an: don't judge me. this is all i want for maya. not dead and bellamy's second.

Bellamy finds her sitting apart from the others, face barely lit by the roaring fire. She hadn't spoken much since the siege on Mount Weather, but Bellamy couldn't really fault her there. She'd helped so many people, fought hard and bravely, but so many lives had been lost, so many of her friends had died. Bellamy understood, knew how the crushing weight of guilt strangled your lungs until you could no longer even whisper. Grabbing a bowl of stew from the mess hall, he walked over to her dark, little corner and sat beside her.

"Here. I know it's not as good as what you're used to, but it's warm." Maya looked up, red eyes rimmed with dark circles, and took the bowl with a small nod of thanks. Bellamy pulled an apple from his pocket, and they ate in silence. Across the fire, Raven was running her hand up and down Clarke's arm in comfort. Outwardly, Clarke was impassive, her face neutral and stony. But Bellamy knew she was hurting, knew she was mourning those lost. She had been friends with Jasper, with so many of them…

Next to her, Octavia and Lincoln sat with their foreheads pressed together. Octavia knew those little displays of affection irked Indra, but not even the tough-as-nails warrior could fault her second for this, for wanting just a few moments of happiness with the man she loved. Love. The word made Bellamy's throat tighten, and he couldn't help the small smile that graced his lips as he watched his sister laugh.

Monty, Miller, and Harper sat a little distance from most of the other survivors. Miller's face was soft in the firelight, and sad as he rubbed Monty's back. Monty had been crying since the siege ended, eyes in a perpetual state of irritated puffiness. Harper sat with her head on his shoulder, eyes distant and empty. None of them spoke, lost in their little bubble.

"Y'know," Bellamy said, tossing his apple core to the side. "I watched my mother die."

Maya looked up, bowl of half-eaten stew balancing on her knees. She still didn't speak, but her dark eyes pressed him to keep talking.

"On the Ark, families were only allowed one child. Octavia was never supposed to be born; her entire existence was illegal. But my mother and I, we hid her for sixteen years." He paused, licking a stray pearl of apple juice from his thumb. "I thought she was going to die under that floor, old and wrinkly.

"But I was stupid and cocky, and I blew our cover. Octavia was locked away and our mom…"

Maya looked down, hair falling in front of her face, veiling the tears Bellamy knew were welling in her eyes. Sometimes, when Bellamy told this story, he cried, too. But he wasn't telling this story for himself, today; he was telling it for Maya.

"They floated her. I watched as her body was sucked out into space. My one consolation is that Octavia didn't see it, that she gets to remember our mother alive and…content." Bellamy leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. Next to him, Maya sniffled.

"I know it's kind of fucked up to think this, but if I hadn't…if I hadn't gotten my mother killed, if I hadn't gotten Octavia locked up, we probably wouldn't be here. She probably wouldn't be free."

Across the fire, Octavia laughed again, tucking her head under Lincoln's chin. Bellamy could tell Maya was watching them, remembering the people who would never have that because of the war.

"What I'm trying to say, is, when I got Octavia caught and my mother floated, when I shot a man to follow O down here, when I killed all those Grounders and all those guards in Mount Weather, it's because I was doing what I thought was right."

Next to him, Maya's body was shaking, silent sobs bubbling from her throat. He'd tried to keep his distant, tried to give her space, but Bellamy was nothing if not a big brother, so he wrapped an arm around her shoulder, letting her bury her face in his chest as she cried.

"You did what you thought was right, Maya. You save our people, you risked so much to help us. Your father was proud of you. Jasper was proud of you. It's not your fault they died."

"I-I should have saved them," Maya whispered, hands grasping at his shirt. "J-Jasper shouldn't have g-given me his bone marrow, w-we could have saved him i-if he hadn't insis-sisted."

"Maybe," Bellamy said, looking up at the stars. They were so small, so far, sparks of light in such a vast darkness. Somewhere up there, his mother's body floated, silent, still, alone. "But that was his decision. You can't let the guilt eat you alive. We owe it to the dead to keep on living."

With another shuddering breath, Maya let out a few deep, body-wracking sobs, arms wrapped tightly around Bellamy. Bellamy just stroked her hair, remembering when he did this for Octavia, for Raven, how he wanted to take every dead-eyed teenager in this camp and just rock them to sleep, take their demons from them. The light of the fire dimmed as the night dragged on. Raven led Clarke from the fire by the hand, and Miller and Harper helped Monty to his tent, the one he no longer shared with Jasper. Octavia and Lincoln stayed by the fire longer than most, but eventually retired to their own tent, smiles fading as the loneliness of night consumed the camp.

