8.

Pain. The physical feeling caused by disease, injury or something that hurts the body is one definition of pain. Another definition for pain is mental or emotional suffering like sadness caused by some emotional or mental problem. Then there is also the definition that someone or something causes trouble or makes you feel annoyed or angry.

Directly speaking, I think what I'm feeling right now fits all three of the definitions perfectly, and I like to add that my pain was most definitely involuntary. Honestly, who in the world asks to get shot? And more importantly who shoots someone and is dumb enough to not pick up the bullets? Probably someone who lacks of decent humanity and is confident that the bullet can't be traced back to the shooter, but nonetheless I should be glad that the shooter didn't decide to make the kill shot while he had the chance. That means whoever shot me doesn't want me dead. At least not right now.

Clarke felt her body was fighting to survive the pain. Her hands were on the injury, blood tainting them before she ripped a piece of her top and used it to apply pressure to the wound. On the outside she seemed calm and focused on what was happening, pushing herself to think about the stressing situation she was in and handle things professionally like her mother once taught her to be during her medical days, but inside she was freaking out. Of course she knew that with her return she had a lot more enemies, who wanted her gone, but she doubted that all of them would go to such extreme measures that they were willing to shoot her down like an animal.

Urgh, stop thinking about that right now, you have way more important things to worry about right now then who shot you. Like threating your damn injury so that you don't end up dead due to blood loss for example. Clarke shook her head, and carefully used her right hand to retrieve her phone from her pocket meanwhile her left hand continued to apply pressure on the wound. Once she had her phone in her hand was ready to push the number buttons when she halted. Who was supposed to call? Obviously 911 were the most reasonable option, but she stubbornly refused to stay at the hospital when that place had only given her terrible memories. Her mother? That meant a trip to the hospital and the dreading confrontation with her mother about her poor life choices etc. That's definitely not an option. Lincoln? He's on a date with Octavia and she wasn't about to bug them about this, even though he was most likely going to reprimand her later for keeping it to herself, but that was something she could deal with. Raven? Monty? Jasper? She didn't want to bother them either and honestly she wasn't sure how well received she really was with them yet considering the circumstances, especially with Jasper, and besides she didn't want them to pick sides, especially Monty, so that was a bust too. That left her with one alternative left. Unfortunately for her, it was also the one person she was most doubtful would actually pick up the phone and help her once he realized that it was her. Clarke sighed heavily before she pushed the familiar number and waited to see if the call came through. Who knows maybe she got lucky and he decided not to be such huge ass that he could be?

Bellamy had a desperate need for an aspirin for the throbbing headache he was dealing with, but he had already taken the recommended dosage so he seems like he was going to force himself to live with the pain for now.

Why don't you go home like any ordinary person? Bellamy thought to himself. Cause you're a damn workaholic and don't have a life besides your sister and the once-in-a-while one-night stands. Miller had already left for the evening, apparently scored himself a date with someone he didn't know, and he was doing some paperwork alone at his desk when his phone started to vibrate. He picked up his phone, expecting to see Octavia's name on the display, knowing that she would call him whenever she was in trouble or she forgotten her keys to her place again, but instead the displayed showed an unknown caller id. Debating whether he should answer the call or not, he quickly reached the decision to at least hear who it was before hanging up. So he answered the call and automatically responded with, "Blake."

"Bellamy?"

What the hell? Why is she calling me? Bellamy thought confused over why she would try and contact him after how things ended before in the earlier in the elevator. "Clarke? What is it? Why did you call me? Didn't we say what was left to say to each other?"

Clarke laughed, but it wasn't the type of laugh that he loved and treasured to hear. No, her laugh was stressed and panicky without any trace of joy or humor in it. Which immediately got his attention.

"Listen, okay, I need your help." Clarke sounded agitated, and he almost believed that he imagined the heavy breathes and groans, but he knew better. She would never call him for anything unless it was something important, at least that's how it was in the beginning of their relationship anyways, but clearly they have reverted back to old habits so it would seem.

"What is it?" Bellamy asked, not realizing that the grip he had on his phone tighten.

A moment passed before she bluntly asked, "Do you still have the emergency first-aid kit I gave you?"

Uh-oh. Double uh-oh. "It's in the trunk of my car. Why?"

Clarke scoffed. "Because I need it asshole, so can you bring it to me or not?"

She's hurt, and from the sound of things badly. Bellamy didn't waste time and immediately shut down everything and headed straight for the stairs and his car. "Where are you?"

After she gave him a quick explanation that she was in her gallery and included giving him the address he got to his car, picked up the first-aid kit and ran as fast as his legs could run and headed for the art gallery.

Don't ask her how long it took for Bellamy to get there, because honestly she didn't know and didn't care at the moment. As long as he showed up, despite their messy and turbulent relationship, and gave her the medical equipment that she needed to fix her wound. The best thing you can do is not question or wondering why he still even considered helping me. Clarke thought, continuing putting pressure and examine the wound. As far as she could tell the bullet hadn't penetrated too deep and had missed the vital parts in her leg. If she was right that meant that there wouldn't be any lasting injury and that she should be able to walk again after a couple of weeks. But that's the least of my problems so it would seem.

Seconds later the door the gallery was forced open, she could hear the lock snap by the brute force, and in entered Bellamy with an agitated expression on his face and a first-aid kit in his hand. His expression only darkened when she saw her on the floor, covered in blood.

"What happened?" Bellamy went up, sat down next to her and handed over the kit.

