You've Been Blaked

[blake]

Octavia Blake

---

I don't want to survive. I want to live.

---

The Blakes were hunting. Seeking out some good fun while also looking for food to take back--and explore the woods more. They had been apart for about 20 minutes, thought sometimes yelling to check in on each other. The Blakes were not the same people they were a year ago, or even when they had first landed. They trusted each other to be able to handle themselves out n the woods alone. Bellamy trusted her. That was powerful for her. When they had first landed, he had not,--or at least had tried to overly protect her. From the world, from the other kids, from herself--now he let her go, and let her be who she was. And she loved him for that.

O saw a clearing up ahead and walked through it, coming to a stop on the edge of something she'd never seen before. It looked like something from an old book she read--a playground. It was over grown and errie looking. Stepping closer she heard something--faint but there. As she approached the sewsaw, she looked under it, expecting to see an injured animal from the faint, sounds coming from under it--however what she saw made her step back.

It was a baby! "BELL!" She yelled, knowing he was within shouting distance! Moving forward she picked up the infant, quickly, noting that it was naked, and freezing! No wonder the cries were faint! The baby was dying! Setting it down, she unzipped her coat, and then pulled it inside, before wrapping the edges around the baby to share her warmth with . . . . with him. It was a boy! A naked infant! O didn't know how to guess ages but it was small! "Be-Bell!" She called again, but could hear him moving closer to her. Once he entered the clearly she stood up and turned to face him, looking shocked and confused. "It's a boy." She told him, her tone displaying everything he could read on her face.

[Bellamy Blake]

Tag: blake

whatever

THE HELL WE WANT

Whenever Bellamy went outside the gates with someone and they were paired off -- whether it was scouting or gathering -- he often told the other to stay within shouting distance. This time, he and his sister were indeed within that range but they had remained separated. There was no luck with animals here, otherwise the shouting back and forth would have been completely counter productive. But he wasn't overly worried about Octavia. He knew she could handle herself, and her voice filling the air every so often reassured him of that. It wasn't until he heard the evident change in tone that he rushed toward her. Something had happened.

When he saw her she was holding something that she had shrouded with her jacket. Leaving her without one. Instictively -- before even addressing what she was holding -- he pulled his jacket off, and wrapped it around her when he was near enough to do so. She then pointed out that it was a boy and that was when he fully realized just what she was cradling. He reached forward to tuck back one of the lapels from Octavia's jacket that was providing warmth for the baby to get a better look at it.

"How long was I gone for?" He questioned sarcastically, the shock of what she held in her arms numbing all else -- though he made no show of it. "The mother must be out here somewhere," he stated, starting to look around their surroundings for her. How far could she be? That was only one of the questions he had. The baby was clearly a grounder one . . . what if this was some sort of trap. Bellamy's guard was as raised as ever as he started scanning the area.

[blake]

Octavia Blake

---

I don't want to survive. I want to live.

---

Bellamy came toward her and pulled off his coat to put on her. She would have told him not too but she was distracted until she felt the warm around her. "How long was I gone for?" She looked up at him in a sarcastic glare, "Funny!" Though the shock of the baby meant that she wasn't going to tell him that it was more likely to be one of his. "The mother must be out here somewhere," O reached in the coat and touched the baby to see if it was gettign warm, and it was but not enough. SHe needed to put her coat back on and try to share body heat with the baby.

The baby touched her hand, wrapping it's fingers around her's and O felt her heart swell. She felt herself angry that it was here alone, and the need to protect it come over her. "Wanna take a look around?" She asked, moving to sit the baby down on the ground and tossing him his coat back--though apart of her LOVED that he had given it too her, because she knew he would not have done it for just anyone. The she pulled her coat QUICKLY on, and the baby inside the coat to make her body the the heat source. It was then she noticed on it grasped at her shirt. Hungry. Oh shit. O went to move the hand away but paused, noticing something else for the first time. "Wait, Bell . . . don't bother. She'd not here." THIS was the part about the grounder culture she didn't like. This was the thing she could never respect.

"They left him here to die." O looked up from the baby, her face serious. "Look at his hands." They were webbed, and some of the skin sticking together more then just webs. "When a baby is born like this they don't accept them." Her tone wasn't approving, but more forlorn. She hated that this had happened to this baby---and she wasn't going to let it die! "We need to head back. He's hungry and needs warmth." And she was going to give it too him!

[Bellamy Blake]

Tag: blake

whatever

THE HELL WE WANT

Bellamy stood, watching her. The sight of Octavia holding a baby such an unfamiliar one. It made his heart warm, in a strange sort of way. He wasn't sure if she would ever want children, but the fact that she had found someone to be with . . . found the love of a partner. Able to build a future with that person . . . and thus, having the option of having children . . . well, it wasn't something Bellamy ever thought she'd be able to have. They had kept her contained in their apartment for her own protection, but what sort of future could it truly offer her? A hell of a sheltered one that was for sure. With all the devastation the ground had had on everyone, he couldn't lie about the freedom it offered her. Was the pain she endured worth it? He didn't know. But in this moment, seeing her hold that child . . . it was impossible not to feel something.

