Blame it on the Rain

Summary: After talking to Jaha, Bellamy starts avoiding Clarke in camp and sets on an unforeseen chain of events that force him to rethink what direction he's going in.

Set post S01E8, cannon until then, whatever the hell I want after that point.

There just wasn't enough fighting in my other story, Either/Or, so when this idea came to me, the opportunity to write them sparring was too much to resist. I have chapters 1-3 written and 4 is half done, still working on how to write the ending I want.

Chapter 1

"You've been avoiding me," Clarke said without preamble, a thread of annoyance in her tone as she stepped out of the rain into the tent that was Bellamy's headquarters. Her expression was one of guarded neutrality, the seriousness in her eyes trained on Bellamy, even as she wiped away the moisture from her forehead, her blonde hair curling around her shoulders, soaking the shoulders of her jacket.

Miller, Liza, Derek and a few others looked from Clarke to Bellamy, then back again before exiting the tent, not needing more than two seconds to decide that they'd rather face the icy cold than the awkwardness and tension between their two leaders.

"I'm not avoiding you, Princess, just busy. This camp doesn't run itself," Bellamy dismissed her with an imperious glance then returned his attention to the maps on the table before him.

"You've been avoiding me, so let's just get it out in the open, deal with it and get back to normal," she said resolutely.

"There is no 'it' and there is no 'normal' here, Princess."

She leveled a hard look at him. He always had to make things so difficult. "Look, Bellamy, just tell me. What did I do? Or not do? Let's get it out of the way, people are starting to notice." She'd thought they'd turned a corner, earned enough trust in each other to avoid these pointless conversations where he played the role of imperious leader and she played the role of bleeding heart humanitarian after the trip to the FEMA shelter, the confrontation with Dax, Bellamy's emotional reaction to killing the boy, all culminating in Clarke convincing Bellamy to talk to Jaha, and convincing Jaha to pardon Bellamy.

He ignored her and Clarke gritted her teeth together. "You're wrong you know. There is a normal. The sun rises, we get up and try to eke out a life here, the sun goes down and those of us who survived the day try to get some rest to get up and start all over again the next day."

He shook his head. "That's what I'm doing. Trying to keep us alive. As you keep harping on, we need to store up a significant amount of food for the winter, that won't happen by standing around talking," he said dismissively and swept past her. "The sun doesn't shine here every day, Princess, and it's only going to get harder to hunt as the weather gets worse."

Clarke reached out and grabbed his arm. She knew she couldn't stop him by force, but she hoped he would stop nonetheless. "Bellamy... if I did something..." She looked up at him steadily, but he avoided her gaze, only glancing at her with annoyance before looking towards the tent flap. "Bellamy... if I did something... or said something…"

"You didn't do anything. No, that's wrong, you do a lot for the camp." He shored up his resolve and looked her in the eye. "There's no problem, Clarke, we're both just busy. So get back to work and stop trying to create trouble where there is none. God knows we have enough already. Now get back to the drop ship and try to stay dry, the lat thing we need is you getting sick," he said, pausing only long enough for to get the words out then exiting the tent, the flap falling back into place, leaving her alone.

Clarke frowned. Something was wrong, she knew it. She felt it. And she'd learned to trust her instincts in the weeks they'd spent on Earth. Who to trust, who not to trust. (Even after her mistake with Finn.) Who could be counted as an ally, and who to avoid.

The problem was Bellamy was harder to read than most, and she was only able to lead with Bellamy's support, the class divisions on the Ark having created ingrained prejudice and dislike against her. With the rift between them growing, Clark wasn't sure how much longer she'd have enough clout in camp to be effective as their second leader and their healer.

Some of the distrust and dislike aimed at her might not be fair, stemming from the class disparities on the Ark that she had no control over and no hand in creating, but she still had to deal with it. She tried to content herself that it wasn't about her. However, she was self aware enough to know that some people just didn't like her- her attitude, her butting into situations they felt she had no business involving herself in, or just how she spoke or looked.

That hurt a bit more, but Clarke was too busy doing things to spend time and effort on making people like her. She had learned to think more before she spoke since they had crash landed on the ground and some of her words had caused unnecessary problems.

He was doing a good job, had been for awhile now, but it had been there coming together as co-leaders that had stabilized the camp and swung them away from chaos and towards an organized society that had a chance at survival. Clarke didn't like it, but she was a realist (though Bellamy would probably call her an idealist) and she knew she needed Bellamy's support to get things done.

Case and point, she needed to go get more seaweed. She was worried that the plant would die at the first cold snap which could come any day if the Old Farmer's Almanac that Finn had found on one of his excursions was reliable after the nuclear holocaust that had reshaped the continent and the world. She'd been trying to get one of Bellamy's security team to go with her for the last two days.

They'd made it a rule, one of the few that the camp had, no one went outside the gate alone and no one ventured away from camp without a gun. Since Bellamy's people had the guns, she'd tried to get one of them to accompany her, but she'd been rebuffed.

