The 100: A New Beginning Part 1: Healing Wounds

A little later…

Guarding Clarke's room, even if it was completely unnecessary, at least gave her a purpose. Something she needed so desperately. She didn't care about the people who passed by, some of them looking at her with faces that Octavia could easily recognize as resentful, painful and hateful. But even after standing there for almost an hour, she wasn't attacked once. This was obviously due to the large sword she still wore on her belt. But even that couldn't extinguish the desire and willingness of many to at least think about it or even try to land a blow or two on her.

"Octavia!" Bellamy's voice suddenly came from across the hall, "What are you doing here?"

"Bell?" She said as he approached. To her surprise and even shock, he immediately hugged her. "You can't be here," he said, grabbing her arm and trying to pull her behind him.

"Why, what? Tell me what is wrong?" She asked him, trying to resist his pull by throwing her weight in the other direction. He stopped and gave her a serious look that even she couldn't misinterpret. Something bad was going on...

"I can't tell you here, you have to come with me... now!" he explained to himself and began to pull her behind him until they reached his quarters.

"How are you?" he asked her before they had even entered the room. "I'm fine, Bell. How are... I'm sorry..." It came out of her. But before he could tell her, his eyes widened in shock when he saw her bandaged hands.

"What happened?" he asked her worriedly.

"Nothing", she lied to him. 

"Nothing? That doesn't look like nothing. Why are you lying-?"

"Fine. I had a slight breakdown, okay? Are you happy? I didn't hit anyone... or kill anyone..." she confessed to him, annoyed.

"Hey... it's okay. I'm glad you're okay otherwise," he told her, half relieved as he forced her into another hug.

"I'm sorry, Bell..." she puffed into his chest. A few tears ran down her cheeks as she slowly surrendered to her feelings.

"I know. Let's talk about it later. Because we have a problem right now," he explained, "Shaw just told me that we may have a blind passenger on board..."

"One of the prisoners?", she took her first guess after he released her.

"Perhaps. Or someone from our own people... From Wonkru. Look, Octavia. Clarke and I are afraid that you might be a target. I know you want to try to fix this, but I can't lose you. I almost lost Clarke. I don't know if you're in danger, but I don't want to find out. Please stay here or on the bridge. Don't move until we know what's going on and how the passenger is..."

"I'm not hiding like a coward, Bellamy," Octavia vehemently rejected his plan, "I'm helping you find the person. What if Clarke or Madi are the targets?" she asked him in return, "She's the commander after all... Something you made her, by the way..."

"Yeah, I thought about that too. But they are safe where they are for now"

"And who's guarding them?" Octavia asked him challengingly.

"A heavy metal door and an access code," Bellamy revealed, "before you suspect me, it was Abby's idea so no one could see her..."

"I was there, and Echo kept me out..." Octavia revealed as the pain of Clarke's seeming rejection returned.

"It's not like that..."; Bellamy tried to reassure her.

"And what is it, then?" Octavia burst out loud enough to almost make him jump, "Tell me it's not what I think it is. That Clarke hates me for what I did..."

"No… Clarke was the one who thought that you might be in danger. It was her. She sent me to look after you...", he explained to her with calm words, "We have only been getting along for a short time. And she is still mad at me. I can see it in her eyes, in her voice, even if she doesn't tell me."

"She hates you for putting the flame into Madi…" she stopped and burst into tears. And then it was her who suddenly and nearly violently embraced him. She started to cry even harder. "I'm sorry Bell... I'm sorry..." She cried in his arms, more and more, until she couldn't tell how many times. He held her in his hands and gave her the comfort she so desperately needed.

"It's okay... please stop..." Bellamy comforted her, gently rubbing her back.

"I almost killed you... You are my brother. My family..."

"I was angry at Clarke for leaving me to die... And the next thing I knew, she was shot..." he said, trying to distract her. For some strange reason, he laughed at this fact. Maybe because it was ironic. As if fate had planned all of this a long time ago. He watched her head slowly move up, and then she looked at him with wet, teary eyes.

