Let me know what you're thinking!

——————————

We raced through the forest as fast as we could in attempts to find Roma before the Grounders got to her. This time, none of us stopped. As we went on, running across the forest floor became easier with each step. Maybe one day, it would be second nature.

We slowed down when we spotted a figure up against a tree. Bellamy took the lead, walking ahead of the group to see if it was Roma.

When he rounded on the tree, he stepped back in shock. I ran up next to him, to find Roma pinned up against a tree with a spear. This time, they hadn't allowed the person they speared to survive. By the looks of where it landed, she died on impact.

"They're playing with us," Finn told us.

Bellamy reached a hand up, closing Roma's eyes. "She only came because of me," he whispered.

It saddened me to see him act this way. "You can't blame yourself," I told him as I rested a hand on his shoulder. "We all chose to be here, you didn't force us."

Finn continued with what he had been saying about the Grounders. "They can kill us whenever they want."

"Then they should get it over with!" Jasper screamed. "Come on!"

Dropping my hand from Bellamy, I ran over to be with him. How ignorant could I be to not realise the effect this would have on Jasper. He himself had been speared not long ago.

"Jasper, stop!" I whispered harshly. I didn't want to anger him more, but I also didn't want to see him killed.

He ignored me, turning in a circle. "We know you're out there! You want to kill us, come get us!"

"Please, Jasper, you're going to get us all killed!"

But it was too late. The other girl, besides Roma, who had joined us called Bellamy's name.

We knew what was happening before it even happened.

The Grounders had revealed themselves, closing in once more. The remainder of us tightened our stance in preparation to fight as the Grounders charged at us from every direction.

All we could do now, was hope that if they were going to kill us, it would be fast. Now, I'm not religious at all, and I'm certainly not one to pray, but we had definitely gotten lucky today.

A loud horn sounded in the distance, and the Grounders stopped running as soon as they heard it.

"What the hell," I stated, completely confused by this turn of events.

Bellamy lowered his weapon, "They're leaving."

Jasper had finally calmed down enough to speak in a normal volume. "That horn. What does it mean?"

His face was worried about the horn and the Grounders, but I was more concerned about his mental state. After seeing Roma, he must have been having flashbacks or something; I know I would be.

We were preoccupied right now, but I would definitely be talking to him once we returned to camp. I was really worried for him.

"Acid fog," Finn said, answering Jasper's question. He began to unpack a tent from his back pack as someone suggested we run.

"There's no time."

He waved the large piece of tarp to allow it to expand to its full size. Dropping to the ground, the remaining six of us crawled beneath it and pulled it over our heads. When it covered us all whole, we stayed still so that it wouldn't move and let the fog in.

My body was frozen. I had seen Atom after he had been attacked by the fog; I didn't want to end up like that.

I felt something brushing my hand and I almost screamed, afraid that it was the fog, until I peered down at my hand. Bellamy's hand was beside mine, and had touched my own when he moved.

"Sorry," he whispered, picking up on how on edge I was.

I didn't want to die. I wasn't ready to. Sure, I had expected to be floated, but now there was a chance I could live. And besides, if I was going to die, it wasn't going to be by some weird acid fog.

My breathing sped up as we waited, a light panic setting in. How was a piece of tarp supposed to protect us from air? How would that be possible?

Suddenly, my heart rate began to steady and my breathing slowed to my normal pace. I was confused as to what had stopped my panic, when I felt something touching my hand again.

Bellamy had returned his hand to where it had been previously. It was only touching me lightly, but it had brought down my anxiety levels.

Closing my eyes, I took a few deep breaths, tying myself to Bellamy's touch. My panic had been anchoring me down, dragging me below the water's surface. But then Bellamy simply touched me, and I had found my buoy in the stormy sea that was my mind.

"How long are we supposed to wait?" Jasper asked Finn quietly.

The girl spoke up also, "Is this even going to work."

"We'll find out," Finn replied simply. That wasn't very convincing.

Bellamy looked me in the eyes, before peering past me to Finn. "No, we won't." He lifted the tarp up, and for a moment I thought I felt my heart stop. And yet, it had been seconds, and we were still alive. "There's no fog."

