Dedicated to celinekeaa for helping me sort this chapter out. I love you! ♡

The Poison Fog
SIX

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Aura was tending to the campfire when Bellamy approached her. "Hey, McKinley, how good are you with a knife?"

"I don't know Blake, maybe we should find a tin can to balance on your head and I'll aim a knife at it, hopefully my hand won't "accidentally" slip." She smiles sarcastically at him and goes back to what she was doing.

"Maybe we should start with the trees before aiming a knife at a live being." He placed a knife in her hand, one that was made from dropship metal, and started walking away expecting Aura to follow. "Come on Bambi we don't have all day." She huffed and started following him. Angrily throwing knives would do her some good, since she still has some leftover anger from her previous encounter with one Bellamy Blake.

After several hours of coaching from Bellamy, and several hours of Aurelia imagining Bellamy as the target, she was deemed ready for some actual hunting. Atom was unfortunate enough to end up witnessing the bickering between the two, and was more than happy when they decided to hunt for food.

After slowly treading around the forest for what felt like hours, they came across a black pig. Bellamy held out his arm, signaling the kill for himself, but just as he was about to throw his tomahawk, a rustle was heard from a different direction. Without hesitating, Bellamy changed the direction of his throw and aimed toward the sound that was heard. The blade hit a tree with a thud, but the sound was drowned out by the scream of a girl, whose head was mere inches away from being hit.

"Oh my god." Aura dropped her knife and ran towards the little girl who looked around 14, the same age she was when she was locked up on the Ark. Bellamy sighed in frustration when he saw that the swine had run away, and walked towards the two girls.

"Who the hell are you?" he asked, clearly not caring that the girl was shaking.

"Charlotte." she answers with a small voice, trembling while holding Aura's hand.

"I almost killed you! Why the hell aren't you back at camp?!"

"Bellamy!" Aura hissed. "Stop shouting at her! Poor girl is shaking."

"I couldn't sleep." the small girl said, answering Bellamy's question. "The guy is constantly screaming in there and I couldn't listen anymore."

"There are Grounders out here, you have to be careful." Atom was calmer with his words, careful to not scare the girl. "It's too dangerous for little girls like you."

"I'm not little!" the younger girl exclaimed.

Bellamy chuckles. "Okay you can join us, but you can't hunt without a weapon. He pulled out one of his knives and placed it in Charlotte's hands. "Ever kill something before?" She shook her head. "Who knows, maybe you're good at it." A smile lit up on Charlotte's face, which matched the one present on Bellamy's face.

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The group, including Charlotte, were trying to hunt again, when yellow fog started slowly rolling in. Atom who was closest to the fog, put out his hand to touch it, and hissed in pain. "Everyone get away from the fog! It burns!" he yells as he starts running away from the deadly substance and towards Bellamy, Charlotte and Aura. Bellamy grabs Charlotte's hand and sprints with Aura hot on his heels and Atom quite far behind her.

Weaving through the trees was proving to be a big problem when frantically running from danger. Suddenly there was a cry and a thud. When Aurelia turned around, she saw that Atom had fallen over, and finding it difficult to get up. She was close to running to help him when a hand wrapped around her wrist and tugged her, the hand belonging to Bellamy. "Aurelia we can't help him we have to go."

She tried to pull away from him. "Bellamy we can't leave him" her voice trembled as she tried to pull away again. He placed both his hands on her face and forced her to look at him.

"Aura listen to me. There's no helping him. If you try it'll be two bodies instead of one. Now come on!" He grabbed her wrist again and tugged, this time she didn't resist and ran with him, weaving between a few trees until they reached a cave. The two made their way deep into the cave, and found Charlotte curled up in a ball. Aura was taking deep breaths, trying to take in air that wasn't deadly.

"Are you ok Charlotte?" Aura asks the young girl who simply nodded in response. "We're probably going to stay here for a while, why don't you try and get some rest?" The small girl nodded again and lay on the floor, still curled up in a little ball. Aura took off her jacket and placed it on the young girl, hoping that she isn't too cold. Within a couple minutes, she heard steady breaths, indicating that Charlotte had fallen asleep. Aura smiled slightly and moved to sit next to Bellamy. "Well this is fun. Maybe we should get some sleep too."

