A/N: The story begins between Blood Must Have Blood Part 2 and Wanheda Part 1.
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Everything happened so fast when we heard we were sent to the ground all those months ago. I was so grateful to finally get out of that shithole and once on the ground it felt like a dream when I was reunited with my brother, Finn Collins, and my two best friends, Monty Green and Jasper Jordan.
Sadly, of course not everything turned out so pretty as it looked because what we didn't know was that we weren't the only living beings on earth.
We took note of that rather quickly when Octavia was saved from what looked like a water snake by my brother and Jasper was speared by an unknown figure when he tried to jump to the other side of that same damned lake.
It wasn't easy for any of us knowing we, some still teenagers back then, were surrounded by threats and it didn't take long before my forming wrath was fuelled even more by Jasper's deadly injuries and Monty's disappearance....
However, that all wasn't the worst part living on Earth for me.
It was the moment when Clarke tried to arrange an arrangement with the second Heda, Lexa, so we could finally live in peace together.
According to her, the only option to restore our so-called peace was to sacrifice my brother because he was the one to shoot Tondc after all. After that incident I lost the only family member left and decided to make a promise to never bond with anyone again to save me the broken heart and broken emotions.
I had always been an outsider.
A chill breeze tickled Meave's face and made her loose sandy bronde with ash blonde lowlights colored hair wave through the air while she was sitting by a calming lake in Arkadia, drowning into her own thoughts.
It was currently day 43 since Clarke had retreated herself into the wilderness. Most of Skaikru began to pick up their lives again while the remaining group were only wishing for it to be over soon and most of the amenities were wearing off as well which was a big concern.
Outside of the worries about the amenities, Meave was also genuinely concerned about the welfare of Murphy. She had no idea where he had left off to and he hadn't said anything about leaving so she grew more and more worried as the days passed by without seeing him.
Another thing that really bothered her was the situation Jasper found himself in.
During the Mount Weather fight his love was taken from him and even though she didn't know Maya well, Jasper appeared to be heartbroken by her death.
He had lost his way of living and no matter how hard Meave worked to bring the old him back, nothing worked and he only pushed the kind girl away more and more. He was completely isolating himself from everyone else and it grew even so bad he started to get violent towards them so Meave began to give up, giving him some space instead of help. Monty on the other hand couldn't care less about his violent behavior and, no matter what, kept on trying to help him cope with his girl's death even though he didn't want Monty's help either.
It broke her to see Jasper this way, but she had already needed to protect herself against him once and she simply couldn't help him. He was too far gone to cure him with just talking. He needed professional attention, but the medbay was already full and nobody seemed to understand how bad his situation really was.
Monty had told Meave he would keep her informed about his situation and that it was best if she moved on and find something else to do in the meantime so she did.
While Monty helped his best friend, Meave on the other hand began to train with Bellamy and Lincoln with the idea of letting Monty do his thing.
Bellamy, Lincoln, Murphy, Monty and Kane were actually the only ones who really cared about her since day 1 and the girl figured it would be better to stick with people who wanted her around, rather than stick with people who don't even like her or don't want to have anything to do with her.
With a sigh she got up from where she was sitting and decided to make her way to the training rooms, following personal training with Lincoln and Bellamy before the class really started.
After a little sparring with Bellamy, she returned to the lockers on the opposite side of the fighting area and stretched her neck before opening the locker that belonged to her.
From behind her she could hear the grunting and panting that came from both Lincoln and Bellamy as they were heavily training in the background and her hand dug into her locker.
Moving around a little, it took a moment before she finally found her clean towel underneath all her other stuff and Meave wet it a bit to pat her sweaty face.
In the corner of her eye the girl could see Bellamy not being able to dodge a side punch in time and by hooking a foot behind both of Bellamy's legs, Lincoln could easily knock him down which made Bellamy stumble backwards and roughly fall back onto his back.
Bellamy was always bragging about how strong he was towards the group and even towards Lincoln and it seemed he got what he deserved now.
Meave smiled at Bellamy while he made his way to her, stopping right next to her locker to open his own.
"He defeated your ass." The girl laughed and slapped him on his chest with the wet towel that was still in her hands, not seeing his action of snatching it out of them coming. "Hey, what do you think you're doing!"
"Borrowing your towel, is that a problem?" He stared at her with a cocky face expression and she playfully shook her head at his comment.
"I don't want my towel to be full of your sweat." Meave shrugged as she pointed her finger at his bare chest. "Oh and get dressed, you asshole."
"Pair up and fight. Now!"
