Skyward by #1 New York Times bestselling author Brandon Sanderson is the first book in an epic new series about a girl who dreams of becoming a pilot in a dangerous world at war for humanity’s future. Start reading chapters 1-15 now!

PROLOGUE

Only fools climbed to the surface. It was stupid to put yourself in danger like that, my mother always said. Not only were there near-constant debris showers from the rubble belt, but you never knew when the Krell would attack.

Of course, my father traveled to the surface basically every day—he had to, as a pilot. I supposed by my mother’s definition that made him extra foolish, but I always considered him extra brave.

I was still surprised when one day, after years of listening to me beg, he finally agreed to take me up with him.

I was seven years old, though in my mind I was completely grown-up and utterly capable. I hurried after my father, carrying a lantern to light the rubble-strewn cavern. A lot of the rocks in the tunnel were broken and cracked, most likely from Krell bombings—things I’d experienced down below as a rattling of dishes or trembling of light fixtures.

I imagined those broken rocks as the broken bodies of my enemies, their bones shattered, their trembling arms reaching upward in a useless gesture of total and complete defeat.

I was a very odd little girl.

I caught up to my father, and he looked back, then smiled. He had the best smile, so confident, like he never worried about what people said about him. Never worried that he was weird or didn’t fit in.

Then again, why should he have worried? Everyone liked him. Even people who hated ice cream and playing swords—even whiny little Rodge McCaffrey—liked my father.

Father took me by the arm and pointed upward. “Next part is a little tricky. Let me lift you.”

“I can do it,” I said, and shook off his hand. I was grown-up. I’d packed my own backpack and had left Bloodletter, my stuffed bear, at home. Stuffed bears were for babies, even if you’d fashioned your own mock power armor for yours out of string and broken ceramics.

Granted, I had put my toy starfighter in my backpack. I wasn’t crazy. What if we ended up getting caught in a Krell attack and they bombed our retreat, so we had to live out the rest of our lives as wasteland survivors, devoid of society or civilization?

A girl needed her toy starfighter with her just in case.

I handed my backpack to my father and looked up at the crack in the stones. There was . . . something about that hole up there. An unnatural light seeped through it, wholly unlike the soft glow of our lanterns.

The surface . . . the sky! I grinned and started climbing up a steep slope that was part rubble, part rock formation. My hands slipped and I scraped myself on a sharp edge, but I didn’t cry. The daughters of pilots did not cry.

The crack in the cavern roof looked a hundred meters away. I hated being so small. Any day now, I was going to grow tall like my father. Then for once I wouldn’t be the smallest kid around. I’d laugh at everyone from up so high, they’d be forced to admit how great I was.

I growled softly as I got to the top of a rock. The next handhold was out of reach. I eyed it. Then I jumped, determined. Like a good Defiant girl, I had the heart of a stardragon.

But I also had the body of a seven-year-old. So I missed by a good half meter.

A strong hand seized me before I could fall too far. My father chuckled, holding me by the back of my jumpsuit, which I’d painted with markers to look like his flight suit. I had even drawn a pin on the left over my heart, like the one he wore—the pin that marked him as a pilot. It was in the shape of a small starfighter with lines underneath.

Father pulled me onto the rock beside him, then reached out with his free hand and activated his light-line. The device looked like a metal bracelet, but once he engaged it by tapping two fingers against his palm, the band glowed with a bright molten light. He touched a stone above, and when he drew his hand back, it left a thick line of light like a shining rope fixed to the rock. He wrapped the other end around me so it fit snugly under my arms, then detached it from his bracelet. The glow there faded, but the luminescent rope remained in place, attaching me to the rocks.

I’d always thought light-lines should burn to the touch, but it was just warm. Like a hug.

“Okay, Spin,” he said, using my nickname. “Try it again.” “I don’t need this,” I said, plucking at the safety rope. “Humor a frightened father.”

“Frightened? You aren’t frightened of anything. You fight the Krell.”

He laughed. “I’d rather face a hundred Krell ships than your mother on the day I bring you home with a broken arm, little one.”

“I’m not little. And if I break my arm, you can leave me here until I heal. I’ll fight the beasts of the caverns and become feral and wear their skins and—”

“Climb,” he said, still grinning. “You can fight the beasts of the caverns another time, though I think the only ones you’d find have long tails and buckteeth.”

I had to admit, the light-line was helpful. I could pull against it to brace myself. We reached the crack, and my father pushed me up first. I grabbed the rim and scrambled out of the caverns, stepping onto the surface for the first time in my life.

It was so open.

I gaped, standing there, looking up at . . . at nothing. Just . . . just . . . upness. No ceiling. No walls. I’d always imagined the sur- face as a really, really big cavern. But it was so much more, and so much less, all at once.

Wow.

My father heaved himself up after me and dusted the dirt from his flight suit. I glanced at him, then back up at the sky. I grinned widely.

“Not frightened?” he asked. I glared at him.

“Sorry,” he said with a chuckle. “Wrong word. It’s just that a lot of people find the sky intimidating, Spensa.”

“It’s beautiful,” I whispered, staring up at that vast nothingness, air that extended up into an infinite greyness, fading to black.

The surface was still brighter than I’d imagined. Our planet, Detritus, was protected by several enormous layers of ancient space debris. Junk that was way up high, outside the air, in space. Wrecked space stations, massive metal shields, old chunks of metal big as mountains—there were many layers of it, kind of like broken shells around the planet.

We hadn’t built any of that. We’d crashed on this planet when my grandmother was a girl, and this stuff had been ancient then. Still, some of it worked. For example, the bottom layer—the one closest to the planet—had enormous glowing rectangles in it. I’d heard of those. Skylights: enormous floating lights that gave illumination and warmth to the planet.

There was supposed to be a lot of littler bits of junk up there too, particularly in the lowest layer. I squinted, trying to see if I could pick any of that out, but space was too far away. Other than the two nearby skylights—neither of which was directly above us—the only things I could see were some vague patterns up there in the greyness. Lighter chunks and darker chunks.

“The Krell live up there?” I asked. “Beyond the debris field?” “Yes,” Father said. “They fly down through the gaps in the

layers to attack.”

“How do they find us?” I asked. “There’s so much room up here.” The world seemed a much larger place than I’d imagined in the caverns below.

“They can somehow sense when people gather together,” Father said. “Anytime the population of a cavern gets too big, the Krell attack and bomb it.”

Decades ago, our people had been part of a fleet of space vessels. We’d been chased by the Krell to this planet and had crashed here, where we’d been forced to split up to survive. Now we lived in clans, each of whom could trace their lineage back to the crews of one of those starships.

Gran-Gran had told me these stories many times. We’d lived for seventy years here on Detritus, traveling the caverns as nomadic clans, afraid to congregate. Until now. Now we’d started to build starfighters and had made a hidden base on the surface. We were starting to fight back.

“Where’s Alta Base?” I asked. “You said we’d come up near it. Is that it?” I pointed toward some suspicious rocks. “It’s right there, isn’t it? I want to go see the starfighters.”

My father leaned down and turned me about ninety degrees, then pointed. “There.”

“Where?” I searched the surface, which was basically all just

blue-grey dust and rocks, with craters from fallen debris from the rubble belt. “I can’t see it.”

“That’s the point, Spensa. We have to remain hidden.”

“But you fight, don’t you? Won’t they eventually learn where the fighters are coming from? Why don’t you move the base?”

“We have to keep it here, above Igneous. That’s the big cavern I showed you last week.”

“The one with all the machines?”

He nodded. “Inside Igneous, we found manufactories; that’s what lets us build starships. We have to live nearby to protect the machinery, but we fly missions anywhere the Krell come down, anywhere they decide to bomb.”

“You protect other clans?”

“To me, there is only one clan that matters: humankind. Before we crashed here, we were all part of the same fleet—and someday all the wandering clans will remember that. They will come when we call them. They’ll gather together, and we’ll form a city and build a civilization again.”

“Won’t the Krell bomb it?” I asked, but cut him off before he could reply. “No. Not if we’re strong enough. Not if we stand and fight back.”

He smiled.

“I’m going to have my own ship,” I said. “I’m going to fly it just like you. And then nobody in the clan will be able to make fun of me, because I’ll be stronger than they are.”

My father looked at me for a moment before he spoke. “Is that

why you want to be a pilot?”

“They can’t say you’re too small when you’re a pilot,” I said. “Nobody will think I’m weird, and I won’t get into trouble for fighting because my job will be fighting. They won’t call me names, and everyone will love me.”

Like they love you, I thought.

That made my father hug me for some stupid reason, even

though I was just telling the truth. But I hugged him back, because parents liked stuff like that. Besides, it did feel good to have someone to hold. Maybe I shouldn’t have left Bloodletter behind.

Father’s breath caught, and I thought he might be crying, but it wasn’t that. “Spin!” he said, pointing toward the sky. “Look!”

Again I was struck by the expanse. So BIG.

Father was pointing at something specific. I squinted, noting that a section of the grey-black sky was darker than the rest. A hole through the layers of debris?

In that moment, I looked out into infinity. I found myself trembling as if a billion meteors had hit nearby. I could see space itself, with little pinpricks of white in it, different from the skylights. These sparkled, and seemed so, so far away.

“What are those lights?” I whispered.

“Stars,” he said. “I fly up near the debris, but I’ve almost never seen through it. There are too many layers. I’ve always wondered if I could get out to the stars.”

There was awe in his voice, a tone I’d never heard from him before.

“Is that . . . is that why you fly?” I asked.

My father didn’t seem to care about the praise the other members of the clan gave him. Strangely, he seemed embarrassed by it.

“We used to live out there, among the stars,” he whispered. “That’s where we belong, not in those caverns. The kids who make fun of you, they’re trapped on this rock. Their heads are heads of rock, their hearts set upon rock. Set your sights on something higher. Something more grand.”

The debris shifted, and the hole slowly shrank until all I could see was a single star brighter than the others.

“Claim the stars, Spensa,” he said.

I was going to be a pilot someday. I would fly up there and fight. I just hoped Father would leave some Krell for me.

I squinted as something flashed in the sky. A distant piece of

debris, burning brightly as it entered the atmosphere. Then another fell, and another. Then dozens.

Father frowned and reached for his radio—a superadvanced piece of technology that was given only to pilots. He lifted the blocky device to his mouth. “This is Chaser,” he said. “I’m on the surface. I see a debris fall close to Alta.”

“We’ve spotted it already, Chaser,” a woman’s voice said over the radio. “Radar reports are coming in now, and . . . Scud. We’ve got Krell.”

“What cavern are they headed for?” Father asked.

“Their heading is . . . Chaser, they’re heading this way. They’re flying straight for Igneous. Stars help us. They’ve located the base!”

Father lowered his radio.

