Okay, guys. I know I am so behind on my other fanfictions but that is because I am stuck. I'm not stopping, I've just hit a wall. So if anyone has any ideas as to what you want to see in Because of You please tell me because I am struggling. Also, from here onward, this fic will be written from Clarke's POV. Starting now. Please review!

One. Two. Three. Four. Five.

Those numbers overwhelm the world. I count along with my mom's compressions, feeling everything dim to an agonizing crawl. I watch it all, playing out before me, trying to find the switch that'll turn this nightmare off. There is none, and a silence open up inside me, so deep I can't see the bottom.

But it's not over yet.

"Bel, don't do this!" Octavia screams, on her knees now by Bellamy's head. She'd shoved me out of the way the moment his chest stilled. I don't remember standing but I am, at his feet, staring out at the scene before me.

I feel the silence in me expand and contract, filling up my the cavity in my chest, threatening to pull and bury the rest of me inside it. No, he's not gone, a voice in mescreams. He's not. He can't be.

Thirty six. Thirty seven. Thirty eight.

You knew how dangerous it was, but you sent him in there anyway! Octavia's voice is a faraway memory, but it slams into me, again and again. You are responsible for this. You are responsible. You. I can feel myself cracking, skin spiderwebbing down my arms like I'm made of porcelain. Pieces of me chip and fall away.

I clench my hands until a tingling starts in my fingers, nails carving half moons into palms. No. This is Bellamy. Strong, stubborn Bellamy. Giving up is not in his nature, anymore than letting him is in mine.

My eyes burn, but I don't dare blink, still standing perfectly still, gaze frozen on his face. Beads of sweat coalesce on his forehead. His usual tanned complexion is a deathly pale, making him more ghost than man. I have the mad urge to reach for him if only to prove my fingers won't cut through him like a mirage.

Fifty three. Fifty four. Fifty five.

Mom stops counting at sixty.

I wait for her to do something else. Start another round. Bring out the epinephrine and shoot it into his heart. But it takes me a second before I realize that we don't have any epinephrine, and another to understand my mom isn't trying to do anything else at all. That there is nothing else we can do.

And then that silence lets out a scream.

I see tears falling from Octavia's eyes and she's shaking her head. She takes my mom's place and starts compressions again, but her arms are bent and her hand placement over his chest is wrong.

"No," I think I whisper, but I can't hear my own voice. The silence inside has bled into the room, muting everything around me. So I say it louder.

"No." No. No. No.

"Clarke." Somehow, my mom's voice breaks through the barrier and her hands are on my shoulders, fingers pressing hard into my shirt. "He's gone."

I shake my head. Because she's wrong. Bellamy can't be gone, anymore than the sky or ground can't exist. It just doesn't make sense with one less Blake among us.

If my brother dies, it's on you, Clarke.

I stumble back a step. Run my hands through my hair, trying to dislodge those words. That hideous, ruby red truth. There is already too much blood on my hands. It's a steady ocean surging around me. Soon I'll lose my footing, and slip beneath red waves.

If my brother dies, it's on you, Clarke.

"No," I repeat. Right now, it's the only word I understand. The only one I'm willing to accept.

I twist around, so fast my head spins, and scan the room, looking for something. Anything. This isn't it. It's not. I won't let it be.

My eyes skim over the few medical supplies clumped in a pile, the bandages I used to tend the arrow wound. There's the metal jar and a few weapons, a pair of taser rods-

My gaze snaps back to the rods, lying discarded in the far corner.

Before I can even think about it, I'm over there, snatching one up. I'm sweating but the weight in my chest is like ice, coating my bones and freezing my blood. I scramble back over to where Octavia is still doing compressions, trying to force her brother's heart to beat again.

"Move," I bark. There's no time for gentleness. No time for grief. Because grief means it's finished.

I allow her only a second to back away before my finger is on the button and I'm angling the rod straight over Bellamy. I press it, and an ivy of electricity crackles outward, dancing down the rod with a power that hisses through the air.

Then I bring the end of the rod down on Bellamy's chest.