Lincoln was quick to explain what the group had to do and in no time the crowd went their separate ways to choose a partner based on their weaknesses.
Meave was too distracted at the time by everything that was happening in her surroundings, but even she noticed the glimp of concern in Bellamy's eyes and the way he acted and it worried her deeply.
She had noticed everything seemed to worry her, but that was just the way of living down on Earth.
"Bellamy.... are you okay?"
His eyes switched to her after she tapped his shoulder.
"Yeah, I'm fine. Just heard something about the Ice Nation so I wanted to ask Lincoln about it." The curious girl tilted her head at him, her body filling up with confusion while he was pretending like it was a normal everyday subject as he pulled a simple grey shirt over his head. "You'll see what I'm talking 'bout." Bellamy quickly added before signing to Lincoln to come over to them which caused Lincoln to get worried too.
He probably had seen the concern in Bellamy's eyes as well.
Lincoln walked towards them with a fast pace while grabbing his bottle of water to clench his thirst.
"Lincoln, what do you know about Azgeda?"
"Azgeda? When did you hear about that?" Lincoln had furrowed his eyebrows as Bellamy messed up his hair a bit.
"A few days ago." He answered seriously, but seemed not that aware about who they were or why Lincoln reacted so mysteriously.
"Azgeda is a grounder clan ruled as a kingdom.... they are merciless grounders. Azgeda has a reputation for being ruthless and aggressive and has hostile relations with some of the other clans, mostly Trikru. Their location on Earth stretches for a thousand miles and Azgeda borders the Trikru area at Sector 8. It isn't good to cross paths with those people." Lincoln stopped for a moment to look Meave in the eyes with his stern and anxious facial expression for no reason. "Now, don't get curious, understand?"
"And why is that Lincoln?" She stubbornly questioned him, knowing what he meant, but not actually wanting to believe what he was referring to.
"Rumours told me the Dark Angel is a very curious person, who broke pretty much all the laws that someone can think of back at the Ark." There it was, the warning and secret judgment she was fearing. "Just tell her to not let that curiosity walk around freely again." He raised his brow at her which made her roll her eyes.
Meave knew people were still careful and afraid around her, even though she broke those damn laws to save and help people, but she wasn't like her anymore.
"Fine...." The defeated girl sighed and crossed her arms. "It's none of my business anyway. Oh and by the way, Bellamy? I heard you're going to fill in more gaps on the map.... could you take me with you next time?"
"I will keep it in my mind." She nodded at Bellamy and thanked him for considering it before patting Lincoln on his back. Having said goodbye to both of them, Meave walked out of the room and into the hallway.
Bellamy knew how down she felt around most of the people here and to be fair, she was more useful helping than sitting around doing nothing while letting the rest do it so she hoped he would really keep in her mind.
Meave wandered a few long and boring hallways and opened her room with the silver key that was hanging around her slender neck.
Her room was the furthest away from the workout room or any of the important rooms in general and that was a curse if she was defeated in a tough fight or was just tired because it took ages to get there. Fortunately, she was feeling fit today so it wasn't much of a big deal.
Instead of slamming the heavy door shut behind her back, she gently closed it and jumped onto her bed to lay down.
Her bed wasn't the biggest, but it wasn't the smallest either and she was alone anyway so it didn't matter much anyway. She didn't need all that space if it wasn't going to be filled up by someone any time soon.
Meave's thoughts swirled around her and she became bored quickly. She had already cleaned up everything in her room and had already spent her whole morning training so she actually had no idea what to do for the rest of the day.
After a few minutes of silence she decided to read a little and perhaps pay a visit to Monty and Jasper afterwards.
She picked up the book from her bedside table and right when she wanted to read the first sentence she immediately noticed she couldn't focus on the words at all. Her dark hazel eyes with gray flecks in them made the letters dance around the pages and her mind drifted off to her memories as soon as she had laid the book back down.
Meave had to be honest and say that at first she clearly hated the grounders after they had slaughtered her friends and indirectly her brother too, but after a while she finally understood their side of the story and now it seemed the girl was more invested in their culture than her own. Probably because Meave tried to find another path because she figured she didn't belong anywhere in this world.... in space or on earth.... she just never fitted in and definitely not with her own people, Skaikru.
Skaikru actually made that very clear to her after her actions on the Ark were exposed to the public eye and were labelled as aggressive violation of the law instead of what it actually was.
The lies that were being spread about the woman caused hatred and anger. However, somehow one of the highest ranking people in the council was determined to stop the chaos and has been taking her under his wing ever since Clarke left.... even before her disappearance as well.