“Large Krell breach sighted,” the woman’s voice said through the radio. “Everyone, this is an emergency. An extremely large group of Krell has breached the debris field. All fighters report in. They’re coming for Alta!”

Father took my arm. “Let’s get you back.”

“They need you!” I said. “You’ve got to go fight!” “I have to get you to—”

“I can get back myself. It was a straight trip through those tunnels.”

Father glanced toward the debris again. “Chaser!” a new voice said over the radio. “Chaser, you there?”

“Mongrel?” Father said, flipping a switch and raising his radio. “I’m up on the surface.”

“You need to talk some sense into Banks and Swing. They’re saying we need to flee.”

Father cursed under his breath, flipping another switch on the radio. A voice came through. “—aren’t ready for a head-on fight yet. We’ll be ruined.”

“No,” another woman said. “We have to stand and fight.” A dozen voices started talking at once.

“Ironsides is right,” my father said into the line, and— remarkably—they all grew quiet.

“If we let them bomb Igneous, then we lose the apparatus,” my father said. “We lose the manufactories. We lose everything. If we ever want to have a civilization again, a world again, we have to stand here!”

I waited, silent, holding my breath, hoping he would be too distracted to send me away. I trembled at the idea of a battle, but I still wanted to watch it.

“We fight,” the woman said.

“We fight,” said Mongrel. I knew him by name, though I hadn’t met him. He was my father’s wingmate. “Hot rocks, this is a good one. I’m going to beat you into the sky, Chaser! Just you watch how many I bring down!”

The man sounded eager, maybe a little too excited, to be heading into battle. I liked him immediately.

My father debated only a moment before pulling off his light- line bracelet and stuffing it into my hands. “Promise you’ll go back straightaway.”

“I promise.” “Don’t dally.”

“I won’t.”

He raised his radio. “Yeah, Mongrel, we’ll see about that. I’m running for Alta now. Chaser out.”

He dashed across the dusty ground in the direction he’d pointed earlier. Then he stopped and turned back. He pulled off his pin and tossed it—like a glittering fragment of a star—to me before continuing his run toward the hidden base.

I, of course, immediately broke my promise. I climbed down into the crack but hid there, clutching Father’s pin, and watched until I saw the starfighters leave Alta and streak toward the sky. I squinted and picked out the dark Krell ships swarming down toward them.

Finally, showing a rare moment of good judgment, I decided I’d better do what my father had told me. I used the light-line to lower myself into the cavern, where I recovered my backpack and headed into the tunnels. I figured if I hurried, I could get back to my clan in time to listen to the broadcast of the fight on our single communal radio.

I was wrong though. The hike was longer than I remembered, and I did manage to get lost. So I was wandering down there, imagining the glory of the awesome battle happening above, when my father infamously broke ranks and fled from the enemy. His own flight shot him down in retribution. By the time I got home, the battle had been won, my father was gone.

And I’d been branded the daughter of a coward.

PART ONE

1

I stalked my enemy carefully through the cavern.

I’d taken off my boots so they wouldn’t squeak. I’d removed my socks so I wouldn’t slip. The rock under my feet was comfortably cool as I took another silent step forward.

This deep, the only light came from the faint glow of the worms on the ceiling, feeding off the moisture seeping through cracks. You had to sit for minutes in the darkness for your eyes to adjust to that faint light.

Another quiver in the shadows. There, near those dark lumps that must be enemy fortifications. I froze in a crouch, listening to my enemy scratch the rock as he moved. I imagined a Krell: a terrible alien with red eyes and dark armor.

With a steady hand—agonizingly slow—I raised my rifle to my shoulder, held my breath, and fired.

A squeal of pain was my reward.

Yes!

I patted my wrist, activating my father’s light-line. It sprang to life with a reddish-orange glow, blinding me for a moment.

Then I rushed forward to claim my prize: one dead rat, speared straight through.

In the light, shadows I’d imagined as enemy fortifications revealed themselves as rocks. My enemy was a plump rat, and my rifle was a makeshift speargun. Nine and a half years had passed since that fateful day when I’d climbed to the surface with my father, but my imagination was as strong as ever. It helped relieve the monotony, to pretend I was doing something more exciting than hunting rats.

I held up the dead rodent by its tail. “Thus you know the fury of my anger, fell beast.”

It turned out that strange little girls grow up to be strange young women. But I figured it was good to practice my taunts for when I really fought the Krell. Gran-Gran taught that a great warrior knew how to make a great boast to drive fear and uncertainty into the hearts of her enemies.

I tucked my prize away into my sack. That was eight so far— not a bad haul. Did I have time to find another?

I glanced at my light-line—the bracelet that housed it had a little clock next to the power indicator. 0900. Probably time to turn back; I couldn’t miss too much of the school day.

I slung my sack over my shoulder, picked up my speargun—

which I’d fashioned from salvaged parts I’d found in the caverns— and started the hike homeward. I followed my own hand-drawn maps, which I was constantly updating in a small notebook.

A part of me was sad to have to return, and leave these silent caverns behind. They reminded me of my father. Besides, I liked how . . . empty it all was. Nobody to mock me, nobody to stare, nobody to whisper insults until I was forced to defend my family honor by burying a fist in their stupid face.

I stopped at a familiar intersection where the floor and ceiling gave way to strange metal patterns. Circular designs marked with scientific writing covered both surfaces; I’d always thought they must be ancient maps of the galaxy. On the far side of the room, an enormous, ancient tube emerged from the rock—one of many that moved water between the caverns, cleansing it and using it to cool machinery. A seam dripped water into a bucket I’d left, and it was half full, so I took a long drink. Cool and refreshing, with a tinge of something metallic.

We didn’t know much about the people who had built this machinery. Like the rubble belt, it had been here already when our small fleet crashed on the planet. They’d been humans, as the writings on places like this room’s ceiling and floor were in human languages. But how distantly related they were to us was a mystery even now. None of them were still around, and the melted patches and ancient wrecks on the surface indicated that they had suffered their own war.

I poured the rest of the water into my canteen, then gave the large tube a fond pat before replacing the bucket and moving on. The machinery seemed to respond to me with a distant, familiar thrumming. I followed that sound and eventually approached a glowing break in the stone on my left.

I stepped up to the hole and looked out on Igneous. My home cavern and the largest of the underground cities that made up the Defiant League. My perch was high, providing me with a stunning view of a large cave filled with boxy apartments built like cubes splitting off one another.

My father’s dream had come true. In defeating the Krell that day over nine years ago, those fledgling starfighter pilots had inspired a nation. Dozens of once-nomadic clans had congregated, colonizing Igneous and the caverns around it. Each clan had its own name still, traced back to the ship or section of the ship they’d worked on. My clan was the Motorskaps—from the old words for engine crew.

Together, we called ourselves Defiants. A name taken from our original flagship.

Of course, in gathering together, we had drawn the attention of the Krell. The aliens were still determined to destroy human- kind, so the war continued, and we needed a constant stream of starfighters and pilots to protect our burgeoning nation.

Towering over the buildings of Igneous was the apparatus: ancient forges, refineries, and manufactories that pumped molten rock from below, then created the parts to build starfighters. The apparatus was both amazing and unique; though machinery in other caverns provided heat, electricity, or filtered water, only the apparatus of Igneous was capable of complex manufacturing.

Heat poured through the crack, making my forehead bead with sweat. Igneous was a sweltering place, with all those refineries, factories, and algae vats. And though it was well lit, it somehow always felt gloomy inside, with that red-orange light from the refineries shining on everything.

I left the crack and walked to an old maintenance locker I’d discovered in the wall here. Its hatch looked—at first glance—like any other section of the stone tunnel, and so was relatively secure. I popped it open, revealing my few secret possessions. Some parts for my speargun, my spare canteen, and my father’s old pilot’s pin. I rubbed that for good luck, then placed my light-line, map book, and speargun in the locker.

I retrieved a crude stone-tipped spear, clicked the hatch closed, then slung my sack over my shoulder. Eight rats could be surprisingly awkward to carry, particularly when—even at seventeen—you had a body that refused to grow beyond a hundred and fifty-one centimeters.

I hiked down to the normal entrance into the cavern. Two soldiers from the ground troops—which barely ever did any real fighting—guarded the way in. Though I knew them both by their first names, they still made me stand to the side as they pretended to call for authorization for me to enter. Really, they just liked making me wait.

Every day. Every scudding day.

Eventually, Aluko stepped over and began looking through my sack with a suspicious eye.

“What kind of contraband do you expect I’m bringing into the city?” I asked him. “Pebbles? Moss? Maybe some rocks that insulted your mother?”

He eyed my spear as if wondering how I’d managed to catch eight rats with such a simple weapon. Well, let him wonder. Finally, he tossed the sack back to me. “On your way, coward.”

Strength. I lifted my chin. “Someday,” I said, “you will hear my name, and tears of gratitude will spring to your eyes as you think of how lucky you are to have once assisted the daughter of Chaser.”

“I’d rather forget I ever knew you. On your way.”

I held my head high and walked into Igneous, then made my way toward the Glorious Rises of Industry, the name of my neighborhood. I’d arrived at shift change, and passed workers in jump- suits of a variety of colors, each marking their place in the great machine that kept the Defiant League—and the war against the Krell—functioning. Sanitation workers, maintenance techs, algae vat specialists.

No pilots, of course. Off-duty pilots stayed in the deep caverns on reserve, while the on-duty ones lived in Alta, the very base my father had died protecting. It was no longer secret, but had grown into a large installation on the surface, housing dozens of ships along with the pilot command structure and training facilities. That was where I would live starting tomorrow, once I passed the test and became a cadet.

I walked under a large metal statue of the First Citizens: a group of people holding symbolic weapons and reaching toward the sky in defiant poses, ships rising behind them trailing streaks of metal. Though it depicted those who had fought at the Battle of Alta, my father wasn’t among them.

The next turn took me to our apartment, one of many metal

cubes sprouting from a larger central one. Ours was small, but big enough for three people, particularly since I spent days at a time out in the caverns, hunting and exploring.

My mother wasn’t home, but I found Gran-Gran on the roof, rolling algae wraps to sell at our cart. An official job was forbidden to my mother because of what my father had supposedly done, so we had to get by doing something unconventional.

Gran-Gran looked up, hearing me. Her name was Becca Nightshade—I shared her last name—but even those who barely knew her called her Gran-Gran. She had lost nearly all her sight a few years ago, her eyes having gone a milky white. She was hunched over and worked with sticklike arms. But she was still the strongest person I knew.

“Oooh,” she said. “That sounds like Spensa! How many did you get today?”

“Eight!” I dumped my spoils before her. “And several are particularly juicy.”

“Sit, sit,” Gran-Gran said, pushing aside the mat filled with wraps. “Let’s get these cleaned and cooking! If we hurry, we can have them ready for your mother to sell today, and I can get to tanning the skins.”

