A/N: TAKE IT. I DON'T WANT IT ANYMORE. This has literally been sitting in my drive for over a month because I can't write fluff. I give up. ENJOY IT IN ALL IT'S CHEESY GLORY.

aka the vending machine prompt no one asked me for T.T

Disclaimer: I don't own The 100.

Clarke wasn't one to admit defeat, to admit that maybe she needed to slow down and take a minute- she liked to burn through things like a vindictive wildfire until everything sort of alligned like planets in the sky.

But hot damn, was she tired.

As she glided through the halls of the hospital, airily swaying on her throbbing feet, she tried to count her shift hours in her head but she couldn't seem to count past twenty-eight. She knew she had long since surpassed twenty-eight hours but for the life of her she couldn't remember what came after twenty-eight.

She needed coffee, stat.

How she managed to get to the break room was obviously the work of a greater being far beyond the comprehensible limits of her mind.

How she managed to completely overlook the hulking body bent over at impossibly awkward angles in front of the vending machine was obviously a testament to her tired mental state.

"Do you mind?" A cross voice cut through her decaffeinated haze like a bucket of cold water on her starved ember.

Clarke snapped her head up so fast that she felt stars explode in her neck. Just as her eyes landed on the stranger, her coffee cup slipped through her hand like a ghost. The hot water was most definitely tangible and it tumbled across her scrubs- the searing pain flashed up her middle like rogue sparks. It permeated her scrubs and the hot, hot brine licked up her sides and middle furiously. With a flourish of colorful expletives, she had shucked off her top and shoved the pain into a small corner of her mind. The burns weren't white or peeling or blistering, just an angry shade of puffy red (thank god for scrubs).

She groaned as she staggered towards the sink, her body shaking and rumbling like a burning building. After drenching a towel with freezing cold water and wrapping it around her midsection, she grimaced at the uncomfortable sensation of hot clashing with cold, but reveled in it all the same.

Her relief didn't last long before exhaustion was settling back into her bones and she scowled. Just perfect.

She turned to the asshole who scared the agency out of her and was positively enraged to see the criminal holding back laughter (fortunately, he looked constipated while doing so).

This time fortunately, it didn't escape her notice that The Asshole (yes, she was capitalizing it now) had somehow managed to get his arm stuck in the vending machine slot. She briefly contemplated the existence of poetic justice.

She irritably raised an eyebrow, "Are you really in the position to be laughing at me?" She snapped, walking over to him and crouching in front of the machine, not letting herself wince at the cries of protest from her stomach.

That sobered him up immediately.

"Sorry."

She let out a grunt in response and focused on inspecting the damage. She tenderly tugged on the man's barrel of an arm to assess how tight it was wedged in.

"No wonder you got stuck," She muttered to herself mostly, but her comment didn't fall on deaf ears.

Out of the corner of her eyes, she saw his face contort into the similar shit-eating expression she had seen moments before. She turned to him face him, fully intending to give him a piece of her mind but her rant went and died in her throat when she saw his face.

Bloody asshole was damn attractive.

Then he went and opened his mouth and shattered the image.

"Cat got your tongue?" Holy hell, even his voice was like molten lava.

Even if it was spewing shit.

She snapped out of her reverie and gave him a glare icy enough to freeze Hell, "Vending machine got your arm?" She shot back at him, letting go of his arm to cross her arms over her chest and remind him of his situation.

He needed her, she didn't need him.

Clarke guessed he must actually be a decent human being underneath all the shit he exuded because he pursed his lips and mumbled a quiet apology. She gave him a triumphant smile before returning her attention to his arm, She quietly worked for a minute or two, tugging on his arm gently to avoid breaking it in half or something like that.

After the third tug, she blew a strand of hair out of her face and sat back, cross-legged, "How the hell did you manage to get yourself so tangled with the goddamn vending machine? It's stuck in there deep."

The Asshole raised an eyebrow and his face melted into that stupid grin again.

At her tempestuous expression, he coughed and explained himself quickly, "I was trying to get my granola bar but it kept sliding around everywhere and then I sort of got stuck."

"You sort of got stuck," Clarke mumbled mocking before returning her focus to The Asshole's arm. She tugged and pulled and twisted, she tried mostly everything she could without injuring The Asshole too much (she had still avowed to do no harm and that mantra was ingrained into her blood). When she had given his arm a particularly aggravated yank, he had tried to (unsuccessfully) bite back a groan of pain.

"Sorry," Clarke mumbled, shifting her leg to rest over his for more stability, "It's just wedged in there pretty good- don't say anything. Try bending your elbow downwards."

"I am."

"Can you bend any further?"

"Sorry to say, I'm not that flexible."

"Just try pulling your hand out!"

"We've already covered this: it's stuck!"

"I'm trying my best here but it takes two to tango, bud."

"I'm not really in the position to be doing any sort of dancing, Princess."

With a visceral growl aimed towards the random and unnecessary nickname, Clarke viciously pulled on his arm one last time. Miraculously, his arm slid free and he slid backwards to the ground, taking Clarke down with him. They ended up in an indiscernible pile of limbs on top of each other, groaning from the impact of the fall.

Then the door opened.

"Dr. Griffin," Chief Kane of General Surgery addresses bruskly from the doorway. Clarke feels her body go ice cold and she wishes spontaneous human combustion was more than an inexplicable phenomenon.

Chief Kane stiffly fixes himself a cup of coffee before picking something up and dropping it in her lap on his way out- her shirt, "I believe this is yours." He walks out.

Clarke was double negative that this day couldn't get any worse.

"So Dr. Griffin, my name's Bellamy. Thanks for helping me with my er, situation back there. How about I show my gratitude with some coffee? I promise I won't get miscellaneous body parts stuck in weird places, unless you're into that."

Clarke tries to burn Bellamy alive with her eyes.

….

(As it turns out, he had wandered into the employee-only break room by complete accident because he's directionally challenged and a bit disoriented after his sister broke her leg.)

(As it turns out, she does end up getting a coffee with him and is pleasantly surprised that he's only sometimes an asshole.)

(As it turns out, he becomes her favorite asshole.)

i can't humor.