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chapter five!
NOT A HERO
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━━━━━━ ◦ ❖ ◦ ━━━━━━

ARES SPENDS THE night thinking about his mother.

Jasper's frequent, drawn-out cries of pain chase any thought of slumber from his mind. It's the second day of enduring his anguished groans that cut through the serenity of the forest any time there's any bit of silence. He's come to cherish the few moments of quiet he manages to get throughout the day.

He doesn't know why he thinks of her. Maybe it's because he'd been staring at the ceiling of his tent for so long that he doesn't know what to do anymore, and his mind had eventually drifted to Elena Ortega's face. Or, at least, what he can remember of it. He has vague outlines— they share a similar facial structure and high cheekbones. Her shoulder-length dark hair was always braided back, and it somehow smelled like apples even though they couldn't afford many showers.

Ares mostly hears her voice. She'd liked to call him her "conejito," or little bunny, because of how restless he was as a child. He remembers how it would change tone when she'd teach him Spanish— like speaking it was the same as returning to an old home. She loved using it and tried to teach him as much as she could, incorporating the language into everything they did together.

"And when you have a niño of your own," she'd said, bopping him on the nose with the pad of her index finger, "you can teach them the language, too."

The last time he'd seen her, he'd been eight years old. He still remembers the day as clearly as if it had happened yesterday. A kid in his class had gotten sick, so the other children were dismissed to keep the infection from spreading. He'd walked the entire length of the Ark alone since his father wasn't there to pick him up yet.

It comes in flashes now. His key card swiping through the slot. The buzz of the door opening. Ares walking in, his eyes automatically drawn to something his eight-year-old eyes couldn't comprehend: there was his mother, tangled with a man who most certainly was not Castor Ortega. He couldn't do anything except cry in that moment. There was nothing else he could do— he may not have fully understood what was going on, but he was aware of the overpowering sense of wrongness that accompanied their actions. And his mother had scrambled over to him, running her hands over his cheeks soothingly and explaining things he couldn't comprehend.

A few hours later, she was gone, and it was almost as if she'd never existed.

Ares had been dimly aware of the fact that there had been a fight between his parents. He'd been sent on an unnecessary errand all the way on the other side of the Ark, and when he'd returned, his father was downing a bottle of liquor like it was the last bottle of water in a desert. And then the bottles never left.

Presently, his heart squeezes at the memory, the sensation so unexpectedly agonizing that he feels his eyes start to sting. A shuddering breath escapes his lips. A tear slips out, running down his temple and close to his ear before he quickly wipes it away.

Despite everything that had happened with his mother, he still considers himself more of a mama's boy. Every prior memory he has of her is positive, which is more than he can say of his father, a man destroyed by his grief. He doesn't know why this is affecting him so much all of a sudden. Part of him tries to rationalize it, saying it's the lack of sleep making him more sensitive to pain. Another part of him disagrees. He knows it's partially fear making him act this way; he hasn't seen his father since he was arrested a year and a half ago. Did he even care when he was convicted? Was he happy with the fact he had more rations to spend on booze?

The truth is, Ares has been lonely since the moment his eight-year-old self walked in on his mother. He's been floating in space with nothing to tether him. It's like he's one of the Ark's zero-g mechanics outside of the Ark, but there's no rope keeping him from drifting. He can't go back the way he came, either. He just keeps going farther, farther, farther...

Ares is just a kid who still needs his parents. Well, maybe he's not such a kid anymore. His birthday is tomorrow— his eighteenth birthday, to be exact. The day he would have been called into the Council room and had his case reviewed. The day of his inevitable floating, because the Council likes to only give the illusion of fairness. Verdicts are rarely overturned. In another life, this would have been his last twenty-four hours still breathing.

And what for? He finds himself asking this question more often these days. What contribution is he making here?

Ares rubs his watering eyes with the backs of his hands. Inhaling another trembling breath, he drops his arms back down and stares at the darkness above. Inhale through the nose. Forced exhale through the mouth. It doesn't ease the pain in his chest that feels eerily like heartburn, but it does soothe the lump blocking his throat. His chest shakes from the force of trying to block his sobs from escaping. And, just like that, the lump returns, threatening to choke him from the ache it brings.

Trapping his emotions inside is only making things worse. He opens the dam and releases his desperate hold on the floodgates, allowing his despair to wreak havoc on his body. The force of his silent sobs causes his chest to jerk almost violently. His face screws up, twisting and contorting into an expression of pure agony. Slapping a hand over his mouth to prevent any sound from escaping, he lets himself cry until there aren't any more tears to be shed. The corners of his eyes become raw from so much salt.

