"Ok, so how did you even actually get arrested? Aren't you supposed to be the Ark's goodie two shoes?" I snigger, and Wells rolls his eyes from besides me. It's dark out now and we have been sat chatting for a while, as a way to forget about the hunger lingering in our stomach's. It's been somewhat working.
"I, uh, I burnt down the last tree." He pulls a face as my jaw drops.
"Why on earth would you do that?"
He sighs looking down. "I couldn't let her go alone. Not after everything."
He really still does love her.
He then looks at me. "Or you."
I roll my eyes at him trying to be nice and adding me to the equation.
I nudge him. "Bet you're regretting doing that now, huh?"
"Not at all, idiot." He chuckles.
"Oh really?" I laugh back. "Surrounded by real Einsteins here and a Bellamy, who thinks he's in charge now. We will be dead by the end of the week."
"Hey, let's not think like that. Clarke will be back soon with the fo-"
I put a finger up to his mouth and tilt my head. "What did I say?"
He rolls his eyes. "No mentioning the f word."
I nod in agreement. "Exactly."
I then turn my head notice a bright light growing in the distance and decide to investigate. It's dark out now, and I suspect it's a fire. I'm surprised those idiots actually had the intellect to start a fire to keep us warm.
"Wow they, potentially did something...smart?" I question.
"Let's not assume that before we go and see." Wells adds.
I help Wells, as he limps besides me toward the full light of what appears to be a bonfire which everyone is surrounding. The scene playing out before us is almost tribal, fire and laughter temporarily pushing hunger and thirst out of everyone's minds. It draws us in too, and just as we are about to give into the primal forces we realise what's taking place at the centre.
I watch as Bellamy supervises as Murphy and some other boy, wristbands already gone, help a rough-looking girl take off hers. What the hell are they doing? It appears to look pretty painful as a rod is jammed into the cuff, then violently pried up, cracking the band that is then ripped off. They then toss it into the fire, besides multiple others. "Who's next?" Bellamy calls out with a smirk on his face, immediately making my blood boil.
"What the hell are you doing?" I call, moving in front of me. Bellamy turns to face us, the same smirk glued to his face.
"Liberating ourselves, what's it look like?"
"It looks like you're being an idiot to me, getting us all killed." I say, moving in front of Wells, closer to Bellamy. Wells was definitely right. He is a dick. I just didn't think it was humanly possible for someone to be this much of a dick. "The communication system is fried. You do realise that these wristbands are all we've got to make the Ark believe we're alive. That we're not dead so they can follow us!"
"That's the point, Matthews. We can take care of ourselves," Bellamy then turns to the crowd. "Can't we?" It unsurprisingly draws cheers and Bellamy clearly gets off on the feeling of power.
"You think this is a game?" Wells says from behind me, the crowd quietening.
"Those aren't just our parents and friends. They're our farmers, our doctors, our engineers. I don't care what he tells you, we won't survive here on our own. Besides, if it really is safe, why wouldn't you let the rest of our people get away?"
"My people are already down." Bellamy begins, before pointing to the sky. "Those people locked my people up. Those people killed my mother for the crime of having a second child. Your father did that."
"My father didn't write the laws." Wells says in defence.
"No, but he enforced them. But not anymore. Not here. Here, there are no laws. Here, we do whatever-the-hell we want." Bellamy announces.
"Whatever-the-hell we want!" Murphy calls out, pumping his fist in the air, and everyone begins to chant the phrase out. The intensity of it begins to disturb me. All I want to do is stop it. I look at Wells and notice he feels the exact same, I can see it in his eyes. Only something stops it for us.
Rain.
It's gentle at first, but hard enough to freeze everyone. All of our eyes begin to drift toward the sky. And then the sky opens and it begins to pour, igniting a rapturous frenzy on the forest floor. So this is rain. People begin to fling their arms out, open their mouths, drink the rain as it splashes against our skin. It doesn't take long for me to become soaked, my blonde hair dripping in water and the front strands sticking to my skin. I brush them out the way with my hand.
I move my eyes from the sky toward Bellamy, who was already staring right at me. For a moment we just watch each other before I take a few more steps towards him, until we are centimetres apart. He's the ring leader of all this, he's the only one I need to speak to. "Stop this whatever the hell we want bull. Most of the people here are criminals- dangerous criminals. Some even murderers. You really want no rules with people like that around?" I ask him.
