hoshi No hiromi's blog: "futeristick"

not all my blogs will be extreamly graphic but will contain muture contint

Chapter 1. The Stone Floor

I lay prone and exhausted on the floor, arms by my sides, the smooth stone against my forehead hard but pleasantly cold. I was midway into the last hour of prayer for the day, the hour of The Prayer of Repose, and I could feel the polished stone chilling my sweat and pulling the excess heat from my body. I remained motionless in my thin white Initiate robe. After the previous grueling hour of The Prayer of Weakness, it would be so easy to drift and relax and dream. But that would be a fatal mistake.

I am Ilias, and tomorrow will be the first day of The Holy's Year 8235 and the beginning of the 52rd year of the reign of Abdul Quddus, the 83th Great Cunif Califar and First Servant of the Holy. The numbers signify a year of Jubilee. It will also be the year I reach twenty-one years of age, and as such tomorrow I will be at the last of the three great gates of my childhood. In two days I will either be an adult or dead.

The faint sounds of my classmates' breathings are totally ignored. My senses are tuned to one purpose, to detect the presence of Fateen as he walks among the Initiates in his clothed feet. He is Citizen-Level 13, only three levels below royalty, and it is somewhat unusual for such a high ranking Priest to work as Imul with children. But Fateen loves his work, and he is a master of silent walking.

When I was very young, two years before my eighth year and the first of my childhood gates, a group of my classmates and I had quietly discussed Fateen's age. Recklessly ignoring the danger of the conversation, we had all concluded he must be at least a hundred years old, and probably much more. It was impossible to tell by outward appearance of course. With the anti-aging drugs, Fateen looked exactly the same as when he completed his own journey from child to adult. But to all of us though, the image of Fateen as child was beyond our comprehensions.

There has been no detectable sound, but I sensed the vibrations of footfalls along the stone, and then, stillness. Fateen was standing a meter in front of me. I did not have to open my eyes to know upon whom his gaze was fixed. For all the hundreds of Initiates in my class, only I had never received demotion in Open Prayer. In all the years, I was the only Initiate Fateen had never managed to trip up, and we both knew tonight was his last chance. I focused myself in a Prayer of Suspension, and kept my heartbeat slow and resting.

There was the slightest sound of a touch as Fateen's onyx rod came upon the Summoning Apex of the stone before me. My head snapped up in obedience with my eyes wide open, alert and bright. Any sign of drowsiness now would be a sign of drifting and impure thoughts. Such a mark of weakness so close to my control gate could well be a fatal handicap in my imminent competition for survival with my classmates. By holy Law, one tenth of Initiates do not survive each childhood gate. I gazed into Fateen's eyes and waited for his test.

"Ilias, describe the holiness of the digits."

I kept all expression of surprise from my face. Fateen had asked me a question proper for a child approaching his first gate, not his third. Any slip now with such a simple question would be a disaster. I quoted verbatim from my earliest Catechisms.

"The digits two, three, five, and eight are holy, ordained by the Holy for His Greatness. The digits four, six, and nine are the digits of the Earth, not directly holy but formed by holy products. The digits zero, one, and seven can not be the product of holiness, and thus must be the digits of Shaitan."

"Ah, very good young Ilias. But how do we know this is true?"

A dangerous question to ask, especially for someone below royal level. But it was an even more dangerous question for an Initiate not to answer. I worked to keep my voice calm as I spoke the correct affirmation from The Book of Bel'dar. "Because it has been preached, and the Holy is One, and Bel'dar is His one true preacher. Thus he preached, therefore thus he preaches."

Fateen stared at me, his eyes hard and cold. I returned his stare in obedience, and almost didn't catch the slight lifting of his rod off my Apex. I immediately snapped my head down and closed my eyes. There was the softest of sounds as the rod gently touched the stone again. Damn him! His summoning call was far softer than appropriate. But it would be hard to debate the issue if I were dead. My eyes snapped up and locked with his. I watched him glare at me.

"And what is the order of the day?"

Another question from my early youth, this one going so far back my response came from my nursery days, when females encapsulated in blue body coverings watched and cared for us as the priests taught their lessons. I replied immediately. "The order of the day is based on the holiness of two, three, and eight. One third of our time is for The Holy, one third for Earth, and one third for Shaitan. The holiness of two divides the Holy time into morning prayers and evening prayers."