Meave still didn't have a clue why Kane took her under his protection, but even if she didn't really need it and she had been the one who made their lives on the ark so difficult, she of course appreciated it nonetheless.
Meave never had a great family, except for her brother, and when he passed away she really had nothing left to lose.
Luckily that feeling was reduced by Kane and the group she was now befriended with trying to help her and she is still so grateful for that.
"Nova? Would you mind playing some music?"
"Yes ma'am~ what song would you like to hear?"
"I have no idea, just turn on my playlist." Her online system was processing her command and Meave sighed in the meantime. She could feel her eyelids becoming heavy while she grew more annoyed and bored by the second. "How was your day, Nova?"
"I am still a programmed online intelligent system. You must stop asking me that question day after day because I still won't be able to answer it no matter how many hours, minutes, or seconds fly by. I don't live and that means I can't enjoy my day or even live one.... do you want to know what kind of weather it'll be tomorrow?" The bored woman cursed under her breath and slammed her clenched fist on top of the small table next to her bed which made an old glass of hers filled with water fall to the floor.
"No. I don't like to know about the weather." She rolled to her stomach, trying to lay down comfortably, while answering Nova.
"Ha ha ha ha...."
"Nova?"
"Battery low."
"You got to be bloody fucking kidding me.... fucking electronics."
Too lazy to clean the mess up that she had caused, she quickly put Nova in the charger and let an old coin of hers roll through her slender fingers after she laid down again. It was one of her little habits that showed up when she got nervous or had to think hard.
She didn't know why, but the word Azgeda made a wave of nervous feelings rush through her body and she didn't like where her thoughts were going. Wanheda.... Commander of Death.... obtain great powers when taking her head. Azgeda.... merciless grounders.
Clarke had to be found and protected again or else she would be dead within a few days, if she wasn't dead already. Everybody knew about the blond woman's bounty by now and if Azgeda is really what they are said to be, merciless, they would want her head on a plate as soon as possible so they could obtain her deadly 'power'.
Meave quickly got off her bed and rushed to her wardrobe to get changed and make a plan to retrieve some supplies for her dangerous trip without anyone realising she took them.
She got dressed into her most used black and white jacket. The fur in the collar was still fluffy even after everything that happened on Earth and the leather combined with the fur made it her warmest jacket so it was the smartest idea to take it with her. Her hair was braided and she tied a matching black and white bandana around her neck before quickly grabbing a huge backpack that was hidden somewhere under a pile of clothing.
Meave casually walked out of her room, hoping nobody would find out what she was actually trying to do and silently sneaked into the kitchen. She knew if the wrong person would find out what she was planning to do, they would lock her up, acting like she was mentally unstable until she would finally give in to their rules and laws.
That wasn't going to happen though.
Stealing as much dried food as was needed for her to survive, she also stored water as well. It was hard to find or produce clean water and definitely if she was going into a cold area where it could all be frozen.
After collecting important necessities for the trip, Meave sneaked back into her room and as she did so, she filled a smaller backpack from when they arrived on Earth with everything that she had found and that was essential for the trip. Besides the food and water, she had also packed important products, dry, clean clothing because of the frozen landscapes and to finish it all, she tied a rolled-up tent to the backpack and her sword to her hip.
After a minute of trying to make a decision, Meave eventually decided to climb through the window because the chance to encounter someone was less that way, even though if she got caught it would look horribly suspicious.
The woman examined the best route to go outside of their camp when she was outward, but was soon reminded of the fact that the walls were improved and the gate was closed and highly guarded as well.
Shit.
Her plan slowly began to fail and she desperately grabbed an iron rod to try and tear the steel plate off the wall, even bending it was enough as long as she could fit through it.
Thanks to the good luck she suddenly received, she could lift one up to get under it and she recklessly ran into the forest as fast as possible.
Running as fast as she could, Meave still managed to hear the people from Arkadia shouting and arguing whether she was a grounder trying to get in or that she was one of them escaping camp. She had to thank the people who believed she was with Skiakru later because if it wasn't for those people she would have been shot by now.
She walked further and further into the direction of the North and kept walking without looking back to our camp.
Exploring caves inside and out and climbing trees to get a better look at her surroundings, there were no signs of life anywhere she went, but she couldn't give it. Every few meters that passed, Meave carved weird symbols into the trees that were located out of sight of others so that if she would find Clarke, she would find the way 'home' faster as well. A couple of hours in, it was already getting darker and colder.
The further she walked into her direction, the colder it got which meant she was getting closer to the North side of their Earth.
"Well, Clarke... where are you hiding?"