Eventually, only Bellamy and Maya remained, passed occasionally by the weary guards making their rounds. Maya's sobs had quieted, but she still sniffled and shuddered, and Bellamy let her. So few of her people had survived, had made it from the mountain. Her father had taken a bullet to the brain, had collapsed at her feet, eyes wide in fear. The boy she might have loved had, with his last breath, ordered that his bone marrow be transferred to her, so that she could see the sky. Clarke had done it herself, hands bloody and shaking, eyes still full of mistrust when she looked at the mountain girl. Maya had resisted, had screamed at Clarke to ignore Jasper, to save him; Bellamy had been the one to hold her still.

They stayed there until the faint light of dawn peeked over the trees. Bellamy led Maya to his tent – she didn't have a place in this camp, not yet, maybe not ever – and let her collapse on his bedroll. He sat next to her, watching her breathing evened out, as her eyes flickered closed. It wasn't until she smiled in her sleep, at peace, did Bellamy let himself nod off, head bowed against his chest.

It hadn't even been a week when Clarke had another fight with her mother. The Chancellor still seemed to be under the impression that she was in charge, that she held the power, and Clarke, who, side-by-side with Lexa, had led the army to Mount Weather, wasn't about to let her mother believe that delusion. Bellamy had missed most of the power struggle between the two while locked away in the mountain, but Octavia and Raven enjoyed filling him in on the details of the fights.

Now that the survivors from Mount Weather were back in camp, Chancellor Griffin wielded even less power than she had before. Many of the kids, who had only heard about Finn's death from the whispers of the older members of Camp Jaha, were wary of this new Clarke, but they still trusted Bellamy, and if Bellamy followed Clarke, then they did too. There were talks of a coup, of replacing one Chancellor Griffin with another. Some of the kids talked about leaving, about going back to the dropship, back to a place where they hadn't been considered second-class citizens. Some of them wanted Bellamy to lead them there, or to the sea, or to follow Jaha in his suicide mission to find the City of Light. There was so much talk, and only this was clear: things couldn't – wouldn't – stay the way they were.

Bellamy knew he should talk to Clarke about it, hold a meeting with her and Raven and Octavia, discuss their options, but he was honestly scared of what Clarke might choose. No option seemed like a good one, and while their current situation wasn't ideal, Bellamy was scared of what conflict might do to his people. He'd only just gotten them back.

As he patrolled camp, gun hanging lazily at his hip, Bellamy spotted Maya ducking behind a tent, his pack hanging off her shoulder. He followed quietly, like a hunter trying not to spook a doe. Peering around the tent edge, he saw Maya hurriedly stuffing rations and a blanket into the stolen pack, her flyaway hair pulled back in a messy braid.

"Going somewhere?" She jumped at the sound of his voice, dropping the pack. She shook her head, mouth opening and closing wordlessly.

"I-I-I was just-" Bellamy crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow at her. Maya sighed, head dropping. "Sorry for stealing your bag."

"I don't care about that," he said, moving a bit closer. "But where were you going to go?"

"Anywhere," Maya said, squaring her shoulders in a small gesture of defiance. "Anywhere that isn't here."

Bellamy looked her right in the eye, sighing. "And how long would you survive on your own? You literally had never seen a tree in your life before last week. Do you know how to hunt, or how to take shelter during a blizzard? Can you speak to Grounders, fight the ones who want you dead? Do you even know how to make a fire?"

Maya pressed her lips together and stared at the ground, as if she could will it to swallow Bellamy whole. "No," she whispered.

"I'm sorry, what was that?"

"No," she said, louder, more viciously. "No, I don't know how to do those things." Her fists clenched, hands shaking. "But it doesn't matter, because I'd rather die than be in a place where everyone hates me."

Bellamy let his arms drop. The hard edges of his face softened, and he smiled sadly. "I don't hate you."

"Well, you're the only one." Maya sat on the ground, staring out through the links in the electric fence. "Nobody trusts me. They think I could turn on them like I turned on my people."

Bellamy sat down beside her, placing his gun off to the side. "Trust is a luxury these days. The Grounders don't trust us. The poor don't trust the privileged. The council doesn't trust the delinquents. Half the camp doesn't trust Chancellor Griffin. The other half doesn't trust Clarke. Raven doesn't trust Lexa. Indra doesn't trust anyone. Kane trusts too much, and he's an idiot for it. People might not trust you, might think you'll sell them out first chance you get. But that's okay. They don't have to trust you, they just have to need you, until you earn their trust."

