Survival Aptitude Test: Sound (The Extinction Odyssey Book 1)

by Sheriff, Mike

  One Jiren powered off his levideck’s varinozzles and dismounted. He swaggered closer, hand hidden behind his back. “Aren’t these two a glinty couple, comrades?”

  “Glinty indeed,” a Jiren said atop his hovering craft. “If he isn’t warming his jackstaff in her tasty pocket, he deserves to be harvested.”

  The others cacklebracked in agreement. The dismounted Jiren’s hand appeared. It waggled a phallic glass device. “One sure way to find out if he is.”

  Daoren stepped in front of Heqet, heart thudding in his throat. He tugged his quantum tile from his tunic’s inner pocket. Without taking his eyes off the dismounted Jiren, he stretched and rolled it into a three-foot rod.

  The Jiren rasplaughed. “This boy’s a cocky one, isn’t he? Thinks his pathetic rod can stop me from testing his playmate.”

  Daoren thumped one end of the rod into the ground, shock-fusing the glass, giving it solidity. “I’d think twice about that if I were you.”

  “That glass isn’t combat-hardened, slag,” the Jiren said.

  Daoren steadied his breathing, keeping his intent hidden from his eyes. “Funny . . . neither is your jaw.”

  He swung the rod with both hands. It sliced the air and struck the Jiren’s jaw with a withering crack.

  Broken teeth and bloody spittle sprayed from the brute’s mouth. He yelped and sagged to his knees.

  Still astride his levideck, another Jiren swung a combat-hardened staff at Daoren’s skull.

  Daoren ducked the staff and thrust his glass rod under the craft’s hovering deck. He levered the rod upward and drove his shoulder into levideck’s armored panel.

  The levideck heeled, tipping the Jiren. Man and craft crunched into the adjacent levideck, knocking its rider off his feet.

  Both craft lurched sideways, out of control and gaining speed. They veered across the transway and smashed into the Librarium’s fence. The impact hurled the riders into the fence’s unyielding crystalline blocks.

  Daoren whirled and faced the two Jireni left standing.

  One held a crystal dagger to Heqet’s throat. “Drop it or she dies!”

  Heqet whimpered, eyes bulbed with terror. Daoren hesitated, his mind scrambling for a solution . . . any solution.

  “Drop it now!”

  He had no choice. His makeshift rod clattered onto the transway.

  The dagger-wielding Jiren sneered. “You’ve earned a stay at the Rig, Daoren. I hope you enjoy pain.”

  The other Jiren fired a ceramic twitchgun. Micro-darts spat from its muzzle.

  They thudded into Daoren’s chest. He glanced down at the twin darts, sensing no pain. He raised his hands to yank them out.

  The darts emitted a sizzling zap.

  Daoren’s muscles seized and relaxed at sixteen cycles per second. His jaw clenched and unclenched so rapidly, he thought his teeth might shatter.

  Heqet and the Jireni melted behind a loom of brilliant white light.

  * * *

  THE UNUM STRODE the main concourse of the Rig’s seventy-fifth floor the next morning. Like most denizens, he held a morbid fascination for the city-state’s detention facility. Unlike most denizens, he didn’t have to break an edict to see inside its black-crystalline walls.

  He’d first visited the facility as a child, when he was nine. His father’s unique position within the Cognos Populi had secured the privilege—either that or he’d given a sizable bribe to the Rig’s regent. Truth is, the Unum didn’t know how his father had arranged the visit, but he knew why.

  He’d wanted his son to see with his own eyes what became of dissent in Daqin Guojin.

  It left a lasting impression. As he made his way along the concourse, grainy memories of that first visit swept through his mind like a mid-winter sandstorm. Much to his delight, the facility hadn’t changed.

  The Rig took its name from the rigs bracketing the concourse. The devices consisted of a seven-by-three-foot glass slab encased by tubular framework. Ceramic disks, two feet in diameter and half as thick, hung from the framework at the head of each slab. At the foot of each slab, sand-filled funnels the size of wash tubs counterbalanced the disks via intermediary cables and pulleys. Thinner cables with load-bearing ringlets led to the wrists and ankles of the dissenters splayed upon the slabs.

