Work Text:
Numbness.
It was the only thing she could feel anymore. After everything that had happened. After everything she had done. And after everything that had gone wrong.
If she was honest with herself, the only thing that kept her going was the promise of peace, a chance to start again. Maybe achieving that would redeem her. Maybe. There was something else too, something she refused to acknowledge, something she buried deep within her. Something she felt she didn’t deserve to hang on to.
~*~
Clarke was standing next to the Commander’s tent, just having emerged from her own, much smaller one, right next to it. The Sun was rising, painting the woods around her in various shades of reds and oranges. She used to love this time of the day, often spending it sitting under the cover of some tree and trying to catch the colors of the forest into her sketchbook with whatever crude paints she could whip up from the environment. The time spent with the Grounders had earned her a few tricks in the art department supply-wise, but it didn’t really matter now. She could hardly find it in herself to care for the serene views anymore: the giant old trees standing tall and unwavering, the boundless fields filled with various crops and plants she could not name, the lakes that seemed endless compared to the tiny pools back at the Ark, or the countless shades of greens, browns, blues and yellows they contained. Her world had become so dull, devoid of any colors.
She hadn’t drawn anything in weeks.
She had spent so much time in the Grounder camp in the last few days discussing the oncoming assault on Mount Weather and trying to negotiate the peace after, that Lexa had seen fit to give her a place to sleep and even a guard to follow her around, to keep her safe. You could never be too safe, or so she had told Clarke to try and convince the headstrong Sky Girl.
She had accepted the tent eagerly, and after a long and somewhat heated argument with the Commander, agreed to tolerate the guard. His name was Ryder and Lexa trusted him, that was all she knew, or really cared about. He didn’t talk much, and that suited Clarke just fine.
It was easier staying in this camp anyway, away from the Ark, not having to look her own people in the eyes. Or her friends. Or her mother. Of course they could, and did, come and go as they pleased, but most of them got the message after a while and mostly left Clarke alone. But their presence reminded Clarke that they were still her people, her friends. People who, for some unknown reason, seemed to still have faith in her. To trust her to keep them alive - to save them. Right now she wasn’t so sure she could even save herself anymore. And every time a hopeful glance was cast her way, she felt like she would suffocate.
~*~
She more or less lived in the Grounder camp now, training herself in combat with the warriors by day and discussing various strategies with Lexa and her generals by night. It became her routine and she liked it; it kept her mind busy so she didn’t have to focus on the numbness, the gaping void inside of her that was threatening to consume her. Or so she thought, if given enough time.
But there were still times where she couldn’t busy herself with anything. Times she spent either walking around the camp like a zombie, or sitting in her tent staring at the walls flailing in the wind, listening to the rain’s gentle taps on the ceiling. Times she was lost in her own mind. And she hated it. Every second of it.
But no matter how hard and how many times she tried to force herself to feel something, anything but the numbness, she failed miserably. And it always came back to those three words, the words that she carried around everywhere she went. She didn’t sleep much, but even when she managed an hour or two of restless slumber, they were right there with her.
“Love is weakness.”
It seemed that when she had decided to let go of love, she let go of everything else too. It felt easier. It would be worth it in the long run, she hoped. It had to be.
Of course she realized the benefit of it all, being cold, emotionless. She was a better leader because of it, no doubt. Decisions that would have previously taken her days to rationalize to herself took no longer than a few seconds now. Good of the many outweighs that of a single person, whether it be a friend or not. She still hated it, but it was necessary. This was war after all. People died in war.
~*~
Clarke stepped out of Nyko’s hut, her mind buzzing. She had been trying to learn as much as she could about the herbs and other plants the Grounders used to treat their sick and wounded. The Ark was running low on medicine, so she figured the more she knew about the natural remedies the less she would have to rely on the Ark and the dwindling supply of drugs there. The Grounders had gotten this far just fine, so their methods were obviously working.
