I Am the Reaper

Here

 A tension fills the air, taut and fragile, and I'm suddenly very aware of the room. The silence. Of Bellamy's gaze burning into my face. Shadows collect under his eyes and his complexion is still pale, making his freckles stand out like splatters of dark paint against a flushed canvas. He's still lying down but the grim set of his lips suggests he wishes otherwise. There's a wariness in his features, guarded. It tells me he senses the fragility too. 

Guilt rises up like a monolith inside me. Guilt and regret and relief, compounded with the desire to turn back time and stop him from going into Mount Weather. And, since I'm already entertaining such notions, maybe I'd even go further back, so I can stop the bomb before it collides with Rubicon. Find Finn before he massacres innocent villagers. Warn the 100 of the monster waiting for them in the mountain. 

But wishes are just that. Wishes. And as the second's fall away with neither of us speaking, our last conversation whispers harshly over the silence. 

You should go.

I thought you hated that plan. That I'd get myself killed.

It's worth the risk.

I clench my teeth as the shame barrels into me, so hard my legs nearly buckle again. I swallow the lump in my throat and struggle for some kind of apology. 

But Bellamy beats me to it. "Clarke." His voice is gruff from disuse.

After seeing him as he was, some vessel for a drug that made him into something he wasn't, that one word of acknowledgement derails me. There is no apology good enough. No words. I struggle for a smile I can't feel and take a step towards him. "Hey."

I see Bellamy's jaw working and his Adams Apple bobs like he doesn't know where to go from here. So I close a little more of the gap between us. "How're you feeling?"

He takes a few seconds to respond. "My head hurts," he says. "And my chest feels like it's on fire."

I nod, blinking quickly. "Yeah, that's to be expected. It should fade soon." I purse my lips and take a shaky breath, trying to sum up my courage before asking, "What do you remember last, Bellamy?" 

For a second, I'm worried that I've upset him. But he just shakes his head a little, then winces. His eyes flutter closed. "It's . . . It's like waking up from a dream. Some pieces are coming back but it's slow." He lets out a frustrated sigh.

I swallow, and risk another step. I don't want to goad the subject and stand in silence. 

"Octavia said Lincoln was all right," he says slowly, eyes opening again. "Was she telling the truth?"

At least in this, I can reassure him. "Lincoln's fine." For now, my words seem to convey. 

His tight expression turns relieved and gives a meager nod. Another handful of moments slip by us, but I'm not eager to fill them. he's alive. Right now that is enough.

"I heard you talking to Octavia," he says.

I bite the inside of my cheek. "Sorry if we woke you." 

"I didn't understand all of it and I don't know what happened while I was . . . " a haunted look crowds into his eyes but he blinks it back. "But it wasn't your fault. She shouldn't blame you."

An incredulous sound bursts from me, like a scoff and a choke, because he doesn't know. He doesn't know I left his sister at Rubicon. He doesn't know of the bodies that still litter the ruin and the families that will spend the rest of their lives mourning for them.

"I sent you in there, Bellamy."

"You asked me to go. I'm the one who made the choice, Clarke." 

"I shouldn't have let you. It wasn't worth it. Seeing you like that . . ." I press my tongue to the roof of my mouth, trying to stop tears. I let myself break down once. I'm not doing it again. I glance away, feeling Bellamy's eyes on me.