"And what is the direction of the day?"

"The four morning prayers take us from Shaitan to Holy. Then in a state of Holy grace, we work eight hours for our masters the Priesthood and the Guilds. The four evening prayers return us from Holy to Shaitan, leaving us eight hours to dream in his low impurity."

"And what are the names and directions of the prayers?"

"The morning direction is mind to body to church to Holy. The names of the four hours are The Prayer of Ascension, The Prayer of Purification, The Prayer of Wonder, and the Prayer of Counted Failings. The evening direction is the reverse, from Holy to church to body to mind. The evening prayers are The Prayer of Uncounted Failings, The Prayer of Joy, The Prayer of Weakness, and the Prayer of Repose."

The rod left the Apex. My head snapped down. There was the faintest whisper of a click. My eyes and head snapped back up, none of my internal fury visible upon my face.

"Tell me Ilias," Fateen whispered without a sound, moving only his lips. "You are the top student. There's no doubt you'll pass tomorrow. We're all expecting you to book the run. How far will you ride the lion?"

Was he mad?! To begin chatting as an Initiate during Prayer, especially about personal ambition, would mean instant death. And yet, not to respond on point to such a direct question would also disqualify me from adulthood. Did he really hate me that much? If I spoke to such a question, even with my lips alone, my death was assured; and his also, once the security videos of this conversation were reviewed by the local execution council. But if I remained silent, it would be up to Fateen to decide whether to press a charge of disobedient silence against me.

I realized my Imul had entwined us, both of us holding both our lives in our hands. I had first choice, to decide whether we both would die, or if we both had a chance to live. If I voted in silence for life, both our fates were in Fateen's hands. I stared at him and thought, "Perhaps he missed his last chance for promotion, or perhaps he is so old the anti-aging drugs are about to fail anyway. Does he hate me so much, that he will drag me down with him into oblivion?"

I had no wish to die. My mouth remained closed, my lips unmoving. I waited for Fateen's decision.

The rod left the stone. My head snapped back down. After a timeless period of utter silence, I heard the whisper of my Imul's dry voice. "Excellent Ilias. Your discipline serves you well." I sensed the faint clothed footfalls moving on.

Chapter 2. Day of Judgment

According to the preacher's texts, The Holy revealed His new calendar when Bandar the Wanderer entered the seaport city of Punta Arenas at the southern end of the ancient and mythical country of Chile. He came less than a month after the War of the Burning Metals and the blazing of Shaitan's fires across the globe. Eight years later the Holy revealed Bandar as His preacher and anointed him Bel'dar, creating the first of the Cunif Califar.

We are all taught geography as children of course. It is fascinating to think what life must have been like back then, with the survivors of the war forming a global refugee population. The southernmost areas of the globe suffered by far the least of the fallout, and for decades they were the only regions habitable. The place that eventually became Bandar Arenas had one of the lowest radiation levels in the world outside of Antarctica, and it was a magnet for humanity.

It's difficult to imagine how small the city was at the beginning. The Book of Bel'dar suggests its population was only about 100,000 before the war, 2% of the present size of five million. By current law, both the world capital and the Priesthood contain one fifth of the world's population.

It took the Earth several hundred years to recover from the war. Two of the most serious isotopes in the fallout were cesium-137 and strontium-90. They both have half-lives of about 28 years. It also took several centuries for the ozone layer to recover from being destroyed by the nitric oxides produced by the bombs. The primary lingering health concern from the war is now carbon-14, with a half life of 5600 years. Fortunately the oceans and biosphere have recycled much of it out of the atmosphere.

Bandar Arenas is the southernmost city on Earth, at 53 o 10' S and, by definition, 0 o 0' W. There are also 120 townships scattered in North and South America, with populations averaging 167,000 each. Each township is sponsored by one of the 120 Guilds, and the Priesthood is the sponsor of the capital.