"It could have been a false alarm," Carter theorised as we all rose to our feet, pushing off the tarp.

Movement in the trees caught our eye. "They're coming back," was all Bellamy said. And it was enough.

"We have to go," I told them all as I began to quickly refold the tarp for Finn to return to his backpack.

Apparently there was only one Grounder out there, because Jasper claimed that he thought the person may be alone.

"Now can we run?" The girl whose name I still hadn't found out asked.

Doing the last few folds, I sighed, "Just give me a second. We can't afford to lose any more supplies."

"No, it's okay, he doesn't see us," Bellamy told me. "I'm going after him."

"And what? Kill him?" Finn asked. He was trying to remain very humanitarian while we were down here, but eventually we would all have to get our hands a little dirty.

"No. Catch him. Make him tell me where Octavia is, then kill him."

Jumping to my feet and handing the tarp to Finn to put away, I shook my head, "Not alone, you're not."

We followed Bellamy quietly so that the Grounder wouldn't see us. Before long, we reached the entrance to a cave.

"Be prepared," Bellamy whispered, before stepping down into the cave. As we made our way towards the bottom, I heard a familiar voice call Bellamy's name.

"Octavia."

Bellamy rushed over to his sister. She was currently trapped, chained and locked to one of the cave walls. She was covered in dirt, her forehead smeared in blood.

"Monroe, Jensen, watch the entrance," Bellamy told the girl and my friend as he picked up a key to unlock Octavia.

Monroe; that was her name. Good to know; it made it that tad less stressful knowing one of the people I was entrusting my life to.

As soon as she was free, she leapt into Bellamy's arms. He whispered things in her ear, closing his eyes and releasing a breath of relief. I grabbed onto Jasper's hand, squeezing it tight as he smiled. Seeing that Octavia was safe had cheered him up considerably.

"How did you find me," Octavia smiled, almost in tears as she let go of Bellamy and hobbled over to hug Jasper.

His smile was so wide, I couldn't help but grin, letting go of his hand so he could embrace her.
"Followed him," Jasper replied simply, pointing to the Grounder laying on the cave floor.

Octavia stepped back from Jasper to envelope me in a quick hug.
"It's good to see you again," I laughed.

"I knew Bell would find me," she nodded.

"He never gave up. Not for a second."

She grinned as she let go and backed away, before her smile dropped. "We should go. Now. Before he wakes up."

"He's not gonna wake up," Bellamy growled as he went over to the wall and picked up one of the Grounder's spears.

"Bellamy, stop. He didn't hurt me. Let's just go."

"They started this." He prepared to stab the Grounder, but Finn was knelt down leaning over him.

"Finn. Move."

Finn whispered something beneath his breath that we couldn't hear. I was about to ask him what he'd said, when the Grounder sat up all of a sudden, stabbing Finn in the chest.

There was a lot of movement straight after that. Finn dropped to his side and Bellamy rushed forward, spear at the ready. The Grounder was already on his feet, however, and he was bigger than Bellamy.

In less than a minute, Bellamy was on the ground with the Grounder above him, spear at his throat. He was pushing downwards, trying to shove it through his throat, but Bellamy was holding it back for now.

"Stop!" Octavia shouted. "That's my brother!"

She and I sat beside Finn, who still had a knife buried in his chest. "Don't take it out," I told her. "He'll bleed out in minutes."

But she wasn't as focused on Finn at that point in time, her eyes on Bellamy and the Grounder. Just when it looked like Bellamy was about to be skewered, the Grounder dropped heavily to the ground.

Behind him was Jasper holding another spear. He had hit the Grounder upside the head hard enough with it to knock him out.

"We need to get him back to camp right now," I told them all as I looked down at Finn.

✦✦✦✦✦

"Clarke!" Jasper yelled. "Where's Clarke? Get Clarke now."

On the way back Jasper had helped Octavia walk as Bellamy carried Finn, leaving Monroe and I on lookout, weapons at the ready. We made it back without any complications thankfully, motivated by a paling Finn. He needed medical attention as soon as possible.

