ALPHA STRIKE |rooster x oc|

chapter 12- everything else

Sunlight streamed onto the carpet in small beams. Clarke blinked the sleep from her eyes, but quickly squinted from the brightness. She stretched and sat up slowly. She grabbed her phone and saw multiple notifications. Scrolling through them she saw twelve texts from Phoenix, seven from Bradley, four from Blair, and two from her dad as well as a missed call from each of them.

Phoenix: 

-Hey you awake?

-Hello????

-Call me when you wake up

-Okay wtf how are you still asleep??? it's like 10

-did rooster text you?

-did your dad?

-that's it im calling you

-PICK UPPPPPPPP

-CLARKE!!!!

-BROADWAY

-THIS IS A CODE RED SITUATION

-UGHHHHHHHHHH

The texts from everyone else contained the same message: call or text me when you wake up. Seeing that Phoenix seemed the most pressing, she called her first. The dial tone only rang once before she answered, her voice panicked. 

"What the hell?!" she yelled. Clarke moved her phone away from her ear. 

"Okay, geez, let's not make me go deaf. What the hell is going on?" Clarke asked as she rubbed the lingering sleepiness from her eyes. "Why is everyone needing to talk to me this morning? It's our day off and I planned to sleep at least half of it."

"Wait, you haven't talked to anyone else yet?"

"No, you sent me twelve texts, that to me says you have something more important to say than the seven I got from Bradley, four from Blair, and two from my dad. What is going on?"

"Call Blair, then your dad, then Rooster. Then call me if you can," she instructed. Clarke reluctantly listened, agreed on the plan and hung up. She found Blair's contact in her phone, her thumb hovering over the 'call' button as she racked her brain for what could possibly be going on, especially since Phoenix knew. She pressed the button. Instead of the cheery singing that usually greeted her when she called Blair all she heard was crying.

"Blair, what is going on? I've gotten like a million texts from everyone but no actual info. What's happening?" Her voice grew more panicked as she listened to her best friend cry through the phone.

"Uh, my dad...my dad died." Blair croaked out and then instantly resumed her crying. Clarke felt the air get sucked from her lungs. She couldn't move. Ice was dead. She didn't even know that he was sick again. 

"I'll call you later," Clarke choked as the words left her mouth. She scrambled on her phone to call her dad, but a knock at the door stopped her. She threw her phone against the mattress in anger and stomped to the door, ready to tell whoever it was to go away. She threw the door open, but instead of seeing a mailman or something like she had expected, she saw her dad. She instantly wrapped her arms around his torso and buried her head into his chest. He rubbed a hand along her back as he led her to the couch and sat down, her still clung to him. Heavy sobs racked her chest as she gasped for air. Her whole body shook. Pete's cries were quieter, but the same heart breaking pain was felt. 

"How?" she finally managed to ask through her tears. 

"He, uh, got sick again about a month ago. Didn't want to fight it, put everyone through that again. The doctors said he was supposed to have a year, maybe two. Not a month," Pete's voice shook as he explained.