FROZEN STARS
THREE
❝ we look up at the same stars and see such different things. ❞

            THE STARS were in the sky by the time Marley emerged from the dropship. Their cold white light twinkled harshly against the pitch black backdrop - a hauntingly beautiful ghost of something that once was alive and thriving within the vast expanse of the universe. The moon was full too. It peaked through the trees, its borrowed silvery light beaming down onto the ground from so far above.

            A large fire had been lit close to a clearing in the trees; it was a little away from the dropship itself and the site in which the tents had been erected. Around it grouped the delinquents - aside from one or two - who were all cheering and dancing under the shimmering moonlight.

            Marley had found her way back to the rock she'd been sat on earlier with Jasper and Monty. She'd been toying with the idea of joining the group over by the crackling fire - but, as she'd idly twirled a small straggly strand of her brown hair around her fingers, she'd decided against it. She still felt a little shaken up over the whole Tate situation. She was now watching from afar, watching as one by one the hundred teenagers stepped closer to the fire and to Bellamy Blake who was leading whatever meeting or celebration was occurring. He'd smirk at them before taking his knife to their wrist. It alarmed Marley at first before she'd heard the cracking of metal and realised that the group were prying off the tightly bound metal wristbands fixed around their arms.

            "Who's next?" She heard him call out as a small black haired girl retreated back into the crowd, the cheers subsiding slightly as she did so.

            Marley looked down at her own wristband - she hadn't realised, but the skin around it was still red and tender as she ran her finger along the exposed part of her wrist. It was sore to the touch and she winced as she brushed her thumb over the reddened skin.

            "What are they doing?" A voice asked from behind her. Whoever it was sounded angry and his tone of voice made Marley jump a little; it set her on edge as a dark-skinned boy came into view. She recognised him - Chancellor Jaha's son, Wells, she was pretty sure of that.

            "I, um, I think they're taking off their wristbands," she replied. The brunette eyed Wells' face as it twisted into one of anger; his eyes were fixed on the cheering crowd as another girl stepped up, offering out her wrist for the leader of the delinquents to pry off her bracelet.

            "How could they be so stupid?" He grumbled, more to himself than to Marley before he stormed off towards the fire. She was a little scared as he went; she expected there to be a full-blown fight. After all, he and the boy who seemed to be Bellamy's right-hand man - the very same boy who'd been stood alongside Tate when he'd grabbed her earlier - had got into a fight a little earlier when they'd first landed on the ground. "What the hell are you doing?"

            She saw Bellamy smirk - a smirk that, although she'd only known him for a matter of hours, was all too used to seeing. He crossed his arms over his chest and squared up to Wells - he was slightly taller than the younger boy and looked down at him with a condescending stare that told of the fact he was in charge of the teenagers surrounding the pair.

            "Liberating ourselves." Bellamy spoke with a shrug, earning loud cheers from the adrenaline-fuelled hoard of underage criminals. "What does it look like?"

            "It looks like you're trying to get us all killed!" Wells exclaimed, "the communication system is dead, this is all we've got. Take them off and the Ark will think we're dying, that it's not safe for them to follow."

            Marley's brows were scrunched together as she listened to the conversation occurring through the trees. She had to admit that, if the people on board the Ark didn't come down, it wouldn't be the end of the world. After all, they did persecute her and lock her up with not even an ounce of human interaction for a crime she didn't even commit. Who knew whether their crimes would be completely forgiven like Chancellor Jaha had promised? And, although she was at the point where interaction with a living person made her wary and - admittedly -terrified her, she couldn't even dare to think about what it would be like to spend another day locked away in an echoing, enclosed cell for another two years.

            "That's the point, Chancellor. We can take care of ourselves, can't we?"

            A roaring chorus of shouts rose through the air, "yeah!"

            Wells stepped closer to the older man. "You think this is a game?" He spat before turning to address the crowd who clearly weren't on his side. "Those aren't just our friends and parents up there, they're our farmers and engineers and doctors. I don't care what he tells you. We won't survive on our own, and besides, if it's really safe, how come you don't want the rest of our people to come down?"

            But Bellamy wasn't listening. He'd already made up his mind and he wasn't going to change it, regardless of what Wells said or did.

            He shook his head and motioned to the crowd around the pair. "My people are already down here. Those people locked my people up. Those people killed my mother for having a second child. Your father did that."

            "My father didn't write the laws," Wells countered.

            "No," Bellamy scoffed, "he enforced them. But not anymore, not here. Here there are no laws."

            That drew another thunderous cheer from the huddle of teenagers. The ninety or so criminals grouped by the campfire were firmly on Bellamy Blake's side and Wells didn't seem to be succeeding in winning them over.

