“We can’t let them take us alive!”
He tried to process Bushudo’s plea, tried to translate her fear into action, but his mind and body no longer occupied the same vessel. He sensed her tugging his hand, pulling him through the archway. Faster and faster, as if compelled by an invisible force, Teimei swept toward his salvation . . . toward the wind-spun sand . . . toward Zilian’s corpse. . . .
His muscles froze. His legs stopped functioning, halting him steps from the desert.
Bushudo’s fingertips slipped across his palm. Her body broached the archway’s mouth.
Another horrid screech slashed the air, its ultra-high frequency identical to the first.
Without uttering as much as a whimper, she dropped to her knees and slumped face-down next to Zilian. White sand lapped up the blood streaming from her ears.
Teimei cradled his head, eyes awash. He opened his mouth, scouring his soul for words to beg her forgiveness.
The shriek of compressed air slammed it shut again. He whirled to the din.
A hulking black form hovered in shadow at the far end of the archway. Other figures flanked it, cloaked by swirling gray mist. The shrieking din ceased.
The silence triggered a clamor of conflicting thoughts. One thought alone gave him any hope of survival. “I’ll go back to the Center!” he said. “I’ll take my chances on the test!”
The black form extended a needlelike appendage. A chilling voice drifted through the archway. “That aerostat has sailed, prospect.”
Of all the thoughts that might have ushered him out of existence, Teimei never imagined it would be a simple accounting of the date. He was going to die today, seven hundred years After the Cycle of Extinctions.
The appendage recoiled. Two percussive reports smacked the archway’s crystalline blocks.
Two shimmering objects hammered Teimei’s legs. He gasped and lowered his chin.
The fluted end of a glass dart jutted from each kneecap. Their blood-streaked tips pierced the back of his knees.
Teimei blinked, unable to fathom why he felt no—
Slag-hot pain incinerated his thigh muscles. It arced into his hips and spine, melting his bones.
He flopped onto his back. His mouth stretched. It didn’t close again until his lungs had emptied, the scream amplified tenfold by the archway.
The form advanced. It cacklebracked a guttural growl stripped of humanity. “I’d wager they heard your yowl inside the Center.”
Teimei’s vision grayed. Consciousness seeped away, then flared back on brilliant waves of saw-toothed pain. The form appeared above him, its eyes numb orbs behind a black helmet’s slotted faceplate.
Beneath the agony, Teimei wondered how Zilian ever wanted to be one of these things. “Cull me,” he said. “For Sha’s mercy, Jiren, cull me!”
“No, slag,” the Jiren said, his tone almost melancholy. “I’m going to do far worse than that.”
2
Speak of the Unum
RESTLESS DENIZENS JOSTLED Daoren from all sides of the stairway’s landing. He held his ground and cursed under his breath.
Over the last ten minutes, the approaching test had churned the sea of humanity into a simmering froth. Empty conversations bobbed along its surface; final words of advice from parents to their children, fervent petitions to Sha the Sapient for good fortune, frantic pleads for postponement of the inevitable.
A few prospects waded through the agitated waters in silence, gazing up at the Center. Most looked like they were encountering an apparition from their worst nightmare.
The Center dominated Zhongguo Cheng’s administrative district like a festering boil on a fevered forehead. Constructed from cold-rolled crystal, the octagonal structure perched at the apex of eight terraced stairways. Two hundred years ago, designers had taken great pains to orient them to within one arc-second of the compass’ cardinal and inter-cardinal points.
The purpose for the alignment escaped Daoren; the decisions of the Cognos Populi tended to defy logic. On their orders, the stairways had been built to equally exacting standards. They comprised eight flights, each measuring eighty steps high and eighty feet wide, and separated by generous horizontal landings. If the fixation on multiples of eight held special meaning for the old rulers of Daqin Guojin, it escaped him as well.
Panicky cries rang out near the upper archway. They broke over the lower flights like acidic waves on a sun-parched shoreline. Mako shrank at each one.
Daoren kept a watchful eye on his brother. If a prospect for denizenship was going to break, this was the moment.
The moment when reality could no longer be denied.
