AN: Hi guys, I'm back with another chapter! Thanks to those who took time to review the last chapter, it's always nice to hear from you guys

As usual, I don't own anything.

-5-

Clarke enjoys explaining all the rules of soccer to Bellamy, even when he's being deliberately obtuse just to get a rise out of her. Which he's being. A lot.

She's seen the game many times before, though, and towards the end of the first half, she finds her eyelids drooping. She sinks down further on the couch, to be able to lean her head against the armrest, and lets her eyes slip closed.

After a moment, she feels Bellamy lift her feet into his lap, so she doesn't have to keep her knees bent, and then his hand, big and warm, against her calf.

"Put something else on, if you want," she mumbles sleepily.

"What, and miss the end of the game? No way," he replies in a teasing voice, and Clarke pokes him in the stomach with her toes in retaliation, but he just chuckles.

She doesn't fall asleep all the way, just drifts in and out of a light slumber, so she's vaguely aware of a door opening and closing and then Jordan's voice.

"Soccer, huh?"

She feels Bellamy move slightly in response, probably shrugging.

"Apparently she used to watch it with her dad back on the Ark," he says in a hushed voice. It's quiet for a moment before he continues. "Sorry… You OK, kid?"

Clarke hears Jordan sigh and wonders if she should step into the conversation, make sure everything's OK, but the couch is soft and comfortable underneath her and Bellamy's thumb is tracing slow circles against her calf that send warm shots of electricity up her leg, even through the material of her pants.

"They told me they would probably be gone by the time I woke up." Jordan's voice again. "We said our goodbyes before they put me in cryo, but I guess it's different when it's actually real."

Clarke's heart aches for him, this poor boy who spent his entire life with just his parents only to wake up and find them gone… Even if he's grown up on stories about the rest of them, it must be overwhelming and frightening to only have them now.

"I obviously can't put myself in your position, but I think I know what you mean," Bellamy says. "But just know that we're here if you need to talk or anything. They were our friends too, we're trying to come to terms with them being gone as well."

Clarke relaxes a little again – they don't need her right now, Bellamy's got this.

"I know." Jordan doesn't sound as sad anymore, to her relief. "But 'kid', really? You do realize I'm only a couple of years younger than you?"

"But technically, you were born, what, 35 years after me? So yeah, I'm going to stick with 'kid'."

"But only if we count all the time, including the years we've spent in cryo." Clarke can hear Monty's old enthusiasm in Jordan's voice now. "When you go into cryo, you're essentially frozen in time, so you don't age, which means you stay the age you were when you went to sleep and pick up there when you wake up again. So while I might have been born… how old were you when you went into cryo again?"

It's quiet for a moment while Bellamy apparently has to think to remember.

"29, maybe 30? Time was a bit of a loose concept when we were on the Ground, I might have missed a birthday," he finally says.

"OK, and I was born when you all had been in cryo for two years, so in that respect you'd be about 32 years older than me, but then I was awake until I was 26 before I went into cryo, meaning I'm still 26 and you're 30, at most. So four years."

Jordan sounds like that should be the end of it, he's made the winning argument, but Clarke knows Bellamy, and sure enough, he doesn't give in that easily.

"OK, fine, you're 26, but I still think actual age relations should be based on when you were born. I mean, your way you'd be older than Clarke, and that's just not OK."

Right, now they're talking about her, time to join the party. She makes a show of stretching and yawning – not that she has to fake that part, it really is surprisingly tiring to sleep for over a century – so they don't think she's been deliberately eavesdropping.

"Who's older than me?" she asks.

"Jordan, if you want to use his weird reasoning," Bellamy replies.

Clarke puts on a frown and looks between the two men.

"That's not right," she finally says. "You were born long after me."

"Thank you," Bellamy says, giving Jordan a pointed look. "That's what I said."

"But, come on," Jordan insists, once again getting into his scientific mode. "Fine, you can think you're my seniors all you want, but the fact remains that I am 26 years old. You can't get away from that. How old were you when you went into cryo, Clarke?"

She has a slightly better grip on that than Bellamy obviously does, but only because she was counting down to her birthday and a possible floating on the Ark.

"24," she says. "I'm pretty sure, at least. I know my 18th birthday was, like, a month after we were sent to Earth, so considering the time down there, before and after Praimfaya, I should be 24 by now."

