THE UGLY TRUTH

In the end all it took was one look and a few muffled cries to annihilate the beautiful lie between them.

She came to him in a cave after a cold day full of tough calls and a major battle fall.

Packed into the deep cavern, the rest of their people sprawled out in differing stages of sleep, some tossing and turning, some stifling sniffles, others snoring soundly.

Bellamy was lying awake on his back in a small alcove slightly away from the main chamber, his hands behind his head, shirt stretched tight across his chest.

Habitually, his eyes and ears were attuned to every hint of movement, every small sound elicited in the hugely hollow space where they all hid from the horrors of the world outside.

But despite his hyper-vigilance, Bellamy was startled when Clarke suddenly stood above him, her golden hair glowing in the dim light of the dying fire.

Perhaps it was the unfamiliar look of unadulterated desire impressed upon her painfully familiar features that frightened him.

Or maybe it was the escalating ache in his core that before that look, had been easy enough to ignore.

He drew his hands from the back of his head, propped himself onto his elbows and started to speak, but Clarke dropped to her knees beside his thigh and placed a finger to her lips.

Silence, she gestured.

She fanned her other hand out on his chest between his pecs and gently pushed down until he was flat on his back again, before sliding one leg over to straddle his hips and unbutton his pants.

"Clarke… this is a bad idea," he beat out breathlessly, frantically grabbing her wrist.

"Stop me then," she whispered without emotion, but her eyes betrayed her.

Just give me this… please Bellamy, her piercing blues beseeched him.

"You want me…don't you?" she leant daringly near and huffed harshly and heated into his ear, tilting her pelvis forward faintly to graze against his growing erection.

Not like this, he groaned internally.

"Yess…" he hissed instead.

There was no use resisting. He would give her what she wanted, because that was who he was and she knew it. She needed him and he would do anything for her, even if it meant destroying himself and the carefully constructed charade they had sustained all this time on earth.

But if he was going to do this, he was taking control, so he rolled them over.

He desired nothing more than to see her breasts in the flesh and to kiss her lips long and lazily but they stayed clothed, clung close and kept quiet so as not to bare their consensual sin to the rest of the cave.

Clarke refused to let him linger on her lips, wrenching her mouth away when he became too immersed in the moment and shoving his head down to her chest.

He bit his frustration into the slip of skin between her shoulder and neck, grinning as she shuddered beneath him.

Once he had unclasped her bra, he palmed her breasts beneath her top as his mouth manipulated her nipples through the thin material, leaving warm wet patches that her hard pink peaks rubbed against involuntarily after his lips had left.

She writhed under his touch.

Nuzzling her shirt up with his head, Bellamy nipped at the supple skin of her stomach and followed his teeth with soft sucking kisses as he trailed lower and lower, the curls of his long hair tickling her in his tracks. His hands dragged down the side of her ribs and hips to the hem of her pants where he hovered, pausing to take in her face.

Clarke's eyes were open, glaring intently at the earthen ceiling above them.

She looked tense.

"Breathe," he muttered, the warm air of his words washing over the top of her pubic mound.

She gasped and clenched a fist to her lips, her hips capitulating to him, one hand hooked in his hair.

Bellamy took advantage of her momentary surrender and opened his mouth around her swollen nib, his chin nudging gently into the hot, moist mess between her legs.

He grunted at her wetness soaking through the fabric of her leggings and his vocal appreciation buzzed against her clit, causing her to buck into him.

Reluctantly he removed his mouth to furiously tug her pants down, the sight of her golden curls sending tremors to his dick.

But Clarke was quick.

She pulled him up by his hair – his eyes scrunching in a wince.

"Bellamy… that's too much. I just want you… inside me," she instructed abruptly.

"Patience princess," he growled, but her insistency was infuriatingly arousing, and whilst he had intended to drag this out to give whatever it was the justice it deserved, he hadn't anticipated the effect she was having on him.

"No - now!" She breathed harshly.

It had never been like this for him.

Sex was usually fun and flirtatious, soft and sensual, sometimes hard and fast. He had always exercised control, at least until those last few seconds. He had always been purposefully present and aware of his partner's pleasure.

This was irrepressible and unpredictable. Every time his lips or the tips of his fingers connected with Clarke's skin, he felt like a flare igniting, and soon after, dying. He had never felt so unstable and yet so oddly steady all at the same time.

So when he entered her, just like she ordered, he wasn't surprised to find that he was already dangerously close to blowing his mind.

The last thing he wanted was to let everything they had built be brought down without emblazoning her with a crown, but he recognised in her eyes that she didn't want to be revered – she wanted to be ruined.

She wanted it to be ugly and base – callous and impassive.

Like the things she had done.

The things they had done.

Bellamy knew this, because he had thought the same things too.

So, if she wanted to punish herself by detaching from everything meaningful in her life, then he would give that to her, but he wouldn't let her do it alone. Together they would raze all that was good and real and reliable about their relationship to the ground.