"Yeah that's a good idea. We need you in good shape before we hunt again tomorrow." Aurelia rolled her eyes. Typical, they just ran from deadly people killing fog and he's already giving orders again. They both laid across the floor and tried to get comfortable, which was proving difficult for Aura since she had given up her jacket. She tossed and turned, trying to fall asleep, which was starting to get annoying for the Blake boy.

"Come here Aura." She looked at him wondering if she had heard him correctly.

"Pardon?" she asked to confirm what she heard.

"I said come here, I know you're cold. We can share body heat." She raised her eyebrows and shuffled towards him, but clearly that wasn't enough since he wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her even closer. She looked at him in surprise, and then laid her head against his chest.

"Since it seems like we're not falling asleep anytime soon, why don't you tell me why you were in the Sky Box in the first place." He asked, curious as to how she had ended up in such a place. Based on her temper and sass, she probably bad mouthed someone important or assaulted someone.

"It's going to sound really dumb. I mean technically I didn't even do anything, I just took the blame for someone else. One day I was just walking around the ark aimlessly not really doing anything, when I came across this boy stealing. I went to ask what he was doing but a guard came round and almost arrested him. He looked 18 and would have been floated instantly, so I took the blame instead. This was around the time I lost both my parents. I was so depressed that I took the blame, hoping to get floated eventually. You know, the weird part is, he wasn't even stealing anything normal, he was stealing girl's clothes."

Bellamy pulled back from her so fast he almost hit his head against the cave wall. "That was you?!" Aura stared at him in confusion. "Bambi that was me. I was stealing clothes for Octavia and got caught." Suddenly it all made sense to Aurelia.

"Oooh that would explain the 14 year old girl clothes. Huh. What are the odds."

"If you hadn't taken the blame, I most likely wouldn't be here. Not earth here, I mean alive. So uh." He hesitates. "Thank you."

"Don't look too much into it Blake, I was just doing it for my own benefit." she reasoned, her voice sounding significantly quieter than before.

"Shut up and accept my thanks McKinley." He tried to sound stern, but in reality he was trying to fight a smile and failing. When he heard no reply, he checked on her and saw that she had fallen asleep against his chest. He smiled again and pulled her closer to keep her warm. "Sweet dreams Bambi."

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Sudden screaming woke up the pair. Before Aura had time to react, Bellamy got up and rushed towards Charlotte who was thrashing around in her sleep. He gently held the girl's shoulders and shook her, trying to shake her awake. She woke up after a couple tries and looked around in fright, before visibly relaxing when she saw she was safe.

"Does that happen often?" Bellamy asked the girl quietly. The girl nodded slightly.

"Every night." she replied timidly.

"What are you scared of?" he questions, but he was only met with silence. "You know what.. it doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is what you do about it."

Charlotte looks at him confused. "But I'm asleep?"

"Fears are fears. Slay your demons while you're awake, and they can't get you while you're asleep."

"How?"

"In a place like this, you can't afford to be weak. Down here, weakness is death, fear is death. Let me see the knife I gave you." Charlotte carefully pulled out the knife from the pocket of her coat, and Bellamy wrapped his much larger hands around hers. "Now. When you're afraid, I want you to tightly hold onto that knife and say 'screw you, I'm not afraid'." He gently took his hands away, and nodded in encouragement.

"Screw you, I'm not afraid." Charlotte repeats with a trembling voice. Bellamy nods his head again, encouraging her to say it again. "Screw you, I'm not afraid!" This time her words radiated more confidence and Bellamy grinned at her.

"Slay your demons kid, then you'll be able to sleep."

During this whole interaction, Aurelia was staring at the boy in awe. She normally gets to see the annoying moron who likes to be right all the time, but for the first time she sees his much sweeter side, one which was typically reserved for his sister. Maybe he's not bad after all.

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Awww cuties I love Bellaura!
If you liked the chapter please vote or comment to let me know! I tend to be a silent reader myself but I genuinely have no idea how this book is doing so it would be a great help!

Thank you for reading if you are sticking with the book! I swear the later chapters are better.

A x