AN: I know it's short, but I hope it's good

Rescue Me

(by One Republic)

Heaving with the effort, Bellamy picked his way downstream, at the back of the procession of Skaikru. It didn't seem to be enough of them ahead, but in the hazy, pale glow of the fires growing closer, it was hard to tell. He'd thought he'd heard some kids climbing the banks, escaping the river along the way, but he couldn't see any movement up on either side anymore. Clarke should be here. Octavia should be here. He couldn't keep them all alive on his own.

His throat seizing up, Bellamy went down to his knees in the river. The frigid water washed clean the burning embers from his arms and hands. He bowed his head, panting, before struggling back up to his feet. All around him, he felt more than heard the sloshing as dozens of kids trudged through the purgatory. It was too cold to be wet, much less to stay in this frothing, icy river.

Choking on the smoke at the banks, or drowning in the deep, rushing center of the wide river?

Feeling something hard against his knees, Bellamy reach down, and realized it was someone. Bracing himself by digging his heels deeper into the muddy riverbed, he yanked up hard, and pulled them from the freezing depths. Trudged a few steps up the bank to stand just calf deep.

Limp in his grasp, Bellamy brushed the shaggy, soaking hair out of the kid's face.

Sterling.

Clammy and sopping, the boy coughed ineffectively, and Bellamy rushed further up the bank, onto dry ground, risking the sweltering heat of the forest going up nearby. He dropped the boy, and pushed him onto his side, slapping his back.

"Where the hell is Jones?" yelled Bellamy, but the few stragglers who'd heard, and slowly made their way up the bank behind them, looked blankly between them, and the rest of the clan moving downriver still.

With slight huffs, and his head flopped forwards onto the rocky, slick ground, Sterling coughed up a mouthful of water. His eyes didn't open, and his breathing didn't ease. Bellamy pounded on the smaller boy's back, getting out only little streams of river water.

"Hey, hey, man,"

With a burst of an idea, Bellamy awkwardly held the kid up, and stuck two fingers gingerly down into his throat.

The kid seized up as he gagged, and Bellamy pulled his hand back. Hastily turning the kid to the side, Bellamy sagged with relief when Sterling began to vomit.

"It's ok, you're ok, c'mon, man," urged Bellamy.

Water mixed with yellow bile and the remnants of their dinner, stinking, and foamy, splattered onto them both, and then, thank all the gods that be, the boy began to cough up sputtering mouthfuls of brown water.

Sterling gasped, and his blue eyes flew open, streaked red, his hands flailing out, snatching a hold of Bellamy's jacket.

"Really, kid, you're ok, you're gonna be ok,"

Sterling coughed wetly again, his teeth chattering.

"C'mon, what happened? Where's Jones?" asked Bellamy, but Sterling's bloodshot eyes wavered, and he opened his mouth but nothing came.

"Ok, it's gonna be ok, I got you," Bellamy's assurances were loud, and thick.

Blowing out of breathe, and watching it in the cold air, Bellamy tried to think of what to do. Couldn't come up with much. Stripped off the heavy jacket, and waterlogged utility belt from Sterling. Tossed them aside. At least he wouldn't be weighed down so much.

Hands half-numb, Bellamy stood up, and dragged Sterling up with an arm around his back. The kid's raised his head a bit when he found himself on his feet.

"Bellamy," coughed Sterling, reaching out and grabbing hold of Bellamy's jacket again.

"Yea, man, it's me. I'll get you out of this, you hear me?"

Nodding almost sent the boy to his knees, but Bellamy held him up. Adjusted his grip on the gunner, and dragged him along. Whether it'd been five minutes, or twenty, that they'd been up on the rocky bank, Bellamy couldn't tell. But as he'd stood up, he'd clocked just how much closer the flames had raced.

Worst of all, he could see fire ahead, on both sides.

Leaving the river anytime soon wasn't going to be an option.

"They're all going to die on my watch," he realized.

They grew wearier with each slog of a step. He realized he could hear the splashing, groaning sound of others entering the river behind him. He looked behind, and could only make out a mass of shapes. Many shadows of them, moving quickly downriver. The smoke obscured the orange, dim light of the flames too thickly. Those who'd crawled out of the water back upriver? Or were these even Skaikru?

Bellamy supposed it didn't matter for now, who was who. Anybody in this river needed an escape.

Hours heaved by, every moment bruising and beating them further. They rested on hands and knees in the shallows upon the banks. Crawled along the rocks, and tried their luck at leaving the river altogether. Each time, they were driven by, sooner or later, by the horror that nipped at their heels.

Monroe knew... no, she hoped, that her friends were all behind her, slogging their way downstream. At least she hoped they all were. The glow of the flames creeping closer from either side only permeated so much through the thick white veil. Splashes, and cries- fear? Exhaustion? Pain? She couldn't tell anymore, told her at least some still followed, and so she kept going. Her feet, both of them, weighed more than a doe, and Monroe didn't know much how longer she could keep lifting them. Coated in her last pair of Ark-issue cargos, her calves burned, and her thighs ached, somehow, beneath the deepening numbness. How much longer could she keep going...

Not daring to let her feet still, Monroe tried to look behind as she kept moving forwards. A slippery rock, and she scrambled to regain her footing, gasping for air, praying for it to clear.

She looked over her shoulder again, moving slower as she did this time.

There!

There was definitely movement, people, trailing her, starting not five feet back, and stretching at least till she couldn't make anything out.

Skaikru was still following her.

So she kept going.

Yet again, she risked a look over her shoulder.

Was that sunrise creeping up behind them? She tried to remember the dropship's solar powered clock. Sunrise beginning meant it must be about 7am. There was no way they'd been walking since midnight.

Someone bumped into her shoulder, and she steadied them automatically. She looked back again. There was definitely a pink tinge to the sky behind them, a faint splash of relief against the blues and oranges that had been their night.

"Zoe?" croaked a hoarse voice.

"Yea, who're you? Can't see," Monroe forced out her scorched throat.

"Cade," the kid coughed, and fumbled against her, before finding her hand and holding on desperately.

"The sun's coming up," grunted Monroe, "We'll find a way out soon,"

Cade mumbled something that sounded like it was maybe agreement, but Monroe couldn't really make it out.

There was no way they could keep going much longer.