XX

[ PREVIOUSLY: Octavia was dragged from solitary and barrelled down the hallway without much explanation as to what was happening. She was sentenced to death for being born; and now she'll be dead before her 17th birthday ].

I exhaled sharply as my mind turned over the events of the last hour. Leaning my head back against the wall behind me, I closed my breath and willed myself to stop breathing so fast.

1 ... 2 ... 3, I thought to myself as I struggled to control the rage of emotions that were swirling throughout my mind. Just breathe, Octavia, just breathe.

BAM. I was dragged, struggling, kicking and yelling, through the metal grate and into the room beyond.

"Stop fighting!" one of the guards warned me, waving his shock baton around. "You don't want me to use this."

I glared at him and then I glared at the baton. "I'm never gonna stop fighting! Not until you give me what I want!"

"And what's that?" he sneered in response.

"I - I need to say goodbye to Bellamy!"

The guard paused.

"Please ..." I begged. "He-he's all I've got left ..."

A shadow was thrown across the floor as someone came to a stand-still behind me and the two guards. One of the men glanced questioningly over my head towards the figure.

"No," the steely cold voice of Commander Shumway cracked the air around me. "We don't have time for goodbyes. We must get her to the drop-ship before take-off or she'll be left behind. The launch begins within the hour."

"You monster!" I screamed, turning and lunging for the commander. "I hate you! How could you do this to me?"

ZAP.

And, just like that, I was stung by the guard's shock baton.

A volt of electricity flowed throughout my body, causing me to drop to the ground and writhe in pain at the contact.

"Oh my god," I gasped out when I could finally breathe again.

"Don't cause us any more trouble," Commander Shumway spoke, gravely and authoritatively. He sent a knowing look at the guards hovering nearby. "Take ... her ... to ... the ... drop-ship ... now."

As I was hauled to my feet I demanded angrily, "What the hell is a drop-ship? Aren't you gonna float me?"

Commander Shumway smirked as he looked at me. "Oh my dear Octavia. You're gonna wish we had."

My eyes widened in horror as I was dragged away. What the hell was going to happen to me?

I was marched through a maze of empty prison cells, passing the prison courtyard on the way. I had been locked up in solitary so I hadn't had the pleasure of being allowed to socialise with any of the others kept here. It was fine by me, anyway, I had spent all my life in hiding, only seeing my mother and Bellamy on occasion. I wouldn't even know how to interact with a large group of people.

I heaved a deep shaky breath, my mind spinning over the last 16 years of my life.

I was the second child born to my mother ... Bellamy had been the first. He was a good guy. He always looked out for me and brought me presents even when it wasn't my birthday. He was big and strong and I was so proud of him the day he burst excitedly into my hide-out and told me that he'd made the cut: he was going to join the guard.

I couldn't help but feel jealous though. Bellamy would tell me all these amazing stories; but I knew I would never get to experience any of them myself and that made me sad.

According to the rules of our community, only one child was allowed per family. Anyone else caught breaking this rule would be cruelly executed ... as well as the unwanted child. In my case, that unwanted child was me.

The leader of our community was Chancellor Thelonious Jaha. He was head of the Council, a board that many prestigious and privileged people sat at. They were our form of government and the guard? Our form of punishment. They did whatever the Chancellor told them to do without question. It was like they were his little minions, carrying out his dark deeds in the dead of night. To be fair, Chancellor Jaha isn't as bad as some of the previous ones we've had, but let's cut to the chase: all the privileged care about is themselves and Chancellor Jaha was no exception.

There were  2,659 of us in this tight-knit community. Everyone had their special talents in their own special sectors, some of which included the medics, the mechanics, the scientists, and the workers. Each sector was marked off with a specific number and were subject to frequent surprise inspections.

As for me, my "home" was in a dingy cold corner of the washroom that no one used anymore. Whenever I heard the officers' boots clattering across the floor, I would pull up one of the floorboards and hide beneath it until the inspection was over. However, the guards barely ever made the rounds around the washroom so it was only on occasion that I was forced to hide.

