Disclaimer: I don't own The 100 or its characters, or else I'd never make all the fans suffer through such a long winter hiatus!

Chapter 11

When they returned to Mel, there was no longer a sense of anger shrouding them, and Clarke didn't even mind as Mel flitted around Bellamy. And she found every excuse she could to touch him. She was constantly stumbling, or gripping his arm when the wind rustled leaves or birds flew through the air. Clarke was actually amused at the sight of Bellamy's total indifference toward her, and she even let a small, self-satisfied smile slip onto her face from time-to-time.

A short time later, they reached the dropship. Bellamy gently lifted Mel's hand off his arm and grabbed his gun, ready for anything. He walked ahead, and when Mel tried to follow, Clarke put an arm out to stop her.

"O?" Bellamy called, walking into the silent dropship. After a moment, he popped his head out and motioned for Clarke and Mel to follow.

Inside, Octavia sat with Lincoln, who lay conscious but shaking on the floor, tremors wracking his body as the withdrawal hit him hard. "You've been giving him plenty of fluids?" Clarke asked, examining him.

"Yes. He was in an aggressive state until a few hours, and now he's just been shaking." Clarke got close enough to open one of his red, bloodshot eyes, and she saw his pupils rapidly moving back and forth. This seemed wrong. Lincoln suddenly started to seize.

Octavia pushed Clarke to the side, yelling, "Lincoln? Lincoln!"

"What's happening?" Bellamy asked Clarke, who shook her head.

"I don't know. I think it's whatever they've pumped into him… Seems like the withdrawal is stopping his heart."

Octavia was crying, "Help him, Clarke!"

Lincoln's seizing suddenly stopped, and Bellamy lifted Octavia up and off of him, holding her while his implored Clarke to help. She kneeled and felt his pulse… which was silent. No heart beat.

Clarke immediately got on his chest and began to do CPR. "C'mon, c'mon!" she muttered, hoping against all hopes that this would work.

It didn't. Nothing was working. Octavia let out a keening wail, and even Bellamy felt his eyes prick with tears. He would never say that Lincoln and him were friends, and nor did they even really like each other, but they did see eye-to-eye on one thing: protecting Octavia, no matter what the cost. Bellamy knew that no matter what, Octavia and Lincoln were head over heels in love, and the Grounder have proved himself time and again willing to forsake anything and everything to protect his little sister. He looked at Clarke, seeing panic in her eyes.

Clarke tried to take a deep breath. Medics had to be calm and levelheaded, even in the face of crisis, and for not the first time, and definitely not the last, Clarke felt her will being tested. But he was dead… His heart had stopped, CPR wasn't working, so what could she do?

She looked at Octavia, sobbing in Bellamy's arms, and Bellamy… He was looking at her, but not with horror or disappointment. He was looking at her like he knew she could do this. He gave her a nod, eyes resolute, and suddenly, Clarke knew she could.

She looked around. They were in the same room where they had first held Lincoln captive in the first place. All this time, and just to come full circle. Tensions had been high. Clarke thought how the urgency of that situation mirrored this one. They had a short amount of time to save Finn, and they would do whatever it took.

She remembered Bellamy stabbing a pike through Lincoln's hand, but it had really been Raven who had gone ballistic, firing up an electrical current to shock Lincoln into talking.

That was it! Raven had electrocuted Lincoln! Clarke spun around and saw that the cables were still there. Nobody had touched them after Lincoln had escaped, instead choosing to forget the nasty affair had ever happened in the first place.

Clarke stood up, fired up the transformer by pulling on a lever, grabbed the two cables, and with a quiet, "Here goes nothing," she jabbed them onto Lincoln's chest.

His body jolted, and Octavia cried out. Nothing. Clarke took another deep breath and then shocked Lincoln again, and this time, he woke up with a gasp.

Octavia rushed over, her face gripping his cheek. "Lincoln," she cried, hoping, praying that he would be okay.

Lincoln groaned and opened his eyes, looking over at Octavia. Clarke noticed that some of the bloody capillaries seemed to have receded, leaving his eyes still bloodshot and worn, but clear. "Octavia?" he asked, and she cried in relief, cradling his head.

Clarke felt the crackling cables stop their humming, and she turned to see Bellamy had shut off the transformer. She dropped the cables by her side, feeling the delayed adrenalin rush. She'd done it. Lincoln was okay, and the drug seemed to be gone from his system.

Clarke turned to see Mel huddling in a corner, looking completely terrified by this turn of events. She nodded her head at the girl, and then at Bellamy. "We should give them a minute." And with that, she headed outside, waiting for the other two to follow so that Lincoln and Octavia could have a short, joy-filled reunion.

Outside, Clarke finally allowed herself a break as she slumped against the cold side of the dropship. Things on the ground were never boring, were they?

She saw Mel grab Bellamy's hand, and he shot her a patient smile as he quickly extricated himself. Clarke mused silently. Bellamy was so good with everyone, which is why the 100 had originally gravitated toward him as a leader. He had a natural sort of calm, and a captivating charisma that instantly sucked you in. Clarke was sure that if he hadn't have been so mulish and stupid about his whatever the Hell we want ways, she'd have followed him as well.

But she had been wrong too. The 100 needed a leader they could trust not only to keep them together, but also to look out for them, and together the two of them had provided the right direction. They were yin and yang, she and Bellamy, but they'd done this together, and she found herself wondering how she had never felt this pull towards him before. It was as if he were the sun, and she was caught in his orbit.

