Octavia

They pushed the horses until they were all on the brink of exhaustion, and then Lia turned them off the deer trail they were following and deep into the thickness of the forest, where brambles tore at their hair and the trees barely left space for them to pass. There was something comforting, though, about being swallowed by the woods, cocooned and unreachable. Maybe it would keep them safe, at least long enough to get Bellamy through this.

Even with three of them, it was hard to ease the dead weight of his body off the horse and lay him in the dirt. It was cold, night falling, and the frogs singing through the darkness told her there was water nearby.

"We cannot risk a fire," Lia cautioned as she started pulling furs out of saddlebags, enough to keep them warm, though Octavia could see her breath hanging in the air like puffs of smoke, even in the darkness.

Clarke leaned down and felt Bellamy's pulse. Frowning, she pulled out the injector and slid the needle into his neck, monitoring his heart rate as she measured out the dose. Octavia reached for the feather at his neck but Clarke cautioned, "Give him a minute. We don't know how he'll be."

Octavia shifted Bellamy's head into her lap and stroked his curls, felt his skin like wax as she touched his cheek, his face clammy and drawn. She stayed with him as Clarke helped Lia lay furs down on the ground, then she helped them move him onto the makeshift bed and cover him with more furs.

"We should restrain him," Clarke said, looking around doubtfully at their surroundings.

"We had Lincoln in the dropship with metal chains and he still got free," Octavia pointed out, frowning. "You gave him Red, shouldn't that settle him?"

"I don't know," Clarke admitted. "I never saw Lincoln when he was on the drug."

Octavia remembered finding Lincoln outside tonDC- his behaviour had been disturbing, but he'd definitely been cognizant, and not dangerous. She said to Clarke, "He'll be fine on the Red. We need to get food and water into him."

"Compromise?" Clarke asked gently. "We'll tie his hands and feet."

No one commented on the fact that rope would make no difference if he wanted to be free. Octavia just nodded, and they let Lia tie the knots because they trusted her to be the most ruthless.

"Get back," Clarke warned her.

"No way," Octavia said, shaking her head. "He'll be scared enough when he wakes up, I don't want him to be alone."

"Octavia, I'm not worried about him being scared," Clarke said. "I'm worried about him killing you."

"Bellamy would never-"

"Just- please?" Clarke cut her off. "Can you not be stubborn this one time?"

Octavia glared at her, but she shifted Bellamy's head and stood up, walking over to the horses. "Happy?"

"Yes," Clarke said, though she sounded far from it. She reached down and swiftly pulled the dart from Bellamy's neck before hastily stepping back to where Octavia stood.

He came to with a jolt and a gasp, and his eyes darted everywhere- taking in the trees, the stars, the furs around him. Octavia wondered if he could see them. She remembered how sensitive Lincoln had been to light and wondered if the Red did something to their vision, made it easier to see in the dark of the tunnels.

Bellamy tried to sit up and for the first time he noticed his hands were bound. He rolled onto his side instead, managing to struggle to a sitting position. She wanted to help him, but Clarke's hand like a vice around her arm stopped her from going to him.

Once he was sitting he looked around again and this time he seemed to notice them across the clearing. He let out a groan of frustration and then the single word, "Why?"

"Are you okay?" Octavia couldn't resist asking.

He nodded. "Yeah… mostly. How?"

"We've given you some of the drug," Clarke answered carefully. "Just enough to control your symptoms."

At that, Bellamy swallowed a little, but nodded his head. "Good."

Octavia pulled her arm out of Clarke's grip and said, "He's fine." She went to him, but Bellamy jerked backward, startling her.

"Stay away from me," he cautioned, putting his first real sentence together, his tone urgent.

"Hey, it's okay," Octavia said gently, dropping to her knees, staying at the edge of the makeshift bed. "You didn't attack me when you were in withdrawal, you're not going to attack me now."

"You don't know that," he insisted. "Just… stay back. Please, O."

"I'm staying right here," she assured him, keeping her tone gentle.

Clarke approached next and stood near Octavia, keeping a good couple of metres back from Bellamy. "How are you feeling?"

"Like shit," he answered honestly. "Like my heart's going to explode."

Octavia remembered Lia's explanation about Red causing heart damage and she looked at Clarke sharply. Clarke seemed to understand her fears, and gave her a reassuring look. "I want to check your heart rate," she said to Bellamy, and Octavia heard her voice waver just a little.

Bellamy's face fell and Octavia could have killed Clarke for the look of despair that came over him. She could read him like a book, and she could see that it broke his heart to think that Clarke might be scared of him. "Okay," he said, very quietly. Clarke approached him slowly, dropping to her knees in front of him. Octavia watched as he looked up into Clarke's eyes, tried to smile, but she knew that look- it wasn't a real smile, it was tight and full of self-loathing. He was thinking about how he'd bitten her, hurt her. Softly he said, "I'm sorry."