I probably should have gone off to class—Gran-Gran had forgotten again—but really, what was the point? These days, we were just getting lectures on the various jobs one could do in the cavern. I had already chosen what I’d be. Though the test to become a pilot was supposed to be hard, Rodge and I had been studying for ten years. We’d pass for sure. So why did I need to hear about how great it was to be an algae vat worker or whatever?

Besides, since I needed to spend time hunting, I missed a lot of classes, so I wasn’t suited to any other jobs. I made sure to attend the classes that had to do with flying—ship layouts and repair, mathematics, war history. Any other class I managed to make was a bonus.

I settled down and helped Gran-Gran skin and gut the rats.

She was clean and efficient as she worked by touch.

“Who,” she asked, head bowed, eyes mostly closed, “do you want to hear about today?”

“Beowulf!”

“Ah, the King of the Geats, is it? Not Leif Eriksson? He was your father’s favorite.”

“Did he kill a dragon?”

“He discovered a new world.” “With dragons?”

Gran-Gran chuckled. “A feathered serpent, by some legends, but I have no story of them fighting. Now, Beowulf, he was a mighty man. He was your ancestor, you know. It wasn’t until he was old that he slew the dragon; first he made his name fighting monsters.”

I worked quietly with my knife, skinning and gutting the rats, then slicing the meat and tossing it into a pot to be stewed. Most people in the city lived on algae paste. Real meat—from cattle or pigs raised in caverns with special lighting and environmental equipment—was far too rare for everyday eating. So they’d trade

for rats.

I loved the way Gran-Gran told stories. Her voice grew soft when the monsters hissed, and bold when the heroes boasted. She worked with nimble fingers as she spun the tale of the ancient Viking hero who came to aid the Danes in their time of need. A warrior everybody loved; one who fought bravely, even against a larger and mightier foe.

“And when the monster had slunk away to die,” Gran-Gran said, “the hero, he held aloft Grendel’s entire arm and shoulder as a grisly trophy. He’d avenged the blood of the fallen, proving himself with strength and valor.”

Clinking sounded from below in our apartment. My mother was back. I ignored that for now. “He ripped the arm free,” I said, “with his hands?”

“He was strong,” Gran-Gran said, “and a warrior true. But he was of the oldenfolk, who fought with hands and sword.” She leaned forward. “You will fight with nimbleness of both hand and wit. With a starship to pilot, you won’t need to rip any arms off. Now, have you been doing your exercises?”

I rolled my eyes.

“I saw that,” Gran-Gran said. “No you didn’t.”

“Close your eyes.”

I closed my eyes and tipped my head back, face toward the ceiling of the cavern, far above.

“Listen to the stars,” Gran-Gran said. “I only hear—”

“Listen to the stars. Imagine yourself flying.”

I sighed. I loved Gran-Gran and her stories, but this part always bored me. Still, I tried doing as she had taught me—sitting there with my head tipped back, I tried to imagine that I was soaring upward. I tried to let everything else fade around me, and to picture stars shining brightly above.

“I used to do this exercise,” Gran-Gran said softly, “with my mother, on the Defiant in the engine rooms. We worked the flagship itself, a battle cruiser larger than this entire cavern. I’d sit and listen to the hum of the engines, and to something beyond that. The stars.”

I tried to imagine her as a little girl, and somehow that helped. With my eyes closed, I felt as if I were almost floating. Reaching upward . . .

“We of the engine crew,” Gran-Gran said, “were odd, among the other ship crews. They thought we were strange, but we kept the ship moving. We made it travel the stars. Mother said it was because we could hear them.”

I thought . . . just for a moment . . . that I heard something out there. My imagination perhaps? A distant, pure sound . . .

“Even after we crashed here, we people of the engines stayed together,” Gran-Gran said. “Clan Motorskaps. If others say you’re strange, it’s because they remember this, and maybe fear us. This is your heritage. The heritage of warriors who traveled the sky, and will return to the sky. Listen.”

I let out a long, calming sigh as it—whatever I thought I’d

heard—faded. I opened my eyes and was shocked, for a second, to find I was back on that rooftop, surrounded by the ruddy light of Igneous.

“We maintained the engines,” I said, “and moved the ship? What does that have to do with being warriors? Wouldn’t it have been better to fire the weapons?”

“Only a fool thinks that weapons are more important than strategy and motion!” Gran-Gran said. “Tomorrow let me tell you again of Sun Tzu, the greatest general of all time. He taught that position and preparation won wars—not swords or spears. A great man, Sun Tzu. He was your ancestor, you know.”

“I prefer Genghis Khan,” I said.

“A tyrant and a monster,” Gran-Gran said, “though yes, there is much to learn from the Great Khan’s life. But have I ever told you of Queen Boudicca, defiant rebel against the Romans? She was your—”

“Ancestor?” Mother said, climbing the ladder outside the building. “She was a British Celt. Beowulf was Swedish, Genghis Khan Mongolian, and Sun Tzu Chinese. And they’re all supposedly my daughter’s ancestors?”

“All of Old Earth is our heritage!” Gran-Gran said. “You, Spensa, are one in a line of warriors stretching back millennia, a true line to Old Earth and its finest blood.”

Mother rolled her eyes. She was everything I wasn’t—tall, beautiful, calm. She noted the rats, but then looked at me with arms folded. “She might have the blood of warriors, but today she’s late for class.”

“She’s in class,” Gran-Gran said. “The important one.”

I stood up, wiping my hands on a rag. I knew how Beowulf would face monsters and dragons . . . but how would he face his mother on a day when he was supposed to be in school? I settled on a noncommittal shrug.

Mother eyed me. “He died, you know,” she said. “Beowulf died fighting that dragon.”

“He fought to his last ounce of strength!” Gran-Gran said. “He defeated the beast, though it cost him his life. And he brought untold peace and prosperity to his people! All the greatest warriors fight for peace, Spensa. Remember that.”

“At the very least,” Mother said, “they fight for irony.” She glanced again at the rats. “Thanks. But get going. Don’t you have the pilot test tomorrow?”

“I’m ready for the test,” I said. “Today is just learning things I don’t need to know.”

Mother gave me an unyielding stare. Every great warrior knew when they were bested, so I gave Gran-Gran a hug and whispered, “Thank you.”

“Soul of a warrior,” Gran-Gran whispered back. “Remember your exercises. Listen to the stars.”

I smiled, then went and quickly washed up before heading off to what would, I hoped, be my last day of class.

2

“Why don’t you tell us what you do each day in the Sanitation Corps, Citizen Alfir?” Mrs. Vmeer, our Work Studies instructor, nodded encouragingly at the man who stood at the front of the classroom.

This Citizen Alfir wasn’t what I’d imagined a sanitation worker to be. Though he wore a sanitation jumpsuit and carried a pair of rubber gloves, he was actually handsome: square jaw, burly arms, chest hair peeking out from above his tight jumpsuit collar.

I could almost imagine him as Beowulf. Until he spoke.

“Well, we mostly fix clogs in the system,” he said. “Clearing what we call black water—that’s mostly human waste—so it can flow back to processing, where the apparatus reclaims it and harvests both water and useful minerals.”

“Sounds perfect for you,” Dia whispered, leaning toward me. “Cleaning waste? A step up from coward’s daughter.”

I couldn’t punch her, unfortunately. Not only was she Mrs. Vmeer’s daughter, I was already on notice for fighting. Another write-up would keep me from taking the test, which was stupid. Didn’t they want their pilots to be great fighters?

We sat on the floor in a small room. No desks for us today; those had been requisitioned by another instructor. I felt like a four-year-old being read a story.

“It might not sound glorious,” Alfir said. “But without the Sanitation Corps, none of us would have water. Pilots can’t fly if they don’t have anything to drink. In some ways, we’ve got the most important job in the caverns.”

Though I’d missed some of these lectures, I’d heard enough of them. The Ventilation Corps workers earlier in the week had said their job was the most important. As had the construction workers from the day before. As had the forge workers, the cleaning staff, and the cooks.

They all had practically the same speech. Something about how we were all important pieces of the machine that fought the Krell. “Every job in the cavern is a vital part of the machine that keeps us alive,” Alfir said, mirroring my thoughts. “We can’t all

be pilots, but no job is more important than another.”

Next, he’d say something about learning your place and following commands.

“To join us, you have to be able to follow instructions,” the man said. “You have to be willing to do your part, no matter how insignificant it may seem. Remember, obedience is defiance.”

I got it, and to an extent agreed with him. Pilots wouldn’t get

far in the war without water, or food, or sanitation.

Taking jobs like these still felt like settling. Where was the spark, the energy? We were supposed to be Defiant. We were warriors.

The class clapped politely when Citizen Alfir finished. Outside

the window, more workers walked in lines beneath statues with straight, geometric shapes. Sometimes we seemed far less a machine of war than a clock for timing how long shifts lasted.

The students stood up for a break, and I strode away before Dia could make another wisecrack. The girl had been trying to goad me into trouble all week.

Instead, I approached a student at the back of the room—a lanky boy with red hair. He’d immediately opened a book to read once the lecture was done.

“Rodge,” I said. “Rigmarole!”

His nickname—the callsign we’d chosen for him to take once he became a pilot—made him look up. “Spensa! When did you get here?”

“Middle of the lecture. You didn’t see me come in?”

“I was going through flight schematics lists in my head. Scud.

Only one day left. Aren’t you nervous?”

“Of course I’m not nervous. Why would I be nervous? I’ve got this down.”

“Not sure I do.” Rodge glanced back at his textbook.

“Are you kidding? You know basically everything, Rig.”

“You should probably call me Rodge. I mean, we haven’t earned callsigns yet. Not unless we pass the test.”

“Which we will totally do.”

“But what if I haven’t studied the right material?” “Five basic turn maneuvers?”

“The reverse switchback,” he said immediately, “Ahlstrom loop, the twin shuffle, overwing twist, and the Imban turn.”

“DDF g-force warning thresholds for various maneuvers?” “Ten Gs in a climb or bank, fifteen Gs forward, four Gs in a dive.” “Booster type on a Poco interceptor?”

“Which design?” “Current.”

“A-19. Yes, I know that, Spensa—but what if those questions aren’t on the test? What if it’s something we didn’t study?”

At his words, I felt the faintest seed of doubt. While we’d done practice tests, the actual contents of the pilot’s test changed every year. There were always questions about boosters, fighter components, and maneuvers—but technically, any part of our schooling could be included.

I’d missed a lot of classes, but I knew I shouldn’t worry. Beowulf

wouldn’t worry. Confidence was the soul of heroism.

“I’m going to ace that test, Rig,” I said. “You and I, we’re going to be the best pilots in the Defiant Defense Force. We’ll fight so well, the Krell will raise lamentations to the sky like smoke above a pyre, crying in desperation at our advent!”

