Collateral Damage ➵ Bellamy Blake

Chapter One

Slowly, Rylie regained consciousness and groaned at the pain in her neck. As she became aware of her new surroundings, her head shot up from its hung position. A panic started to set in when she realized what had happened.

You have got to be fucking kidding me.

No no no no.

"Son of a bitch!" She yelled in frustration.

People glanced at her wearily but she didn't pay attention. Her mind was caught up on the last 20 minutes, or however long it had been that she was thrown onto the drop ship like a toy that children grow bored of and toss into the bottom of a toy bin. That's what she was, expendable. Useless.

Squeezing her eyes shut, she sighed before opening them again and looking around the small drop ship where she was crammed into. Rylie took note of The Ark's delinquents, some of them she recognized while others remained as strangers. The latter applying to the majority. Most of these kids were younger than her as anyone above the age of 18 was either floated or let out upon a second trial. Still, some of them she had seen wandering the halls at school years prior or knew through a friend. Some, she had tended to while working in the medical bay.

Looking around, Rylie studied the faces of the teenagers, listing off names in her head of the ones she knew. Some she didn't even have a name to place with, their face being the only sense of familiarity in her clouded memories. Her eyes landed on a goggle-wearing boy who she recognized as Jasper Jordan, a boy who came in to see Abby for a sprained ankle just months earlier.

A rattling sound accompanied by flickering lights brought Rylie's attention to the chancellor's son sitting next to her.

"That, was the atmosphere." He explained to a startled blonde on the other side of him.

"Clarke?" Rylie question in surprise. Despite not being close friends, Rylie was well acquainted with Clarke after working with her mom for years.

"Rylie? What are you doing here?"

"I could ask you the same thing." she replied, equally as shocked.

Clarke began to speak but was interrupted by a familiar voice coming through the TV.

"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 have sent others..." Rylie sighed to herself. She couldn't decide if the plan of mass murdering 100 kids came as a surprise to her or if the inhumane plot was exactly what you would expect from the council.

The young brunette is brought back from her thoughts by someone informing the chancellors son that his dad is a dick. Light laughter fills the ship as Rylie briefly wonders what the ground will have in store for the boy next to her. She couldn't quite see the logic behind Jaha's plan. Sending your only son to a radiation-soaked planet with the very same people you locked up? If the radiation doesn't kill him, surely one of these delinquents will.

"Hey," For the first time, the boy next to Rylie starts talking to her. "I'm wells."

"Rylie." She replies while hesitantly shaking his outstretched hand.

"So what got you locked up?" he questioned while Clarke leaned forward to hear her response.

Rylie paused, deep in thought before responding to the question, "long story." She half smiled, trying to keep her emotions in check and hoping that he wouldn't press any further. "You?"

"Long story." He repeated her answer before returning the smile.

Wells' turned his head to the sound of his name being called and Rylie took the opportunity to let her eyes wander back to the monitor as she vaguely caught the part of Jaha's speech about wiping records clean and Mount Weather. It didn't take long before her attention was again brought away from the disconcerting man.