Chapter 9
Raven didn’t get much sleep. She was too busy worrying over their plan. So much could go wrong, they could end up dead. But staying would mean almost certain death.
Finally she couldn’t take it anymore and she rolled out of bed. Abby wasn’t awake yet, and Raven wondered if Abby knew that she talked in her sleep. Mostly nonsense, but sometimes she’d blurt out random surgical instruments.
And Raven thought she was obsessed with her job.
She stood staring at the older woman as she slept, it’s not often Abby isn’t staring at Raven pitifully. And although Raven doesn’t appreciate her pity, she’s grateful that she’s stuck in this shithole with a familiar face at the very least. She could trust Abby. She may think Pike was a little too willing to incite violence, and Rashid would do absolutely anything Pike asked him to do, but she had Abby.
Her thoughts were ripped from her head when the door opened suddenly to reveal Maya and a small cart of what looked like medical supplies. “Hello, Ms. Reyes, ready for your physical therapy? We have to make sure that knee works correctly.”
Raven smiled nervously. “Yeah, sure. Abby, wake up.”
Abby startled awake, eyes immediately scanning the room fearfully. Her lips moved as if she were speaking, but nothing came out. Her eyes finally landed on Raven and Maya and she realized where she was. “S-Sorry,” Her voice was groggy from sleep, but she struggled upwards, untangling her limbs from the threadbare blanket clumsily despite her fatigue.
“All hands on deck upstairs, all but urgent personnel are required to help with unloading and then there’s a mandatory meeting with Dante. I don’t know what it’s about but hopefully we’ll be long gone by then.” Maya smiled, her nervousness poorly hidden by her fidgeting hands. “I’ve got some supplies that’ll help me get the two downstairs out and up here. They’ve decided that you all are low risk, so they’ve only let two guards outside. It’s a downright miracle. But once the elevator is out of service and they see us rushing the door on the cameras, they’re going to immediately start trying to intercept us. Rashid and Pike can take care of them I’m sure, and then it’s a straight shot to the trees, we’ll be travelling southeast after that until we reach the ocean. It’s eight miles to get there, but we’ll be able to reach it by sun down.”
Abby threw her blanket to the side and rubbed a hand across her eyes. “What time is it?”
“Seven in the morning. We have half an hour before the ship is docked and camp will be busy.” Maya answered. “So here, eat some of this, you’ll need the energy, drink up, and hide these on your body, we never know if we’ll need a knife for something.” Maya unloaded four light breakfasts and four bottles of water, all paired with a small switchblade.
“Thanks, Maya.” Raven smiled. Just as Maya turned around to wheel the cart out, Pike and Rashid appeared in the doorway, both stony faced and tense.
It felt like only seconds by the time seven thirty rolled around. Raven had eaten fast, too nervous to make conversation or do anything but think through everything that could go wrong, just like the previous night. But when Abby ushered her to the door, she was focused. She was ready.
“Raven, go take care of the elevator.” Abby ordered her, and Raven took off hobbling down the hallway as fast as she could.
It only took a second to pop the covering off the elevator buttons with the screw driver she had hidden in her brace. But then she had to make sense of the wires and circuit board in the wall. That took all of thirty seconds, she was the world’s best mechanic after all. Another ten seconds for her to cut the appropriate wires, both the main circuit and the backup emergency circuit.
She had the elevator disabled in less than a minute, but already she could feel her heart pounding and the adrenaline pumping through her system. She swore she could hear the pounding of boots down the stairs, rushing at her, they’ll pull their guns out and shoot her in the back, or the neck, or the face, and she’ll be dead in seconds.
But in reality, nothing happened. Instead Maya poked her head in through the door to the stairs, calling out for Rashid and Pike, and the thundering of feet on the stairs were welcomed. Abby gestured for Raven to hurry, and she was up and down the hall as quickly as possible. Abby stayed at her side during the whole struggle up the stairs. Rashid and Pike had already taken out the guards at the top by the time they got there, looking for any weapons that could aid them in their escape.
“No guns,” Pike furrowed his brow.
“This is a pacifistic facility.” A man at the back of the group spoke. He had darker skin than Pike, and his brown eyes were filled with grief, even now. He wasn’t particularly physically imposing, Raven thought so at least, but his demeanor was that of a person in power. This was the captain. The man at his side was even less imposing than his captain, he had a rough, unshaven jaw and bags under his eyes, Raven wasn’t sure how long they’d been on the island, but by the looks of this taller man, he hadn’t slept since the crash. He was physically fit, though he slouched enough to hide his physicality. His hair was brown and fell over his forehead in a wave, a shadow of what once was the single most boring hair style Raven could summon in her self-proclaimed vast imagination.