The name of my childhood township is Anqara, and it is the home township of the Guild for specialty metal fabrication. We are located at 48 o 20' N, 0 o 6' W, built at the ancient site of Bagotville, Quebec. Anqara has the distinction of being the farthest township from Bandar Arenas, but with our close match in longitude with the capital, we also have the smallest shift in solar time. Our solar noon occurs only 24 seconds later than official solar noon. Official time is the same everywhere of course. There are no time zones. The rhythm of the daily Prayer is not fragmented. 

In Bel'dar's calendar, each year has 2x2x3=12 months, and the months have kept their ancient names. Each month has 2x3x5=30 days. In addition to the twelve months, there is a five-day festival to celebrate the Holy's Judgment. The festival is at the beginning of year, shortly after the summer solstice in the southern hemisphere. When the calendar year is divisible by twelve, the festival is lengthened to eight days in order to keep the calendar in synch with Earth's solar orbit.

The festival of The Judgment is the appropriate time for the childhood gates, and also for the gates that control adult advancement from one citizen level to the next. The childhood gates are used to test and cull all male children as they enter their 8th, 13th, and 21'st year of life. Each of the three gates culls 10%. There is also continuous culling due to medical, behavioral, or heretical problems, for both children and adults. The end result is 65% of the 120,000 male children born each year survive the challenge of entering adulthood.

The First Day of Judgment of 8235 began as usual for me with 6 AM prayers. I and the 577 other members of the Initiate class of Anqara found ourselves in the presence of the Bandar Arenas test monitor. Some seemed to find it difficult not to be intimidated by his purple insignia of royalty.

The class moved through the familiar cycle of the morning prayers. The Prayer of Purification hour was filled with tests of power and form in the martial arts. The exhaustion tests of endurance would come later in the evening Prayer of Weakness.

At 10 AM I began eight hours of qualifying tests with the Guild that had been sponsoring me since my thirteenth year. I have spent the last eight years of my life as an acolyte member of the Security Guild.

Security is a coveted Guild for membership. It is a small Guild, only three thousand adults, but it is very well represented in the royal levels. All rulers and royalty are part of the Priesthood of course, but 25 of the 4,092 current royals (citizen levels 16 through 23) entered royalty through the Security Guild. The previous Cunif Califar, Abdul Matin, Servant of the Firm, entered royalty through Security.

The ancient counterpart of the Security Guild would be a combination of domestic and international spy agencies. The Guild does not do installation and maintenance of the worldwide monitoring systems, but it does have ownership of their operation and technical evolution, and Security works closely with the Priesthood, in particular their embedded military and police units.

The Security Guild's township is called Jizari. It is located 360 km northeast of the capital, across the Straits of Magellan at the ancient site of Rio Gallegos, Argentina, 51 o 37' S, 1 o 37' E. Not surprisingly, Security's home is the closest township to Bandar Arenas.

There is a saying all males learn in nursery school, that the boy chooses the girls, but it is the Guild that chooses the boy. As a young child though, I discovered I have a unique talent, a secret gift that is the fuel for my hidden ambition. My gift let me choose my Guild. I have a perfect memory.

Am I a mutation? Probably. So many of our religious practices evolved from the mutations problems of the war, and how urgent it was to adapt society to the new reality. The culling was necessary to stop the degradation slide of the human genome, and it made the Genetics Guild one of the most powerful organizations under the Priesthood.

Major genetic changes were engineered in the first few thousand years after the war, as the Genetics Guild mastered the science of writing DNA at the level of complexity of the human genome. Evolution jumped from geological to generational timescales, and the Ruling Priesthood became the supreme legislature for determining the definition of human.

The ability of the species to repopulate was a critical concern, and one of the first successful genetic modifications was to change the male/female probability birth ratio from roughly 1:1 to 1:3. There are currently 120,000 male births a year and 360,000 female births. Daily sleep requirements are also half of what they used to be before the war.

Another genetic modification made the human genome compatible with anti-aging drugs. No one has lived to be 400 yet, but with continual use of the drugs 300 to 350 years of life can be expected, with all but the last few months in fully functional health.

My memory mutation is a powerful gift. It goes far beyond the ability of perfect recall of experiences. I have perfect recall over everything I sense. I can stare at my monastery study monitor flashing several pages a second and then read what I've observed at my leisure when I have time to close my eyes. I was six years old when I learned the trick of stealing Imul passwords by glancing from the corner of my eye, watching them type long and rapid password strings. I would later replay their finger movements in my mind.