"Murderers- like you, you mean?" He smirks a little when saying this, almost appearing amused.
"Yeah, exactly. Only some of them did it in cold blood." I spit, trying to act as if his comment didn't hurt. "Yes, Jaha had some pretty stupid laws but he kept us alive. What you're doing is gonna get us all killed."
"You were locked up there too. If we weren't sent down here, we all know you'd have been floated. We have a chance to get a fresh start down here, away from the Ark, away from those people who floated your mom, who locked you up- why not take it?" He asks me, looking curious, and I try my hardest not to throttle him for even mentioning my mother.
"Because I still have family up there, that's why. People I care about. And even without that I want to survive. And yeah, I hate them. I hate them for what they did but,,, we can't do that without them." I look down at his transparently fake guards uniform and then meet his eyes again.
"You snuck onto the ship didn't you? For your sister?"
He goes quiet before nodding.
"So you must have half a brain on you at least. Half a brain to know we need them, wether we like them or not."
He shakes his head. "You're a strong girl, Ariel. And you're smart. You really think they aren't just going to kill you when they come down? After all you've done?"
His words ponder in mind and I look down an inch. Kane killed his own friend for the Ark, what makes me so naive to think he wouldn't do the same to me? Wouldn't the same happen to Clarke? I mean, once everyone comes down they won't care about the secrets of the Ark anymore, but surely they would still see her as a traitor and not trust her anymore.
I look back up at his accomplished eyes and gulp.
"We should collect this water." I respond and he shrugs.
"Whatever the hell you want."
I scoff at him, shaking my head before walking away from him and crowd with Wells.
"I mean who the hell does he think he is? Whatever the hell we want? Does he even realise he's surrounded with criminals and he's saying crap like that? What an idiot." I clench my jaw, thinking about him, and more so at the fact I was almost about to buy into his idiocy.
"You do realise this puts a bigger target on our backs right?" I explain to Wells and he nods. "We should take turns to sleep. I can be on watch first."
Wells shakes his head. "No, Ariel it's fine-"
"No really, I want to go first. I can't sleep right now anyways I'm too mad at him." I admit and Wells hesitates before nodding in agreement, and we find a spot to sleep.
—
I awake the next morning to the warm air touching my skin and bright sun in my eyes and smile to myself. Damn I really am on the ground, huh? It all would feel like a dream if not for the people. The people. Crap. I was supposed to be on watch but I fell asleep. I immediately jump up and realise Wells isn't laying down besides me and instantly go into panic mode. Did Bellamy get him? Stab him in the back like the coward he is and dump his body somewhere?
But there's no blood anywhere in sight. I have to find him. Alive him.
I jump on my feet and start to scurry around looking frantically for him, hearing people running around and screaming and rolling my eyes, before I squint and spot him in the distance besides two graves he probably dug himself. Relief grows on me and I run to him, definitely startling him and pulling him into a hug, a big smile stuck to my face.
"I thought you were dead you idiot." I then pull out the hug and push him. "Don't ever wake up and not wake me up, I was supposed to be on watch."
He looks down and I furrow my eyebrows.
"What?" I question.
He simply pulls down his sleeve and shows me his bare wrist. At first I'm confused until I realise there's no wrist band there.
"What the hell?" I gasp, grabbing his wrist. "How did you-" He looks defeated and I know instantly that it was Bellamy.
"They held me down, Ariel. I couldn't stop them."
"That asshole." I drop his arm. "I'm gonna kill him."
"Ariel, wait!" He calls out after me, but it's no use because I'm already racing ahead, heading straight to the drop ship, my blood pumping. It's one thing to start acting like our leader and persuading naive teenagers to take them off, but forcing it off of Wells? He's going to regret ever doing that.
In front of the drop ship stands Atom, and as I try to move past him, he directly counters me. "Hey Ariel. Where you going?"
"Move out of my way, Atom." I spit at him as he stands in front of me.
"Whats the rush for?" He raises a brow, clearly not intimidated by me.
"I need to talk to Bellamy. Now." I tell him and he appears amused, his face telling me he was probably there last night too.
"What about?" He shrugs, playing into it, knowing its gonna rile me up.
