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Bellamy wasn't averse to the quiet.
When they first landed on Earth, there wasn't a time when all of the delinquents were quiet enough for him to be able to really listen to the Earth — to hear the sounds of crickets, or the rain falling on the tents of their makeshift camp. There was always some fire to put out.
Bellamy got his first taste of the quiet—the all encompassing kind, the kind that you can’t escape—when he got his mother floated and his sister thrown in the Sky Box. Bellamy thought he understood silence then, but he didn't, not really. Not in the way he came to see the beauty and pain of it a year and a half later.
No, Bellamy never really understood silence until he left Clarke behind and went back to space.
Six years and seven days... That's when Bellamy understood silence. He embraced it, and silence welcomed him like an old friend.
Being on the Ring was an adjustment after Earth—even if they’d only been on the planet for a fraction of their lives—but the constant hum of the machine that kept them alive in the vacuum was easy to ignore.
On the Ring, Bellamy found that he had too much time to himself. Space wasn’t an issue but they agreed that they’d stick together to save resources, so everyone paired off. Somehow, Bellamy found himself alone.
Monty and Raven had both banished him from their workspaces—he was a leader, yes, but that didn’t involve hovering. He helped as much as he could, but Bellamy was always more useful when he could use his hands to do something. And so, he took to scouring the ship for whatever was left behind by the previous inhabitants of the Ring. What started off as having something to do to fill the time bloomed into curiosity, and Bellamy found himself not being able to stop.
And so the days flew by and nights dragged on.
You have such a big heart, Bellamy. People follow you. You inspire them because of this. But the only way to make sure we survive, is if you use this too.
Every time he closed his eyes, he heard her words; he saw the look on her face and the dread enveloping his lungs like lead. But then he’d opened his eyes surrounded by the grey of the Ring, not the white of Becca’s lab.
Sleep didn’t come easy to Bellamy. It’s an anxiety he’d had since he was six. He’d always worried about his sister being found; or after she was, he’d lay awake overwhelmed by the guilt of having gotten his mother killed.
After his mother died, an oppressive silence had enveloped Bellamy. A year and a half later, Bellamy once laid in the same hunk of metal floating through space, hating himself for leaving Clarke behind, effectively sentencing her to die.
How was he back here again, alone and wracked with all this guilt he didn’t know how to hold in him?
How was it that he kept getting the people he loved killed?
***
Soon after they’d made it to the Ring, Raven (and Monty, after Bellamy asked for his opinion) had told him the comms were useless. There was too much radiation and this part of the Ark didn’t have laser comm. Bellamy had insisted they try getting the comms working anyway.
At least they’d have tried, even if in vain.
Bellamy willed his hands to remain steady as he removed the plastic encasing the wire under the console in the captain’s deck. Raven and Monty thought a wiring issue could be blocking their radio.
It didn’t make sense for Raven to focus all her energy on getting comms working — she also had to get them back to the ground. So it was decided that someone would help her with the physical part of the comms repair while she used her brilliant mind to find a way to get them home.
Bellamy didn’t need Raven to tell him how much of a lost cause getting the radio working was. He knew it, but maybe if they tried again it would work?
“We need to reuse that encasing Bellamy. Try not to hack it all off, please?” Raven’s muffled voice came through the panel.
Bellamy rolled his eyes but did as he was told. Raven preferred Emori, and it seemed the latter enjoyed making herself useful, too. But Murphy had just woken up from the coma Monty’s algae had put him in, and Emori had finally been able to breathe after weeks.
It was a little amazing how quickly Emori had adjusted to space, but not surprising. Echo, on the other hand, had a harder time finding her place on the Ring. So she stuck to what she knew, and everyone took turns to train with her. Bellamy didn’t enjoy those sessions very much. Everytime he laid his eyes on her, he felt the rage creeping through his veins. She shouldn’t be here, in space, safe from the radiation. What had she done to deserve this second chance, apart from killing Gina and stabbing his sister? The injustice of it all overwhelmed Bellamy some days.
He felt a foot make contact with the sole of his shoe. “You alright down there?” Raven asked, her voice still muffled.
Bellamy dropped the instrument he was holding and pushed himself out from under the console. “Yeah, I’m fine. It’s done, by the way. It’s not as neat as you or Emori would have done it, but it should work, I think,” he said, turning to Raven with an eyebrow raised.
