ATARAXIA • BELLAMY BLAKE

[ 4 1 ]

Walking onto the blackened soil, I stop to a halt before I can step on the skull just in front of me. I step back, but once I've averted my gaze from the charred remains of what used to be a person at my feet, I'm only met by the sight of dozens more.

When we'd been back here with Lincoln, I hadn't gotten the chance to take in any of the damage that was done here. I'd been too focused on us getting him inside before things could go south. And after everything had gone down up there, it was too dark out to see much, and we'd been in a rush to get Lincoln to Medical and to wait out Lexa's decision behind the safety of our gates.

But now I can really see everything. The drop ship looks the same, only the bottom half of the metal is black from where flames discolored it when Clarke and the others had blasted off to create a ring of fire that night. The burned bodies on the equally burned ground need no description.

I step around the skull in front of me and maneuver my way through scrap, logs and bodies until I step onto the ramp. Pushing aside the overhang with one hand, I step inside.

"Jesus, what took you so long?" Bellamy asks, walking up to me once he sees me, which is straight away. His eyes scan over me while mine scan the room. Raven is stood behind him, looking worried.

"I don't know what you expected," I say, setting my rifle on the table to my right in order to get my hands free to redo my ponytail. "I never make this trip."

The others had done it a bunch of times before I'd reunited with them, which turned out to be a good thing back when we'd needed to bring Lincoln back to the Ark. Without their sense of direction, it would've been difficult to find our way back there in the darkness.

"Still," Bellamy says, watching me tie my hair before running a hand through his own. "Raven was the last to leave and she's been here a long time."

We'd all decided that the only way to save Finn from the others turning on him was to bring him away from the Ark and to the drop ship. Give ourselves some more time to figure this thing out.

But the remains of the Ark is surrounded by Grounders, so we'd split up and took turns leaving through Raven's gate in the fence, where she'd cut the power long enough for each of us to make our way through.

By taking the low ground, we'd slipped past, but my unfamiliarity with the route from the Ark to the drop ship evidently slowed me down a great deal since Raven beat me to it. And that's with a bad leg as well.

"Clarke and Finn?" I ask, picking my rifle back up and slinging it over my shoulder by its strap.

"Not here yet," Raven replies, her mouth tight with tension.

I pause. They definitely know the way here better than me and should have gotten here long before Raven.

"You didn't see them?" Bellamy asks, but he knows I wouldn't have asked about them if I did. I shake my head.

"We shouldn't have split up," Raven says as she starts to pace the floor. "This was stupid."

Then we hear foot steps. Raven stops and we all go quiet. The steps get louder as they approach the drop ship and Bellamy and I both raise our guns in case it's not them.

A shadow appears behind the overhang and a hand pushes it aside. In comes Murphy.

"Whoa, hey, hey," he rushes out once seeing our guns pointed at him. I lower mine with a frustrated groan.

"What are you doing here?" Bellamy asks as I put a hand on his gun for him to lower it too.

"I believe I was invited," he responds with a nervous laugh. I send the other two a confused look.