For years I did nothing with my illegal access to knowledge. But when I was nine and had passed my first gate, my class went through a basic course on network security, and I realized Anqara has a weakness in its local security design. There is a six-second window every night at 11:30 PM when the township's network establishes new security handshaking protocols with the worldwide web. During this period, worldwide Security can't monitor local data access directly, and relies on the local logs to bridge the six-second gap once handshaking is reestablished.

But there is a flaw in the local monitoring software. It polls central video memory every 400 milliseconds for the image being transmitted to my room's monitor. With access to the monastery computers through an unrelated course on graphical displays, I used my stolen passwords and left behind a small and I hope untraceable daemon.

The end result is I have fifteen 400-millisecond windows every night to access adult data. I start my process just after the end of the security polling cycle; loading the data into my video buffer, flashing it to my screen for 350-ms, and then shutting down and terminating the data request before the security poll asks my video buffer again what it is doing. End result? I get fifteen views a night with as much data as I can fit onto my screen, and there is absolutely no record of my activity.

In the last decade, I have had access to vast stores of information, far beyond what an Initiate is ever allowed to see. It is an extremely dangerous game. Sidestepping the local audit logs is not easy, but my greatest fear is someday showing that I know not too little but too much.

When I was eleven years old, I decided that the only truly safe way of protecting the use of my gift would be to have access to the Priesthood's master security logs, and the only way to do that would be from inside the Security Guild. I modified my performance on my aptitude tests to appear especially attractive to them, and at my thirteenth year, when the Guilds pick their acolytes from the survivors of the second gate, I succeeded in my quest to have the boy choose the Guild.

And the years passed. I reached my third gate. My final day of childhood continued. After four hours of Guild testing, I was pleasantly surprised to be served a lunch at 2 PM. Except for Guild training materials and courses, all children are completely under the control of the Priesthood, and the acolytes for adult Priesthood would be finding this a fasting day. But the other acolytes are owned by both the Priesthood and their Guild on Judgment Day, and it is permissible after morning prayers for the sponsoring Guilds to feed their acolytes.

I was touched by my Guild's generosity. They had sent me a magnificent lunch, one worthy of a royal. There was a fine selection of delicate fishes and meats wrapped in small pastries, plus an assortment of fresh fruit slices and greens from the southern hemisphere. It wasn't a large amount of food, but with the Prayer of Weakness testing in six hours, stuffing myself now would be foolhardy. The lunch was perfect. I thought about the message my Guild was sending me with their extravagant feast as I savored each bite.

I had to keep my wits about me during the last hours of testing. I was being asked to make intelligent guesses about matters that I had factual knowledge of only through my nocturnal data access. I intentionally made numerous guesses reasonable but wrong, especially those concerning the political alliances within the ruling Priesthood (the 87 Priests of Citizen Level 24 though 31).

One of the last tests from my Guild measured my memory and manual dexterity. I was shown long strings of random characters on a monitor for a brief period of time, and then required to rapidly type them. All adults have a minimum requirement of entering twenty-character complex passwords in ten seconds, but Security's requirement is a minimum of twenty-four characters in eight. I passed the test easily, overshooting my Guild's requirements by a considerable margin, but then holding back so as not to reveal my hidden talent.

The hours of Prayers passed quickly. I had no trouble with the theology. It did surprise me that the Hour of Weakness was used for unrelenting full-contact sparring. I am not the most aggressive fighter, but my form is excellent, and I received only three minor demerits, two for taking too long to defeat my friend Afeef, a clearly weaker opponent, and a third demerit for being too merciful with the selection of the combination kick that ended my final contest. The judge ruled I had a perfect opportunity for a back-knuckle strike to my opponent's nose.

My class spent the Hour of Repose in perfect silence. It didn't feel like a test until near the end, when I realized other acolytes bruised from the sparring or worried about passing might be finding it difficult to maintain the required perfect stillness. When the closing bell sounded, there were numerous sighs of exhaustion. We all rose and quickly walked to our small bedrooms. I glanced around at some of my classmates, trying to make eye contact and offer encouragement. The testing was over. Talking was not strictly prohibited, but it certainly wasn't encouraged either, and we all make our way back to our rooms in silence.

