The first thing that Bellamy noticed when he and Clare re-entered the room was the newcomer sitting on an arm of a sofa with Jasper's arm around her shoulders.
"Raven!" He strode across the room, his face splitting into a grin. He hadn't been worried as such, but he was definitely glad to see her back with the 100. She slipped out of Jasper's arm and a moment later they collided and he had her in a bear hug. He actually lifted her off her feet and she was breathless when he released her.
"Are you okay? What did they do?" He fired the questions at her.
She shrugged but he sensed that she wasn't comfortable. "I'm fine. Freaked out, but Jasper's explained who they are and everything but...it's weird."
He could not disagree with that. Clarke smacked into him as she rushed forward to give Raven a hug too. Bellamy cocked his head to the side as he studied the two girls. He hadn't realised they had become such close friends. In his mind they were still the two sides of a competition, but he was glad that they had been able to move past that. It would have been childish and stupid if they'd hated each other for Finn's screw up. That's how he saw it anyway.
Eventually Clarke released Raven and he thought he saw her actually swipe at her eyes. Come to think of it, everything they'd been through and he couldn't recall seeing Clarke ever cry.
"So what did you two discover?" Monty asked, jumping up to take Raven's place on the sofa arm. He bumped in to Jasper who nudged him playfully back. They dissolved into a brief tussle which sent Monty toppling backwards and straight into Cara's lap. He grinned sheepishly up at her.
Bellamy rolled his eyes at their childishness but he was still grinning as he and Clarke moved into a position so everyone could hear them. He still felt as though he was in a dream with all his people around him so happy and alive.
"Well, we have good news and bad news," Clarke said.
"What's new?" Miller said bitterly.
"The good news is that the Mou - the Society – want to work with us," Clarke said, the forced optimism in her voice painfully obvious. Bellamy wished she wasn't trying so hard to see the good in these people, but he couldn't say he blamed her after everything she'd been through. There was only so much a person could take and maybe Clarke was ready to believe that something in their lives could go well, that they could be looked after and would have the freedom to be teenagers again. He didn't want her spirit to break if – when, he suspected – her hope was crushed.
"The bad news," Bellamy cut across her, "is that freedom will come at a price."
Everyone was watching them. Some people looked worried, their eyes flicking nervously between Clarke and Bellamy. Others simply looked angry, jaded by too many similar catches already. It probably wasn't new to many of them that something as simple as freedom came with a heavy price.
"They have proposed that we live as we please on the surface on the condition that we subject ourselves to their testing," Bellamy said. He knew he was making his own view on the matter perfectly clear with his tone and his expression. Clarke did too because she frowned at him and eagerly cut in.
"They want what's best for us though," she said, her eyes earnest and only a little but desperate. "They have no reason to not be true to their word. It would be a situation that would benefit both sides. We would get what we want – protection from the Grounders, freedom to live on the surface just like we always wanted..."
"We fried the Grounders!" Miller shouted suddenly. Bellamy appreciated the pride in his voice. "We don't need the Mountain Men's protection! We can protect ourselves."
A murmur of agreement rose up from the group. Jasper was nodding determinedly and Bellamy wondered if he'd already forgotten the fear of being in the fox holes with ammunition running through their fingers and a Grounder army in the darkness.
"We didn't kill them all," Bellamy spoke up, surprising Clarke who had been about to interject. She turned to Bellamy incredulously. "There will be more Grounders out there. And we came too close to failure this time. Or have you already forgotten those of us who didn't survive the final battle? But there is a way we can live freely – both from these Mountain Men and from the Grounders! There are people to the east who are supposed to be peaceful. My sister has already gone to them. We can make a new life there. No more living in fear! And no more being a lab rat!"
His speech had people on their feet. Jasper and Miller were pumping the air. Others were shouting their support. One way or another almost everyone in that room had lived in the shadow of authority their entire lives. They craved freedom, not anarchy, but the ability to make their own choices and to live their own lives. All they needed was a chance.
"Bellamy, what are you doing?" Clarke hissed at him, suddenly an inch from him. He noticed that her eyes had flecks of hazel in the blue.
"I'm giving them a choice,"" he said. His blood was singing. Whenever he stood in front of the 100 and roused cheers and shouts from them, he felt like a different person to the meek janitor of the Ark. He felt like the person he was supposed to be.
