Promise me - Jasper Jordan

12

I sit in front of Clarke with Jasper's body inbetween us. She looks at her watch while checking Jasper's pulse, I keep myself busy with my hands in his hair to try and calm him down.

"His pulse is thready." Clarke comments, looking at the boy before he groans out again.

"Is that a good or a bad thing?" Clarke looks at me and by her expression, I can tell it's definitely not good. Someone shouts to shut him up, I roll my eyes.

"Don't listen to them. You're gonna make it through this, okay?" Clarke tells Jasper. "I promise." Someone else shouts up, I can hear he wants Jasper to die.

"Can you keep your fucking idiotic comments to yourselves? Bunch of selfish cowards!" I scream back, making Clarke smile at me.

"I'm gonna get clean water. Keep an eye on him." Clarke says, getting up from the ground.

"Is there anything I can do, I feel useless." I admit, playing with Jasper's hair.

"Take some rest, you've done a lot already. I promise that if there is something I'll come and get you." I nod and watch Clarke disappear down again. I look at Monty, he's working with the wristbands and wiress.

"Do you need any help?" I ask him, he shakes his head just when Jasper groans again.

"No, I don't think you can help much, I barely know what I'm doing." I nod, tiredly looking down at the injured boy.

"Oh, Jasper." I breathe out, rubbing up and down his arm. "Please hold on."

"You've changed a lot since we met about a year and a half ago." Monty suddenly says. I look up at him, smiling at the memory. "You were so shy and softspoken."

"I remember."

-----

I am sitting at my desk, writing down words I had found beautiful. I get through by making poems, which help me pass time. The door of our family rooms open and my dad walks inside with a smaller boy behind him. His eyes are almond shaped, he has yet black hair and he avoids eye contact.

"All right Monty, there you go." My dad tells the boy, handing the boy some paper. I put down my pen, looking confused at my dad. "This is Monty, one of my students. He had given me his homework which I forgot to give back." I nod, making eye contact with the boy for the first time. "That's my daughter Malin." My dad tells Monty.

He waves a little, clamming the paper in his hands. I wave back watching as he leaves the room. My dad closes the door and turns to me with a big smile on his face.

"You're both very shy people." He says.

-----

"Good old times." I tell him. A yawn escapes me, I see Monty look at me.

"Go to sleep, I'll watch Jasper and wake you whenever something happens."

"No, I'm fine."

"Seriously, just go to sleep. We'll be fine." Monty reassures. I nod, getting up and rubbing in his hair softly before strolling over to the pile of blankets on the ground. I lay down, closing my eyes and almost immediately drifting off to sleep, before I'm completely gone I hear Monty say: "Good night."

***

Jasper has been moaning and groaning from the pain for the past couple days, it's getting harder and harder to bear especially with everyone around telling us to just kill him. I sit next to Clarke, helping her checkup on his wounds like usual.

"The Grounders cauterized the wound. It saved his life." She says, looking down at it.

"Saved his life so they could string him up for life bait." Finn adds, walking up next to me. "Garden of Eden this ain't."

"This is infected. He could be septic." I look at her with wide eyes. "Any progress on using the wristbands to contact the Ark?" No answer. "Monty?"

"That would be a firm no."

"My mother would know what to do." Clarke says.

"Yes, but Sepsis gets treated with Antibiotics on the Ark which we don't have here. Even with your mom we wouldn't know how to make it." I tell her, she nods.

"How's he doing?" Wells asks.

"How does it look like he's doing?" I look at Finn behind me who gives me a weird look before focusing back on Jasper.

"Just trying to help." Wells says. Jasper groans again, I sigh.

"Right, you wanna help? Hold him down." I look at Wells and Finn who are both helping to hold him down. I keep his upperbody flat against the floor. Clarke burns the knife, waiting for it to heat up.

"I'm not gonna like this, am I?" Monty asks. My heart skips a beat, hoping that I'm strong enough to keep him down so he won't move too much. I look at Finn who nods at me.

Jasper screams once the knife gets hold onto him. The sound almost making my ears bleed, poor Jasper.

"Hold him still." Clarke comands. "I need to cut away the infected flesh."

"Stop it. You're killing him." Octavia says, coming up to us.

"She's trying to save his life."

"She can't." Bellamy says as he too climbs up. Wells stands up and tells him to back off.

"We didn't drag him through miles of woods to let him die." Clarke says.

"Kid's a goner. You can't see that, you're deluded. He's making people crazy."

"Yeah? You're making me crazy but am I telling you to kill yourself? No." I tell him.

"Sorry if Jasper is an inconvenience to you, but this isn't the Ark." Clarke snaps. "Down here every life matters."

"Take a look at him." Bellamy replies. "He's a lost cause." I wipe away the tears that have fallen over Jasper's cheeks while Clarke had been cutting away the infection. I'm not letting you die.

"Octavia, I've spent my whole life watching my mother heal people. If I say there's hope, there's hope."

"This isn't about hope, it's about guts." Bellamy interrupts. "You don't have the guts to make the hard choices. I do. He's been like this for three days. If he's not better by tomorrow, I'll kill him myself."

"And if you do that I would sleep with one eye open cause I will come and kill you."

"You don't see it, do you Malin? Not everyone can be saved. Not everyone lives in unicorn paradise without problems like you do!" I get up and glare at him.

"You really think I grew up without problems, do you? You think I had never any inconvenience in my life but guess what Bellamy, I did. You think you can boss everyone around and make them do whatever you want them to but I'll tell you right now, you will never make me your little puppet." I pause, staring at him. "And if you don't get out, right now I will kick you down that motherfucking ladder myself."

He looks at me for a moment and clears his throat, walking to the ladder and going down but looking up at Octavia before he's completely gone.

"Octavia, let's go."

"I'm staying here." She replies, making Bellamy leave without another word.

"Power-hungry, self-serving jackass." Monty says, eyeing the ladder. "He doesn't care about anyone but himself. No offense."

"Yeah," Finn says, hugging his legs to his chest. "Bellamy is all that. But he also happens to be right." I stare at him, the anger I had for Bellamy now turning towards Finn.