trepidation |BELLAMY BLAKE| [1]

CHAPTER 03

AVERY BEGAN EXPLORING THE AREA NEARBY.

But she made sure she stuck close to the group. She didn't know what was out there, none of them knew.

She soon heard voices and in front of her in the dirt, she noticed bootprints. Some of the delinquents must have wandered off.

Avery followed the voices until she came upon a group of five. It was Octavia and the others from the conflict before Avery left camp.

"Hey, guys, would you try to keep up?" The blonde from earlier called out to the others who were behind her.

"Come on, Clarke. How do you block all this out?" Spacewalker asked with a smirk.

 Clarke turned to them, "Well, it's simple. I wonder, 'why haven't we seen any animals?' Maybe it's because there are none. Maybe we've already been exposed to enough radiation to kill us. Sure is pretty, though. Come on."

Avery watched as Clarke kept walking. She sure lived life on the wild side.

"Someone should slip her some poison sumac." Octavia sighed and the boy with the goggles snorted.

"I got to know what you two did to get busted." Spacewalker said to the other two boys as they kept walking and Avery followed along. She wanted to know, too. They didn't look like criminals.

"Sumac is not the only herb in the garden, if you know what I mean." The Asian boy replied,

"Someone forget to replace what we took." Goggle boy responded,

"Someone has apologized, like, a thousand times." The other one sighed,

 "How about you, Octavia? What'd they get you for?" Goggle boy asked the girl who jogged past them to catch up with Clarke,

"Being born."

"That is so not game." The Asian boy commented.

The girls paused up ahead and the boys followed. Avery slowly approached, wanting to know what they were looking at. She got close enough to spot a deer and she smiled. It was a real live animal.

She wanted to get closer, but as she stepped on a stick and it let out a loud 'snap', the deer's head shot up, revealing that it, in fact, had two heads. The group screamed and the animal took off and they all turned towards her,

"Sorry about that." Avery let out a small, nervous laugh, "Hi."

"Who are you?" Clarke asked,

"You're the girl who talked to my brother earlier." Octavia stated,

"Yeah, um, but most people just call me Avery." She walked over to them, "I was out for a walk when I heard you guys. So, Mount Weather?"

Clarke and Spacewalker glanced at each other, "The more the merrier." The blonde sighed, "C'mon, we don't have long till it gets dark."

The group of six kept making their way across the forest, pausing only for a few moments to examine their surroundings. There could still be dangerous animals out there.

"Hey, you know what I'd like to know?" Finn called out after a while, "Why send us down today after ninety seven years? What changed?"

"Who cares? I'm just glad they did. I woke up rotting in a cell, and now I'm spinning in a forest." Octavia grinned, spinning around a tree to get his attention.

"Maybe they found something on a satellite, you know, like an old weather satellite or..." Monty started,

"It wasn't a satellite." Clarke interrupted, "The Ark is dying. At the current population level, there are roughly three months left of life support, maybe four now that we're gone." She explained to them,

"So that was the secret they locked you up to keep, why they kept you in solitary, floated your old man?" Finn asked,

"My father was the engineer who discovered the flaw. He thought the people had a right to know. The Council disagreed. My mother disagreed. They were afraid it would cause a panic. We were gonna go public, anyway, when Wells..." She paused,

"What, turned in your dad?" Monty finished for her,

"Anyway, the guard showed up before we could. That's why today. That's why it was worth the risk. Even if we all die, at least they bought themselves more time." Clarke informed the group,

"They're gonna kill more people, aren't they?" Monty asked and Avery's thought immediately went to her father. 

He was up on the Ark at that moment. He probably had no idea that she was down there.

"Good. After what they did to me, I say, float them all." Octavia stated, running ahead of them once again,

"You don't mean that." Avery replied,

"We have to warn them."

"That's what my father said." Clarke responded,

"Oh, damn, I love Earth." Avery looked ahead and saw Octavia stripping away her clothes, "Oh! Holy..."

"Octavia, what the hell are you doing?" Clarke questioned as Octavia jumped in the water below.

The group rushed ahead to make sure she was alright, "We can't swim." Monty called out, seeing Octavia head above the surface of the water,

She grinned as she stood, "I know, but we can stand."

The two boys laughed as they began taking off their jackets. Avery looked at the dark water below and gulped. She had no urge to go in there. They didn't know what was in those depths.

"Wait. There's not supposed to be a river here." Clarke stated,

"Well, there is. So take off your damn clothes." Finn smiled at her,

Suddenly, Jasper called out, "Octavia, get out of the water." They all looked to what Jasper was staring at. Approaching quickly was something under the water. And it looked big.

"Get out of the water now!" Clarke yelled,

Octavia turned to see the creature right before it attacked and pulled her under. 

"What the hell is that?" Monty questioned,

"We have to help her." Finn stated,

"What are you gonna do?" Clarke asked him,

"Try not to get eaten." Finn responded as he took off his shoes,

"No. Wait. If we distract it, it might let her go. Help me." She reached down to push a big rock into the river and Finn helped. It actually worked. The creature disappeared and Octavia surfaced once again,

"It worked. It let her go!" Monty called out,

"Octavia, get to the shore, now!" Jasper yelled at the girl and she made her way back over, "I got you."

"It's coming back. It's headed right for you, guys."

Avery stepped back and watched in fear as Jasper grasped Octavia's arms and pulled her out of the water and onto the rocks before the creature was able to grab her once again.

"Thank you. Thank you." Octavia coughed,

"Note to self, next time, save the girl."