I closed the door of my room as required, hearing the lock click and the door seal behind me. The time was 10:09 PM, and the Day of Judgment was almost over. Sometime within the next five hours, I would hear a gas hissing into my room. It would either be a simple nitrogen-oxygen mix, or something just as odorless but extremely lethal. By tradition, acolytes void their bladders and undress, in order to minimize the work of the acolytes in next year's class.

Some acolytes doubt this, but bedrooms really are unmonitored. The human psyche needs a place to wallow in peace during the hours of low impurity, and the Priesthood does provide that place. One thing I've learned about the Priesthood over the years is that they are many things, but they are not liars.

I actually fell into a restful sleep shortly after entering my room. I was that confident, and regardless the matter was out of my hands. I've learned the lesson to grab rest when I can. I was awakened by the faint sound of hissing air. I opened my eyes and glanced at the clock display on my monitor, 2:53 AM.

It was later than I expected. The test administrators are required by law to complete all executions by 3 AM. I shuddered as I thought about being one of the thousands of judges for the gate. A vast amount of the scoring is based on computer tabulation, but the final decisions are human, done over a worldwide teleconference. With over 87,000 Initiates per year, there are rumors of many heated discussions for the exacting rankings near the cutoff.

I laughed at myself as I realized I was sniffing the air. My subconscious demand to live was overwhelming my reasoning. Sniffing the air made no sense. I tried to calm myself by thinking of the soft hissing sound as relaxing. I looked at my sealed door, and waited for my adult life to begin.

Chapter 3. Adulthood

At exactly 3 AM the hissing stopped and I heard my bedroom door unsealing. A moment later the lock clicked and a woman entered carrying adult clothes for me. I couldn't tell what she looked like of course. She was encased in a full burqa. Purdah (the curtain law) forbids any part of a woman's body to be visible in public. I thought she might be one of the wives of the monastery's priests. It was the first female I had seen in thirteen years.

I got dressed quickly. My shirt had insignia on both arms, showing a bright green circle (the symbol for Citizen Level Two), and underneath that the insignia of the Security Guild. There was also a small card telling me where to report to my Guild's representative for my debriefing.

All males are required to display their Citizen Level when in public. There are color codes for the different levels. Blue is for children (Level One). Green is the base color for labor (Levels Two and Three), and like Level One uses a circular emblem. Yellow is the base color for management (Levels Four through Seven) and uses a triangular emblem. Red is the base color for command (Levels Eight through Fifteen) and uses a diamond shaped emblem.

At the very top is purple for both Royalty (Levels Sixteen through Twenty-Three) and Ruling Royalty (Levels Twenty-Four through Thirty-One). Royalty uses a square emblem, except for the Cunif Carifar who wears a pentagon bearing all five colors, signifying his role as the representative of all people to the Holy.

My bedroom had been my small place of refuge for the last thirteen years. I took one quick last look around and then left.

The hall was busy with the new adults heading off to their own meetings. Within the coming hours and days, we would all be traveling to the home cities of our various Guilds. Mixed with the feelings of joyful relief and excitement was an air of nostalgia. After two decades of very close living, most of us would not see each other again for years. Or never. I grimaced when I saw Afeef's door had not unsealed.

The door was open to my interview room. I saluted the superior there from my Guild, a CL-12, his diamond emblem red at the bottom half and yellow at the top. I was pleased someone of such high rank had been sent to debrief me. The man snapped a sharp salute back, and then signaled me to close the door and sit down.

He went back to reviewing his monitor while I waited. I couldn't see his screen, but I guessed he was reviewing my test scores. Finally he sighed and looked up at me. "I'm Commander Fadil. Welcome to Security! Before we begin the debriefing, is there anything you'd like to know?"

"Yes, thank you sir. The testing, how did we do?"

"You mean Anqara?"

"Well, that would be interesting too, but I meant Ghazi and Hakem." I was referring to two CL-23 Royal priests who were both taking their advancement tests this year. Both had entered Royalty through the Security Guild.

