AVERY WOKE TO THE SOUNDS OF YELLING AND BANGING THROUGHOUT THE SKYBOX.

She groaned and sat up from her bed, "Interrupting my mid-day nap." She mumbled, adjusting her shirt around her shoulders.

The cell door suddenly opened and Avery backed up to the wall on her bed, "Prisoner 437, stand up and face the wall."

"What? Why?" It wasn't her time. There was just under a week before she turned eighteen.

The guard pulled on her leg, dragging her from the bed and her body slammed to the floor harshly, a small 'oof' leaving her lips, "Stand up and face the wall." He ordered again.

Avery slowly got off the ground and did what he said, putting her hands up, "I don't turn eighteen for another five days. I'm not supposed to float yet!" She exclaimed as they put something on her arm, a bracelet, with a needle pushing into her skin, "Ow! What's going on?!"

Two guards dragged her out of her cell and she looked around at all the other teenage prisoners in the same situation as her, "Where are you taking us? You can't be floating us all?!"

She didn't receive an answer and began kicking her legs out, trying to get free. One of the guards took out a needle and jammed it into her arm, "No! No! Stop!" She screamed before everything went black.

When she gained consciousness, she was shaking, but not from the cold. Her surroundings were unstable. She was strapped into a chair she realized before she even opened her eyes. When she did, Avery gasped. They were on a ship of some kind.

It was small, and there were dozens of other teenagers strapped in around her.

"What the hell is happening?" She groaned, leaning her head back against the headrest, trying to ease the headache she got from whatever they injected into her, "Where are they putting us?"

"We're going to the ground." Avery turned to look at the man to her right. She studied him for a moment. He seemed a bit older than the rest of them and was wearing a guard outfit. 

But his brown eyes still held fear in them, just like hers.

The ground? It wasn't safe, they were told they were still decades away from returning to the ground.

So why now?

Avery whimpered as the dropship shook, maybe they were never gonna make it down. Maybe the ship would explode upon entry.

Gosh, she's become so negative being in that little cell.

 Chancellor Jaha appeared on the screen and the man next to her drew in a sharp breath,

"Are you okay?" She asked, looking over at him, observing his tense shoulders and furrowed brows,

"Yeah..." He cleared his throat, his eyes still on the screen, "I'm fine."

Avery opened her hand and flipped it over on the armrest between them, "It's okay to be scared."

That's what her mother used to tell her.

The man looked at her before grabbed her hand and intertwining their fingers. The dropship shook a bit more and Avery squeezed his hand tighter. 

"Prisoners of The Ark, hear me now." The Chancellor spoke and Avery glared at the screen, "You've been given a second chance, and as your Chancellor, it is my hope that you see this as not just a chance for you, but 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've sent others. Frankly, we're sending you because your crimes have made you expendable."

Avery squeezed the man's hand in anger. He glanced over at her, "Are you okay?"

She sighed, "Yeah...he just pisses me off. Solving the problem by throwing us overboard, seeing if we die or not. Sink or swim."

"I think he pisses everyone off." He smirked before the Chancellor continued,

"If, however, you do survive, those crimes will be forgiven, your records wiped clean." The man next to her tensed again, "The drop site has been chosen carefully. Before the last war, Mount Weather was a military base built within a mountain. It was to be stocked with enough non-perishables to sustain 300 people for up to two years. No one ever made it there. Because we spare you no food, or water, or medicine, I cannot stress strongly enough, that Mount Weather is life."

Avery looked over at the man, "What if there's nothing left?" He glanced down at her, their dark eyes connecting, "What if they just sent us down here to die?"

He squeezed her hand gently, "Think about it, sweetheart. We're free from the ark. We can do whatever the hell we want."

She smirked at him, "We've known each other for, like, five minutes and you're already giving me pet names?"

"You bet, honey. We're already holding hands." He smiled down at her, bringing her some comfort.

"Your one responsibility is stay alive."