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It's not necessarily in the books that she's allowed to listen in on the conversations Kane and Abby have with those they've sent to go scout the woods and the areas nearby, but Raven thinks it's only fair that if she's the one fiddling with the radios, she gets to listen in.
She's been waiting for hours for him to walk right through her door. Around midnight she'd heard him radio in and speak to Kane, informing him they've found nothing at all, which is a good thing, and that his little group of scouters are returning in one piece. She had released a breath she hadn't realised she'd been holding for the good week he'd been gone, but ever since she'd let that tension seep from her, she's been anxious for him to return.
None of her radios and projects keep her mind busy. She wanders for a bit, becoming lost in fixing a radio and an earpiece, before she eventually thinks of him again. She doesn't sleep at all, keeping her head up and her ears as sharp as she can as she waits to hear his loud, yet confident, footsteps try and tiptoe toward her workstation door.
It's late in the evening she hears word over the radio, another voice crackling over it to inform the guard that they're coming and not to shoot, that she tries to bite back her smile when she hears him approaching her door two hours, thirty-three minutes and fifty-seven seconds later.
She hadn't been counting. It's not like Raven cares.
He always tries to be quiet, but even with her back turned to him, she can hear him. She can feel him, a powerful presence behind her. So soft and warm and safe. She spins on her work chair to face him. He's dressed in all black, much like the guard, but without his rifle strap weighing down his shoulder. He looks dirty, mud and grime caking his freckles. She pushes herself off her stool to grab a damp cloth, stepping around him as he approaches and looks at her inquisitively. "What —"
Turning around to step into him, she leans up and wipes his face hard with the damp rag, ensuring to get all the mud and dirt she can off his features so she can see him. After bopping his nose, Raven wipes at his cheek once more, uncovering his freckles and quickly skimming the apples of his cheeks to ensure they're all there.
He's smiling as she drops it onto the floor. "Hell —"
Curling her fingers around the bones of his shoulders, she lifts herself up the best she can on her good leg and slopes her mouth hard against his. Breathing him in, she wonders if she's extracted all his air, stealing it from his lungs to leave him as parched and desperate to breathe again as he had left her.
Pulling away, she smiles up at him as she leaves him as breathless as she should. His lips curve upward as he breathes out, "If this is the type of hello I'm going to get —"
"— You're not going out," she says, shaking her head. When he'd left, her voice had been tight and guarded, warning him if he's not to return with the rest of them, she'll raze the entire Earth and prove to them the first nuclear apocalypse won't be anything compared to what she can cook up. Now, it's softer and warmer, a laugh in her words as she thinks to slap his shoulder, "Don't even think about saying you're going to go scout some more if this is the way you're going to be greeted, Captain Blake."
He rolls his eyes, embarrassed. She can feel his hands snake their way onto her hips. They're sore from lugging herself around, but she finds his touch to be what she needs more than any therapy from Abby or suggestions of how to move better from Clarke. She's stretched and she's kept herself hydrated and, truthfully, Raven knows her body better than anyone who has been trained in reading them from books and cutting people open without any pain medication.
"I'm just a scout."
"And I'm just a mechanic," she says, arching her brow. She can feel his fingers grip at her shirt, as if he needs some sort of lifeline to remind him he's not out in the woods, looking for Grounders, preparing them for their inevitable attack. She's not so sure if they're going to come. She doesn't really care.
Looping her arms around his neck, she leans forward as she bites her bottom lip. "As much as I like hearing you talk …"
He scoffs in amusement. "As if you listen."
Raven gifts him a pointed look. With a roll of her eyes, her features smooth out and she continues once more, as if he hadn't chosen to interrupt her. "Sometimes I just like feeling you talk."
His brows crinkle as he looks down at her, smiling in amusement, "Feeling me —"
Raven purposefully sighs, feigning aggravation, and leans forward to slope her mouth against his. She can still feel the upward curve of his smile against her lips, unknowingly encouraging her own to mimic his. Her hands slide from around his neck into his hair, gripping at the short strands as she feels and focuses on his fingers gripping her jeans. She feels him hook his fingers inside of the waistband as he opens his mouth beneath her own.
