CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
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     ONCE MORE, Taylor found herself back in the office of Dante Wallace. After their attempt at escape, both of them had been led back to his office in restraints. He was facing away from the door, focused intently on a painting that he was working on.

     "Lose the handcuffs," he ordered without even taking a glance back at them. The guards uncuffed Clarke and Taylor, both of them shooting each other a quick look. Taylor wasn't sure she would ever understand anything about the motivations of anyone in the entire mountain. "There's a blank canvas if you'd like. I know you're not much of the art type, Taylor, but my offer extends to you too nonetheless."

     Clarke simply shook her head confusedly while Taylor furrowed her brows, fists clenching slightly. "I used to paint the ground too," Clarke said, causing Taylor's attention to drift to the scene that he was working on. Dark green trees stood out against the light blue sky, reminding her of exactly what they had been living in and making her feel an ache for it, despite all that had happened.

     "It's not just the ground, it's a memory," he clarified, his focus still not wavering for even a moment.

     "You've been outside?" Clarke asked, shocked.

     "How?" Taylor added, seeing as they had just been arrested for the endangerment of the entire population inside of Mount Weather for fear of radiation wiping every single one of them out.

     "It was once. Fifty-six years ago. For five minutes," Dante replied, looking down at his palette and wetting his brush once more. "I was seven when the first of what we call the Outsiders appeared. Before that, we thought we were all there was. Imagine our surprise."

     "We don't have to," Taylor interjected, looking at Clarke while the memories of that second day on the ground ran through her mind.

"My father — this was his office at the time — believed it meant that the Earth was survivable again. And so he opened the doors. Within a week, fifty-four people were dead from the exposure. My mother and sister among them," he explained, his tone drastically different from the one that she was accustomed to hearing from the man. He finally turned around and put down the palette and brushes in his hands to face the two. "Loss, pain, regret. Time eases these things. But the only time it's ever truly gone is when I'm painting."

"You didn't bring us here to talk about painting," Clarke responded, standing statue still and looking like she was slightly uncomfortable.

"I wouldn't be here if that was the case," Taylor mentioned, eyeing the older man suspiciously.

"I'm afraid I have bad news. Our patrols have swept the area and found no evidence of survivors. Either at your camp, or from the Ark," he informed. Taylor's expression fell while Clarke's remained one of denial.

"How can they be sure?" she inquired, looking slightly panicked at the thought of none of their people having survived. That thought made Taylor uneasy as well, it seemed so impossible that they were the only ones left of anyone who had ever lived on the Ark.

"They can't," Dante conceded. "I've ordered them to keep searching —"

"I need to see for myself," Clarke interrupted impatiently.

"I'm sorry, I can't allow that," he responded stoically. "I'm doing this for your own good, Clarke. It's not safe out there."

"Radiation has no effect on us," she countered indignantly, Taylor feeling utterly infuriated at the man in front of them.

"And I don't know who gave you the right to go and decide what's best for us. We can decide for ourselves," Taylor snapped, making no effort to hide her seething expression from him.

"It's not the radiation I'm concerned about." He signaled at the guards that were waiting patiently outside of the doors. "You both need time to grieve. These men will show you to your room."

"And if we try to leave?" Clarke challenged, clearly attempting not to lash out at Dante as much as she could.

"Please don't test me, Clarke," he warned. It sounded like a threat to Taylor completely, but she followed Clarke out of the door without making any accusations like she so desperately wished to. To her, the room they were being escorted to what just felt like another prison.

__________

Taylor entered the dorm, having eaten the first meal that she allowed herself since their arrival just hours before. A public dinner was something she was still having trouble being used to and felt none of the unity that she supposed she should have felt during it.

All of the remaining members of their group were laughing and joking around, happy and safe. She wished that she could have that feeling, but nothing could really shake the unsettled one she hadn't been able to kick.

It did relax her somewhat to be among them again, but as she sat down on her bed, something still felt missing. One thing she would credit Dante with is that she may have needed time to grieve. Escaping was taking top priority, but she hated feeling how she was feeling.

Not many of the others had arrived in the dorm just yet and she was quite early considering that she had practically inhaled her food and left as soon as she could. One thing she couldn't do was act as well as Clarke.

More and more people trickled in after dinner, seeming relaxed, which she didn't understand considering how on edge she had been and how much the place freaked her out. "Hey," Clarke's voice suddenly alerted from behind her. She turned around to find her standing in front of an open box.

Taylor stood up from her seat on her bed and walked over to where she was, eyebrows furrowing at the sight. An array of paints and pencils filled the box, her eyes gazing to Clarke quizzically when she handed her the note that informed them it was from Dante to Clarke.

"I still don't trust them," Taylor let out quietly, handing the note back to Clarke and crossing her arms lightly.

"Neither do I," Clarke agreed, grabbing a pencil from the box and handing it to Taylor. "Take notes with the binder. We need to find out everything we can about this place if we're going to get out."

Nodding with a small smile, Taylor returned to her bed on the bunk she shared with Clarke that was just next to where they were standing. Taylor situated herself on the bottom one and opened her binder, ready to mark down anything that might be useful.

__________

That night, she jolted awake in a cold sweat, the pages of the binder that she had fallen asleep marking up sticking to her face unpleasantly. Trying to suppress her gasp upon her ascent back into reality was something she failed at, hoping that she hadn't woken anyone else.

Sitting up stiffly, she didn't want to think about what she had seen in her dreams. But she knew that avoiding them would just end up worse for her in the end. Tonight it was Bellamy again, and she guessed tomorrow would be Finn or Octavia or Raven or even Chandler, who she had discovered hadn't made it to the mountain either.

She wondered how long her nights would be a rotating cycle of the ghosts of the people she couldn't save.

The sobs that escaped her lips next were involuntary, her body and mind tired of the oppression she had given her thoughts. Grabbing at her pillow quickly, she pressed her mouth against it in order to not make too much noise. From the bed next to hers, the bunk that Jasper and Monty shared, there was a stirring from Jasper's mattress on the bottom.

Wiping at her eyes furiously, she dropped the pillow to be faced with his open eyes, looking at her concernedly. He sat up under the covers and didn't say anything for a moment before asking, "Are you okay, Taylor?"

"I'm — it's fine," she responded in a shaky tone that she knew wouldn't convince anyone that she was okay. Jasper scooted himself to the edge of his bed and stepped onto the floor, switching his position onto her bed.

That was the point that she didn't try to stop crying anymore. She let the tears flow down her cheeks and bit her lip to keep the sobs contained. "Is this about Bellamy?" he asked, looking at the disheveled girl understandingly. "The others too, of course. But we all know you were closest with him."

Taylor nodded slowly in response, closing her eyes tightly and hating the fact that his face still popped into her mind when she thought about what had happened. In the dark of the dorm, it somehow felt safer for her to feel these things, talk about what was really and truly real to her rather than the artificial place Mount Weather appeared to be. Now, everyone she distrusted was asleep and unable to hear who she was before everything.

"I just — it hurts — and I — I don't know how to get rid of this feeling that keeps suffocating me," she whispered in a heartbroken tone, her already broken heart feeling like it had been smashed into a million more pieces. "I just can't believe it. I really — I can't — I don't want to."

Jasper pulled her into a hug as she struggled to articulate her last words, past the point of even thinking clearly about what she was saying. On some level, it felt nice to talk about it, but somehow it felt worse in a way. She didn't know anymore.

All she did know was that as they sat there in the dark, Jasper hugging her and letting her sob into his shoulder, was that she was still utterly broken up.