Hi guys, writer here! First I just want to let y'all know that I'm so appreciative for all the views, follows, and reviews this story has received! It's more than I ever expected, and I am beyond grateful. In other business, I've received conflicting opinions from my betas on whether or not to include snippets of Kane's POV. One says cut it out completely, one says tell his whole story, and the last says to only include his important bits. Right now I'm going with beta #3, but I would love opinions from ya'll on what YOU want to see! So write a review or send me a message either here or at my tumblr: dearawrites
Enjoy chapter 4!
Bellamy silently followed Rachel away from the dropship and into the woods. He had though after their agreement at the meadow that she was with him, but she obviously wasn't fully. He needed her to take off her wristband if he was going to convince the other delinquents they should too.
She stopped at the edge of a hill, and wrapped her arms around herself. Bellamy stopped a few feet behind her. He watched as she hung her head, and her back began to shake slightly; she was crying. Bellamy took a deep breath, steeling himself to approach her. He had managed to calm her down on the dropship, but he did that through her anger and suspicions, he had no idea how to handle this. Whenever Octavia has been upset, he told her the stories their mom had told him, but he was pretty sure that wasn't going to work with Rachel.
He had to do this, he told himself, cautiously stepping forward. As he got closer, he could hear her soft sobs, his heart ached a little at the pitiful sound. He felt for her, he had willingly come down to be with and protect his family, but she was here because her father had betrayed her.
Suddenly, he knew how to approach this.
"I'm so sorry, Rachel," he kept his voice as soft as possible, coming to stand next to her, looking forward but sliding his eyes over to her. She had pulled her head up, looking out on the small valley in front of them with her watery green eyes and as much pride as she could muster. But she didn't speak, so Bellamy did.
"Your dad was there, at the dropship," she nodded, clenching her eyes shut, a few tears spilling out of them, "did you get to talk to him?" she just sobbed again, letting her head fall as she lost control of her tears. She was even more vulnerable than she had been when Bellamy led her onto the ship. Sensing an opportunity to win her over, he reached over and placed a hand on her shoulder, squeezing gently. "I don't know why he…why anyone would do that to their own kid."
He sighed, feeling slightly guilty for what he was about to say, "If I were you, I'd tear off that wristband just to stick it to him," he wasn't surprised when she froze, finally turning to look at him. Utter devastation was written all over her face, from what had happened to her in only the past few hours, but from Bellamy's words too.
Shoving aside the guilt that riled his stomach, Bellamy continued, "I mean, think about it Rachel, he oversees all of the law enforcement on the Ark. He could have stopped you from being arrested, from being put in lock-up, but he didn't." She looked away from him again, wiping tears off her face with the sleeve of her sweater.
"I don't know why we're down here," he said, stepping so close to her so she had no choice but to look up at him, "but I know that your father could have stopped you from being on that dropship. He didn't. So help me understand why you wanna keep that wristband on."
She sniffled, taking a moment to gather her strength before replying, "Because he's still my dad. I have to believe he had a reason for sending me down here, or I'm not gonna be able to get through this."
"Look," Bellamy started, "If you're right, and he had a reason - maybe he knew that we could survive down here -he still sent you down here clueless, and definitely terrified." He laughed a little, trying to lighten the mood, but she didn't buy into it. "After all, if they know it's survivable down here, they're gonna follow us anyway, screw the wristbands. Why not take it off? If only to give Kane payback for today."
Rachel thought on Bellamy's words, scared to find that they felt right. She believed in her heart that her dad had only put her on the dropship because he thought it would be best for her, but all the evidence suggested otherwise. The wristbands, the secrecy, what Jaha had said in his video.
If Kane has sent her down here to survive, he had done it on only a hope and a prayer.
Bellamy had the knife she'd seen Murphy working on in his hand, ready to take the bracelet from her. She looked at it, felt its cool metal on her wrist, slightly damp from the fog. There was an entire atmosphere between her and her father, the wristband the only thing keeping them connected.
She braced herself, and offered her wrist, "Take it off."
Kane's heart stopped, his mind fuzzing over as the ringing of the alarm clouded out any other noise.
His monitor was flashing red, and he knew it's counterpart on the main screen was too. Two words, two terrible words, blinked over and over in front of Rachel's smiling picture.
TRANSMISSION TERMINATED.
