Dissention || Bellamy Blake [1 - Avery]

1: An Unusual Day

Avery Clarissa Pearson has lived in space since the moment she was born. The Frankenstein of a space station she lives on, called the Ark, has never been the pinnacle of what a society could be, though. And she certainly isn't the pinnacle of what a good citizen should be. Nor are her friends, which is the exact reason they have all ended up in the situation they are in.

The situation?

Jail.

Now, Avery and her two best friends did not end up in lock-up, or the Skybox, as it is called by their people, at the same time. Not by a long shot. Different crimes for different folks. That's how the saying goes, right?

Avery was the first of the three to end up behind bars. Or, rather, behind layers of thick sheet metal and magnetic locks. Her story, unlike the majority of her peers', is unique. One-of-a-kind. All her own. A tale over a decade old and still talked about to this day, much to the chagrin of the umber-haired young woman. Especially in more recent times. As the day of her 18th birthday draws steadily nearer, more and more speculation weaves tangled, suffocating webs over her daydreams about the future.

After all, when one lives in an absolutist society, all crimes are capital crimes.

Even ones committed by a six-year-old.

Of course, straight executing children for not understanding the importance of following every rule in the book to a T is still considered morally wrong. So, they lock them up. Put them in little 5' by 5' cells with a bed just barely long enough to hold their entire body, maybe a chair of some sort if they're lucky, and tell them that their crimes will be reviewed on their 18th birthday. Wait until they're 18. Then kill them. That's how it's always gone. Nobody, not one single person, has been acquitted of their crimes by the review board in the entirety of the 97 years their people have lived in this hunk of scrap metal in space. Avery suspects that, deep down, the people in power enjoy having that sort of influence over the lives- and deaths- of others.

As it stands, the running theory is that she'll be floated just the same as every criminal before her. All those years completing homework assignments, attending forced recreational time with the other prisoners in her cell block, making friends, for nothing. She'd been forced to watch at least three friends make the death walk in the past two years, and in six weeks, she'll make the same trip. Her friends will be forced to stand at attention in front of their doors, silent as they watch her be escorted to the airlock at the end of the hall.

There are a million horrible ways to die on the Ark. Most of them involve some sort of system failure. Freezing to death because of a heating fault, burning to death because of the same thing, life support faults, and accidental breach in outer walls are all things that can, and have, happened in the past. But those were accidents, something that happened to someone that was absolutely terrible, very likely preventable, but ultimately a shitty draw in the card game of life.

But the way one is given the ultimate punishment for a crime committed is intentional. And objectively insanely inhumane.

Floating.

That's what they call it. And yes, it's as horrible as it sounds. Put a human in an airlock, close the door, then open the one that leads directly to space. Let the void outside take care of the rest. You'll die within minutes, but how you die depends on so many things. Take a deep breath in preparation of death? Have fun feeling your lungs rupture and tear themselves to shreds. Exhale before that door opens? Welcome to the lovely feeling of suffocating until you pass out.

There are so many other options, humane options, to execute people, but of course, the most dramatic must be used. Nevermind just using the prospect of dying to keep citizens from breaking the rules. Why not instead use a very public, very dramatic method to get rid of the pesky criminals? And even better, have the unfortunate prisoners' families- their significant others, their kids, their parents- or even their friends, watch. Barbaric.

The girl with a questionable future lays sideways on her bed, butt up against the cold metal wall and feet straight up in the air. She hangs her head over the edge of the thin mattress, arms reaching down toward the floor. A chill runs through her, and she groans, reaching down her body to tug the faded maroon tee shirt she wears back over her abdomen, where it has slipped up.

"Ever heard of heat?" She calls out to nobody in particular, an annoyed frown on her lips, "It does wonders to, you know, keep people alive."

Moments after her snarky remark, a click sounds from her door and it swings open, revealing two surly looking men in guard uniforms. Some twisted part of her always finds it funny to see that their clothing is just as tattered and derelict as hers. Even the guard uniforms they wear are taped together or shoddily sewn up in spots. Makes her wonder what will happen in another hundred years, when clothes are little more than rags.