“If they were pacifists they would have let us go.” Abby levelled a glare at him. “Anyway, we don’t have time for this, let’s go.”
They rushed into the room fully, Raven barely had the time to take in the normality of the room, how much it looked like one of the model living rooms in Modern Living, before there were more guards rushing in. These guards were armed, but with batons and what Raven assumed were Tasers.
“Shit,” Raven growled, but the three guards rushing towards them were beset by four desperate men, fighting for their freedom. They were doomed to fail.
Now Pike, Rashid, and the captain had Tasers and the co-captain handed Abby and Raven batons, keeping one for himself. “My name’s Marcus Kane, and this is Captain Thelonious Jaha.” He said, looking between the two. He made eye contact with them and gave them a sad attempt at a reassuring smile, but he seemed to be gentle, at the very least. Raven hadn’t met a particularly gentle man since Finn, which on its own is sad, but that’s not exactly her fault. The circles she ran were filled with gruff mechanics.
“We need to go.” Maya ushered them around the couches and the coffee table and towards the door. “They’ve sounded the alarm.”
They ran.
Or at least, they ran and Raven struggled behind them. Abby at her side, a hand like an iron vice around her bicep, trying to yank and urge her forward, just a little faster, but there were people behind them, boots thundering, there were shouts and clanking of metal and the sun was too bright and Raven’s leg hurt and her back was beginning to ache, her head was pounding and sweat was dripping down her forehead and staining her shirt. Maya was struggling to keep up with Rashid and Pike at the front of the group, and Kane and Pike were keeping even pace just behind her, but Raven was dragging Abby behind, they were going to get caught.
“Abby go,” Raven tried to shove her off her arm. “Get off, Clarke is at the beach, go!”
Abby only responded to her with a withering glare, it told Raven all she needed to know, Abby was not leaving her side. Either Raven was coming with her, or they were both going down.
Raven tried not to feel reassured, tried not to be grateful. She’d be the reason Clarke lost her mother, but she did. She didn’t want to be alone. God, she didn’t want to be alone.
Kane looked back at them, fear evident in his eyes as he saw them struggling to follow, and the oncoming A.L.I.E. members behind them. His eyes widened even further upon seeing the people following them. “They’ve got-“
Shots rang out.
They were rapid fire, and they missed everyone in their group, but it was enough to terrify all seven of them. The ones at the front picked up the pace, they still had two hundred yards to go, and darted for the trees. More shots rang out and this time it grazed Raven’s bad leg, destroying one of the mechanisms in her brace, sending her to the ground.
She rolled a few times before struggling back upwards, only to fall immediately. Abby had tripped over Raven and had to backtrack several steps to regain her spot at her side. Kane and Jaha looked back again, eyes falling on the two struggling women.
“Abby, I’m good as dead, go.” Raven pushed Abby away. The guards, only five of them, but armed with AR-15’s were only fifty yards at most away from them. “Go to Clarke! It’ll be fine, go!”
“No, Raven, I’m not leaving you, now come on I’ll help you, put your arm around my shoulders.”
Abby didn’t give Raven much of a choice, as much as Raven struggled, she pulled her to her feet, and pushed her forward, half carrying her, half supporting her as they hobbled along, even slower than before. “Abby,”
“Absolutely not,” Abby snapped, her glare almost more frightening than the men with guns behind them.
They made it several yards before Raven was being hoisted into the arms of an unfamiliar man. “Hey! Lemme-“ But then they were pounding off towards the forest again at a much faster rate. Abby sprinting at their side. Raven looked up to see Kane’s jaw set, she could feel the strain in his body, but he didn’t slow down.
More bullets rang out, sweeping the ground around them, but these men had clearly never fired guns before in their lives. Sweat poured off of them in the burning sun, Raven still struggled to blink against the light burning her retinae.
It felt like an eternity before they finally burst through the foliage into the forest. They were on an uneven path, and Kane’s feet sunk into the rich, damp soil as they stumbled through broadleaves and vines.
They were positive the guards with the guns were still following them, so when Maya stopped to grab the packs of supplies, they grabbed them without even breaking stride and continued tearing through the forest, veering off path as soon as it hooked away from the direction they were heading.
As soon as they stopped for breath, however, they heard the firing of bullets raking the foliage around them and boots as they struggled through the forest after them. The foliage had slowed everyone down immensely.