Rig cocked his head. “A bit much?” I asked.

“Where do you come up with these things?” “Sounds like something Beowulf might say.”

Rodge settled back down to study, and I probably should have joined him. Yet a part of me was fed up with studying, with trying to cram things into my brain. I wanted the challenge to just arrive. We had one more lecture today, unfortunately. I listened to the other dozen or so students chatter together, but I wasn’t in a mood to put up with their stupidity. Instead I found myself pacing like a caged animal, until I noticed Mrs. Vmeer walking toward me with

Alfir, the sanitation guy.

She wore a bright green skirt, but the silvery cadet’s pin on her blouse was the real mark of her achievement. It meant she’d passed the pilot’s test. She must have washed out in flight school— otherwise she’d have a golden pin—but washing out wasn’t uncommon. And down here in Igneous, even a cadet’s pin was a mark of great accomplishment. Mrs. Vmeer had special clothing and food requisition privileges.

She wasn’t a bad teacher—she didn’t treat me much differently from the other students, and she hardly ever scowled at me. I kind of liked her, even if her daughter was a creature of distilled darkness, worthy only of being slain so her corpse could be used to make potions.

“Spensa,” Mrs. Vmeer said. “Citizen Alfir wanted to speak with you.”

I braced myself for questions about my father. Everyone always wanted to ask about him. What was it like to live as the daughter of a coward? Did I wish I could hide from it? Did I ever consider changing my surname? People who thought they were being empathetic always asked questions like those.

“I hear,” Alfir said, “that you’re quite the explorer.”

I opened my mouth to spit back a retort, then bit it off. What?

“You go out in the caves,” he continued, “hunting?” “Um, yes,” I said. “Rats.”

“We have need of people like you,” Alfir said. “In sanitation?”

“A lot of the machinery we service runs through far-off caverns. We make expeditions to them, and need rugged types for those trips. If you want a job, I’m offering one.”

A job. In sanitation?

“I’m going to be a pilot,” I blurted out.

“The pilot’s test is hard,” Alfir said, glancing at our teacher. “Not many pass it. I’m offering you a guaranteed place with us. You sure you don’t want to consider it?”

“No, thank you.”

Alfir shrugged and walked off. Mrs. Vmeer studied me for a moment, then shook her head and went to welcome the next lecturer.

I backed up against the wall, folding my arms. Mrs. Vmeer knew I was going to be a pilot. Why would she think I’d accept such an offer? Alfir couldn’t have known about me without her saying something to him, so what was up?

“They’re not going to let you be a pilot,” a voice said beside me.

I glanced and saw—belatedly—that I’d happened to walk over by Dia. The dark-haired girl sat on the floor, leaning on the wall. Why wasn’t she chatting with the others?

“They don’t have a choice,” I said to her. “Anyone can take the pilot’s test.”

“Anyone can take it,” Dia said. “But they decide who passes,

and it’s not always fair. The children of First Citizens get in automatically.”

I glanced at the painting of the First Citizens on the wall. We had them in all the classrooms. And yes, I knew their children got automatic entry into flight school. They deserved it, as their parents had fought at the Battle of Alta.

Technically, so had my father—but I wasn’t counting on that to help me. Still, I’d always been told that a good showing on the test would get anyone, regardless of status, into flight school. The Defiant Defense Force—the DDF—didn’t care who you were, so long as you could fly.

“I know they won’t count me as a daughter of a First,” I said. “But if I pass, I get in. Just like anyone else.”

“That’s the thing, spaz. You won’t pass, no matter what. I heard my parents talking about it last night. Admiral Ironsides gave orders to deny you. You don’t really think they’d let the daughter of Chaser fly for the DDF, do you?”

“Liar.” I felt my face grow cold with anger. She was trying to taunt me again, to get me to throw a fit.

Dia shrugged. “You’ll see. It doesn’t matter to me—my father already got me a job in the Administration Corps.”

I hesitated. This wasn’t like her usual insults. It didn’t have the same vicious bite, the same sense of amused taunting. She . . . she really seemed not to care whether I believed her.

I stalked across the room to where Mrs. Vmeer was speaking with the new lecturer, a woman from the Algae Vat Corps.

“We need to talk,” I told her. “Just a moment, Spensa.”

I stood there, intruding on their conversation, arms folded, until finally Mrs. Vmeer sighed, then pulled me to the side. “What is it, child?” she asked. “Have you reconsidered Citizen Alfir’s kind offer?”

“Did the admiral herself order that I’m not to pass the pilot’s test?”

Mrs. Vmeer narrowed her eyes, then turned and glanced toward her daughter.

“Is it true?” I asked.

“Spensa,” Mrs. Vmeer said, looking back at me. “You have to understand, this is a very delicate issue. Your father’s reputation is—”

“Is it true?”

Mrs. Vmeer drew her lips to a line and didn’t answer.

“Is it all lies, then?” I asked. “The talk of equality and of only skill mattering? Of finding your right place and serving there?”

“It’s complicated,” Mrs. Vmeer said. She lowered her voice. “Look, why don’t you skip the test tomorrow to save everyone the embarrassment? Come to me, and we’ll talk about what might work for you. If not sanitation, perhaps ground troops?”

“So I can stand all day on guard duty?” I said, my voice growing louder. “I need to fly. I need to prove myself!”

Mrs. Vmeer sighed, then shook her head. “I’m sorry, Spensa.

But this was never going to be. I wish one of your teachers had been brave enough to disabuse you of the notion when you were younger.”

In that moment, everything came crashing down around me. A daydreamed future. A carefully imagined escape from my life of ridicule.

Lies. Lies that a part of me had suspected. Of course they weren’t going to let me pass the test. Of course I was too much of an embarrassment to let fly.

I wanted to rage. I wanted to hit someone, break something, scream until my lungs bled.

Instead I strode from the room, away from the laughing eyes of the other students.

3

I sought refuge in the silent caverns. I didn’t dare go back to my mother and grandmother. My mother would undoubtedly be happy—she’d lost a husband to the Krell, and dreaded seeing me suffer the same fate. Gran-Gran . . . she would tell me to fight.

But fight what? The military itself didn’t want me.

I felt like a fool. All this time, telling myself I’d become a pilot, and in truth I’d never had a chance. My teachers must have spent these years laughing at me behind their hands.

I walked through an unfamiliar cavern on the outer edge of

what I’d explored, hours from Igneous. And still the feelings of embarrassment and anger shadowed me.

What an idiot I had been.

I reached the edge of a subterranean cliff and knelt, activating my father’s light-line by tapping two fingers against my palm—an action the bracelet could sense. It glowed more brightly. Gran- Gran said we’d brought these with us to Detritus, that they were pieces of equipment used by the explorers and warriors of the old human space fleet. I wasn’t supposed to have one, but everyone thought it had been destroyed when my father crashed.

I placed my wrist against the stone of the cliff, and tapped my fingers on my palm once more. This command made an energy line stick to the rock, connecting my bracelet to the stone.

A three-finger tap let out more slack. Using that, I could climb over the ledge—rope in hand—and lower myself to the bottom. After I landed, a two-finger tap made the rope let go of the rock above, then snap back into the bracelet housing. I didn’t know how it worked, only that I needed to recharge it every month or two, something I did in secret by plugging it into power lines in the caverns.

I crept into a cavern filled with kurdi mushrooms. They tasted foul, but were edible—and rats loved them. This would be prime hunting ground. So I turned off my light and settled down to wait, listening intently.

I had never feared the darkness. It reminded me of the exercise Gran-Gran taught, where I floated up toward the singing stars. You couldn’t fear the dark if you were a fighter. And I was a fighter.

I was . . . I was going to . . . going to be a pilot . . .

I looked upward, trying to push away those feelings of loss. Instead, I was soaring. Toward the stars. And I again thought that I could hear something calling to me—a sound like a distant flute.

A nearby scraping pulled me back. Rat nails on stone. I raised my speargun, familiar motions guiding me, and engaged a smidgen of light from my light-line.

The rat turned in a panic toward me. My finger trembled on the trigger, but I didn’t fire as it scrambled away. What did it mat- ter? Was I really going to go on with my life like nothing had hap- pened?

Usually, exploring kept my mind off my problems. Today they kept intruding, like a rock in my shoe. Remember? Remember that your dreams have just been stolen?

I felt like I had in those first days following my father’s death.

When every moment, every object, every word reminded me of him, and of the sudden hole inside me.

I sighed, then attached one end of my light-line to my spear and commanded it to stick to the next thing it touched. I took aim at the top of another cliff and fired, sticking the weightless glowing rope in place. I climbed up, my speargun rattling in its straps on my back.

As a child, I’d imagined that my father had survived his crash. That he was being held captive in these endless, uncharted tunnels. I imagined saving him, like a figure from Gran-Gran’s stories. Gilgamesh, or Joan of Arc, or Tarzan of Greystoke. A hero.

The cavern trembled softly, as if in outrage, and dust fell from the ceiling. An impact up on the surface.

That was close, I thought. Had I climbed so far? I took out my book of hand-drawn maps. I’d been out here for quite a while by now. Hours at least. I’d taken a nap a few caverns back . . .

I checked the clock on my light-line. Night had come and gone, and it was already approaching noon on the day of the test—which would happen in the evening. I probably should have headed back. Mom and Gran-Gran would worry if I didn’t show up for the test.

To hell with the test, I thought, imagining the indignation I’d feel at being turned away at the door. Instead, I climbed up through a tight squeeze into another tunnel. Out here my size was—for once—an advantage.

Another impact rocked the caverns. With this much debris falling, climbing to the surface was definitely stupid. I didn’t care. I was in a reckless mood. I felt, almost heard, something driving me forward. I kept climbing until I finally reached a crack in the ceiling. Light shone through it, but it was an even, sterile white, not orange enough. Cool dry air blew in also, which was a good sign. I pushed my pack ahead of me, then squirmed through the crack and out into the light.

The surface. I looked up and saw the sky again. It never failed to take my breath away.

A distant skylight shone down on a section of the land, but I was mostly in shadow. Overhead, the sky sparkled with a shower of falling debris. Radiant lines like slashes. A formation of three scout-class starfighters flew through it, watching. Falling debris was often broken pieces of ships or other space junk, and the salvage from it could be valuable. It played havoc with our radar though, and could mask a Krell incursion.

I stood in the blue-grey dust and let the awe of the sky wash over me, feeling the peculiar sensation of wind against my cheeks. I’d come up close to Alta Base, which I could see in the distance, maybe only a thirty-minute walk or so away. Now that the Krell knew where we were, there was no reason to hide the base, so it had been expanded from a hidden bunker to several large buildings with a walled perimeter, antiaircraft guns, and an invisible shield to protect it from debris.