"Or a hundred and forty-nine," Bellamy intervenes in a teasing voice.

"That's just wrong," Clarke says, wrinkling her nose. "I think I prefer being 24, even if that does mean you're older than me, Jordan."

"Thank you!" Jordan exclaims, dramatically flopping back against the armchair, and Clarke's reminded, irrationally, of Jasper.

"However," she continues, swallowing the flash of grief, for what time in the last few hours she doesn't know, "you are our friends' child, which means you will always be a kid to me. Just like Madi will, no matter how old she is. You might as well get used to that."

Jordan seems like he's about to argue for a moment, but then lets out a sigh.

"OK, fine, if you want to rope me into the kid camp with Madi, I'll give you that one."

"There you are."

They all look up to find Raven in the doorway, looking annoyed and slightly out of breath.

"This ship is fricking huge, do you know how long I've been looking for you guys?" she grumbles as she crosses the room to claim the second armchair.

Bellamy rolls his eyes. "Geez, so sorry we didn't tell you where we were going when you threw us out of the bridge," he says drily, and Clarke nudges his side with her toes before pulling her feet out of his lap and reclaiming a sitting position on the couch.

"Did you need us for something?" she asks Raven, who gives her a grateful smile.

"Thank you, Clarke," she says in an overly polite voice, which is canceled out just a little when she sticks her tongue out at Bellamy. "And yes, sort of. I've finished going through Monty's notes and everything I can think of in the Eligius system."

"And?" Bellamy asks expectantly.

"Well, it's basically good news. The ship's in top shape, all systems running like they should, so at least we won't have to worry about that. And we're in the right place, I know that much," Raven continues. "The coordinates check out, but apart from that… all Eligius really had about this planet was basic information, the ship they sent here was going to evaluate the planet and determine if it was a viable alternative to Earth, but, of course, they disappeared without a trace."

"Dad always thought there were two likely scenarios – either they got here fine but didn't have time to report back to Earth before the nuclear apocalypse, or something went wrong before they got here," Jordan supplies. "He figured if they reached the planet, they probably would have checked in before landing to explore it. Or, if not, they would have only sent down a small group initially, which wouldn't explain why the whole crew disappeared at once."

They all contemplate that for a moment, before Bellamy speaks.

"Good thinking, but there's one other scenario, as far as I'm concerned. Since the crew was made up of both prisoners and guards, like Eligius Four, it's not impossible that what happened on this ship happened on that one too – a coup where the prisoners took control of the ship at some point, killed the guards and just decided they wanted this new planet to themselves. Screw the rest of humanity."

"You mean kind of like you when we first landed on Earth?" Raven teases, getting an eye-roll in return.

"Shut up, Reyes."

Raven chuckles a little before going back to serious mode. "Either way, I think our initial plan is still solid," she says. "I've checked one of the drones, mounted an oxygen probe on it so it's good to go when we want to get started."

Clarke covers her mouth with her hand to hide another yawn, and Bellamy frowns.

"I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm exhausted," he says.

Clarke gives him a questioning look, eyebrows raised, but he just shrugs.

"I hear you, for some reason a century in cryo isn't as restful as you'd think," Raven agrees. "And it's not like we have a natural circadian rhythm to follow, might as well set one of our own."

OK, so maybe they're all tired.

"I vote for food, maybe a shower and then bed," Raven continues. "Or, well, algae, but hopefully only for a couple of weeks this time."

"We set up a bedroom for you," Clarke tells her. "Come on, I'll show you."

She leads Raven to the bedroom closest to the kitchen area of the apartment, while Bellamy and Jordan stay on the couch.

"Here we are," Clarke says, taking a few steps into the bedroom so Raven can enter as well. "We ran the water for a while, so it's fine, and there's even spare toothbrushes and toothpaste in the bathroom cupboard."

There's a large and soft bed – Clarke tried the one in her own room earlier and it was like a cloud – with bedside tables on either side, a closet in one corner, and a dresser along one wall. The door to the en-suite bathroom is on the wall to their left, furthest into the room, and there's even a poster of some landscape above the bed – maybe to give the illusion of a window, Clarke thinks.

"Nice," Raven says appreciatively, throwing herself down on the bed. "This will do after spending the last few nights sleeping in your old church. Or, the last 125 years in a cryo pod, I guess, but you get what I mean."