She pulls away, laughing softly. Bellamy's brow crinkles as he smiles. "Yeah," she says, eyes flicking from his mouth to his own. She settles with peering at his mouth again, leaning forward as she watches his own lips part, anticipating her to lean forward to mould them together once more. "You heard me," she says softly, absently.
Raven leans forward to slope her mouth harder against his, hands sliding from the back of his head to cup his face. Stepping into him, she presses herself tight against his frame. She's no longer smiling; she can feel his disappear, as if she's inhaled it, as his fingers dig into her hips even more.
One hand moves against her back, presses right over the small of it where there'd been the biggest, ugliest bruise anyone's ever seen in their life. He doesn't press his hand delicately over it, like she's still somehow injured. With the heel of his palm, he presses against her back, pushing her to arch into him.
She likes it this way, feeling like herself, even though she can only stand on the tips of the toes on her right foot. Sometimes, when his hand moves underneath her shirt as it does now, she can feel her left, like nothing in her is irreparably broken anymore.
He doesn't pick her up, doesn't seem to even try it. It's for another day, one where they're fools who think they have the entire world at their command. Time is only a prisoner of their own, except for the instances where he's stolen from her.
His fingers try to burrow beneath her skin, digging into the flesh of her back, searching for the notches of her spine as they begin to travel upward. It's ticklish, with how his blunt nails ascend; she arches into him as he traces her bottom lip with his tongue. She doesn't flinch at all, not when he presses against the notches of her spine she thinks had been rendered completely shattered by a bullet.
She thinks it comes from him, the satisfied exhale, but she can hear herself beginning to make a sound of approval. Pulling away from him, there's only a sliver of space between them, and it's there she still breathes into his mouth before he bends his head to brush his lips against the slope of her throat.
Arching her neck, Raven closes her eyes and smiles, feeling her lips curve loosely upward as he pushes against her gently. It's the only time he ever treats her like she's made of something breakable. In the moments where she needs to move blindly, he doesn't shove at her like she's still the same girl she was before.
Sometimes she wonders if he had ever been that guy he'd postured. Hadn't fooled her, she thinks; there's a reason she'd chosen him to be the second person she'd ever been with after Finn. It's not the floppy hair, the dark strands soft enough to make her think of a boy who hadn't given her a second thought. It'd been the way he'd looked at the kids, even at her — his eyes may be closed now, but she can feel it in his touch, of how he may be broad-shouldered and clipped words, but he's made of the softer stuff, the kind of insides she thinks stars must have.
She takes a step back, feels him move with her, slowly moving backward to her workbench. She feels it press against the small of her back gently, but it still feels sharp. With his hand pressed between her shoulder blades, she steps into him, removing the pressure of the table edge from her back as she lets her hands drop to his shoulders and glide along the dirty fabric of his shirt.
"Come on, Bell," she sighs. He's kissing her neck, smiling against it, as he informs her with just the movement of his mouth he's being slow on purpose. With her fingers digging into his shoulders, she thinks it's evident enough she's impatient. "Lift me up," she says, fingers sliding into his hair to grip it and tug hard.
Removing his head from her neck, he looks up at her. Lips parted and eyes dark, Bellamy's fingers slide from where they sit against her bare skin beneath her jeans. Wrapping them around the backs of her thighs, he pulls her up against him. Her arms wrap around his neck, fingers gripping his shirt tightly, as he lifts her up and onto her workbench.
Her right leg wraps around his waist when he steps between her legs. His hand grips her bum leg, shifting it slightly. She can't feel it, but she knows it's with gentleness, as if the mere touch, the mere kindness, will summon the sensation back.
She pulls him to lean down with her hands at the back of his neck, fingers gripping the strands of his hair. Kissing the underside of his jaw, she blindly moves her hands down his back to grip at the fabric of his shirt. Pulling at it, he seems to catch on quick, removing his hands from her back to pull it up and over his head.
Without all the gear she knows he wears when he plays guard, it's easier to strip him until he's Bellamy again. She likes him better like this, as the guy with the bare skin that's bruised and scarred. Leaning back when he moves to kiss her, he stands before her, watching her intently as she looks to his chest. Hands gliding along the planes of him, she presses her fingertips lightly against the purple blemishes on his pectorals and biceps, gliding further down his torso until he's sucking it in from sensation.