Slowly, he felt his heart start again, beating faster and faster with each carefully controlled breath. He couldn't tear his eyes away from the screen, from the photo of his daughter, joy in her eyes, and a sweet smile on her face. He couldn't even look below it, to the vital signs that had just disappeared, the heartbeat that just dropped to zero.
He didn't notice how everyone else in the room froze. All eyes were trained on him, nervously waiting to see what he would do.
What he wanted to do was find Abby Griffin and throttle her. This had all been her plan. Her wristbands. Her idea.
Now his daughter was dead because of it. Because of her.
And because of him. He had let her talk him into putting Rachel on that ship, believed her ramblings about giving her a better future, a better life. She had fit the profile perfectly, they needed someone with her skills in the 100. So he had agreed. After all, it was his duty as a father to give his child the best chance at a better life.
But now she didn't even have a life to live.
Abby Griffin would pay for that.
Even though the wristband had only been on for a day, Rachel's wrist felt strange and light without its weight. She stared at it for a moment, at the small dots marking where it's needles had gone into her skin. A small bit of blood welled from one of them, and she wiped it away with a finger, pressing onto the cut to stop more from coming out.
"Feel better?" Bellamy asked, pulling her out of her trance. He held the wristband in one hand, and his knife in the other.
Rachel nodded, "I think so."
He smiled, "Good, now let's head back to camp. We have work to do."
She followed him back to the dropship, where everyone was still sitting on the entrance ramp. Miller, Harper, Monroe and Sterling had joined Murphy's gang in sharpening pieced of metal from the hull into makeshift knives; the two groups were surprisingly getting along well. Bellamy turned back to her, handing her the knife he has used to remove her bracelet.
"Murphy, Mbege," he ordered, the two delinquents obediently snapping their heads up from their weapons, "help Miller and his friends get their wristbands off."
"What?" Miller stood, brows furrowed with confusion and a little bit of anger. He turned to Rachel, who suddenly felt the urge to hide her left arm behind her back. After a quick nervous glance at Bellamy, he looked back at her, an obvious question in his eyes.
She swallowed, bringing her arm out from behind her back, letting her friends see the smooth brown skin where her wristband once was. Looking over all of them, she nodded her approval at Bellamy's order.
Miller nodded back, though she could tell he was still apprehensive. He walked over to Murphy, shooting one suspicious look back at her before holding his hand out to him. The delinquent pulled out a crude knife and slid it carefully under the metal.
"Don't bother being gentle," Miller crooned, a smug mocking in his voice as he smirked down at Murphy, "this isn't my first time." He laughed at his own joke, but only received a scowl and a rather rough jerk of Murphy's knife snapping off his wristband before he walked over to Harper to tear hers off.
Rachel watched as each of her friend's wristbands was snapped off. When it was done, all of them, including Murphy's crew, looked to Bellamy for his next order, but found him looking off into the trees. Rachel followed his eyes to the west, where the spaces between the trees seemed to be on fire they were so bright and orange. After a moment of being dazzled by the sight, she finally realized what she was looking at: the sunset.
"I never thought I'd see that," she said to no one, several murmurs and chuckles responding. But everyone stayed silent while they watched, letting darkness began to drape over them.
After several minutes more, Bellamy finally spoke, "I guess it's time to get that fire started, huh?"
It took them several minutes of arguing over the proper technique, but Sterling and one of Murphy's boys, Myles, finally got a fire started. It was a huge bonfire, and a crowd of the delinquents, already tired from the few hours they'd been on the ground, soon gathered around the heat.
Bellamy took the opportunity of the crowd and Clarke's continued absence to make his next move. He walked over to a short log a few guys had rolled over to the fire. With a raise of his eyebrow, the one sitting on it quickly moved, and Bellamy jumped up.
Most all eyes turned to him immediately, his age and guard uniform granting him immediate respect. He scanned the crowd, seeing Murphy's crew at the edge of the fire, Rachel and her friends right next to them. Both groups watched him with bated breath, and Bellamy took a moment to be smug at how easily he was able to win them over to his cause.
"Alright!" he shouted, everyone attention now on him, "By now you've heard that I'm not really a part of the Guard, but that doesn't matter. The wristbands the Ark gave you will bring the Guard down to us," several unsatisfied murmurs went through the crowd, "And you can be sure that they won't honor what Jaha said. Once they're here, you'll go back to what you were on the Ark: undervalued, underprivileged, and underappreciated."
This time, several angry shouts rose up, these kids were putty in his hands. Bellamy continued, "But it doesn't have to be that way down here! We can be the ones in charge, we can do whatever we want to do!" He grinned as his words were met with cheers, and even a small smirk on Rachel's lips. "All you have to do to make it happen, is take off your wristband."
