OUT OF MIND² ━━ Bellamy Blake

𝐕: Eclipse

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ECLIPSE

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          THE SUN SEETHES over the dirt-brown misery of Arkadia.

     The January skies somehow scream with heat, heat that is almost suffocating the moment Lyra has slipped back inside the gate. She's done what she apparently does best, slipping into the outside world and making a temporary home for herself in the thickest thicket of the forests. She wouldn't have been able to sleep in Arkadia last night, anyways. Not with Bellamy in lockup.

She comes back just before dawn, twilight lingering overhead. By the time the skies are smeared with the reds and oranges of the blazing sunrise, she finds Kane, Abby, and her dad. She also finds the new, bitter truth; Pike is gone, along with his firing squadron. No, not Pike ━━ Chancellor Pike. He'd won the election and thus him and Farm Station are no longer in lockup.

     And no one has seen him or his people since. Bellamy is missing, too.

     That is, until now.

     The Arkadia gates rattle open and the sheer lack of hope attacks Lyra at full force. The firing squad emerges into view, moving with almost violent synchrony as they straggle back through the gates. Their bodies are striped with filthied Arkadia insignia as they carry their rifles. Nausea begins to bleed up into Lyra's throat as she takes in Bellamy's ragged appearance, his molten countenance, his bronze skin that is stained a calloused, ugly red.

     "Bellamy," she walks towards him slowly, hesitantly. He is covered in blood. "Are you OK?"

    "I'm fine." His voice is low. His face is sullen, downcast, unnaturally pale. Lyra knows at once that he is seeing ghosts.

     Octavia jogs towards them, looking uneasy. "What happened out there?"

This time he does not answer. An almost grieving look comes upon his features as he ducks his eyes low to the ground. Then he turns and continues on his way wordlessly, trudging towards Alpha Station.

Exchanging an unnerved glance with Octavia, Lyra fights the urge to demand Bellamy for an answer.

     Pike is the last to emerge from the gate. Unlike Bellamy, his head is held high and when Lyra catches sight of his teeth, she is unnerved to see that they gleam crimson. "Lock it up!"

     The grating silence presses onwards as Noah and Costa start to crank the gates shut. There are a few scattered murmurs here and there as the crowd begins to grow, and Lyra's fingers start to twitch restlessly. The need to know what had transpired while she'd left is overwhelming, and yet strangely enough her relief comes in the form of Pike. The newly anointed Chancellor leaps upon a tumbledown pile of crates and addresses his people for the first time:

     "Everybody, listen up!" The Chancellor calls from his makeshift platform. "24 hours ago, you elected me your Chancellor. Every action I've taken since and every action I will take will be to achieve one sacred goal: the creation of a self-sustaining, prosperous, and safe Arkadia."