“Everyone go, I’ll hold them up.” Captain Jaha commanded.
“Captain, let me.” Kane begged, Raven looked up at his face in terror. “Take her,” They all ducked another round of bullets. “I’ll go, they’ll need you to lead.”
Jaha’s expression darkened. “I should have stopped this. The least I can do is help as many people survive as possible. Go, take care of them. I’ll catch up if I can.”
Before anyone else could stop him, he was gone, heading towards the gunfire. Maya panted, chest heaving. “Let’s go-“
“Wait.” Pike demanded. Stepping between her and the southeastern direction they were going. “You’re not coming with us.”
“What are you talking about Pike?” Abby demanded, coming to stand at Maya’s side. “She helped us.”
“How do we know she’s not the plan to execute us?” He pointedly glared at Abby. “Lead us to the ocean, take us out, and say it was some sort of botched escape plan huh? Or maybe lead us off then let us get lost and die in the jungle?”
“Pike, that’s downright convoluted. Let her be.” Kane stepped forward, Raven still cradled in his arms.
“I’m not a part of A.L.I.E. I never was!” Maya begged.
Rashid stepped forward. “We don’t trust you. We can’t trust you. You aid the terrorists, so you must not be around us.”
“What’re you-“ Raven was cut off by Pike and Rashid pointing their Tasers at Maya. “Put those away! She helped us!”
Abby tackled Pike, or at least tried to, but Rashid had his Taser ready and Kane still held Raven. Maya fell to the ground, jolting and jerking.
“Get off me, Abby, this was for our own protection. Now, let’s get going. Rashid, grab the compass.”
Abby was pushed away, bumping into Kane before she managed to right herself once more. Rashid did as ordered, pulling a small compass from Maya’s pocket. They hitched their backpacks further onto their shoulders and led the charge through the forest. A fast clip, even for Abby, a healthy woman without any extra weight to carry. But it pushed them through the forest, leaving Maya stunned on the forest floor behind them.
Clarke hadn’t realized she’d fallen asleep, and evidently neither did Lexa, because they woke awfully close to each other for two people who’d only met a couple of days ago. But Clarke only had a few seconds to recognize this before her attention was torn elsewhere.
“Lexa,” She whispered, nudging the sleeping brunette’s shoulder. “Lexa, wake up.”
Lexa jolted upright, sand following her head upwards and slowly trickling from her braids back to the ground. “Chit?”
“Do you hear that?” Clarke hissed.
It was faint, but they could hear popping in the distance. “Gunfire?” Lexa suggested groggily. “What else could it be? No one fires fireworks just after dawn.”
Clarke nodded. “Who’s firing the guns and at what? Or whom?”
Lexa furrowed her brow. “I don’t know.”
Clarke, despite her worry, smirked. “You don’t wake very easily do you?”
Lexa yawned and rubbed at her face, wincing at the sand grinding into her skin. “I used to, but college changed me.”
Clarke huffed a quiet laugh. “We should get everyone else up. If there’s gunfire, then I’m sure the people on this island aren’t friendly.”
Lexa nodded, standing and stretching her arms and shoulders. Clarke avoided looking at her directly, but she did peek a little out of the corner of her eyes. Not that she would admit that. “I’ll rouse everyone if you agree to get Anya.” Lexa attempted lamely.
“Absolutely not, I’ve seen that woman in the mornings. She’s a menace. Your cousin, your problem.”
Lexa groaned and slouched off, sending a private smile over her shoulder to Clarke.
It had taken about an hour to get everyone up and situated on the raft, and ready to begin their march to the east. Every single person was grouchy and moody and ready to fight. Apparently sleeping on the beach was not conducive to actual rest after a long day of physical exertion. And tonight was looking to be no better.
Only, Octavia, it seemed, was in a good mood. She had confided in Clarke excitedly that she had won the argument with her brother the previous night and that she would be scouting with Indra all day without any additional argument from her brother, but she was almost certain he would be grumbling about it later. Octavia didn’t care. She had some modicum of freedom from her overprotective brother and she was going to take it and milk it for all its worth. Even if it was at the expense of an entire plane of people, the survival of the rest of the group, and complete isolation on an island far, far away from anything inhabited.
Clarke couldn’t help but soak in some of Octavia’s giddy energy. The girl was young, and the weight of the world hadn’t settled on her shoulders quite yet, and Clarke missed that innocence in herself. Even if her naivety was frustrating at times.