“Cool, I’ll take a look or get Emori to later. You’re done—I don’t need you here any more,” she said, extending her hand for Bellamy to grasp and pull himself up.
“You think this’ll do it?” he asked.
Raven shot him a look he’d grown very used to being on the receiving end of.
“Alright, alright, I’m going,” he said, raising his hands in surrender as he backed away..
The galley was quiet as he walked past it, but he saw two figures on a bench, leaning against each other. Even from afar, Bellamy could make out Monty’s slight frame against Harper’s broad shoulders.
Bellamy knew Monty had been a bit of a mess ever since Murphy slipped into a coma after trying Monty’s algae. That outcome had always been a possibility — Monty hadn’t known how the human body would react to the substance. In a particularly non-cockroach moment, Murphy had volunteered to try the first batch. No one had protested, of course.
Monty had worked on the concoction through Murphy being unconscious — even working himself to the bone, Bellamy would wager. With Murphy regaining consciousness, Monty was definitely breathing a little easier.
“What’s going on,” Bellamy asked, walking into the room.
Harper looked up, confusion colouring her features. “Oh, you’re done with Raven. Murphy’s fine, resting for now. Emori’s with him. Echo is..somewhere,” she told him. Bellamy nodded, sitting across from them, his elbows resting on the cool metal table.
He reached across and poked Monty in the arm. “You okay?”
The younger boy nodded but remained silent, still not meeting Bellamy’s eyes.
Unsatisfied, Bellamy’s eyes flitted to Harper. She shook her head slightly before her eyebrows knit together in a frown. It wasn’t good if even Harper didn’t know what to do.
Right.
“You didn’t do this to Murphy, you know that right?” Bellamy started, poking Monty again. For all that they had seen and done on the ground, it was easy to forget how young all the delinquents were.
Putting the fate of the human race on the shoulders of children and expecting them to survive on an irradiated planet was just another thing in the long list of fucked up things that were normalised on the Ark.
“Murphy knew the risk, and he volunteered . He’s alive. He woke up. The algae won’t have any lasting effects. The rations will last us for a few more months, so you have time to adjust the algae. It doesn’t have to taste good, just keep us alive til we can get back to the ground.You’re doing good, Monty,” Bellamy said, his eyes trained on the said of Monty’s face.
The younger boy turned, his chin against his forearm resting on the table. Monty’s eyes were hooded as he raised them, looking away from Bellamy and Harper.
“Am I? I’ve been working on this for months, Bellamy, and I still don’t have an edible concoction. I don’t know how to move forward. How do I make it right? I don’t know what else to do. This is the one thing that’s on me, and I can’t even do that. I— I can’t—I need Jasper. I can’t do this without him. I need my best friend. I can’t do this—” Monty choked on his words, his face crumpling.
Bellamy didn’t know how to help him through this. He didn’t know what to say that would take his pain away.
Harper grips Monty’s torso a little tighter as he starts talking again. “Jasper and I have never been separated for this long for all the time we’ve known each other. I keep catching myself wanting to ask him something or make an observation. I’m happy I’m alive, that’s not it. I miss him. I miss Clarke —” Bellamy feels the wind get knocked out of his lungs. “—she died so we could live and this... this is how I honour her sacrifice? I can’t even get the one thing I’m good at, right.”
When Monty finally turned to Bellamy, his eyes were shining with unshed tears.
“You work the problem. That’s how you honour the dead. You take a breath and then another, and you do what you have to. You’re not failing, Monty. Making something edible out of something that is not, it’s not an easy task. You’re doing good. ” Bellamy told him, willing his face to form a smile.
“Take a break — however long you need — to get some perspective, and then get back to work. Like I said, we have rations. We can cut it down to fewer meals if we need to. We’re not hurting for food, Monty. Take your time,” Bellamy said, gripping Monty’s forearm. “You got this. And you didn’t put Murphy in a coma. He knew what he was getting himself into,” he repeated softly, his eyes not leaving, Monty’s tear-filled ones.
Harper placed her head on his shoulder. Monty held Bellamy's gaze for a long moment before he pushed himself off the bench and hugged Bellamy awkwardly across the table.
Harper and Bellamy’s gaze followed Monty’s retreating form, silence falling upon them again.
“You know it’s not your fault, either,” Harper said, softly.
“Of course I do. I didn’t force feed Murphy. He volunteered,” Bellamy replied easily.
“That’s not what I’m talking about,” she continued, a sad smile ghosting over her lips.