"We can't make a decision like this on our own," Clarke said fiercely. He'd forgotten what it was like to have the intensity of her glare on him. "We're supposed to be waiting for the rest of the Ark."
"They can make whatever decision they want, Clarke," he said, equally fierce now that he had the drug of power in his system again. He wasn't angry at her but he wished she could see that the 100 could never exist as lab rats to be prodded and poked whenever, and that was only if these people were as good as their word. He still didn't trust them. "But we're no longer in the sky. I refuse to be a test subject and I'm not the only one. The Ark can decide to make an alliance if they want, but I'm not staying if they do. And they can't stop me."
"You don't know the Ocean People will accept us all," Raven said suddenly in the silence that followed. She was frowning in thought as if she was trying to weigh up both sides of the argument. A few other people fell silent from their chatter and stared at her. "Just because Lincoln took Octavia to them doesn't mean they'll accept a whole herd of us. Maybe this is our best choice. If we go back out there it's to an unknown. Perhaps a known world, even with flaws, is better than one where we all might die anyway."
Bellamy was shocked to hear her speak like that. Raven was one person he'd assumed would be on his side. She hated authority; he'd assumed she loathe the idea of the Mountain Men.
She looked up at him, almost seeming a bit apologetic. "You saw what they did to Finn," she said quietly. "How can we go out and face that again?"
Clarke's head shot up. "What happened to Finn? Who did what?"
Bellamy cursed Raven for dropping it on Clarke like that. He'd wanted to pull her aside and tell her about the Reapers later. All she'd needed to know for now was that Finn was fine and being looked after by Abby. But he wasn't going to get that chance now. He knew Clarke wouldn't rest until she knew that Finn was alright.
"He tried to follow you," Bellamy said through gritted teeth. "And he was captured by the Reapers. Raven and I found him a few days ago. He was hypothermic and dehydrated and had a few cuts and scrapes but he was fine. Your mom was looking after him."
"He's not fine," Raven said and he glared at her. Was she determined to contradict everything he said? It was almost like she'd taken on Clarke's role. But Raven was more intent on looking at Clarke. "He was really shaken up, Clarke. I've never seen him like that. It...it scared me. I didn't recognise him."
Bellamy felt a stab of guilt for his anger at Raven when he heard the way her voice caught. She cleared her throat as if she was trying to hold back tears and looked intently at her hands, which had been twisting together in her lap. Clarke looked distraught. She stared at Raven without seeing her for a few moments and Bellamy hovered. He wanted to offer something, a touch on the shoulder or a word, but he felt inadequate. It wasn't him she wanted anyway.
Suddenly she came back to life and she turned on him. "How can you ask them to go back out there?" she said, colour rising to her cheeks and her voice rising with it. Everyone in the room was silent now and staring at the two of them. Bellamy felt his own face heat up but he wasn't sure whether it was because they were watching or because Clarke was angry at him.
"Haven't we been through enough?" she said. "We're just kids, Bellamy, whatever you want them to think. We're not meant to be in charge. We're not meant to be facing the things we have. It's been awful and you want to drag them all out there to face it all again? You can go, if you want, but I'm waiting for the people from the Ark to get here and I'm waiting to see what they think. Because I'm done making the decisions. I'm done having to choose between life and death."
A/N: Uh oh, trouble in Mount Weather. I know I'm probably going to have some unhappy responses because of the Raven/Bellamy conflict AND the Clarke/Bellamy conflict. Trust me, it doesn't make me happy either to see Bell unhappy and unloved. But hey, hands up for Raven and Clarke to team up, reject all boys and run away to Fiji? Hehe.
PS. Dark-Supernatural-Angel: I wasn't ignoring your searching for Raven, I just knew it was coming up soon anyway. Also stop making predictions! You're often scarily accurate! :p
PPS. Emme019: Never! I know I might have scared some people earlier in the fic with my ranting, but that wasn't about people expressing thought-out, honest and respectful opinions, whether good or bad, it was about people blackmailing me into writing the ship they wanted. I always love to hear people's thoughts. It is my goal in life to be a good writer and I can never do that if I don't learn to listen to people's opinions and apply them to my work. So thank you for giving me the opportunity to do that.