The Cupel Recruits Read Online Free PDF Page B

stridently to the sensory awareness platform and turned it on. “I hate this thing. You first.” In response, Wood jumped up onto the platform, turned to face his partner and did a little tap dance. Stone sighed quietly. Usually he enjoyed Wood’s jovial nature, but found it difficult when he was battling his own anxiety as he had been all day.
    “Ready?” Stone prompted.
    “Yeah,” Wood answered, his jokester tone leveling out to denote the nature
    of the task. Stone selected “arrival intro test 1” on the monitor and pressed ‘run’. Wood immediately felt a sensation of flying and reported. Next he felt a sensation of walking and reported. Next he saw a blue bird flying through the room. “Blue bird,” he informed Stone, who marked down each response diligently. “Bell ringing” he continued. The test continued for approximately 20 minutes through cold, heat, pain, nausea, hunger, satiety, etc. as well as a series of visual images and sounds. As the test ended, Wood stepped off the platform and sat down in the closest chair, feeling a little dizzy and disoriented.
    “Want some water?” Stone offered.
    “Yeah,” Wood answered, resting his heard downward in his hands on the desk for a moment in an effort to not take in any additional visual stimuli. Once a few moments of recovery had passed, Wood’s head emerged from its shelter as tentatively as a turtle head pushing out for a view.
    “My turn,” Stone announced, setting the clipboard on the table to the right of Wood. Knowing his friend had even a worse reaction to the test than his own, Wood suggested that one test was enough. The platform had performed adequately.
    “No, Saraceni said for each of us to test it,” Stone deflected the shirking of duty, “Thanks, though.” With that, the pair repeated the test and recorded the results. Following his test, as Stone sat sipping water, he looked around the room observing the additional oddities of the training environment. In the right rear corner of the room stood a large orb perched on a pedestal, glowing the same amber color as the border to the hallway display. Customarily, the orb glowed a light iridescent blue, so the change did capture his attention. Lining the back wall were seven paintings arranged in a progression according to when they were painted. The earliest was an early cave drawing and the last was a 20 th century modern piece. The most notable was the middle painting, which Stone guessed was from a middle era and clearly European. The vibrant colors and elaborate detail matched the gold gilded Louis XIV-style frame that encircled it. The frame complemented the gold, blues and red tones of the painting. The detail was amazingly accurate to what Stone now knew of the nature of the universe-impressive considering the time from which it came. Saraceni’s head appeared in the swiftly opened door and alerted:
    “It’s time.” Wood and Stone fell in swiftly and silently behind him and the three made their way down the corridor to the adjacent wing where the briefing was to be held. Turning into the room, Saraceni pointed to two chairs against the back wall in the corner and his gaze directed Wood and Stone to sit as part of that linear row, which they did. Saraceni took a chair as part of the 8-circled concentric configuration around the center podium. Once the remaining seats were filled and the briefing start time arrived, all grew silent and directed their attention forward without any instruction.
    “Good morning, colleagues,” Ruth Fielding began when all had arrived, “for the minutes, this is briefing 12873, subject matter: status update on training class titled ‘Molior’. Instructor, project manager, senior project manager and project Champion all present. She looked pointedly at each: Saraceni, Kuminsky, and Hallowell respectively. She was, of course, the Champion herself. Wood and Stone looked at one another with the naming of the training class. ‘Did they name all