The 99

Chapter Twenty Nine: Clarke

Okay, I figured it was time to finally wrap this story up. I might do an epilogue, because it doesn't necessarily end where people might want it to, but I tried to end it in a way that the next pieces are implied and tie into the opening episode of season 2. I didn't want to write a bunch of chapters of them on the ground, because the focus was the Ark, so I'm hoping this will suffice. I didn't edit it really yet, so I might come back and add some things, but for now I figured it wouldn't hurt to post. Thank you to all who have read this story. I'm sorry this conclusion took such a long time coming.

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In the Ark, there were moments when fear seemed to suck the very air from the room, leaving her to suffocate in its absence. Dimly was Clarke surprised that, for all the air the ground offered, fear had the same effect here, too.

She didn't need to look at him to see it in his eyes; she could feel it, his fear, his panic, spreading as rapidly as she'd always imagined fire to.

She reached a hand out to him. "Bellamy-"

He jerked away, eyes fixed on the graves surrounding them. "No. No, I didn't come all this way for my sister to be -" his words snapped in half, swallowed up by rage. By that fear. He couldn't seem to look away.

Clarke's heart twisted painfully. She placed her hand on his shoulder again and this time, he didn't buck it off. "Bellamy, listen to me. We don't know if she's here."

He looked at her then, startling brown eyes more terrified than Clarke had ever seen them. His shoulders seem to fall, burdened with that invisible weight of possibility. "We don't know she's not."

"You're right," Clarke said bluntly. She tried to push away the image of Wells.

Bellamy squeezed his eyes shut.

"But," she went on, "we can't just assume either. Your sister is a survivor, Bellamy." Pressing her hand to his cheek, she coaxed hm to look at her rather than through her. "We don't know what's happened here," she said firmly. "For all we know, your sister is out in the woods somewhere. Alive. Let's not underestimate her just yet."

Clarke watched as the resolve built in his eyes. The fear was still there, but she watched him force the wave of it back enough before he drowned in it. He stared back at her, the rays of light playing like small sunbursts in his gaze. They reminded Clarke of the bridge window back on the Ark.

"And if she's alive?" Bellamy said slowly, never looking away from her. "Neither of us know anything about tracking. Where do we start, Clarke?" He cast his attention at the forest surrounding them, as if taking in its size. How many miles of trees were there? And that was only one part, one facet of the abundance that was earth. How many mountains were there? How far could Octavia have gotten by now? How much time was she given to?

Clarke gritted her teeth, frustrated at yet another obstacle. Nothing came easy. The ground held just as many questions and possibilities as the stars had. Maybe more. "I don't know," she admitted. "We'll just have to start where we are. We can wait a day, and then-"

But Bellamy was already shaking his head, the muscles in his jaw feathering. He started in the direction of the woods, boots crushing dead leaves. "No. I'm done waiting around, Clarke. Not when we're here and I can finally do something."

"Bellamy"-

From beyond them, a twig snapped.

Maybe it was the after effects of the landing that sent instant tension shooting through her limbs, her spine already stiff before she'd taken another breath. For one absurd moment, the memory of glacial blue eyes flashed across her mind. But no, Soren was a ghost left in the sky. Who else was there to chase her now?