She didn’t make it two steps when she saw Raven and Bellamy heading towards her, looking anxious as ever. The Mountain Men and the hostages they were bleeding had been a hot topic around both camps for a while now, and Clarke had spent every waking moment racking her brain for an answer, a way into the mountain. And she wasn’t the only one.
So far they had come up with absolutely nothing that would have any real chance of success. Their biggest enemy, the acid fog, had made sure of that.
Clarke had an assumption this conversation was not going to be a very pleasant one. Both her friends looked like shit, bags under their eyes from lack of sleep and clothes dirty, filled with cuts and rips. They had no doubt been having meetings of their own, brainstorming ideas.
Suddenly she was face to face with Raven, Bellamy electing to stand a few steps further, and before she could even open her mouth she was presented with the same question that kept coming up in every single strategy meeting.
“Have you come up with a plan yet? I mean you haven’t come by in almost a week and we heard some patrols were sent out today. People are getting anxious, and worried.” Raven looked tired, most likely from trying to fix as much of the Ark’s broken machines she could alongside everything else. “Honestly I was beginning to think that maybe the radio I gave you broke or something since you haven’t really been using it either,” she added, a hint of nervousness in her tone and eyes trained on the walkie-talkie safely attached to Clarke’s belt.
Clarke gazed over at Bellamy, who apparently had nothing to add, before responding: “The radio is fine, I’ve just had nothing of importance to say. No plan; the patrols were just going out for food.” She was so tired of the look people gave her when she said they had no plan. She was sure nobody intended it, but it felt like they were accusing her for it. Like she should’ve had some brilliant plan fully fleshed out already, like she’d have all the answers.
Raven sighed before continuing: “Okay, well Bellamy and I were thinking, I mean since the fog is the biggest problem here, right?” She glanced at Clarke for some sort of reaction, but when she received none, kept going: “Well have you uhm… thought about trying to get someone into the mountain. You know, infiltrate it or whatever, disable their defences.” She looked quite proud of herself for a fleeting moment, risking a small smile, but Clarke just exhaled tiredly.
“Yes, it has been thought of, but so far no one has volunteered,” Clarke said, looking over at Lexa’s tent where their war meetings were kept, remembering the night just two days ago when she had presented the same idea.
“No one has volunteered? I thought the Grounders would be happy to try and, I don’t know, prove their skills or something. I mean it’s worth trying at least,” Raven said with a look of bewilderment on her face.
“Even if we’d manage to get a warrior inside that place, which would be incredibly difficult to begin with, they would raise too much suspicion. And on top of that they have next to no knowledge or experience with any sort of working technology, so in the end it would be useless anyway,” Clarke responded grimly, reciting the same point Lexa raised on any occasion the plan was brought up.
Raven was silent for a minute, most likely processing what Clarke had just said, before turning back to her, looking concerned. “Wait. Wait just a minute, you’re not implying what I think you are Clarke?” A tiny flash of anger passed through her tired eyes, and she continued with a voice no louder than a whisper: “You want to send our people there? After everything?”
Clarke was barely able to contain a scoff as she replied with a sense of finality: “Well isn’t it obvious, that’s the only way it would ever work.” Raven looked dumbstruck and even Bellamy’s so far stoic expression changed to a slightly uncomfortable one. “I have to go,” Clarke added, knowing that this discussion wouldn’t go anywhere. Arguing these same things over and over with everyone was a waste of her time.
Without even a second look at her friends, she walked past them, leaving them standing there with various amounts of confusion shrouding their faces. She only made it behind the first tent, when something made her stop. Once again she felt like she was suffocating. She brought a hand to her temple and took several deep breaths. Having a breakdown in the middle of the camp would definitely not help her status among the Grounders. Or Lexa.
“What the hell has gone into her.”
Clarke perked her ears when she heard Raven speak up, either to herself or Bellamy, she couldn’t be sure.
“She sounds like that Commander. What if they’re doing something to her? I mean she’s been staying here a lot, maybe…”
Before she could finish, Bellamy cut her off. So he was still there. “They’re not doing anything to her, she’s just dealing with a lot. It hasn’t exactly been easy for any of us lately.”