Exhausted, Ares calms down and closes his still-wet eyes. Falling asleep is easier this time. It's like he'd desperately needed to purge all of the pent-up anxiety and sadness inside of him before moving on with his life. He's used to a routine like this— you get upset, you cry, and you're able to move on. His body had needed to reset his emotions in order to reach equilibrium. Although he doesn't like crying in front of others, he doesn't take it as a sign of weakness. It's something the body needs to do.

He's grateful when the void sweeps him away.

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A series of frantic knocks on the flap of Ares' tent rudely awakes him. Disgruntled, he sits up, hair sticking up in every direction and a scowl on his face. The faceless silhouette on the outside has the audacity to start unzipping the entrance before he has the chance to blink the sleep from his eyes and tell them to stop.

A girl pops her face in. She has pale skin and red hair pulled back into a single braid that dangles over one shoulder, fear clouding her green eyes. That same fair skin reddens upon seeing him inside.

"Hi, sorry, I'm Laine," the girl says, even though he didn't ask for an introduction. "I'm looking for my friends Pascal and Trina— they went into the forest yesterday afternoon and I haven't seen them since. Have you noticed them?"

Ares, still confused from having just woken up, forces his tired and aching body into a sitting position. He tames his hair and rubs his eyes a bit before replying sourly, "I have no idea who those people are."

Laine's cheeks redden even further at the roughness of his voice from lack of use. "Um, Pascal is pretty tall, with light brown hair and a brown jacket on. Trina's short and wears her hair in a blond ponytail." She darts her gaze away from him and back again, seemingly gathering courage from his blank stare instead of backing away. "Please, they've been gone for a while and it's not like them to just — just disappear—"

"The descriptions you gave aren't very specific," Ares cuts in, causing her to redden again, but judging by the way her lips purse into a frown, it's out of anger instead of embarrassment this time. "But I'll keep an eye out for them."

Laine breathes a sigh of relief, cheeks fading to their normal color. "Thank you."

She exits, zipping the entrance to his tent back up as she does so. Ares finds himself almost glad she's gone. He's not sure how he'll look for these two kids among a hundred others, but maybe he'll try to do so if he remembers.

After all, he'd had to say that in order to get her to leave.

Upset at the awakening, he rolls over on his cot to hopefully get some more shut-eye before the day truly begins. He's just beginning to doze back off when an ear-piercing scream jolts him awake once more. He sits straight up in bed at the sound of Jasper's agonized cry. Curling his hand into a fist around his shirt, he wonders how beneficial it would be to just put the kid out of his misery himself. Everyone already thinks he's a psycho, anyway.

Ares' scowl twists his face as he gets himself ready to face the outside world. It mainly means patting his unruly curls down once more, yanking his new fingerless gloves onto his hands, and shrugging on his jacket. He almost misses having Nate here to crack a few jokes and get his exhausted mind working from the sheer brain power it usually takes to deal with his nonsensical taunting. Then he shakes his head. He loves having this tent to himself— he wouldn't trade it for the world.

He gives a jolt. It's September 17. Birthday. His birthday is today, making him eighteen, legally an adult in the eyes of the Ark and therefore the day he should have been floated for his crimes. But instead of being sucked into the vacuum of space, he's breathing the crisp air of Earth and feeling the gentle breeze caressing his face. This world, he supposes, is the best gift of all.

After consuming a quick breakfast of leftover panther meat, Ares is greeted with the sound of metal clanging against an unfamiliar source. He follows the sound to the edge of the forest and finds Blake and Murphy practicing their weaponry skills. Murphy throws his knife just as Jasper's strangled cry cuts through the air. Clearly distracted, the kid releases the blade too early and it bounces off of a tree harmlessly before falling to the ground.

"It's that damn kid, alright?" Murphy motions to the upper level of the dropship with a sneer on his face. "He's messing with my head."

"Or maybe you just suck." Ares slips a knife from his pocket and stands beside him, close enough to where Murphy has to take a step back in order to keep his balance.

He rotates his shoulders. Cracks his neck. Releases a slow breath. The injured boy's screams become muted until all he can hear is the steady thump of his own heartbeat, the rustling of leaves on the trees, and the heavy, angry breathing of Murphy behind him. Ares holds the handle just as the Underground had taught him: positioning his thumb over his other fingers, blade tilted toward him so he can cartwheel the knife in a spin. This is what he was meant to do.

The blade sings through the air upon his release. In a blink, it sinks into the rough bark of the target like it's butter. Ares straightens in satisfaction. Blake smirks. Murphy, clearly annoyed he'd gotten upstaged, kicks at the dirt.

