that cold black cloud is comin' round

[to_survive]

"Clarke! We're out of time."

When the dreams happen, it's like living through the same memories, all the emotion and pain heightened to a sharp point that slices and cuts until Bellamy wakes. He lives those moments over again and it's usually in waking that he remembers they're in the past.

He is very, painfully aware that this is a dream, and it feels much too real.

He remembers falling asleep with an arm around Clarke's waist, her body pressed up against his under her sheets. Gone is the smell of her hair, replaced by the acrid tang of blood and recycled air that he'd come to associate with Mount Weather. The familiar adrenaline rush is back and he recognizes this moment, knows exactly what they're about to do.

The monitors are quiet but he can still see their people trapped as Clarke's mother is drilled for her marrow, can see Octavia on the ground with a gun pointed at her head. Bile rises in the back of his throat as he remembers the words he'd uttered as he watched the screen, knowing if they didn't do this, she would be dead along with all of them.

"Clarke," he says, his hands shaking as he tries to figure out why this is so different, why it feels so real. His body aches and he smells like blood and sweat, singed flesh and fear. The entire control room stinks of it.

He knows what she says next and waits for it, heart in his throat at the idea of having to live this all over again only to wake up with her in his arms and unable to change any of it.

Comments

[to_survive]

"Goddammit," Bellamy snarls when his hand slips, and he hits the door with the side of his fist before getting back to undoing the locking mechanism. They're so safely locked in that it makes getting out difficult.

"She's being a Grounder," he answers Clarke, his voice raised with anger -- not at Clarke or Octavia, but at the fact that any of this is happening at all.

It's hard to work the door and watch the screen at the same time so he looks back every other second, sees Octavia surge up and take out one of the guards in short flashes of blurry action with each time he looks back until he finally sees her go down.

And she doesn't get back up.

[willbetested]

Her nerves are already too frayed to really be upset at Octavia's actions. After the neverending loop of dying or watching others die, watching Bellamy's sister fight like that makes weird amounts of sense. Octavia isn't the girl who grew up under a floor anymore.

"We should," Clarke stops herself, shaking her head as she goes back to watching the screens. "Good for her."

A throb aches at her temple, pulsing from adrenaline and anger and fear. "Do we have any options left?"

[to_survive]

"Screw the options." His hands are slick with sweat and they're trembling as he fumbles with the lock again, all of it feeding into the frustration and fear that lances through him every time he thinks of Octavia surrounded by guards and their guns.

She's become an excellent fighter, a true Grounder in her own right, but she's not invincible.

"I'm getting my sister."

Bellamy doesn't look back at the screen, focusing instead on the door in front of him. He doesn't want to look back and see the fight is over; he doesn't want to even chance it until he can get to her.

[willbetested]

"Bellamy!" Clarke tears her attention away from the screen, from Octavia's fight, from her mother being ground into. There's too much going on, a pounding in her head that threatens to engulf her.

"Bellamy, stop," she urges. Octavia can hold her own, but she's outnumbered. As much as she wishes there was any other way, the best choice is the one attached to the lever. "Don't leave. We can stop this. I can stop this."

She nods to Monty. "We're ready, aren't we?" Monty nods his ascent. "Yeah. Just need to open the vents."

Taking a deep breath, she grabs ahold of the lever. "Bellamy. I can save her from here."

[to_survive]

It's not until she says his name a third time, just as he finally feels the door latch release, that Clarke's words penetrate his panicked fog. Bellamy wants to keep going, wants to run down the hall and kill anyone in between himself and Octavia, but his arms go limp with the realization of what Clarke's saying.

"You don't have to," he tells her even though he's let go of the door, even though his eyes are on her hand on that lever and he knows his hand belongs on top of hers. "Clarke, you don't..."