Chapter 43 - Talk by the fire

At first, I was supposed to follow Anya to meet her commander and see if I could somehow persuade their commander to stop this madness that they call a war against the invaders, but after talking with my friends about what happened to them, Byrne decided to have Bellamy, Clarke, and Octavia follow me and Anya while at the same time check the village where Finn and Murphy went to search for Clarke.

We all followed Anya through the forest until it was dark outside, and since no one wanted to get mauled by one of the carnivorous dinosaurs that roams the woods, we decided to build a fire and set up camp for the night and continue making our way when the sun rises. Sadly for me, I was only able to get a few moments of sleep here and there before I gave up entirely, and thanks to that I just sit near the fire since I didn't want to disturb the girls as all three of them went to sleep leaving Bellamy to take the guard duty for the first part of the night.

Bellamy didn't notice me since he was busy looking at his sister who was sleeping so peacefully for the first time in a long time. When I met her, Olivia was that girl who carried so much resentment for being under a floorboard as well as hating everything related to the Ark and its people and while my friend wasn't happy when she met Lincoln, being with Lincoln changed her, possibly for the better or at least that's what I hope.

Then there was Clarke breathing softly next to her, all battered and bruised like a warrior and even though she wasn't the same girl that didn't know anything about how to act like a proper leader, she wasn't a soldier or a warrior yet. We all want peace, maybe even Anya, but the peace-loving Clarke was forced to fight her way out of a mountain filled with enemies. What can I say? The few lessons I and Bellamy gave to her helped her survive the worst time of her life, the same thing can be said for most of the kids that were sent down here with us.

And surprisingly, Anya looked not like her usual self when she was sleeping, and while I have no doubt that she didn't trust us, I know that she at least knew that we will keep her safe for the time being.

When I sit next to Bellamy, he looked at me in surprise before he let out a long sigh.

"Sorry, Leon, I didn't see you coming."

"You were quite busy making sure your baby sister wasn't hurt or worse pregnant."

He frowned at me before he punched me in the shoulder.

"Don't joke like that, because I'd be damned if I wouldn't kill that bastard."

"She's an adult, you know?"

"Even if she's one, O is still my baby sister and you know better than anyone what I'm willing to do for her."

"I know, Bellamy, I know. "

Hearing us talking woke Clarke. She slowly opened her tired eyes until she was looking at us and the flicker of the flames in front of us. We both heard Clarke get up, and thankfully she was the only one to be woken up by our conversation. Clarke sat up next to me and let out a sigh when she thought about her boyfriend.

"I'm glad that both of you are safe and alive. The last time I saw you guys was when I was closing the drop ship door. That day, I thought that I lost you two as well as Finn, Octavia, Monroe, and Sterling, but thank you all survived the slaughter and the fire."

I turned my head towards Clarke, only to see how her tears were falling down on the ground. While it was a brutal night, it was necessary for our survival, but it seems that Clarke didn't really accept what she had done.

"Clarke, it had to be done. It was either that or we all would have been killed by the grounders. You had a choice to make and you chose the best option that would save our friends."

She nodded slowly when she heard me, a small smile forming on her lips, but in the end, she still changed the subject.

"Have you or Bellamy slept at all?"

"Not really."

"Same here princess, I can't sleep until I know that my decision didn't cause more unnecessary deaths. I feel like if I fall asleep, I won't wake up. It was definitely a terrible idea to give Robin Hood a gun, right?"

"Finn wasn't exactly the calmest guy after that night, but still."

Bellamy waited for Clarke to laugh at his joke, but instead, he watched as Clarke fell silent. Neither one of us said anything for a while before Clarke suddenly broke the silence with a question of her own.

"Why haven't you told Octavia? She has the right to know."

"It's complicated, Clarke. It was a mistake, one that even he would forgive me for, especially since we weren't exactly free."

"You almost killed her boyfriend for fuck sake, Bellamy! She deserves to know why Lincoln didn't come to meet her in the past few days thanks to you."

Before Clarke or Bellamy wakes Octavia and Anya, I decide to interfere between them.

"Clarke, Octavia knows, she met Lincoln before she went to Niylah. "

"Then why isn't she angry?"

"Because, unlike what we all thought, Octavia has grown up to understand the difference between intentional harm and misfire or better said a collateral casualty. "

Again, silence filled the air surrounding us as we, the three co-leaders reflected upon my words for a while, until finally, Bellamy decided to change the topic. He nodded at me before he looked over at Clarke wearily as if his next words may trigger her anger or maybe even scare her.

"You haven't seen him, Clarke, losing you, the others…the war, all of the bloodshed and gore… it changed him, it changed all of us, but Finn got it the worst. He executed the Grounder that drew us the map. He pulled the trigger without even blinking and dragged the body away as if it was nothing."

Clarke shook her head, and I could the shock and fear on her face as her words almost stop in her throat. "T-That doesn't sound like Finn."

"No. It doesn't, I saw what he was capable of…and still, I let him go with Murphy, and two automatic rifles."

"That's not the Finn I befriend, but I can understand why he fell into madness. I may have remained behind, but even before he did that, Finn was unstable…I should have come as well, maybe I could have stopped him from falling into that state."

"I'm sure that both of you would have done the same if..." Clarke didn't continue, but deep inside she knew who were the girls that would have made us become her Finn.

We both looked up, surprised, but Clarke's eyes showed only sympathy for us, sympathy that both I and Bellamy were sure that we didn't deserve.

"When Kane took us back to the drop ship and no one was there, we assumed it was the Grounders."

"And even when one of the guards found one of the things that made you all unconscious, we still thought that the grounders were at fault."

"Of course you did. No one couldn't have known that it was the Mountain Men that attacked us after we annihilated the grounders. It was, after all our first time seeing them."

"I hate to admit it, but if my guess is right, then they may have been observing us since the first day, waiting for an opportunity to 'help us."

"Miller and I found out why they took the grounder and us, at least to some extent regarding our fate. They are sucking the blood of out the grounders so that they could their radiation wounds, but I don't know why they didn't force us as they did with the grounders…"

It took a while before I remember reading something about how blood is made in one of Pike's books back on the Ark.

"Our bone marrow…they want to use our friends for their bone marrow. We all have been modified and our bodies have developed a rather good tolerance to space radiation which makes us the perfect hosts for their desires of walking out in the sun once again. They would kill our friends for their own benefit."

"First we find Finn, and then we save our people from Mount Weather."

"And Lincoln," Octavia added, catching us by surprise when we realize that Octavia had eavesdropped on our conversation, but not only did she hear everything, but just as she got on her feet, our last companion's voice chimed in.

"And let's not forget about my people. We are saving all of them."

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