            "Here, we do whatever we want whenever the hell we want," the older boy continued. He stepped away from Wells. "Now, you don't have to like it, Wells. You can even try to stop it or change it, kill me. You know why? We can do whatever the hell we want."

            "Whatever the hell we want!" The boy who had been stood beside Tate when he'd grabbed her earlier yelled, throwing a fist up into the air. She thought she'd heard Bellamy calling him Murphy, but she wasn't sure.

            "Whatever the hell we want!" A few more delinquents joined in.

            Before long, it became a chant. A growing chant of rebellion so loud that it was near impossible to hear the fire, or the noise from the forest surrounding them, or anything for that matter. The delinquents all began to jump around, pumping their dirty fists up into the air as a signal of liberation.

            And at that exact moment, the rain began to pour from the sky. It had come from nowhere. The once peaceful starry sky now ravaged by harsh grey clouds and low rumbles of what Marley believed to be thunder. She squealed as the freezing droplets of water hit her skin - it was a downpour, the rain bouncing off her bare face and soaking her navy blue jacket through in mere seconds. Her pale hands had turned to ice - but the feeling was unlike anything she'd ever felt before. She was stood now, her face tilted up towards the dark sky, letting the bitterly cold rainwater wash over her grinning face. It was the small things that made her smile, she realised. The small trivial things that someone one hundred years before would have taken for granted or scoffed at, even. The feeling of rain or sun on her skin, the sight of a star, the smell of the forest. It was all new and she wanted to savour it forever - because who knew how long, for sure, they had left in that place.

‣ ‣ ‣

            She'd spent the rest of the night collecting rainwater with Wells. He'd asked for her help and - after a little bit of persuading to even step away from the familiarity of camp and the euphoria of rain - she'd agreed. In fact, after a while, she'd realised she was glad that someone had taken her away from the rest of the groups reckless gathering. It was especially refreshing to be away from the rest of the delinquents after they'd started chanting - "whatever the hell we want!" had been a cue for chaos. The two hadn't stuck around long enough to see the full extent of the small riot that had broken out in the wake of the rain and Marley was glad of it. That way she couldn't get caught in the middle of something she wouldn't have full control of.

            She lugged the heavy water containers into camp, following closely behind Wells. Bellamy eyed them as they re-entered camp but he'd chosen not to speak up. After all, they could do whatever the hell they wanted. She was surprised he'd resisted the chance to call her Queenie - especially since she'd realised halfway through collecting the rainwater that Wells was, in fact, Chancellor Jaha's son.

            Undoubtedly, Bellamy knew that. And, undoubtedly, now she'd chosen to help him, he was sure to scorn her the same way he did Wells, believing that she thought she was above everyone else. Or a suck up. Just because she decided to help out the Chancellor's son.

            She and Wells dropped the water containers just inside the dropship. Someone had draped fabric over the doorway, shielding the inside of the metal structure from the delinquents charging around outside. The ship itself seemed to be acting as a makeshift storage facility. All that had been given to the hundred - nothing of significance, other than a few sheets and a small roll of bandages. The teenagers were pretty much left to fend for themselves.

            "Rainwater. Not ideal, but it'll do," Wells sighed, setting down a heavy water pitcher onto one of the benches.

            "At least we won't all die from dehydration," Marley shrugged, her voice still quiet despite that fact she'd established Wells was a friend, not someone to be feared.

            "No. But if they all keep taking off their wristbands, we'll all be dead anyway."

            "W-what do you mean?" She asked. She slid herself down the wall so that she was sat down, her knees tucked up to her chest as an icy gust of wind blew through the thin covering over the door. Her clothes were still soaked through from the rain - if she didn't keep warm, there was a high chance she could fall ill. Especially now she was in an unfamiliar environment.

            Wells sighed and scratched his head, "The wristbands monitor our vital signs. If we take them off, the Ark will think we're dying. Everyone we care about is relying on us surviving so they can survive. The Ark is dying. Life support is failing. They need Earth to stay alive."

            She was still indifferent about wanting the people from the Ark to follow - how could she help people who had been so cruel to someone as to judge them without evidence? But taking off her wristband to trick them into thinking they were all dying, that was like second-hand murder. Everyone on the Ark would die - if what Wells had told her about the life support system - and for what? Because she didn't want to suffer anymore? The suffering of the many was significantly more painful than her own.

            She couldn't shake it though. No matter what she did, that niggling little thought buried itself deep into her brain like a piece of shrapnel. It embedded itself there until all she could think of was that one fact. Everything they'd believed her to be, she would become. It was just that, no matter what she did, she couldn't stop these beliefs from rooting themselves deep into her mind. Her instinct screamed at her; she couldn't do this. She wouldn't do this. She wouldn't become the person they thought she was. Never, under any circumstances, would she become the murderer they thought she was.