Maya let out a huff, then looked down at her hands. "Why would anyone need me? Like you said, I don't know anything about survival."

"I'll teach you, then," Bellamy said with a shrug. "I'll teach you everything I know about Earth, and then people will need you."

With an incredulous laugh, Maya asked, "Why would you do that for me?"

"Because I trust you," he replied, smiling softly. "I would be dead if it weren't for you."

With that he stood, grabbing his gun, and held out a hand. Maya took it cautiously and let him pull her to her feet. Together, they returned to throng of Sky People who had gathered to watch Clarke and her mother duke it out. Bellamy's pack lay forgotten by the fence.

In the end, about a hundred people left Camp Jaha, and made camp by the Dropship. He and Clarke had led them out of the gates, guns raised in case Abby tried to stop them. But she had let them through, face aged and sharp with grief. Octavia had returned to the remains of TonDC with Lincoln, but promised to stop by with the Grounder envoys once they had settled. Their peace treaty would have to be revised – though Clarke her mother were no longer speaking, Clarke would not wish war on those who had chosen to stay behind.

It was lucky she was knocking boots with the Lexa, or else the commander might have not been easily swayed to spare Camp Jaha.

Everything was hectic in those first few days, just as they had been when the dropship had first fallen to earth. Tents were assigned, rations were stored, a new wall was built. Bellamy watched as Monty and Miller set up a new still, ready to brew a new batch of moonshine. Raven limped around camp, yelling at Wick to set up radios here and store gunpowder there. Harper followed close behind Clarke, watching as she sorted their medical inventory and patched up minor injuries. Harper, like many of the survivors of the mountain, hadn't said much since returning. Bellamy thought it was fitting that she would want to help others heal, would want to learn everything Clarke could teach her about saving lives. Fox joined her sometimes, as did a few of the younger delinquents. They had all seen so much fighting, so much death; there was power in healing, and they saw that.

Even in the commotion, he didn't forget his promise to Maya. Every evening, after their chores for the day had been done, Bellamy would sit with her, showing her how to skin a rabbit or use flint to spark a fire. He had already sharpened a spear for her to practice with, and had borrowed some scrap metal from Raven's workshop to pull together a small knife for her to keep in her boot. Over their meals, he would explain the politics between the Grounder clans and the Sky People, would explain how to stay on Clarke's good side, would tell her how to differentiate jobi nuts from the non-hallucinogenic kind. In the mornings, before the rest of camp awoke, he would show her different self-defense moves, how to track prey without making noise, how to climb a tree. Maya went to bed each night looking worn and weary, but the smile she gave him as she left for her tent kept him from easing up on her training. Clarke watched them, sometimes, with a funny little smile on her face. Octavia thought it was hilarious.

"She's your Second!" She told him the first time she visited camp and saw him teaching Maya how to throw her spear. "You totally have a Second!"

Bellamy just laughed and slung his arm around O's shoulder. "That's just because the best one was taken."

"Please," Octavia said, grinning. "You would be my Second."

"Uh huh," Bellamy said, and only yelped a little when Octavia dug her fingers into the ticklish spot by his ribs. He pulled her into a headlock, messing up her braids, and let out a loud shout when she flipped him over her shoulder.

"Like I said: my Second," Octavia said with a smirk. Bellamy huffed in annoyance, but took the hand she offered him.

After O wandered off to talk to Monty and Harper, Bellamy sidled up to Maya, rubbing at his bruised tailbone. "Sisters…" he muttered with a mock darkness.

"Pain in your ass, huh?" Maya asked without looking up from the squirrel she was skinning. The corners of her lips twitched up, and she broke into a smile as Bellamy laughed.

"You could definitely say that." He sat down on the log next to her, watching as she worked. Maya, it turned out, was a quick study. It wouldn't be long before she didn't need his tutelage anymore.

"So I made a friend today," she said, eyes still glued to the dead squirrel.

"Really." Bellamy grinned, resisting the urge to ruffle her hair. "Who?"

"Mel. She and I were assigned to working on the smokehouse earlier, and we talked the whole time. She's really nice." Maya clearly was trying to play it cool, like friends were in abundance out in the wild, but he could tell she was very excited.