After that there was a long silence. Clarke had calmed down and was now quietly staring at her guard, who was silent as usual. Sometimes Clarke wished he would talk about something, anything really. Just to fill her head with something other than her own voice and thoughts.
She was broken out of her thoughts when Bellamy spoke with a sudden sense of purpose in his voice: “We need to get inside that mountain.”
“Well of course we do Bellamy, but you heard Clarke, there’s no...” she started, but was once again interrupted.
“That there’s no volunteers. She didn’t say it’s a bad plan, just that no one wants to do it.”
Clarke felt a sudden lurch in her stomach at the statement, but kept quiet and listened.
“Bellamy you are not going to… Bellamy! BELLAMY!” Clarke heard someone running off, and by Raven’s shouting she assumed it was Bellamy. He was going to do it. He was going to try and infiltrate the mountain. And she had no idea what to do with that knowledge.
“Fuck,” she heard Raven grunt, after which she was walking away, back to Camp Jaha she assumed.
Clarke stood there, mesmerized. She was waiting, almost hoping for something to pop up, to feel herself shaking from head to toe with anger, or for the mask of indifference shatter and tears fall down on her face, anything really. But there was nothing.
She wasn’t angry with her friends - they were right after all. She was not like she used to be. She looked like it, sure, but she felt dead inside. She didn’t feel like crying either, it wouldn’t change anything. So she let her tense body relax with a resigned sigh, gave her guard a curt nod, and headed for the woods. She needed to think.
~*~
Clarke was sitting under a particularly large tree, it’s leaves drooping low enough to almost make her feel like she was somewhere else. And if she closed her eyes, and listened hard enough to the quiet sounds of the water splashing in the lake right next to her and the rustle of the leaves in the wind, she could almost picture what the ocean would look like in her head - almost. Of course all she had were worn-out pictures and descriptions from old books, but from what Lexa had told her they more or less still held true. And it sounded incredible.
She was drawn out of her musings when she heard a scream. A scream that, after all this death and killing, she had associated with death. Someone was dying.
She was on her feet in seconds, hands grasping for the knife tucked inside her boot. Before Ryder, who had luckily given her some space and thus was further away could stop her, she was sprinting towards the place she had heard the scream from. There had been no more screams after the first one and that terrified her, would she be too late once again?
She reached the clearing in the woods at about the same time her guard did, a massive sword already in his hand and ready to strike, sweat glistening in whatever sunlight penetrated the trees and his muscles clenching in anticipation. His other hand was squeezing Clarke’s roughly, trying to force her backwards.
But Clarke wasn’t even trying to move forward, because she had already seen where the screams had come from. Two Mountain Men snipers were lying on the ground, the rifle set up next to a backpack between them. Both men had their throats slit, with Octavia silently crouched behind them wiping her blade clean of blood.
She didn’t seem surprised to see Clarke here, or if she did she hid it well. She started going through the backpack while Clarke tried to organize her brain enough to be able to speak. Meanwhile Ryder had left her side, vanishing into the nearby bushes.
“I already checked, there’s no one else,” Octavia shouted after him, obviously annoyed. Regardless of her status as Indra’s second, the Grounders had trouble accepting her into their ranks, or trusting her. Clarke knew she would prove them wrong eventually, but that would take time. Respect had to be earned after all.
“W-What happened? I mean why would they…” Clarke was interrupted when Octavia muttered something in Trigedasleng. She wasn’t too well versed in the language, but even she knew that something was wrong. “Did you find something?”
The brunette was silent, instead handing Clarke a photograph that had been attached to the radio the men were carrying, coated in plastic to keep it dry. It took her a moment to realize what she was looking at, it seemed so unbelievable at first. But there was no denying it, she was holding a picture of herself and Lexa, with red circles drawn around their heads. They were here for her. And Lexa.
The photo had barely hit the ground before Clarke had disappeared in the bushes, rushing back towards the camp as fast as her legs could carry. She heard Octavia shouting something after her, but frankly, she didn’t care. Lexa was in danger. She was certain that those weren’t the only snipers. She had to make it in time, she refused to think about what would happen if she didn’t.
