The Ground : Part One

seventeen : torture is not the answer

Bellamy's POV

"I'm going to ask you one more time. Where is Briar?" I wait for the grounder chained up in front of me to answer. He just glares at me with a hateful look on his face. I raise the home-made whip. Clarke and Octavia have both told me I shouldn't be doing this, but if i'm getting anything out of him, this is how it will work. I crack the whip, and it snaps onto his chest, leaving a gnarly laceration. Clarke storms in and over to the grounder.

"What's on this?" She asks with the knife that was in Finn.

"What are you talking about?" I ask her.

"He poisoned the blade! All this time he knew Finn was going to die no matter what we did! What is it?! Is there an antidote?" She yells and gets in the grounder's face.

"Clarke, he doesn't understand you." Octavia says while walking up beside her.

"You'd have to be stupid to have a poison around this long without an antidote. Which one?" She asks while holding up a leather pouch of little bottles.

"Answer the question!" I yell to the grounder.

"Show us, please." Octavia says sweetly. Too sweetly for my liking. Why can't she understand that this grounder is not good?

"Which one? Our friend is dying down there and you can stop that!" She is clearly worried about Finn.

"I'll get him to talk." I raise the whip.

"Bellamy, no!" Octavia yells and grabs my arm.

"He wants Finn to die, why can't you see that?" I ask her and then look at Clarke.

"Do you want him to live of not?"

She thinks about it for a second.

"Clarke you even said it yourself, this is not who we are! He was protecting me, he saved my life!" Octavia pleads her, then looks at me. "Briar wouldn't want this to be happening and you know that." Her name pinches at my heart.

"For all we know, Briar could be dead. This guy could've killed her!" I look back at the grounder trying to ignore the fact that she could be dead.

"Do it." Clarke says and backs up.

"No. Just tell us!" Octavia says and gets closer to the grounder. I push her away and rip his shirt with my knife.

"Show us the antidote or you will wish you had." I give him a final warning.

"Please." Clarke says and kneels down in front of the antidotes.

"Clarke." I say to her, trying to get her out of the way.

"Which one is the antidote?" She asks again.

I repeat her name. "Clarke."

"Just tell them." Octavia says to him.

I put my hand on Clarke's shoulder. She stands up wand walks away. I whip the grounder again.

I continue whipping him. My arm is aching, but there's no way i'm stopping any time soon.

"Enough!" Octavia yells, on the verge of tears. Raven yells from the lower level.

"We're running out of time. Which one? Which one is it? If you tell us they'll stop! Please, tell us which is the antidote and they'll stop this!" Clarke continues to plead the grounder.

"If that doesn't work, maybe this will. Clarke you don't have to be here for this." I say and find a nail on the floor. I walk towards the grounder.

"I'm not leaving until I get the antidote." She says sternly.

I get closer to him.

"Last chance." He doesn't say anything, so I stab him through the hand with the nail.

"What's taking so long?" Raven climbs up the ladder. "He stopped breathing."

"What?!" Clarke yells and stands up quickly.

"He started again, but next time he may not." Raven says, calming Clarke down a bit.

"He won't tell us anything." Clarke says.

"Wanna bet?" Raven walks over to the wall beside the grounder, grabbing wires. She walks closer to him.

"What are you doing?" I ask her.

"Showing you something new." She says and shocks the grounder.

"Which one is it? Come on!" She shocks him again.

"He's all I have!" She yells.

"NO!" Octavia aid yelling at Raven for her to stop.

"He's letting Finn die!" Raven yells at Octavia.

Next thing I know, I see Octavia cut her arm with the poison-coated knife.

"Octavia, no!" I yell because I can't lose both of them.

"He won't let me die." She says and walks to the antidotes.

"Octavia." I repeat.