Miller and Derek had ignored her no matter how many times she asked. Connor had said he was busy. Liza had told her no and shoved past her. Jones had told her to ask Bellamy first. (But of course she couldn't find Bellamy to ask him, since he had been avoiding her no matter how much he denied it.) Myles and Monroe had been the night shift on the fence and were sleeping making Drew was her last chance, and she hadn't been willing to take no for an answer.

She'd tracked him down in the forest just outside of camp, cutting down logs to reinforce the fence. He'd denied her request, but she'd kept at him, trying to make him see how important it was. When that failed she'd gotten in his way, trying to stop him from walking away from her.

"Just give me two hours. That's all it will take," she pleaded, hating that she sounded desperate.

"I said no, now get the fuck back to camp."

"Drew, listen, we need it. What if someone gets hurt? I won't be able to stop infections."

She could admit she had misjudged. She put herself in his path when he'd tried to barrel past her. She'd been overconfident. She was used to standing up to Bellamy, getting in his way with words and her body, when necessary, to make her point. He'd never hurt her. But Drew didn't stop to avoid her, just knocked her out of his way, sending her tumbling onto a ragged tree stump before falling to the ground. He'd paused, but hadn't offered to help her up or inquired if she was hurt, just marched away to another tree.

She'd picked herself up and gone back to her work, trying to put the miserable day behind her. The next morning as soon as she'd checked on her current patients, she'd gone to find Bellamy. His people had never liked her, but feeling free to knock her around was a serious deterioration of the status quo.

Bellamy could fix it with a word, but he wouldn't. Either he was as busy as he'd said, or his people were carrying out his will. Or both. Clarke had no idea what she had done to upset Bellamy. They'd gone to the FEMA bunker together. She'd thought they'd had a breakthrough of sorts in their partnership. Agreeing on bringing guns back to camp. Fighting off Dax's attack. She'd asked him to come back to camp with her, said she needed him, and he'd come.

Despite his belief that as soon as any of the Ark populous came down he was dead, he'd come back. Knowing that his fears were a real possibility, and not willing to let that threat hang over his head, Clarke had gone to bat for him with Jaha. But the very next day, Bellamy had started giving her the cold shoulder.

Maybe he'd gotten what he wanted from her, and now he didn't have to pay lip service to listening to her. She'd convinced the Chancellor, a man she'd known her whole life and had considered family until he'd floated her father and locked her up, to pardon Bellamy for attempted murder. Bellamy was a strategic thinker, he would have considered all the angles.

Clarke exited the command center tent, idly wrapping an arm around her middle, feeling the soreness that had set in from her fall the previous day. Looking around the camp she assessed her options.

She didn't even know half of their names. It hadn't seemed worth it to extend herself to get to know people who only glared at her or ignored her. She'd meet them all eventually, once they got hurt and needed her help.

Monty would go with her if she asked, but she knew he was busy working with Raven trying to amplify the electricity from the drop ship's solar panels and battery. Jasper was still afraid to leave camp and would be jumpy the whole time, and frankly he might be more of a liability if the Grounders did show up. Finn was laid up, healing from his stab wound. Octavia still wasn't talking to her (or Bellamy or Raven) because they'd hurt the Grounder she believed had saved her life.

Clarke's musing were cut short when she heard Emily shout her name. A few inches shorter than Clarke, she was only 15 years old and had been locked up for murder at the tender age of 13. Emily had been reluctant to talk about it, but eventually she'd opened up to Clarke. According to her, she'd been raped by one of the guards on the Ark and had stabbed him to death while he'd gotten dressed afterwards. The Council hadn't believed her and had locked her up until her 18th birthday, but instead they had sent her to Earth.

Clarke was inclined to believe the girl. Emily didn't like being touched and was afraid of men. She'd slept in the trees their first week on the ground, trying to make sure no one snuck up on her. Eventually she'd taken up a spot in Clarke's tent, and had volunteered to work for Clarke in the medbay (such as it was) rather than be assigned to gather food and firewood outside the fence with the others.

Clarke entered the drop ship to find a large guy she didn't know with blood covering his forearm. Emily was cowering in the back corner of the area designated for medical treatments and supplies. "Emily, can you get the alcohol ready," Clarke asked, looking at the cut quickly. "What's your name?"

"Who gives a fuck what my name is, just fix it, bitch."

Clarke's mouth tightened into a straight line, but she didn't respond to the surly male. Getting the container of clean water she kept filled at all times, she poured it over the cut, trying to clean away any debris. When Emily brought over the container of alcohol that Jasper had brewed up extra strong for medical purposes, Clarke used it to sterilize her hands, then probed the cut carefully. "You'll need some stitches," she declared.

"No shit. If that is an example of your medical expertise, we're all fucked."

Stifling her own retort, Clark doused a bandage with the alcohol. "This will hurt," she warned before swiping the cloth over her patient's cut.