All prospects, regardless of wealth or lineage, had to sit the S.A.T. within one year of their nineteenth birthday. The edicts of the Cognos Populi granted an exception to those with mental or physical impairments. The small mercy was a hollow comfort for the few to whom it applied—they were culled upon the determination. Each year, five hundred-thousand prospects sat the test. Each year, half of them failed. For some, the one-in-two odds of survival proved too much to bear.
Another panicky cry drilled down the stairway, much closer than the others. Mako shuddered and released a whistling breath.
“Stay calm,” Lucien said. “Do you have enough grooll?”
Mako patted the opaque pouch clipped to the receiver loops on his waist. Bruised knuckles marred the back of his hand.
Daoren eyed the swollen welts. Mako must have struck a solid object . . . and done so within the last twenty-four hours. “Your hand!”
Mako covered the bruises with his other hand. “It’s nothing.”
It wasn’t nothing. A thousand snares could trip up a prospect during the S.A.T. Inadequate preparation and insufficient technological knowledge were the most common snags, but innocent physical ailments could also be fatal. A few years ago, a prospect with laryngitis had found it difficult to voice his answer confirmations. According to the cautionary tale, he wasted too many precious minutes on repeating muted yeses and noes and didn’t complete the test. He failed by less than a thousand points.
The injury might hamper Mako’s ability to manipulate the touch-screen inside the Center, but its further discussion served no purpose. It was too late to seek medical attention, and his brother had enough worries choking his mind. Cordelia had other ideas though.
“Let me see it,” she said.
Mako muttered a brief protest before lifting his hand.
She peered down her nose at the welts. “How did you do this?”
“An accident. It doesn’t hurt.”
Cordelia kissed each angry knuckle.
Mako blushed and yanked his hand back. “I’m not a child!”
“You’re my child and don’t forget it. If you run out of grooll, seek the Libraria inside the Center. They can—”
“I have more than enough for the eight hours, Momma.”
“You’re certain?”
A throbbing drone drowned out Mako’s response. Daoren craned his neck skyward.
A Jireni aeroshrike sailed overhead, one thousand feet high. Sunlight rippled off its black, ceramic-armor panels. Six contra-rotating airscrews, blade-like airfoils, and triple-barreled turrets fouled its streamlined shape. Two more aeroshrikes orbited a mile to the east, maneuvering among the Cheng’s tallest structures. Their enormous gas envelopes blotted the sun.
Daoren grunted. The Jireni were showing their strength for a reason.
They loathed crowds as well.
He glanced up the stairway, knowing they’d be up there. Sure enough, a dozen of them skulked in the archway’s shadow.
The Jireni’s black, studded chest plates and segmented body armor paid homage to the Terra-cotta warriors of antiquity. Their name harkened from the same time period. Ji referred to the dagger-axes once carried by Mother China’s imperial armies. Collectively, the men were known as Jireni—men with dagger-axes. The security force had long-since abandoned the weapon, but the name persisted.
/> Today, each Jiren carried a crystalline dart gun. Its needlelike appendage fired eight-inch darts with a variable muzzle velocity of up to 3,200 feet-per-second. Flex-hoses connected the guns to conformal air packs on their backs. The packs held enough high-pressure air to fire two hundred darts. Depending on the skill of the Jiren, that could translate into as many as two hundred culls.
Daoren lifted his chin in their direction. “Will they also be inside the Center?”
“Never mind the Jireni, boy. They’re here to maintain order in case . . .” Lucien shifted his attention to Mako. “If you need anything once the test starts, look to the Libraria.”
Cordelia cupped Mako’s chin. Her finger traced the contours of a face she likely knew better than her own.
Daoren suppressed a pang of envy; when had she last touched his face like that? He couldn’t recall, but one thing was certain. Mako’s face honored obedience and brought harmony to the family. His face questioned everything under the swollen sun and cultivated discord. At times he forgot they were related.
Cordelia lowered her hand, the tracing complete. “This day has come too soon.”
“As it comes for us all,” Mako said.
“And once it’s finished, you’ll be a denizen,” Lucien said.