"You need to be more careful," she murmurs.
His hands grip her legs, even though she can only feel one. He's always treating her like she can feel them both.
His gaze doesn't drop from watching her face. She thinks to look up now, but she's glad she doesn't. His voice is quiet, "I am."
"Be better at it," she says before looking up. Though she suspects her own eyes are as dark as his, she looks at him with her own expression as naked as his chest, peering at him imploringly to at least follow her advice for this one, last time.
Rather than waste another second trying to get Bellamy to listen to reason, she pulls him forward, arching her back, to kiss the temptation of telling him to resign from his position in the guard into his mouth instead. If it lingers there, then it won't ever be voiced by her, seeing his face fall as he takes a step back from her. She's done this song and dance before, finding she steps on his feet, the left sharper and heavier than the right, rather than it being the other way around.
His hands easily find their way onto her shoulders, perching there for a reason before he glides them along her arms. Dropping from her elbows, she feels his hands against her hips as he leans down and misses her mouth, moving to the other side of her neck.
She breathes out, "Tease." Feeling his hands move underneath the hem of her shirt, she removes her own from his shoulders when he pulls it up. Over her head and onto the workbench behind her, Raven sits before him in her bra. It's nothing special to her, but he looks at her like he's never seen it before — or maybe he's simply canvassing her for bruises, for little scrapes that tell him she's been stumbling more than she's been confessing.
As tempting as it is to pull him forward or even distract him by removing her bra, she lets him have this, this peace of mind he searches for. When he finds it, he lifts his gaze to hers.
"Take off your pants," she tells him. She can see him shift, removing his shoes with his feet, as his hands grip her legs. She wants to believe she can feel his fingers dig into her left leg. Sometimes, she tricks herself into thinking she can feel him burning his fingerprints into the fabric of her pants.
Removing his hands from her legs, he strips himself of his black jeans, standing before her in black boxer briefs. With a quirk to her lips, she lets her gaze run over the length of him on purpose.
He rolls his eyes and stands there, letting her ogle him. Peering up at him once more, she keeps the smile on her face as her own hands move to the button of her jeans, unhooking it to leave herself as undressed as she can be without his help.
With her right leg, she slips her shoes off, opting for a pair of flats they'd found at Mount Weather. Maybe it's wrong to wear a dead girl's shoes, but considering no one will be wearing them otherwise, it's been easier to slip her feet into those than it is to tie boots up with a bum leg that's aggravating to shift around.
Flexing her right foot, she tries to worm her heel out of the shoe. "You'll have to remove the brace," she says. She doesn't look down, not as he does, and she watches as he doesn't hesitate in dropping. It's never to his knees — she's not into roleplaying knight and princess, pretending to be in a position she's not.
Bellamy on his knees has never been a good look for him. She's witnessed Kane push him to them, belittling him, dethroning him from his status as leader. He moves down to assist with her brace, and she feels him remove a weight she can't quite shake without his help.
She loses her anchor for her leg, but knows his hands are sliding along the pant of her jeans like he's what's going to hold her steady in this tumultuous sea. And she believes he will, even when she pushes against his shoulders to let her kick and paddle toward her own debris in the water.
She finds she doesn't really need debris to cling to when she has him to pull her to shore.
While he's still down near her legs, her hands dart behind her back to unhook her bra. Letting the straps slide down her arms, she drops it off to the side, feeling as bare as him within the safety of her workstation.
When he stands, she's looking at his left hip, noting an ugly bruise that looks almost as big as the one that had been on her back. He steps into her, unable to break her gaze. Raven feels his fingers against her jaw, pressing against her cheeks as he gently guides her to look up at him.
"Hey," he says softly. "I'm okay."
She looks at him, thinking her expression must be uncertain. She lets her hands glide along his sides, fingers purposefully gentle against the ugly bruise.
Stepping into her, she feels his leg brush against her good one. "Lean back," he says, voice warm and deep. Raven lets her gaze remain on his torso before she lifts it, removing her hands from him as she leans back against the workbench.
With her fingers gripping its surface, she watches him as he steps closer, wrapping one arm beneath her ass to lift her off the table. His other hooks into the waistband of her jeans as he pulls them over her hips.