He cursed jumping to his feet and jerked his arm upwards and away from her, pushing her back in the process. Clark was startled by the violent reaction but moved towards him again, the rag with the disinfectant held out before her. "I need to-"

She never finished explaining that the disinfectant would reduce the chance of infection, because her patient backhanded her, sending her stumbling backwards and to the side, feeling the startling burst of pain radiate through her jaw then recede to a dull ache. Emily made a high pitched noise more like a fearful small animal than a human and stood as still as she could several feet behind Clarke.

The boy glared at Clarke and grabbing several of the bandages from where she'd set them for wrapping his wound, stormed out of the drop ship. Clarke turned to Emily, rolling her jaw side to side to ease the pain. Emily started to shake until it was full blown tremors. Clarke approached her slowly, speaking softly. "Hey, it's OK, it barely hurt. I'm fine," Clarke lied, running her hands gently over the frightened girl's arms. "You're safe here."

Emily sank to her heels, hugging her skinny legs to her chest, her eyes wide with terror. "No one is safe here. We're all going to die."

Clarke dropped to her knees before her, trying to convey reassurance through her steady gaze. "We're working on preventing that, Em. You just have to hang in there. We'll take care of each other."

"I thought... I thought you were safe. You're from Phoenix. You're important. Bellamy... likes you," Emily forced out through chattering teeth.

"Bellamy respects me," Clarke corrected, wondering if she was lying again.

-The 100-

Once she had gotten Emily settled down, tucking her away at the top of the drop ship to 'help' Raven and Monty, Clarke packed her bag. She needed to get out of camp and she needed more seaweed. The asshole who had hit her would likely be back with an infected wound, and they were already running low from the amount she'd used on Jasper, Finn and a few others who had sustained more serious injuries working around camp or gotten caught up in Grounder traps.

The argument for never leaving camp alone, and never venturing very far without a gun, was protection. But Clarke didn't need any more proof that she was not protected inside the camp or by their defense team. She would be safer on her own at this point, and she really needed the time alone to calm down and regain her equilibrium. Anger and frustration built inside her until she was ready to scream, but it was the acrid taste of fear in the back of her throat that really upset her.

The safety of the camp had always been relative, but Clarke no longer felt safe there. She just felt alone.

Glancing up at the sky and seeing that the rain was likely over for the day, she gathered her pack and fell in step behind a group that was heading out to gather the logs Drew and Derek were cutting in the forest. Clark followed until she was out of sight of the Bellamy's people on guard duty. Veering away from the group, she headed towards the stream where the water pooled, providing the right environment for the seaweed to grow.

She hadn't been in the forest alone after that first day when she'd ventured off to find a vantage point and discovered that they had landed way off course. She knew Earth was dangerous, but it was also beautiful, achingly beautiful. The trees, the smells, even the feel of the ground below her feet that the leaves of the various plants she stopped to inspect called to her. This was their home. Earth.

She knew she'd never return to space again. She would live or die here, on the ground.

As she walked her thoughts quieted, but it wasn't peace that swept over her, but a soul deep grief.

She'd made the first trip to the stream with Finn and Wells, and the memories made her throat ache with unshed tears. Finn had lied to her. A lie of omission, but a lie nonetheless. He'd made her party to hurting Raven, a girl that Clarke respected deeply even though they'd just met. Clarke understood that he'd thought Raven was lost to him, but from the first moment she'd met him on the drop ship, he had pursued her, and never given any indication that he was already involved with someone else.

And Wells. Her best friend had lied to her to protect her from a worse truth. She'd been horrible to him, punishing him for betraying her, causing her father's death, even after he followed her on the suicide mission to Earth and just when she'd learned the truth he'd been killed. He'd been a constant in her life before she'd been confined. Born only a few months apart, they'd grown up together, their parents' friendship naturally extending to them.

They'd run through the halls of Phoenix together, studied together, and been there for each other through childhood heartbreaks. Their friendship had survived Wells' changing feelings for her, and Clarke had held Wells' hand and let him cry on her shoulder while his mother's health rapidly deteriorated after her diagnosis with cancer. She'd thought they would always have each other's backs, until the day her father was executed and Wells let her believe he was responsible.

She'd been busy since his death, going from crisis to crisis with Bellamy and Finn, able to push back the anguish of losing her best friend, possibly her only real friend on the ground. But now, with her ribs and jaw throbbing, alone in the forest, the tears came. For Wells. For home. For Charlotte, Atom and Finn. For her father. For her mother's betrayal. For herself. Because it was very, very clear to her that she was alone.

A quote from a celebrated Earth writer skittered through her mind. 'Love all, trust a few, do wrong to none.' Clarke's parents had raised her to be open, trusting, helpful, and giving. But down here, alone, she had to be smart. Her mother's last words to her on the Ark rang in her ears. "Your instincts will tell you to take care of everybody else first, just like your father, but be careful. I can't lose you too." Abby must have known that beyond the radiation and unknown conditions on the ground, that The 100 were dangerous all by themselves.

Another quote, from a very different Earth writer was more appropriate to her current situation. 'The trust of the innocent is the liar's most useful tool.'

Words 3199

-The 100—