Authors Note
This is the newest of my character FanFiction creations! I fell in love with The 100 from the first episode, but I didn't realize Eris until around season 4. As a warning, this character has an extremely dark and violent past so this is your TRIGGER WARNING FOR MATURE AND SENSITIVE CONTENT AHEAD. It is my personal belief that the strongest characters are the one's who have overcome the darkest pasts which is exactly how Eris is written.
While I will not be writing explicit content, there will be mature themes throughout the story. Consider this a rated R version of the show because while the CW's vocabulary and language content is limited, mine is not. I believe it to be a more realistic setting with slightly more mature content. The CW does an amazing job of making gore seem not so much like gore. I will not be following this suit.
Please note that you have been warned about the mature content, so proceed at your own risk. I promise the story won't disappoint you!
The Dropship
She was dreaming again… if you even could call it dreaming; it was more of a nightmare that haunted her since she was a little girl, but even when she awoke and was thrust back into reality, the fear of the dream still plagued her. It was a never-ending sickness with no antidote. Fear brought back this nightmare and that fear made her weak; it made her relive the past over and over again in her sleep as she rotted in the cold metal cell that kept her prisoner. Eris sat up, her breath shallow and her body still aching from the shadows of her past. She drew her knees to her chest and wrapped her arms around them attempting to make herself feel safe, but to no avail. She never felt safe not as long as she was trapped on the Ark Station. Frustrated, she laid on the floor and started doing push-ups to try and clear her mind. A sore body was the only distraction she had from her disordered mind, so it became a daily routine from the moment she was sentenced to a life in prison or at least until she reached her adult age. She didn't really know what she was preparing herself for, but Eris made a promise to herself that she would never again be the victim. She was going to be strong, someone who didn't need to rely on anyone to help her to survive…not that she would survive for very much longer.
Her crimes on the Ark were enough to get her floated the moment she turned eighteen. Any crime, as a matter of fact, was enough to get anyone floated unless they were a minor in which case they just locked up until they were of floating age. The Chancellor always told them that they would review the crimes of each minor and reevaluate their sentence before making their decision, but Eris murdered seven people in their sleep; there was no way they were going to let her live even with her claim to self-defense. Of course, no one believed her… the doctor who examined her to prove (or rather disprove) her claims of sexual abuse happened to be the secret lover of one of the guardsmen she had murdered. He couldn't tell his wife of course, but he had enough authority to tell the Council that Eris was a liar and a murderer and deserved to be locked up for her crimes. Given the chance…Eris would have murdered him in his sleep too. Slit his throat like all the others and let it stain her hands without hesitation. Men like him all deserved to die painfully. She never liked violence, but when it came to protect herself, Eris never wavered.
Sweat dripping from her nose, Eris was reached one hundred when the door to her cell creaked opened and three guards walked in. Two of them were armed with rifles, the third had his hands full with a set of clothes and boots. She wasn't quite eighteen yet, but if they wanted to float her a few months early Eris was more than happy to be granted that escape from her life on the Ark, free from its tormenting memories. "Prisoner zero-one-three," said one of the guards as another threw a pile of clothes on the bed. "Get dressed, you're coming with us." Eris stared at the outfit lying on the bed all neatly folded up as the same guard laid a pair of boots below them on the ground. He closed the cell door and locked Eris in once again; at least he was smart enough to give her some privacy, no doubt he knew her as the guard killer since five of her seven victims were actually guardsmen. Eris walked over to the bed and picked up the clothing. It was the first time she had been given something that wasn't a pair of sweatpants and sweatshirt. She had practically grown up in this cell, been locked up since she was twelve years old which meant she was pushing six years. She didn't care. Why keep someone who didn't want to be here who was constantly plagued by the nightmares from within these walls?
The pants they had given her had leather patches in all the important areas where her arteries were; knees, upper thigh…weird that they would've given her these when they would've been better off on a guardsman. Practical, good for a fight against knifes and non-automatic weapons. Eris felt slightly uncomfortable in them, they were tight fitting to her figure, but she wore them anyways. She didn't have a reason to fight the guards now since they respected her space without any trouble. The white, short-sleeved shirt was a little loose on her, falling off her shoulders a bit, but the leather jacket they provided with her covered her up well enough. There were several more off-coloured patches holding it together. Such a strange outfit to be worn for a floating. The door to the cell opened and the three guards walked back in. "Prisoner zero-one-three hold out your arm," he said, the other two pointing their guns at her ready to fire. Eris held out her arm unwillingly as the guard clamped a metal bracelet around her wrist that cut into her skin. Eris winced, but refused to show them any sign of vulnerability. The three guards led her out of the jail cell and into the open.
It was a mass exodus. Every under aged prisoner on the ship was being led out of their jail cells and in an orderly fashion for the most part; a few of the prisoners continued resisting the guards insisting that they weren't yet eighteen. She couldn't blame them since they weren't given any information about what exactly was happening. There had to be a least a hundred of them if not more, each one of them wearing a silver bracelet on his or her wrist just like the one the guard put on Eris. Some of them were dressed like her and others had clothing that looked like had been worn since their arrest. Where the hell were they taking them? She didn't recognize any of the faces around her, but then again, she didn't have much of a life on the Ark even before her arrest. Wherever they were taking them Eris knew it couldn't be the floating chamber; they couldn't possibly float this many underaged prisoners, there would be a riot from the families of the prisoners. No; there was something else going on, but she had yet to figure it out.