~*~
“Lexa you can’t be serious? Did you even hear what I just said?” Clarke said her voice shaky, trying her best not to shout at the Commander in front of her. The Commander’s guards had already rushed in after her when she came running from the woods, and she didn’t want to be interrupted again. At the same time she really didn’t think Lexa would be so stupid, or so stubborn.
“They are hunting for us, they almost got me already and now you are going out there voluntarily?” She knew she was doing a poor job with keeping her voice in check, but she just couldn’t help it. For the longest time she felt incredibly irritated, and a part of her enjoyed it. It was such a welcome change to the numbness.
Lexa turned around, having attached the final piece of her battlescarred armor. She had tha black warpaint on, and more daggers secured around her than Clarke thought she knew what to do with. She looked fierce, like one look would be enough to kill you.
That’s why the blonde was not expecting what came out of the warrior’s mouth next: “But they didn’t. You are okay, and that is the important part.”
Clarke was confused; that was definitely not something the Commander of the Grounders would say, at least the last part. It almost sounded like she cared.
Before she could get any more lost into her head, the brunette continued, voice unwavering: “And yes Clarke, I heard you. But given the recent developments in our plans, I need to go. We need more warriors if we wish to execute them successfully.”
Clarke drew in a sudden breath before asking: “You mean Bellamy and Lincoln taking off into the mountain on their own?”
“We needed a volunteer, and now we have one. Do you not think that he can do it?” Lexa asked, looking curious.
“No… I mean yes, if anyone can do it, then he can, but I just…”
Clarke was interrupted as Lexa grabbed her sword, and turned around to leave. “Well when he will succeed, we will attack. And for that, we need more warriors,” she said with a sense of finality.
“Just, just come back alive, okay?” Clarke sighed, realizing that Lexa was done arguing with her.
Clarke could see the Commander turn around, but she couldn’t look her in the eye. She was suffocating again, only this time it felt ten times worse.
“Don’t worry Clarke, these are my woods and I can handle myself in a fight. I’ll be back at first light tomorrow.” The softness in her voice went undetected by the blonde.
“Just come back to me,” Clarke murmured as Lexa was walking away, unaware that she had said it aloud. She was staring at the ground, deep in thought, so she didn’t notice the Commander pause for a moment, nor did she hear the almost inaudible “I will” that followed soon after. And then Lexa was gone.
~*~
Octavia was running through the Grounder camp, gathering more than enough curious looks, but she didn’t have time to explain. She needed to find Clarke. Judging by the blonde’s reaction the day before when the Mountain Men snipers and their targets were revealed, this was something she’d want to know sooner rather than later. Any in any case, if the scouts she had run into were right, something had to be done. And she had a hunch Clarke wouldn’t hesitate to do whatever it took.
Wiping the sweat off of her brow she finally reached Clarke’s tiny tent, but noticed that something was wrong. She was under the assumption that Clarke was to be accompanied by a guard wherever she went, yet there was no one to be seen outside the small tent. A quick glance inside confirmed that it was indeed empty.
Before she could make any assessments as to where she should try next, a grunt caught her attention. Looking over, she found it odd that the Commander’s tent would be guarded when there was no Commander to guard, but caught up as the warrior standing next to the it gave a slight nod towards it.
But why would Clarke be… Nevermind, I don’t have time for this.
She swept past the Grounder, Ryder if she remembered correctly, and into the tent. Even in the dim interior she could spot the blonde she had been looking for, quietly snoring on one of the chairs flanking the only table in the room, the table that was overflowing with all sorts of maps of the surrounding area and Mt. Weather.
As peaceful as her friend looked in her current state of slumber, she closed the distance between them and roughly shook her shoulders in the hopes of stirring the blonde.
“Clarke, you need to wake up, we have a problem,” she rasped, voice harsh from all the running.
Clarke popped up like a jack-in-the-box, startled and instantly reaching for her knife that Octavia had spotted on the table when she had entered.
