and Bellamy can take over to try to pull the answer out of Maureen. Clarke paces. Heel to toe. Heel to toe. Octavia looks at Bellamy and Bellamy is looking at Clarke. She can't hear what Maureen is saying, it sounds like the incoherent babbling, like the noise of rushing water over rock.
"What? What is it?" Neither of the siblings explain and they don't have to because Clarke starts listening and hears, "They promised. They promised me. Promised. Theypromisedtheypromised."
Doug and Lincoln face out into the darkness, torches lowered so the light won't blind them. They circle the group, but don't try to be quiet. The Mountain Men, if they are still out there, know where they are either way.
Clarke crouches by Bellamy. Octavia holds Maureen, rocking her. Petting her hair and cooing into her ear. Clarke latches on to Maureen's chin. Her eyes focus for a moment. "Where is Monty, Maureen?" she says, demands, pleads.
"They promised they would take me," she hiccups. "But they just took him and forgot me! Why?" She covers her face again. "I told them everything they wanted. I gave them names, but why won't they take me?"
It's Bellamy who holds Clarke back. He hugs her to hold her. She tries to push him off. "She's a fucking idiot," he hisses into her ear. "A fucking idiot and we can't do anything about it."
Clarke puts her head on his shoulder and growls into his neck teeth scraping along his skin and tasting the sweat and dirt from the collar of his shirt, "We get Monty back. We get him back and then deal with her." Her hands are up in his hair because she knows he can't handle pressure on his back yet.
"Your orders, Princess," he agrees, voice angry and spiteful.
Miller has Maureen on her feet and hands tied behind her back. Doug and Lincoln never interfere. Ricky sniffles because of the cold (or maybe he is crying because it hurts to be betrayed by one of their own because down here they only have each other dammit). They go back to their lean-tos, break them down, and spend the rest of the night dozing off. Clarke stares up at the statue, sharing the frustration of trying to get people to cooperate and compromise and then having to deal with the consequences when they fail to do so.
Lincoln accompanies them back to camp along with a boy named Wight and an older woman with lines in her face, but no gray hair who introduced herself as Nanjemoy. The grounders split the delinquent's packs between them so everyone carries lighter bags except for Maureen whose hands are tied behind her and has enough trouble walking. Clarke doesn't trust to give her any of their supplies, anyways.
"Lead us home, Ricky," Bellamy says. He picks at gunk that crusts his eyelashes.
Ricky nods, looks a few ways and Wight ends up pointing where the trail begins. It is a long way home, but thankfully, that's all the guidance Ricky needs before he gets his barrings and moves with ease through the forest avoiding traps that he marked off as the one hundred expanded into the woods. Nanjemoy comments the grounder may have to improve their traps if they are so easy for the Sky People to detect. Clarke isn't sure if she is teasing, though.
Clarke thinks there is fog ahead, but as they approach, she realizes that it's smoke. The smell is powerful and heady and sucks the moisture away. Miller hefts the gun they retrieved to his shoulder and takes off the safety and saddles up beside Ricky, who pauses for the first time since they started moving four hours ago.
Bellamy grunts at him to move forward. Clarke tells everyone to cover their mouths, "We don't know what's in the smoke," she defends. Even the grounders do as she says. She's the one who puts a rag over Maureen's face. Her eyes dart left and right, looking for something. Part of her hopes this traitor finds it. The other part of her, the part that keeps coming back through no matter how much damage this Earth does to her soul, is curious as to why because Maureen has never shown signs of instability and her crime on the Ark was relatively benign (unauthorized pregnancy; Clarke doesn't know if the fetus was carried full term or not).
They move deeper into the smoke and the temperature rises. The gate is open and any wood of the wall is scorched and smoldering. They step through. Inside, tents are crumpled masses and melted fabric. Dirt is in an upheaval and pot holes exist where they didn't before. Clarke wonders if it was Raven or someone else who set off the bombs that caused this damage.
She doesn't see any bodies, but that is because they had yet to reach the drop ship. Three bodies lay outside of the closed door and Clarke has a hard time identifying what killed them because the fire scorched their bodies so much. Bellamy shouts and bangs on the door only to his hand pull away. The metal is still hot. The hydraulics of the drop ship activate and the door lowers. Doug unabashedly stares. He wasn't here with Indra's original group and hasn't seen the technology of the Sky People.
Finn rushes Clarke; she flinches back, but relaxes once she realizes that he isn't a threat. He asks her if she is okay, hands on her shoulders, her cheek, her arms. She asks where is everyone else. Finn looks at Maureen. "Why is she tied up?"
"Stand guard," Bellamy instructs Nanjemoy and Wight before jogging passed Finn into the drop ship. Clarke dislodges herself from his grip, pulling the cloth from her mouth and watching sweat drip down Bellamy's neck. Finn didn't answer her question. Inside, Clarke counts another three bodies, but she can recognize the dead this time: Sterling, Harper, and Quinn. Sterlings skull looks like it was kicked in. Harper's intestines push out from her skin. And Quinn looks like he had a seizure when no one was paying attention. (Does knowing who is dead make it easier?)
Where was Marc? she thinks, but he's leaning against a leg of the table, clutching his leg. Clarke can't tell if he pulled out an arrow or if he got shot.
"Where's Raven?" Bellamy asks. He unties the cloth from his face, a line of ash emerges, separating
Finn keeps trying to get Clarke to look at him and answer his question, "Are you okay?" She wants to say, No, but stays silent instead.
