Extraction Read Free

my legs not to shake so badly. I walk up these steps every morning on my way to school. I can pretend this morning is like every other morning; I can pretend everything is normal.
    I won’t look back at Logan. For days, I know he’s been worrying about what will happen if by some miracle luck is on my side today. If I win an escape that he lost last year.
    But I can’t worry about that yet. This test is my only shot.
    I won’t mess it up, no matter what.

 
    2
    The faint smell of coura dung and wet hay fills the departure craft. I pinch the bridge of my nose. It always smells like this—like us, the only passengers of this ship.
    The ship rumbles as we fly, sending vibrations through my already shaky body. I clutch one of the leather straps dangling from the ceiling so I won’t fall.
    There aren’t any windows except in the cockpit, but by now I can guess well enough when we leave the work camp behind and fly over the first of the forest trees. Lumberyards where some of the older kids work sit below us. The woods stretch for miles and miles. We zip through the sky above them at breakneck speed, but it feels like nothing at all.
    The hovercraft slows when we reach the Pavilion, the city that takes up the other half of the lone settlement on the Surface. Only adults live here, and they all come from the Core. Most aren’t permanent residents; they travel to the Surface for research—top secret, so I have no idea what it is. The ones who stay in the city awhile work as instructors in our school, or wardens and guards in the camp, or nurses and doctors in the sanitarium. Governor Preston oversees everyone, acting in place of the Developers.
    We settle with only a slight jolt on the landing platform atop one of the education buildings. The door opens, letting a gust of wind into the ship.
    I search for Grady as I move with everyone else out onto the platform. But I don’t see him. There are too many bodies. Their warmth does little to block the chilly air that seeps through my clothes.
    Officials lead us down a short set of steps, onto a narrow roof of black and silver panels with a rail that blocks us from either edge. Ahead lies a set of glass doors leading into the main education complex, which has a few more stories than ours. I come here every morning for four hours of memorizing scientific theories and mathematics, and learning about why our world is the way it is. Most of my knowledge will only be useful if I’m picked for Extraction.
    That’s why only half of all children in the outer sector camps are tested. When we’re born, doctors perform brain scans to determine how much Promise we have. Only those deemed worthy of possible transfer to the Core get to go to school and take the Extraction test. The rest are doomed for replacement.
    To my left, dark buildings rise from the streets, most towering over us and touching the clouds. Sometimes I picture myself standing on one of their rooftops and sticking my arms out. I close my eyes, take a deep breath, and launch myself into the sky.
    And I fly.
    But even if I could fly, the towers are restricted for people like me. The only time we’re allowed to move through any part of the city beyond the education complex is during school tours or on the day of the yearly Extraction ceremony. Tomorrow.
    I glimpse the gravel road far below as we near the glass doors. A couple pods zoom by, whirring as they hurtle around street corners with giant CorpoBot screens that broadcast news from the Core, but are usually silent when I see them. The pods pass the oval-shaped sanitarium, where girls not much older than me give birth to babies they’ll never see. They pass the spot on the gravel where Laila broke down after pictures of the new Extractions appeared on the CorpoBots, and her face wasn’t shown.
    “Keep moving,” a guard says.
    I turn away from the road. The glass doors to the education complex are already open, and kids ahead of me are moving inside. A small part of