Survival Aptitude Test: Fury (The Extinction Odyssey Book 2)
Page 21
“How many times have you seen Havoc?” the aide asked, voice charged with eager energy.
“More times than I can recall,” Pyros said, “but I’ve only seen it from a distance.”
“You’ve never set foot in it?”
“Never. But I performed several missions inside Decay and Discord in my youth. So did Commander Cang.”
“What kind of missions did she perform?”
“You’ll have to ask her when we get back,” Pyros said. “If you catch her on a good day, she may even tell you.”
The aide released a nervous rasplaugh. He peered through the forward windows. “How close will we approach Havoc?”
“You’ll see when we get there. First, we need to survey the crops.”
“Of course, sire,” the aide said, blushing. “I didn’t mean to—”
Pyros chucklebucked to set the boy at ease. “I still remember my first excursion beyond the border wall. I was far more nervous than you.”
They passed over the Great Northern Border at two thousand feet. Beyond it, hundreds of crop circles dotted the sand, each a half-mile in diameter, each a different shade of green.
Even from this height, it was possible to make out the irrigation piping and thousands of denizens tending to the nascent crops. A handful of circles had browned since the last data-collection mission. Some crops had been harvested; others had failed to grow in the mixture of sand and mulched grooll. It might take several generations of growth and experimentation to determine the optimum mix, but they’d get it right. The yields would improve. More varieties would be planted. The brightest minds in Daqin Guojin were working on the problem.
“The sensors are ready for data collection, sire,” a crewman said.
“How many passes do you need?”
“Two should be adequate.”
“Very well. Helm, you may commence the first pass.”
The aeroshrike banked to line up for the pass. The two other aeroshrikes held station on the port and starboard beams, one thousand feet distant.
FOUR HOURS LATER, Pyros gazed through the forward windows. Cang’s aide remained at his side, shifting his weight from sandal to sandal. The boy’s chatterwailing had tapered off.
The steady buzz of a fully manned bridge replaced it. Thirty Jireni now stood watch at the various consoles. Throughout the aeroshrike, a hundred more had reported to their duty positions. The vessel could now fend off any threat the mongrels could throw at it. It could also react to whatever damage they might inflict, as remote as the possibility might be.
One hundred feet below, steeply corniced dunes drifted past at a moderate pace. The two other aeroshrikes sailed in close formation on either beam, hugging the sand. The low altitude prevented detection by the mongrel sensors until it was too late for them to react.
“Range to Havoc?” Pyros asked.
“Twenty miles,” a crewman said.
“Any close contacts?”
“None, sire.”
“Very well. Ballast, set your bow angle at ten positive.”
“Ten positive,” a crewman said from the ballast-and-trim console.
“Helm, take us to three thousand feet on a heading of zero-one-zero.”
“Three thousand feet at zero-one-zero.”
The aeroshrike climbed, its deck inclined at a tolerable ten degrees. The other vessels matched the ascent. The desert fell away.
“Twenty miles is the optimal distance to begin the climb,” Pyros said to Cang’s aide. “A ten degree offset in bearing provides the best angle for the sensors.”
The aide nodded. “How high do we have to be before we see it?”
“You can keep watch and tell me.”
As they passed through one thousand feet, a smudge of blackened structures resolved, fine off the port bow.
The aide pointed. “Is that Havoc?”
“It is,” Pyros said. “Well done.”
“It’s smaller than I imagined.”
“Everyone says that.”
Havoc boasted more inhabitants than Daqin Guojin, but the mongrels didn’t erect tall, breathculling structures. They built down, burying most of a structure’s bulk deep underground. Those on the surface favored utilitarian, low-profile designs that glutted the horizontal plane. From this distance, the city-state of twenty-five million looked benign.
Pyros knew better.
“Do they have long-range sonic weapons?” the aide asked.
“No, but they have gunships. Much less powerful than our aeroshrikes, but they can prove a nuisance—especially if they attack in large numbers.”
They continued the climb to three thousand feet, closing to ten miles from Havoc’s southern border.
“Ballast and helm, bring us into hover,” Pyros said. “Comms, signal the fleet to commence reconnaissance.”
Pyros and the aide paced to the electro-optical sensors console. Its multiple screens relayed images of Havoc, captured by the aeroshrike’s powerful tele-optics. The operator toggled a hand control, panning the sensors.
“Are you recording?” Pyros asked.
“Yes, sire,” the sensor operator said. “Scanning for targets of interest in our assigned sector.”
The mission’s pre-briefing had assigned the western sector of Havoc to the vessel on the port beam and the eastern sector to the vessel on the starboard beam. Pyros’ command aeroshrike was responsible for the central sector. The division of labor enabled maximum coverage in minimum time.
