THIRTY FIVE.   there's no me without you

Tatum couldn't look Finn in the eyes.

Octavia had argued that they didn't need him to go get their friends from Mount Weather. They had Tatum, their second best tracker. She could get them there. But Abby argued against it. That was her condition on letting them leave at all. Tatum felt like she couldn't breathe. To see the blank look in his eyes contrasting with the shamelessness in his actions scared her. He was a completely different person.

Abby tried getting her not to go with them. Bellamy tried. Raven tried. It was Clarke that was able to convince her. "I know you're afraid to go back out there, but I also know you would do anything to get Jasper and Monty back." It was strange to think about how they hated one another at first. But Clarke could read her like a book. She loved her friends more than anything, including herself.

She traveled between Bellamy and Clarke. Finn led them through the woods. "I can't believe they let Finn come." Octavia grumbled.

"He's the best tracker we've got." Her brother stated.

She scoffed. "No, Tate is."

Bellamy wasn't going to argue that. "Don't forget to look up. The Grounders use the trees. That's how we lost John Mbege." He announced to everyone.

"Yeah, I know. I got his blood all over me." Tatum brought up and shuddered at the memory.

Raven walked alongside her, her hands around the straps of her pack. "How are you doing?" She asked her friend.

"About as good as any girl who survived getting tortured in a grounder camp." She responded sarcastically, her eyes scanning the ground below her for any footprints or blood. When she didn't get a response, Tatum looked up and Raven was looking at her with her brows raised. "Sorry, bad joke."

She cracked a smile. "There's the Tatum I know." She looped her arm through hers. "C'mon."

They continued walking until they entered a clearing. Tatum looked around the open forest, looking for sign of grounders or danger in the trees. Raven peered through her binoculars. "There. I see it!" She announced.

She quickly went and stood by Abby's side. Clarke grabbed the binoculars and looked through them, indeed seeing the tower on top of the mountain. "It'll be dark soon. We'll never spot the traps. We should set up camp here."

"In the clearing where we're an open target for a grounder attack?" Tatum questioned with her eyebrows raised.

"We'll leave at first light. Have someone on watch." Clarke insisted. There was still doubt on her face. "They won't come, Tate. I promise." She assured her.

"We're missing two!" Abby suddenly yelled.

Now in hindsight, it probably wasn't the smartest idea to not tell Tatum about Bellamy and Octavia leaving. But Clarke looked at it in two ways. Tatum would've tried going after them or tried stopping them from going all together. She'd refuse for them to separate and getting into Mount Weather was the most important thing.

On the other hand, Tatum was the best tracker. Finn was clearly out of his mind. They didn't know what would set him off or what he would do, and Clarke didn't want to risk it. So she told everyone not to tell her or her mother.

Tatum looked around for the Blake siblings but saw them nowhere around. "Bell? Via?" She called out their names. There wasn't sight of black hair anywhere. Her heart spiked and she looked at the others. She saw the anger on Abby's face. "W-What?"

"Where are they?" She said to her daughter.

"What?" Tatum repeated and she looked at Clarke.

The blonde shifted her jaw. "They went to find a way in." She simplified.

Tatum looked at her like she was crazy. "You sent them out there?" She said and walked closer to her. "And you didn't tell me?"

"You would have tried to go with them and we need you here."

"That's not for you to decide!"

"Okay!" Said Abby and she put her hands between them.

"We just found each other again and you want to split up?" Tatum yelled in disbelief, titling her head.

"This was not the plan." The mother of the group said to her daughter.

"It is now." Clarke replied blankly, her decision settled.

Tatum continued to stare at her with betrayal.

Abby turned to Brixon and Scott. "Find them. Bring them back." She ordered.

The pair of them nodded. "I'm going with them." Both Ttaun and Finn said at the same time. Her muscles tightened.

Immediately, they all objected. "No!" Abby said to Tatum. "Finn, wait." Clarke stopped Finn.

"We need you here." Said Raven.

"Why? So you can keep an eye on me?" Finn looked between Clarke and Tatum, only one of them actually meeting his eye. "You'd have to be able to look at me to do that." He threw at them.

"Keep him here all you want. I'm going." Tatum declared and began walking off.

Abby quickly grabbed ahold of her arm. "No, you're not going anywhere." She firmly said.