Monroe shakes her head. "I don't know, we had to leave some outside."
"How many are missing?" Bellamy says. His voice is too low and Clarke watches him and his hand at his hatchet.
Monroe shuffles and doesn't look in his eyes. "I don't know how it happened," she says instead. Her braids are loose and large chunks of her hair fail to stay in the weaves. She limps around the drop ship, unable to stay still. Clarke thinks she might have sprained her ankle and that having her rest it would make it heal faster, but having Monroe sit would be impossible at the moment. Bellamy taught Clarke when to pick her battles.
"The smoke house caught fire and we were trying to get it under control and it was fine until people started screaming and someone was shooting and there was this red stuff." Monroe looks to Clarke, her green eyes demanding an answer and explanation. Clarke had no lies to tell her nor did she have any truths, so she begins to tear out the materials she can and puts Lincoln and Octavia to work patching up the handful of people in the drop ship.
"Monroe." Bellamy leans forward. "I don't care how it happened. I wanna know our numbers. I'm not blaming you."
"I got seventeen into the drop ship before the red smoke," she says, eye darting between looking at Bellamy and looking at the bodies rigid with rigor mortise.
Neither Clarke nor he ask, "That's all?" It would be cruel to someone who has never been in the position to sacrifice all for the collective.
"I closed the door, then. I heard people banging on it. Shouting. But I didn't open it up," Monroe chokes. She scrubs at her eyes.
"You did what you had to," Clarke tells her. Bellamy's hand fists around the hatchet. He nods in agreement.
"I don't know," Monroe tells them. "Raven ran into her tent and I was trying to get everyone else into the drop ship. She's the one that probably set off the bombs." A grin slips onto her face. "I hope some of those fucking bastards are dead."
The hatch up to the second floor squeaks open. "Oh, good! It's just you guys." Jasper climbs down the ladder, tangling his legs for a moment, but he staggers towards Clarke, hugging her. "About time you guys got back." He goes to Bellamy, but stutters at the glare, so embraces Ricky instead. He skips Finn, but his arms are still wide, ready to hug one more person. Clarke can only see his back and his long, thin neck. "Where's Monty?" He knows the answer to the question already. Knows that if Monty isn't here right now then that means he is either dead or was taken, implying that he could be dead very soon.
"It was the Mountain Men," Bellamy says.
"Is that a tribe of Grounders or something?" Monroe sniffs.
Clarke begins working on Marc's leg. He passed out as soon as she probed his wound, but it looks clean and congealed nicely. She thinks he did a pretty good job patching himself up. She feels proud knowing that he wasn't as incompetent as she assumed when he ended up giving one of the guys Queen Anne's Lace instead of the chamomile like he was instructed to do. She keeps moving then, the conversation in the back of her mind, trusting Bellamy to fill everyone in. Doug touches the metal of the drop ship and some of the wires. The skin between his eyebrows is smooth and maybe she guessed wrong on his age. He is younger than Bellamy. The autumn sun finally makes an appearance, filling in the dark corners of the drop ship and a gust of air brings in the acrid smell of smoke. Clarke coughs, wipes her mouth, and keeps bandaging Mikey's wrist, one of the remaining who crawled down from the upper levels. She is worried he might have fractured it, but there is no way to tell down here on Earth and bone marrow poisoning becomes a very real possibility.
Finn stands beside her when she moves away. "Why would Maureen do this, Clarke? She must have a good reason. We can't just tie her up without an explanation."
"Can she explain away betraying us?" Monroe snaps, barring her teeth to Maureen.
"That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying you just jumped to conclusions. Maybe the Mountain Men aren't bad? Maybe they want to help us. Maybe it's not them at all." Finn defends.
Bellamy scoffs, "Yeah, well whoever it is, people don't get killed and kidnapped if they wanted to help us."
Clarke stares at Finn's wide, brown eyes and thinks that he is too innocent for this world of acid storms and deadly organization. She worries where the innocence might lead. "No, Finn, I don't think so." She unties the cloths from her neck, wrist pinching at the angle. "Marc got shot with a bullet. I can tell by the entry wound. Unless it was one of us, we know that the Grounders don't have access to those type of weapons, ruling them out."
Lincoln adds, "This is what the Mountain Men do. They come in fast and use tricks to disorient and scatter people before disappearing."
Doug finds Clarke's medical journal and starts flipping before Bellamy follows her line of sight and snatches it away from the curious Grounder, grumbling about manner. Doug holds his hands up and smiles in good humor.
"Now what?" Jasper speaks up. He is looking at the bodies. To think that Clarke and Monty cleaned this together with moonshine clogging their nostrils.
"The dead are gone. The living are hungry." Everyone looks to Doug. Lincoln nods. This is something the Grounders have heard all their lives. They sleep with it at night and drink it in their water. Bellamy catches Clarke's eye. Can we learn to do the same? they ask each other.
Author: I need tragedies. The 100 feed me and then I'm left craving more. It is a cruel cycle, I tell you. Waiting for an update was probably was horrible for you, too, though. So I suppose we're in this boat together. Thank you for all you commented on the last chapter. The feedback blew me away and humbled me. (Do you think we can break 100?!) To all my readers who do or don't favorite, alert or comment: it's incredible to think of how many people my writing is reaching. Thank you for allowing me to enter into your lives in this small way.
Also, yay for officially being renewed for season 3!