Octavia kept her hold on the other girl’s shoulders, trying to calm her down: “Clarke, Clarke it’s me, Octavia. Snap out of it, Lexa’s in danger and we need to do something.”
Mentioning the Commander’s name had an instant effect on Clarke; her arms stopped flailing around wildly and her eyes focused, with a hint on something Octavia couldn’t quite place.
“What’s going on, is she back yet? Did something happen during the trip?” the blonde blurted. Her voice hadn’t yet caught up with the rest of her it seemed, apparent by the slight slurring.
In any other circumstances this would’ve come off as funny, but Octavia ignored it and went on: “It’s about the snipers I killed yesterday, the ones targeting you two. They weren’t the only ones.”
“What,” Clarke all but shouted, her eyes widening to the size of dinner plates, “You are not saying what I think you’re saying,” she added with a panicked look.
Realizing that her hands were still resting on Clarke’s shoulders, she let them go, grabbing Clarke’s knife from behind her instead and handing it over to the blonde. “I don’t think they’ve attacked yet, but from what I heard from the scouts near the lake where I was just hunting, the same area the Commander is going to come through today, they might be trying to ambush her. They found some fresh tracks they believe belong to the Mountain Men, and sent me to get reinforcements.”
“Then what are we waiting for,” Clarke uttered before jumping up, almost tackling Octavia in the process, and bolted out of the tent.
“Dammit Clarke,” the brunette huffed to the empty tent, before regaining her balance and hurried after her friend.
When she got outside, Clarke had already mounted a horse and was anxiously gazing towards the road Octavia had come from before.
“Clarke you can’t go alone, if the snipers are actually there you are risking both of your lives,” she tried to reason.
“Warn the others, if it’s not too late already,” the blonde said sternly, before urging the horse onwards.
The guard that had stood outside the tent during the whole exchange stumbled a moment with his own horse, before racing after the blonde who was only barely visible at that point, muttering a variety of curses in Trigedasleng.
Octavia decided there was nothing she could do about it, heading towards Indra’s tent.
~*~
The wind felt like ice on her cheeks, but she didn’t care, urging the horse to go faster still. She should have probably taken her jacket, but it had slipped her mind in the heat of the moment. She could worry about herself later, and getting a cold was more than acceptable if she would manage to warn Lexa in time.
She was riding Lexa’s spare horse, the fastest one in the camp, and thus her guard had already fallen far behind, but she hardly cared. The trees were flashing by her, blurring into a mush of different dull colours, yet she wished the horse could go even faster. If it were to trip at these speeds, she would snap her neck anyways, so going even faster hardly mattered in that sense.
After what felt like years, but must’ve been an hour at most, she spotted a clearing ahead with familiar looking figures gathered around a small campfire. She kept the speed as high as she dared for as long as she could, before using what little knowledge she had of riding to slow the black mare down. The thundering of the hooves against the hard dirt road had gathered the attention of the Grounders sitting at the edge of the clearing, and Clarke sighed of relief when she spotted Lexa, very much alive, among them.
She jumped off the horse while it was still moving, causing her ankle to twist in an uncomfortable angle as she landed. Ignoring the sudden flash of pain, she started running towards the figures who had now stood up, clearly alert and swords already drawn. Lexa was the only one without a weapon, staring at the running girl curiously, clearly having recognized Clarke from a distance already.
Before Clarke reached her and the rest of her party, a flock of birds decided to abandon a nearby tree. The sudden rustling of wings, accompanied with their loud cries was enough to divert Clarke’s attention towards them for a second. While seeing the ascending birds was nothing out of ordinary, the sudden flash within the trees at the nearby hill was. Granted, it could’ve been anything, but given the circumstances the only thing that the blonde could think about was a reflection. A reflection from either a sniper scope or binoculars, no doubt already aimed at Lexa.
Refocusing her attention in front of her, she felt her heart skip a beat and her mind cloud with fear. It was faint, but she was sure she saw the red dot just above Lexa’s stomach, closing in on her heart.
