A/N: Hey guys, so I got the Season 2 DVDs of the special features alone, and there's a deleted scene between Lincoln and Bellamy where Lincoln warns Bellamy that he might get turned into a Reaper! I just love that I thought of that without even knowing that they'd thought of that. haha :P
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Clarke
She woke with a start, not even realising she'd fallen asleep in the chair. She quickly sat up, but then regretted the motion as her neck seized up from the position she'd been sleeping in. She reached, up, massaging it gently, then looked around the dark room. She was alone except for Bellamy, but she didn't have to check that he was okay- he was still making those horrible sounds, a low drone of grumbling, shrieking, and groaning. She could make out his shape on the bed, his head tossing from side to side, his arms and legs clenched- always- against the restraints.
After working through the strain in her neck, she pulled to her feet and walked over to Bellamy, staying well out of reach of him. She ignored the snarls and increasing agitation in his posture as she watched the monitor, making sure all his vital signs were still okay. They were, so she picked up the clipboard to make a note of it, then smiled as she realised that, while she slept Octavia had dutifully kept up the record on her own. Maybe she'd decided that writing everything down wasn't such a horrible thing to do- but Clarke very much doubted that. Probably she was just keeping it up because she figured it would let Clarke do her job more easily, and save him.
Clarke checked the level of his fluids and then finally looked down at Bellamy's face. His expression was twisted in agony, his brow sweaty, his hair thickened into clumps, his eyes wild and red. She circled around him and watched as his gaze followed her, watched as he bared his teeth and raged at her. She wondered if he was trying to say real words, or whether he was just raving.
"I'm right here," she said softly to him, despite the fact that his response was to gnash his teeth and scream at her. "We're going to get through this," she told him. "You're going to get better."
She could see blood dripping from his wrists and she grabbed her little flashlight, making sure to point it at the ground as she turned it on. Bellamy still reacted, twisting his head around to look away from her, away from the light.
She shined the flashlight on his wrist and examined the wounds carefully. His constant straining against the leather cuffs had turned them a dark brownish red, and although the wounds themselves were superficial, he was constantly reopening them, never giving them time to heal. She tried to remind herself that they would soon be just more scars on his body, but still, it hurt her to see it.
Clarke would have liked to clean and dress the wounds, but she knew that was impossible. Instead she dabbed at them with a clean cloth, making Bellamy redouble his struggles, and finally she just left it alone, realising it would cause him more anxiety and pain that it was worth.
She turned away and put her hands flat on the trolley of supplies, taking big breaths, trying to calm herself down. It was so hard to see him like this, to be able to almost nothing for him, except wait it out. But she managed not to break down, not to cry about it, not to let herself get so upset that she couldn't get through this. There would be time for the shock of all this to catch up to her- to all of them- later.
Clarke could see that Octavia was doing the same thing. The younger girl acted as though Bellamy's words the day before hadn't bothered her, or that she'd forgotten them, but Clarke knew it wasn't true. What he'd said to her had been hurtful enough, but even the small bit she'd overheard him saying to Octavia had been even worse.
"Addicts hurt the ones they love the most," she said softly, almost under her breath. She tried to let that comfort her, that half-remembered line from when she was still a medical apprentice, still studying under her mother and the other staff in sickbay. It seemed like so long ago, so impossibly long that it must have been another life, another person- it couldn't have been her. Sometimes she'd wondered how they'd all survived at all, experiencing such horrors in such a short span of time.
Suddenly she realised that Bellamy had gone quiet.
Hurrying back to his side, she glanced at the monitor and saw that his heart rhythm had totally changed, and was rapidly going downhill. She took exactly one second to register that and allow herself to panic, and then she sprung into action, running to the defibrillator and turning it on to charge, then hurrying to the door and screaming for Octavia before running back to his side and getting the paddles ready for the shock.
Octavia and Lia both burst in just as Clarke was laying the paddles on Bellamy's chest, and quickly Octavia went to the machine and waited for Clarke to give the order to shock him.
Clarke looked to make sure nothing would interfere with the charge and then said, "Now!"
Bellamy's body's tensed and his back arched as the electricity surged through him, and then he went still again. When he didn't immediately revive, Clarke put the paddles down and placed her hands over his sternum, interlacing her fingers and starting chest compressions.
Octavia's face looked stricken, as though she couldn't quite believe that the shock hadn't worked. Clarke met her eyes, thinking to give her some kind of reassurance, but she knew her own expression must have been grim as well.
Inside her head, she counted to sixty, and then she pulled away from his chest and grabbed the paddles once more. Bellamy still wasn't moving.
"Again," she said to Octavia, who flipped the switch, delivering another charge through the paddles and into Bellamy's chest. Again, his body stiffened and arched, but again when he collapsed back into the bed, he showed no signs of life. Clarke resumed her chest compressions.
"It's not working," Octavia said, her voice rising in panic with every word. "Why isn't it working?"
"Come here," Clarke said, and Octavia ran to her side. "Tilt his head back and open his mouth. Octavia swallowed but did what she said. Clarke kept up with the chest compressions as she said to Octavia, "Now you're going to pinch his nose and blow into his mouth- two big breaths for every thirty compressions I do. Okay?"