"Prisoner 037, stand and face the back wall," One of the guards, she doesn't catch which, orders. Avery flattens her hands on the floor, puts her scuffed up gray boots against the wall, and pushes, flipping back over herself off the edge of the bed.

As she slowly pushes herself to stand, hands raised, she gives a wary reply, "You do know I was just joking about the heat thing, right?"

Both guardsmen scowl at her. So her joke hadn't gone over well. They rarely do. Doesn't stop the sarcasm from flowing, though. The taller of the two (though only by an inch or so!) steps forward without another word and roughly snatches at her wrist.

"Ow," Avery growls as the man yanks her forward, then spins her pulls it around behind her back, "Be careful with my arms, dude. Believe it or not, I still do have use for them."

Neither of the men give reply. Instead, she hears the sound of metal scraping along metal, and then a click, and a sharp pain in her wrist. A pained yelp escapes her and she wrenches her wrist free of the guardsman's grasp. Wrapped tightly around her arm, just above where her wrist bends, is a thick, curved metal cuff. She pries at it with her free hand, but finds no way to get her fingers beneath or any sort of clasp that would assist in removing the thing.

"What the hell is this, man?" She questions incredulously, spinning to face the two men once more. The guardsman all but rolls his eyes, reaching out toward her once more without a single word said.

Not one to accept things and move on, Avery sidesteps the reach, slicing her hand through the air to slap his arm away. When he lets out an annoyed growl and goes after her again, she ducks under his arm and darts out the door of her cell. The second man can't do much in the way of restraining her, his own hands occupied by the large black box filled with more identical cuffs to the one she now wears, but he does manage to stick a toe out and trip the dark haired girl.

Avery stumbles out the doorway, slamming her ribs into the metal bars that line the opposite edge of the walkway. She's on the second 'floor' from the bottom, so a fall from here wouldn't have caused too serious an injury. But still, the idea that the man had nearly sent her sailing face-first over the rail pisses her off. She spins, nostrils flaring with anger.

"You're really trying to break bones today, aren't you?" She snaps, glaring at the two men as they slowly follow her out of her cell. One- the very same that had grabbed her wrist so roughly in the first place- has now pulled a weapon.

While there are certainly a few guns among the higher ranks of the guardsmen who police the entire space station, most are armed with a weapon called a shock lash. A cross between a police baton- like the ones seen in the worn history books she'd been forced to read- and a taser, the shock lash and Avery Pearson are well-acquainted.

"Just turn and walk, little girl," The man snarls, gesturing to the right of Avery with the lash in his hand. She chances a quick glance that way, eyebrows raising when she realizes she's not the only prisoner being forced out of their cell. And she's not the only one with a cuff around their wrist, either.

"Thought the whole point was that in 6 weeks, I won't legally be a 'little girl' anymore," Avery deadpans, leaning back so her forearms rest against the railing. "The chancellor pass a new law to forgo the formalities and do now what everyone knows is gonna happen to us all at 18 anyway?"

"Why don't you go find out?" The guardsman suggests, a smirk tilting his lips upwards as he speaks.

Avery glances between him and his partner a few times, pulling her bottom lip between her teeth as she tries to figure out if the man is bluffing or not. Surely the entire Ark would have a collective conniption if the council chose to float all of the juvenile prisoners at once, right? Like, there are kids who are 12, 13 years old here. Kids who, unlike Avery, still have a parent or two who love and care about them. Who would be absolutely horrified to not get to say goodbye. Right?

Right.

Avery decides they're bluffing.

"You're bluffing," She says, eyes narrowing slightly, "Trying to scare us into doing some sort of hard or tedious labor that the council doesn't want to pay some regular worker for."

The guardsman simply lets out a sharp exhale. It sounds more like a laugh than anything, and with the stupid smirk still on his face, he repeats, "Why don't you go find out?"

//

Well hi there, friends! If you're new here, welcome! Enjoy the ride, and please consider leaving a vote or comment, as I love hearing from my readers on what they like or don't like! If you're not new, you might as well be! This is the Avery and Bellamy story you all deserved from the beginning. The one my lil 20-year-old self just didn't quite have the ability to write at the time. Thanks for returning, and expect a similar, but slightly different, story! Enjoy!