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She wondered if Vahn had engineered it this way so she wouldn’t feel out of her depth. If so, he deserved a big, grateful kiss. Among other things.

At least the trees gave some shelter from the unremitting rain. Down here beneath the leaf cover it was more of an annoying drizzle than a downpour.

She sat under a tree and examined the contents of the rucksack, drawing them out one by one.

A laser-blade. A coil of thin wire. A pen-sized igniter. A handheld device with an electronic map showing both her position and the finish line some fifteen kilometers to the west. An empty water bottle. And a small tin of meat protein.

Kara stared at the items and a laugh bubbled from her throat. Now she knew beyond doubt that Vahn had had a hand in planning this challenge.

This trial wasn’t just about finding a kid’s toy hovering among the trees. This was about survival. And that was something she’d become good at on Minerva-6.

It was obvious the organizers thought they might end up being out here for a while. She decided to prepare accordingly.

The first task was to fill the water bottle, something she did easily enough by holding it beneath a broad leaf and catching the run-off.

The next item on the list was to make sure she had something to fill her stomach. If she found the sphere within a few hours, all well and good. But if she had to spend the night, she would need sustenance.

The other Potentials might think the tin of protein in the rucksack was there as a meal. But she knew better. It wasn’t food for her. It was bait.

She stuffed everything back into the rucksack except the laser-blade. Then she went in search of a thick piece of wood. Using the blade, she put a notch at one end and carved the other into a point.

Walking through the forest, she scoured the ground until she came across animal tracks. It struck her there could be dangerous creatures out here – she had no idea what the ‘indigenous flora and fauna’ of Vraxos were. But surely some of them were small and fluffy. And most importantly, edible.

When she found a well-used trail meandering through the trees, she stopped to set up her trap.

Vahn had taught her how to build snares on Minerva-6. Most of the animals there were definitelynotsmall and fluffy but there was a kind of bunny-thing that tasted okay. They would catch two or three a day, sometimes too many to eat.

And sometimes they hadn’t had to set snares at all. Their hound-beast Rocky would bring them back clutched between his fearsome jaws.

She was saddened by the thought of the large, scary-looking wolf-monster who’d been their companion on the planet. He’d died the day they were rescued. He’d died trying to protect her. She gave herself a shake.

Focus.

She set the trap by sinking the stake into the ground and attaching a loop of wire to a long, springy sapling next to the trail.

Next, she pulled the sapling into a taut bow until she could hook it under the notch in the buried stake. When she let go, the sapling quivered under tension but stayed put. It wouldn’t move until something tried to walk through the wire-loop and dislodged it. Then it would snap upwards, taking the animal with it.

Kara baited her trap with a handful of the meat protein. Her stomach growled as she placed it carefully around the snare but she stoically ignored the discomfort. She would have food soon enough. When she was satisfied, she sat back and viewed her handiwork.

“Yep. Still got it.”

Now it was time to play hide-and-seek. Predictably, that part wasn’t as easy.

She used the hand-held map to plot a grid search pattern, covering an area of about one square kilometer. She was working on the assumption that there were at least thirteen spheres hidden in the forest, and one of them had to be in her vicinity.

That would explain why the Potentials had been dropped at different points in the forest – so they could each find a sphere without tripping over each other. She was convinced there was one nearby, she just had to be methodical.

But after four hours of fruitless searching, she wasn’t so sure. Her neck ached from constantly looking up into the trees and her patience was frayed.

“Where the fuck is it?” she muttered, paranoia kicking in. Maybe the others had already found their spheres and she was the only one wandering round like an idiot. Maybe she shouldn’t have wasted those minutes setting up the snare.

The only bright spot was when the rain finally eased off and watery sunlight began to poke through the trees. At least she’d be dry if she was stuck here all night.

Hunger finally drove her back to the trap. Her spirits lifted when she saw she’d caught something. It hung from the snare lifelessly and she cut it down. A mammal of some sort, the size of a hare but with features resembling a goat. Hopefully it would taste like one or the other.

She made a fire and used the igniter to light it. Adjusting the laser-blade to the right width, she deftly skinned and gutted her kill. It was effortless – it hadn’t been so long ago since she’d been doing this every day.

Before long she was wolfing down succulent roasted meat until her belly was full. She washed it down with rainwater. Blood sugar levels restored, she tried to think logically.