Chapter 41 - Home at last

(A/N: Longest chapter until now-3.1k words , so without any further ado enjoy your three in one chapter )

The water had rushed around her, swallowing her whole and carrying her without reservations or limitations downstream. Neither she nor anyone that was raised and born on the Ark could swim, having been raised in a space station, but Clarke could only follow Anya, who decided to swim away from the Mt. Weather's guards that were chasing after them.

Thanks to how inexperienced she was and at the same time, due to the river that was hitting her in the face, Clarke lost track of where Anya had gone and could only try to keep herself afloat long enough to get air before she would once again be dragged back under the water by the force of the stream. This torture continued for longer than she could fight the stream and before she could react, Clarke almost lost her strength a few times if not for her desire to reunite with her friends.

She used every bit of her power against the stream as she desperately tried to get ashore or at least to the nearest stone where she could regain her bearings. Every time she came up for air, she felt around for anything that she could latch onto. Being underwater for so long made Clarke unsure of what she was seeing, but soon after she felt her body slowly falling into exhaustion. Just as she was about to drown, someone grabbed her hand, slowly dragging her out of the water and back to land.

When coughing out all of the water that she had involuntarily drunk, Clarke looked around, only to see Anya waiting for her to finish coughing out the water.

Just as Clarke was about to talk, she heard the voice of a man talking to someone, followed by the familiar buzzing sound of a walkie-talkie. Before she could react, Anya dragged her as both of them hide behind a fallen tree. Anya put her hand on Clarke's mouth while she held her breath. Both of them saw the green lights searching for them as some men in gas masks and hazmat suits walked around as they searched the area for someone.

"The target is somewhere near us. Let's split up and remember, we can't use lethal force."

"Roger that, sir."

The men from Mt. Weather split into teams of four, each walking in a separate direction as their devices were eventually going to lead them to their target.

Seeing the men leaving or at least giving them that impression, Clarke was about to run, when Anya, who until now didn't talk at all, stopped her.

"Don't. That's what they are waiting for us to do. As much as hate you, I need you as much as you need me to survive."

"Then what do you expect me to do? Listen to you, until you accidentally lead me into a trap, before you leave me to die?"

"No, Clarke, right now, we aren't enemies and I will be a fool if I would kill my ticket out of this predicament that we seemed to have fallen into. We are going back to the place where you have burned my people."

"Why there?"

"We need help from your people since my people aren't going to win against the mountain men. You have fought against us and even defeated us when we outnumbered you. I believe your people would be able to fight against a small group of armed men."

Right as both of them got up, Clarke stopped as she realized something when she saw Anya's wound. The men from Mt. Weather were tracking them somehow and if her hunch was right, then the reason why they could find them was inside Anya's body.

"Wait, we can't leave yet."

Anya turned and looked at Clarke as if she was crazy, but before she could say something, a tranquilizer shot flew past her, hitting the tree behind her. As soon as they heard the gun shoot, both of them run as fast as their legs could take them, hoping that the guards would lose their tracks.

"Your arm…we have to take the tracking device out!"

Before Clarke could ask Anya for her arm, Anya bite down where she was sewed back in Mt. Weather. Alongside the piece of flesh, was a small device and before it could help their captors to find them again, Anya threw the thing away, before she grabbed Clarke's hand.

Stunned by what she had seen, Clarke didn't even know when they start running again, but thanks to Anya, who dragged her away, they weren't going to stay behind and wait for the guards to find them.

Meanwhile, Bellamy and his group reached the crash site of the factory station.

"Everyone, keep your eyes peeled. We're in grounder's territory!"

Bellamy instructed as he, Finn, Murphy, Monroe, and Sterling ran through the forest, with their weapons ready for combat.

"Everything around us is grounder's territory, isn't it?"

Murphy joked before he came to a halt, trying to catch his breath. The other four all stopped hearing the joke and looked back at Murphy, who was greedily trying to inhale as much air as he could.

"I can't keep running, all right? We don't even know if the guy Finn killed was telling the truth! We could very well walk into a trap!"

"Shut up, Murphy. Don't joke about it, besides we can't afford to get heard or seen by the grounders, especially after killing one of them."

"Fine, fine, I'll be a mute from now onwards."

"Still, Bellamy, we need to rest. We ran for almost the whole day, I for one can't keep running anymore."

"We are going to rest once we made sure that there aren't any grounders or survivors around. Is that fine with you all?"

"I don't see any problem, Bellamy."

"Same here."

"Fine by me."

