Kapitel 47: Ride or Die

"So, this is where it happened, huh?" Raven asked solemnly, looking over the numerous monitors lining the wall.

"Yeah…" Monty replied quietly, no doubt thinking about his part in the Mountain massacre. Even though he wasn't the one who pulled the lever, I could tell that he still placed the deaths of all those innocents on his shoulders.

The entire walk through the bunker was done in a heavy silence, all of us just taking in the gravity of the situation. Empty except for the occasional guard, the bunker felt like a mausoleum—cold, dark, and quiet. Even Raven wasn't her regular joking self. I noticed her place a comforting hand on Monty's shoulder more than once.

Wanting to change the subject to try and lighten the mood a little, I explained what the purpose was for the security room and what could be done with the controls here. "...I think the dam nearby supplies the bunker with power, but I have no idea how it all works. If something were to break, no one in the coalition would be able to fix it. That is where you guys come in. With your expertise and knowledge, we'll need you two to keep this place up and running. Eventually, the Heda and I would like to see you take on a couple seconds to teach what you know."

With Monty pulling up different types of controls on the computer screens, he seemed to be looking for something before answering. Raven was watching over his shoulder like a hawk, taking in all the information.

After confirming whatever it was that they were looking for, Raven turned towards me. "We already said that we'll help before we left Polis. You're stuck with us, big guy." She said with a smile, punching me in the shoulder playfully.

That was true, they did confirm that they would help already. But I had feared that they would change their minds once they actually got to the bunker.

"Thank you," I told them honestly, 'playfully' returning the punch. I may have put too much power in the hit, though. Raven stumbled back with a hiss.

"Damn you hit hard. What are they feeding you?" She said teasingly, rubbing her shoulder to alleviate that soreness that was surely setting in. I gave her a sheepish look, scratching the back of my head.

Eventually, after looking over everything and getting themselves familiar with the controls and programs that ran the bunker, I led the way to the dam. Raven wanted to check out what she was going to be working with.

I've never been there myself, so I had to follow one of the maps that were in the security room. They looked really old, practically falling apart when I found them. It looked like no one had even touched one in about a hundred years or so. Not that they really needed them, they were born here, after all. I'm sure they all knew their way around the bunker fairly well.

The journey to the dam was short, but because of the poor quality of the map, we had to turn around a couple times.

Apparently, the dam that the bunker got its energy from is called Philpott dam. When the mountain men were in charge of Mount Weather, they had only a handful of guys guarding the dam to make sure no grounders got to it. Which was kind of strange, considering that without the dam, the entire bunker of theirs wouldn't work. If their energy supply was cut off, then they would either suffocate to death or be killed by the radiation. The bunker's oxygen scrubbers required a constant supply of electricity.

Of course there is probably a backup generator of sorts somewhere to keep the power on, but it wouldn't last forever. Keeping all of the bunker's facilities active took a lot of power.

In the future, I could probably get Raven and Monty to help rig solar panels or something to the bunker for extra energy just in case. At the end of the Dead Zone on the coast, there was a large field of solar panels that we could definitely scavenge. A handful of years ago I had traveled there under orders from Matthew. I haven't been back since, though. The journey was arduous, and very dangerous: Resources were scarce, there were land mines, raider tribes, vengeful exiles, and many more unpleasantries.

If I send a small well armed group, they should be able to move quickly and safely through the desert. With any luck, we may even be able to get some electricity running in Polis. We could start with setting up some panels on the tower and see where it goes from there.

Hearing Raven's impressed whistle, I put those thoughts to the back of my mind as I got curious about what grabbed her interest.

We were standing in the large open hall that housed the five hydroelectric turbines that powered the mountain. Being the nerds that they were, Monty and Raven made their way to the closest one. "This is one impressive machine…" She trailed off after looking at it for a while.

"I agree. In fact, it's so impressive that none of my people have any idea how it works at all." I voiced lightly, standing with my arms crossed as I watched the two former Skaikru members get familiar with the large machine in front of them.

Rolling her eyes at my poor attempt at humor, she turned to face me. "Yes, yes, I know we're awesome and you need us."

"Do you think that fixing these marvels of engineering will be a problem if they break down on us?" I inquired, already guessing what her answer would be.

Looking at me with a challenging glint shining in her brown eyes, she began to boast, "Of course they won't be a problem. You're looking at the Ark's youngest Zero-G mechanic in the last fifty two years. Trust me, I got this."

Finding out that she's the youngest Zero-G mechanic that the Ark has seen for a long time earned an impressed look of appraisal from me. It seems that we have lucked out in the talent department when it came to Skaikru integration.