Suddenly, she heard a shout of frustration from Mel across the clearing. She drew back from Bellamy as if stung. She rushed with a huff back into the dropship. Clarke looked questioningly at Bellamy, who shrugged.

Mel rushed back out, hastily slinging her pack over her shoulder. She glared venomously at Clarke, and she ignored Bellamy completely as she made to head out of the vicinity. Clarke stood up, quickly catching up with her. She noticed Bellamy standing his ground. "Mel, where are you going?"

The girl spun around, and Clarke couldn't believe how much hatred she saw in her eyes. "I'm leaving. Going back to Camp Jaha. Not like you guys wanted me here anyway."

"We're going back too, but just as soon as we make sure Lincoln's doing okay. Just wait a while. It's safer to travel in groups," Clarke said, unsure where this sudden aggression was stemming from. She reached out to put a hand on Mel's shoulder, but the girl recoiled.

"Don't touch me. You put on this act, like some little goody-two-shoes, but you're not better than the rest of us," Mel leaned in, her voice quiet. "And being another one of Bellamy Blake's conquests will just prove that."

Shocked, Clarke just stood there as Mel turned and began to head out into the woods. Within seconds, she was lost from sight in the dense forest.

Bellamy walked up, looking off in the direction Mel had gone. "What was that?" Clarke asked.

Bellamy shrugged. "She was propositioning me. I said no."

Clarke looked at him sideways, crossing her arms over her chest. "Doesn't seem very like you."

He actually looked hurt, and Clarke bit her tongue. She knew that wasn't true, but for some reason the thought of Mel and Bellamy made her so angry she could barely think straight. "C'mon, Clarke. It hasn't been like that in a long, long time. We were all the most feral versions of ourselves when we first landed here."

Clarke swallowed. "You're right. I'm sorry."

"Could you say that again? I don't think I heard you right."

Clarke shoved him. "Don't push your luck, Blake."

He smirked rakishly at her. "All right, but I'll never forget this moment."

"It can't be the first time you've pissed off a girl so much she's stormed away from you."

"Ha, ha. Very funny. I meant your conceding to me that I'm right."

"I know when to apologize," Clarke muttered.

"Besides, my saying no wasn't what pissed her off the most."

"Oh?" Clarke asked, curious.

"She asked why, and I told her that I couldn't because there was someone else in the picture. The days of bedlam Bellamy are over."

Clarke felt her face heat up, and she looked up and met his intense stare. She felt rooted to the spot, like she couldn't break away. Her heart pounded. "And who's that?" she nearly whispered.

But the tense atmosphere abated when Bellamy chuckled and then turned around, heading toward the dropship. He called out over his shoulder, "Like I said earlier, Princess. If you don't know, I'm not going to tell you!"

He walked inside, leaving her alone with a warm feeling in her gut, and she felt herself smile. And it was then that she realized how loud silence was when all you could hear was your heart.

Mel screeched in annoyance as another branch caught her long hair, and she lashed out, breaking it. She huffed and set on her way again. These stupid woods. The ground wasn't so great. In fact, it'd been pretty awful so far. And here she'd thought Bellamy liked her, but she'd clearly misread the situation. She'd known, though, from the second she'd seen him hugging that blond bitch that there was something there, but she'd ignored it. Bellamy had saved her, after all. Scaled a cliff for her.

But he'd jumped off a cliff for Clarke too. And Mel could tell that something had happened after that too. The two of them seemed to just drift toward each other, like some kind of magnetic pull.

But then Bellamy had saved her again from the Grounders, and Clarke seemed to be angry about something in the car. Mel had thought her luck was turning. Sure, Bellamy didn't seem to be responding, but time could fix that. She had her ways. As long as Clarke was out of the picture, she felt sure that she would win him over in due course.

Then they'd talked. Mel hadn't know what about, but it was clear that after that, the two of them were closer than ever. It was all very back-and-forth, and annoying, to say the least. Mel had finally decided to proposition Bellamy in hopes that she could snatch him up before it was too late, but she hadn't acted quickly enough.

"Mel," Bellamy had said, gentle. She was sure he was about to acquiesce, but then, "I'm flattered, but there's someone else. I'm sorry."

What? This wasn't how this was supposed to go. "It's Clarke, isn't it?" He didn't say anything, but they both knew it was. "Newsflash, Bellamy. She's obviously still hung up on that guy Finn. And let me tell you something. A guy like you doesn't get with a girl like her."

He didn't lash out angrily, as she half-expected him to. "I'll never know if I don't try, will I?" he'd asked. Frustrated, Mel screeched before she headed towards the dropship. It was time to go.

Mel's thoughts were interrupted when's she suddenly noticed smoke start to waft up around her, and she coughed as she tried to cover her mouth and nose. It was no use, and she felt herself growing faint, but not before she saw men in suits and masks carrying guns make their way towards her. And then she saw nothing.

A/N: Hey guys, first I want to give a shout-out to my beta S.B., because I only started writing this story when both of us were feeling particularly angsty about the show/Bellarke and couldn't wait for the next episode! So thank her for encouraging me to write it :) And secondly, just wanted to give a shout-out to this whole Bellarke fanfiction community. All of you who read and review are AMAZING, and the other authors on this site write things that make me happy, sad, giddy, angsty... Everything. You guys are all awesome, so just know I appreciate it. Remember that reviews make the writing faster, and otherwise, hope you all had a great weekend! xoxo, TATF