A lone violet stud glinted in the notch below his father’s lower lip. As a young prospect, his face had boasted garish glass implants that pushed the limits of good taste—Daoren and his brother had rasplaughed many times at the old quantum images. Lucien opted for the single, sober stud twenty-five years ago when he ascended to the ruling caste; the Assembly of the Cognos Populi frowned on limit-pushing.
Daoren frowned on the ornamental custom. Unlike his family and the other inhabitants of Daqin Guojin, he wore no implants. The habit reeked of superficiality. Years ago, prospects at the Librarium had offered him suggestions on stud shapes, patterns, and body placement. In time, they stopped. He’d abandoned them to embark on independent study when he was eight years old. Mako, on the other hand, had excelled under the tutelage of the Libraria, finishing at the top of his cohort thanks to his impressive prep-test scores.
“A denizen, Mako,” Lucien continued. “Do you understand what that means?”
Daoren grunted anew. Of course his brother understood. For every prospect, passing the S.A.T. and attaining denizenship meant the right to life. For his father, it meant more. Upward mobility in the city-state required two virtues; a stellar S.A.T. score and an obscene amount of grooll. Lucien had only the former, but if Mako received a high enough score to join the Cognos Populi he’d have a crucial advantage—a father in the Assembly to help lift him higher. Lucien had chatterwailed about little else for the past six months.
“Score high enough and you may be in contention to become Unum one day.”
“Lucien!” Cordelia said. “Let him concentrate on passing this damnable test first!”
Daoren rolled his eyes. “Even if he ignored half the questions he’d still pass, Cordelia. Maybe attain a perfect thirty thousand points if he’s not careful.”
Mako lunged forward. “I don’t want to be Unum!”
The shove caught Daoren off-guard. He teetered on the edge of the landing, a hair’s breadth from falling down the flight. For all his militant implants and posturing, Mako never used physical force. Bruised knuckles and now this act of aggression? The stress of the S.A.T. must be playing havoc with his mind. Was he seeking confrontation as a means of distraction?
Daoren primed his muscles, keeping his intent hidden from his eyes, but a quivering hiss preempted his retaliatory shove.
On the transway at the base of the stairway, five bulky levitrans whisperglided to a stop. Red cupolas with flared, golden eaves etched their gloss-black doors; the Imperial Regalia of the Cognos Populi.
Unlike civilian levitrans, those of the regal fleet shunned teardrop hullforms in favor of brute protection. Anechoic wedges coated their outer skins. Their glossy finish masked a serious purpose; the wedges were designed to deflect kinetic blasts and absorb acoustic energy. Judging by the plumes of compressed air jetting from the gimbaled varinozzles, the vehicles countered their mass with far fewer hydrogen-infusion cells than their non-regal counterparts.
The compressed-air plumes thinned. The levitrans settled onto the transway.
The leading and trailing vehicles disgorged squads of armed Jireni. Red-and-gold regalia emblazoned their chest plates, marking them as members of the personal guard. They converged on the middle levitran and cordoned it off. One guard opened its rear door.
The Unum of the Cognos Populi hauled his bloated body out of the levitran. His purple mianfu strained mightily at the waist, but the eight layers of gleamglass garments played a minor role in producing the bulge. A stud-encrusted zhaoshan topped the layers, its side panels vented from ribs to thighs to enhance freedom of movement. Cropped hair revealed a bulbous skull that grew larger and redder by the day. Two pyramidal studs erupted from the Unum’s forehead, positioned over each eye. He tended to change their color to suit the occasion. For some reason, today’s S.A.T. warranted black.
“Speak of the Unum and he appears,” Daoren said.
“Quiet, boy!” Lucien said, the words more growled than spoken.
Below, the Unum adjusted the red sash draping his chest. He positioned its embroidered gold cupola over his heart and waved. A smarmy smile softened his brittle Slavvic features. Behind him, a prospect exited the levitran.