But he would do it on his terms. He would make her see that he believed that what they had was worth burning, because after this they would never be the same again.

He may never get the chance to show her that there was beauty in being broken and that the pain was a part of them.

And you couldn't just fuck it away.

He should know.

So for her, he went slow - unbearably so.

He tried to catch her eye as he drove into her bit by bit, drawing his dick out and back in again with delicious deliberation.

But Clarke continued to stare at the cold stone above them. When he leant close to put his lips on her, he felt her body go rigid.

Something wasn't right.

He knew he was taking it too tenderly when all she wanted was his roughness – his rawness,

"Bellamy stop… please."

He reeled backwards, afraid that he'd hurt her, and she pushed her heels into his upper thighs, pulling her hips away from him until he slid out, hard and slick.

"Just… fuck me," she demanded calmly turning over onto all fours.

He wasn't allowed to care. They weren't allowed to connect. This was just sex.

Behind her Bellamy sighed in resignation.

Clarke bucked her backside against him and he leant in close, until the smooth, hot skin of his upper thighs and pelvis pressed against her cheeks. His dick bobbed beneath her. He placed his open palm on her ribs just below the curve of her breast and guided the top of her torso up, until she was kneeling with both hands braced firmly on the wall in front of them.

A weak whimper escaped her lips as he entered her from behind, the vertical slant of him sliding delightfully against that perfect place inside. She shuddered around him as he continued to penetrate her shallowly, teasing the spot. He had one hand over her breast and one on her hip, half controlling and half supporting her as he thrust up.

It soon became clear, however, that it wasn't going to work for him like this. He couldn't see her face, couldn't feel her skin warm against him, couldn't reconcile their sins. In a last ditch effort he thrust frantically before falling against her back, his arms reaching over the top of hers to the cavern wall for support, his head dropping, beaten, into the crook of her shoulder.

He couldn't even give her this.

"I can't… I can't do it Clarke," he choked, pulling out. "Not like this."

With his head buried in her neck, he felt that the hollow of her collarbone was wet. Cupping her jaw in his hands Bellamy gently guided her eyes to his and found them filled with tears.

"I'm sorry," she rasped desperately, wrenching her gaze away from him in disgrace. "I shouldn't have put this on you," she fumbled for her pants, trying to pull them up from her calves while she knelt in the dirt. "I knew you wouldn't refuse… and I used that." She stopped, shuddering between sobs. "I used you - just like I used all of them."

Clarke collapsed onto the hard cave floor, lost in a world of grief and defeat.

Bellamy knew from the beginning that this was not just about the two of them. It was about today's battle – it was about all of their battles. All of the shitty decisions they'd had to make since setting down on earth. The lives they'd taken and those they had lost.

"Clarke - you don't get to own this. I made my choice. And so did those people out there on the field today."

"I gave you no choice," she sniffled. "I used your self-sacrifice against you. I knew you would give me what I wanted, even if it meant destroying the one good thing we had left."

To Bellamy's surprise he smiled, reaching out to caress her upper arms. He shifted closer until their thighs were pressed together, and ducked, so that their foreheads rested against each other.

"There is always a choice," he whispered with conviction. Then, trailing his hands up and over her shoulders to rest at the back of her neck, he softly kissed her eyelids shut, embracing her in to him, cradling her head to his chest and lifting her legs into his lap.

"Maybe what we had was burnt to the ground just now," he paused, squeezing her tighter as a cool draft drifted over them, reminding him how exposed they really were. "But I…"

Clarke looked up at him as he trailed off, the wetness of her cheeks shimmering in the low light of the fire, her eyes filled with uncertainty. For the first time in a long time, she looked vulnerable, and for some reason that made him feel at peace.

He raked a curl of hair behind her ear and tenderly pressed a kiss to her lips.

"…I still have hope."

Hope that they would rise from the ashes.

Maybe tonight had been a mistake.

They had razed each other to ruins and lay festering in the wreckage and the waste of what once was.

But now, there were no more secrets, no more lies, and no more carefully constructed pretences about who they were and what they meant to each other.

They needed each other - with a fervid, searing fury - a fury that could be destructive. But there was beauty in that ugly truth - beauty that could only brighten, now that they had broken each other open.

A/N:I started writing this wayyy back in early Season 3 when there was so much angst between these two. It's been sitting for a while because I wasn't sure where to go with it but finally found a way to end it. I wanted to challenge myself with three things -

* writing angst with a happy ending
* writing explicit sexual content
* completing a one-shot
All of this was hard to do. I'd love to hear what you felt about it, as it gives me so much joy to hear from your voices, and it helps me improve and write better stuff for you to read!

BTW - sorry about the "anti-climax," but it had to happen!

I've been a little silent on tumblr lately, cause I'm only up to S4 Ep 4 over here in Oz! But come say hi!