Disclaimer: Do not own Marvel, DC, The 100 or Teen Wolf

Warnings for murder, maiming, child abuse, attempted rape and torture

For context, I was trying to look more at the horror aspect of WolfHowlRunner61's Her Guardians series.

Are you afraid of us?

Clarke wasn't entirely sure how to deal with everything that she had learned about these vampires.

They had killed her biological mother. That she knew. They had killed anyone else who had so much had spoken badly about her.

In some ways, she supposed she should be grateful to them for their protectiveness over her.

It didn't change that thinking about all they'd done, made her nervous.

These people had thrown Murphy down the stairs, had killed him. Had set all three Jasper, Miller and Monty on fire. Had skinned, raped and mutilated Bellamy Blake, then had killed the others he'd worked with. Bellamy and his group were a pack of rapists and human traffickers, so, they got whatever they deserved. But still? Clarke remembered what the report said about how Bellamy was tortured before his death.

About how his head was sawed off. About before that, he was skinned alive, castrated, his skin burned, raped with a knife.

Clarke sat back in her desk chair in her dorm room, looking at the vampires in front of her, unsettled, knowing that these people had done all of that to Bellamy. Again, Bellamy had deserved no pity at all. But knowing that she was the soulmate of people who could do that to another living person? Was honestly really disturbing.

Clarke looked at the small glass full of water, where there was the goat's beard flower sitting there.

It was brought to her by Felicia, one of her mates.

It was strange, knowing that these people, who had killed her mother, and had gleefully set Jasper and Miller on fire, and had tortured Bellamy slowly to death, were capable of sensitivity when it came to her.

They apparently wanted her to be happy. Because they made sure she was adopted by a good family that would raise her with all the love that they were capable of.

She had not learned this until recently, even if would be clear to anyone else, but the Barton family had adopted her because they were ordered to. By Clarke's mates.

The Barton family knew Clarke's mates, before they had adopted her.

Clint and Laura had met these vampires before any of their children were born.

And it was because of this, and because of the vampires protecting the Barton family, that the Barton family obeyed and adopted Clarke. Clarke's friends, Wells Jaha and Lydia Martin too, since Clarke made it clear to both of her potential adoptive parents that she wasn't leaving the orphanage without Wells or Lydia.

Clarke had come to rationalize that it meant that Clint and Laura never loved her, but these vampires insisted otherwise.

Laura and Clint already had five children by the time they had brought Clarke, Wells and Lydia into their home.

Jillian and Cooper were nearly adults, Lila was getting close to her teens and Zach was getting bigger by the day. Jessie was still small and young.

But that was already a lot of kids. And adding in three more mouths to feed?

Clarke didn't get it at the time, even if she was grateful.

But now that she knew? She had to assume that it was all because they were ordered to do it and nothing else.

She wanted to believe that Laura and Clint loved her. But she just couldn't.

Clarke saw the sympathetic expressions on these vampires' faces, most likely understanding her conflict.

Clarke knew that there were people following her, she'd suspected it for years. She had denied it, however, for a long time. But after Bellamy, his sister, Octavia and the rest of their disgusting group were killed when Bellamy and his group tried to kidnap Clarke and her siblings?

Clarke knew she couldn't pretend that she didn't know she was being followed, anymore.

That was why it wasn't entirely a surprise to her, when she was confronted by these vampires only a few days ago and they had introduced themselves to her.

But twenty-five of them? She had to admit, she didn't understand how that worked.

How could she have twenty-five soulmates?

But that was beside the point.

Even if they assured her that the Bartons loved her, it didn't change that they had murdered multiple people for her.

She was grateful to them for protecting her and her family. Obviously, she was. But there were so many uncomfortable questions she heard in the back of her brain.

Questions like, "which of you skinned Bellamy?" "Which of you raped him with the knife?" "Which one of you threw Murphy down the stairs in the orphanage?" "Which of you set Jasper, Miller and Monty on fire?" "Which one of you killed my biological mother?"

As horrific as Bellamy's death was, deserving as it was, that was the question that nagged Clarke the most.

Who had killed her biological mother?

Clarke had no love for her biological mother, Abby Griffin. She sure as hell knew that Abby had never loved her.

Still, Abby, it didn't change that Abby was Clarke's birth mother. And even if Clarke was actually happy that the abusive woman was gone, she still had to wonder the question, who had taken her life?

The vampire closest to where Clarke sat, Tora, said, chuckling, "You're thinking about something, Clarke. We can tell. What is it?"

Clarke knew she probably shouldn't ask the question, because things were awkward enough as they were. But still, she felt like she had to ask.

She said, staring at her mates, "Which one of you was the one to kill my biological mother, Abby Griffin?"

There was silence for several seconds.

Helena and Dinah looked at each other, as did Hela and Carol.

But Diana decided that she might as well answer, either because she wanted to be more honest with Clarke than the others were being, or she felt it her duty, because she was the one who had become close to Clarke first.

She walked closer to Clarke's chair and said, speaking quietly, appearing to be almost sure that if she spoke louder, she might be hurting Clarke in some way, "We all had a part in killing Abby, Clarke."

"I know," Clarke said, glaring at Diana, "But I want to know who did the killing blow."

It didn't occur to Clarke that her mates might decide to try to protect each other from Clarke's anger or blame.

Because she would have thought that they knew she would be in no way angry over Abby's death. She was just curious.

A hand dropped onto Diana's left shoulder and Diana turned to look at who had touched her shoulder.