Clarke leans against the wall, nodding. "Yeah, I get it. We were sleeping in the old gas station those few days in the valley, and before that it was a cell in the bunker, so definite upgrade here."

"Oh yeah," Raven agrees. "So what were you up to while I made sure we weren't going to get killed by failing systems?"

Clarke rolls her eyes at the exaggeration.

"Well, the guys had the algae farm pretty much done when I got there, we just need to water it now as far as I can tell, and then Jordan took us here." She pauses for a moment. "I think it was tough for him, he sort of shut himself in Harper and Monty's bedroom for a while. Bellamy and I got these rooms set up, found some clothes and stuff, I put some in the dresser for you, and then we… watched soccer, actually."

Raven gives her a questioning look, pushing herself up so she's sitting on the edge of the bed. "Soccer? As in the old game where you kick a ball around on a field?"

"Yup. I used to watch old games with my dad back on the Ark, I guess I was feeling nostalgic or something… and then I sort of fell asleep."

"Yeah you did." Raven wiggles her eyebrows, lowering her voice a little as she continues. "You two were looking real cozy when I got here."

Clarke sighs. "Please, Raven, just…"

"Yeah, yeah," the brunette interrupts, hands raised in the universal sign of surrender. "I said I wouldn't meddle unless it was absolutely necessary, and I won't… for now."

"No, not ever."

Raven doesn't offer a response to that, just shrugs, unconcerned as she gets up from the bed.

"Come on, I'm not looking forward to algae – again – but I am dying for a shower," she changes the subject before leading the way back into the lounge. "Though I don't know how I can feel dirty after being asleep in a hermetically sealed pod for 125 years."

Bellamy has moved to the dining table, just fifteen or so feet from the door to Raven's bedroom, and for a moment, Clarke thinks he must have heard their conversation. But then he looks up at her with a smile, and she lets out a relieved breath. Jordan is rummaging through one of the cupboards, emerging a moment later with a large plastic container.

"Algae, I assume?" Raven asks, wrinkling her nose, as she and Clarke join Bellamy at the table.

"I'm afraid that's all this establishment has to offer," Jordan replies, taking the lid off the box and putting it in the middle of the table. He turns back to the kitchen and fills a pitcher with water, which he then places on the table as well, along with a glass for each of them. "The water might taste a little metallic for a while, since it's been sitting in the pipes and cistern for so long, but it's safe to drink."

"And shower in, I hope?" Raven wonders, grabbing what looks like a dark green protein bar from the container on the table.

"Sure, that too," he confirms, sitting down to Raven's left.

"OK, so you might want to take it a little easy on this stuff, Clarke," Raven recommends as Jordan hands her one of the bars. "The first time I ate algae, I puked for, like, two days."

Clarke feels her stomach turn at the prospect.

"I don't think that was so much your digestive system as Monty's algae batch," Bellamy says, giving Clarke's arm a comforting squeeze. "None of us handled that one very well, but it was a bit of an experiment. The ones after that one was fine, and this is pretty much an infinitely refined version, right Jordan?"

Jordan nods. "It should be fine," he agrees, turning to Clarke. "I mean, you must have eaten your fair share of food that was hard to digest after Praimfaya?"

"Food would be too kind in some cases," she replies, turning the bar over in her hands curiously. "Try bark, pine needles, seaweed."

Raven makes a gagging sound. "Maybe our algae wasn't so bad after all."

Clarke breaks off a small piece of the algae bar and puts it in her mouth, chewing carefully. The consistency is a little funny, but it doesn't taste too bad. She swallows it down and takes another bite.

"I've definitely eaten worse stuff than this," she concludes, as the other three seem to relax and start eating their own bars. "On the other hand, once I found the valley, I had all kinds of food to choose from – fruit and berries, meat, fish, we even managed to grow some vegetables. Beats your algae any day."

As she thought, this earns her narrowed eyes from Bellamy and a small chunk of algae in her hair from Raven. Jordan, however, just seems fascinated. Clarke supposes it's hard to miss something you've never experienced.

"I can't wait to try all that," he says excitedly. "Sometimes, Dad told me about the food on Earth – roasted meat, dried berries, nuts and fish… and the stuff from Mount Weather."

Clarke can't help the groan that escapes her.