"That… is actually pretty impressive."

"I know." She smirked, turning back towards the large turbine Monty was still examining.

We stayed exploring the dam for about an hour or two, wandering around and looking over everything. Near one of the entrances, we found a garage full of Pre-Praimfaya armored vehicles. Most of the vehicles looked as though they had fallen apart in the last hundred years, the odds of getting them to work were slim to none. However, there was one armored black jeep that seemed to be in good condition. It looked like the Mountain Men wanted at least one of their vehicles to work in case of emergencies.

The Jeep earned Raven's seal of mechanical approval, which made me giddy. There were solar panels on the roof, meaning that the vehicle didn't need any gasoline or other combustible fuels to work, thankfully. If anything were to suddenly break and they needed to fix it, they could recycle some parts from the other vehicles to get it up and running again pretty quickly.

Not only would it be useful for transportation of important personnel and equipment, but the jeep even had a small gatling gun attached to the hood, making it useful in the need of defense, as well. Ammunition for the gun wasn't an issue, there were around a thousand rounds in the jeep according to Raven, and there were many more cases of ammunition against one of the walls in the garage. Sadly, the gatling gun would only be used for emergency situations. I was still wary about using guns willy-nilly. I wasn't sure how my people would take to us using guns so soon after the Mountain Men's defeat.

Gaining a wistful smile on my face, I imagined Lexa and I tearing through entire armies with the force of a thousand horses while the gatling gun roared fire, shooting a hail of fiery bullets like some ferocious armored dragon on wheels.

Seeing that I was lost in my head, staring off into the distance misty-eyed, Monty snapped his fingers in my face to get my attention. "W-what?" I asked dumbly, snapping out of my fantasy driven stupor.

"I asked if you knew how to drive one of these things, but you didn't hear me, I guess." Monty replied questionably, giving me a suspicious look as though I was an intriguing puzzle that he was trying to solve.

"No, I definitely don't. However, it wouldn't hurt to try and learn; it wouldn't hurt at all…" I answered honestly, almost slipping back into my fantasy as I trailed off.

"We could learn together, it could be fun." He suggested with a friendly lilt to his voice. It seemed that Monty was looking for a friend since he didn't have Jasper to hang out with. Other than Lexa and John, I can't really say I have any friends. It wouldn't hurt to make more, though.

"Sure," Smiling at him, I turn and rub my hand across the hood of the jeep. "This thing is awesome, isn't it?" I ask, not tearing my eyes away from the dark metal. I had read about different types of vehicles that they used before Praimfaya, but I never thought that I'd actually be able to see one, let alone drive one. And now? Here was my chance.

Facing Raven, I asked, "Do you think that you can figure out how to open the garage door?"

"Pfft, easy peasy." She replied sure of herself, walking towards the large control box near the steel door of the garage. It took less than a minute to get familiar with the controls before she flipped a couple switches and the large door began to slide up.

"You're awesome, Raven!" I shouted to her, climbing into the jeep's driver seat with Monty calling shotgun and hopping into the passenger side.

"Oh come on, why do I have to sit in the back?" She pouted, walking away from the control panel and promptly entering the back of the jeep before finding her seat. Though she may have been pouting, Raven still had a small smile on her face as I began to pull out.

Once we were clear of the garage, Monty hopped back out of the vehicle and went to close the door. It wouldn't do if some Azgeda spy found their way into the bunker to sabotage it or something similar. Or worse, if they stole guns from the armory.

Driving wasn't too hard… after some trial and error. We may have suffered from a bit of whiplash, but we eventually got the hang of it. I drove us in wide circles around the bunker, getting used to the near alien machine that I found myself in control of. Every few laps we would switch out who was driving, trying to get all of us familiar with it. Monty was about as timid as I was, practically over thinking each and every move he made. Raven, however, was an absolute menace behind the wheel.

I don't think I've ever been more scared for my life than I had been when Raven drove. I was honestly surprised that the jeep could even handle what she put it through.

Monty wasn't even fully buckled in the back when she almost immediately began to gun it once she was in the driver's seat. Luckily for me, I buckled up just in time. Unfortunately, because of Monty's lack of seat belt, he was flung to and fro. Even I was straining against the seatbelt as she hit the corners like a complete maniac, nearly laughing her entire turn. But out of all of us, she was definitely the one who had the most fun.

The sun was just dipping below the treetops when we eventually returned to the garage.

"That was awesome!" Raven exclaimed, sporting a wide smile across her face "Can we do it again sometime?" She turned to me with a pleading look, ignoring the flash of fear that crossed Monty's features as she did so.