Fadil raised his eyebrows and then smiled in approval at me. "That's the right attitude Ilias! And the answer is the Guild did extremely well! As of today, we have twenty-six Royalty from Security, including two at the ruling level." He then shot me a sly grin. "Can you guess who was promoted?"

I weighed my answer before I replied, "Ghazi sir, I'm almost sure."

The Commander blinked. "Correct! Judging from your test essays, I thought you might pick Hakem."

I nodded. "With all respect sir, I had to document my essays with references to official capital news. There was nothing from Bandar Arenas to suggest Ghazi, nothing that I had access to anyway, and putting unsupportable hunches into my essays would be, well..." I smiled and shrugged my shoulders.

Fadil gave me a long, thoughtful stare. "Indeed. I'm beginning to see why the Guild is so excited about you." He finished up with his monitor and then looked at me. "Let's begin the debriefing. Your combat scores, do you think they were fair?"

"The three minors?" I paused for a moment. "Yes sir, the demerits were fair."

"In total, I think so too. Maybe not the last demerit itself, your combination roundhouse spin kick was a thing of beauty. But in your eighth match, you pulled a knife-hand strike to the throat so early the blow wasn't scored, and the judge let that one go."

I nodded. "I agree sir."

"But your third match, the one with Afeef, what was up with that?"

"Ah..." I thought for a moment and decided to be completely honest. "A friend sir, since early childhood. I suspected he was low in the rankings."

Fadil typed on his monitor for a moment. "Fourth percentile, not even close. You should have known you had no chance of pushing him above the cutoff."

I was properly chastised. "Yes sir, agreed."

Fadil looked at me. "Ilias, your defensive skills are world class. Seriously, if defense were everything, you could compete in the world competitions right now. You're that good. And nobody is ignoring the fact you were the only Anqara Initiate who did not suffer a single solid hit during the sparring. But you have to work on your aggression!"

"Yes sir!"

He shook his head in disbelief. "Your ninth opponent, Uday, you took him down in less than five seconds."

I smiled at the memory. "I had no choice. His punches are lightning! He could well have taken me in a longer fight." I have a reputation for being a careful fighter, and I had used my reputation as a weapon against a superior opponent. Uday was so surprised by my wild combination attack that I scored a quick takedown.

Fadil finally understood my strategy for the competition. "Interesting," he mumbled as he went back to reviewing the test scores. "You'll be happy to know you're the top rated Initiate from Anqara. And Anqara made their 8% again, which means you're among the top scorers in the world, out of 78,044 survivors to adulthood. You're definitely in the top 1%. Security will be very interested in your decision about booking the run."

To understand Fadil's comments, I'll have to explain how promotional gates work.

Worldwide, across the 120 townships and the capital, 90% of the Initiates survive the final childhood gate. It's a worldwide ranking, but the competition between townships is also capped by a minimum monastery culling of 8% and a maximum of 12%. Anqara has a reputation of having one of the toughest monasteries on the planet, and it is one of a handful of townships that consistently hits the lower cutoff.

Adult gates are designed differently than the childhood gates. There is no culling for failure, at least not directly. The name for Citizen Level Two is Lower Labor. Under usual circumstances, I would take my tests to advance to Level Three (Upper Labor) in two years, on the First Day of Judgment in 8237. Test success is based on ranking. The top 20% of the applicants will advance to Level Three (which has an emblem of a green lower hemisphere and an upper blue), and 80% will remain at Level Two.

For those who fail the first gate, there is a second gate three years later, again with the top 20% of the remaining applicants passing. Similarly, there is a third gate five years after that, a fourth gate eight years later, and a fifth gate thirteen years after that. By the time of the fifth and final gate, citizens would have lived 31 years at the same Level. Success at any gate starts the whole process of advancement over again, taking the next Level's first gate two years later.

Failure at the fifth gate is not an immediate death sentence, but it does put your future access to the anti-aging drugs into a lottery system. There is no further possibility of promotion, and the lottery odds get exponentially worse each year, culling about half the population after ten years, and then rapidly culling the remainder. The record for survival in the lottery system after failing a fifth gate is twenty-two years. That record was set over three thousand years ago.

