Bellarke One Shots Book 1

40) Souls meet Body

She is born into this world in a burst of bright light and sterile air. For a moment, she panics, trying to claw her way back into the body she had been in before- the world had been cold and she had been lonely, but she had been okay with her solitude. Now, though, it has all been ripped away from her.

"We have a pulse," a voice says above her, in a language unlike any she's spoken before. The vowels are soft and flat, the consonants hard, and she understands the words because this body understands the words. Her skin feels hot and sticky and she's sitting bolt upright without meaning to, all the colors around her vibrant and popping.

"Where am I?" she asks in a voice that is not her own. "What kind of world is this?"

The other female in the room smiles at her. "Welcome to Earth."

They ask her what her name is. "I do not remember," she tells them, because she doesn't. She hardly remembers anything, and it scares her, how it's all slipping away. When she prods in this body's mind, she discovers that its name was once Clarke. It sounds like an ugly name, short and sharp, but she claims it because she does not have another one to take.

The female Soul- Diana- keeps her in a room for hours at a time, pacing back and forth while firing questions. Clarke doesn't see how it will help. She doesn't know anything. If she did, she would have told them by now.

"There must be something," Diana hisses, leaning her hands on the table between them. "The human was spotted around others."

"Perhaps she's dead," Clarke says. She can't hear a single thing from the body. It's hollow and distant, like an abandoned home. This body's soul is long gone. "I can't feel her anywhere."

"You're not trying hard enough!" Diana snaps, slapping her palm against the tabletop. Clarke jumps. "Other Souls who have been uncooperative have been exiled."

"What right do you have to banish them from Earth?" Clarke asks, genuinely shocked. "That is not the way of our kind."

"Neither is withholding information."

"I have done all I can for you," Clarke says after a long pause, standing up and brushing her hair back. She hasn't had hair in years- fur and scales and gills, but not hair. "If I find something, you'll be the first to know."

"We're not done here," Diana snaps, but Clarke twists the doorknob anyway.

"Yes, we are."

Her favorite thing about Earth is the bodies. They're beautiful. They come in so many different shades and shapes and sizes, each so fragile but yet so strong in different ways. Her own body is mildly aesthetically pleasing. It's small and soft, but the eyes are bright blue, as they are for all Souls, and there are lines around the mouth that suggest either too much smiling or too much frowning. She's not sure which.

Her favorite body to look at is the one in her dreams.

She's not sure who it is, because her body's soul is gone, and the dreams are just wisps of smoke left behind. But it's a boy, and his hair is a little long and his eyes are wide and naive. He wears a hat pulled down over his ears in the dreams- memories? She's not sure- and there's a scar on his abdomen, ugly and puckered, like he was once run through with something.

She wakes up sweaty and anxious, grasping the empty air for a boy who isn't there.

Earth is beautiful- not only because of the humans, but because of the plants. Nature, she thinks Diana called it.

Her favorite plant is called a sunflower. She draws it sometimes, because apparently this body has a talent for art, and she has no intention of letting that go to waste. The part of Earth she's in is warm and she sits outside in crisp dresses she finds in her closet, the fabric smoothed out against the grass.