Wormhole Pirates on Orbis Read Online Free Page A

be rewarding us a little? Think of the work you did with the central computer and with the Samirans. I think this is how they’re thanking us.”
    “I also remember making a lot of Trading Council members very angry. I’m not so sure the Citizens are interested in rewarding a bunch of knudniks. I don’t know. Something’s wrong. I mean this
is
everything I dreamed about. There
has
to be a catch.”
    As if on cue, Charlie centered himself in front of us and announced, “There is one small issue we need to discuss.”
    I knew it!
A couple of the kids groaned. I didn’t even have to look at Max.
    “Now, wait,” Charlie said. “It’s not that bad. Every human needs to go through this. I did. It won’t be hard. You kids are the smartest I’ve ever met, but you still have to go to school.”
    “Nooooo!” came a collective groan. Not school!
    “There’s nothing we can’t learn with a simple uplink,” Dalton protested.
    “Yeah, just give us the files,” shouted another kid.
    “Really, Charlie?” Max moaned.
    “It’s important for your future,” he said. “If you hope to be a Citizen one cycle, then you have to learn the ways of the Citizens. You must interact with them and, hopefully, discover a way in which you can live here with some sort of purpose.”
    “What’s your purpose?” I said.
    Charlie looked away.
    Finally he turned back to me and replied, “To take care of you.”
    I don’t know why I put Charlie on the spot like that. In fact, I don’t know what I was feeling at that moment. Something was off. Maybe I wasn’t too keen on spending my cycles with a bunch of Citizens. But what did I expect, really? That we would hang out with Charlie in the house all cycle? Even I knew that was dumb. I reminded myself that Charlie was a Citizen now and that I liked hanging around
him.
Maybe they weren’t all bad. Maybe it was just the Trading Council that made me dislike the Citizens so much. But then I thought of the Citizens on the shuttle and how they ignored us even after the wormhole pirates attacked. No, they were all bad. School on the Rings of Orbis was not going to be fun.
    “Look,” Charlie continued. “Don’t judge it yet. Wait till you see the school. The Illuminate is an amazing facility.”
    “Where is it?” one of the other kids asked.
    “It’s in Tromaine. You get there by chute,” Charlie replied.
    “What’s the city like?” Max asked.
    “It’s simply amazing, but you must promise to never go there without an authorized escort or clearance by a Citizen —
by me
— for a particular work rule. Knudniks are not allowed to roam the city freely. The vest you’re wearing can inform any Citizen if you have been cleared or not. There are serious consequences if you break their rules. Do not challenge them.”
    Everyone spoke at once, each with a different question.
    “See, this is why you have to go to school. To learn all of this and put it into practice.”
    Max stood up and shouted over everyone, “When do we start?”
    “Next cycle,” Charlie said, and everyone was quiet.

We all waited for Charlie to fall asleep before we piled out of the sleepers and gathered in the farthest corner of the room.
    “This feels more like a storage facility than a bedroom,” Theodore complained.
    “I hate it,” Grace said, sitting next to Theodore.
    “The rest of the place is golden, though,” Max argued, the last to emerge from the wall. In her hands were the workings of the dream enhancement features standard on every sleeper we had ever used on the Rings of Orbis.
    “Did you rip that out?” I asked her.
    Max nodded. “I just wanted to see how these things work,” she mumbled, pulling at the chips and wires.
    Ketheria, Nugget, and some of the other kids had brought their pillows with them and were sprawled out on the soft floor. Most of the floors in the house were covered with a cushy, malleable material, much softer than our own sleepers.
    “Vairocina?” I called out.
    “I