Lexa organized a pulling rotation for both the raft and the two sleds, allowing for people to rest their arms and shoulders for hours at a time. All in all, they had six people on the raft, including Harper with the steering stick, and eighteen people walking. Lexa organized six additional people to pull the raft along with four pulling the sleds. With eight people not pulling anything, Anya too injured to pull, and Indra and Octavia acting as scouts, that meant only half of the group could filter off at a time. Though, Clarke supposed, it was better than never having a break at all.
Clarke volunteered to pull one of the sleds for the first shift, leaving Lexa alone, walking with her cousin at the front of the group. Clarke unfortunately found herself paired with Bellamy for her shift. Luckily he seemed too preoccupied with his sister to care much about Clarke, but either way, it was only a matter of time before he recognized his partner.
Indra and Octavia tore down the beach, running at full speed. It only took them a few minutes to completely disappear from view, but that only increased Bellamy’s grumbling, which did not help Clarke’s mood. The sand made it difficult to walk, and having Bellamy complaining about his sister ruined everything that was good about Clarke’s morning. It didn’t help that Clarke struggled to keep up her end of the pulling, Bellamy was built like an ox, and compared to him she was downright scrawny.
To be fair, it’s not like Clarke did much exercising beyond the regular walk to and from work. But either way, without proper purchase in the sand, she wasn’t going to be able to keep up with Bellamy. “C’mon, let’s move over to the packed sand.” Bellamy grunted, pulling the sled towards the water.
Once they reached the tide line walking became so much easier that Clarke’s mood lifted almost immediately. “That’s much easier.”
“Hey ladies, it’s easier over here!” Bellamy called to the two soccer players struggling to tug their own sled. “The sand is packed over here.”
The two girls nodded and made their way over the tide line and onto easier ground, almost immediately sighing in relief as the sled moved behind them smoothly. “Thanks, Bellamy.” One of the girls smiled. Clarke could hear the suggestion in her tone, and had she looked over, she knew she’d see Bellamy’s answering smirk and wink.
Jasper had the first resting shift, and so he fell into step next to Bellamy. “How’s it going, Bell?” He smirked, rubbing his face, the beginnings of a scraggly beard appearing along his jaw.
“Slowly,” Bellamy grunted. “You seen my sister?”
Jasper shook his head. “Believe me, I would love to.” His grin made Clarke shiver silently.
“Hey, that’s my sister you’re talking about!” Bellamy growled, shoving Jasper several feet closer to the water, his skinny, lanky body practically a rag doll compared to Bellamy’s muscles.
“Sorry! Sorry, buddy, I was just joking you know.” He snickered. “Lighten up, would ya?”
Bellamy grunted again, shrugging Jasper’s apology off as if it meant nothing. Though Clarke was absolutely certain that it didn’t. “Just shut up, Jasper.”
“Whatever, you know, you really should be nicer.”
“Oh yeah?” Bellamy glared down at the younger man. “Why’s that?”
“Because eventually we will get off the island, and then all the sudden laws will actually apply to us again.” Jasper’s mocking tone took on a darker note. “I’m an excellent pickpocket Mr. Blake.”
Bellamy’s jaw clenched. “What is it you think you’ve found?”
“The reason you were on the plane in the first place.” Jasper shrugged. “Anyway, I’m just saying, I know what’s really going on and I have proof. So, lighten up maybe? I’ll have your back if you have mine, I mean, I know your sister-“
“My sister is not involved in this.” Bellamy hissed, halting and grabbing Jasper’s arm in a grip so tight his knuckles turned white. “Now go, before I kill you myself.”
Jasper laughed nervously. “Murphy knows too.”
Bellamy blanched, dropping Jasper, he gaped in the direction of the other man. Murphy was walking alongside his new friend, Emori. They were deep in conversation quietly at the front of the group, snickering and occasionally shoving each other. “Murphy?”
“Yeah, Murphy, and if you try to kill me, he’ll tell Octavia. And if you kill him, well, who do you think everyone will immediately suspect? Lexa hates you, and she knows you hate Murphy, especially with the way you pulled him off of me the other day. Everyone will back her when she comes for you with her army of broads. You’re toast. Only five bullets left right?” Jasper mocked.
“Why are you telling me this now?” Bellamy growled.
Jasper shrugged. “My mom always told me when I went to a new school, if I got picked on to pick the biggest kid on the playground and knock him on his ass. But, I found that if I picked the biggest kid and made him need me, then I got much more out of the whole situation. You’re the guy with the gun, and you need me. So! Allies?”