  The design made it possible to apply any amount of strain to any limb in any direction. By allowing sand to drain from the funnels, the strain could be increased over time if so desired. In most cases, it was highly desirable; it proved an effective method for extracting information and contrition.

  Hundreds of men and women—dissenters from the Chengs—lay spreadeagled upon the rigs, arms and legs yanked in opposing directions. Their contorted faces implied incalculable pain, their yawning mouths protracted screams.

  The Unum halted. He had to hear it again. He plucked the glass plugs from his ears and was rewarded by—

  A cacophony of wails, groans, pleads, and petitions to Sha.

  He smiled. The awesome chorus sang in perfect harmony with his memory from four decades earlier—and that was just the dissenters on this level. Beneath his feet, dissenters filled another seventy-four levels to capacity. If only the city-state’s acoustic engineers could harness the sonic energy of the agony; Daqin Guojin would never want for power again.

  The Unum reinserted the ear plugs. He continued along the concourse toward his destination, which was conveniently landmarked by Pyros and another Jiren.

  Pyros bowed upon his arrival. He removed a plug from his right ear. The Unum did the same. He raised his voice to be heard above the din. “Has he spoken about his activity with Laoshi?”

  “No,” Pyros said. “He hasn’t said a word since he arrived.”

  The Unum gazed at the rig’s slab.

  Daoren lay on his back, arms and legs reefed in opposite directions. Purple bruises dappled his cheekbones and jaw. Sand drained from the funnels at the foot of his slab, shedding mass, but the boy’s face betrayed no emotion.

  “So you assault three Jireni, then refuse to answer questions,” the Unum said. “Perhaps you aren’t as smart as your prep-tests imply.”

  Daoren remained an impenetrable cipher.

  “Did you know there was a dissenter who survived eighteen days while subject to ninety percent strain from his rig?” The Unum checked the funnels; they were half full. “You’re experiencing fifty percent strain. Not to be taken lightly, to be sure, but not severe enough to cause permanent damage.” He grabbed a cable and leaned back. “Ninety percent strain would feel more like this.”

  The cable hummed, protesting the added tension. Daoren’s mouth warped. He bared his teeth.

  The Unum put the full measure of his heft into the effort. The cable hummed and twanged. . . .

  Daoren’s face blanched as white as sun-bleached sand, but he didn’t say a word.

  “Imagine eighteen days of this,” the Unum said, still pulling. “Remarkable, don’t you think? The dissenter was a fellow Slavv. Part of me takes pride in that.”

  He released the cable. The strain eased.

  Daoren gulped shallow breaths, recovering.

  The Unum walked to the head of the rig. “Why do I get the feeling you could survive even longer?”

  The boy’s burning, unblinking eyes communicated a clear message. He wouldn’t be broken.

  “How lucky for you that your skills are needed elsewhere in six days time,” the Unum said. “You’ll be held here with the other dissenters until Jireni escort you to the Center.”

  He leaned closer to make certain Daoren heard him. “And lest you think you can maintain this veil of unresponsiveness during the S.A.T., know this. Should you score one point less than thirty thousand, your lovely mother will be mounted in her own rig before you receive your stun shot.”

  Daoren’s expression stayed disturbingly stoic, as if etched in sculptglass. The Unum grabbed a handful of hair and lifted his head from the slab. The boy needed to see this with his own eyes.

 
Across the concourse, the other Jiren tarried at the foot of another rig. A skeletal Asianoid boy with festering knee wounds lay upon its slab. He’d been interned on the day of the January S.A.T. for trying to breach the Great Northern Border. The two dissenters with him had succumbed to their sonic nanocharges before they could be detained. They’d got off lightly.

  “Watch, Daoren,” he said. “Watch and see what dissent begets.”

  The Jiren detached the funnels at the foot of the slab. They thumped to the floor.

  Without the counterweight, the full force of the ceramic disks transferred to the cables attached to the dissenter’s arms and legs. Its rapid onset lifted his body off the slab.

  The Asianoid boy bellowed in agony, suspended two feet in the air, until his legs parted at the knees with a grisly crack. His body thudded onto the slab. Blood geysered from the twitching stumps, pulsing in sync with his heartbeat. The torrent slowed and ceased within thirty seconds.

