XX
[PREVIOUSLY: Things escalate dangerously as Trikru surrounds the camp of Skikru. When Octavia is tortured, Finn suddenly makes an appearance, begging for her release. Lexa agrees to the proposal and, as Octavia is taken away, she is hit with a sudden realisation].
I had loved him and I had lost him.
As I was dragged, screaming and struggling, kicking and swearing, fighting and crying, back through the gates, I realised that a tiny portion of my heart still belonged to Finn. He had been the first person to befriend me when we landed on Earth. He had been the first guy, besides Bellamy, to look out for me, protect me and make me feel like I was worth something. He had been the first boy I had ever loved.
And now he was going to die.
As the guards ungracefully dumped me onto the cold, hard-packed ground next to the Ark doors, I saw one of them remove their shock baton and hold it dangerously close to my face.
Emitting a loud, angry screech, I scrambled to my feet and tried to run back out of the gates. When the guard forcefully restrained me, I clawed furiously at his face, drawing bloody patterns on his forehead and cheeks.
"Enough! Enough! Just quit fighting!" one of his friends shouted.
"No! You don't understand!" I screamed back, right in his face. "He's going to die and it's all my fault!"
I collapsed, sobbing, to the floor. I couldn't fight anymore. I couldn't be strong anymore. I was personally responsible for the death of one of my closest companions. If that wasn't enough to break someone, I don't know what is.
Just then, a loud, feminine voice cried out, "Stand aside! Stand aside! Let me through! Octavia! Octavia! Are you alright?"
Startled, I lifted my head and looked straight into the concerned face of Clarke! Blonde curls framed her rounded cheeks and her features were adorned with big, blue eyes that were filled with anger, worry and determination.
Completely convinced that I was hallucinating, I backed away from her, my face an expression of sheer shock. "C-Clarke?" I quavered. "W-what is this?"
Clarke crouched down beside me and placed a soothing hand on my shoulder. "Relax, Octavia, it's okay. I have a plan. I won't let them kill Finn."
I shook my head in disbelief, tears glistening in my eyes. "You can't stop them, Clarke! There are hundreds of them and only one of you! He's gonna die. He's gonna die because of me!"
"Shhh, stop saying that," she rebuffed me firmly. "He's not going to die. C'mon, let's get you back inside the Ark. We need to clean up those wounds. Then, I'll explain everything."
A few moments later and I found myself sitting on the edge of a single bed, covered in starched white linen and situated in the fore-front of Abby's medical ward.
As she dipped some cloths in a bowl of alcohol, Abby spoke, "Can you remove your shirt so I can clean out those cuts? We don't want them to get infected."
I rolled my eyes and huffed as I lifted the flimsy material, stained with blood and dirtied with stains, over my head. "Finn's going to be executed and all you can think about is cleaning some cuts?" I scoffed.
Clarke, who was standing nearby, shot me a warning look. "It's not like that, Octavia."
All I did was send her a glare before turning back to Abby, "Where's Bellamy?"
Abby hesitated before answering, "He's in the holding cell."
I straightened up with a lurch. "What? Why?"
"He tried to attack Kane because he wouldn't send anyone after you," she explained softly. "Here, hold still, this is going to sting."
Gritting my teeth, I watched as Abby pressed the cloths to the wound in my stomach. A loud hiss of pain escaped my lips as a burning sensation seeped through my skin.
Abby sent me a sympathetic glance past the thin strands of her dark-blonde hair. "Sorry," she murmured as she pulled away. "I'll try to be as quick as I can."
I nodded grimly, not saying another word until she had finished cleaning out the cuts. As she was preparing some bandages, Clarke attracted my attention by speaking up from her position on a chair nearby, "So, I'm guessing you're wondering how I escaped Mount Weather, huh?"
I shrugged. "It'd be handy to know why you saved yourself and not everyone else but, yeah, okay, let's hear it."
Clarke narrowed her eyes at me. "I tried to tell them that we couldn't trust those people but they wouldn't listen to me. They thought I was overreacting. In the end, we barely escaped with our lives. Where to start? We encountered a psycho doctor who was trying to bleed her patients to death, a whole army of Reapers in some dark tunnels and a..."
"Wait. Did you say 'we'?" I suddenly interrupted.
Clarke sighed and ran her fingers through her tangled mess of blonde curls. "Yes. We. I wasn't alone. Anya escaped with me."