Eris stopped just behind another prisoner, a tall boy with blue eyes that were too far apart and a crooked hooked nose. He made her uncomfortable and for whatever reason it made Eris want to hate him. He raised his eyebrows at her and smirked before a guard took him by the arm and forced him onto what looked like an escape pod built for a large amount of people. An exodus ship? Why would they be loading the prisoners onto the exodus ship? A guardsman grabbed her arm and began pulling her towards the ship. Eris fought back. "Let go of me!" Eris yelled as she tried yanking her arm from his hand. She didn't like to be touched especially by guardsman so when she started to fight back, she caused a panic amoungst the other prisoners who started questioning what was happening with them. Another guard from behind her lashed her with his electric stick catching her by surprise, but it was enough for the other guard whose hand was still around her arm to pull her onto the ship and force her into one of the seats. Eris didn't fight after that; at least the guard was no longer touching her. Every face surrounding her was young, all of them minors and all of them had blank expressions. One of them was even passed out, a blonde girl who looked like she was sleeping peacefully. Eris could tell that if anyone knew what was going on it was the unconscious girl, probably silenced for her knowledge. Smart move by the Ark, even if they were just children they outnumbered the guards one hundred to ten and even without weapons they would easily overpower them.
Then it struck her. They weren't being floated… they were being sent to the ground. It was the only thing that made sense; the private classes about earth survival that they were forced to attend, learning how to make a fire, shelter, how to make weapons and hunt. The wrist bands that cut into their wrists as some form of identification. The durable clothes that looked like they were meant for an all-weather occasion. The Ark must be in desperate need of oxygen if they're sending this many of them to the ground. Eris may have been locked up for a long time, but she had nothing but time to read and study different skills while she was imprisoned: it was the one thing that set her apart from most of the other prisoners, she had been in prisoner for most of her life, so she was given access to whatever books she wanted to make up for her lack of access to the public schooling the rest of the kids received while growing up. Too bad most of them didn't take their Earth survival classes seriously or they might have been more prepared for this event. Eris watched the door to the dropship close as the last of the guards exited…. One, two, three…three guards evacuated the dropship. But where was the fourth?
The lights to the dropship flickered as the metal clamp that held the ship to the Ark creaked and moaned in defiance, signaling the beginning the activation launch sequence. Eris closed her eyes and tightly gripped the handles of her seat. No one had ever been sent to the ground before since the Ark's creation and according to the scientists on the Ark it wasn't meant to be livable for at least another hundred years. Still, Eris would rather die a painful death of reentry or radiation than be stuck on the Ark for another few months before being floated: in her mind she was going to die soon either way. At least with this act, she would have a chance to live on the ground if it proved to be survivable.
Like a pebble teetering from a cliff's edge, they were dropped. Eris tightened her grip on the seat as the weight of the dropship fell towards earth's gravity. The booster engines propelled them towards the surface of the earth, the worn-out contraption rattling and shaking violently. Eris closed her eyes, inhaling deeply through her nostrils as she tried to bring herself to a sense of calm when a familiar and hated voice carried through the loud speaker and infiltrated the display screens inside the dropship: it was Chancellor Jaha. Eris' eyes flew open in a rage as he began to speak to the hundred.
"Prisoners of the Ark hear me now. 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." Eris turned her head as another kid screamed out to Wells Jaha, the son of the Chancellor. "If, however, you do survive, those crimes will be forgiven, your records wiped clean."
Wiped clean? Was he serious? Eris pondered the fantastical idea; a clean record and a chance to start over. Undoubtedly, he didn't mean everyone on the ship had this option since there were more than a few that were murderers, rapists, and other violent offenders. Eris was empathetic to the kids on the ship who had committed minor infractions like drug abuse, stealing food from the kitchens, or even something as harmless as breaking curfew. They were going to be stranded on a savage Earth with others who were not so innocent, including herself.
"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 here. Because we spare you no food, or water, or medicine, I cannot stress strongly enough, that Mount Weather is life. You must locate those supplies immediately. Your one responsibility is to stay alive."
Responsibility? The idea was laughable! Eris watched as two of the prisoners removed their safety straps and began floating around the zero-gravity cabin. The blonde, who had finally came-to, pleaded with them to remain in their seats, but neither of them heeded her words. The cabin started to heat up as the dropship entered into the Earth's atmosphere; those kids were going to regret ever leaving their seats before landing. Then again, they might all die on reentry since the dropship showed no signs of slowing down. Eris couldn't drown out the screams and tears around her as they pummeled towards the Earth in a fiery ball. Ready to accept her death, Eris felt the burst of the retrorockets followed by a sudden jerk from the parachutes deploying to slow their landing. Still the landing was rough, throwing the three prisoners out of their seats harshly against a wall. Eris heard a distinctly loud crack over the roar of the retro engines as two of the prisoners crumpled to the floor. Eris knew by the sound that neither one survived the crash landing.