A sickening jolt runs through the length of his body, down the very tips of his fingers, and his spine arches backwards, chest reaching up towards the pole. Then, just as quickly, he goes slack.

For a second, there's nothing. So I don't hesitate to do it again.

Please, Bellamy, everything inside me screams, louder than the snap of electricity. Louder than the roar of silence, crashing and breaking and shouting in my ears. I am a hurricane, content on tearing this world apart. Please!

I can't lose you too.

There's a gasp, and I nearly hit him again before I register the movement of his chest. That, as the seconds tick by, small breaths continue to saw between his pale lips.

Then his eyes are fluttering open, and they're suddenly looking up the ceiling. He blinks, and a a confused line appears between his brows. He doesn't try to fight his way up. His fingers are no longer curled into claws. I don't know if we should restrain him again, just in case, but I seem to have forgotten how to move.

Slowly, Bellamy's gaze sweeps to the side. Instantly, it locks on Octavia who's still crouching over him, her hand against his cheek. I'm not prepared for what comes next.

"O?"

She let's out a shaky laugh, half relief, half incredulity, and strokes his cheek. There's a smile on her face, the first I've seen in too many days. She draws her forehead to his while tears splash onto him, but he doesn't look away from her. Though still very weak, he struggles to place his own hand over hers. The band of red decorating his wrist is as brilliant as ribbon, and I know we won't be needing the shackles.

It isn't until then that I realize how badly I'm shaking.

I let the rod clatter to the floor, and the noise grabs Bellamy's attention. Those brown eyes swing over to me, and though tired, they are unmistakably clear. No Reaper, just Bellamy.

The sight yanks the air right out of my lungs and something in me snaps. It crumbles like dry timbre and I whirl away, sharply twisting on my heels. I start for the hatch.

"Clarke," Mom begins, but I sidestep her outstretched hand and clamor down the ladder. I can't move fast enough. Can't get out of here fast enough. The tremors are so bad I almost lose my grip on the rungs and fall the rest of the way.

I barely manage to make it outside and down the ramp before my legs give out and I collapse in the dirt. It's still dusted in ash, coating my hands in a fine layer of black, but I don't care. The silence is gone, replaced by a flood of relief I can't hold in anymore. The dam shatters, and I let myself do what I haven't allowed up until now.

In the company of the dead grounders I helped burn, I let myself cry.

I stay outside for as long as I dare, until the compulsion to check on Bellamy overrules my desire to stay put. I have to make certain he's okay. With my own eyes.

Upstairs, it's dark. I can tell from the sound of deep breathing, he's asleep. Worry has me measuring the evenness, ensuring there's no symptoms of fluid build up in his lungs, but they sound clear. Someone's put a bundle of cloth beneath his head and has draped a wool blanket over him. Octavia hasn't moved, and is now lying beside him, asleep on her own makeshift pillow.

I don't want to wake either of them, but I don't want to go back downstairs. It's a small comfort, being close by, in case there's any change. The rod is still on the floor where I left it. I pray I won't need it again.

I don't bother with scrounging up a blanket or pillow for myself, and just take a seat with my back against the wall, content with staying awake. I'm afraid to sleep; my nightmares are too intimately entangled with the thorns of reality. I can't escape one without cutting myself on the other.

I lean my head against the wall, keeping my eyes on Bellamy's sleeping form. I try to banish the image of his still chest and white face from my mind, but the memory does not go.

It haunts me, like a phantom.

Like a warning.

I don't remember falling asleep. But the shadows crouching in my nightmares scare me back to myself and I wake with a jolt, gaze tearing across the room, searching for the threat. Death and blood and red eyes and-

But the room is quiet, save for the sound of shifting movements as Octavia checks over her brother. Bellamy is still asleep, face turned toward me, and I feel myself relax. There are no monsters here.

As if hearing my thoughts, Octavia's eyes snap to me before looking away again.

There's a painful ache in my lower back and my joints pop as I make it to my feet. "How is he?"

"Fever's down," she says, voice empty and robotic. "Your Mom checked on him before leaving. Told me to tell you she'll be back this afternoon."

