The recovery ward of the Citadel was a cold, white space that hummed with the sound of thousands of individual life-support units. Kael woke to the taste of copper and the feeling of fire behind his eyes.
“Don’t move,” a voice said. It was Mir. He was sitting on the edge of the cot next to Kael’s, his own head wrapped in a pressure-bandage. “The nanites are still building the bridges. If you shake your head too much, you’ll lose your lunch.”
Kael groaned, the interface port at the base of his skull throbbing. “How long?”
“Six hours. You went deep, F-7712. Draken was impressed, though he’d sooner rip out his own heart than admit it.”
A shadow fell over them. Kael looked up to see a woman who seemed to be composed entirely of sharp angles and cold moonlight. She wore the dark blue robes of the Academic Ministry.
Academic-Mistress Elara.
“The link is established,” she said, her voice like silk over a razor. “Your neural density is high, Kael. A rare gift. But a gift is only as useful as the hand that wields it.”
She looked at Sardon, who was sitting three beds away, staring at the ceiling. “And you, F-8890. Your scores remain… puzzling. A tactical genius who cannot seem to calculate a simple orbital insertion without a ten percent margin of error? Explain.”
Sardon didn’t blink. “The math is complex, Mistress. My mind is slow.”
“Your mind is many things, Sardon. Slow is not one of them.” Elara leaned in, her eyes narrowing. “Do not mistake the Empire’s need for tolerance. You will be a pilot, or you will be a labor-unit in the core foundries. Choose the cockpit.”
She swept away, leaving the air feeling ten degrees colder.
The First Simulation
Two days later, they were strapped into the “Cradles”—the semi-fluid pods that served as simulators for the Vulture interceptors.
“Link active,” a synthetic voice whispered in Kael’s mind.
Suddenly, the Citadel was gone. Kael was floating in a void of perfect, terrifying black. He could feel the Vulture’s engines as if they were his own lungs. The thrusters were his fingers; the sensors were his skin.
“Formation Gamma,” Draken’s voice crackled over the link. “Target is a Frith supply drone. Destroy it.”
Kael surged forward, the power of the interceptor intoxicating. He saw Saeth already diving, his movements aggressive and precise. Mir was flanking him, her laughter echoing on the private cadre channel.
“Look at them go,” she cheered. “Come on, Kael! Don’t let the Envisionist take all the glory!”
But Kael was watching Sardon. The “reluctant genius” was lagging behind, his flight path ragged. But then, a simulated debris field erupted between Sardon and Mir. A rogue asteroid, a trap in the simulation.
Mir didn’t see it. Her sensors were focused on the drone.
“Mir, break left!” Kael screamed.
She was too slow. The debris was going to crush her cockpit.
In a flash of light, Sardon’s ship dived. It wasn’t “mediocre” anymore. It was a blur of mathematical perfection. He threaded the needle between two massive rocks, his wingtip missing Mir by millimeters, and used his own thruster wash to shove her out of the path of destruction.
The simulation ended abruptly. The pods hissed open.
Kael climbed out, gasping for air. Sardon was already walking toward the exit, his head down, his face pale.
“Sardon!” Kael called out.
The older boy stopped but didn’t turn around.
“Don’t tell them,” Sardon whispered, his voice shaking. “If they know what I can really do, they’ll never let me go. They’ll make me the monster they want.”
Kael watched him go, realizing that in the Fahren Empire, even excellence was a cage.