Next Up

Chapter 40

Every colonist, ages eleven to eighteen, must participate and pass the 'skill test.' All classes of the participants will be paused. The test lasts for one workweek; each day is a new phase of the trial, with the last day, day five, being a culmination of everything they've learned up until this point. As they would train most days, they'd only have twelve hours of sleep total for the entire week. On average, two colonists per colony die yearly due to the difficulties of the test; hence, the residents of Crater renamed it 'The week of death' or 'Death week.'

Twenty years ago, Orion created the test. Each year, he would evaluate the progression and status of each colony and build their tests around that. Since no one has seen him or had any contact for some time now, they must go back to the first-ever test implemented as default.

Lubbock stood tall, his eyes scanning the crowd of kids in front of him. Most had heard the horror stories of this week; highly exaggerated, most likely, but almost all of them were on edge. It was this year's first time. They were all standing near the front gate, the cold fall morning making them all bunch together.

They split up the colonists by age group for this section to make things easier. Eleven to twelve were with Sylas—Group A. Thirteen to sixteen were with Lubbock—Group B. Seventeen and eighteen joined Amelia—Group C.

He glanced to Neph; he sensed they both had similar thoughts running through their heads. 'Who's going to die this year?'

"The fact that this is still allowed..." sighed Lubbock. 'Orion is a crazy, senile old man! If he were here, he'd have that look he has every year at this time. Absolute glee.'

Zoe awkwardly maneuvered through the crowd. The loud buzzing and murmuring of the group made her wince as it seemed to slowly go up in volume the longer she paid attention to it.

Finally spotting the familiar faded white jacket, she walked towards it, seeing Ivy talking to Herald and some of his friends. She had just finished explaining where she was for the past few weeks.

"There you are," Ivy grinned, turning around.

"Wussup," Herald yawned.

"Man," one of his friends said, "I dunno about all this."

"This is all of our first times, so they'll probably go easy on us."

"Maybe," his friend said, not sounding too convinced.

"What about you?" Herald asked Zoe, "This is the first time you've done it too, right?"

"Quite honestly, I'm a bit afraid," Zoe said colorlessly.

"Colson said we'd probably get through it pretty easily," Ivy chimed in.

"My dad told me that it's more about mental strength than physical," Herald mentioned. "Just gotta keep pushing forward."

Next to Lubbock, Sylas stood, staring at his watch. "Just one more minute." He unhooked the giant megaphone that was strapped around his chest. "What do you think of the warmup, pushups, and crunches before the run?"

"Adding stretching before all that would be beneficial."

"Hm, yeah," He turned on the megaphone, lifted it to his mouth, and took a deep breath. Lubbock quickly plugged his ears with his fingers, bracing himself. "On the ground! Now! You'll do push-ups for a minute and thirty seconds. You have to do a minimum of sixty, and you'll count off as you do them!"

There was a collective grumble as everyone got down in the plank position, counting aloud. Afterward, they did as many situps as possible in that same time.