The optical sensor’s wide-angle view offered limited details. It had a resolution of one hundred square-feet; adequate enough to pick out structural geometries, angular contrasts, and color differences. A slow pan revealed four rows of fuzzy, gray cylinders arrayed in the southernmost portion of the central sector.
“What are those?” Pyros asked.
“Unsure, sire,” the sensor operator said. “Magnifying.”
She toggled another hand control.
The on-screen view refined as the magnification increased. The cylinders sharpened, revealing air-screws and lateral fins on elongated gas envelopes.
“Troopships!” the sensor operator said.
“There must be hundreds!” the aide said.
Smaller, darker objects milled among the troopships, too blurry to make out.
Pyros knew what they were before he voiced the order. “Magnify!”
The sensor operator toggled the hand control.
The on-screen view zoomed in, resolving details as small as one square-foot. It revealed masses of mongrel shock-troops, bulked up by gray-and-black battle armor.
“Sapient Sha,” the aide said, “there must be a hundred thousand of them!”
“Pan as needed to get an accurate count,” Pyros said. “Comms, prepare an air-link message to Commander Cang. The mongrels are massing shock-troops for an incursion!”
“Sire!” the sensor operator said, “there’s an anomaly here!”
Her finger stabbed the screen. It underscored a purple-clad figure amid the gray-and-black troops.
Pyros couldn’t recall the last time he’d tasted fear, but its toxic juices soured his mouth now. “Zoom in! Maximum magnification!”
The sensor operator complied.
The purple figure resolved, capturing features as small as one-tenth of a square-inch.
Pyros gasped.
Julinian’s face filled the screen. The resolution was sharp enough to trace the purple implants from her lips to her eyes.
“That’s the Unum’s niece!” the aide said. “What’s she doing in Havoc?”
Pyros gaped at the screen.
Julinian was smiling. Her appearance and manner gave no indication she was under duress. In fact, her expression suggested she was there of her own choosing. She looked . . . smug.
The last time he’d seen her, she was lying face-down on the berm outside the pyramid. His presumption of her death was obviously a mistake, but how in Sha’s name did she get from the Great Saharan Desert to—
He’d assumed they were deceptive traits, used to hide her true intelligence and her lover’s identity. Coupled with her obvious disdain for Narses, her appetite for power, and her presence in Havoc, the traits cast a hue more sinister than self-preservation.
Pyros gripped the sensor console, unbalanced by the revelation. What if Julinian had been communicating with the mongrels all along? What if she’d promised them a share of power in Daqin Guojin in exchange for installing her as Unum? What if she’d—
The console emitted a warbling screech.
“Search lidar!” the sensor operator said. “Bearing true north!”
“Comms, signal the fleet!” Pyros said. “Break off reconnaissance and return to Daqin Guojin! Helm, set all airscrews to—”
An intense flash culled his breath. He whirled to the port windows.
A luminescent yellow beam scored the sky with a brilliance rivaling the sun. It originated from a point on Havoc’s southern border and bored into the port aeroshrike’s bow, its light-print no more than a foot in diameter.
Armor panels beneath the beam glowed yellow . . . then orange . . . then red. . . .
“What is that?” the aide asked.
Molten globules geysered from the ruddy armor panels. A split-second later, a column of flame spewed from the breach.
A roiling fireball erupted from the gas envelope. It surged aft, blowing out armored panels with a cannonade of staccato reports. The aeroshrike rolled over and plunged from the sky.
“Mongrels don’t have such weapons!” the sensor operator said.
Pyros would have agreed had he not seen it with his own eyes. “Evasive action! Crash dive!”
A second yellow beam drilled into the starboard aeroshrike’s bow. It morphed into a raging inferno within seconds and plummeted toward the ground.
“What’s happening?” the aide asked.
Saliva evaporated from Pyros’ mouth, but the toxic taste persisted. He had just one answer to the aide’s question; they were living the final seconds of their lives. “Comms, transmit the reconnaissance data via air-burst transmission! Do it now!”
A third beam lit up the sky, tracking over the bridge windows. The angle left no doubt it centered on their own bow.
Pyros shielded his eyes from the atrocious glare. Beside him, Cang’s aide trembled. His eyes were impossibly wide . . . and absolutely doomed. It occurred to Pyros—he didn’t know the boy’s name.
“Are we going to die?” the aide asked.
“Yes . . . in about thirty seconds.” He grasped the boy’s shoulders. “What’s your name?”
“Ra . . . Radan.”
“If you have any petitions for Sha, Radan, you’d best say them now.”
The crump of an explosion shuddered through the deck, blotting out Radan’s petitions. Another explosion followed . . . and another.
The aeroshrike nosed over. Desert filled the forward windows, three thousand feet below.
The stinging flutter of free-fall pricked Pyros’ stomach. His sandals broke contact with the deck. His body rotated level with the horizontal plane.