"I'm ready," Octavia said, leaning close to Bellamy and watching his face, which was totally slack and unresponsive.
"Twenty-four, twenty-five, twenty-six, twenty-seven," Clarke counted aloud with every push of her hands. "Twenty-eight, twenty-nine, thirty." She stopped the compressions and Octavia leaned down quickly, covering Bellamy's mouth with hers and blowing one long breath into his mouth, and then another. Clarke went back to his chest, lining up her hands again and restarting the compressions.
"Please, Bellamy," Octavia started whispering urgently into his ear. "Please wake up… please, please, Bell, please wake up." Tears started slipping down her cheeks, but she held it together enough to wait for Clarke to reach the thirty count again, and then again Octavia leaned down and gave him two more breaths. Again, nothing happened.
Clarke kept working on his chest, staring at his face, willing something to happen. The twitch of a muscle, the flutter of an eyelid- anything. Octavia's pleas and promises soon became a begging mantra for him to wake up. But he was so still, so dead-looking, that it seemed like there was no hope. But she knew she couldn't lose it- none of them could.
"Lia, grab me that syringe on the trolley," she ordered. "It's a little clear tube with liquid in it."
"I know what a syringe is," Lia said, going to the trolley and picking up the adrenaline that Clarke had drawn up and laid out earlier.
"Octavia, switch with me," Clarke ordered, guiding the younger girl's hands into the right position and letting her resume the compressions. "Count out loud," she told her, starting her off, "Eighteen, nineteen…"
"… twenty, twenty-one," Octavia continued.
Clarke took the syringe from Lia and attached it to one of the ports on Bellamy's fluid line. She felt sick to her stomach, like vomiting. She knew this was the last result. This, plus one more shock, and if nothing happened then she'd have to call it, declare him dead. And then what? She looked at Octavia's terrified face and wondered, could any of them go on after that?
"One milligram epinephrine, administering now," she said out loud as she depressed the plunger on the syringe and delivered the medicine.
"… twenty-six, twenty-seven," Octavia was still counting.
Clarke leaned in close to Bellamy's face and she swept a hand over his forehead and through his hair. "Please," she whispered to him, feeling the crack in her voice, feeling her own tears welling up. "Please don't leave us."
"… twenty-nine," Octavia continued.
At the count of thirty, Clarke covered Bellamy's mouth with her own and breathed into it- two long, sustained breaths. She watched his chest rise and she knew that air was getting through, at least. But she couldn't help the horrible thought that this might be the last time she felt his lips under hers.
Bellamy didn't move, didn't stir. He did nothing at all.
"Okay," Clarke said, trying to pull strength back into her voice. "Let's shock him again."
"How long does this continue for?" Lia asked.
Clarke and Octavia's eyes met but they ignored the question as Clarke put the paddles back onto his chest. "Hit him," Clarke told Octavia, who dutifully flipped the switch and delivered the shock.
Setting the paddles back down, Clarke resumed chest compressions immediately, counting out loud, feeling her dread growing with every number. Finally she got to the twenties and she could barely speak. Octavia heard the obvious grief in her voice and her face crumpled. She leaned over her brother, resting her forehead against his, sobbing quietly as her tears dropped onto his cheeks, making it look like Bellamy, too, was crying.
"… twenty-four," Clarke whispered. "Twenty-five." She felt one of his ribs snap under her hands but kept going, "Twenty-six. Twenty-seven."
Bellamy's body suddenly reanimated and his eyes snapped open, his mouth pulling in air in deep gasps, as if he could never get enough. Octavia collapsed over his chest, sobbing, clinging to him. Clarke reached out to pull her away, warn her off in case Bellamy might hurt her, but then his turned his face into the crook of Octavia's shoulder and whispered, "Hey, O."
"Impossible," Lia whispered, but she was clearly impressed- maybe even happy.
Octavia pulled back, her tears stopping- from shock or joy, Clarke wasn't sure which. Octavia took his face in her hands and looked at him, and Clarke crept closer, noticing the change in him, that he didn't try to attack them, didn't try to break his restraints, didn't even try to shake Octavia off. Once Clarke was alongside the bed, she could see that his eyes were no longer red, but back to that soft brown gaze that she knew so well. The relief was almost overpowering.
"Bellamy," Clarke breathed, drawing in a shaky breath and then releasing it, feeling the dam of her tears break at the same time, and then her face was wet too. Octavia reached back and grabbed Clarke's hand, pulling her closer, and together the two of them smiled down at him, Octavia keeping a hand on his face while her other hand squeezed Clarke's tightly. Clarke swept her fingers through Bellamy's curls and asked him softly, "Are you okay?"
He licked his lips and let out a shuddering breath of his own before he said, very quietly, his voice strained, "Yeah. I think so."
Octavia grabbed Clarke up in her arms and squeezed her so hard she thought she might break, but she didn't care, she just hugged her back, both of them crying, holding each other, grinning through their tears.
When they broke apart and looked at Bellamy again, he was smiling. His voice was raw but wry and gentle as he said, "Well… if I'd known something like this would make you two friends again, I'd have done it a long time ago."
Clarke and Octavia turned their heads in unison to look at each other, and both of them burst into laughter as though he'd just said the funniest thing in the world.