Something in Clarke's face collapsed and she shook her head, blinking back tears. She touched her fingers to his neck and he flinched, which made her flinch, but she kept her fingers there, and Octavia breathed an inward sigh of relief as the tense moment passed.

"Your pulse is a little fast, but it's okay," she assured everyone. "Just… tell me if you start craving the drug again."

"I'm already craving it," he said, an edge to his voice. "It's practically all I can think about."

Clarke paused. "Well… you seem remarkably coherent," she said. "The small doses must be keeping you just enough in control."

"You still need to be careful," he cautioned her. "Just… keep back." His eyes slid to Octavia and he said, "You too, O."

Stubbornly Octavia shrugged. "I'll be fine."

Clarke stood and went to the horses, bringing out water and some food that Lia had managed to get in Polis before they left. Belatedly Bellamy noticed Lia standing there and he tensed. "What the hell is she doing here?"

"She got us out," Clarke answered, crouching down next to him and holding a cup of water to his mouth. "Here, drink."

Bellamy was obviously still disturbed by Lia's presence but as soon as the water touched his lips he drank it down eagerly. He downed three full cups before he finally settled enough to speak again. "So what's the plan?"

"We don't really have one," Clarke admitted. "Other than to get you somewhere safe so we can detox you like we did with Lincoln."

"Great," Bellamy said dryly, shaking his head. "What about the queen?"

"She is hunting us," Lia volunteered. "We must be extremely careful... it is difficult to say what the best course is, considering we are being pursued and your camp is so far away from here."

"Can we figure that out later?" Clarke asked, an edge of stress to her voice.

Octavia watched as Bellamy met Clarke's eyes, a small smile playing at his lips. Softly he said, "Whenever you're ready."

The smile those words brought to Clarke's face was so bright that Octavia knew there was more to what he'd said, that he'd evoked some kind of memory of her.

"There's water that way, isn't there?" Octavia asked Lia. "I'll go fill up our canteens."

"No," Lia answered, surprising her. "The water that way is not for drinking. It is a hot spring." Looking to Clarke she said, "I thought it might help with Bellamy's recovery… Red tends to cause muscle cramping."

"You can say that again," Bellamy said. "I feel like I've been hit by a meteor."

"You're also dirty as hell," Octavia teased lightly. "And you stink."

Clarke and Bellamy both laughed, and some of the tension seemed to dissipate.

"First thing tomorrow, we'll all have a dip," Clarke said. "It's too cold to go now- we won't be able to warm up and the last thing any of us need is hypothermia."

"You should take turns watching me," Bellamy said to her, serious again. "And keep dosing me up, make sure I don't go crazy."

"The drug is really bad for you, Bell," Octavia said apprehensively. "It can hurt your heart."

"Better that than me hurting one of you," he said gently, giving her a reassuring look. "I'll be fine- Clarke will fix me up."

"No pressure," Clarke muttered under her breath, but she was smiling.

All of them ate, drank, and then Octavia laid down to sleep. She cuddled close to her brother without even thinking about it, but he warned her away, forcing her to move her bed to the other side of the clearing. Clarke sat up for first watch, but Octavia didn't close her eyes either. Only Lia and Bellamy actually slept.

In his sleep, Bellamy grunted and wailed like he was having horrible nightmares, and eventually she couldn't stand it anymore. She threw off her furs and went to him, shifting his head into her lap.

"Octavia-" Clarke warned.

"Screw you," Octavia cut her off, stroking her fingers through Bellamy's curls until he settled. Looking at Clarke, she asked quietly, "You can fix him, right?"

"The Red should hold him over until we get back to Camp Jaha," Clarke assured her. "And then, with the medical equipment there, detoxing him will be easy."

"Easy," Octavia repeated, feeling like the word was foreign on her tongue. "None of this has been easy."

Clarke cringed a little. "I know," she said softly.

"When we get back there and he's better, you know you're staying, right?" Octavia asked, looking down at Bellamy's face and trying to smooth the tension from his forehead with the backs of her fingers.

When she didn't get a response, she looked at Clarke, who was in turn looking down at the ground.

"Don't you dare," Octavia growled. "Don't even think about leaving again."

"I won't," Clarke said quickly. "I won't, I promise, I was just… thinking."

"About what?" Octavia snapped, unable to let it go. The idea that this- all this- could end with Clarke abandoning them again made her absolutely furious. "How wrong you were?"

"I did what I thought was best," she said softly, meeting her eyes, and Octavia saw the plea there- her gaze said, please just leave it alone.

But she couldn't. "Yeah, and guess what?" she pressed. "We all had to pick up the pieces when you walked away from camp." Gesturing down at Bellamy she said, "And I had to pick up the pieces when you walked away from him."

Clarke flinched and looked away, and then she nodded her head. "I know."

"Good," Octavia said. "As long as you know- you're not allowed to leave." She turned her attention back to her brother and lowered her lips to his forehead, kissing him softly before whispering, "And you're not allowed to die."