It always requires so much damn work, but Raven finds herself holding her breath, like he's kissing her again, like he's trying to tease her with his own unpredictability. It's nothing, in the grand scheme of things, but Raven's always found her heart beat ten times quicker inside her chest as her throat closes up at the sight of him simply undressing her like it's not a chore at all.
Sometimes she thinks to ask, but she can feel his answer whenever she presses her question into his mouth.
And she finds herself laughing when he takes the chance to peel her underwear from her hips, too.
Her jeans remain around her legs, right beneath her knee. "You're going to have to do it properly if you want to come any closer, shooter."
He smiles, shaking his head. She can hear the I know.
He ducks again, fiddling with her brace. She hears it against the floor moments later, knowing he hasn't dropped it carelessly, but placed it on the ground like it's some priceless jewel. She wants to tell him it's a piece of shit, that she doesn't care if he breaks it. If he breaks it, it's worth it.
But he's removing her jeans, pulling them and her underwear off. Rather than letting them drop to the floor, he swings his arm and throws them onto her workbench.
"Attractive," she says, but he doesn't answer. Still leaning back on the bench, he remains slightly out of her sight.
She can't feel it, what he's doing, but she knows his hand is sliding up her bum leg. She can't feel it, him kissing behind her knee. She can see her leg move, and she finds herself aggravated, annoyed she can't feel it.
But she can. She knows she can. It's what makes her heart swell and her own chest feel a little heavier with the sharp brush of the wings the butterflies in her chest burn into her ribcage. As much as she angrily confesses she wishes her leg wasn't a part of her, it being a mere letdown in the grand scheme of things, he never treats it like it's some appendage hanging off her. It's Raven Reyes, even if she can't feel it, and she's always hated him for making her want to peer at her damaged leg and own it.
His hand wraps around her good leg as he steps closer toward her. Leaning forward, he kisses her neck again, moving along her shoulder. She tilts her head to the other side, trying to keep her eyes open. She closes them and sighs, focusing on him breathing as his hands press against her naked hips now.
Her good leg wraps around his waist, the heel of her foot digging into the small of his back to push him closer. A hand on her hip moves to the small of her back as she moves forward, wrapping her arms around his back as she drags her fingers along his spine.
"As much as I love a good hickey," her breath hitches as her lips drop from their upward curve and part. She inhales sharply when he bites at her pulse in her neck.
His fingers glide along her back, his other hand digging into her hip. She can feel them move along her good leg, palm curving around her upper thigh. He's moving her leg slightly, parting them as his legs hit against skirt of the workbench.
"I've missed you," she breathes out on a groan.
He hums in the back of his throat as he moves up her neck, kissing beneath her ear. She slides her hands from his back and presses her palms against the workbench to push her body to the very edge of the table. Her leg drops from being wrapped around his back as she leans forward to hook her fingers into the waistband of his underwear.
"I was waiting for you," he murmurs against her neck. She tilts her head to the side, momentarily distracted from her task in pulling his underwear from his hips. "I wanted you to call in."
She smiles. "Too risky, shooter."
"Since when do you care?" he breathes it under her jaw. Nipping at her skin, her breath hitches, heart hammering in her chest.
She closes her eyes and lets her head loll to the side. Her fingers grip the fabric of his underwear tightly, knuckles brushing against the bones of his hips. "I have something to lose." Biting her bottom lip, she releases it when he's at the slope of her neck, his hand removed from her thigh to palm her breast. "And it's not worth the risk."
Sometimes she thinks she knows why he responds to that best. Before, when she'd said it, a slip of the tongue, he'd flinched and looked at her like she'd slapped him. Over the months, she's let it slip from her lips on purpose, watching his reaction carefully as his edges gradually softened.
She thinks she gets it, sometimes. She doesn't need to ask him why it is he looks at her sometimes like he doesn't know who she is. He peers at her like she's said something he doesn't understand, like those moments where she speaks Spanish or talks about parts of machines to him like he's someone who she expects to know what she's speaking about. She remembers a time where Clarke had told him it was worth the risk, whatever it is they'd been talking about, and sometimes Raven can piece together the shards of a person, rather than a machine, and build the missing scenes of a story she's not privy to.
Her hands tighten around his hips as she chooses to grip onto him rather than attempting to dig her nails into the wood of her bench. He's no longer working at her neck, but peering at her.