Outside that wall, groups of people worked a small strip of something I always found strange: trees and fields. What were they even doing over there? Trying to grow food in this dusty ground?

I didn’t dare get close. The guards would take me for a scavenger from a distant cavern. Still, there was something dramatic about the stark green of those fields and the stubborn walls of the base. Alta was a monument to our determination. For three generations, humankind had lived like rats and nomads on this planet, but we would hide no longer.

The flight of starships streaked toward Alta, and I took a step after them. Set your sights on something higher, my father had said. Something more grand . . .

And where had that gotten me?

I shouldered my pack and my speargun, then hiked in the other direction. I had been to a nearby passage before, and I figured that with more exploring, I could connect some of my maps. Unfortunately, when I arrived, I found the passage’s mouth completely collapsed.

Some space debris hit the surface in the near distance, toss- ing up a spray of dust. I looked up and saw a few smaller chunks streaking down overhead, fiery chunks of metal . . .

Heading straight toward me.

Scud!

I dashed back the way I had come.

No. Nonononono! The air rumbled, and I could feel the heat of the approaching debris.

There! I spotted a small cavern opening in the surface—part crack, part cave mouth. I threw myself toward it, skidding and sliding inside.

An enormous CRASH sounded behind me, and it seemed to shake the entire planet. Frantic, I engaged my light-line and slapped my hand against stone as I fell in the churning chaos. I jerked up short, connected by the light-line to the wall, as rock chips and pebbles flew across me. The cavern trembled.

Then, all grew still. I blinked dust from my eyes and found myself dangling by my light-line in the center of a small cavern, maybe ten or fifteen meters high. I’d lost my pack somewhere, and I’d scraped my arm up pretty good.

Great. Just great, Spensa. This is what throwing a tantrum gets you. I groaned, my head throbbing, then tapped my fingers against my palm to let the light-line out, lowering myself to the floor.

I flopped down, catching my breath. Other impacts sounded in the distance, but they dwindled.

Finally, I wobbled to my feet and dusted myself off. I managed to locate the strap of my bag sticking out from some rubble nearby. I yanked it out, then checked the canteen and maps in- side. They seemed okay.

My speargun was another matter. I found the handle, but there

was no sign of the rest. It was probably buried in the mound of rubble.

I slumped down against a stone. I knew I shouldn’t go up to the surface during debris falls. I had practically begged for this.

A scrabbling sound came from nearby. A rat? I raised the handle of my gun immediately, then felt doubly stupid. Still, I forced myself to my feet, slung the pack over my shoulder, and increased the light of my bracelet. A shadow ducked away, and I followed, limping only a little. Maybe I could find another way out of here.

I raised my bracelet in the air, illuminating the cavern. My light reflected off something ahead of me. Metal? Maybe one of

the water pipes?

I walked toward it, and it took my brain a moment to realize what I was seeing. There, nestled into the corner of the cavern— surrounded by rubble—was a ship.

4

It was a starfighter.

An old one, of a design completely unfamiliar to me. It had a wider wingspan than DDF ships, and was shaped like a wicked W. Straight, razorlike wings at the sides framed an old dust-covered cockpit in the center. The acclivity ring—the thing that gave starfighters their lift—was buried in the rubble underneath the ship, but from what I could see it looked whole.

For a moment, I forgot about the test. A ship.

How long had it been here to collect that much rubble around it, and that much dust? One wing had been bent almost to the ground, probably by a cave-in, and the rear boosters were a huge mess.

I didn’t know the model. That was incredible. I knew every DDF design, every Krell ship, and the roving tradeship designs used by nomadic human clans. I had even studied old ships we’d flown during the first decades after crashing on Detritus.

I could rattle off each of these practically in my sleep, draw their silhouettes from memory. But I’d never seen this design. I dropped my pack and climbed—gingerly—up the wing that had been bent down. My bracelet provided light as my boots scraped off caked-on dust, revealing a scratched metallic surface. The right side of the ship was particularly banged up.

It crash­landed here, I thought. Long ago.

I climbed up near the circular cockpit, which had a glass— well, probably fusion-plastic—canopy that was remarkably intact. The ship was generations past having enough power to open its own cockpit, but I found the manual release panel right where I expected it. I brushed the dust off, and found letters—in English. They said emergency canopy release.

So the ship was human. It must be old, then. Likely as ancient as the apparatus and the rubble belt.

I yanked on the release lever to no avail. The thing was stuck. I put my hands on my hips and considered breaking in—but that seemed like a shame. This was an antique, the sort of thing that belonged on a pedestal in the Igneous ship museum, where we celebrated warriors of the past. There was no skeleton in the cockpit though, so either the pilot had escaped, or it had been here so long that even the bones had turned to dust.

All right, let’s be delicate about this. I could be delicate. I was

incredibly delicate. Like, all the time.

I attached one end of my light-line to the release lever, then walked across the top of the ship to the rubble at the rear, where I attached the other end of the light-line to a boulder. That separated the energy rope entirely from the bracelet, which stopped glowing. The rope could function for an hour or two once separated from its power source, but would remain stuck at the length it was when released.

I got down on my back, braced myself against the wall, and shoved the boulder with my feet. It started rolling down the rubble, and as soon as I heard a click from the cockpit, I disengaged the light-line with a tap. The glowing rope released its holds on either end, and was sucked back into the bracelet.

That done, I scrambled over to find the lever pulled and the ancient cockpit popped ajar. Reverent, I lifted the canopy all the way, sending dust cascading to either side. The interior looked extremely well preserved. Indeed, as I slid down into the cockpit, I found that the seat was stiff, but the leather wasn’t cracked or decomposing.

Similar controls, I thought, resting my left hand on the throttle, my right hand on the control sphere, fingers resting in the grooves. I’d sat in mock cockpits before at the museum, but never in a real ship.

I reached into my pocket, feeling my father’s pin, which I’d recovered from its hiding place before setting out into the tunnels. I held it up, letting it sparkle in the glow of my bracelet. Was this what my father had felt, this snug sense of rightness when sitting in a cockpit? What would he think if he knew his daughter spent her time hunting rats? That she was here in a dusty cavern, instead of sitting and taking the pilot test?

That she’d folded instead of fighting? “I didn’t fold!” I said. “I didn’t run!”

Or . . . well, I had. But what else could I have done? I couldn’t fight the entire system. If Admiral Ironsides herself—head of the DDF—didn’t want me in, there was nothing I could do.

Anger flooded me. Frustration, hatred. Hatred at the DDF for how they’d treated my father, anger at my mother and teachers— every adult who had let me keep dreaming when surely they’d all known the truth.

I closed my eyes, and could almost feel the force of the ship’s booster behind me. Could almost sense the pull of g-forces as I took a turn. The scent of crisp, clean air pulled in from the upper atmosphere and pushed into the cockpit.

I wanted to feel it more than anything. But when I opened my eyes, I was back in a dusty old broken-down antique. I would never fly. They’d sent me away.

A voice whispered from the back of my mind.

What if that is the test?

What if . . . what if they wanted to see what I’d do? Scud, what if Mrs. Vmeer had been lying? What if I’d run away for nothing— or worse, what if I’d just proven that I was a coward, like everyone claimed my father had been?

I cursed, checking the clock on my light-line bracelet. Four hours. I had four hours until the test. But I’d spent almost an entire day wandering. There was no way I could make it back to Igneous in time. Could I?

“Claim the stars, Spensa,” I whispered. I had to try.

5

I exploded into the testing room like a fighter with its booster on full overburn.

I interrupted a tall older woman in a white admiral’s uniform. She had chin-length silvery hair, and she frowned at me as I pulled to a halt in the doorway. Then her eyes immediately went to the clock hanging on the wall.

The second hand ticked one last notch. Eighteen hundred hours on the dot.

I made it. I was a sweaty mess, my jumpsuit ripped and stained with dust from my near encounter with a piece of space debris. But I’d made it.

Nobody said a word in the room, which was located in the government buildings at the center of Igneous—near the elevators to the surface. The room was stuffed with desks; there had to be a hundred kids here. I hadn’t realized there were so many seventeen-year-olds in the Defiant caverns, and these were only the ones who wanted to test for pilot.

At that moment, every single one of them was staring at me.

I kept my chin high and tried to pretend that nothing was out

of the ordinary. Unfortunately, the sole open desk I spotted was the one directly in front of the woman with the silver hair.

Did I recognize her? That face . . . Scud.

That wasn’t just some junior admiral, it was Judy Ivans, “Ironsides” herself. She was a First Citizen and head of the DDF, so I’d seen her face in hundreds of paintings and statues. She was basically the most important person in the world.

I limped a little as I made my way over and sat down in front of her, trying not to show my embarrassment—or my pain. Dashing all this way had involved multiple crazy descents with my light- line through caverns and tunnels. My muscles were protesting the effort, and my right leg seized up with a cramp the moment I sat down.

Wincing, I dropped my pack to the ground by my seat. An aide snatched it and carried it to the side of the room, as you weren’t allowed anything at your desk but a pencil.

I closed my eyes—but then cracked them as I heard a distinct voice whispering nearby, “Oh, thank the homeworld.” Rig? I glanced and spotted him a few rows over. He had probably arrived three hours early, then spent the entire time worrying that I would be late. For absolutely no reason. I’d arrived with at least half a second to spare. I winked at him, then went back to trying not to scream in pain.

“As I was saying,” the admiral continued, “we are proud of you. Your work and preparation prove you to be the best and most promising generation that the DDF has ever known. You are the generation who will inherit the surface. You will lead us in a bold new era in fighting the Krell.

“Remember that this test is not to prove worthiness. You are all worthy. To field a single flight of pilots, we need hundreds of technicians, mechanics, and other support staff. Even the humble vat worker is a participant in our great quest for survival. The fighter’s booster or wing should not scorn the bolt that holds it in place.

“Not all of you will pass this test, but by simply choosing to be here, you live up to my lofty expectations of you. And to those who pass: I look forward to supervising your training. I take a personal interest in the cadets.”

I frowned. She seemed so aloof, so indifferent. Surely she didn’t care about me, no matter how infamous my father was.

As aides rushed to distribute the tests, Ironsides stepped to the side of the room, near some captains in sparkling uniforms. A short man in glasses whispered to her, then pointed toward me. Ironsides turned and looked at me again, her lips turning down sharply.

Oh no.

I glanced toward the other wall of the room, where some teachers—including Mrs. Vmeer—watched. She saw me, then shook her head as if in disappointment. But . . . I . . . thought I’d figured it out. They were just trying to see if I was truly Defiant.

Right?

An aide deliberately took a test off the bottom of the stack and placed it on my desk. Hesitant, I searched my pockets for a pencil, but found only my father’s pin. At a hiss from the side, I glanced toward Rig—who tossed me a spare pencil.

Thank you, I mouthed, then opened the test and turned to the first question.

