They hit Jou's atmosphere like a meteor.
The Odyssey's hull groaned under atmospheric pressure as the drop-pods were loaded. Each candidate was assigned a survival pack—barebones gear, just enough to keep them alive long enough to prove they deserved more. No armor. No helmets. No guarantees.
Kaiell stood in line as automated loaders locked candidates into their pods. The chamber was alive with steel and steam, lit by a harsh red glow. Sweat clung to his back under the thin deployment gear—a flexible, temperature-resistant suit. His pulse thudded in his ears.
Joran stood behind him, chewing something invisible. Nervous tick.
"You ready?" Kaiell asked.
Joran chuckled dryly. "As I'll ever be to drop into a planet that wants me dead."
"You'll be fine."
"'Fine' isn't in the Kruger handbook."
Ahead, the machine hissed. A candidate's pod sealed shut. Then—with a violent whoosh—it launched out the side of the Odyssey and vanished into the clouds of Jou below.
Kaiell's pod opened.
"Candidate 1179, Kaiell Arkan. Confirm identity."
"Confirmed."
He stepped inside.
It was barely large enough to hold him. The harness closed in over his shoulders. A screen flickered to life, showing a blinking red dot: his landing zone. Miles from anyone else. Isolation was part of the test.
The voice crackled again. "You have been issued:— One pulse knife.— One impact pistol with 8 rounds.— Two protein ration packs.— One survival scanner.— One trauma injection.— One body bag."Pause."Use it wisely."
Kaiell let out a breath. "Thanks."
"Good luck, candidate."
The pod hissed.
And dropped.
The descent was chaos.
Flames licked at the pod's shielding as it tore through Jou's thick atmosphere. The jungle world spun into view below—an endless canopy of green, coiled with vines the size of starships and trees that pierced cloud layers like spears. Lightning flashed in the distance. The jungle was alive, not with peace, but with heat and hunger.
Kaiell's pod rattled like it was coming apart. He braced himself, teeth clenched, hands gripping the harness—
Impact.
The pod slammed into the jungle floor, carving a crater into the moss-covered earth.
Steam hissed from the sides as the hatch burst open.
Silence. Just for a breath.
Then the jungle screamed.
Birds—or something like them—shrieked in alarm, flapping through the thick air. Insects buzzed in clouds. Leaves twitched unnaturally, as if the trees themselves were watching.
Kaiell stumbled out of the pod, boots sinking into damp soil.
Jou.
The air was hot and heavy, like breathing through blood. Everything was wet. Loud. Alive.
He pulled the survival pack from its pod compartment and checked the contents. Everything was there. He clipped the pulse knife to his belt, slung the pistol at his hip, and activated the scanner. A flicker of green light painted the trees, revealing terrain, temperature, movement signatures.
No sign of Joran.
Not yet.
A nearby tree pulsed with bioluminescence. The trunk moved—flexed—and Kaiell realized it wasn't a tree at all, but some kind of carnivorous plant coiled like muscle.
He backed away carefully.
A signal pinged faintly on his scanner—another drop pod, maybe a kilometer south.
Could be Joran. Could be someone else. Or worse.
Kaiell clenched his fists.
Then he ran.
Ten minutes later, he found Joran staggering out of thick underbrush, arm bleeding from a gash along the forearm. His pod had clipped a ridge on descent and skidded into a swamp.
"You look like hell," Kaiell said.
"You should see the swamp," Joran wheezed.
Kaiell tossed him a ration pack and helped him wrap the wound. The blood had clotted fast, thanks to the local air—saturated with fungal spores, some of which had coagulating effects.
"Your scanner working?" Joran asked.
"Yeah. There's movement everywhere."
"Figures. The second we land, the whole jungle wakes up."
They moved together, back to Kaiell's pod, forming a temporary base near a dense thicket with high ground. They dug in as the sky darkened—Jou's short days gave way to pitch-black nights where the air cooled and the real predators emerged.
No flares. No signal beacons. No map.
Just orders: Survive. Learn. Endure.
The jungle creaked and hissed around them, the trees moving in slow rhythms like breathing lungs.
"You think this is the real exam?" Joran asked, cleaning his pistol. "Or just the warm-up?"
Kaiell didn't answer right away.
He looked into the jungle—into the dark, into the wild, into the unknown—and saw movement. Just at the edge of the trees. A shimmer. A ripple. Like heat distortion. Or something worse.
He gripped his pistol tighter.
"I think the exam started the second we hit dirt."