Clarke looked too.

It was Hela.

Hela nodded to Diana, smiling. "It's alright," she said, then she walked past Diana as she looked at Clarke and said, "It was me, Clarke. I was the one that did it."

Clarke's eyes widened. She stared at the draugr, startled.

She didn't doubt that Hela would be capable of it. Because they all were capable of it. But she honestly wasn't expecting it to be Hela.

In some fucked up way? Clarke had thought it was Diana. Because Diana was the first of them to insert herself in Clarke's life.

It was really messed up, but Clarke had assumed that Diana had started a sexual and romantic relationship with her, as a way of apologizing for being the one to directly kill Abby Griffin.

Did that make sense? Sort of. Was that assumption really messed up? Yes. But it made sense to Clarke when she had thought of that as a possibility.

Hela being the one that had taken Abby's life directly? Clarke admitted to not seeing that one coming.

"You?" Clarke asked, honestly surprised.

Hela nodded. "Yes," she said, "I will not regret it. I can't regret it, because of how she treated you. She isolated you, hit you, never loved you. I enjoyed every moment of killing her."

Clarke nodded, sighing. None of this was a surprise to her; Hela enjoying killing her biological mother. No, she hadn't expected it to be Hela, but she wasn't surprised in the least that Hela had enjoyed the kill.

Hela as a general rule, enjoyed killing her prey. But she most likely would especially enjoy killing someone who had so much as entertained the possibility of hurting Clarke.

Hela stepped forward, her ice-blue eyes meeting Clarke's sky-blue ones as she said, "I do not regret it even for a moment. But I am sorry if this news upsets you at all. But I will confess, Clarke, I very much enjoyed killing the woman that made your life miserable during the first years of it."

Clarke tried not to shiver.

In some ways, she was still grateful. She was. But the mental image of what these vampires had done to her biological mother remained seared in her brain.

She was not there when her biological mother was killed. But she had a mental image in her mind of what happened.

Back before she had found out that a group of vampire women were the ones responsible for her mother's murder, she had always pictured it as a bunch of men in ski masks, but that mental picture was destroyed immediately when Clarke discovered who actually was following her for years.

A group of vampire women, who had killed her biological mother.

Now, a new image entered her mind regularly.

But now, knowing this? Hearing this? An even more vivid picture entered her mind.

Marcus Kane, her mother's new husband, pinned down to the ground of the woods, staring up as people closed in on Abby, knives being pulled out.

Abby's screams blasting a black sky, flesh, meat and sinew being sliced into, blades gleaming, blades soon coated in blood and bits of meat. Then Hela leaning down, a smile of absolute victory and malice splitting her face as she unleashed the final blow, relieving Abby of her life and of her blood.

The mental images continued; Hela lifting herself up, mouth and hands slick with blood, having more kinship with the blade of her knife than she did with the carved up woman on the ground, who she had so happily decimated.

Kane's screams now were the only screams remaining, and soon, those anguished screams turned to screams of pain.

After those two corpses were made, the vampires left the carnage and traveled back to the house where Clarke remained a prisoner at the time.

The vampires had called the police, leaving one of those anonymous tips.

They would not identify themselves, but they would send the police to go to the scene of the crime, so that young Clarke could be tracked down and not be left alone for too long.

That image, for some reason, made Clarke's skin crawl all the more.

The realization that these people capable of mass torture and multiple murders, also had gone back to the house where Clarke was held captive by her own biological mother, and had alerted the police to two bodies in the woods, so that the police could find Clarke and bring her to an orphanage so that she could one day be adopted, more than implied that somehow, they were capable of great and bloody carnage but also, great care and protectiveness.

Clarke swallowed and felt her stomach twist. But…..wasn't them murdering her biological mother, who was her first abuser, proof already that they felt nothing but care and protectiveness for her?

Realizing that alone, made Clarke shiver against her will.

She knew that the vampires had noticed her shiver, because she heard one of the vampires, Wanda ask, "Clarke, are you alright, love?"

Clarke broke out of her thoughts and stared at several of the vampires, trying not to shiver again.

She considered what Wanda had just said. "love."

That was funny, wasn't it?

They loved her. Everything they'd done, was because they loved her. They never involved themselves in her life before, when she was a child, because as they explained it, they would not do anything that was even close to child grooming. That was why they'd kept their distance from her for so many years, until now, when she was an adult that was about to graduate from college.

But during all that time, they had shaped her life, in a way. They had killed Abby and Kane, made sure she got adopted by a loving family, made sure she had friends and went to a good college and was protected during all that time.

All they'd done, was for her. In some way, wasn't it clear that even murderers and people capable of the most severe of tortures, was capable of love? Capable of protecting and providing someone they loved more than anyone in the world?

Clarke stared at these women who claimed to love her, vampires; Wanda, Hela, Mari, Natasha, Jennifer, Diana, Shayera, Dinah, Helena, Carol, Brunnhilde, Tora, all of them? Even if they didn't try to make her become a vampire or whatever exactly the plan was going to be? They had dedicated their lives to her.

That on its own, was rather disturbing.

Because who really wanted to admit that murderers, let alone a bunch of murderous, blood sucking vampires, were capable of love?

Jennifer then asked a question that Clarke did not want to answer. She asked, "Clarke, are you afraid of us?"

Clarke looked away. She wouldn't answer that question. But her not answering the question in itself, would be evidence of answering Jennifer, wouldn't it?