1 + 2 | EMBERS TO FIRESTORM | THE 100 | JOHN MURPHY

TWENTY FOUR

T W E N T Y  F O U R

Pain. Pain is all she felt as her mind swelled within its cage. Left alone too long, it grew starved and savage. Willing to bite the head off any who passed close by, hostile or not. It was ravenous and most definitely sick: a sickness self-inflicted. A sickness which had no cure and limits to its relief.

The immediate prediction of the pill which allowed some relief was simply love, but how could such an emotion cause the escape? The simple fact was that it couldn't. It was a lie that Althea Barnes told herself and she knew it. Forever seeking the lies she spun.

Lying to herself was something she had done for years, but she disguised it as promises. Promises that things would get better, that someday she would be free of this burden and that one day, just maybe one day, she would be so in love that all her pain would just cease to exist.

Perhaps she could even have a child of her own, call it something unique and watch it grow every day with a smile on her face and setting wrinkles. But pain is all she felt. Pain. Relentless.

Today the pain was there, but it was dulled to an extent that undoubtedly puzzled Althea. It drew in all her attention, causing her to unintentionally ignore Octavia as she spoke until she was no longer talking to her for she was calling for Bellamy.

Althea rises from her seat, standing beside Octavia as Bellamy emerges from his tent, but not without being shirtless or being followed by two rustled girls, clearly annoyed by the disturbance. Althea looks between the girls and then to Bellamy, her eyes lingering a little longer than she would have liked but his aura enchanted her. It was nothing like Murphy's. His was angry, always, but Bellamy's was much calmer, simpler and she liked that.

Octavia points to the tumbling ship. One girl, wrapped in a blanket, speaks up. "Please tell me they brought down some shampoo," She whines, looking inconvenienced. Althea resists the urge to scoff and looks on to the falling ship, missing the look of worry on Bellamy's face, but she didn't have to look to know his concerns. She knew what he had done, that was all she needed to know in order to predict the expression that painted his cheeks.

The ship stained the dark night sky, streaking flames across its flawless skin. Burning it up, burdening it. The flames were not pretty, they were fierce and bold, but beauty is more than being dainty.

-

"We should get moving, everyone's ready," Octavia announces, entering Bellamy's tent with Althea not far behind. These days, Althea never strayed far from the younger Blake sibling. Perhaps it was the company, or perhaps it was the fact that Octavia was the only one Althea knew and trusted down here. Everyone else Althea looked at with fear of their judgements.

Octavia knew that there was something not quite right with her, but rather than dwelling on it she let her be with knowledge that if Althea ever wanted to tell her about it, she would do so. Pressuring her would only signal for the walls to be built impossibly high.

"No one's going anywhere," Bellamy tells her, earning a look of confusion from Octavia and relief from Althea. Going out there in the dark of night seemed like they would be tempting fate and poking death awake to claim yet another life. "Not while it's dark. It isn't safe. We'll head out at first light, that's the word."

"Everyone for a hundred miles saw this thing come down. What if the Grounders get to it first? Bell, we should go now," Octavia says firmly. This firmness takes Althea by surprise. She wasn't sure whether it was usual between them, but nonetheless she did not expect it.

"I said we wait until sunrise," Bellamy reaffirms, pushing past her out of the tent going to do exactly the opposite to what he had just told his own sister. Like a gust of wind, he is gone.

-

Stepping into the night after Bellamy, Althea feels the cool air on her bare arms. It wraps around her, pushing her onwards and driving her to reach out and grab his arm from behind. He whirls around, she assumed he expected to see Octavia so he seems to relax when he sees Althea. Perhaps he thought she didn't understand. He was wrong.

"You're going to do something stupid, aren't you?" She asks with sudden confidence, gifted to her by the icy air. Her forwardness takes him back. He glances down at her fragile fingers, which looked like they could shatter at any moment, curled around his wrist.

"No, you should go back to your tent," He tries, but she persists. Her fingers curl tighter and her other hand reaches out too, gripping fearfully onto his other wrist. "Althea."

"What are you going to do Bellamy? Banish me for trying to tell you to be careful?" She challenges, but she doesn't smile. Her eyes look iced over, like a beautiful lake in the middle of winter. Captured in its breath, held captive until the sun arose as its savior. "I just don't want someone else to die."

"I'm not going to die, Al," He tells her as he turns his wrists and folds his hands over the worrisome girl's own, wintry hands.

"I know what you did and I want you to know that I would have done the same thing to protect a sibling," She admits, looking up into his eyes that seemed shocked by her sudden expansion of her knowing looks. Absently, her finger grazes across his skin before she jolts away from him. Her movement rigid, as if she realized what she was doing. "Sorry," She murmurs.

"It's okay," He replies, dazed by the encounter with the girl who whispered to the crows. Crow Girl, that's what he knew her as until today. Today, she became 'Al' to him, whether or not that was a thing to cherish he did not know, but for now she was 'Al'.

But to her he was still the ever charming Bellamy Blake with the big heart and eyes that could charm the devil, but also the same Bellamy Blake that had shot Jaha to protect his sister on her journey to the ground.

-

[1051 words]

althea tries so hard to stop people from doing stupid things, but they always do it anyway.

[NOT EDITED]