Surviving | A Clexa AU

Chapter III: Are You Afraid?

Pov: Lexa

The thing about survival is that it consumes you. It burns you inside out and leaves your body and mind in a heap of scar tissues that are too tough to cut through. The thing about survival is that it moulds you—breaks you into pieces, and rebuilds it with steel engraved into your soul. Survival creates the person you are, after it is done destroying you. It gives you life, and takes away the will to live.

Years later, on a cold January morning, when things had been different, Clarke and I had been sitting up on the makeshift bed, afraid to fall asleep, when Clarke had suddenly asked me, "Aren't you tired Lexa?"

I had known that it wasn't the kind of tired we usually were after a day of hunting or gathering. It was a different kind of tired.

"We do what we have to do to survive," I had told her, trying to quell her questions. She had remained quiet for a long while, absentmindedly playing with a loose strand of thread on my tshirts before looking into my eyes and saying, "Survival is insufficient, Lexa. I am tired of surviving. I want to thrive. With you."

Coming back to that summer, I had already gotten off to a bad start with her the first time I had met her. And the subsequent days did nothing to make it any better.

The next morning I woke up with the rather annoyed and grumbling voices of Gustus and the Nyko from the outside the tents. Back then, we were a group of around 40 of us, camped out in an old school building. It was secure and gave us plenty of space to move around.

As I got dressed and walked out, I was greeted with the bizarre sight of these two giant heavily built men being subjected to what they would refer to as nothing short of torture.

"It's the last injection! I swear!" Clarke Griffin almost whined.

"Uh no ma'am! You poke me with that needle once more, I'll feed you to a Walker!"

"C'mon Nyko! I need to test you for at least the common stuff. That's what I'm here to do!"

"Who the hell called you here?"

"What's going on here?" I asked, sterner than I intended to.

The three of them looked up at me.

"I'm testing them for malaria and typhoid and the usual stuff you contract out here in the forests," Clarke said, explaining herself. "But they are children!"

I considered for a moment before I asked, "Clarke Griffin am I right?"

She nodded.

"Do they look sick to you?"

"You won't even know if you have the parasites, until the last moment!" she defended herself.

"And you think that's a good enough reason to waste medical resources?"

She looked at me for a few seconds, and then tried to protest, "You can't just seek cure! You have to help prevent diseases in the camp too!"

"I am not wasting finite resources on men who look and feel perfectly healthy. Now if you please, they have more important things to attend to."

As I walked out, I could hear her grumble about the lack of scientific approach in my camp.

That afternoon, as I got ready to go out for a hunting party to the nearby waterfalls, she walked upto me.

"Is there anything I can help you with, Miss Griffin?"

"You are going out for the food now, right?"

I nodded.

"Can you see if you find leaves like these?" she held up a sketchpad with the sketch of a rather familiar leaf.

I looked at her through narrowed eyes, "The world is going to hell and you want me to find marijuana leaves? Is this a joke?"

"To an idiot like you, yes maybe! But they have high morphine and other medicinal properties which could be helpful. So no, this isn't a joke," she tore the paper and thrust it into my hands as a reminder.

"If I'm not busy trying to save our asses from Walkers, I'll try looking for your weed," I said, not veiling my annoyance.

"Why do you call them Walkers?" she asked, ignoring my jibe. "Why not call them what they are—Zombies?" she pursed her lips and crossed her arms and looked at me in a challenging way.

I paused, wondering why hadn't anyone asked me that before. Thing is I knew the answer to her question. I always had. But I've never had to explain it to anyone before, not even Anya.

"When was the last time before the earth fell, that you heard zombies and got scared, Miss Griffin? Zombies were nothing but television tropes and Halloween costumes. This, this is real life. There are no zombies in real life," I explained.

"But doesn't it sound more ominous? Aren't you scaring people more than they actually are!" she questioned.

"Being afraid is good. Fear is survival. If you aren't afraid, you wouldn't take anything seriously."

"Is that why you never smile? You've taken everything too seriously?"

I narrowed my eyes and walked closer to her, bridging the gap. Her question had brought back memories that I had meant to subdue for two long years, and at that moment, the question made me livid. She stood a step back hesitantly as I narrowed the gap, and said in a rather low and menacing tone, "How many people have you had to watch die, Miss Griffin? How many loved ones and family members have you had to kill because they turned? How many times have you had to stab your lover through the eyes, and twist your knife to get to their brains, because they had been bitten, and turned in the middle of the night? Try burning down your entire family in your house and then try smiling." Her face had gone deathly pale as she stared at me, unable to come up with anything.

"I...I am sorry Lexa...I didn't know.." she stammered.

"It's Commander for you, Miss Griffin. Don't try to come into my camp and pretend to get along with us," I said, finally letting out the things that were swirling in my head since yesterday. "You are not one of us. I will not help or protect you. I have my own people to save. I do not trust you or your people. So once I'm back with the food, you'll take me to your camp, we'll exchange the food for medicines, and that will be the last I see you."

"Are you afraid?" she asked, looking keenly at me.

I turned around sharply, "Aren't you?"

"Yes" she nodded. "But unlike you, I'm afraid of the zombies, and not the people. You are terrified of both, Commander."

I had walked away without responding to her last statement, the words gnawing away at my brain.

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A/n: The first Clarke POV coming up in the next chapter.