I stiffened in horror. "Anya? Oh no, you have to be kidding me! The only reason Trikru is willing to make an alliance with us is to get her out of Mount Weather! Now, they'll kill us all!"
"No, they won't," Clarke shook her head.
"What makes you so sure?" I persisted.
"Because Anya's dead."
I gaped at her. "W-what? A-Anya's ... dead? Are - are you serious?" I blubbered.
"Some over-eager cadets from the Ark shot at us when we were approaching camp," she explained, her tone laced with a hint of sadness. "Anya was hit. She died in my arms. The last thing she said to me was to make sure Skikru made peace with her people. She must've realised, after being trapped in Mount Weather, that Trikru cannot save their own alone."
"Wait. There are other grounders in there?"
Clarke nodded. "Yes. Mount Weather has been capturing them for decades. They bleed them dry to supply their own iron and mineral deficiencies. Octavia, these people haven't seen the light of day in nearly a century!" she leaned forward, her hand gestures indicating that she was both agitated and intrigued. "Their bodies are unable to cope with the amount of radiation that is still lingering in the earth's atmosphere. If any of them venture outside for more than five minutes, their skin practically melts! A huge horde of them, thousands and thousands of them, live in a bunker within a massive mountain, one that is so fortified and so technologically advanced, that, even with all our guns and all our mechanics and engineers, we wouldn't have the slightest chance against them!
"They're led by an elderly man known as President Wallace. When we first arrived, they quarantined us to make sure we weren't infectious, but afterwards, we were welcomed with open arms. We were given proper beds, real food and a variety of differing entertainments and pleasures. But that's just the thing: I don't understand why. If they were going to bleed us like they did the grounders, why would they treat us so well?"
"They were probably fattening you all up for the kill," I responded dryly. "Whatever the case, Clarke, we have to get them out of there! If that - er - President Wallace guy turns nasty, things could go downhill really quickly. W-we can't tell Lexa or any of the Trikru warriors, for that matter, about Anya or they won't help us. We have to make them believe that she's still inside that place. We have to make them believe that you came here alone. Can you do that?"
Clarke paused as she exchanged a hurried look with her mother. "Yes. Of course. I've seen inside that place first-hand and I know for a fact that we can't do this alone. Our only chance against Mount Weather is if we fight together."
I pressed my lips into a long, firm line. "And speaking of fighting ... you said you had a plan that would stop Finn's execution?"
Clarke bit down on her lower lip. "Yes. I need to speak with Lexa face-to-face and explain the situation. I'm sure she can be reasoned with."
I raised my eyebrows. "Have you met Lexa? She's not going to let Finn off with just a mild smack to the behind. Clarke, surely you have concocted up something better than that?"
"Yep. She has."
At the sound of Raven's cracked, strained voice, Abby, Clarke and I all turned around to see her leaning against the near doorway.
"R-Raven?" I breathed. "Oh my god, Raven, are you okay?"
Raven, completely ignoring me, bored holes into Clarke's eyes with her own, ones that were alight with a fiery anger. "Here," she tossed a knife to the blonde. "When you get close enough, stab her."
I stared at the shimmering blade of the weapon in shock. "She can't kill Lexa! She'll be jumped by her warriors! Besides, we need her alive! She knows everything about Mount Weather! She has to help us get inside!"
"How come that is the only thing you're worried about?" Raven exploded as she stepped threateningly towards me. "Finn is going to die! He is about to be executed! He is all I have left! I can't lose him! Okay? I can't! I love him!" During the last of her sentence, her voice started to break. In a tone thick with tears, she repeated in a near-whisper, "I love him."
I stuck my tongue between my teeth and chowed down on it to stop the tears from pouring down my face. I had cried so much that day I had nearly ran out of the saltiness that glittered in my eyes and wetted my cheeks.
I was just trying to distract myself from the inevitable truth: Finn was going to be slaughtered just like he slaughtered the village of TonDC and there was nothing any of us could do.
"Ahem," Clarke's halting voice broke through the tense undercurrent of silence permeating the air. Tucking the knife into her sleeve, she sent Raven a firm nod as she said, "Don't worry. We'll figure this out ... together."
"You better," Raven snapped as she spun around on her heel and stomped from the room.
As I watched the pale green of her shirt disappear through the doorway, my heart, weighty with an unbearable grief, sank.
Things would never be as they once were.
Why?
Because we were on Earth. And, contrary to what our ancestors thought, it wasn't a dream. Not even close.
It was a nightmare.
Gif: Octavia as she sits in the medical ward.
XX