"The kid's not gonna last much longer," Blake tells Murphy, adjusting his grip on the silver hatchet in his hand, "so think of a new excuse."

He rears his arm back and throws the weapon. It sticks its landing almost as well as Ares' had, embedding itself in the tree a few inches shy of his mark. It makes Ares wonder where he'd learned his skills. Had he really been a guard?

"We searched a half mile all directions," a boy Ares has never seen before reports, emerging from the brush without warning. He's tall, with black hair that seems to defy gravity with the way it sticks upward and away from his angular face. Judging from his appearance, he has to be close to turning eighteen as well. "No sign of Trina or Pascal."

Another kid trails behind him— Jones, he thinks he heard someone call the boy. He's thinner than the other kid, with dark skin and close-cropped brown hair. Although he tries to put on a brave front, Ares notices his left foot tapping irregularly against the mossy ground. A nervous tick.

"Visit your special tree while you were out there?" Murphy asks the black-haired boy. This is clearly meant to be an insult, judging by the mousey kid's swaggering walk as he goes to retrieve his fallen knife. Ares doesn't understand the jab.

"Atom took his punishment," Blake says with a twinge of annoyance. "Let it go."

"Could be Grounders," Atom suggests, steering the conversation back toward the missing couple.

"Yeah?" Murphy asks in the same snarky tone as before. "Or maybe they're in Pound Town. Lot of that going around recently."

Atom's jaw ticks as he directs his gaze toward his boots. Okay, so Atom must have been caught getting frisky with someone. But why get punished for it? Sex is a normal thing between teenagers, and it's bound to happen when there are nearly a hundred of them so close together all the time.

Wait a minute. A guess works its way into Ares' brain, causing him to flicker his gaze between Blake and Atom and assess the tension between them.

It's easy to figure out, then. Atom had made a move on Octavia.

Ares is relieved. Maybe that means her obvious interest in him has faded, setting him free from the flirtatious looks she's been giving him ever since they landed. Good. She deserves someone who actually reciprocates her romantic feelings.

He tunes back into his surroundings at Blake's call of, "Ortega!"

A blink and his knife is arching toward him handle-first. His quick reflexes allow him to catch it even though he wasn't prepared. In fact, he doesn't even register the movement of his hand shooting out until he feels the cool metal of the knife in his fist. He shoves it into his pocket without a thank-you.

Atom turns to where Blake is now standing by the tree, hatchet back in his grip. His gaze is darker now due to his frustration with Murphy's taunts. "Look, Bellamy. People are scared, and that dying kid? He's not helping the morale around here."

"Morale will go up when I bring them more food," Blake replies.

Ares scoffs. He doesn't have a lengthy speech to give this time— nothing to tell the people in order for them to calm down. No reason for them not to be scared.

Frightened people with no rules binding them? This will be a disaster.

"And what will we say when they ask about Trina and Pascal?" Jones asks.

"For now? Nothing." Blake slips his weapon into one of the belt loops in his jeans. "It's possible they're just lost. We'll keep an eye out for them when we go hunting later."

"Let's go kill something," Murphy muses, giving a longing glance upward at the dropship as another pained wail echoes throughout the camp.

Blake stops him before he can begin to follow the rest of them. "You're not going. I need you to stay here. The Grounders are circling, and we can't leave this place unprotected."

Ares barely suppresses another scoff. Protect them with what? Murphy's shitty knife-throwing skills?

"Fine." Murphy pulls his lips into a rueful grin, suggesting that everything is, in fact, not fine. "Somebody needs to tell Goggle Boy to keep it shut."

Blake eyes him warily before drifting his gaze to Ares. He lifts his chin in a nod of acknowledgment. "Ortega, wanna come? You obviously know your way with knives. Maybe you could teach my boys a few things."

Ares is so shocked by this offer that he forgets to respond for a moment. Even more so, he's surprised that Blake had asked him to go instead of ordering him around. Maybe he's finally realized that Ares isn't intimidated by him. He doesn't like to take orders from anyone.

"Why not?" he lifts his shoulders in a careless shrug that doesn't give away his momentary shock. "Your boys look like they could use all the help they can get, anyways."

Their hunting crew consists of six people— Blake, Ares, Jones, Atom, and two kids that Ares doesn't know. One of them has honey-blond hair, blue eyes, and a scatter of freckles across his nose. Despite his pretty-boy appearance, he proves to be decent with weapons. The other has shaggy brown hair that he has to flick out of his eyes every few seconds. It irks Ares to no end, tempting him to use his knife to give the boy a damn haircut. That long of locks could cost him his life in battle if he can't even see his opponent.