"I'm here. What's up?" The girl asked. She then spotted Finn in Bellamy's arms and realisation set in. "Finn. Finn?"

The first thing she did was check for a pulse, sighing in relief as she made it known that he was still alive.

"Theo and Bellamy told us not to take the knife out," Jasper told her. We hadn't really gotten the chance to explain to him why, but I was just happy he'd listened. A few boys came up and took Finn out of Bellamy's arm, his arms beginning to give out because of the boy's weight and the distance we had covered.

Clarke held up a hand, "No, that was a good call. Get him in the dropship now. Go!"

As they left with Finn, I took the chance to quickly check in with Jasper. "Are you doing okay after all that?"

"We found Octavia, so yeah, I'm all good."

"You know that's not what I'm talking about, J," I replied softly.

Jasper bit his lip, gulping a little as he played with his sleeves. "Roma. . . she. . . they. . ."

Tears played on the rims of his eyes, and I knew the best I could do was be there for him. Stepping forward, I went onto my tiptoes and wrapped my arms around his neck, hugging him tightly.

"We're going to be okay. You're going to be okay, J. I promise. I'm sorry I couldn't stop what happened last time, but I'm not going to let that happen again."

I could hear him sniffling as he pulled me closer, "You couldn't have stopped it. But thank you. I just - they killed her, Theo. They speared her and she died. Why do I get to live and she doesn't?"

Pulling away from him, I shrugged lightly. "I honestly don't know, and I'm so sorry I don't have an answer for you."

He nodded, wiping his eyes quickly before anyone saw. He was going to be okay, he just needed to rest and calm himself. "I'm going to go and check on Finn."

"Okay. I'll be there soon, I just want to check in with Octavia."

He told me he'd see me in there, before heading into the dropship. I walked back towards the gates, only to be met with the two siblings in the middle of a fight.

"If Finn dies in there, that's on you!" Octavia yelled in her brother's face, poking him in the chest. "Everything that's gone wrong is because of you."

This wasn't going to end well.

"You got me locked up on the Ark. You wanted me to go to that stupid dance. You got mum killed!"

Bellamy stood for a moment, face still as he was in shock. Until his mouth curved into a malicious half smile. Not a happy smile; more like one of those, 'are you kidding me?' smiles.

"Me?" Bellamy asked, sniffing as he glared down at her. "Mum was floated for having you. She's dead because you're alive. That was her choice. I didn't have a choice. My life ended the day you were born."

Octavia looked like she was about to either cry or punch someone as she went to walk out the gate.

But Bellamy grabbed her arm before she could, "Where do you think you're going?"

"You can't keep me locked up in here forever."

She ripped her arm from his gasp and stormed away and right past me.

"Octavia," I said as she walked away, but she ignored me. Bellamy and I stared at each other for a few seconds.

I could see the hurt in his eyes, the shame at what he had said to her. He never wanted to hurt his sister, that was always the opposite of his intentions ever since he had arrived. But right now, he had hurt her badly. I was the first to break eye contact, running after her.

"Octavia, hold up!"

She slowed down, wiping her eyes, "Theo, I really don't want to do this right now."

"Don't worry, I won't ask if you're alright. We don't even have to talk. Just please don't go off alone again," I pleaded. "You really scared everyone last time."

"I didn't mean to," she began to explain. "I tripped on my way back and. . . he saved me. The Grounder."

"So why were you chained to a wall if he was just looking after you."

She shrugged, "I think because I got away at one point and he didn't want me to leave again. I tried to speak to him, but I don't think he understood what I was saying."

"You sound like you trust him or something. He's a Grounder, Octavia."

"I know that, Theo. But he also saved my life, and I can't just ignore that."

I sighed as I ran a hand through my hair.
"Well, if you can forgive a Grounder who you never even knew, I'm sure you can forgive your brother."

"Theo-"

"I'm not saying right away," I interrupted quickly. "But eventually. You know he didn't mean any of it, Octavia. He was just. . ."

"Being Bellamy," she finished.

Being Bellamy. A perfect description.

"Come on," I sighed. "Let's get inside before this storm gets heavier."