  The Unum released Daoren’s head. “Dissent begets death.” He turned away. An afterthought made him turn back. “I almost forgot,” he said. “You’ll be pleased to know that Heqet tested negative for penetration. It seems she and Mako were respectful of our edicts. You’d do well to follow their example.”

  He hoped to see a reaction to the affront, a sign of contrition on Daoren’s face. The boy conceded none; he’d apparently retreated to a place where he couldn’t be touched. The Unum concealed his disappointment and glanced at Pyros.

  His sullen aspect broadcasted his disapproval without distortion. No matter. It wasn’t his place to approve. “He’s to be kept in the rig until the S.A.T.,” the Unum said, “but be sure no more than fifty percent strain is applied. I don’t want him incapacitated for the test.”

  “I’ll pass along your order, Unum.”

  The Unum proceeded down the concourse, noting the undertone of contempt in Pyros’ utterance of the honorific title. Yes, his Primae Jiren was worth keeping an eye on. Cang had as yet uncovered no suspicious activity, but tasking her to conduct the investigation was the right decision.

  He stuffed the plug back into his ear, welcoming the silence.

  * * *

  LAOSHI HELD HEQET on one of the Temple’s two glass divans, stroking her hair. Her tears still flowed, but the cuts on her cheeks had stopped bleeding. Her sobbing had also ceased—another improvement.

  It had been a long night.

  She’d spent most of it relaying the wretched story of what had befallen her and Daoren outside the Librarium’s southern archway. Laoshi couldn’t recall a time when a prospect had struck a Jiren and not been immediately culled for the offense. Daoren had known the potential consequences of his defiance and acted, regardless. It proved the boy’s willingness to sacrifice himself for Heqet, just as his grandfather had done to protect those he loved. Dominus would be proud.

  Heqet had taken the better part of an hour to describe what the Jireni had done to her after Daoren fell to the twitchgun. When she finished, Laoshi had to excuse himself for ten minutes. Outside the Temple, he’d sat and wept on the tapered steps. He’d also expended every reserve of self-control to stop himself from marching to the Assembly and culling the Unum with his bare hands.

  Even now the urge to exact revenge burned slag-hot in his chest. The Unum’s day of reckoning would come soon enough though. For now, his granddaughter needed him. “Be still, Heqet,” he whispered. “Be still.”

  “He was trying to protect me.” She sniffled. “Will they cull him?”

  “No, but they’ll hold him in the Rig until the S.A.T.”

  That, of course, presented a serious problem. He was about to voice his concern when Heqet rendered it moot.

  “The insulating glass . . .”

  He smiled despite the ill predicament. His granddaughter was no fid. “I know, child. I won’t be able to apply it before he sits the test.”

  “Can’t you do it in the Center?”

  “Libraria aren’t allowed inside if their kin are taking the test.”

  The edict was as old as the test itself, designed to eliminate the possibility of collusion. It seemed comical now, given the travesty the Unum had made of the S.A.T.

  Heqet’s brow crinkled over the bridge of her nose—her telltale sign for the birth of an idea. “Can you show me how to apply it? I’ll find a way to get to him before the test begins.”

  Laoshi kissed her forehead. His son and daughter-by-union may have been taken, but their courage lived on. “My brave, brave girl. Your mother and father would be so proud.”

  “And there’s one more item I need for the test.”

  “What’s that, my dear?”

  Her voice resonated with resolve. “A dagger for Daoren.”

  18

  A Reckoning

  GUSTAR RODE IN the levicart’s forward passenger seat, hands wedged under his thighs to stop them from trembling.

  Plasmonic-map symbology glimmered above the dash-panels, none of which made it easier to determine his precise location. Worse, staring at the three-dimensional depictions of transways while moving induced mouth-sweats and creeping nausea.

  He’d spent the last half-hour gazing through the side window, pretending to watch the administrative structures glide past as twilight stained the eastern horizon. Of course, he couldn’t focus on them either due to the events of the morning.