"Sure we can." I responded with a chuckle.

"Yes!" She raised her fists with a look of success. Monty didn't seem to share her enthusiasm, though. I could hear him groan in displeasure from his place on my right side.

Finished up with the garage and dam, I gave them a quick tour of the rest of the bunker. When we first entered, I led them directly to the security room, so they didn't really get to see a lot of it. Monty was pretty familiar with a lot of public areas, but he hadn't been to any of the private sections, yet.

Upon reaching the armory, Raven whistled in appreciation, her interested gaze sweeping over the wide variety of firearms. She asked me why we couldn't just use the guns and arm our warriors with them, so I had to explain the superstitions of my people; about how we feared the Mountain Men would launch a missile at us if we did. When she pointed out the Mountain Men being gone, I informed her of the political situation of such an act and how it would make Lexa look. If worst comes to worst, we would use them, but only if we had to.

The same couldn't be said about explosives though, surprisingly. Whether it was because my people didn't make them often, or because the ingredients were hard to come by, I didn't know.

"Raven, you have experience making explosives," I started, thinking about how she had made the mines they used against my army during the dropship siege. Getting her attention, I asked, "Do you think that you'd be able to do so again?"

Looking at me with that smirk of hers, she replied, "Of course I could."

"We have an upcoming war with Azgeda, your expertise would be much appreciated." I tell her, hoping that she'd be open to helping us out. It wasn't long ago that she was making bombs to kill our warriors, so it might be weird for her.

***

Raven's PoV:

"We have an upcoming war with Azgeda, your expertise would be much appreciated." James informs me, his persona of the ever serious Shield gon Hedas leaking through.

Did I want to help them with war? Fixing up their bunker and educating their people about engineering and mechanics was one thing, but explosive development? I guess it would be my people, now…

I wanted to get on their good side and show them that I'm one of them. However, is this how I wanted to do it? Yeah, they'd probably appreciate it and see more value in having me around, but James has already told me how invaluable my skills were to the coalition, isn't that enough? It might be enough for them, but is it enough for me?

There was a reason I strived to be the best in my field, to score perfectly on my Zero-G exam, to be the youngest Zero-G mechanic in the last fifty years… I wanted to prove to myself that I could be better than my mom, that I wasn't destined to just be a worthless drunk like she was—I deserved better.

Being here on the ground where I was welcomed with open arms by the very people I tried to kill… They wanted me for me, for who I am. They didn't care about my past, they didn't care that I came from a broken household.

Yes, they killed Finn, but it was during a time of war. After I heard about what happened from Clarke, I was beyond furious and upset. I cried for days, but I knew he was just another casualty to the ever rampaging machine of war. If I called him innocent, I'd be a hypocrite. I killed people too.

And, well… ever since he was locked up, we started to grow apart. He was less and less excited to see me during my visits, his smile stopped reaching his eyes. I saw the way he looked at Clarke, that was the same way he looked at me once upon a time. When I saw the necklace he made her, I realized I was no longer special to him. I was just another girl in the crowd.

Finn and Clarke had sex when he knew that I was still alive, that I still loved him, but he didn't seem to care about me anymore. He gave up on us way before I finally gave up on him. Maybe one day soon I could give love a chance again, though it wouldn't be today or even next week, I'm sure I'll be ready eventually.

Then again, you can't decide who you love, and it sort of just sneaks up on you when you least expect it…

"Raven?" James calls out a little concerned.

Realizing I was lost in my head, I gave him a sheepish look. "Yeah, yeah, I'll help," I confirmed, deciding that it would be better to move on with my life and show these people that I'm one of them. "But we don't have anymore hydrazine. One of the crashed exodus ships where we got the hydrazine before finally blew up."

Gaining a thoughtful look on his face, James only frowned lightly, trying to think of another way to create explosives.

"What about the dropship?" He asked, recalling that the dropship had thrusters on it, if he remembered correctly. Surely having thrusters meant that there would be a fuel source as well.

Looking at him, I was honestly surprised that I hadn't thought of that before. Of course the dropship had hydrazine! "That… that might actually work. I'll need to take a trip out to the dropship to confirm it, but yeah, there should be plenty of hydrazine left in the tanks."

"Not an issue," James stated with a smirk. "With the jeep, we could make it there and back before nightfall.

Thinking about driving the jeep again, I smirked as well. My smirk got even larger as I heard Monty mumbling to himself, no doubt remembering how good of a driver I was. "Can I drive?" I asked, sporting the best puppy dog eyes I could manage.