A beat and then—
“I have trouble sleeping at night, too. I don’t think any of us have had a full night’s sleep since we got here,” she continued. “Monty holds on to me so tight some nights... We know how you feel, Bellamy. Or at least, we get it.”
He didn’t meet her gaze, instead training it on his shoes, worn from the violence on the ground. They were standard issue boots which everyone in cadet training got.
“I’m not saying you should talk to me about it, or anyone. But you have to take care of yourself, Bellamy. We need you more than you think.”
Bellamy was never attached to these boots, but they’re the one thing that stood by him the past few years. His mother had been so happy, so proud when he’d received his cadet training kit. “This is it, Bell,” she’d said. “You’re a big boy now. I’m so proud of you, my son.”
He’d beamed at her, a blush colouring his cheeks. Octavia had jumped on his back, demanding a piggyback ride around their quarters.
“You’re what’s keeping everyone together, Bellamy. But—you don’t have to do it alone is what I’m getting at.”
“Yeah, of course. Thanks Harper,” he replied, the words barely leaving his throat.
Your sister, your responsibility
It was his responsibility to keep her safe, to take care of her and he couldn’t do that. He couldn’t protect anybody, not Clarke, not Octavia. The one thing he was supposed to do, he couldn’t. He was a failure.
***
131 Years Later
Bellamy pulled the cardigan tighter around his shoulders as he wove the repurposed needle through the fabric from the Bardoan disciple’s clothes. It didn’t look like it would offer much insulation from the cold, but with the limited layers they had on their body, it would have to do.
Bellamy’s eyes drifted to the unconscious man’s leg that he’d stitched up not even a week ago. Every wince and yell, he’d been taken back to the early dropship days after Jasper had been impaled and Clarke moved heaven and earth to keep him alive.
He missed them, he’d realised in that moment. All of them. Not just his sister, or Clarke. He missed Jasper and the reverence with which he’d looked at Bellamy until the very end. He missed Miller’s unwavering loyalty and snark. He missed Monty’s kindness, even though life had never been kind to him.
Thinking about Clarke caused a physical pain in Bellamy’s chest. He’d almost lost her again and just as he got her back, he had been sucked into the godforsaken anomaly and ended up here—just out of reach of his friends, with no way to contact them.
The disciple stirred, muttering something unintelligible before his head lolled to the side. The stitches, coupled with resetting his broken leg, had taken a lot out of him. Without modern medicine, his best bet was to let his body heal itself.
It was a stupid idea, and near impossible, to scale the many peaks it would take to get to the anomaly alone. All Bellamy could do now was wait. Wait for the disciple’s body to heal, and then they’d make the long trek to the green light.
All of a sudden, the irony of his isolation hit him, and Bellamy couldn’t help the chuckle that escaped his lips. The chuckle grew into a fit of laughter and soon, he found himself leaning his head against the cold wall of the cave trying to catch his breath.
The wave of loneliness that hit him was less of a tsunami and more like the waves lapping at the lakeshore. Inevitable, but surprising all the same.
Maybe he should stop trying to outrun the sadness that seemed to follow him around. Maybe this is who he was, and maybe there wasn’t more to life. You just put one foot in front of another and brace yourself for the next tragedy.
He glared into the silence, not entirely sure what he was expecting to happen. The man lying next to him didn’t even stir. The silence continued, seemingly validating his thoughts.
***
Bellamy wasn’t looking for something to believe in, but the way Doucette spoke of transcendence, it was hard not to get pulled in.
Doucette was right. Loving wasn’t the problem, the way he did was. Putting his sister, his Clarke above everyone else was what got him into this mess.
So he believed. He listened to the prayer. He chanted.
And when his mother’s hand reached out to him, he exhaled the breath he didn’t know he’d been holding and gave in.
***
Bellamy lowered the axe on the piece of wood on the exhale. Even after so long, the noise of the splinting wood made him wince. Just as he was calculating if it would last him through the week, the skies opened up and made his decision for him.
This was Bellamy’s favourite time of the year, as autumn transitioned into winter. It was damp and miserable but he loved the possibility of experiencing a nip in the air as the sun set. In one fluid motion, he dropped the logs with one hand, while reaching for the sweater on the back of his chair with the other.
Most days Bellamy had a routine down, wake up, hunt, eat, woodwork, eat, sleep, with a few existential crises thrown in now and then. But for the most part, you could say Bellamy had found a semblance of peace.