"That's great." Bellamy smiled, and took the knife from her as she stood to clean and hang the meat.

Maya nodded, preoccupied with her work. "She told me you saved her life, once. Scaled down a cliff, nearly died. Sounded pretty stupid to me."

Bellamy shrugged. "She needed help. Couldn't just leave her there to die."

"Of course not." Maya looked away from the squirrel, a small smile on her face. "But most people would have just thrown her a rope, not gone down themselves. Especially not after someone else had died trying."

"Is there a point to this?" Bellamy asked. She was doing that thing that Clarke did, where she tried to make him feel more special than he was. He was just a man trying to do what he thought was right; he wasn't some goddamn superhero.

Maya shrugged, and returned to her work. "Just thought it was neat, being Second to someone so cool."

Hanging his head, Bellamy let out a small chuckle. "You too, huh?"

"Octavia isn't very quiet," Maya said, finishing with the squirrel. "And she's not the first to say it."

"Who else? If it was Raven-"

"Actually, it was Clarke." Maya walked to the water bucket and washed the blood and guts from her hands. "She told me you were lucky to have such a dedicated Second."

There was a pause, then Bellamy clasped her shoulder with a smile. "I am lucky."

Maya beamed, and together they walked to the edge of camp, where Octavia was taste-testing Monty's latest batch of moonshine. The sun overhead shone brightly as it dipped behind the trees.

"Maya, where did your idiot go?" Clarke stormed into the tent, hands on her hips, Lexa right behind.

"My idiot?" Maya raised an eyebrow as she laced up her boots. "Bellamy?"

"Yes." Clarke had warmed up to Maya in the few months they'd been living at the dropship, and Lexa seemed to think she had a warrior's spirit. "He's disappeared."

"Why would I know where he is?" Maya asked, standing.

Clarke laughed a little, not unkindly. "Because you always do."

Maya couldn't actually argue this. "He mentioned something about visiting Octavia."

Brows furrowed, Clarke thought hard for a second, then sighed. "Right. O warned me today was coming up."

"What do you mean?" Lexa asked, hand resting at the small of Clarke's back.

"It's the anniversary," Maya guessed, gasping a little. "Of their mom…"

"Yeah," Clarke said with a nod. "I can't believe I forgot, Octavia told me about it weeks ago."

"You've been busy," Lexa told her, voice low. "You can't remember everything."

"But this is important," Clarke countered, pouting a little.

Maya left them to bicker, and strode right through the gates. Octavia had returned to camp an hour before, disappearing again with Lincoln, so Maya could very well assume Bellamy was on his own. Trekking softly through the forest, Maya approached the clearing that Bellamy took her to sometimes, whether to practice sparring or learn different kinds of plants.

And just as she thought, he was seated at the base of a tree, staring up at the sky absently. Without a word, Maya sat down beside him, toying with the torn hem of her shirt.

"Is Clarke looking for me?" He asked, voice hoarse.

"She was, until she remembered what day it was." Maya picked at a blade of grass, eyes trained forward. "I figured you might want to be alone, but what kind of Second would I be if I let you have privacy?"

Bellamy chuckled a little, voice watery. Overhead, a bird called out to its family. The summer was approaching, and life seemed to return to the forest. "I killed a boy here, once."

"Really?" Maya tried not to sound too interested, but failed. Bellamy didn't talk too much of the early days at the Dropship.

"He tried to kill me and Clarke. It still haunts me." Bellamy leaned his head back against the tree. "I've killed so many people."

Maya turned to face him, lips pressed tightly together. "You've saved a lot of people, too."

Bellamy laughed, and the sound was hollow to Maya's ears. "I know. But some days it doesn't feel like enough."

"You know," Maya said, voice soft. "A wise man once told me, 'You can't let the guilt eat you alive. We owe it to the dead to keep on living.'"

Bellamy closed his eyes, snorted at his own words. Maya scooted closer, and took one of his hands in her own.

"You're a good leader, Bellamy, a good person. We've all done things we regret. But you've done so much for me, for all of us. Don't forget that, okay?"

"You sound like Clarke," he said with a laugh. "She hasn't stolen you from me, has she?"

"As if," Maya countered, a silly grin on her face. "Besides, she always tells me I sound like you."

Bellamy looked up, eyes bright, a small smile forming. They sat like that until nightfall, grinning and laughing and healing. And if a new knife appeared at the foot of Maya's bed the next morning, sturdier and sharper than her old one, well, no one would argue she didn't deserve it.