Explain, with examples of what is made from them, the fourteen types of algae grown in the vats, and the nutritional value of each.

My stomach sank. A question about algae? Yes, the tests often included random questions from our schooling, but . . . algae?

I flipped to the next page.

2. Explain the exact conditions required for optimal growth of algae, not limited to—but including— temperature, water purity, and vat depth.

The next was about how sewage was treated, as was the one after that. I felt my face growing cold as I realized all fifty pages were questions about things like algae vats, sewage, or ventilation. Those were lessons I’d missed while hunting. I’d shown up in the afternoon classes for physics and history, but I simply hadn’t had the time to study everything.

I looked at Mrs. Vmeer again, and she wouldn’t meet my eyes, so I leaned over and stole a glance at Darla Mee-Bim’s test. Hers had a completely different question at the top.

Name five aerial maneuvers you would perform to dodge a Krell ship that had you in close pursuit.

A tight loop, a rolling twin­scissor, the Ahlstrom loop, a reverse backpedal, and a banking roll. Depending on how close they were, the nature of the battlefield, and what my wingmate was doing. I leaned to the side and checked the test of another neighbor, where I spotted some numbers with the words booster and throttle. A question about acceleration and g-forces.

An aide spoke up, loud enough for most people in the room to hear. “Be advised that no one sitting next to you will have the same test, so cheating is not only punishable by expulsion, it is useless.” I slumped back in my seat, anger boiling inside me. This was complete and utter trash. Had they prepared a special test for me,

covering topics they knew I’d been forced to miss?

As I stewed there, several students rose and walked to the front of the chamber. They couldn’t be done already, could they? One of them—a tall, well-built young man with brown skin, short curly black hair, and an insufferable face—handed the admiral his test. From where I was sitting I could see it was blank except for his name. He showed her a pin—a special pin, blue and gold. The pin of a pilot who had fought at the Battle of Alta.

Children of First Citizens, I thought. All they had to do was show up and fill in their names, and they’d be given automatic entry into flight school. There were six of them today, each one getting a free slot that could have gone to other, harder-working students.

One by one the six left, and the admiral dropped their unfinished tests on a desk by the front wall. Their scores wouldn’t matter. Just like my score didn’t matter.

Dia’s words returned to me. You don’t really think they’d let the daughter of Chaser fly for the DDF, do you?

I tried anyway. Furious—holding my pencil so tightly I broke the tip and had to get a replacement—I scrawled on my stupid test. Each question felt intended to break my will. Algae vats. Ventilation. Sewage. Places I supposedly belonged.

Daughter of a coward. She’s lucky we don’t just toss her into the vats.

I wrote for hours, emotions dogfighting within me. Anger fought naive anticipation. Frustration fought hope. Realization shot down optimism.

14. Explain the proper procedure if you think a vat of algae might have been contaminated by a coworker.

I tried not to leave any questions blank, but on well over two- thirds of them, my answer boiled down to, “I don’t know. I’d ask someone who does.” And it hurt to answer them, as if by doing so I was proving that I was incompetent.

But I would not give up. Finally the bell chimed, marking the end of the five-hour time limit. I slumped as an aide pulled the test from my fingers. I watched her walk off.

No.

Admiral Ironsides had returned and was speaking—now that the test had ended—with a small group of people in suits and skirts, First Citizens or National Assembly members. Ironsides was known for being stern but fair.

I stood up and walked to her, fishing in my pocket, fist closing on my father’s pin. I waited, respectful, as the students filed out for the after-test party, where they’d be joined by those who had already settled on other careers, and who had been spending the day applying for and being assigned positions. Those who took this test and failed would be given second pickings later in the week.

Tonight though, everyone would celebrate together, future pilot and future janitor alike.

Finally, Ironsides looked at me.

I held up my father’s pin. “Sir,” I said. “As the daughter of a pilot who fought at the Battle of Alta, I would like to petition for acceptance into flight school.”

She looked me up and down, noting the ripped sleeve, the dirty face, the dried blood on my arm. She took the pin from my hand, and I held my breath.

“Do you really think,” she said, “that I would accept the pin of a traitor?”

My heart sank.

“You aren’t even supposed to have this, girl,” she said. “Wasn’t it destroyed when he crashed? Did you steal someone else’s pin?” “Sir,” I said, my voice taut. “It didn’t go down in the crash

with him. He gave it to me before he flew that last time.” Admiral Ironsides turned to leave.

“Sir?” I said. “Please. Please, just give me a chance.”

She hesitated, and I thought she was considering, but then she leaned in to me and whispered. “Girl, do you have any idea the kind of public relations nightmare you could cause for us? If I let you in, and you turn out to be a coward like he was . . . Well, there is no way on this planet I will let you into a cockpit. Be glad we even let you into this building.”

It felt like I’d been slapped. I winced. This woman—one of my heroes—turned to leave.

I grabbed her arm, and several aides nearby gasped softly. But I held on.

“You still have my pin,” I said. “Those belong to the pilots and their families. Tradition—”

“The pins of actual pilots belong to the families,” she said. “Not cowards.” She pulled herself out of my grip with a shockingly firm yank.

I could have attacked her. I almost did; the heat was rising inside me, and my face felt cold.

Arms grabbed me from behind before I could do it. “Spin?” Rig said. “Spensa! What are you doing?”

“She stole it. She took my father’s . . .” I trailed off as the

admiral walked out with her collected attendants. Then I sagged into Rig’s grasp.

“Spensa?” Rig said. “Let’s go to the party. We can talk about it there. How do you think you did? I think . . . I think did terribly. Spensa?”

I pulled away from him and trudged back to my desk, suddenly feeling too exhausted to stand.

“Spin?” he asked.

“Go to the party, Rig,” I whispered. “But—”

“Leave me alone. Please. Just . . . let me be by myself.”

He never did know how to deal with me when I got like this, so he hovered about, then finally trailed off.

And I sat alone in the room.

6

Hours passed.

My anger before had been as hot as magma. Now I just felt cold. Numb.

Echoes of the party drifted in from another area of the building. I felt used, stupid, and most of all . . . empty. Shouldn’t I have been snapping my pencil, throwing tables about in rage? Ranting about seeking vengeance upon my foes, and their children and

grandchildren? Typical Spensa behavior?

Instead I sat there and stared. Until the sounds of the party grew quieter. Eventually, an aide peeked into the room. “Um, you’re supposed to leave.”

I didn’t move.

“Are you sure you don’t want to leave?”

They’d have to drag me out of here. I imagined it—very heroic and Defiant—but the aide didn’t seem so inclined. She switched off the lights and left me there, lit only by the red-orange glow of the emergency lights.

Finally, I stood up and walked to the desk by the wall, where Ironsides had—perhaps accidentally—left the tests the children of the First Citizens had given her. I looked through the stack; each of them had only the name filled out, the other questions blank.

I took the one off the top, the first one handed in. It held the name Jorgen Weight, followed by a question.

Name the four major battles that secured the United Defiant Caverns’ independence as the first major state on Detritus.

That was a tricky question, as people were probably going to forget the Unicarn Skirmish—it didn’t get talked about as much. But it was where the fledgling DDF had first employed fighters of the second generation of designs, built in secret in Igneous. I trailed over to my desk and sat down, then answered the question.

I moved on to the next, then the next. They were good questions. More than simple lists of dates or parts. Some math questions about combat speeds. But most were questions about intent, opinion, and personal preference. I struggled on two of them, trying to decide if I should say what I thought the test wanted, or

what I thought was actually the correct answer.

I went with the second both times. Who cared anyway, right? By the time I was finishing up, I heard people talking outside.

Janitors, from the sounds of their discussion.

Suddenly I felt silly. Would I scream and force some poor janitor to pull me out by my hair? I’d been beaten. You couldn’t win every fight, and there was no shame in losing when you were outnumbered. I turned over the test and tapped my pencil against it, still sitting mostly in the dark, working by the glow of the emergency lights.

I started sketching a W-shaped ship on the back of the test as a crazy idea began to form in my head. The DDF hadn’t begun as an official military; it had started out as a bunch of dreamers with their own crazy idea. Get the apparatus working, create ships from some schematics that had survived our crash on the planet.

They’d built their own ships.

The door opened, letting in light from the hallway. I heard a bucket get set on the ground outside, and two people complaining about spills in the party room.

“I’ll be out in a minute,” I said, finishing my sketch. Thinking.

Wondering. Dreaming.

“Why are you still here, kid?” a janitor asked. “You didn’t want to go to the party?”

“I didn’t feel much like celebrating.”

He grunted. “Didn’t do well on the test?”

“Turns out it doesn’t matter,” I said. I glanced at him, but he was backlit, just a silhouette in the doorway. “Do you ever . . . ,” I said. “Do you ever feel they forced you to be what you are?”

“No. I might have forced myself into it though.”

I sighed. Mother was probably worried sick about me. I stood up and wandered over to the wall where the aide had put my pack.

“Why do you want it so much?” the janitor asked. Was there something familiar about his voice? “It’s dangerous, being a pilot. A lot of them get killed.”

“Just under fifty percent are shot down in their first five years,” I said. “But they don’t all die. Some eject. Others get shot down, but survive the crash.”

“Yes. I know.”

I froze, then frowned and looked back at the figure. I couldn’t make out his face, but something flashed on his breast. Medals? A pilot’s pin? I squinted, and made out the shape of a DDF jacket and dress slacks.

This was no janitor. I could still hear those two out in the hallway, joking with each other.

I stood up straighter. The man walked slowly to my desk, and

the emergency lights revealed he was older, maybe in his fifties, with a stark white mustache. He walked with a prominent limp.

He picked up the test I’d filled out, then flipped through it. “So why?” he finally asked. “Why care so much? They never ask the most important question on these tests. Why do you want to be a pilot?”

To prove myself, and to redeem my father’s name. It was my immediate response, though something else warred with it. Something my father had sometimes said, something buried inside me, often overshadowed by ideas of vengeance and redemption.

“Because you get to see the sky,” I whispered.

The man grunted. “We name ourselves Defiants,” he said. “It’s the central ideal of our people—the fact that we refuse to back down. And yet, Ironsides always acts so surprised when someone defies her.” He shook his head, then set the test down again. He put something on top of it.

He turned to limp away. “Wait,” I said. “Who are you?”

He stopped at the doorway, and the light outside showed his face more clearly, with that mustache, and eyes that seemed . . . old. “I knew your father.”

Wait. I did know that voice. “Mongrel?” I said. “That is you.

You were his wingmate!”

“In another life,” he said. “Oh-seven-hundred sharp on the day after tomorrow, building F, room C-14. Show the pin to get access.”

The pin? I walked back to the desk, and found—sitting on top of my test—a cadet’s pin.

I snatched it up. “But Ironsides said she’d never let me into a cockpit.”

