Rebel's Call by Jamie McFarlane & Rachel Aukes

Author:Jamie McFarlane & Rachel Aukes [McFarlane, Jamie & Aukes, Rachel]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Science Fiction
Amazon: B08YDHFXST
Goodreads: 57772031
Publisher: Aethon Books
Published: 2021-05-31T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 20

The train rolled to a stop, and the announcer called out, “Squad One, depart.”

The squad of six members squeezed past the other cadets. Someone stepped on Jai’s toe, and he cursed. He was sure it had been intentional.

Squad Six stood, crammed shoulder to shoulder, holding all their gear as the train brought them to the Occator Crater. The train swayed from side to side as it zoomed through the underground tunnels of Ceres, and the squad moved with its rhythm. Each cadet carried their shield and wore a vest containing sensors. Their blasters had been programmed to light stuns with tracking lasers. If they were shot, the sensors would notify Roddy’s leadership team the cadet had fallen. There would be no injuries. If a cadet was tagged, they were dead and had to remain within fifty feet of that location for the duration of the event.

“Squad Two, depart.”

The next squad began to depart. Zean, the squad leader, looked across the throng of cadets until she found Jai, and she winked and grinned before jumping through the doorway. With her squad gone, there was breathing room in the train car now, though the space was still tight due to every cadet carrying their shield and backpack.

Shields, blasters, helmets, and vests were the only requirements for cadets in the Crucible. Jumpsuits were a given—no one wanted to fight naked, though Cort would probably find some fun in that. All other gear was optional. Jai made his squad bring everything they could fit into their packs. He’d even picked up extra food pods and water from the cafeteria. Poor Roma looked like her pack weighed more than she did, and Jai wondered if he’d gone overboard. But when he started thinking of what lay ahead, he decided it’d be smarter to dump extra gear than to not have it to begin with.

The train slowed abruptly, and Jai fell forward into Cort, who shot him a glare.

“Squad Three, depart.”

In addition to Six, all seven Roddy squads had been riding the same train. Every squad except Zean’s squad Two was down one more squad member. The squads had been reconfigured after the first Crucible, but a fair number had washed out—or died—since then. Jai used to only care about becoming an officer. Now, he cared about not losing any more squad members, like Stiv.

He wished he could talk with Corporal Ahmed, but neither she nor Corporal Demmer were joining them in the crater. They stayed back at the command center with Sergeant Mayne, watching their cadets go through three days of hell in the Occator Crater simply to collect one stupid flag.

After another three stops, the announcer called out, “Squad Six, depart.”

Jai drew in a deep breath. “All right, Six. Let’s do this.”

His squad’s seven cadets, including himself, hurried off the train and into the Combat Crucible. He stopped, taken aback. He’d expected to see a massive wilderness. Instead, he was standing outside what looked to be an abandoned city. How Academy managed to

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