Citizens in the lottery show up for their annual shots along with the other citizens, but the lottery system might assign them a placebo. Somewhere between their fifth and eighth month, those who receive the placebo will notice their bodies begin to age rapidly, more than one year per day. By this time their medical condition is hopeless, even with access to the real drugs. Death always comes before the twelfth month, and in mercy the Priesthood will offer assistance in suicide.

In addition to the C.L. gates, there is also adult culling due to criminal behavior or heresy. There are no prisons. The end result? Slightly less than 62% of all citizens entering each Level will advance to the next higher Level, and 38%+ will die within the Level. The average age for all adult males (exclusive of children) is 51 years and 4 months, including the long, thin tail of the distribution of the citizens living hundreds of years. By law, the average age of the adult women is exactly the same, although they are on a completely different system.

There are only two exceptions to this process, one at each end of the Citizen Levels. Promotion and culling within the Ruling Royalty are processes not of formal testing but political infighting, and the Cunif Califar is appointed for life. At the other end is the Asad, the Lion. That is what Fadil was referring to when he asked me about booking the run.

The Lion is only available to the top 1% of the surviving population entering adulthood. From what Fadil told me, a total of 780 new adults would be offered the chance for advanced placement in the Citizen Levels. Historically, close to 90% will accept the challenge, and a third will target two-level advancement for immediate placement into management. How far the new adult wishes to "ride the Lion" is declared to the Priesthood on the Fifth Day of Judgment. Once declared, there is no turning back.

Lion tests are given on the 21'st day of each month, starting in January for the advancement to Level Three. Most of the testing is over by February, though a very few ambitious candidates will target the higher levels. Success brings the additional status, prestige, and privileges of the higher levels, including the entitlement for an adult male to have his number of wives equal his citizen level. But the primary reason to ride the Lion is the dream of Royalty. One must start adult life at a minimum of Level-Three to have any chance at Royal promotion. On average, there are 93 promotions into Level-Sixteen each year. And one must start adult life at a minimum Level-Four Management Level to ever enter Ruling Royalty (an average of two promotions per year into Level-Twenty-Four).

The downside risks are considerable. First of all, Lion passing rates are wildly unpredictable. The scoring process is somewhat of a mystery. All scoring is supposed to be by computer, but some years almost all will make it, and other years less than half. There seems to be a large random element for how high the bar is raised. The year 7777 was a horror, when not a single candidate made it to Level Four.

Failure on the Lion automatically fails you for all your future adult gates. You get 31 guaranteed years of the anti-aging drugs, and then are put in the lottery. Declining the drugs at the beginning of adulthood and trying to age normally is not an option. The human genome (at least in its present definition) can not tolerate that.

Is it worthwhile to ride the Lion? The risk of failure plus the lost years of not living at the lower Levels result in no net increase of life expectancy. Booking the run is really about ambition, not the desire to live longer through Royalty. And in three days I would have to declare my choice.

Fadil smiled at me and went on. "I reviewed the security logs of the day before your exam. What Fateen did to you on December 30th was way out of line. Do you want the Guild to make an issue of it?"

"The Hour of Repose, his last question? No sir, not at all. I realize now Fateen was teaching me one last lesson, about ambition and discipline, a lesson well worth knowing."

Fadil nodded slowly. "Very well." We chatted a bit more about my performance, and then he surprised me with an unexpected offer. "The Guild's ramjet will be taking off for Jizari at 5:30 AM. We'll make a brief landing at Bandar Arenas first, to drop off the Royal test monitor. There's one vacant seat on the plane." He grinned at me. "Want to hitch a ride?"

It was an extremely magnanimous offer. The other new adults in ancient Canada and the ancient U.S. northeastern seaboard would be flying to the hub city of Aleppo, at 42 o 21' N, 0 o 9' W, the ancient site of Boston Massachusetts. The city had been slowly rebuilt over centuries, long after being directly burned by Shaitan's fire 8,235 years ago.

The Judgment Days are the busiest time of the year for air transport, with all the successful Initiates making transfers to their new homes. The opportunity to travel sub-orbital in the Guild's plush private jet was a pure gift. And I would probably have the chance to chat informally with the Royal monitor. Fadil's offer was priceless. I gratefully accepted, and we left for Anqara's airport shortly after.