Rosalinda Pale, prisoner 397, aged 17, charged with theft of private property, sentenced to confinement until the age of 18.

That was it. That was her sentence. She still couldn't believe they'd caught her over a damned necklace, of all the things she'd stolen during her time on the Ark. Rosa had always had issues with the notion of private property. Other people's private property, that is. She'd fallen in with a gang of thieves at 15, after years of independent thieving, and quickly rose to the rank of leader. Planning heists, relieving people of valuable items, and buying and selling information, Rosa knew it was her calling.

She wasn't just a petty thief though. She had her set of morals and ideals and always stuck to what she thought to be right. No killing. No fighting, if at all possible. No unnecessary damage to people or objects. Her small family, as she liked to call it since she was an orphan, had its set of enemies and by no means was it the only gang of thieves on the Ark, nor was it the best. But Rosa was working on that. She was going to make it so that hers was the only operation on the Ark.

But then she got arrested. The job had fishy written all over it, but they needed the work. A man had asked them to get the diamond necklace he gave to his now ex-wife back. Whether it was true or not, it didn't matter. He owed them no explanation, nor did they want to hear it. What Rosa couldn't explain though, was how the guards had been waiting to search her right after she left the common area with the necklace. They'd immediately restrained her as if they knew it would have taken her seconds to make the piece of jewellery disappear. At least she only had one year in the Sky Box before being reviewed, and she would be pardoned. Other than the necklace there was no other evidence to her criminal activities. Something told her she'd be paying a visit to Nygel as soon as she got out. After all, who else had the connections to get her arrested and had more than one reason to?

One more week and she'd be free. Rosa lay quietly on her bed, the itchy blanket flung across the room. It really was an offensive piece of fabric. Her internal clock told her it must be morning. She sat up, yawned, and got to work on her daily exercises. Being locked up for a year was not helping her flexibility and with no infiltration jobs to keep her in shape she had to maintain a strict regimen of stretching exercises. Just as she was balancing on her left foot, with her right leg completely stretched upwards, the door to her cell opened.

"Prisoner 397 face the wall" one of the two guards said as they entered.

"What's this about, Ivanov?" Rosa asked, not moving from her position. She knew the guard whom had spoken and he knew her. He had been one of the guards to arrest her and knew what a fight she could put up if she wanted to.

"Don't make this harder than it has to be. Face the wall" the other guard spoke in his place.

Rosa glared at him. "I won't make this harder than it has to be, if you tell me what's going on" she threatened. "I'm not eighteen yet, you have no business here."

"I'm afraid we do Rosa" Ivanov finally spoke. "Just calm down and hold out your wrist, we've got to put this on you" he continued, holding out a strange metal wristband. Rosa just glared at him, debating if bringing her still raised foot down on his head would just make matters worse.

"Enough nonsense" the other guard said as he drew his weapon. The baton began to spark and Rosa cartwheeled backwards, ready for a fight.

"Stop" Ivanov intervened. "Rosa, you're going to the ground. Now just put this damn thing on and quit making problems."

The young thief relaxed her stance when she realized they weren't going to beat her to death. She held out her arm, still watching the guards carefully. Ivanov put the wristband on her small wrist and told her to come quietly. As she was being walked to the dropship along with all the other juvenile delinquents she began to piece together what was happening. A year and a half ago Rosa had gotten a curious job request that had caused her to stumble upon some very valuable information. She knew all too well the Ark was dying and all the mysterious accidents that had been claiming the lives of so many people weren't accidents at all. It was population control. The leadership of the Ark must be getting desperate, sending one hundred kids to die on the ground.

Soon enough Rosa was strapped into her seat on the dropship next to a couple of scrawny guys. The ship took off causing the general level of anxiety to rise even more.

"Hey, my name's Jasper" the closest of the two introduced himself.

"I'm Monty" the other one added.

"Rosalinda" she said "Rosa for short."

"So what do you think is going on?" Monty asked, fidgeting in his seat.

"We're going to the ground," Rosa smiled "hell of a way to die, huh?"

Jasper looked nervous "You're sure?" He questioned as Monty paled.