“I’ll deal with Ironsides. It’s my class; I get final say over my students, and even she can’t overrule me. She’s too important for that.”

“Too important? To give orders?”

“Military protocol. When you get important enough to order an armada into battle, you’re too important to interfere with how a quartermaster runs his shop. You’ll see. There’s a lot you know, judging by that test—but still some things you don’t. You got number seventeen wrong.”

“Seventeen . . .” I flipped through the test quickly. “The over- whelming odds question?”

“The right answer was to fall back and await reinforcement.” “No it wasn’t.”

He stiffened, and I quickly bit my tongue. Should I be arguing with the person who’d just given me a cadet’s pin?

“I’ll let you into the sky,” he said, “but they’re not going to be

easy on you. I’m not going to be easy on you. Wouldn’t be fair.” “Is anything fair?”

He smiled. “Death is. He treats us all the same. Oh-seven- hundred. Don’t be late.”

7

The elevator doors opened, and I looked out upon a city that should not exist.

Alta was primarily a military base, so perhaps city was an ambitious term. Yet the elevator structure opened a good two hundred meters outside the base proper. Lining the roadway between the two were shops and homes. A real town, populated by the stubborn farmers who worked the strips of greenery beyond.

I lingered in the large elevator as it emptied of people. This represented a threshold to a new life, a life I’d always dreamed about. I found myself strangely hesitant as I stood there, pack full of clothing over my shoulder, the phantom feeling of my mother’s kiss farewell on my forehead.

“Oh, isn’t it the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen?” a voice said from behind me.

I glanced over my shoulder. The speaker was a girl about my age. She was taller than I was, with tan-brown skin and long, curly black hair. I’d seen her earlier on the elevator and noted her cadet’s pin. She spoke with a faint accent I didn’t recognize.

“I keep thinking it can’t be real,” she said. “Do you think it might be some cruel prank they’re playing on us?”

“What tactical advantage would they gain by that?” I asked her. The girl took my arm in a much too familiar way. “We can do this. Just take a deep breath. Reach up. Pluck a star. That’s what the Saint says.”

I had no idea what to make of this behavior. People normally treated me like a pariah; they didn’t take me by the arm. I was so stunned that I didn’t resist as she towed me after her out of the elevator. We entered the wide walkway leading through the town, toward the base.

I’d rather have been walking with Rodge, but they’d called him in late last night to ask him something about his test, and so far I hadn’t gotten word of what that meant. Hopefully he wasn’t in trouble.

The girl and I soon passed a fountain. A real fountain, like from the stories. We both stopped to gape, and I extricated my arm from the girl’s grasp. Part of me wanted to be offended—but she seemed so genuine.

“That music the water makes,” she said. “Isn’t it the most wonderful sound ever?”

“The most wonderful sound ever is the lamentations of my enemies, screaming my name toward the heavens with ragged, dying voices.”

The girl looked at me, cocking her head. “Well bless your stars.” “Sorry,” I said. “It’s a line from a story.” I stuck out my hand to her. Best to be on good terms with the other cadets. “I’m callsign: Spin.”

“Kimmalyn,” she said, shaking my hand. “Um, we’re supposed to have callsigns already?”

“I’m an overachiever. What room you reporting to?”

“Umm . . .” She fished in her pocket and pulled out a paper. “C-14? Cadet Flight B.”

“Same as me.”

“Callsign . . . callsign . . . ,” Kimmalyn murmured. “What should I pick?”

“Killer?” I suggested. “Afterburn? No, that’s probably too confusing. Fleshripper?”

“Couldn’t it be something a little less gruesome?”

“You’re going to be a warrior. You need a warrior’s name.” “Not everything is about war!”

“Um, it kind of is—and flight school especially is.” I frowned,

noting the accent in her voice. “Where are you from? Not Igneous, I guess.”

“Born and raised in Bountiful Cavern!” She leaned in. “We call it that, but nothing really grows there.”

“Bountiful,” I said. It was a cavern somewhat close to Igneous, also part of the Defiant League. “That’s where the clans from the Antioch crew settled, right?” The Antioch had been one of the gunships in the old fleet, before we’d been driven into hiding here on Detritus.

“Yup. My great-grandmother was assistant quartermaster.” She eyed me. “You said your callsign was Spin? Shouldn’t you be something like Lamentation or Eats Enemy Eyeballs?”

I shrugged. “Spin is what my dad used to call me.”

She smiled brightly at that. Scud, they’d let this girl in, but had denied me? What was the DDF trying to do? Put together a knitting club?

We approached the base, a group of tall, stern buildings surrounded by a wall. Right outside it, the farms gave way to an actual orchard. I stopped on the walkway, and found myself gaping again. I’d seen these trees from a distance, but up close they seemed enormous. Almost three meters tall! Before this, the tallest plant I’d seen was a mushroom that reached up to my waist.

“They planted those just after the Battle of Alta,” Kimmalyn said. “It must take brave people to volunteer for service up here so exposed to the air and to Krell attacks.” She looked up at the sky in awe, and I wondered if this was the first time she was seeing it.

We stepped up to a checkpoint in the wall, and I thrust my pin toward the guard there, half expecting rough treatment—like I’d always gotten from Aluko when entering Igneous. However, the bored guard only marked our names off on a list and waved us in. Not much ceremony for my first official entrance into Alta. Well, soon I’d be so famous, the guard at the door would salute me on sight.

Inside, we counted off the buildings, joining a handful of other cadets. From what I understood, around twenty-five of us had passed the test, and had been organized into three training flights. Only the best of the best would actually pass flight school and be assigned to full-time pilot duty.

Kimmalyn and I soon arrived at a wide, single-story structure near the launchpads. Flight school. I barely held myself back from running over to the glistening starfighters lined up for duty—I’d done enough gawking for one day.

Inside the building we found wide hallways, most of which appeared to be lined with classrooms. Kimmalyn squealed, then rushed over to talk to another cadet, someone she apparently knew. So I stopped by a window on the outer wall and looked out at the sky, waiting for her.

I found myself feeling . . . anxious. Not about the training, but about this place. It’s too big, too open. The hallways were over a meter wider than those of most buildings in Igneous, and the base’s buildings sprawled outward instead of being built on top of one another. The sky was just up there, always present, looming. Even with a forcefield between me and it—of the same invisible type that starfighters employed—I felt exposed.

I was going to have to sleep up here. Live, eat, exist. All out in the open. While I liked the sky, that didn’t mean I wanted it peeking in during every intimate moment.

I’ll simply have to deal with it, I told myself. The warrior cannot choose her bed; she must bless the stars if she can choose her battlefield. A quote from Junmi’s The Conquest of Space. I loved Gran- Gran’s stories about Junmi almost as much as I did the old Viking stories, even if they didn’t have quite as many decapitations.

Kimmalyn returned, and we found our classroom. I took a deep breath. Time to become a pilot. We pushed open the doors.

8

Ten mock cockpits dominated the center of the room, arranged in a circle facing inward. Each bulky device had a seat, a control console, and part of a fuselage built around it—though no canopy. Other than that, they looked as if they’d been ripped right out of starships.

Instead of the nose cones of ships, however, each had a large box attached to the front, maybe a meter tall and half as wide. Kimmalyn and I were apparently the first of our flight to arrive, and I checked the wall clock. It was 0615. For once in my life, I was not only early—I was first.

Well, technically second, as Kimmalyn jumped past me to look

over the mock cockpits. “Oh! I guess we’re first. Well, the Saint always said, ‘If you can’t arrive early, at least arrive before you’re late.’ ”

I walked into the room, setting down my backpack and checking out the mockpits. I recognized the control panel layout—they were from Poco-class ships, a basic, if fast, DDF starfighter model. The door opened, and two more cadets entered. The shorter boy at the front had dark blue hair and appeared to be a Yeongian. The crew of the Yeong­Gwang, from the old fleet, had largely been from China or Korea on Earth.

The blue-haired boy grinned as he looked over the room, putting his pack beside mine. “Wow. Our classroom!”

The girl behind him sauntered in like she owned the place. She was a lean, athletic-looking girl with blonde hair in a ponytail. She wore a DDF uniform jacket over her jumpsuit—loose, like she was out on the town.

Those two were soon followed by a girl with a tattoo across her lower jaw. She’d be Vician—from Vici Cavern. I didn’t know much about them, only that they were the descendants of the marines from the old space fleet. The Vicians had their own culture and kept to themselves—though they had reputations as great warriors.

I smiled at her, but she looked away immediately and didn’t respond when Kimmalyn perkily introduced herself. Fine then, I thought.

Kimmalyn got names and home caverns out of the other two. The guy with the blue hair was Bim, and was indeed a Yeongian. His clan had been part of the hydroponics team on the old ship, and had settled in a nearby cavern that maintained a large set of underground farms, lit and maintained by ancient machinery. I’d never eaten any of the food from there; it was reserved for those who had many achievement merits or industry merits.

The athletic girl was Hudiya, from Igneous. I didn’t know her, but the cavern was a big place, with a vast population. As the time for class drew near, a tall girl entered and introduced herself as Freyja. It was a good mythological name from Old Norse—of which I approved. She kind of had the look too. Though she was skinny, she was tall, maybe even a hundred and eighty-five centimeters, and she had blonde hair, which she wore cut very short. Her boots were brand-new, polished to a shine, and done up with gold clasps.

Well, that made six of us. We’d have a few more at least. About ten minutes before the start of class, three young men walked in together. They were obviously friends, as they were talking and joking softly. I didn’t recognize two of them, but the one at the front—with brown skin and short curly hair—was distinctive in a kind of baby-faced, pretty-boy way.

The guy from the test, I realized. The son of a First Citizen who had gotten free admission.

Great. We were saddled with a useless aristocrat, someone who lived in the lowest—and safest—of the Defiant caverns. He’d be in flight school not because of any skill or aptitude, but because he wanted to sport a cadet’s pin and feel important. Judging by the way the other two talked, I instantly pegged them as his cronies. I’d have bet anything that all of them had gotten in without taking the test, so our cadet group had three people who didn’t deserve to be there.

The tall, baby-faced guy walked to the center of the ring of seats. How could a boy have a face that was so extremely punchable? He cleared his throat, then clapped his hands sharply. “Get to attention, cadets! Is this how we want to present ourselves to our instructor? Lounging about, making idle chitchat? Line up!”

Kimmalyn, bless her stars, jumped up and stood at a kind of sloppy attention. His two cronies stepped over and fell into step as well, doing a much better impression of real soldiers. Everyone else just kind of looked at him.

“What gives you the right to order us around?” asked Hudiya, the athletic girl from my own cavern. She stood leaning against the wall, arms folded.

“I want to make a good first impression on the instructor, cadet,” Jerkface said. “Think how inspiring it will be when he comes in to find us all waiting at attention.”