She thinks now is the best time to try and ensnare him. She looks at him, noticing how he looks at her unblinkingly. Sometimes he's so intense, looking at her like she's one of the Labours Heracles had to undergo. But she knows she's not some task that will help him reach atonement. Sometimes she thinks he wears her like that pelt of the unbeatable and stubborn lion.
She licks her lips and watches as his gaze drops to her mouth. She thinks to goad him onward, pressing her heel to his back, but Raven wants to wait. He's come to her tonight, and though she wants him to wrap himself up in her like Heracles does his Nemean pelt, she waits.
Watching him sometimes is like trying to piece together another pod. Like the radio he'd brought to her months ago, she looks at him like he's almost a project, but one that she admires — the finish product of something she hasn't made, but wants to emulate with her own posture and strength.
If there's any space left between them, he closes it with a step. He's right against the counter now, and her fingers pull down at his underwear, feeling his fingers wrap around hers to pull them further where she can't reach. Her palms slide along the backs of his legs, over his ass, and ascend his back. There, she drags her nails up the landscape of his skin, feeling his muscles shift beneath her as he inhales sharply.
If she's to look up, she can see him biting his lip, almost absently. But she keeps her gaze on his chest, as if she needs to memorise it, just in case the idiot walks into another landmine out there in the great, big world she can't guide him in.
Lifting her gaze, she finds he's closer. Leaning down, he watches her with a darker expression, lips parted. It's then she feels his hand on her leg, knowing the other mirrors the one she can feel as his hand burns his imprint into her thighs.
Shifting on the bench, she lets one of her hands slide down his side, fingers slowing and curving around his hip. It doesn't stay there as she shifts, letting her gaze remain on his as she watches him watch her. Her fingers grip his hard cock as he feels his hand slide up her leg, knowing the other follows suit, as he spreads her legs.
She wraps her fingers around him, moving her hand along the length of him. She brushes her thumb against the head, watches his jaw clench as his lips press tightly together. She slides her hand along his cock, flicking her wrist, waiting for him to moan low in his throat.
Once he does, she smiles.
Lifting her good leg, she hooks it loosely around the back of his upper thigh. He leans forward and brushes his lips against her cheek near her ear, maybe a lousy attempt at kissing her neck, but she feels him leave a trail of what burns against her jaw as he remains underneath it.
She guides him into her with a hitch in her throat before she groans. Pressing her hand against his chest, she can feel his heart hammering as hard as her own is. She wants to press them together so he can memorise the beating of her own heart, feel it echo inside of him when he's far from her. But she thinks he can feel how she hums and beats for him with him inside of her.
Looping her arms around his neck, his hands move to her back, curving beneath her ass as he lifts her just slightly. He moves, shifting slightly at first. Her fingers curl against the nape of his neck as she moans, tilting her head in an attempt to dislodge him from her jaw.
Bellamy gets it immediately, lifting his head to slope his mouth against her own as he moves against her. He withdraws, tip of his cock still inside of her, before he pushes himself back in. He does it over and over, slowly withdrawing to bury himself to the hilt within her.
He shifts her on the workbench, holding her so she's on the very edge of it, as his hips mould into her own. She bites at his mouth, finding her lips parting momentarily as she goes slack to only tense. He licks into the cavern of her mouth as he kisses her, fingers gripping her hips as he keeps her in place.
His hands have always been warm. She's always found him to be, like a fire she can't quite remove herself from in the winter. Raven knows she's felt cold without him, exposed to the elements of Camp Jaha. But with him inside of her, she burns as hot as a star in the sky rather than as cold as a piece of metal shooting to Earth from space.
She doesn't need to build this by herself. She doesn't need to collect the parts without another person knowing her intentions are to escape. Raven finds herself not wanting to, not with how his hands encompass her hips and how his fingers dig into her flesh like he wants to burrow beneath her very skin.
Their mouths disconnect as she feels him press his temple against her own. She can hear him moan, can even see his lips part as his eyes close. She wants to watch him burn as she does the stars in the sky, but she closes her eyes, preferring to feel him be aflame instead.