"Oh my God, that chocolate cake!" she exclaims. "I still dream about it sometimes, I swear…"

"I used to dream about meat on the Ring," Raven says. "I had, like, steaks chasing me through the corridors up there, yelling at me to eat them. Which might not all have been about missing the food, but I'd rather not examine that too closely."

They continue discussing what food they miss from the Ark and the Ground, trying to explain how different things taste to Jordan, while they finish their algae bars. They're surprisingly filling, Clarke finds as she swallows the last few pieces.

After their dinner, they lounge on the couch for a little while, not even turning the TV back on, just letting the events of the day settle and throwing out the odd question to Jordan when they think of something they haven't talked about yet, before they turn in for the night. Raven's the first to leave, mumbling something about a shower through a huge yawn, and the other three follow suit soon after.

The water feels like heaven on her skin, even though it's just barely lukewarm. Clarke decides against washing her hair, since she knows from experience that it'll look like a complete bird's nest in the morning if she goes to bed while it's still wet, and instead just uses the soap in the little cubicle to clean herself off. She reluctantly pulls on her old underwear again – they'll have to do a more thorough search of the ship to see if they can find more somewhere – along with a pair of shorts and a soft t-shirt she found earlier. There's a toothbrush in the cabinet above the sink, still wrapped in plastic, and Clarke opens it and brushes her teeth. She can't remember the last time she used real toothpaste, but she knows it must have been back on the Ark, so needless to say it's been a while.

She leaves the bathroom and turns on the lamp on one of the bedside tables, but doesn't get into bed right away. She remembers there was a bookcase in the lounge, and decides to check it out before she goes to sleep.

The lights have been turned off, only a small table lamp by the couch still lit, leaving the bookcase mostly in shadow and Clarke crosses the room and crouches down in front of it.

Books were a rarity on the Ark – there was a digital library that everyone had access to through their media tablets, so there was plenty to read, but they had very few physical books and the ones they did have were kept locked up in glass cases in a room that mostly resembled a museum exhibit, to protect them. Clarke still remembers when she was eight and her dad took her there to see the most amazing book, a big, red one with a leather clad cover with gilded, faded letters – The Complete Works of William Shakespeare. They'd been allowed to take the book out of its glass case and her dad had turned the pages almost reverently, telling her about the different plays and sonnets. The next day, Clarke had opened Romeo and Juliet on her tablet, but the language was so strange that she gave up after five minutes. She read other works by Shakespeare later in school, of course, but never that one for some reason.

"Maybe it's time to try again," she mumbles to herself as her fingers stop on a faded blue spine. She pulls it out of the book case carefully, standing and wiping away a little dust from the cover. She's about to return to her room when the door to Bellamy's room opens and he steps into the living area, only a towel around his hips, hair still wet from his shower and dripping slightly onto his shoulders and chest. For a moment, Clarke's frozen, her throat immediately dry as a desert and her heartrate picking up.

He pauses when he sees her, but then he smiles and crosses the room to join her.

"Great minds think alike, I guess," he says, turning his attention to the books.

Clarke has to swallow a couple of times before she can even open her mouth and by the time she can finally speak again, he's already got a book in his hand.

"What did you pick?" she asks, hoping he doesn't catch the way her voice trembles slightly.

He holds the book up and she has to lean in closer to be able to read the title in the low light, the scent of the soap she just used herself and something else, uniquely Bellamy, filling her nostrils as she does. She deliberately keeps her eyes on the book and does in no way let them wander down, across his chest, abs, the V that disappears behind the towel that could so easily fall to the floor if she just… She clears her throat to stop that train of thought and takes a step back.

"Catcher in the Rye," she reads out loud. "Any good?"

Bellamy raises his eyebrows. "Well, I haven't read it yet, so I don't know," he says. "Get back to me in a couple of days."

Clarke rolls her eyes. "I just thought you might have read it before and liked it," she replies.

"Nope." He shakes his head. "I mostly read to O when we were kids, didn't get much say in what we read. And school stuff, of course."

"Ah." Clarke nods in understanding. "Well… enjoy your book."

He gives her a soft smile.

"You too. Goodnight, Clarke."

She returns the smile before turning in the direction of her room.

"Night, Bellamy."

AN: There we go, hope you liked it, and if you did, feel free to let me know – comments are always appreciated!