After Earth Read Free Page A

Senshi’s unmoving body with its teeth and lifts it up to within range of the nearest window. Senshi’s shredded form is thrust into view, and Kitai can hear Novans screaming in the distance
.
    The Novans are as fearful as Kitai, perhaps even more so. Kitai can hear their footfalls as they run, can hear the growling and derisive snort from the triumphant Ursa. Then it drops Senshi’s corpse right before Kitai’s eyes
.
    Senshi’s body lies on the floor, her face turned in Kitai’s general direction. He sees her stare at him in what appears to be accusation, and he wants to turn away from her. Instead, all he can do is continue to look at her, his eyes wide and horrified, for what seems like a long, long time. Finally, he manages to look away, but even then he feels as if he’s abandoning her somehow
.
    The Ursa leaps out of the room then to go search for other prey. Kitai lies there within the cabinet, no longer staring at Senshi but instead deeply into the narrow wall that constitutes the makeshift shelter Senshi has shoved him into
.
    It takes nearly an hour for the Rangers to find him. It’s nobody’s fault in particular, except perhaps Senshi’s, for she had told him to stay there until a Ranger showed up. And that didn’t happen until the Rangers who arrived had done everything they could to try to bring Senshi back. Only then did they entertain the off chance that someone else in the apartment might have managed to survive
.
    Until then, Kitai had had to remain there silent and immobile, his tears drying on his face
.
    It is not until Kitai’s mother’s arms are wrapped securely around him that he finally starts crying again. He keeps saying the same thing over and over: “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” He blames himself for what has happened, but no matter how much he says it, his mother refuses to accept his apology—because she is certain that she might well have had two children die this night
.
    Oddly, knowing that doesn’t make Kitai feel any better
.

1000 AE
United Ranger Corps Training Camp
i
    The alarm jolted Kitai awake.
    He sat up, gasping for breath. He had been dreaming, but he didn’t remember the dream. He had a vague notion that it had something to do with his sister, but he couldn’t be sure.
    It probably had to do with her
. Most of his nightmares did.
    Kitai flopped back down onto his bed and lay there despite the howling of his alarm. Long moments passed as it continued to shout at him. Finally he reached over and slapped it, hard. The alarm’s cry finally ceased, allowing him a few more moments in bed. Another person might have been tempted to roll over and return to sleep, but that wasn’t Kitai Raige. All he had needed was the jolt to wakefulness; after that, he was good to go.
    Kitai finally sat up, rubbing at his face. He managed to bring himself to glance outside and begin to get a feel for what the day was going to be like. This was
his
day, after all, and he needed to have some idea of what the weather was going to be like. Of course, bright skies or pouring rain, it made no difference. Today was the day, and if he was going to have to do his stuff in soggy ground, well, that was the way it was going to be.
    It didn’t mean he was looking forward to it, though, and when he looked outside and saw that the day promised to be decent, he gave a silent “thank you” to thepowers that be. He couldn’t be absolutely sure since it was still dark outside, but from what he could see, it looked promising enough.
    For just a moment he allowed himself to drift back to his dream. His recollections were vague at best, but he was reasonably sure that he’d been dreaming that awful day from five years ago when he had hidden from danger while his beloved sister was torn to shreds.
    The notion that he had done so—that he had relived the deep guilt that still festered within him—was one of the hardest things for him to handle. Yet he dreamed of it with a frequency that was almost