His thrusts become less slow and calculated. Sharper, he slams into her, hips possibly bruising her own. It's the kind of bruise she wants him to wear, the proof that he'd survived yet another war, made stronger for it with how he gives her strength. She may be the Nemean lion, unable to be destroyed, but he's the one who really is the coat, the one filled to the brim with the strength she wishes to harbour one day.
Lifting her hands from his back, she presses her palms to his cheeks. They fall to the slope of his shoulders, gliding down his arms before she grips his biceps hard enough to leave crescents in his skin. She hopes she can leave a little scar there of the moon, of the promise that it'll guide him when she's not on the other end of the radio to do so.
He breathes out her name on a groan, mouth tilting toward hers. She feels his lips brush lightly against her own, but she knows he's not committed to sloping his mouth firmly against hers as their temples remain pressed together.
Digging her nails hard into his biceps, she drags them down, thinking she's broken skin when he kisses her firmly. His thrusts become sporadic, less thought out, less teasing in the way he purposefully tries to withdraw a moan from her. She bites at his mouth, licking into the cavern of it as she feels his tongue trace her bottom lip.
Breathing him in, she finds she swallows her own name intermingled with his own. She's never cared if she descends as loudly as a meteor crashing to earth, but she likes it best this way — when she comes, it's in his arms, his name on her tongue as he swipes his own from hers as if he wishes to collect it, too selfish to let anyone else hear the syllables shake the walls of the shattered Ark. Her hands grip at his arms so tightly she worries he'll break; she feels his hands grip at her back, pressing her flush against him as he comes inside of her.
His hips still, no longer rocking into her as fiercely and disjointedly as they had. Her hands move to his shoulders to slide down his arms, feeling the thin layer of sweat stick to him in the manner she wishes to.
Instead of letting him pull away from her as he does with his own mouth, breathing so loudly in her workstation, she wraps her arms around his neck and pulls him to her. His chin rests against her shoulder as his arms wrap around her without hesitation.
Breathing heavily, she rests her chin against his, leaning up slightly to do so. Her arms wrap so tightly around him she worries of choking the life out of him, too. But his hands are warm against her back, gliding up and down her spine comfortingly.
Swallowing, her mouth is as dry and hot as she thinks a star would taste. Still breathing hard, she murmurs, "O Captain, my captain." She looks at the board she scribbles on, finding that her writing is nothing but squiggles as she feels his hands still on her back. His head bows and he can feel his mouth curve upward against her shoulder. "Our fearful trip is done."
He pulls away from her, looking down at her with his brows raised and his lips fighting a smile.
"Yes," she says, answering what he has yet to question. His hand lifts up to brush some of the hair that's escaped its band from her face. It sticks to the sweat of her forehead. His palm cups her cheek. "I read," she continues. His brows shoot up for a moment and she rolls her eyes. "The crap you leave behind."
He licks his lips, leaning forward slightly. He doesn't lean his temple against her own. His eyes remain on hers as he smiles, and she finds it's the prettiest constellation she's ever seen. "I'm not a captain," he breathes out, needing to remind her once more. Sometimes she chooses not to listen to Bellamy, believing the stars have foretold the future — in it, he's greater than any lousy scout could ever hope to be.
She smiles, big and wide, and laughs. "You have a point," she says, trying to bite back her smile to no avail. He cocks an eyebrow, hand still on her cheek. She leans into it, turning her head to kiss his palm, before she looks at him once more.
The crinkle of his brow tells her he can read the shyness in her own expression. It's weird to her he can be hip to hip with her, inside of her in her workstation, but she finds exposing a slip of herself to be the most frightening creature she's ever faced.
With him, though, she feels a little brave. With her Nemean lion, she feels invincible.
"I'm going to rewrite a piece of classic literature," she says, puffing out her chest slightly.
His gaze doesn't waver from her own. His voice is quieter than it has any right to be. "To what?"
Her lips curve upward as she lets her hand slide from his neck and glide down his chest. She watches its descent, feeling his gaze flicker away from hers for only a moment before peering at her intently once more. Once her palm is over his heart, she leans forward to kiss his shoulder, purposefully stalling, intentionally giving into temptation.
Leaning back, she peers up at him. Tapping her fingers against his chest, she speaks it, knowing Bellamy doesn't speak Zero G. "Heart."