Surviving the Sky

Chapter Fourteen

After feeling around his neck, Bellamy helped me up. Dropping my bow, I tried to take his hand, but another blinding pain shot through my arm.

I looked at my shoulder to see blood pouring out of a bullet wound. The pain hadn't been from hitting the wall, I just hadn't noticed in the adrenaline.

Still trying to stand up, Bellamy shook his head, "Wait until Clarke gets back. She'll help."

"I can help myself," I said, "This was part of training- well, actually we trained with arrows, but how different can it be?"

"Very," Bellamy muttered.

I shrugged, a painful way to remember the bullet in my shoulder, "I need just some cloth." Still not agreeing with my idea to help myself, I reminded, "Clarke might not be back for a while. Go check if Raven's okay."

"What?"

"Raven," I said, "She was the one Murphy was trying to shoot through the floor, right?"

His eyes widened with fear. He tossed me a clean cloth on his way out of the dropship.

Carefully using two large metal needles, I removed the bullet and used the cloth to cut off the blood flow.

I then carefully got my balance right as I pushed myself up with the other arm. Taking one look at Myles's limp body, I fought the urge to scream in anger.

If I'd been down that ladder a minute earlier, Jasper and Bellamy wouldn't have been in any danger. I may even have been able to save Myles.

I'd just have to kill Murphy the next time I saw him. Especially since he blew up the rest of the gunpowder.

"Clarke! Finn!" Octavia screeched, "You're alive!"

"Lincoln," Clarke breathed, "Scouts are coming. We have to leave now- Sky, what happened?"

Looking at the blood creeping through the grim bandage on my shoulder, I found it in me to calm my breathing, "Murphy went mad, killed Connor and Myles, Jasper saw him, Bellamy swapped himself for Jasper, Murphy tried to kill Bellamy, shot me, and escaped by blowing up the rest of the gunpowder."

"So Raven can't work on the mine field anymore?" Finn asked.

"Raven can't work on anything anymore," Bellamy yelled, "Clarke, get here quick!"

I followed to see Raven. She was sat in the small control box under the dropship, "I can't feel my legs."

"No," Clarke muttered, "No, no, no."

"What?" Raven snapped, "Can you fix me or not?"

Clarke sighed, "My mom might have been able to." She winced at the memory. Abby died in the dropship explosion, "But she's- she's gone."

"What's wrong with me?" Raven asked, "Let me fix it."

"There's a bullet lodged in your spine. You're lucky it didn't kill you," Clarke said, "You- you won't be able to move or feel anything from your waist down."

Raven glared at us, "Is it permanent?"

"I think- unless we can remove the bullet, yes. It's permanent," Clarke finished stiffly, "I'm sorry. Lincoln said-"

"We need to assemble the entire camp and tell them our options. If we leave, it's in the morning," Bellamy said, "At night it's too risky."

The camp assembled quickly.

"As you all know, John Murphy came back after being tortured by the grounders, unknowingly bringing the virus that killed three of us," Clarke began, "What you might not know is that he was also responsible for the deaths of Connor and Myles."

A murmur broke through the camp at that.

"In his attempt to kill me, he shot Sky in the shoulder and another bullet is lodged in Raven's spine, paralyzing her from the waist down," Bellamy continued, "In his escape, he destroyed the last of the gunpowder."

"Whatever we have, we use only if absolutely necessary," Clarke announced, "But in the morning, we need to leave."

Another loud murmur, "Why should we listen to you, princess?"

I walked in front of them, "Because she's right. I know how grounders operate. Anya, their leader, will first send scouts to scare us. They might kill a few of us. They'll report back to her, telling her all of our defenses and numbers to confirm the information they tortured out of Murphy. Then, by dusk tomorrow, the entire army will be here to wipe us out. They will take no prisoners. We will all be dead if we don't leave."

"We built this place," Bellamy said, "We need to defend it at all costs. This is our turf. We've got bombs out there, along with guns that are no match for their primitive tools."

"Keep in mind they've had years of training with these primitive tools," I reminded everyone, "And they are lethal. Much better than a bunch of kids with guns."

Bellamy shrugged, "The field is rigged with mines. We're fighting on our turf. We have the better weapons. I say we use them."

"They have the numbers. They are one thousand strong at their weakest. This was their turf first. They know the lay of the land," I said, "The fact is that we can stay here and we can fight or we can leave now and live to fight another day. If we stay, mark my words we are all dead. We need to leave before the scouts arrive. Even then, it might be too late, and we might have to turn around."

Apparently I was convincing or scary enough to get them all to listen to me. Clarke put Raven on a makeshift stretcher. Each person had at least one gun, so we all left camp.

"I wish I could fight," Raven said.

"If you could fight then you might not have been smart enough to build that bomb," I reminded her.

She sighed, "Those were the good old days. I kind of miss going on spacewalks as a zero-G mechanic."

"How did you get the bridge to blow up?" Finn asked, "I mean, I know hydrazine's explosive and all, but that bridge withstood a nuclear war and ninety-seven years of weather."

"It didn't survive me," Raven smiled wickedly at the memory of the explosion.

I then asked, "What happened to Monty? He went after you."

"He- he vanished after hearing a strange sound on the radio and seeing something, but he didn't tell us what," Fox, a small girl with long dark hair, informed me, "We looked for him, but no luck."

A sharp metal disk resembling a star flew threw the air into Dal's head, and he dropped to the ground moments later. We all backed up and closed the gates.

Clarke turned to Bellamy and growled out, "Looks like you'll get your fight after all."