The blond one — Kiernan Adams, Ares thinks he'd introduced himself as — creeps alongside him, a makeshift knife clenched in his hand. A rookie mistake. He should be keeping the knife loose in his fingers right up until the point of release. However, Ares can't give him this tip because there's a boar nearby and they can't risk scaring it away.

"Shh— shh — shh," Blake whispers, cautiously stalking toward the wild animal with a hand out to keep anyone else from claiming his kill. "She's mine."

He twirls his hatchet in his right hand and takes another step forward. However, a snapping of tree branches to his left causes him to rapidly change direction and hurl the weapon that way. It embeds itself in a tree a foot away from a young girl's head. The startled boar makes a break for it, squealing as it runs away from them. It's too fast for even Ares to try and knock it down with a knife.

He sends a cold glare to the girl standing to his and Kiernan's left, unsure if he's more annoyed at her following them or the fact that he didn't realize she was following them. Of course she was silent enough up until when it actually mattered— that was the first real game they'd seen out in this forest.

The girl is maybe on the verge of becoming a teenager, with her blonde hair pulled back from her face in two tight braids that make her appear younger. Her frightened eyes stare at the weapon that had narrowly missed her and her shoulders are stiff from being noticed.

"Ortega!" Kiernan whisper-shouts, yanking him by the sleeve in a way that has his skin roiling. "Come on!"

He's right. Who cares about a stupid kid when their food is making an escape?

Ares turns around and bolts straight back without waiting for the blond boy to follow. He quickly assesses where the other hunters had gone, some carrying bulky weapons like handmade spears that are bound to slow them down. Sure enough, he passes Jones, who looks to be struggling with the thing.

The curly-haired boy cuts sharply to his right to avoid crashing into a cluster of trees. Grabbing onto the trunk of one at the edge, he uses it to swing his body around and propel him even faster with the added leverage. His heart is pounding in his chest. The Ark hadn't allowed for so much physical activity, so even though he's physically strong, running is definitely not his strong suit.

He catches sight of the squealing boar sprinting like hell away from its pursuers. Ares stops short upon realizing that it seems to be heading in a specific direction. Maybe it will lead them to something if they follow it closely.

Kiernan appears beside him, hair windswept and panting. They meet eyes. It takes Ares a moment to realize that the kid is waiting for instructions— instructions from him.

"Follow it," he orders, unused to the feeling of people wanting to listen to him. "It might be able to lead us straight back to its home and possibly others like it."

Kiernan nods, Jones and the shaggy-haired-kid copying the movement from across a small ditch that cleaves the land in two. The boar had gone down it. Their best bet is to stick to higher ground so they can see where they're going.

Ares goes first. He's not sure where Blake and Atom have gone, but for now, he doesn't care. He feels a surge of confidence for once. These people are listening to him. They trust that he knows what he's talking about. Although he doesn't particularly enjoy being their temporary leader, he doesn't mind not being cursed at.

Sure enough, the animal appears to be leading them somewhere, as evident when the ground levels out and they can see her moving with her sights set on something. Its path is deliberate and not randomly chosen. But just as Ares begins to actively enjoy the hunt, the thrill making him almost giddy with elation, his joy is cut off by a scream from behind.

"Rhett!" Jones cries, his voice cutting through the otherwise tranquil forest. Ares debates turning around. But then, just as he begins to consider continuing after the boar, the hairs on the nape of his neck prickle and stand straight up in alarm. Something is wrong.

He whirls around and gapes at what he sees. They're being chased by a thick, sulfuric cloud that's so dense and yellow that it swallows the trees and makes visibility beyond a few feet impossible. As it reaches him, his skin begins to itch. His eyes water until his vision is blurry. He sees the vague outline of Jones, of Kiernan, but the other kid is nowhere to be seen.

His screams chill Ares' very blood. They're the cries of a dying man, he realizes, a man not screaming from his wounds but begging for mercy.  He's heard that kind of cry before— and it was always met with the honorable mantra of the Underground: Swift as wind, dark as night. You have served us well. May you now find peace in your rest underground.

He notices Jones' hesitation. Although the fog is thickening around them, causing Ares to writhe in a futile attempt to rid his skin of the burning sensation racing across it. Tears begin to stream down his face in irritation. Whatever this fog is, it's poisonous. They have to leave. Now.

"Let him go!" Ares shouts, regretting speaking instantly. The fog rushes into his open mouth and seems to scratch at his very vocal cords. "Come on!"

He doesn't wait to see if they turn around before he starts running in the direction that the boar went. Come on, girl. Show us something good. And good she does. Ares stumbles across a series of caves that are carved into a large slab of rock that's high and thick enough to mean the caves are deep. It's not a sure shot, but they can't outrun this fog forever.