  Not only had the Unum summoned him, but he’d also dispatched a Hexalite levicart and three Jireni as personal escorts. They were heading to the Eastern Mound on the edge of Zhongguo Cheng. The moraine covered five square-miles of Daqin Guojin’s most pristine territory . . . and most dangerous. For ordinary denizens, one unauthorized step on the elevated ridge risked death.

  The Eastern Mound was the home of the Unum’s palace.

  Gustar could barely comprehend it. He was going to the Unum’s palace. At any other time the invitation would have sparked unbounded joy. Today it spurred unceasing angst. Meeting the Unum in person was a fracture in the communications protocol.

  When it came to the test-manipulation scheme, the Unum had been cautious to the point of paranoia. Their method of contact relied on anonymous third-party proxies, using quantum messages safeguarded by the most robust encryption. They’d met once, five years ago, in Nansilafu Cheng. At the end of that forty-minute meeting he’d received explicit orders to never make direct contact with the Unum again.

  He’d taken the order to heart, even sending his gift through an intermediary. Narses was happy enough to transport the Newton’s Cradle to his father following one of his dismal prep-tests at the Spires. Gustar’s sole concern was whether the clumsy fid would smash the precious device before its delivery. So what to make of this unexpected invitation?

  His escorts pleaded ignorance as to its reason. Either they didn’t know or their nature tended toward the obtuse. He wasn’t sure which applied. As a Librarian, he’d experienced limited contact with Jireni. They were a foreign territory—as unknowable as the decayed western continent that lay across the acidic western ocean.

  He glanced at the driver, a cleft-chinned and callow youth whose vacant eyes in all likelihood fronted a vacuous mind. The boy looked barely competent enough to walk without stumbling, never mind pilot a levicart. He also had the disconcerting habit of taking his hands off the steering yoke during their passage on the straightaways. At this speed, an inadvertent bump would send them careening off the transway. Gustar tried not to dwell on it.

  The two Jireni riding in the rear troop compartment were older, but no less shells of men—automatons who needed curt orders and specific directions to function. They announced their presence through the occasional cough or belch. Neither had spoken since their pre-dawn departure from the Librarium’s southern entrance an hour ago. Still, it was worth another try.

  “I won’t mention that you told me,” he said to the driver, the most sociable of the three, if only because he’d mumbled a dozen words so far. “That I promise you.”

  �
�All we know is that the Unum wants you delivered to the palace before he escorts his son to the Center,” the driver said without taking his eyes off the transway.

  Gustar forced a smile. On the inside, he cursed the useless fid. He loathed venturing into situations about which he had no foreknowledge. Foreknowledge was his stock-in-trade.

  Foreknowledge had led him to send excerpts of Laoshi’s seditious writings to Zhongguo Cheng’s district commander—that and the Primae Librarian’s snooping into the prospect databases after the January S.A.T. In the face of a mounting insurrection, reporting dissension could generate considerable rewards. Uncovering a dissenter of Laoshi’s influence ought to be worth fifteen thousand pounds of grooll. As a bonus, it would remove a dire threat to the manipulation scheme.

  The discovery of the two excavation tunnels leading into the subterranean site where Laoshi spent most of his time ought to be worth even more. Commander Cang needed an ally unencumbered by the Jireni’s black armor to investigate the Primae Librarian’s activities. She’d soon accept his proposal to perform the task. Forty thousand pounds of grooll may be a huge sum, but no one was better positioned to carry it out.

  His foreknowledge had also fashioned the test-manipulation scheme into reality. Hundreds of Libraria had access to prospect prep-tests and biometric data. He alone had the foresight to see the information’s tremendous value. Over the past five years, the scheme had proven successful on more occasions than he could count. It had enriched the Unum beyond measure and saved his niece from certain death, but today it would pay off as never before. Thanks to Gustar’s fortuitous discovery of Daoren’s perfect prep-tests, Narses stood an excellent chance of becoming Unum Potentate.

  The heady realization provoked a gasp. . . .

  The Unum must be summoning him to the palace to bestow his reward in person. That had to be it!

  No sooner had the thought solidified than they were passing through the gated entrance to the Eastern Mound. One thousand feet ahead, his destination resolved. He’d viewed countless quantum images of the majestic structure, but laying eyes on it for the first time from such proximity culled his breath.