"The same goes for you. Even if I'm angry with you... I can't lose you. I need you to stay here until we know what we are dealing with..."

"You weren't the only one who feared for her life...", Octavia confessed to him.

"I'm glad you're here. And alive, despite everything," Bellamy said into her teary eyes, "you're still my sister. You're always my sister.

"And you're still my brother..." Octavia replied, " You're my family. Always."

"But then why did you do that... why everything...?" He finally asked her this important question after they had stared at each other in silence for a few moments. The question he didn't want to ask, mostly because he was afraid of her answer. But his heart dictated it to his mouth because he knew he couldn't leave this room without an answer: "Why did she do this?"

Octavia looked at him, mortified for a few moments before finding her voice. "Because that wasn't me... You have no idea what has happened in the last six years... I didn't want to remember... I didn't want to do it... I didn't... but I was the commander, and they listened to me, respected me, obeyed me..." She started her version of the story. "They expected me to have a plan for everything..."

"As always..." She added bitterly.

"It's okay. You can tell me later..." Bellamy tried to stop her, but she continued. It was too late, there was no going back. The gates in her mind were already open.

"Abby told me to break Kane... I didn't want to, but I had to..." Octavia told him about this traumatic event.

Bellamy picked her up with both hands and steered her to the bed. For some reason, he felt that they should sit during this speech. He couldn't believe what he had just heard, and maybe it was just because he wanted to sit down after hearing it.

"We didn't have enough to eat. Our hydrofarm couldn't produce food with enough protein... We had to find a way to survive. It was Abby's suggestion. She was the first to discover the problem. Even she didn't want to do it, but what else could we do? The bunker wasn't the Ark and we didn't find out until it was too late," Octavia said, staring at the floor with a blank expression. She could feel Bellamy's hand on her back, trying to comfort her and let her know he was there as they sat hip to hip on the edge of the bed.

"Kane, he refused to eat the meat, like most of the others at first. Abby said if I could break him, they would eat... I had to shoot two people who also refused to eat the flesh of our dead before he cracked and ate..." Octavia told him, "I still see their faces... I killed them so that he ate and lived. I had to force them… to live"

"Eat or die..." Bellamy said quietly "Shit... that's awful..."

"And do you want to know what the worst part of this is? Even though I don't want to understand why the people on the ark did what they did... I understand. And that's why I hate Kane so much... He floated our mom... He floated our mom... And in the bunker he was like a changed man. Like I was the evil now…"

Then she felt his embrace again. She stopped talking and silently accepted his offer of comfort and forgiveness.

"O' it's okay... It's okay... It really is... That was way more than I wanted to hear. I don't want you to go through this again..." She couldn't see the pitiful smile he put on to cheer her up as she leaned her head against his chest.

"I just want my sister back... The Octavia who was my sister... Just promise me that I will get her back, okay?" Bellamy said, his head now resting on hers. 

"Okay," she finally answered him after a moment of silence, "I'll try"

"And I'll help you," he assured her.

"Can you tell Clarke about this... I can tell him again..." She asked him with a tired look on her face.

"Yeah, sure. I'll talk to her when I see her later."

"We'll find a way to deal with this. Please stay here until we know who this person is and what they are up to," he told her, remembering the original reason he had gone to see her. Echo must be furious at this point, as she and Shaw were left alone to deal with the current crisis. He quickly jumped up, back to his feat, but did the equation without Octavia.

"No, Bell. I won't hide like a coward," Octavia rejected his idea immediately. Suddenly, she seemed more alive, and yet agitated by his request. And she jumped up as well.

"Octavia, please..." Bellamy begged her desperately. "I'll help you find the person, too," she replied, taking the lead to the door. Surely feeling powerless against his sister's ambitions, he could stand still and stare at her, sourly surrendering.

"Is this how you want to make it up? Is this how you want to win me back?" But his last attempt to hold her back failed before he could finish his appeal, as she had already entered the hallway and was looking at him.

"No, I'm doing this because it's the right thing to do. Now come on, we have a passenger to find..."