"Tate—"'

"I'm not a little girl anymore." She seethed at the woman who had known her since she was a kid.

"No, but you're a girl who's just been through something traumatic and shouldn't be running off." Abby argued with her, still holding her arm.

"Yeah, me and all the other kids the Ark sent down here to die." Tatum snapped and took back her arm. She stormed off and Abby sighed deeply through her nose.

"Well that plan backfired." Said Clarke with a huff and she went to find Finn.

Tatum stormed through the woods with her sword in hand. With each step she took, she grew angrier. Angry at Clarke and Raven for lying to her and angry at Bellamy and Octavia for not telling her. She tried so hard to find them all when they got separate and for them to be okay with splitting up again hurt her. She was tired of living in fear of losing the people she loved.

"In case you've forgotten, we're not under your command." She heard Bellamy's scruffy voice. He stood in front of Scott holding his rifle.

"Don't make us do this the hard way." Scott threatened.

"You won't have to. I might beat you to it." Tatum announced herself.

They all turned and looked at her. Bellamy sighed and closed his eyes for a brief second. "Tatum, go back." He told her.

"I love how you think I suddenly take orders from you now." She snapped and stood by Scott. She looked between him and Octavia. "You two think you're so sneaky."

"I'm sorry, Tatum. We didn't have a choice." Octavia said, more apologetic than her older brother.

"Come on, Scott. Forty-six of our people are prisoners in this mountain." Bellamy directed to the guard.

"That's why we're here."

Tatum nearly scoffed. "Wrong. You're out here to find the other stations on the Ark. We're out here to find our friends."

"And you had to be so secretive about it?"

Bellamy looked her way. "Cause I knew exactly how you'd react." He stated the obvious.

Tatum took a step closer to him and glared. "All of us have fought like hell to find each other and you two think I'd just let you leave?" She looked at Octavia. "I want to find our friends just as bad as you do but we are not splitting up again."

"Tatum, listen to me." Bellamy stepped in again and she looked his way. "Just go back. O and I can handle this. We'll find a way into Mount Weather and we'll reconnect soon."

"Yeah, and what are the chances that you don't come back?" She snapped through her teeth.

"Don't think like that."

"Bell, Tatum." Octavia interrupted their arguing.

"I'm not going anywhere without you." Tatum insisted in a deep voice.

"Guys!"

"What?" The couple exclaimed in unison. They saw Octavia looking down and Tatum lowered her head to see thousands and thousands of beetles running by their feet. She jumped back. "What the hell?"

They were all running in the same direction. "What are they doing?" Scott questioned.

"Running," Bellamy bluntly responded.

"Running from what?" Tatum asked, her voice wavering.

That's when the yellow fog appeared. "Acid fog. We need cover, now! Deploy your tents. Let's go!" He shouted.

Her instincts kicked in and Tatum immediately took off her pack. She rummaged through it and saw Octavia still standing there, eyeing the beetles. "Octavia, hurry!" She yelled. When she started following the bugs, her eyes widened. "What are you doing?"

"They're running this way!"

Bellamy turned around. "Tatum! O! Get back here!" He shouted at them.

Octavia crouched down and Tatum stood behind her. "What are you looking at?" She questioned as she began digging through the moss.

"There's something in here." Octavia huffed out.

Bellamy ran up behind them. "What are you doing?" He quickly asked.

His sister quickly stood. "Guys, maybe it's the ruins." She realized.

"Hey, hey, over here!" He yelled to the guards.

"Yeah, yeah, you're right." Tatum nodded quickly when she continued to knock off the moss. A door handle was revealed. "HURRY!" She yelled to Scott and Brixon.

The fog was getting closer and closer and Tatum's heart rate increased. "Hurry up!" The girls shouted to the guys trying to open the door.

Finally, Bellamy yanked open the door and they immediately scurried inside. "Hurry! Quick, get inside!" He cried out to the remaining guards.

Tatum held on tightly to Octavia as they watched them run into the ruin. When she didn't see Brixon, she realized he got caught in the fog and she had to look away when Scott tried running out. But the fog was too close. Bellamy yanked him back inside and quickly shut the door, leaving them in darkness.

"Flash lights. Flash lights." Bellamy ordered. The group of them took out the flash lights from their packs. "Let's go."