Ares wipes at his streaming eyes and picks the cave closest to him to enter. When that proves to be too treacherous, stalagmites poking out of the ground so profusely that walking is impossible. The next one is better. It's deep and fairly smooth, so dark he can't see the end of it. That fact should worry him, but he can't find it in him to care as Kiernan and Jones appear beside him.

"Where are Bellamy and Atom?" Kiernan questions nervously as the three of them duck into the dark cover of the cave.

"Doesn't matter," Ares replies, making Jones wince at his outright indifference to their whereabouts. "All we can think about is ourselves, or we're dead, got it?"

"Rhett is probably dead," Jones points out raggedly.

"Yeah," Ares agrees, "and we might be too if we keep yapping at the mouth of this cave and don't try to burrow into it."

Kiernan sets his jaw and shoves in front of them to lead the pack. His messy blond hair serves almost as a beacon of light for them. It's easy to keep track of him as they walk deeper into the cave, careful to avoid touching the walls in case something unpleasant is on them.

A familiar squeal causes them all to jump. Ares blindly flings a knife into the darkness, producing a wet and satisfying thunk that means he'd hit the boar. Gradually, her pained whimpers die down until they're met with silence.

"I wish I could see a damn thing," Kiernan grumbles lowly.

"At least we have something to bring back tomorrow." Ares shrugs, stepping into the shadows and taking tiny steps that are more like shuffles until the toe of his boot hits something soft. He reaches down and grazes his hand along the still-warm body of the animal. His heart stops at the unmistakable feeling of blood as he trails his hand across it, but forces his voice not to shake as he announces, "Boar's dead. We've got ourselves a meal, boys."

"How can you act so — so careless?" Jones bellows, causing Ares to turn in mild surprise. He can barely see either him or Kiernan in the lack of lighting. Even so, he can feel the boy's anger radiating off of him like a heat wave. "We left Rhett to die. That fog's probably what killed Trina and Pascal. We don't know where Bellamy and Atom are— they could be dead, too. Why don't you care?"

So much for having them trust him.

Maybe he should feel guilty. Maybe any normal person would, but Ares had been trained by the Underground to preserve his own life above others'. Ever since he was ten, he'd been told to leave a dying person behind if it meant saving his own hide. It's not a selfless thing to do, but he never said he was.

The thing that truly frightens him is not the fact that Rhett is dead, but the fact that Rhett is dead. The radiation from the last war must have fucked up the planet more than they realized, because he doesn't remember reading about a yellow, poisonous fog in Earth Skills.

Ares wipes the boar's blood onto the thigh of his jeans and stands up. He lets cool confidence exude from him to cover up the fact that his hands are still shaking, even sliding them into the pockets of his jacket to further obscure that fact. The truth is, he's very far from careless. It's obvious now that, although he's mystified by Earth, it's not always going to be so kind in return.

"Fear is your one-way ticket to hell, Jones," Ares informs him calmly. "Too much of it makes you useless. You need to learn to conquer it and temper what makes you afraid."

Another thing the Underground taught him. If only the leader, Klaus Silas, could see him now, though. How many times has he been rendered unresponsive from the feeling of blood on his hands? It's something he would be punished for in the club.

But Jones doesn't need to know that.

He continues when he's met with silence. "You wanna go back out there and rescue Rhett, go ahead. He probably has less of a chance than Jasper and you'd get yourself killed. But be my guest if you want to try."

The dark-skinned boy's lip curls— the movement only detectable because of how deathly still the rest of his body is. "Some hero you are, Ortega."

"I never said I was a hero. Did you miss the part where everyone calls me the psycho?"

Kiernan sighs, cutting through the tension between the two other boys like one of the knives on Ares' person. "Ortega is right, Jones. We can't go back out there— maybe we can go find him when the fog clears up and bury him."

Jones doesn't like the idea of it being two against one, but reason beats the urge to be self-sacrificing and he eventually plops down against the wall. So much for caring about whatever's on there. Ares wants to ask if the wall is dry or seems damp with moisture, but Jones would probably tell him to go to hell, so he simply keeps his mouth shut and reaches behind him to see for himself. The rock is rugged and threatens to slice his palm with its sharpness, but it's not wet.

Ares steers clear of the boar's carcass before feeling for a relatively smooth part of the wall to lean against. His arms cross over his chest as he stares at the floor, perfectly aware of the awkwardness swelling inside of the cave.

"I'll keep watch," he offers, eager to be rid of the stifling tension that threatens to choke him. "Someone needs to report when that fog clears up."