I nod, feeling suddenly awkward and unsure. There's been tension between Octavia and me since I sent Bellamy into Mount Weather, and has only worsened since recovering him. I can feel the strain of it, as if our friendship were made of thread. One wrong pull, and it comes undone.

I try to find the right words, but Octavia is already standing and moving toward the hatch with nothing more than a simple, "I need to see if Raven's got anything."

Before I have a chance to reply, she's ducking down descending the ladder. After a moment's hesitation, I follow her.

On the bottom floor, she slings on her pack and heads for the ramp.

"You were right," I say, before she can disappear outside. Her back is to me when she pauses, and she raises her head. I swallow. "It wasn't worth the risk."

I hear her drag in a deep breath, shoulders flexing. "You thought it was. At the time."

"I was wrong." It is a huge understatement and falls from me in a pitiful heap.

I see her hand clench into a small fist. "This isn't something he'll just be able to get over." Her tone is brusque, and those words carve into me, making it difficult to breathe. When I speak, it sounds weaker. "You think I don't know that?"

Octavia doesn't turn around. "It's hard to tell what you know these days."

I feel a cinder of anger light inside, warming against my ribs, but I push it away. "I understand you're still angry about Rubicon. I know-"

"You know," she repeats, slathering on a thick layer of sarcasm as she twists around to face me. Her lips pull up in disgust."You know, and you still did it. You condemned an entire village to die. You ordered Lincoln across enemy lines. You surrendered my brother to some twisted nightmare he'll blame himself for and you know."

Just like that, my anger extinguishes. The ember dies. I suddenly feel hollowed out on the inside, struggling to grip onto something solid if only to keep from falling into that sea of red. "I'm sorry that I can't find a more moral way around war."

"You could at least try," Octavia snarls back. "Rather than just deciding to let Mount Weather drop a bomb on innocent people!"

"I had no choice," the words wrench from me. Their edges are barbed and I'm sure if I say them enough, they'll make my throat bleed. "The bomb would've dropped one way or the other. The only difference is that those people would've known what was coming and Lincoln's position would've been given away." A desperation leaks into my voice, one I can't quell and don't try to. She has to see. She has to understand. "The Mountain Men would keep turning men to reapers and capturing more grounders to drain for their blood. Right now they could be draining our friends of their blood. If I'd warned the village, everything would be ruined and those people would've died for nothing."

That is what I tell myself, at least. And it's true. It has to be true.

There's a furnace in Octavia's gaze, eyes like the blue of too-hot flames. "So that makes it okay then."

I lock my jaw, feeling my hold over this very thin thread slipping. The guilt threatens to fall and bring me to my knees. I'd let it, if it meant being crushed into dust, into nothing, where no more war and the death it brings can exist. It's enough to nearly make me wish for a life back on the Ark again. To trade the ground for order. The sky for peace. The freedom of Earth for an unstained conscience. But my wings are gone and the stars have no place for us anymore. I doubt they'd take us back if they could.

"Do you think I wanted this?" I ask softly, feeling a pressure build behind my eyes. "Do you think I want to be responsible for ending people's lives? Either way, someone dies. Either way, something is on me. None of us get to survive without blood on our hands. Maybe you could do better, but I am doing the best I can."

Octavia's lips press into a thin, unforgiving line. "Well it's not good enough."

Without another word, she returns her back to me and I watch as she shoves the curtain over the door aside, and disappears from view.

I let out a shaky breath I hadn't known I was holding. I rest my back against the ladder, gaze falling to the floor. Choices, I figure, are like glass, strong in their own right, but still full of the potential to break. And I feel like I am standing in a river of broken choices, with no right and no wrong among them. They all lead to the same outlet anyway, and is no more an outlet than it is a graveyard.

I'll find a way to fix this later, somehow, after this war is finished and our friends are safe. If you even make it to then, a tinny voice at the back of my mind whispers, but I shake it off as I turn and climb the ladder again.

At least now I know with certainty what I am willing to lose, and when I reach the top of the ladder and look over at Bellamy, only to find his brown eyes already open and fastened onto mine, those red waves become less of a burden and more of a promise.

No one else.