Jasper held his hand out for Bellamy to take. Bellamy glared hard, and when he took Jasper’s hand, he squeezed so tightly the scrawny man nearly fell to his knees in pain. Jasper took the hint and scampered off to talk to Monty for the rest of the shift as soon as Bellamy let go.
Clarke kept her mouth shut after he left. If Bellamy thought she knew anything, she wasn’t sure what he would do. Clearly it had to do with something he did before he boarded the plane, it involved Octavia, though she didn’t know about it, and it could get Bellamy into serious trouble with the law.
Was Bellamy a criminal with a gun? He could cause some serious trouble among the passengers if that were so, and clearly it had already caused a rift between him and Jasper, which could result in cliques forming. They didn’t have the resources for alliances to form and feud between, they’d destroy themselves if they fought amongst each other.
Finally at about midmorning, Lexa called for a temporary halt to rehydrate and rotate shifts. She took Bellamy’s place beside Clarke, and Bellamy shifted to the raft pulling team. Aden took the opportunity to jump from the raft into the water and wade out to walk with Lexa and Clarke. Anya joined them once the walking began again.
Clarke had only looked back once to see their progress, and while it wasn’t very far, it was reassuring to know they were making progress at all. “The sand is really making it difficult to walk.” Aden chirped from beside Lexa.
Lexa huffed a small laugh and Anya ruffled Aden’s hair. “It does, I should make you pull some.”
Aden sighed. “I dunno, I’m not really that strong, I’d probably just fall behind.”
“You’ll get bigger.” Lexa assured him gently. “Clarke, I hope your morning wasn’t too awful?”
Clarke shrugged, looking around to find Murphy, Jasper, and Bellamy all tugging along at the raft. “Something’s up with Bellamy. I overheard Jasper pretty much blackmail him for protection and whatever other advantages. He claims Murphy knows too. Apparently Octavia doesn’t know. But it’s something big. It could be dangerous enough to split apart camp. I don’t want people taking sides and starting a feud.”
“Heda,” Anya clipped.
“Sha, Anya,” Lexa muttered. “We’ve affirmed a hierarchy of some kind now, but we have to set in place rules to make sure no one starts anything unintentionally. Once we start regularly hunting for food and everyone has time to make trouble, we’ll have to deal with it. Hopefully Bellamy plays into Jasper’s plans for a little longer so that we can focus on our priorities first. We need that gun away from him, and I can’t just confiscate it. Especially not me, these people are used to having a democracy. Being both the enforcing authority as well as the deciding authority, they’d perceive me as a tyrant, even if I were just, and overthrow me. Most likely violently.”
“What about me?” Clarke suggested.
“No, you’re the healer of the group. Most people look to you for comfort and safety, if you’ve all the sudden got a weapon, then that might undermine the image you’ve built up among the group. They trust you implicitly as the bringer of life. You ensure we stay alive.” Anya explained. “Especially with that stunt you pulled with me, you’re the miracle worker. With you on Lexa’s side, then you’ll have people backing her because you back her. Pairing your implied safety and her leadership is what makes this group follow the two of you so absolutely. Injuring your image will injure hers, and the group will become even more unstable.”
Clarke huffed in annoyance. “This is way too complicated.”
“This is politics.” Lexa muttered. “It’s not as easy as just picking someone and saying they’re in charge. Favor is difficult to gain, and even harder to keep.”
Anya shrugged her good shoulder, grimacing at the slight stretch of her wound. “But no one else will step forward and keep us from killing each other or starving to death, so, it’s down to you two.”
“I never would have thought of all that.” Aden spoke up from his silence. The three women turned to him, having forgotten he was there.
Lexa recovered first, clearing her throat. “One day you’ll be able to, it takes practice and training to be able to think of all the possibilities of your actions. It’s not easy. But I trust you’ll keep what we’ve been talking about to yourself?”
Aden looked up at her in wonder. “Absolutely. I promise, I get that not everyone can know everything. That’s why the president doesn’t tell everyone in America everything. Sometimes knowledge can be dangerous.”
Lexa gave him a smile and ruffled his hair. “Good.”
Clarke estimated that they were about halfway to the southeastern tip of the island by the early afternoon. Incredible progress for a group of exhausted, wounded, hungry survivors of a plane crash. Lexa halted them a second time for a break and rotation. This time Clarke was given the opportunity to walk without pulling anything, and she found herself walking in pace next to Anya and Aden while Lexa battled the raft with the other unlucky five passengers stuck with raft duty.