"Absolutely not," Jones fires back immediately. When both boys turn to look at him, one in surprise and the other in mild indignation, he shrugs. "What, you think we trust you, Ortega? How do we know you won't kill us in our sleep? After all, you were imprisoned for murder."

It takes all of Ares' willpower not to flinch at the last word. He doesn't correct the boy, not when trying to do so has already failed him so many times. It's better to let them believe it than exhaust himself trying to tell the truth.

"You're right," he says in response, clearly catching Jones by surprise in the way the smug smile falls from his lips. "I'm crazy. I'm off-the-wall. You'll never know what I'm going to do next. Stab someone? Snap their neck? Actually, why don't you tell me, since you've got me all figured out? Go on, Mister Expert on Ares Ortega. Please— I'm dying to know."

The tension between them crackles like electricity, making Kiernan rub the back of his neck uncomfortably due to Ares' outburst. Seemingly eager to act as the mediator between the two of them, he says to Jones, "Since you don't trust Ortega, take watch. You can clear your head. Plus, you two really need to be separated."

Jones gapes at the freckled boy, his appearance more vivid now that Ares' eyes have adjusted to the lack of light. He finally stands after a moment and begrudgingly moves toward the mouth of the cave. Hopefully he won't be stupid enough to go too close to it. If Ares cared enough, he'd warn him not to do so.

Once the dark-skinned boy is a safe distance away, Ares curses under his breath, "Qué cabrón."

Kiernan snorts. It takes Ares a moment to realize that he'd understood the insult, but it doesn't make him feel guilty for saying it aloud.

"Maybe," the blond boy agrees, "but only because he's lost a friend. I'm sorry for the way he treated you— it's not fair. You were right to tell us to leave him behind. I guess Earth is more messed up than we thought, huh?"

Ares blinks. Once. Twice. It takes three times for it to sink in that someone has just apologized to him, something he hasn't heard in so long that he wonders if his ears are playing tricks on him.

"I'm used to it," he says dismissively, partly because he doesn't really know what else to say. It's not okay and it's not fine— those responses are out of the question. He pauses a moment before asking, the question seeming to burst out of his mouth, "Why are you apologizing?"

Kiernan shrugs, messing with his fingers mindlessly. "I don't believe in judging people based on rumors that swirl around the Ark. After all, there was one about me that I got arrested for public nudity, which definitely isn't true, so..."

Ares finds a small grin working its way into his lips that disappears as quickly as it had come. Even so, curiosity makes him question, "What did you get arrested for?"

"Attacking a guard. He was harassing my friend Val and I couldn't take it anymore. Of course, he denied everything when faced with the Council, and I was charged with disorderly conduct for pounding his face in."

Ares isn't surprised. It's another classic example of those in power doing nothing but abuse it, and while he wants to believe that people can be better, it's hard when he's never seen it before. Even Clarke's family... her mother had looked at him like he'd been chewing gum stuck to the bottom of her shoe— something to be discarded. Thankfully, she doesn't seem to be like that. She'd patched up his nose, after all, but still.

Looking at Kiernan, he doesn't seem like the type to be capable of doing much damage to a trained guard. Then again, there does appear to be a sense of vitality behind his blue eyes that almost glow in the dimness of the cave. He probably shouldn't underestimate the kid. Even his knife skills are promising.

Instead of sympathizing with Kiernan, he decides to say, "When you're preparing to throw your knife, keep your grip loose up until you're about to release it and position your thumb on top of your other fingers. Right foot in front of left if you're right-handed, opposite if you're left."

The younger boy blinks, taken aback by his advice. "Oh... thanks, man."

Things are getting a little too friendly for Ares at this point, so he chooses to slide down the wall until his backside hits the floor. Nestling against the rock, he curls up in a fetal position to make himself as comfortable as he can for sleeping.

"Prepare for a long night. If Jones hasn't said anything, the fog's probably still there."

He closes his eyes before he can see Kiernan nod in response. Tucking his hands into the pockets of his jacket, he curls one hand around his knife before allowing himself to drift off.

Attacked by a sulfuric fog, losing half of their party, and being trapped inside a cave for the rest of the day so he can't see the beauty of nature. Some birthday.

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When Ares wakes, it's because Jones is shaking him. His eyes open to reveal the boy still scowling— he obviously hasn't forgiven him for choosing to leave Rhett behind. His gaze is stormy, making Ares wonder if Jones would have been content to leave him there to find their makeshift camp on his own.

Now that early morning light is filtering through the mouth of the cave, making it slightly brighter than before, the trio can actually see. They work together to wrap the boar in a section of tarp that Kiernan had been carrying to transport any game they'd hunted yesterday. Ares is immensely grateful when the blond boy offers to carry the animal first. He doesn't know what he would have done if they didn't have some sort of barrier between his skin and the blood still drying on its fur.