The prospect’s aura of aloofness earned a snort of disdain from Daoren. Although Julinian wore a white pienfu to signify her social status, its luster indicated it wasn’t the itchy burrglass variety that swaddled her cohorts. Her coiffed hair confirmed another difference; wealth and lineage allowed her the occasional styling without fear of punishment. Her belly also suggested she never ran short of her monthly grooll ration. Every nuance of the Unum’s niece reeked of privilege, but none was as offensive to the senses as her smug bearing.
Surrounded by his Jireni guard, the Unum led Julinian up the stairway. The masses parted. Most bowed with spineless admiration, others with unthinking obedience. A rare few offered stunted nods, making little effort to conceal their contempt.
A minute later, the regal entourage halted before Daoren and his family. Lucien, Cordelia, and Mako folded at the waist in unison, bowing so low they could have kissed the Unum’s knees if they’d chosen. Daoren dipped his chin while they groveled.
“Survival through sapience, Unum,” Lucien said after he straightened.
The Unum pulled him closer until they touched foreheads. “And to you, Lucien.” He flashed his version of a winning smile. “Cordelia, you look as lovely as ever despite the circumstances. Your Mako sits the S.A.T. today?”
Cordelia answered with a fretful nod.
“As does Julinian.” The Unum gripped Mako’s shoulder. “It’s good to know she’ll have such intelligent company inside the Center. How do you feel, boy? Confident?”
Mako’s head bobbled. His glassy eyes remained static.
Daoren cringed at his brother’s timid posture. He shifted his focus to Julinian.
Purple implants outlined her lips, extending their corners to the outer limb of each eye. The pattern gave her smile a disturbing prognostic quality—like she could see into the future. Her smugness persisted until a biting squeal made her flinch.
On the flight above, the crowd edged away from an Indonoid prospect. The girl struggled to break the grip of an older Indonoid denizen. “I can’t do it, Papa! I’m not ready!”
The father grabbed his daughter by both arms and shook her. “If you try to run they’ll cull you!”
She warped her body from side to side. The convulsions threw her father off-balance. She squirmed free and bolted down the steps.
Prospects and denizens gave her room to pass. The gesture had nothing to do with courtesy.
Fifty feet above her, a Jiren hoisted his dart gun. He pressed its crystalline stock into his shoulder and steadied
his aim.
Three glass darts spat from the gun’s muzzle. They streaked arrow-straight down the flight and pierced the girl’s back.
“Nnnnnnnn . . .”
The girl launched forward, clearing a dozen steps before thudding onto the stairway. She tumbled downward, legs pinwheeling, sandals sailing into the air, before coming to rest on the landing separating the two flights. Her dying moans drifted over the crowd’s murmurs. They blended with her father’s tortured cries.
Whether either heard the other, Daoren didn’t know, but the girl wouldn’t be harvested. Grooll production required sanitary deaths. The father would have to pay for her body’s disposal, a service that might cost more than a year’s grooll ration depending on his vocation.
The Jiren on the upper flight lowered his dart gun. “Any prospect who attempts to evade the edicts will be dealt with as a dissenter!” he said, addressing the crowd. “Don’t repeat her mistake! Remain calm, sit your test, and place your trust in Sha.”
The Indonoid father stumbled down the steps to his daughter. He wavered over her body, hands wringing a sand-tone shenyi embroidered with gold, corkscrew-shaped columns. The garment’s embroidery and quality suggested he was a senior silica engineer—the body’s disposal would likely claim less than two months’ worth of his grooll ration. He crumpled to his knees and rocked his daughter. The dart tips jutting from her chest complicated the act.
The Unum released a drawn-out sigh. “Every year we lose more prospects before they sit the test.”
“Maybe the Cognos Populi should stop raising the passing score,” Daoren said.
Lucien’s face paled to the color of shock-fused ceramic, but the barb didn’t earn a verbal rebuke. It stung the Unum into speaking though.
“It isn’t something we take lightly, Daoren. We only raise the passing score to make up for grooll shortfalls.”
“Yet millions still live on the cusp of starvation. Why is that?”
“Enough, boy!” Lucien said. “Please forgive him, Unum. He knows not what he—”
Survival Aptitude Test: Sound (The Extinction Odyssey Book 1) Page 2