He grabbed a hard-point on the console to stop his rotation. Beyond his feet, grainy images of his wife and daughters flickered on the bridge windows. On some level, he knew they were mental projections triggered by extreme distress. He reached out to them, regardless.
The images reached back. Of course, his family didn’t touch his outstretched hand. Nor would they ever again.
Pyros squeezed his eyes shut and offered his petitions to Sha.
He asked her to speed the reconnaissance data to Commander Cang.
He asked her to help Daoren organize his defenses in time.
He asked her protect his family during the coming resource war.
He asked her to safeguard the survival of humanity.
Pyros opened his eyes.
The flickering images of his family had vanished. Their disappearance left him with one recourse to distract his mind—counting off the seconds until the aeroshrike impacted the desert.
He held his breath and clenched his teeth to suppress the scream climbing his throat.
One . . . two . . . three . . . four . . . five . . . six . . . sev—
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Survival Aptitude Test: Fury
Survival Aptitude Test: Rise
(Book 3 of The Extinction Odyssey)
Arrives Spring 2017
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THANK YOU FOR downloading Survival Aptitude Test: Fury. If you’ve made it to Book 2 of The Extinction Odyssey, I’m guessing this isn’t your first sampling of my work. I sincerely hope you’re enjoying the journey so far. It only gets better (or worse if you’re one of my characters) from here!
As usual, you’ll find links to all my material in the “Also By” section at the end of this ebook. I’ve also included two bonus chapters before you get there: the first chapters from Survival Aptitude Test: Sound and Survival Aptitude Test: Hope’s Graveyard.
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Mike Sheriff
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Bonus Chapter #1
Survival Aptitude Test: Sound
Chapter 1
700 A.C.E.
THOUSANDS OF RAWBONED bodies packed the Center’s northern stairway. Thousands more glutted the transway two flights below.
Daoren clenched his jaw and balanced on the landing’s edge atop the second flight. He kept his spine as straight as a sparring staff to minimize the risk of contact with the writhing, murmuring horde.
He loathed crowds for one reason.
It wasn’t the shorn scalps or smug self-righteousness worn by Daqin Guojin’s denizens, though the two attributes proved as loathsome as any. It wasn’t the bulging waistlines, triple-chins, or other displays of wealth touted by the entitled elites. It wasn’t even the endless chatterwailing spewed by the malnourished masses.
It was the smell of hunger.
Not the physical hunger caused by a shortage of grooll, but a psychic hunger caused by hopelessness. The miserable scent soured every gathering he’d encountered. Life seven hundred years After the Cycle of Extinctions made it impossible to escape, just as life in a city-state of fifteen million made it impossible to avoid. Still, he took every measure to shun crowds, which made standing amid a crush of humanity doubly loathsome.
The crowd cast particularly cruel shadows in the morning twilight. The shenyi garments favored by most denizens spanned the spectrum, slathering the stairway in a smear of color—minus shades of green. The clothing mirrored the styles of Mother China’s imperial dynasties;
stiff tunics with billowy sleeves and broad sashes draped knee-length trousers and skirts. Each of the eight flights also bore ample swaths of dull, white pienfu—the mandated garb of the city-state’s prospects.
The quality of the apparel reflected wide disparity, announcing the wearer’s social status without a wasted word. So did the pinched faces above the quju collars and zhiju lapels; they represented the different lineages of all fifty Chengs.
Daoren maintained his balancing act, but contact was unavoidable. Every random rub of a shoulder or careless brush of an arm made his skin shrink and throat itch. Mercifully, the nearby crowd settled down, congealing into clumps of four or five. Islands of families formed on the Center’s stepped shores, adrift in their thoughts. Few among them spoke, praise be to Sha.
His gaze settled on his own island. Its inhabitants included Lucien and Cordelia—he hadn’t called them Papa and Momma since he was ten—and Mako. Daoren stood at arm’s length while his parents closed ranks around his brother, and so they should.
Today was the day of Mako’s S.A.T.
Lucien wore a purple shenyi woven from the finest gleamglass filament. The color and quality suited his position as a member of the Cognos Populi—and the Cognos Populi was all about appearances. Unlike most members of the bloated forum, his body retained its youthful leanness. He placed a steady hand on Mako’s shoulder. “Once you’re inside the Center, get to your seat right away. Give yourself time to settle in before the test starts.”
Daoren grunted. The pang of hunger in his father’s eyes clashed with his pragmatic tone. Lucien had vaulting ambition, but his lineage served as a crippling anchor. Caucasoids whose ancestry traced to the ancient western continent were a distinct minority in Daqin Guojin. Asianoids, Indonoids, Africoids, and Eastern Caucasoids like the Slavvs enjoyed the majority. They also enjoyed the benefit of multi-generational wealth on which to mount their social ascent.
“You must remember to breathe,” his father continued.
Mako’s head bobbled as if on a spring. His glassy eyes remained static.