The group moved at a slow pace across the path, and soon they reached the crash site. All around them were dead bodies filled with arrows or spears, alongside dead grounders that got shot by the guards that managed to react in time before they were killed as well.

"These are people from the Ark, right?"

"They don't seem to be grounders seeing the dead ones laying a few meters away from them."

"Let's keep moving, people."

The buzzing sound made by the flies around the carnage accompanied by the smell of death filled the whole area as Bellamy, Finn, Murphy, Sterling, and Monroe walked down the path of blood and corpses only to come to the edge of a cliff, where they saw the entire Factory station in pieces at the bottom of the valley.

Murphy being Murphy tried to ease the depressing atmosphere that had settled since they found the carnage left by the crash.

"Ouch, that's a rough landing if I ever saw one."

No one tried to rebuke him or even yell at him for joking like this, but all of them stood there in silence as they looked around for anyone that may have survived. But after a few minutes, it became clear that despite the bodies that they had found, no one was left alive to be saved.

"There's nothing we can do for these people. We've to keep going forward."

"Bellamy…I…"

"Don't say anything Sterling, we all were from here, but sadly we can't do anything to help them."

Just as they were about to leave a voice stopped the group from walking any further.

"Did you guys heard that?"

Sterling and Bellamy turned, as did Murphy, Monroe, and Finn. Just as they walked a few more steps back to the edge of the cliff, they all heard a whimpering in the distance. Since Murphy was the closest one to the edge, he looked down only to see a girl hanging for life.

As soon as she saw him, the girl yelled out for help.

"Please! Help me! I can't hold any longer!"

"No..." Sterling run towards the edged as he strained his eyes to look over the edge of the cliff, trying to see the face of whom he matched the voice within his mind. "Mel?! Mel, is that you?"

When she didn't respond immediately, everyone walked to the edge of the cliff and looked over at Sterling as he anxiously awaited a reply. Not long after, a weak voice was heard from down below.

"Ster...Sterling? Is that you?"

Bellamy, who was next to him, turned and looked at Sterling, waiting for an explanation.

"You know her?"

"Yeah, I know her. We are friends, please help me get her up. "

"You heard him, Finn tie this rope on the rock. "

Finn took the rope without hesitation and went to tie it on the rock as Bellamy looked down the edge of the cliff. "Just hold on a little longer, Mel. We are going to bring you back up."

Thankfully for all of them, Finn was the one, who tied the rope, or else who knows if the rope would have become loose, killing Sterling who volunteered himself to be lowered down.

With the help of the whole group, Sterling was lowered just enough so that he could be beside Mel as she was hanging down a tree. As soon as he took a closer look at Mel, Sterling saw that she was injured, more severe than he would've hoped, with her seatbelt looped on the tree sticking out from the rocks of the cliff. When she saw him, Mel breathed out a sigh of relief as her chances of getting out of there just increased significantly.

"It's good to see you, Sterling."

"I can imagine that, now give me your hand, Mel. We are going to get you out of this place."

As soon as her hand touched his hand, Sterling grabbed her and quickly tied the rope around her waist as well. With his friend secure, Sterling gave the ok sign so that they could drag back on the Cliffside. When the of them were about to be dragged out of the Cliffside, Sterling misplaced his leg, making both of them fall down a few meters, before the people that were up there caught the rope and stop them from falling to their deaths.

"Hold on, guys!"

Bellamy shouted down the cliff as he and the rest of them start pulling them back up again. Sadly for them, they would've been able, to pull both Sterling and Mel up if not for the sudden rain of arrows that fall around them.

"Grounders!"

"Monroe, cover us! We are going to pull them up no matter what!"

With one person less on the rope, the effort needed to pull the duo back up increased making their job even harder, especially when they could be shot by arrows from behind.

"How many are there?!"

Sterling yelled loudly, yet no one was in any kind of position to answer him, but he could hear orders being shouted by Bellamy to his friends as they tried to shoot whatever Grounders were attacking them.

They all grounded in pain since, trying to pull the duo up was hard enough when they were four, now? It was exhausting to even hold them from falling down and at this rate, they wouldn't survive.

Murphy, who was in the front grunted at Bellamy. "Bellamy, he has to cut her loose."

As soon as she heard Murphy's words, Mel closed her eyes, waiting for Sterling to cut the rope so that at least one of them could be saved, but even after a few seconds, nothing happened. When she raised her head and looked at Sterling, she saw his frustrated face, before he quickly smiled at her when he saw her looking at him.

"Don't worry, Mel, I'm not going to cut the rope. We are both getting back to the camp alive."