One day, a few months after my sixteenth birthday, I was sewing a broken button back onto a pair of my old overalls when Bellamy hurried into the washroom. In hushed tones, he told me of a masquerade dance that all the youth were having in Sector 4. He was going to take me there as a belated treat for my birthday! I was so thrilled I couldn't believe it! For the first time in my life I stepped outside of the washroom door. For the first time in my life I saw the outside world. For the first time in my life I wasn't weird, I wasn't unwanted, I wasn't unusual. For the first time in my life, I was dancing with everybody as if I belonged, as if I was wanted. Then ... then the door burst open and ... and I was caught.

While I was waiting for a review, my mother, who had been caught in the middle of a capital crime, was punished by death. Bellamy wasn't allowed to come and see me in jail and was under strict supervision by the higher guards of his squad.

When I was locked up in solitary for all those weeks, I had plenty of time to think and reminisce. Me and the other people in my community were the last remaining survivors after a plant of nuclear bombs exploded and destroyed the world over 97 years ago. Our ancestors, who were only 400 in number at the time, had fled via a large spacecraft they called the Ark. They managed to live through the chaos that completely ruined the earth, turning the only home that humans had ever known into an inhabitable, radioactive mess. Our ancestors had stocked up enough supplies to last them and their descendants for 200 years. But, after those years were up, they'd be forced to return to the ground.

However, as the lapse of time drew on, glitches began to occur in the Ark's system. Oxygen, which was our primary concern, was leaked into space and much of it was lost. So, the council decided to pool their resources, ration food, and limit the population. One way of executing the latter was the rule of one child per family.

The government was very strict. You could do anything, no matter how slight, and you'd be arrested and put into lock-up. You could stay in there for years. It depended on whenever the council was ready to review your case. If they voted for you, you could be released, but if they decided against you, you would be floated the day of your 18th birthday. Being floated basically meant that you were locked in an air-tight room and sucked out into space with the push of a button. The pressure of the non-oxygenic, harsh environment out in the atmosphere would crush your brain within seconds. It was a speedy death, but a painful and horrid one none the less. 

It was a fate I was more than sure to suffer.

The two guards hauling me to my death pulled me through yet another set of secured metal doors before jerking me to a stop.

Breathless, I gazed upwards and then froze.

Prisoners of all sorts were being formatted into orderly lines. Group by group, they were being marched down a nearby corridor, each accompanied by a squad of guards.

I shook my head in shock and confusion. What on earth was going on?

I was forced to stand in a line amongst another group of about a dozen youths who all had their hands tied behind their backs. They all gazed at me in curiosity as I approached them. No doubt they had heard about me, the unwanted stowaway, by now. It was probably a novelty to them that I'd managed to survive undetected for so long.

"Group 13!" the harsh voice of an officer up ahead reached my ears.

"C'mon, let's go," a bunch of guards shuffled me and the others forward towards the front.

There, standing next to the corridor we were about to walk down, was Chancellor Jaha, his second-hand man Marcus Kane and the highest ranking doctor in our community, Abigail Griffin. As we each passed them, our bonds were loosed from our hands and silver cylinder wrist bands were snapped onto our arms.

We were escorted down the passage towards an air-tight compartment. It led straight into one of the spacecraft's launch pads were a missile was set up and being loaded with prisoners.

Was the Ark having yet another oxygen crisis? Were they gonna blow the missile and kill us all?  Were they planning to reduce the population so the others would have a longer shot at life?

My group was taken aboard the large contraption and assigned to seats that had been built into the inside. There were two levels and I was directed to the upper one. As I clambered up the small ladder, I couldn't help but think of Bellamy.

I was never going to see him again.

Tears pricking my eyes, I settled down into my seat and watched as the other prisoners did the same. A bunch of officers came through and checked our seatbelts. I still had no idea what was going to happen to me and, judging from the quizzical, incredulous looks on everyone else's faces, they didn't either.

As the last of the guards exited the missile, there was a loud hissing noise as the doors creaked shut.

"Hey, you're the girl they found under the floor, right?" a snarky feminine voice snapped me out of my reverie.

Straightened up, I opened my eyes and shot daggers at the blonde, blue-eyed speaker as I snapped, "What's that to you? And the name's Octavia, not 'girl-under-the-floor', got it?"

"I've never met a runaway criminal before," the girl laughed lightly, completely ignoring my sardonic comment. As I continued to stare at her, I noticed a hint of malice flicker in her eyes.

