Rupture | Bellamy Blake ² [Discontinued]

✭ | chapter one

❝if i cannot bring down heaven, i will raise hell.❞

-johnathan morgenstern, the mortal instruments

♛

FACING MY FEARS HAS been something I've dealt with daily for almost the full six months we've been on the ground. However, that doesn't mean it's gotten any easier. The excessive pounding of my heart as we climb down the tower in Polis causes my blood to rush in my ears, a thrumming roar. My stomach flip-flops until the feeling is nauseating. I feel light headed even as the soles of my boots finally touch the concrete ground, a sigh of relief falling from my lips.

The first thing I notice is the wailing. Even before I see the people in the square, I hear their cries of anguish, chilling me to the bone. Clarke moves to investigate almost immediately. Her steps are hurried and purposeful, but when she sees the body of a man who'd fallen from the tower, she falters until Bellamy and I reach her side.

But he isn't the only one who'd perished today. Two Grounders have already started piling bodies together, and there are so many that I wonder if they'll possibly have funerals for all of them. My face twists in concern for these people who have either lost a loved one or a part of themselves due to the City of Light. Or, in some circumstances, maybe even both.

Clarke turns to Bellamy and notices his troubled expression. His eyes seem to examine the people without really looking at them, eyebrows pinched and mouth pulled into a line.

"She'll be okay," she promises. "Octavia can take care of herself."

My eyes shift to the cement, stained with blood so dark it appears almost brown. Octavia had immediately gone to the Commander's chambers and climbed down the tower after running her sword through Pike. She must have landed not long before us, but I don't see her in the crowd.

"That's not what I'm worried about," Bellamy answers vaguely.

"She won't be charged," Clarke continues, desperate to ease his mind. "Everyone will say that Pike had it coming."

He blinks and shifts his gaze away from her for a moment. "Maybe we all do."

I feel the weight of his double meaning pressing onto my shoulders. Maybe his mind is flashing back to the cave, back to when his face had been covered in his own blood, back to when his sister had told him he's dead to her.

"How do we tell these people that the world is ending after everything they've been through?" Clarke asks through her breaking voice.

"It never stops, does it?" I mutter under my breath. "Around and around we go. Never a break."

"We don't, until we know that ALIE was telling you the truth," Bellamy says in response to Clarke's question.

She faces him, asserting, "It was the truth."