Mother Earth // Bellamy Blake

New Pantry • 20

"Octavia? Do you need help in there?" I asked from outside the meat shack. We had a lot to prepare for, I just wanted to help wherever I could.

"No, I should be fine," she said back to me, but she sounded like she wasn't sure about her answer.

I walked into the shack anyways, another hand couldn't hurt. I also knew a lot about curing meat. Once I entered I saw why she said she didn't need help.

"Ew," I said at the sight of Murphy in there. Octavia looked like she wanted to laugh at my reaction of him. I watched another kid come in to put wood in the fire. "Woah wait, that's way too much. Don't put all of that in the fire."

"It's fine," he brushed off my warning while continuing to feed the flames.

"No she's right, it can burn this whole thing down," Octavia backed me up.

"Your boyfriend teach you that, grounder pounder?" He shot back.

"What-" I never got the chance to tell him off because his stupidity lit everything up. I grabbed Octavia's wrist as the smoke welled up around us. Together, we got out of there as fast as possible to not be consumed by the heat.

Both of us were coughing harshly when we finally got out. I could feel the eyes of the entire camp on us.

"Are you two okay? What the fuck happened?" Bellamy rushed to his sister and I.

I pointed to the culprit as my coughing started to calm down.

"They told you to stop feeding it," I could hear Murphy's attitude as he shoved the boy. Bellamy went over to get Murphy to back off.

"Bell, what are we going to do? That was all our food!" Octavia expressed as her cough subsided.

"Time to go hunting," I said, knowing that the nuts and onions we had wouldn't last for long.

Clarke was now at the scene, "Kota's right. Everyone needs to pair up and take a weapon. We need everyone we can to go out there."

I approached Clarke and Bellamy made his way over too, "not only hunt Clarke, people need to scavenge berries, nuts and plants at the same time they're looking for animals. We need everything we can find."

She nodded, "I'll tell the teams as they head out. Bellamy I need you to stay here."

"I'm not staying if she's going," his response was automatic. Bellamy knew I was already planning to go.

"Please, you need to watch things here while I'm out. We still don't know when the grounders will come," Clarke pleaded.

I turned to Bellamy, "I'll go with Miller, we'll be fine." Bellamy still wasn't too convinced even though he trusted Miller, but Clarke didn't give him a chance to fight back on it.

"Good, be back before dark no matter what," she stated then walked off to find Finn.

"Be safe," he told me with a serious glare.

"I will," I confirmed before going to get Miller.

I found him near the front gate, he already had a gun but was picking up a spear to use for hunting.

"We're partners," I caught his attention.

"Alright then, let's go," he replied. We left the front gates and began our path through the woods. For the first hour we walked in silence, besides when I told him what to pick as we went on.

I was in awe of a bush filled with gorgeous purple and blue flowers when he spoke to me, "so are you and Bellamy a thing?"

"If you're jealous of him just say so," I joked with him while picking the flowers and placing them in my pack. I read about these in one of my mom's several books. When prepared correctly, they could act as a temporary paralytic. It would be extremely useful if anyone got seriously wounded again, which was more of a possibility than not. Things like this is what made Earth so amazing to me. When I turned back to look at Miller he had a look close to disgust at my comment.

"Oh my god, you're gay," I said, his face gave it all away. "Maybe you're jealous of me."

He laughed at this, letting me know he absolutely did not feel anything like that towards Bellamy.

"Dude is ripped though," he admitted. I would have agreed with him, but instead I signaled for him to shut up and turn around.

There was a boar roaming not too far away. Miller lifted his spear but I placed my arm on him to lower it. I grabbed a knife from my pocket knowing my shot would be more accurate than his.

"Right into the eye, watch," I whispered, never taking my eye off the slow moving pig. When I released the knife from my fingers, it hit the boar exactly where I said it would.

"Badass," Miller commented after its body thud onto the ground. We made it over to the animal I had killed and I noticed I couldn't see my knife, just where it went through. Miller lifted its massive head up and yanked the knife free from the other side. Both of us were shocked that it practically went all the way through. My shot killed it instantly, which is probably why it made no noise. I made those knives a lot sharper than I thought.

"Let's get this bad boy back to camp," Miller stated while grabbing its two front legs. I latched my hands onto the back two and we started to drag it home. I was sweating almost immediately, the boar was extremely heavy and I still wasn't the strongest although I was trying to work on it.

It took us a while to get back to camp because of the dead weight. When we finally reached the front gates, it was well over an hour past nightfall. I think this was a pretty good reason to be late for curfew though.

When the gates opened, Bellamy was standing right behind them. He looked like he was about to leave, but his face was surprised when he saw what we were bringing in.

He rushed over to take my position holding the legs, "I was just about to go look for you guys."

I shook my arms out while walking beside him, "I'm sorry we weren't back earlier."

"You're back now," he said to me, setting down the boar's legs once it got placed where he wanted it to. I noticed two other boars laying next to it. We actually did pretty good today.

My hands were covered in dry blood from collecting my knife that killed our food, "I'm going to clean up."

Bellamy nodded, then turned to order people to get started on preparing the meat.

As I washed my hands and cleaned off my weapon, all I could think about was telling my dad about what I did. I knew he would've been proud of me, but it would've been nice to see his face when I told him. We talked a lot about hunting and the etiquette that went along with it. He taught me to have respect in the animal that gave their life to help the survivors keep on surviving. We've always planned to do it together someday, but that someday will never come.

I snapped out of my thoughts when I saw an empty glass jar near the water station. It was perfect to put the flowers in for now. I wanted to preserve them safely so I could show Monty. He would be able to help me make them useful for us.