The moon shined through the skylight, illuminating the cell into a dozen shades of grey, from inky slate to pale ivory depending on where the light fell. From across the room she could hear the other girl sleeping quietly for the most part, except for the occasional huffing sighs of blissfully deep sleep. Sloane continued to stare up at the moon, remembering a saying her dad once told her.
The sun loved the moon so much, he died every night to let her breathe.
She felt her throat constrict. She missed her dad so damn much, especially on big nights like this. She internally scoffed at her use of the word "big". Nothing was big about her life anymore. She wasn't a life anymore. She was just a girl, a nobody, drifting on this damned ship with a couple thousand other sorry souls. But at least they had freedom. Not as much freedom as the moon per say, but definitely more than she did locked away in this cell. Although there wasn't that much else to offer out there for her, she realized bitterly. And then the absolutely depressing truth set in that Sloane was a nobody, simply because she had nobody. At that moment her roommate snored slightly from across the room, shifting her thoughts away from the darkness that always seemed like it was trying to suffocate her heart.
It was her birthday. 18th as a matter of fact. Her father would have wanted her to be happy. Gazing around the grey cell she noticed how she had sure as hell done a great job at screwing that up. How could she be happy locked in this cell and more than that, how could she be happy when today decided her fate. Today she was going to leave the skybox, either to be a citizen once more, or as a corpse doomed to spend the rest of eternity floating through space. A weight of nervousness settled on Sloane's chest. This room had been her home for the past two years. Time had seemed to stop after that first month in here. She could hardly imagine being anywhere else but within these four walls, and perhaps the offices in the psych ward.
A new noise once again shifted Sloane's thoughts. A little ways down the hallway Sloane thought she heard some commotion. She turned her head towards the door, straining to listen. She waited a few beats and when nothing happened, settled back into the scratchy sheets.
Suddenly with a clang, all of the fluorescent lights came to life. Sloane leapt out of bed, her roommate a second behind her. The girl, her name was Harper, Sloane thought, blinked around rapidly, obviously not yet fully awake. Within moments dozens of guards voices flooded the station. Sloane padded up to her door bars and peered through. Down at the end closer to her, guards had started escorting prisoners out of their cells.
"What the hell is happening?" Harper asked. Sloane turned her head to the side, eyeing the groggy girl and looked back out. "I'm not sure" she replied. "The guards are taking prisoners out of their cell and taking them out of the station it looks like".
"Oh my god." Sloane turned around fully this time at her cellmates exclamation. Harper's already pale face was now sheet white. "They're floating us all".
Sloane's heart skipped a beat. Could that be it? Yes, everyone here was a prisoner but some of these kids had family and friends outside of this station. The door to her cell was suddenly ripped open. Sloane jumped back and two guards marched in. "Prisoner 267 and 403 please step to the back wall and kneel down" the older guard barked out. Sloane noticed the other girl quickly back up but she was a bit more wary. The guard who had spoken was tall and broad shouldered, with dark brown hair that was speckled with grey. He looked so familiar. "Prisoner 267 I said step to the back wall and get on your knees!" He ordered again. As she slowly backed up it came to her why the guard looked so familiar. He was Lt. Miller and had been an acquaintance of her father. But what was such a high ranked guard doing down in the skybox? At that moment the other guard flicked his baton to life. The blue electricity flowed and dazzled throughout the stick, giving the surrounding few feet an eerie light. Her head snapped back to Lt. Millers. "Mr Miller?" she asked meekly, finally sinking to her knees against the wall. The second guard shot Lt. Miller a questioning look, as his own features washed in confusion.
"Do I know you, Prisoner 267?" He implored, taking a second look at Sloane.
"I- I believe you worked with my father, Henry Devereux." She stated quietly. Recognition flashed into his face before being quickly replaced with the same deadpan expression as before.
"Stick out your right hands please" He asked. Both her hand and Harper's lifted away from their bodies. In a flash Miller and the other guard had moved forward and slammed a chunky bracelet looking thing onto their wrists. The two girls cried out in pain as a dozen needles sunk into the sensitive skin.
"Stand and face the wall now" the younger guard growled. Sloane watched him cuff her roommate and then felt the cool metal of her own pair of cuffs clasp over her wrists, just below the new bracelet.
"I'll take these two, you go into the next room, it should be a single." Lt. Miller directed the younger guard. Sloane felt a tug on her upper arm and soon she was out in the hallway, being herded with a few dozen other prisoners.
"Listen Devereux" She heard a harsh whisper in her ear among the ocean of voices around her.
"You're going to Earth with the rest of the Skybox prisoners" Lt Miller told her, his voice strained with something Sloane couldn't put her finger on. "The earth?" Sloane hissed back. How was that possible? The earth needed at least another 100 years before heading back to the ground could even be considered. A quick tug on her handcuffs quieted her trailing thoughts.
"There's no time to explain, I'm only warning you because your father was a great man. Just be careful among this lot, stay with Wells Jaha and Clarke Griffen and find water as soon as you get there, nod if you understand." Sloane nodded almost on instinct, her brain still processing the slew of information that was just given to her.
Chancellors son and two councilmembers daughter? What the absolute hell were they doing here? By this point the crowd had reached a ship capsule. Lt Miller shoved Sloane inside. She turned around and met his eye as she was shuffled into the ship. His expression was grim but she noticed him give her a small, curt nod. He didn't say anything out loud but his expression spoke in volumes for him. Good luck.