Almost immediately rolling his eyes, James gave in without even putting up a fight. "Yes, you can drive. But if I die, Heda will have your head." He added at the end, seeing the excited look in my eye.

***

James' PoV:

The ride to the dropship was about as chaotic as you'd expect. Raven was hauling ass with no apparent concern for her life or her passenger's. I admit, I had fun, though. Raven is like a breath of fresh air, she knew how to let loose. With being Shield gon Hedas, everyone around me was always so serious. Granted, I had to be serious as well.

Once we arrived, Raven and Monty immediately made their way to the side of the metal ship. I was about to ask what they were doing, but then Raven began to remove one of the side panels so she could crawl underneath the dropship.

I couldn't help but notice Monty's appraising glance at her butt as she crawled out of view. "See something you like?" I smirked with amusement, watching as his face began to get red and he began to sputter as he attempted to make an excuse.

"Relax, relax. I'm not judging. If I didn't already have a beautiful woman that I loved, I may have just tried my luck with Raven as well."

"You won't tell her, right?" Monty begged, still looking a little embarrassed, but mostly worried at the possibility of me telling her that he was interested.

"No, don't worry. Your secret is safe with me." I told him, much to his relief. He was about to say something else when Raven's muffled voice came out from the hole in front of us.

"Guys! There's hydrazine in here, a lot of it!" She yelled out.

I couldn't help but grin. "Perfect." With a large amount of Hydrazine, they could create more than enough explosives to win the war against Azgeda. It was time that Nia was humbled once again. Her head has been filled with nothing but empty words of grandeur by her counsel. She had an ego bigger than the entire coalition of the twelve clans.

After taking stock of how much Hydrazine there was, Raven and I came up with a plan for the safe development of the fragile bombs. The combustible liquid couldn't be moved from the dropship without constant fear of premature demolition, so she would make routine trips between the bunker and the former delinquent camp with a couple warriors to protect her. Her mission would be top secret. We didn't want Azgeda to know anything about this, or they would surely sabotage it.

In a more likely case, they would abduct Raven and force her to make explosives for them, if they caught wind.

Not too long ago, Lexa had received a report about a large piece of the Ark that had crashed in Azgeda territory and they were using them as slaves. They had a right to, as Lexa had long since told them they had free reign if Skaikru invaded their lands, but it just showed what type of savagery that the Ice Nation were capable of. Ironically, there have also been reports of a rogue group of Skaikru members that have been hitting Azgeda patrols and have grown to be quite the nuisance. They used guerrilla tactics, often attacking and then running back into the shadows.

For the moment, this little rag-tag group belonging to Skaikru is helpful. They are becoming such a nuisance that Queen Nia has been wanting their heads delivered to her for quite a time. The expression, 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend' would normally be appropriate for such a situation, but from what I hear, they are not only attacking Azgeda, but the bordering clans as well. This Skaikru group has been attacking people indiscriminately, which means they don't see the difference between us. They'd only be detrimental to our fight, and I don't want to risk that.

I only hoped that once the coalition's armies begin their march against Azgeda, the little resistance group doesn't cause any problems for us.

Going back to the bunker, the trip was pretty uneventful. I had Monty drive, which made Raven pout pretty much the whole way. The contrast between the way Monty and Raven drove was stark. Where Raven liked to speed along like she didn't care about life, Monty was definitely more relaxed and laid back, driving along at a nice reasonable pace.

A fascinating thing we found out about the jeep was that it had some kind of device that played music. According to Monty, the radio-like device was a storage for different songs. The mountain men had downloaded a bunch of music onto it so that they could listen while on drives. So not only were Monty and Raven fighting about the speed at which they preferred to drive, but also about what type of music they were listening to as well.

"Oh come on, this song is too slow! I want to listen to some heavy metal, I wanna rage!" Raven exclaimed excitedly, ignoring the looks Monty and I were giving her.

Rolling his eyes at Raven's antics, Monty just replied calmly, "The driver gets to decide the music, and I say a nice and slow instrumental."

"But that's so boooring…" She groaned. "You gotta learn to live every once in a while."

"It's not boring, it's calming. And if you haven't noticed, this is living. I'm just doing it at my own pace." Monty stated steadily, some amusement layered into his voice. Glancing in the rearview mirror, he caught Raven's pouting face and smiled.

"Yeah, that's what I said—boring."

Hearing enough of their back and forth, I decided to gently remind them that I was in the vehicle as well. "Will you guy's stop flirting? You're arguing like a couple of children." Both of them blushed deeply at my words, blatantly attempting not to catch my gaze as I moved my sight back and forth between the two.