The aforementioned Commander had her mouth open, no doubt trying to shed light on the sudden and noisy appearance of the blonde, but there wasn’t time for warnings anymore. Without thinking, or slowing down, she closed the remaining distance between herself and the confused Commander, tackling her to the ground. As they collided, the crippling pain near her shoulder and the distant noise echoing in the woods around them told her she had been just in time.
Another giant flock of birds ascended to the skies screeching, but before Clarke could process that, or anything else for that matter, she felt her head come into contact with something solid, effectively knocking her out.
~*~
Lexa jolted awake with a gasp, when a muffled groan sounded from the bed next to her - her bed. She was crouched down next to the disoriented woman trying to get up within seconds, gently holding her down.
“Calm down Clarke, you shouldn’t try and get up yet. You’re head injury was quite severe, your mother told me you had a confussion, though I don’t know what that means exactly,” she said, trying to sound as quiet and normal as possible. She couldn’t help the slight crack of her voice when saying the blonde’s name, but hoped she wouldn’t pick up on it in her current state.
“Concussion,” Clarke croaked, her voice rough from the lack of use.
“Hmh?” the other woman asked, her eyebrow raising in confusion.
“It’s called a concussion,” the blonde mumbled with a groan, finally opening her eyes. “I’ll explain it to you later.”
Lexa couldn’t help a small smile; it seemed Clarke was more or less okay after all, despite her mother’s grim predictions the day before.
She removed her hands after a few minutes, finally allowing the blonde to sit up. Clarke closed her eyes for a moment, rubbing her temple and quietly grunting now and then, all the while Lexa eyed her curiously. After a while the woman in question let her hand flop down on her side and opened her eyes, gazing intently back at her.
After what seemed like an eternity, Clarke broke the silence with a sound barely above a whisper: “You’re alive.” It was a statement, yet it felt more like a question to Lexa, so she nodded slowly, eliciting a relieved sigh from the blonde, which Lexa found amusing - she was crouching right next to the bed after all.
A sudden wince brought the brunette back to the present; Clarke had finally noticed the sling on her left arm. Lexa was told by her healers, and Clarke’s distraught mother, that the bullet had gone straight through with minimal damage. It would still prevent Clarke from using her hand for a while, but all things considered she had been incredibly lucky. Both of them had.
Clarke was very quiet for a while, carefully examining her injured arm and the bandages covering it. It seemed she remembered what had happened, since she didn’t ask Lexa about it. Another wince ensued as she tried to move it again, obviously failing. The blonde huffed dejectedly giving the arm one last look, before refocusing her eyes on Lexa.
“How long was I out?” she asked. “Have you heard anything from Bellamy? Did he make it?”
“He radioed in yesterday, he and the mechanic have been working on disabling the fog ever since. Or so I’ve been told,” Lexa said absentmindedly.
Clarke looked extremely confused for a moment, opening her mouth to say something, but obviously deciding against it a moment later.
She repeated the same motions a few times, before Lexa saw fit to break the awkward silence: “I’m feel like my generals are starting to think that I’m losing my grip,” Lexa said. Her expression was quite serious, yet her tone had a hint of playfulness, which judging by the blonde’s expression confused Clarke to no end.
“What do you mean? Did something happen while I was out? Are you okay?” Clarke gushed, her voice laced with concern.
Lexa was silent, averting her eyes. She had no idea why she had just said that. She felt the slightest hints of a blush creeping on her face, hoping the war paint she still had on covered it.
Out of the corners of her eyes she could see the blonde examining her carefully, eyes flicking from the smudged warpaint and bloodstains on her face to the cuts and dirt on her clothes and armor.
When she finally allowed her eyes to focus on Clarke again, she saw the flash of realization in her eyes.
“Wait, did you…?” Clarke started, but seemed to lose her nerve and fell silent again, eyes still focused on Lexa, filled with an odd combination of confusion and amusement.
Lexa knew that hoping the blonde wouldn’t have picked on her prolonged stay by her side for the past two days had been pointless - Clarke was a lot of things, but stupid was definitely not one of them.