Jones picks up his spear from the front of the cave and guides them out, keeping his distance from Ares. He immediately sets off in the direction that they'd left Rhett. However, a distant shout causes them to stop in their tracks.

"Anybody out here?"

It's Blake. His voice isn't too close but also not that far, coming from their left and thus not the direction that Rhett's body likely lies. Jones hesitates a moment before responding, "We're here!"

They swiftly change course to follow the older man's voice, Kiernan breathing heavily as he struggles to carry the boar by himself.

"Hey, can you—"

Ares grabs one end of the tarp before the blond can finish his question. As soon as he bears some of the weight, he wonders how such a relatively thin boy could have carried the animal by himself even this far. She's heavy— easily more than a hundred pounds, and likely difficult to transport by the forearms like he'd been doing. Together, they heave it along after Jones as they walk closer to where Blake's voice had originated from.

He emerges from the tree with that damn kid in tow. His black curls are ruffled, navy blue jacket wrinkled like he'd slept on it. Even so, he seems almost relieved to see them walking toward him.

"Lost you in the stew," he says as he approaches. "Where'd you go?"

"Made it to a cave down there," Jones replies, motioning with his spear back the way they came. "The hell was that?"

"I don't know," Blake responds. His brown-eyed gaze sweeps over their group of three, then again, as if he doesn't want to believe what he sees. "Where are Atom and Rhett?"

Jones swallows. Kiernan averts his gaze. Ares is the only one who holds eye contact with Blake, guarding the emotions in his eyes so the man can't see through him.

"Ask Ortega," Jones spits.

Blake's eyebrows pinch as he examines the boy in question. Ares pulls his lips in a line, refusing to apologize like Jones likely wants him to. It may be partially his fault, yes, but Jones could have chosen to disobey him and try to get Rhett out himself, and yet he also chose to save his own life instead.

Blake breaks his stare and addresses Jones and Kiernan. "Where'd you lose Rhett?"

"'Bout a quarter of a mile that way." Kiernan takes one hand off of the tarp to point forward. "What about Atom?"

"We lost sight of him back toward camp, too. Maybe we'll..." A thick swallow. "Maybe we'll find him on our way back."

Ares is surprised to hear a hint of despondency in his voice. Up until now, he hasn't seen Blake give a shit about anyone except himself and his sister. But now there's a crease between his brows and sadness swimming in his eyes, something the younger boy thought he'd never see.

More of Blake's mask is slipping. Ares wonders when it will finally crack.

The girl with the blonde braids carries on ahead of them, picking through the uneven terrain much easier than Ares and Kiernan are. They stumble along, arms straining to carry the boar's dead weight that seems to grow heavier with every step. Not to mention that the tarp slides once their hands become slick with sweat, making it more difficult to get a solid grip. But if he'd managed to help carry a panther twice the length of this route, a wild pig shouldn't be much of a problem.

Twenty minutes later, Ares almost drops the tarp in surprise at a high-pitched, girlish scream that slices through the forest like a blade. Blake immediately sprints ahead of them to see what had made her cause such a commotion. Ares gathers his wits before easing back into the steady rhythm that he and Kiernan had established before the ruckus had made him break his concentration.

When they arrive on the crest of a ditch, they find the girl trembling as she stares at something in the middle of the dirt. The three boys crowd around her to find out what it is, leaving the boar lying in the tarp on the ground.

The sight is so gruesome that even Ares' breath hitches. It's Atom— or what he thinks is Atom. The boy's flesh is covered in angry red welts from the poisonous fog, lips bone-white as if the color had been leached out of them. His eyes are cloudy and covered with a milky film. As strangled, shallow breaths come through his mouth, Ares can see the blood staining his perfectly straight teeth.

One hell of a way to die.

Blake kneels beside his friend, positioning his ear near Atom's mouth to catch whatever it is he's muttering. Ares has read enough lips to know what it is. Kill me. Kill me.

Giving an enraged roar, Jones plants his hands on both of Ares' shoulders and shoves him backward with all of his might. The curly-haired boy goes tumbling down the slope of the ditch and nearly crashes into the boar. He's bewildered for a moment, sky and trees blending together as his head spins.

"You son of a bitch!" Jones cries furiously, seemingly not caring about a twelve-year-old kid listening in on every word they're saying. The boy sprints away, his voice fading the farther away he runs into the woods. "Rhett? Rhett!"