"Well, we learn something new everyday," I responded with a shrug as I turned away.

However, the girl was far from finished. Leaning forward in her seat, she snarled, "If you're a criminal just for being born, I wonder how much more of a crook you'd be if you actually committed a crime. I wouldn't want to be in your shoes!"

"That's it!" I seethed. I flung off my seatbelt and marched over to the girl. I grabbed her by her hair and forced her to look up at me. "Never ... cross ... me ... again. Is that clear?"

The girl stared at me and then gave a short laugh before ejecting a stream of spit straight into my face! Surprised, I stumbled backwards, right into her outstretched leg.

BAM.

I went tumbling to the ground. The girl jumped up from her seat and hurled herself on top of me.

"Stupid bitch!" she screamed right in my ear. "You're an unwanted, unloved un-necessity. If you really care about the rest of us you'll jump off this drop-ship right now and kill yourself!"

A mist of rage settled over me as I freed my arm from her vice-like grasp and punched her square in the face. The girl didn't even flinch as my fist made contact with her nose and mouth. She just wiped the blood off her face and smirked triumphantly. "Game on," she hissed as she dug a knee into my stomach.

My cry of pain was cut off as my head was slammed back into the ground. A stinging blow was delivered to one cheek and then the other. Another knee found its way into my side and a fist, with the girl's entire body weight behind it, slammed into my chest.

I wrenched myself away from her and erupted into a spasm of coughs. "You bitch," I gasped out.

"W-what did you just say to me?" she growled as she prepared to throw herself on me again.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" a loud masculine voice yelled over the chaos that had erupted. "Let's take a chill-pill and calm down, alright?"

I glanced up, right into the brown doe-eyed gaze of a short, stocky youth. His brown hair fell in waves that curled up around his shoulders and ears. His jacket was unzipped and his chest was in full view of everyone. His lower lip was busted and there was a cut over his left eye. As he bent down to give me a hand up, I saw the muscles ripple beneath his arms.

I gagged and snatched my hand away from his. "I'm good ... thanks," I muttered to myself as I scrambled to my feet. What a good-for-nothing show-off, I inwardly scoffed.

"Fine. Whatever," the boy threw his hands up in the air as he turned his back on me. "But seriously ... you were getting your ass kicked."

"Spacewalker!" someone jeered from the opposite side of the room. "Didn't recognise you for a minute there."

"S-Spacewalker?" I repeated, confused.

"Yep. That's me," the boy spun around to look me in the eye. "Or just Finn Collins if you prefer."

"Spacewalker? That's a weird nickname," I muttered as I slowly made my way back to my seat and plonked myself down on it.

"Yeah ... well that's because he ventured out on an unauthorised, illegal space walk and wasted three months of the Ark's oxygen," the blonde girl that I'd been wrestling with rolled her eyes as she stood up and brushed herself off.

"And since when did you kid yourself on knowing everyone's backstory?" I retorted.

The girl's head snapped up and she glowered at me. "Since when have you learned your lesson on keeping your mouth flippin' shut?" she growled.

"Ladies, ladies," Finn held out his hands and gave each of us a pointed look. "Let's not get into this again."

I huffed as I wrenched my seatbelt back on. "Whatever ... Spacewalker."

Finn just grinned mischievously in my direction as he sauntered off, his head held up proudly.

I rolled my eyes. What an asshole.

Suddenly a screen situated to my left flickered to life, revealing Chancellor Jaha's face.

Most of the prisoners shouted and booed at him as he began to speak.

"Prisoners of the Ark, all one hundred of you, listen to me now," he said in a dead-calm tone. "You've been given a second chance. And as your chancellor it is my hope that you see this not only as a chance for you but as a chance for all of us; indeed, for mankind itself. We have no idea what is waiting for you down there. If the odds of survival were better we would have sent others, but frankly, we are sending you because your crimes have made you expendable ..."

I puckered my brow in confusion as I whispered to myself, "W-where are they sending us?"

As if to answer my question, Chancellor Jaha resumed his speech with one more statement, "We are sending you to the ground."

Without realising it, I grabbed the sides of my seat until my knuckles grew white. My breaths were coming out in short and uneven pants as I took in the staggering news.

We were going to Earth.

Gif: Octavia when she hears that she's being sent to the ground.

XX