"You know what. Now let me in or I swear to god-"
"It's ok Atom." I hear a familiar voice chime, and I look behind Atom, my lips part as I notice Bellamy standing on the top of the drop ship ramp. He doesn't look like the same Bellamy from yesterday. His hair was no longer slicked back, and instead it fell into loose curls against his forehead. But the first thing I noticed was that he was shirtless, showing off a completely toned torso with perfectly shaped abs. And it pains me to even admit it, because yesterday I wouldn't have even looked twice at him, and yet today I don't want to stop looking.
I immediately realise I'm staring, and all he'd done to Wells. He may look different but it's still the same asshole. I then watch as a girl with long dark hair walks out from behind him and takes her place besides him. Bellamy then pulls her in from her waist, kissing her before she walks off. I couldn't help but scoff at the sight in front of me, unable to hide my pure look of disgust. A smirk then plays on his lips.
"Let her in." He finally says and Atom moves out of my way and I immediately charge towards him.
"What the hell is wrong with you?" I curse, shoving him back, unable to feign my anger.
"I don't know what you're talking about." He smirks, and it seems me pushing him causes his amusement to grow making me even more furious.
"You want the Ark to think we're dead? I can make it real easy for you with that one because I swear to god I'm going to kill you." I threaten him only his smirk widens.
"Really firecracker? And how exactly are you gonna do that?" He leans forwards slightly, smirk still plastered on his face.
"What is this to you? Some sort of game? You're a freaking coward, you know that?" I lean forwards too, referencing Wells' story and he immediately catches on.
"Lighten up, Matthews, we're on the ground. It's time for the games, it's time for the fun." He then leans down towards me. "If you need any help loosening up, you're always welcome in my tent." He smirks and I immediately bring my hand up and slap him across the face, yet unsurprisingly again he smirks. Is he some sort of masochist?
He then turns to look back at me. "You've got a temper on you, haven't you Ariel?"
"Oh, you have no idea." I glare at him.
"Well whatever you're planning, you might wanna hold off on it." He almost whispers and I furrow my brows, as he looks down towards his jeans and my eyes follow down his torso to something that looks like a gun perfectly placed inside the waist of the jeans. Only it looks like a gun, because it is one. Shit.
I hesitate before looking back up at him, knowing he's already smirking. The sole reason he didn't care for any of my threats, why he made that comment, why he made me angry. All so he could blow it all down. For someone so good looking, he really is such a calculated asshole. But all I'm wondering is how the hell did he get his hands on a gun?
He then leans down to whisper into my ear "I could have killed your friend, but I didn't. Remember that." Then after a second he leans back up and I just stare at him, anger bleeding off my face as he acts as though he did me a favour by not killing Wells. I watch as his eyes then move down my body right to the arm with my wristband. I know he's not going to do the same to me as he did Wells, or he'd have done it already.
"Wells. Hey, uh, where'd you get the clothes?"I hear Atom say from behind us, before Bellamy gets to comment on my wristband and notice Wells holding a bundle of clothes, probably from the kids he buried, hands dug inside his pockets.
"Buried the two kids who died during the landing." Wells tells him, meeting my eyes before hand.
"Smart. You know I'll take it from here." Atom insists, reaching his arms out to the clothes but Wells pulls away.
"Hey, back the hell off Atom." I move towards the two. "You're fully clothed, Atom you don't need them."
"Exactly. We share based on need, just like back home." Wells adds.
"This is our home now. Your fathers rules no longer apply." Bellamy cuts in, moving towards us and taking one off the shirts from Wells. Wells immediately reacts, attempting to charge at Bellamy but Atom holds him back.
"What the hell is your problem?" I ask, actually curious of his answer.
"I don't have a problem, Ariel. I'm just doing whatever the hell I want." He smirks and I shake my head at him, before looking back at Atom.
"Let him go Atom."
Bellamy orders, and his sheep obeys. "You want it back? Take it." Bellamy threatens and I watch as Bellamy and Wells engage in a stare off, before Wells throws the rest of the clothes in his hands to the ground behind him, and everyone turns into savages, scurrying through the clothes.
"My god, you people are animals." I fold my arms watching them.
"Is that what you want? Chaos?" Wells asks, turning back towards Bellamy.
"What's wrong with a little chaos?" Bellamy replies, a smug smile on his face.
We then hear a cry out in pain from behind us. I furrow my eyebrows as I race toward the sound, along with everyone else. What the hell is happening now?