Her question broke him out of this trance as he gave a short nod, turning to start searching for the mother of the child, fully prepared for the parent to be hostile toward them. Maybe she was injured. Maybe she was unconscious. Maybe she was--"Wait Bell . . . don't bother. She's not here." Bellamy turned back around and headed toward Octavia. Her words caused curiosity to flicker on his features as she spoke of them leaving the baby here to die. How did she know that? But he didn't have to voice the question because she elaborated. His eyes complied with her words, falling to look at the baby's hands. He hadn't know the laws of the Grounders, of how they would reject a child that they didn't deem as normal. It made Bellamy clench his jaw, a surge of anger at the rejection of such an innocent being. Condemned for something that could not control. "Sounds familiar," he said in a low voice. The Ark had its own way of rejecting and condemning the innocent . . . Grounders did too. And it was a part of both cultures that he could never accept or condone.

It was also why he didn't reject Octavia's words of taking the baby back. Bellamy had a soft spot for babies, for children. How could they just leave it out here? He believed his sister, as she had a more extensive knowledge of Grounder culture than her. Bellamy raised his head, looking around them one more time. The difficulty of raising a baby was going to be immense . . . but it hardly needed to be considered when the alternative was leaving it here to die. "Wrap him up tightly," he conceded. "Hold him against you," he further instructed, gently moving Octavia's arms that held the child closer so that it was nestled against her chest. Though her instincts showed that she knew what she was doing in regards to cradling the baby. "Let's go then. We better hurry." Traveling with a baby was going to take longer than not. "Let me know when you get tired, O," he further offered, also aware that holding a baby for lengthy periods of time -- especially when not unused to it -- could tire ones arms. Thus, he could take over when she did.

[blake]

Octavia Blake

---

I don't want to survive. I want to live.

---

She could tell Bellamy didn't like it, and for once she wasn't going to defend this. She didn't like it either. Bellamy told her to wrap up the baby, and hold it close to her, and O let him help her move the babe into position. "I'm not tired, I can run back." She told him, not understanding the needs of the baby at first, but after a moment she understood. Or so she thought she did. He was worried it would make the baby sick? If she bounced it from running, or if she fell? "I wont drop him."

it was then O relised how much Bell knew--and why. "You've done this before." She acknowledged. With her as the baby. That was one thing that O could never understand. How hard it had to be for a six year old to do what he did. She could say she knew but she didn't. The say way he 'knew' it was hard for her to stay in that room for 16 years, but really didn't. They could understand, because they were their to watch, but they didn't fully understand. "Where you scared?" When he had do do everything for her. She felt scared, but mostly because she didn't want to mess this up. She wanted to protect the baby the way the Bellamy had her. This was her chance to give something back.

She wanted to keep him.

[Bellamy Blake]

Tag: blake

whatever

THE HELL WE WANT

Octavia assured him that she wasn't tired, and that she wouldn't drop the baby. "I know you won't," he told her, having every confidence in her. He had no doubts about her in that, for protecting a child seemed to be in the Blake nature. "But your arms might get tired," he explained. And since there was two of them, there was no need for one to overly exert themselves when they could take turns. As they started to head back, Octavia acknowledged that Bellamy had done this before. He had. When a hell of a lot had been at stake. She then asked him if he was scared, and he figured that there was no need to lie about this.

No need to sugar coat it. He look at her with a faint smirk, though there was nothing amusing about the circumstances on the Ark when she had been born. "Damn terrified," he admitted, turning his head back forward. He knew then, at six years old, that if he failed in any way from the responsibility that his mother put on him . . . that it would cost the life of his family. Of everything. "I remember holding you for the first time," he said, thinking back to that day as if it was yesterday, his gaze looking at the path ahead of them. "Mom told me that you were my sister, my responsibility." Words that had stuck with him, words that he had lived by. "When you were starting to cry, I've never been more scared in my life." 

Of failing. Of someone hearing her. He hadn't the slightest idea how to quiet her before instinct took over. Who knew there was such thing as fraternal instinct. He turned to look at her again for a moment. "That's when I promised you, I wouldn't let anything bad happen to you." But he had. To her and their mother. He would never forgive himself for that, but would spend the rest of his life making up for it. He turned his head straight ahead once more. "And changing your diapers was always one hell of a delight," he added on teasingly, trying to lighten the mood a bit rather than dwell in the fears and loss that they had both suffered.