Tatum her sword in one hand and the flash light in the other. She saw rows of old cars of many different models. "Is this a garage?" She voiced out loud.

"More like a tomb." Octavia stated.

She looked at Bellamy. "We gotta go." She firmly said.

He nodded and looked at Scott. "Listen, I'm sorry about your man, but we need to find an access door to Mount Weather." He explained.

"Hey, not so fast." The guard stopped them.

Bellamy silently sighed. "Sir, that fog will keep us pinned down—" he cut himself off when Scott took out a gun.

"We'll split up. Meet back here in 15."

"Great, more splitting up." Tatum muttered and wiped her finger across the dusty car, cringing in the process.

Bellamy took the gun from him. He looked at his sister and his girlfriend and they nodded. "Let's go."

"We can never catch a break."

"You're just now figuring that out?" Octavia asked her.

Tatum clicked her tongue. "No, I found that out after almost dying for the ninth time."

The Blake siblings only looked at her.

"Sorry, wrong time for jokes."

They continued walking through the garage until they came across a door. Bingo, she said in her head. But then she heard yelling echo in the dark. "Oh, what now?" She grumbled and they quickly went to investigate.

Carol of the Bells was playing faintly and Tatum grew confused. The closer they got, the louder it became. She crouched alongside the siblings between the cars. "Scott?" Bellamy uttered with his flash light raised. "Are you there?"

The song sent haunting chills down Tatum's spine. When there was no response from any of the guards, the three moved across the floor, still crouched, and they found the guns abandoned on the ground. "Bell, what's that?" Octavia whispered when she heard rustling.

Bellamy quickly grabbed one of the guns and held it up. Tatum held her sword in front of her, ready to attack anything. When he turned the flash light, her eyes widened when she saw reapers in the corner.

Immediately, Bellamy shot at them. Her hand instinct went to Octavia's arm. She saw Scott's dead body on the ground covered in blood and she suddenly felt like throwing up.

"O," he whispered.

"What?"

"Take this." He told her and handed her the gun. He looked at Tatum and pointed across from them. "Go look over there."

Silently, she nodded and stood up slightly but still kept herself crouched. Bellamy continued to hold the flash light, giving her just enough light to see where she was going.

There was a grunting sound and Tatum turned her head. From the light, she saw another reaper tearing into the flesh of one of the guards. She raised her sword and was prepared to slice its head off.

"NO!" Octavia intervened.

Bellamy shined his light on the reaper and the creature looked at them, glaring and bloody. It was Lincoln. Her jaw dropped when she realized.

"It's Lincoln."

But it wasn't. The reaper's clothes were forty and torn and his face was streaked white. His eyes were black and viscous like the blood covering his mouth. No, that wasn't Lincoln. "Octavia—"

"Tatum, back up." Bellamy ordered.

"Lincoln?" Octavia repeated his name. "Lincoln, it's me."

The reaper stood but he didn't say her name in the loving way Lincoln always did. He didn't look happy or surprised to see her. He looked like he wanted to kill them.

"It's Octavia."

"That's not Lincoln." Tatum declared and raised her sword again.

"O. . ."

"Don't kill him."

The reaper charged at them and before Bellamy could shoot, he grabbed Octavia and threw her to the side. "OCTAVIA!" Her brother shouted.

Yelling, Tatum swung the sword and sliced the reapers arm, tearing through his clothes. The reaper turned to her and ran toward her. She swung the sword again but the reaper reached out and grabbed her, making Tatum drop it.

"No!" Bellamy's yell echoed and Octavia pulled the trigger on the gun.

The impact caused the reaper to let go off Tatum and she fell to the ground, letting out a series of trembling breaths.

Bellamy hit him on the back of the head with the gun, knocking the reaper out cold. He ran to Tatum and dropped to his knees. "Are you okay?" He asked with worry and examined her.

"I'm fine. I'm alive. Surprisingly." Her sarcasm took over, showing her nerves.

"Come on." He muttered and helped her up. He held her hand and they hurried over to Octavia. He took his sister by the arm. "We need to get somewhere safe."

"Those don't exist anymore I'm afraid." Tatum slipped out with a scared breath. She picked up her sword and they ran off.

sarcastic Tatum, we've missed you <3