Hudiya snorted. “Inspiring? We’d look like a bunch of suck-ups.”

Jerkface ignored her, instead inspecting his line of three cadets. He shook his head at Kimmalyn, whose version of “attention” involved standing on the tips of her toes and saluting with both hands. It was ridiculous.

“You look ridiculous,” Jerkface said to her.

The girl’s face fell, and she slumped. I felt an immediate burst of protective anger. I mean . . . he was right, but he didn’t have to belt it out like that.

“Who taught you to stand at attention?” Jerkface asked. “You’re going to embarrass us. I can’t have that.”

“Yeah,” I said. “She’d be stealing your spot, since embarrassing us is clearly your job, Jerkface.”

He looked me up and down—taking obvious note of the patched state of my pilot’s jumpsuit. It had been one of my father’s, and had required serious modification to fit me.

“Do I know you, cadet?” he asked. “You look familiar.”

“I was sitting in the front row taking the test,” I said, “when you turned in your exam without a single question answered. Maybe you saw me there when you glanced at the rest of the room, to see what people look like when they actually have to work to get things.”

He drew his lips to a line. It seemed I’d touched a nerve. Excellent. First blood.

“I chose not to waste resources,” he said, “making someone grade my test when I had already been offered a slot.”

“One you didn’t earn.”

He glanced at the other cadets in the room, who were watching with interest, then he lowered his voice. “Look. You don’t need to make trouble. Just fall into line, and—”

“Fall into line?” I said. “You’re still trying to give us orders?” “It’s obvious I’m going to be your flightleader. You might as

well get used to doing what I say.”

Arrogant son of a supernova. “Just because you cheated your way into—”

“I didn’t cheat!”

“—just because you bought your way into flight school doesn’t mean you’ll be flightleader. You need to watch yourself. Don’t make an enemy out of me.”

“And if I do?”

Scud, it was annoying to have to look up at him. I leaped onto my seat to gain a height advantage for the argument—an action that seemed to surprise him.

He cocked his head. “What—”

“Always attack from a position of superior advantage!” I said. “When this is done, Jerkface, I will hold your tarnished and melted pin up as my trophy as your smoldering ship marks your pyre, and the final resting place of your crushed and broken corpse!”

The room grew quiet.

“All right . . . ,” Jerkface said. “Well, that was . . . descriptive.” “Bless your stars,” Kimmalyn added. Hudiya gave me a thumbs-

up and a grin, though the others in the room plainly had no idea what to make of me.

And . . . maybe my reaction had been over the top. I was used to making a scene; life had taught me that aggressive threats would cause people to back off. But did I need to do that here?

I realized something odd in that moment. None of these people seemed to know who I was. They hadn’t grown up near my neighborhood; they hadn’t gone to class with me. They might have heard of my father, but they didn’t know me from any other cadet.

Here, I wasn’t the rat girl or the daughter of a coward. Here I was free.

The door chose that moment to open, and our instructor—

Mongrel—stopped in the doorway, holding a steaming mug of coffee in one hand, a clipboard in the other. In the light, I recognized him from the pictures of the First Citizens, though his hair was greyer, and that mustache made him appear much older.

We must have looked like quite the menagerie. I was still standing on the seat of my mockpit, looming over Jerkface. Several of the others had been snickering at our exchange, while Kimmalyn was again trying to execute a salute.

Mongrel glanced at the clock, which had just hit seven hundred hours. “I hope I’m not interrupting anything intimate.”

“Uh . . . ,” I said. I jumped off my seat and tried a little laugh. “That wasn’t a joke!” Mongrel barked. “I don’t joke! Line up

by the far wall, all of you!”

We scrambled to obey. As we lined up, Jerkface pulled off a precise salute, and he held it, at perfect attention.

Mongrel glanced at him and said, “Don’t be a suck-up, son. This isn’t basic training, and you aren’t grunts from the ground corps.”

Jerkface’s expression fell and he lowered his arm, then snapped to attention anyway. “Um, sorry, sir!”

Mongrel rolled his eyes. “My name is Captain Cobb. My callsign is Mongrel, but you will call me Cobb—or sir, if you must.” He trailed along the line, his limp prominent, taking a sip of his coffee. “The rules of this classroom are simple. I teach. You learn. Anything that interferes with that is likely to get one of you killed.” He paused near where I stood by Jerkface. “That includes flirting.”

I felt my face go cold. “Sir! I wasn’t—”

“It also includes talking back to me! You’re in flight school now, stars help you. Four months of training. If you make it to the end without being kicked out or shot down, then you pass. That’s it. There are no tests. There are no grades. Just you in a cockpit, convincing me you deserve to remain there. I am the only authority that matters to you now.”

He waited, watching to see how we responded. And wisely, none of us said anything.

“Most of you won’t make it,” he continued. “Four months may not seem like long, but it will feel like an eternity. Some of you will drop out under the stress, and the Krell will kill some others. Usually, a flight of ten ends up with one cadet graduating to full pilot, maybe two.” He stopped at the end of the line, where Kimmalyn stood biting her lip.

“This bunch though . . . ,” Cobb added, “I’ll be surprised if any of you make it.” He limped away from us, setting his coffee on a small desk at the front of the room, then riffling through the papers on his clipboard. “Which of you is Jorgen Weight?”

“Me, sir!” Jerkface said, standing up straighter. “Great. You’re flightleader.”

I gasped.

Cobb eyed me, but said nothing. “Jorgen, you’ll need two assistant flightleaders. I’ll want the names by the end of the day.”

“I can give you those now, sir,” he said, pointing to his two cronies—a shorter boy and a taller one. “Arturo and Nedd.”

Cobb marked something on his clipboard. “Great. Everyone, pick a seat. We’re going to—”

“Wait,” I said. “That’s it? That’s how you choose our flightleader? You’re not even going to see how we do first?”

“Pick a seat, cadets,” Cobb repeated, ignoring me. “But—” I said.

“Except Cadet Spensa,” he said, “who will instead meet me in the hallway.”

I bit my tongue and stomped out into the hallway. I probably should have contained my frustration, but . . . really? He immediately picked Jerkface? Just like that?

Cobb followed me, then calmly shut the door. I prepared an outburst, but he spun on me and hissed, “Are you trying to ruin this, Spensa?”

I choked off my retort, shocked by his sudden anger.

“Do you know how far I had to stick my neck out to get you into this class?” he continued. “I argued that you sat in the room for hours, that you finished a damn near perfect test. It still took every bit of clout and reputation I’ve earned over the years to pull this off. Now, the first chance you get, you’re throwing a tantrum?”

“I . . . But you didn’t see what that guy was doing before class! He was strutting around, claiming he’d be flightleader.”

“Turns out he had good reason!”

“But—”

“But what?” Cobb demanded.

I stifled the words I was going to say, and instead remained silent.

He took a deep breath. “Good. You can control yourself at least a little.” He rubbed his brows with his thumb and forefinger. “You’re just like your father. I spent half the time wanting to strangle the man. Unfortunately, you’re not him—you have to live with what he did. You have to control yourself, Spensa. If it looks like I’m favoring you, someone will call improper bias, and you’ll be pulled from my class faster than you can spit.”

“So you can’t favor me?” I asked. “But everyone can favor the son of an aristocrat who didn’t even have to finish his test?”

Cobb sighed. “Sorry,” I said.

“No, I walked into that one,” he said. “Do you know who that boy is?”

“Son of a First Citizen?”

“Son of the Jeshua Weight, a hero of the Battle of Alta. She flew seven years in the DDF, and has over a hundred confirmed kills. Her husband is Algernon Weight, National Assembly Leader and high foreman of our largest intercavern shipping company. They’re among the most heavily merited people in the lower caverns.”

“So their son and his cronies get to be our leaders, just because of what their parents did?”

“Jorgen’s family owns three private fighters, and he has been

training on them since he was fourteen. He has nearly a thousand hours in the cockpit. How many do you have?”

I blushed.

“His ‘cronies,’ ” Cobb said, “are Nedd Strong—who has two brothers in the DDF right now—and Arturo Mendez, son of a cargo pilot who had sixteen years in the DDF. Arturo has been acting as copilot with his father, and is certified with two hundred hours’ flight time. Again, how many hours do you have?”

“I . . .” I took a deep breath. “I’m sorry for questioning you, sir. Is this the part where I do push-ups, or clean a bathroom with a toothbrush or something?”

“I already said this isn’t infantry training. The punishment here isn’t some menial stupidity.” Cobb pulled open the door to the room. “Push me too far, and the punishment will be simple: you won’t get to fly.”

9

You won’t get to fly.

Never had I heard words more soul-crushing. When the two of us reentered the training room, Cobb pointed at a seat by the wall. Not a cockpit, just an empty chair.

I slunk over and settled down, feeling thoroughly routed. “These contraptions,” Cobb said, rapping his knuckles on one of

the boxes in front of the mockpits, “are holographic projectors. Old technology from the days when we were a fleet. When these machines are on, you’ll think you’re in a cockpit; they will let us train you to fly without risking a real fighter. The simulation isn’t perfect, however. It has some haptic feedback, but it can’t replicate g-forces. You’ll need to train in the centrifuge to accustom yourself to that.

“DDF tradition is that you get to pick your own callsign. I suggest you start considering, as you’ll carry the name for the rest of your life. It will be how the most important people—your flightmates—come to know you.”

Jerkface’s hand went up.

“Don’t tell me now, cadet,” Cobb said. “Anytime in the next few days is fine. Right now, I want to—”

The door to the room banged open. I leaped to my feet, but it wasn’t an attack or an emergency.

It was Rig. And he was wearing a cadet’s pin.

“I was wondering if you’d show up,” Cobb said, picking up his stack of papers. “Rodge McCaffrey? You think it’s a fine idea to show up late to your first day in flight school? You going to show up late when the Krell attack?”

Rig sucked in a breath and shook his head, going white, like a flag of truce. And . . . Rig was a cadet. When he’d gone in last night to talk to them about his test, I’d been worried, but it looked like he’d gotten in! I wanted to whoop for joy.

But there was no way Rig had been late without good reason. This was a kid who scheduled extra time in his day for sneezes when he had a cold. I opened my mouth, but held back at a glance from Cobb.

“Sir,” Rig finally said, catching his breath. “Elevator. Malfunction.”

Cobb walked to the side of the room and pushed an intercom button. “Jax,” he said, “will you check if there was an elevator malfunction today?”

“Don’t need to check, Captain,” a voice replied through a speaker above the button. “Elevator 103-D was down for two hours, with people trapped inside. It’s been giving us trouble for months.”

Cobb released the button, then eyed Rig. “They say you got the highest score on the test this year, cadet.”

“That’s what they told me, sir. They called me in, and the admiral gave me an award and everything. I’m so sorry I’m late. I didn’t meant to do this, particularly on my first