Ares pushes himself to a sitting position and shakes his head to clear it. Scowling at the pain of the bruises already on his back and his still-broken nose, he blinks through the ache and waits a moment before getting to his feet.

He supposes he can't blame Jones. If he'd had any friends as close as he'd seemed to be with Rhett, maybe he'd understand. But he doesn't. He doesn't know who he would have gone back for. If Blake had forced him to leave Nate behind, would he resent him for it? Even if it meant saving himself? He's not so sure.

Maybe that makes him a bit of a sociopath, but he really doesn't care.

He ignores Kiernan's look of concern and rejoins his side at the top of the ditch. The little girl is gone, but Blake has a knife in his hand that he's positive he didn't have before, and Clarke is there as well. She kneels on the opposite side of Atom as he coughs, begging them louder to end it. His face screws up in sheer agony at the blisters on his skin. Particularly on his neck, which is more welt than flesh.

"I heard screams," Clarke says quietly.

"Charlotte found him," Blake explains, voice ragged with emotion that makes Ares feel like he's intruding on a moment that he shouldn't be. "I sent her back to camp."

The blonde girl looks back down toward Atom and runs her gaze over him from head to toe. After a moment's hesitation, she flickers her eyes back up to Blake and shakes her head sadly. He can't be saved. Blake averts his own eyes and clenches his jaw before nodding in understanding.

Ares turns away, finally having seen enough. If Rhett looks anything close to this, Jones will flip his shit. He'll never be forgiven. Even though he knows he would have put his own life and the others' in danger by trying to save Rhett, part of him aches.

Does this make him a true murderer? Does this make him Rhett's second-hand killer? Sure, he'll have died from the fog, but he's the one who made the order to keep going.

But the others could have ignored it, a voice in his head reminds him, trying to chase away the — is that guilt? — rising in him.

Ares straightens. The voice is right. It's not his fault.

Clarke begins humming a soothing tune that's likely meant to distract Atom from his blinding pain. In a way, he wonders if she's stronger than him if she's the one doing the mercy kill. Ares doesn't want to find Rhett. He doesn't want to see that Jones was right and that he looks similar to Atom.

He doesn't want to... but he finds himself moving in that direction, anyway.

Ares treks through the forest until his watchful gaze snags on a boot sticking out from behind a tree. Stomach rising into his throat, he slows his pace until he's walking slowly toward the shoe. He couldn't move faster if he tried— it's like the soles of his own boots are stuck in tar.

But he makes it to the body even though his legs are shaking. Jones is standing over Rhett's body, the shaggy-haired boy's misty eyes staring blankly up at the treetops. His pale skin has been leached of its color and is covered with even more welts than Atom, which Ares didn't think was possible. Some of them have broken open and spill blood and puss onto the dirt. It seems that, unlike the other boy, he'd met his demise overnight.

Jones reaches down with a trembling hand and closes the boy's blind eyes. Then, seeming to notice Ares' presence, he snaps his head up to look at him with despair and rage simmering in his brown eyes. His bottom lip shakes, face screwing up into a hateful sneer as he hisses, "Leave."

Ares swallows, fighting nausea that overtakes him. "You'll need help transporting the body—"

"Leave!" Jones' voice rises to a shrill yell as he shoots to his feet. If Ares hadn't trained with the Underground, he would have jumped, but instead he merely stands still as the dark-skinned boy's hands curl into shaking fists at his sides.

Raising his hands in defeat, Ares retreats back the way he came. He can carry the boar instead.

It seems every time he tries to be better, it slaps him back in the face.

_______

a/n:

this author's note is a novel. please bear with me.

i honestly didn't realize how long this chapter was until i finished it, looked at the word count, and was like whaaaat??

i'm really glad i got to reveal more of ares' backstory in this chapter. it will be vital to a ... certain part in this story *cough cough* finn *cough* and raven. it also shows some of his childish innocence that still remains because he's a mama's boy even though she cheated on his father. his dynamic with his parents will change as the story goes on despite the fact they're not present!

also: who wants to throw ares a birthday party with me? the poor boy had such a rough introduction to adulthood.

another note: if you haven't checked the introduction recently, you may not have known that i actually added kiernan adams to my cast list! he's played by my son, froy gutierrez, who is also partly hispanic and is why he understood ares' insult to jones. catch them becoming bros because he's the water to ares' flame and is really easy to talk to!

i also cast ares' parents, finally!
alana de la garza as elena ortega
edgar ramirez as castor ortega

a final note: thank you so much for nearly 11k reads already!! i love y'all so much

TRANSLATIONS:

Conejito: little bunny

Niño: child

Qué cabrón: What a bastard

— kristyn

( word count: 7.8k )