Bellamy slouched towards the back of the group, grumbling to himself. Clarke couldn’t help but pity him, blackmail was never fun, but at the same time, he made her nervous. He had been too willing to wave his gun around the other day when Jasper got out of hand with Murphy. He had thrown his weight around as if he had earned his leadership, but she wasn’t sure he was actually interested in helping the group at all.
The day went faster now that Clarke didn’t have to pull extra weight. The ground was starting to slope upwards already and sand was yielding to grass more and more often as they reached their destination just before dusk.
But of course, things couldn’t be that easy.
Only a rustle of the brush to her side gave Clarke warning for what was to come, Indra and Octavia burst through the trees, running towards the group, well, hobbling, Octavia was clutching at her bloody side and Indra struggled to help her with her own injured arm.
“Guns!” Indra shouted to the group. “They have guns mounted to the drones!”
Clarke met them halfway, hands immediately going towards the younger girl. Octavia looked to be in worse shape, face already ashen and blood soaking the entire side of her body. “You’ve lost a lot of blood. Bellamy, your shirt.”
Bellamy had materialized at her side almost immediately, fretting over his sister. Monroe jogged over to help Indra, much calmer than Bellamy at least. Indra’s wound was clean, the bullet had cut right through her bicep and as long as she kept it clean and wrapped she’d be fine. Octavia would need stitches. Stitches they didn’t really have.
“Okay, Bellamy, I’m going to need you to keep the shirt on her wound, hold it down with a lot of pressure. She’s lost a lot of blood and I’m going to need to cauterize it. We can’t do that here where the drones can see us.” Clarke ordered. “Lexa, we have to get going, now!” She called out before Lexa could drop her rope and check on her injured teammate.
Lexa gave her a curt nod and everyone surged forward once more, this time with renewed vigor, adrenaline helping to fuel them as they moved. Lexa split the group up as soon as the rocks began and using the raft became no longer viable. Clarke, Bellamy, Octavia, Anya, and Indra went ahead to take care of the newly wounded, while Lexa kept the rest behind to begin transporting the injured on crudely made stretchers.
They decided to settle camp at the top of the cliffs, a small ways away from the edge but a good distance from the forest edge. Anya immediately set to work starting a fire to heat their designated cauterizing brand. Bellamy settled Octavia down, trying to wipe away the stray tears on his cheeks without anyone noticing. Octavia herself drifted in and out of consciousness. Indra stayed at her side, a silent guard dog waiting for her to recover.
Clarke barked instructions out to Bellamy rapidly, he was too close to hysteria to leave him alone. Anya took the brand from the fire once it was hot enough, allowing the glowing red to cool back to its normal color, and Indra helped Bellamy to cut away the part of Octavia’s shirt around the wound.
Clarke took a breath and pressed the brand to Octavia’s side, ignoring the sizzle of blood and the smell of burning flesh. Octavia seemed to come to consciousness enough to let out a scream, but it was cut short the moment she passed out from the pain. Releasing her breath, Clarke pulled away. She checked the wound, ensured that it would heal, and wrapped it once more. “Em ailonon ste nomonjoka.” Anya muttered from her spot next to the fire. “They’re evil.”
Bellamy was silent at his sister’s side, knuckles white with the intensity that he gripped the bloodied shirt in his hand. “I’m going to kill them all. My sister, my responsibility.” He growled, so low Clarke almost missed it. “They’ll pay.”
The four of them sat around Octavia, waiting as the sun set for the rest of the group to follow. Only four stretchers made it to the top of the cliff face. Lexa was the last to appear, face gray. “Two of them didn’t make it. We don’t know if it was infection or heatstroke. But they didn’t make it.” She announced, voice trembling with either anger or grief or both. “Tomorrow, we make a real camp here while Monty builds a radio or something to signal help with. Tris, a small group, and I will go into the forest to scout and hunt for the group. We’re safer here, away from the crash site.”
The group seemed to agree in their exhausted state without protest for perhaps the first time since the plane crashed. Monroe ensured that everyone drank plenty of water before going to bed, Anya struggled with a particularly scratchy patch of grass near her face, and Aden was out in seconds, sprawled out next to his mother, taking up an incredible amount of space for someone so small. Bellamy remained upright, stiff and watching over his sister, while Indra remained further away but just as alert and tense as they watched the young girl sleep restlessly.
Lexa collapsed to the ground with a half-hearted grunt, and Clarke didn’t think twice about curling up next to her. Both of them fell unconscious before the sun managed to fall completely beneath the horizon.