He didn’t know where he was, or how he got here. All he knew was that one day he woke up in the forest wearing a blue henley and black cargos, an outfit that was reminiscent of the dropship days. He still had his scars, and his memory was intact.
Bellamy had gone over every regret he had a million times over, and had somehow made peace with everything he’d done. Jasper had been right, there was no point in beating himself up over the crappy things he had done. He did them, and his reasons were his. No one gave a crap about why he did what he did. Punishing himself for doing said crappy things wasn’t going to bring anyone back.
So Bellamy forgave himself, and for the first time in his life, he lived. Every day was a brand new opportunity to learn something or to fuck something new up. He loved it.
Because Bellamy was a sap, if anyone asked, he’d say forgiving Clarke was as easy breathing, and that it was already done. But he’d be lying. He struggled with it.
Some days he woke up with anger coursing through his veins. Trying to rationalise Clarke shooting him, thinking of every scenario that would make shooting him — shooting to kill, no less — seem okay to her. Did he mean that little to her? Shooting him over a sketchbook she ended up leaving behind?
Bellamy supposes, on one hand, that it was him that gave her the permission to shoot him. He had, after all, told her all those years ago that she'd have to make it a killshot if she wanted to stop him.
Maybe this was who Clarke was all along. Wanheda, the commander of death. Maybe he was the idiot who thought he was special. That maybe, she cared for him. Maybe she never cared for him at all.
On some level, Bellamy understood Clarke's actions. He would have done anything to save Octavia from the death wave. So logically, being shot by Clarke wasn't such a betrayal, not when she'd been okay with chaining him up and letting him rot in the boiler room when his sister was out there dying.
It took Bellamy a while to realise the lengths he’d go to for Clarke, and how easy it was to forgive her. On some level, Bellamy knew he loved Clarke. But he loved all of the hundred.
This was the first time he actually considered who he and Clarke were, where they stood, and what they meant to each other.
Forgiveness had always been difficult for him, but it was the easiest thing to forgive Clarke. Or, it had been anyway.
Mount Weather. Polis. Octavia’s fighting pits. He’d heard what she had to say and she was forgiven.
Bellamy struggled with Octavia, whom he raised. She'd been the focal point of his life for so long that he'd forgotten what he wanted. What putting himself first felt like.
And with that realisation came resentment. And the shame for feeling resentment and thinking these thoughts. He really was a monster.
With Clarke, there was none of that. It was so easy to forgive her.
He and Clarke understood each other. That's why forgiving her felt as easy breathing.
The fact of the matter was he needed her. Clarke made him feel like he deserved to live. Deserved to want more than just survival.
Clarke shooting him in the heart was a lot harder to get over for Bellamy. Not only because it made him question what he meant to her, but also — is this what he loved?
What did it say about him that all the people he loved wanted nothing to do with him?
Octavia, his flesh and blood, had essentially disowned him the moment they landed on earth
Ever since then, it had been Bellamy who went out of his way to make sure she was safe, only for her to repeatedly show him that she wanted nothing to do with him.
Clarke — who looked at him like she could read every thought passing through his mind — didn't think twice before killing him. Like he meant nothing. Like his words, actions, meant nothing.
The most frustrating part, for Bellamy, was that he couldn’t ask her. He was here and she was somewhere he couldn’t get to. He was stuck here, fending for himself, the last man in the universe.
It took Bellamy a while to accept that maybe he would never get any closure with her. And that maybe forgiving Clarke was something he needed to do for himself.
Acceptance that came with the epiphany — shooting him was in fact something he could forgive Clarke for.
It was already done.
***
The silence didn’t hurt anymore. It was just there, an able companion, omnipresent and all-knowing.
Today had been good. Uneventful, but then again, most of his days were. Bellamy's definition of an event had been permanently changed. Peacetime had made him soft. He enjoyed doing nothing.
Bellamy was pulling at a loose thread in his sweater, hoping the whole thing didn’t unravel, when he heard soft noises from outside over the sound of rain. He grabbed his axe — the closest thing he had to a weapon — and padded towards the door.
Bellamy's stomach dropped and the breath left his lungs when he opened the door.
He was seeing things. How else could he explain the sight in front of him. A blonde, her back turned to the door, was assessing her surroundings.
He could recognise that silhouette anywhere. It was the figure that haunted his dreams and nightmares alike.
“Clarke?”