The first thing Caelum heard was a voice saying a number like it was a name.
"Subject ***. Eyes open."
The voice wasn't loud. It didn't need to be. It carried the quiet confidence of something that expected obedience simply because it existed.
Caelum's eyelids felt impossibly heavy, like someone had taped coins onto them while he slept. It took effort...real effort...to blink them open.
When he did, the ceiling above him was wrong.
It wasn't the cracked ceiling of his room. No peeling paint. No familiar stains shaped like clouds if you squinted hard enough.
This ceiling was too clean.
Too white.
Thin black lines crossed it in perfect intervals, forming a grid. Not decorative. Measured. Like someone had divided the room into precise units and wanted him to know it.
Okay, Caelum thought dimly. This isn't home.
Something pressed across his chest.
Then he noticed the others.
A strap across his ribs, firm and unyielding. Another across his thighs. His wrists were secured at his sides...not painfully, not tight enough to cut circulation, but with the quiet certainty of someone who expected resistance and planned for it.
He tested them instinctively. Just a little.
They didn't budge.
His mouth was dry. His tongue felt thick, like he'd been chewing dust.
A woman leaned into his field of vision.
She wore a pale uniform...so pale it almost blended into the walls. Her hair was tucked neatly under a cap. Her face was unremarkable in a way that felt intentional. No scars. No softness. No visible emotion.
She wasn't looking at him.
She was looking past him.
"At a camera," Caelum realized distantly.
"Good," she said. "He's conscious."
Not you're conscious.
He is.
"Where am I?" Caelum asked.
His voice came out rough, but steady.
That surprised him.
The woman finally glanced down at him. "Training facility."
"That's not an answer," Caelum said.
The words slipped out before he could second-guess them.
For half a second, the woman paused.
It was small. Almost imperceptible. Like she hadn't expected resistance from something strapped to a table.
"You'll receive answers when you earn them," she said coolly. "Right now, you follow instructions."
Caelum pressed his lips together.
Okay, he thought. That kind of place.
He tried to lift his head.
Pain flared along his neck immediately, sharp and hot. He hissed through his teeth and let his head fall back.
Still… can't do that, he noted grimly.
His eyes slid sideways instead.
That's when he saw the rest of the room.
Beds...no. Not beds.
Stations.
Pod-like platforms arranged in rows, each one holding a child strapped down just like him.
Some kids were crying openly, faces twisted in panic. Others stared at the ceiling with empty eyes, lips moving silently as if counting something only they could see.
And some…
Some weren't moving at all.
Caelum's stomach tightened.
To his left, a boy about his age was breathing too fast, chest hitching in shallow bursts. His eyes were wide and unfocused, like he was watching something terrible that no one else could see.
"Hey," Caelum whispered. "Hey. What's your name?"
The boy flinched at the sound.
He shook his head weakly, once. Like even that small motion hurt.
"Okay," Caelum murmured, trying to keep his voice calm. "That's fine. Just...just breathe with me, yeah?"
The boy didn't respond.
A speaker crackled to life overhead.
"Pilot Aptitude Evaluation: Session One."
The words echoed through the room.
Caelum's heart skipped.
Pilot.
The word cut through his fear like sunlight through fog.
Pilot meant sky.
Pilot meant stars.
Pilot meant everything he'd ever dreamed about while staring through windows and pages full of galaxies.
"Pilot… evaluation?" Caelum asked softly, afraid the word might disappear if he said it too loud.
A different voice answered him...not from the speaker, but from across the room.
"Don't get excited."
The speaker was a kid strapped into a rig with a half-helmet covering part of his head. He looked older...maybe thirteen or fourteen. His voice was tired. Bitter. Like excitement had burned out of him a long time ago.
"It's not pilot training," the older kid continued. "It's a filter."
"A filter for what?" Caelum asked.
The older kid laughed once.
It wasn't a happy sound.
"For who lives."
Caelum swallowed.
Before he could respond, the woman in uniform tapped her tablet.
"All subjects," she said, "prepare for gravity calibration."
Caelum's heart started pounding.
"Gravity…?" he echoed.
The lights dimmed.
Not all the way. Just enough to change the feeling of the room.
A low hum began beneath the floor...deep enough to vibrate through his bones. Caelum felt it in his teeth, in his chest, in places he didn't have words for yet.
His fingers twitched.
Not from fear.
From recognition.
Like his body remembered something his mind didn't.
A red number lit up on the wall.
1.0×
The hum deepened.
1.6×
Caelum sucked in a breath.
It felt thicker. Like the air itself had gained weight. His lungs had to work harder, pushing against something invisible but heavy.
Around him, kids started whimpering.
2.1×
The boy beside him made a choking sound.
"Stop," the boy whispered. "Stop… please…"
The woman didn't react.
2.8×
Pain bloomed in Caelum's ribs. The strap across his chest dug in as if trying to press him flat. His arms felt heavier, like gravity was tugging them downward.
A girl somewhere shouted, "I can't...I can't breathe!"
"Breathe through it," the older kid muttered. "They don't stop."
3.4×
Something wet slid from the boy's nose.
Blood.
Caelum turned his head as far as he could.
"Hey!" he whispered urgently. "Hey, look at me. Keep breathing, okay? Just like this."
He exaggerated his breaths, slow and deliberate.
The boy's eyes rolled back.
"Hey!" Caelum's voice cracked. "Don't do that...don't..."
3.9×
The boy made a final sound, like a hiccup that forgot how to turn into breath.
Then he went still.
"No," Caelum whispered. "No, no, no…"
The woman glanced at the boy, tapped her tablet, and said calmly into a mic, "Subject Eleven unresponsive."
No urgency.
No surprise.
Like she was reading a weather report.
Caelum stared at the boy's unmoving face.
His hands shook against the restraints.
The number on the wall flickered.
4.2×
Suddenly, the older kid screamed.
Not fear.
Pain.
Pure, tearing pain.
His rig jerked violently. The half-helmet flashed. His body convulsed like electricity was chewing him apart from the inside.
Caelum squeezed his eyes shut.
The hum surged.
Gravity slammed down harder, deeper, like a giant hand trying to shove him through the platform into the floor.
His whole life, gravity had crushed him.
But this...
This was different.
This was loud.
Angry.
Artificial.
Caelum's instincts flared.
Push back.
He didn't know how.
He just did what he'd always done...lying on the orphanage floor, hitting his useless legs, begging them to move.
Except now, he wasn't begging his legs.
He was begging the air.
"Stop," he rasped. "Stop…"
The air trembled.
Just a little.
Not enough for anyone else to notice.
Enough for Caelum to feel it.
Like the weight shifted off his bones for half a heartbeat.
He gasped.
A real breath.
The older kid's scream cut off into a choking gag.
Silence.
A siren blipped once.
"Subject 207 terminated," the woman said flatly.
Caelum opened his eyes.
His fists clenched.
His vision blurred...not from tears yet, but from something hotter.
Anger.
He stared at the wall.
4.2×
"I'm not dying here," he whispered.
The hum eased.
The lights returned.
The woman walked away like nothing had happened.
Above him, a camera lens clicked as it adjusted.
And Caelum realized something that made his stomach drop.
Someone was watching him.
Specifically.
Because he was still breathing.
Because he was still awake.
Because he had survived a gravity that killed the kid beside him.
And somewhere deep in his chest, buried under fear, a thought sparked like a match:
They used to call me broken.
They're going to learn what broken really means.