Really? Isn't it obvious? Clarke turned look at him, clearly frustrated over his lack of timing and empathy. "I thought it was obvious, I was shot and now I'm trying stop the injury from getting bad to worse."

"Don't play cute with me, Princess!" Bellamy exclaimed angry. "God, Clarke. Can you for once just be straightforward about something like this? No, wait. Scratch that. Can you for once be straight-forward with me?"

Clarke rolled her eyes. Of course I'm straightforward, a better word for it would be that I'm blunt. However when you ask stupid and irrelevant questions you can't expect anything but stupid and irrelevant answers in return. "Will you hand me a pair of tweezers? I need to take the bullet out."

Bellamy looked completely struck by her even suggesting taking the bullet out. "Are you insane? You need to be at a hospital, with people specialized in doing this sort of thing, not attempting to remove it like it's a part of a do-it-yourself-project." Despite his disagreeing words he handed a pair of tweezers from the kit over to her, which she accepted graciously, and began probing inside the wound to find and get a good grip on the bullet. When she did find the bullet, after some searching and then working on gaining a good enough grip for her to remove the bullet, she took a few breaths like she was preparing herself to jump into ice-cold water. Then she leaped into action, pulling the bullet out in one movement while screaming out in pain.

He turned his gaze away for a moment, even though she caught a glimpse of his painful and heartbreaking expression on his face, but she knew it was of her best interest not to point it out. So instead she asked or rather ordered him to retrieve some clean cloth pieces to clean the wound, meanwhile she did the last few tweaks to close and stop the bleeding before she bandaged it.

Clarke didn't turn look at him, afraid to see his rejection or any other negative emotion towards her, especially when that's all she has been receiving from him ever since she came back into town, but seemed like she wasn't the only one who was afraid or reluctant to look at her directly. However he wasn't shy about talking, which he said with that detective-professional-tone, "What happened, Clarke? Seriously?"

She didn't say anything at first, thinking over what exactly she was supposed to say as well as finally getting the reality of what happened, but she sighed heavily like she knew that there was no way he was going to let this go. Not after he came to her rescue and witness the whole thing.

"I don't know." Clarke answered, and then went on explaining the event that occurred as real and precise as she could. Which in the end wasn't much, however it was enough to make Bellamy fight the urge to not put a fist through the wall. He got up on his feet and began pacing back and forth, completely lost in his own angry and frustrated thoughts, only mumbling a few swear words once in a while, until he finally got his crap together and demands rather arrogantly, "Give me the bullet."

Huh? Clarke was surprised by the out-of-nowhere command. He ignored her presence this whole time and then demands to do what he says. What did he take her for? An idiot? Sure, she understood shortly afterwards why he wanted the bullet, with him being cop involved investigating suspicious crimes and what not, but that didn't mean she was just going to mindlessly give him a piece of evidence. Hello, I'm a PI remember? I investigate things like this too, although not with the same access or resources as the police have, but nevertheless it's all the same. Besides, that bullet was stuck in me first. So I shouldn't I be the one to have it?

Those were her thoughts, but she never voiced them knowing too well how that would go with him. So she scoffed, got up on her feet even though it still hurt slightly, and handed over the bullet against her will. He took it without saying anything or thanking her for it, not that he would anyways, and put it inside a plastic bag that he had retrieved from his right jacket pocket. Then he tucked it back inside his jacket pocket, immediately dropping the subject entirely.

What else was there to say? Bellamy wasn't sure what to do with Clarke, honestly he wanted to simply push her completely out of his life if he could, but as these things keeps turning and spiraling into something that he feared was dangerous business that alternative was most certainly out of the question.

He took a quick look around the premises, just to be sure whoever shot her wasn't still lurking around, but didn't find anything or anyone looking peculiar suspicious or out of place in the area.

"Whoever did this is gone, checked the area and nothing." Bellamy folded his arms against his chest. "Can you think of anyone who could have done this? Do you remember something that can help me find whoever tried to gun you down?"

Clarke shook her head. "No, nothing. Everything happened so fast that I didn't have the time to get anything definitive on my mystery shooter. But thank you for coming to my rescue. I know you didn't have to or want to come, but I appreciate you came anyways."

He awkwardly shifted weight on his feet, confused to how he was supposed to respond to her appreciation. Only mumbled a low-voiced "You welcome", which Clarke smiled graciously for like the princess she denied she was. They didn't slip into the old comfortable tension between them, because this was real life not a stinking fairytale with happy endings, but at least they weren't yelling or trying to kill each other. Yet.

His cellphone vibrated, however due to that it continued to buzz like a crazy bee indicated that someone was calling. So he answered it and found out that it was station. He listened and after being relayed the quick message he hung up, groaning annoyed over the message he received.

"What's wrong? Did something happen?" Clarke asked, sounding surprisingly concerned for him. It didn't make any sense to him why she was all of a sudden concerned, but he chose to ignore his curiosity on the matter and handle it later. Instead he sighed deeply before he answered as unfazed and collected as he could, "We have another dead body, same MO. as our Jane Doe in the woods."

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Thank you guys so much for the reviews, favorite and followings, and I'm glad so many of you got interested in my story. So I hope you guys like the this chapter, and the next one will be out next week.

Also I like to add that there are and will be grammar errors in this story, I had forgotten to mention before, and not a perfect writer and I don't have a Beta to fix it for me (which I have no intention on getting anyways), so if people have issues with that then you just have to live with it, okay? I write and release this mainly to entertain you guys as well release some of my creativity.

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