Just then a screen flickered on revealing chancellor Jaha's face. All one hundred kids stared as he explained how their crimes had made them expendable and that they were indeed going to the ground. Rosa soon tuned out his speech. She felt a strange lump in the seat she was on and began to move, trying to figure out what it was. It felt like a knife but there was something else. Whatever it was it would have to wait, although she had a good idea of who had put it there. She had a few connections within the guard and she knew for a fact that her gang was still looking out for her from the outside.

Three kids were now out of their seats, floating around the dropship. It looked like fun but Rosa knew better, the parachutes would deploy soon and they would probably be killed. A blonde girl echoed her thoughts from across the room but the three guys didn't listen to her. Rosa rolled her eyes.

"So how'd you know where we're going?" Monty asked her, drawing her attention.

"Don't you know? I have eyes and ears everywhere" Rosa giggled as the two boys looked fascinated.

She loved her job and she never got a chance to brag about it since it would have gotten her floated on the spot, but since they were already technically being floated she decided to indulge her pride.

"Ever seen one of those old spy movies?" the two nodded "well they got nothing on me."

All three of them laughed and Rosa was glad they didn't believe her. It was never smart to lay all your cards on the table. Just then the parachutes deployed and the three floating kids were flung around the ship like ragdolls. One of them crashed clean through some tubing and the wires inside began to spark menacingly. "This can't be good" Rosa thought as the ship began to shake violently. Even if the earth was survivable it wouldn't matter because thanks to these three idiots they were all going to die in a crash landing.

A loud thud shook the dropship and quieted the screams of the kids. They'd landed. Everyone rushed out of their seats and down to the lower level. Rosa lingered in her seat and watched as the first boy who had left his seat helped the blonde girl check the bodies of the kids on the floor. Both of the reckless teenagers were dead and the one who had survived leaving his seat looked terribly guilty under the judgemental gaze of the blonde.

The two rushed down to the lower level as soon as they realized someone was trying to open the door.

"Stop" Rosa heard the blonde girl shout "the air could be toxic."

"If the air's toxic we're all dead anyway" a vaguely familiar voice sounded. Who did it belong to?

Rosa pushed the thought from her mind for a moment and busied herself with tearing the seat cover she had been occupying during landing. A wide grin spread across her face as a sharp throwing knife came into view. Under it was a handy multi-tool and a notebook with a pencil. Rosa quickly opened the notebook and read what had been hastily written.

Rosa, me and the gang managed to get you a couple of treats. If you're reading this it means Mole did his job and got this to you. I'm sorry we couldn't do more but the Ark guard is starting to catch on to the fact that he's a spy. Anyway, please don't die on us.

-Danny

P.S. See you on the ground (I hope).

Rosa closed the notebook and tucked it and the other objects into whichever pockets they would fit in. "I love my family" she thought, grinning as she rushed downstairs.

She was greeted by the sight of a tall, dark-haired guard with freckles blocking the door while talking to a younger girl with the same colour hair as him. Rosa now realized why his voice had seemed familiar. He was one of the guards who had arrested her on the Ark. At the time Rosa had only bothered to remember him as someone to get back at when she got out but her second-in-command Danny had managed to gather information on everyone involved in her arrest. This guy was Bellamy Blake. He'd been kicked off the guard and put on janitorial duty and his mother floated after they found out he had a younger sister.

"So how the hell are you here Blake? And in a guard's uniform too." Rosa wondered from her perch on the ladder as Bellamy stepped aside, ready to open the door. She realized that the girl now standing in front of the exit must be his sister Octavia Blake. "Well, that explains why you're down here, but how did you do it?" Rosa wondered again. Her thoughts were cut short as Bellamy opened the door and the whole crowd of kids were blinded by the sunshine.

It took Rosa only a moment to adjust and realized what she was looking at. Green, brown, and cyan greeted her brown eyes in all their brilliance. It was a forest. Rosa had never seen anything so beautiful. Octavia wasted no time in descending the ramp. The younger Blake paused once her feet hit the soil.

"We're back, bitches!" She screamed out of pure joy and immediately all the other kids flooded out into the clearing. Rosa couldn't contain her joy either and ran out after the rest. She breathed in the fresh air, looked up into the trees, spun around twice and began to run. She felt free as a bird as she leapt over fallen logs and other teenagers. She stopped on a patch of green grass and lay there looking up at the sky, losing track of time.