Clarke seemed to have regained her nerve during the short moment it took Lexa to mentally scold herself.
“Were you here all the time I was out?” she asked, fidgeting with her uninjured hand nervously. “Like sitting there, next to me and.. you know.”
Lexa knew she should just ignore it and change the subject, or better yet just flat out deny it. Instead she found herself once again lowering her eyes, suddenly feeling like Clarke’s eyes were the Sun and staring into them for too long would burn her own.
“Wait, really? I mean I was just guessing because I thought that…” the blonde muttered, more to herself. “But I mean... really?”
Clarke had come to the conclusion Lexa had dreaded, yet paradoxically still wished for. Her silence obviously being more revealing than anything she could’ve said.
Shit.
Silence filled the room, with Lexa too busy inspecting the floor to say anything and Clarke trying to process all the new information. Just as Lexa was about to try and salvage the situation, the blonde completely derailed her train of thought.
“Aww, that’s so sweet.” The sickeningly affectionate tone the blonde used was obviously just to get a rise out of Lexa, in which it succeeded.
Yet another wave of embarrassment flooded over Lexa, this time accompanied by annoyance. She raised her eyes, finding herself staring at the most infuriatingly sweet smirk she could imagine.
“I am not sweet,” Lexa challenged, trying her hardest to steel her voice and fight the faint, but persistent blush on her cheeks. “I am many things; ferocious, intimidating and strong. But definitely not sweet.”
“Yeah sure, ferocious like a tiny kitty,” Clarke retorted with a snicker.
Lexa was completely thrown off by the obnoxious response; none of her people would ever had dared to speak to her like this. They would’ve already been dead at this point. Yet she found that while the Commander part of her was obviously insulted by this mockery, the other part of her, the human part she tried to smother as best she could, was mostly just amused by the playful exchange. Delighted even.
No, I do not enjoy this. I am the Commander for crying out loud. She has insulted me and I need to show her that this is unacceptable. And I am NOT sweet!
Lexa closed whatever small distance there was between the two of them, going for dramatic effect. Clarke didn’t seem phased by this sudden change, if anything her eyes suddenly had a mischievous glint in them, surprising Lexa once again. Ignoring her bewilderment to the best of her ability, she reached for her most menacing look, preparing to show the other girl her place.
“Don’t you dare mock me. You may be the leader of the Sky People, but I…”
Before she could finish her sentence, she was interrupted by Clarke: “Oh just shut up already.”
If this wasn’t enough to completely throw her off all over again, the sudden sensation of the aforementioned blonde’s lips on hers was.
~*~
The more this conversation progressed, the more surprised Clarke was of her own sudden bravery. Of course it could’ve just been a side effect from the painkillers or whatever she had been given during the last few days, but right now she didn’t really care. As Lexa closed the distance between them, and went on the defensive once again, Clarke suddenly had an idea. An extremely, incredibly stupid idea. But she didn’t give herself enough time to overanalyze for once, throwing all caution to the wind and interrupting the Commander.
“Oh just shut up already,” she uttered while crashing her lips against Lexa’s, hoping against hope that this would not end in her public execution. But then again in her current mindset the risks seemed worth the reward.
She felt Lexa’s whole body tense like a bowstring, and for a second Clarke thought the brunette would snap. She knew her idea had been idiotic, if not downright suicidal and as much as she hated it, she began to pull back slowly, wishing that her saving Lexa’s life twice now would be taken into consideration in the following moments.
But before she could pull back enough to even see the other woman’s face, undoubtedly twisted with anger and confusion, she felt a hand snake its way to her neck, pulling her back. And suddenly she was kissing Lexa again, only this time she was actually being kissed back, very eagerly too.
Her mind went blank for a moment, but eventually she reciprocated the kiss. Lexa’s tongue was tracing her lower lip, begging for entrance, and after the slightest moment of hesitation, Clarke granted it. As Lexa’s tongue explored her mouth, hungrily clashing with her own, Clarke couldn’t help but release a muffled moan. The hand that wasn’t already clutching her neck was tangling itself in her hair, driving her crazy.