Some people cheered again, others let theirs die down. This wasn't going to be as easy as he'd hoped. "I know that most of you have people you love on the Ark, but now is the time to be selfish. You can build a new life here, a better life, where you won't have to worry about getting floated for trying to help to people you care about. Down here, we can be better than the Ark. Who's with me?"
Murphy raised a long bar he had ripped from the dropship, and called for anyone willing to take off their wristbands. Much to Bellamy's delight, about half of those gathered quickly formed a disorganized line around him, and the first delinquent offered their arm.
One after another, wristbands were removed and tossed into the fire. A few outliers remained on the fringes of the group, but they didn't worry Bellamy. He obviously had the majority on his side. He'd be safe.
He watched on as the next girl, a small, shy thing that Bellamy had trouble believing was ever a criminal, had hers removed. "Who's next?"
But before whoever they were could step forward, Wells limped towards him, brows scrunched together in anger, "What the hell are you doing?"
"We're liberating ourselves, what does it look like?" He had to hold Mbege back, the violent boy more than eager to get his hands on Jaha's kid.
Wells, to his credit, held Bellamy's stare, not intimidated in the slightest by him. "It looks like your trying to get us all killed. The communication system is dead. These Wristbands are all we've got." He turned away, facing everyone gathered by the fire, "Take them off and the Ark will think we're dying, that it's not safe for them to follow."
"That's the point, Chancellor. We can take care of ourselves, can't we?" He barked at the crowd, who enthusiastically and loudly agreed with his, but kept his eyes locked on Wells.
"You think this is a game?" Wells' voice started to become desperate as he began to plead with the crowd, try as he might, he wasn't the orator his father was. "Those aren't just our friends and our parents up there, they're our farmer, our doctors, our engineers. I don't care what he tells you, we won't survive here on our own. And besides, if it really is safe, how could you not want the rest of our people to come down?"
Bellamy didn't notice that several of those lined up to get their wristbands taken off looked around before quickly stepping away. His vision had narrowed to Wells, who, with each word, stretched his patience thinner and thinner. "My people are already down."
He stepped towards the Chancellor's son, wagging a finger at the sky "Those people locked my people up. Those people killed my mother for the crime of having a second child. Your father did that." He had to concentrate to keep his breathing even, anger trying it's best to take over.
To his credit, Wells did look sympathetic, but it didn't help. "My father didn't write the laws."
"No. He enforced them, but not anymore. Not here." Bellamy found his anger fueling his words, each one coming easier and stronger than the last. So he decided to let them fly as he continued to stare down Wells, his volume climbing higher and higher as he continued to speak. "Here, there are no laws. Here, we do whatever the hell we want, whenever the hell we want."
He watched with pleasure as Wells face began to fall as he once again stalked towards him. "Now, you don't have to like it Wells. You can even try to stop it, or change it…kill me. You know why? Whatever the hell we want."
Behind Bellamy, Murphy began leading a chant of "Whatever the hell we want!" His point made, he simply stepped away from Wells, and let his victory sink into both of them. The kid approached him as the chanting went on, looking like he had another argument on the tip of his tongue, but before he could get it out, it thundered.
Rachel had never thought she would hear thunder for real. It scared her. The rumbling was louder than she expected, making it seem like the sky itself would come crashing down on her. The closes thing she had ever heard to it was the time in her childhood when was woke up to space debris hitting the side of the Ark. Her father had immediately rushed in to calm her crying, and stayed with her the whole night to make sure she slept well.
She was snapped out of her memory by rain beginning to fall. Fat wet drops ran down her skin, colder than any shower she had ever taken on the Ark, but infinitely more refreshing. She closed her eyes and looked up, letting the water wash over her face as she soaked it it's feel.
"Holy crap this is amazing!" Nate squealed from behind her. She opened her eyes and looked to him. He had taken off his beanie and grabbed Harper's arm and waist, and was spinning her around while the two got soaked. Rachel laughed, looking around to see everyone else celebrating in a similar way.
Except Bellamy, he stood as she just had, arms spread wide, eyes closed, and face raised up to the sky. She stared at him like that for a while. Then, she didn't see the cocky criminal who had effectively taken command of 100 of the Ark's criminals, but she once again saw, if only for that brief moment. the kind, gently confident Bellamy she had met on the dropship.