Suddenly the familiar sound of the horn that signals the arrival of the fog was heard all over the valley. Luckily for them whatever grounder survived the blind fire, choose to run away rather than fight the kids, after all, why bother killing them when the fog would do it regardless if they attack or not.

Not long after the horn was heard a towering figure made its way from within the forest, revealing the rather familiar dinosaur that they had taken care of, before the grounders attacked their camp, alongside Octavia and Niylah, who was riding on top of it.

When they saw Betsy and the girls, they knew that the horn was Octavia's doing, and with their help, they quickly pulled Sterling and Mel up to them. As soon they were out of danger, Mel quickly thanked everybody for risking their lives to save her, before she was interrupted by Niylah.

"I'm sorry to interrupt you, but we need to leave. The Trikru would return when they realize that the fog isn't coming and believe me, we don't want to be here when they return."

"Niylah, we can't go back. Our friends were taken away by the grounders, we have to save them back."

"Finn, right? Your friend was shot in the leg while the girl that we just saved is injured. No matter how reckless you are, you can't bring two injured people with you."

Before Finn and Niylah could argue any further, Octavia decided to propose a solution that would make everyone happy and save them from arguing with each other for god knows how long.

"Finn, you and Murphy could go and search for our friends, while the rest of us would return to Alpha Station to treat Monroe's leg wound, Bellamy's hands, and the new girl."

Everyone nodded at Octavia when they heard the plan, but before Finn and Murphy left, Bellamy whispered something to Murphy, before he too run after Finn.

Meanwhile, Clarke and Anya managed to lose the people from Mt. Weather. The two of them run for a long time before no mountain men could be seen or heard by them. When the two of them reached the outskirt of the forest where the Alpha station crashed, both of them were stunned, one more than the other.

"Look at that, I was right about it. My people have come down! "

Anya stared at the enormous station with a complicated gaze, as she know what this meant for her people if they continue to fight the sky people, and as much as she hates to admit it, her people would be the ones that would suffer the most. They spent the entire day and even some of the night running way towards the beacon Clarke had seen when they were up on the mountain. Clarke made Anya follow closely behind her until they came to a complete stop seeing the lights in the night from the Ark survivors.

Anya didn't say anything to Clarke as she turned around, prepared to leave as she held her injured arm. Just as she turned around, someone fired in the air, stopping the two girls in their tracks. The two of them didn't make any move as they watched a figure slowly making its way towards them.

As soon as they saw who was coming toward them, Clarke relaxed while Anya got even more scared for her life than when she was a prisoner.

"Look who has come back home. Welcome home princess."

Clarke hugged me when she heard me, while I hugged her back, yet at the same time, I smiled at the woman that had caused the whole war between our people.

"You know girls, I just saved your asses from being shot by the guards. Now, would you two explain to me why the two of you are together?"

Rather than having Clarke explain what happened to them, Anya stepped forward, surprising both me and Clarke.

"We were taken by the mountain men as soon as you burned my people. While I was taken as a blood prisoner, your friends were taken deeper into the mountain. Clarke and I managed to escape the mountain and in the end, we both ended up here."

Even though she told her part of the story, I still decided to turn and look over at Clarke, who nodded at me as soon as she saw me looking over at her for an answer.

"Well then, welcome back Clarke and Anya, you are coming with us. We may have been enemies, but now, I believe we both have a bigger problem to resolve than fighting between us, not to mention that you are injured."

Before Anya could react, I grabbed her like a sack of potatoes while telling Clarke to follow me. When we reached the gate, all of the guards looked at me as if I was some kind of monster for bringing two grounders into our camp, but before anyone could say anything, Abby rushed out of the crowd and hugged her daughter.

Even though Clarke was dirty from running and hiding the whole day, her mother immediately recognized her, easing the tension to some extent, but not completely as Anya didn't look anything like Clarke or us. After Abby made sure that her daughter was alright she turned and looked at me.

"Who's that woman, Leon?"

"You can say she's a friend of mine and at the same time one of the leaders of the grounders. I know that we are in a rather strange relationship with them, but she needs your help. Can you please help her?"

Abby took a second to think over her options before she let out a tired sigh. "I guess this could be seen as our way of trying to repair the relations between our people. Bring her over to the infirmary."

"Thanks, Abby for trusting me."

"No, Leon, I should thank you for not giving up. You and your friends were the only ones that were sure your friends are still alive somewhere out there."

I could only smile at her, before I brought Anya inside the station, despite all the cursing words she yelled at me for treating her like this. At least now, I know where to find the rest of my friends.

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