She deepened the kiss, latching onto Lexa’s waist with her uninjured arm and holding for dear life. The sling was making the sudden embrace slightly uncomfortable, but she really didn’t care for the slightest. After what felt like hours, but was likely no more than a few minutes, she had to break the kiss, gasping for air. She rested her forehead against Lexa’s, with the only functioning part of her brain hoping that this wasn’t a dream. The brunette’s warm, intoxicating breath on her lips was making it nearly impossible to think straight.
The only thing breaking the sudden silence was the rhythmic panting of both women. Clarke’s mind was working on overdrive trying to process everything that had just happened, and she wouldn’t have been surprised if it would have actually been making an audible sound.
Lexa’s face was flushed, but she didn’t seem the slightest bit angry or annoyed anymore, unless the devious smirk on her face meant something else Clarke was accustomed to. Finally she calmed down enough to be able to form something other than whines or moans.
“So that was uhm… I…” Clarke managed to stammer, before Lexa interrupted her.
“I think we would be better off with you following your own advice, and just,” she said with a gaze that was bordering on predatory, “shutting up,” she finished with a whisper.
Before she could fully process what the brunette had said, much less form an actual coherent response, she found herself lying on the bed again. After some further examination, she also found that she was currently being straddled, her uninjured arm tightly locked above her head. She felt Lexa slowly intertwine their fingers, and gulped loudly enough to be heard back at Camp Jaha, or so it seemed to her. The sudden pressure on the lower part of her stomach felt sinfully good, sending a surge of pleasure all over her body.
Lexa’s lips were back on hers in no time, sending her pulse up to amounts she was sure would cause a heart attack. Lexa’s other hand was once again tangled in her hair, and the slight tugs the hard grip caused sent shivers down her spine.
As much as she didn’t want to, she needed to stop this before it… went any further. Just the thought of what that might entail made her shiver and her skin feel like it was on fire, but she needed some time. This was not something she wanted to rush into and potentially screw up. Yeah, they definitely needed to talk.
She was just about to pull back, when she was distracted with Lexa roughly biting down on her bottom lip. Before she could stop herself, a desperate whine escaped her lips. The deep, almost animalistic growl that followed from Lexa was almost enough to make her forget anything and everything, but she gathered whatever willpower she had left and reluctantly broke the kiss once again.
“L-Lexa wait.” was all she managed in her current state, getting lost in the green eyes staring back at her. They had softened from the predatory look before, though the lust was still clearly visible. Her gaze was like a drug, euphoric and addictive, but with enormous effort Clarke managed to blink a few times and catch her previous train of thought.
“Maybe we should uhm… slow down just a bit. I uhm… I really don’t want to rush this you know.” she started timidly. “I mean as long as you’re okay with there being something here to uhm… rush.” she finished, fighting hard to control her wildly beating heart. Her lips were bruised and still burning from the contact and she wanted nothing more than to just grab Lexa and reunite them with hers. But she needed to control herself, she needed time to figure things out first. The rest would come later, or so she hoped.
Maybe the peace wouldn’t be her salvation after all. Maybe, just maybe, she had found it already. And that’s when the realization hit her, forcing a smile on her face - she saw the colors again.
~*~
Lexa was quiet for a long time, her eyes searching Clarke’s face for any signs of regret or discomfort. When she found none, she finally spoke: “I think you are right, Clarke of the Sky People.” She found herself getting lost into the pools of blue staring back at her nervously, reminding her of the vast oceans that surrounded her woods. “After all, it would be preferable that you have both hands available for the next part,” she finished with a lewd smirk adorning her face.
And then she did something she hadn’t done in a long time, and smiled at Clarke. Really smiled, nothing like the detached grins or smirks she used around her own people, but a real, happy smile. Because at the moment, that’s what she felt - happiness. And she wasn’t sure if that made her a weaker leader, but that was something she really couldn’t find herself caring about right now. She and Clarke would figure out a way to deal with it all eventually. That, she was absolutely sure of.