Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Qualify
    Qualify
    Qualify
    Ebook799 pages12 hours

    Qualify

    By Vera Nazarian

    4.5/5

    ()

    Switch to audiobook
    Read preview

    About this ebook

    THE ATLANTIS GRAIL has been optioned for development as a feature film series and/or TV series.

    You have two options. You die, or you Qualify.

    The year is 2047. An extinction-level asteroid is hurtling toward Earth, and the descendants of ancient Atlantis have returned from the stars in their silver ships to offer humanity help.

    But there's a catch.

    They can only take a tiny percent of the Earth's population back to the colony planet Atlantis. And in order to be chosen, you must be a teen, you must be bright, talented, and athletic, and you must Qualify.

    Sixteen-year-old Gwenevere Lark is determined not only to Qualify but to rescue her entire family.

    Because there's a loophole.

    If you are good enough to Qualify, you are eligible to compete in the brutal games of the Atlantis Grail, which grants all winners the laurels, high tech luxuries, and full privileges of Atlantis Citizenship. And if you are in the Top Ten, then all your wildest wishes are granted... Such as curing your mother's cancer.

    There is only one problem.

    Gwen Lark is known as a klutz and a nerd. While she's a hotshot in classics, history, science, and languages, the closest she's come to sports is a backyard pool and a skateboard.

    This time she is in over her head, and in for a fight of her life, against impossible odds and world-class competition--including Logan Sangre, the most amazing guy in her school, the one she's been crushing on, and who doesn't seem to know she exists.

    Because every other teen on Earth has the same idea.

    You Qualify or you die.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherNorilana Books
    Release dateDec 22, 2014
    ISBN9781607621324
    Author

    Vera Nazarian

    VERA NAZARIAN is a two-time Nebula Award Finalist, 2018 Dragon Award Finalist, award-winning artist, a member of Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, and a writer with a penchant for moral fables and stories of intense wonder, true love, and intricacy.She immigrated to the USA from the former USSR as a kid, sold her first story at the age of 17, and since then has published numerous works in anthologies and magazines, and has seen her fiction translated into eight languages.She is the author of critically acclaimed novels DREAMS OF THE COMPASS ROSE and LORDS OF RAINBOW, the outrageous parodies MANSFIELD PARK AND MUMMIES and NORTHANGER ABBEY AND ANGELS AND DRAGONS, and most recently, PRIDE AND PLATYPUS: MR. DARCY'S DREADFUL SECRET in her humorous and surprisingly romantic Supernatural Jane Austen Series, as well as the Renaissance epic fantasy COBWEB BRIDE Trilogy.Her bestselling and award-winning series THE ATLANTIS GRAIL is now a cross-genre phenomenon -- a high-octane YA / teen dystopian apocalyptic science fiction adventure, romance, and historical mystery thriller -- has been optioned for film, and is in development as a major motion picture franchise or TV series.After many years in Los Angeles, Vera lives in a small town in Vermont, and uses her Armenian sense of humor and her Russian sense of suffering to bake conflicted pirozhki and make art.Her official author website is http://www.veranazarian.comTo be notified when new books come out, subscribe to the Mailing List:http://eepurl.com/hKaeo

    Read more from Vera Nazarian

    Related to Qualify

    Related ebooks

    Science Fiction For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      From Marge Simpson to Susan Kennedy: TV’s best mums!

      Mar 27, 2022

      The small screen boasts some magnificent mums. They are loving, loyal and always there to listen. They lay on excellent dinners and even better cuddles. So, to mark Mother’s Day, we’ve taken time out from our chores and homework (they gave us permiss

      3 min read

    • Article

      All Words Fly

      Aug 21, 2018

      All Words Fly
      10 min read

    • Article

      Letters From The Pandemic

      Apr 27, 2020

      Letters From The Pandemic
      8 min read

    • Article

      Out Of The Mouths Of Babes

      Dec 11, 2023

      Out Of The Mouths Of Babes
      9 min read

    • Article

      Frog

      Jan 16, 2022

      Frog
      3 min read

    • Article

      Death Becomes Her

      Jan 21, 2022

      Death Becomes Her
      8 min read

    • Article

      Retirement Advice For The Self-employed Landowner

      Mar 2, 2020

      As a country person ages, there is a temptation to imagine the approach of a quiet and graceful retirement: long, dreamy summer afternoons napping in the porch swing while grandchildren romp in the yard. That might be a happy possibility for the hedg

      3 min read

    • Article

      Benzo Mama

      Sep 7, 2021

      Benzo Mama
      30 min read

    • Article

      Five Minutes With...JONNO ROBERTS

      Oct 30, 2022

      Five Minutes With...JONNO ROBERTS
      1 min read

    • Article

      What's Going On

      Mar 17, 2020

      • Celebrate Beltane at 4am on 1 May at the Lost Village of Dode in Gravesend, Kent – the beautiful Norman church that’s all that remains of a village lost to the Black Death – with a silent walk to their stone circle. Places are limited, find out mor

      2 min read

    • Article

      Dawn Neesom Mind Of My Own

      Nov 23, 2021

      Dawn Neesom Mind Of My Own
      3 min read

    • Article

      Foxes

      Jun 15, 2019

      What’s worth happening happens in deep woods. Or so my daughter tells me. Her plotlines: In the deep woods someone is chasing, someone else is getting hacked. Hatchets are lifted, brought downdowndown. Men stutter blood onto snow. A cast of animals—s

      17 min read

    • Article

      Home For The Holidays

      Aug 10, 2021

      It’s been a year since I’ve been home. I missed Christmas because of work, so Thanksgiving marks a full lap around the calendar. My mom’s been complaining lately about how difficult things have gotten for her. Everything seemed so out of reach, so im

      7 min read

    • Article

      Lucy Sweet Is On Verge

      Apr 4, 2022

      Last week I accidentally (and ironically) donated my husband’s beloved copy of Spark Joy by Marie Kondo to the charity shop. This action sparked arguments, so I spent the next few days trying to claw it back, along with all his other favourite books

      2 min read

    • Article

      Adults Beware: On the Wisdom of the Goosebumps Books

      May 15, 2018

      R.L. Stine’s horror adventures for kids, Goosebumps, are apparently the second best selling book series in history, right behind the exploits of the world’s most famous wizard. As a lifelong Goosebumps fan, I find this endlessly puzzling. It is

      6 min read

    • Article

      Mum's The Word

      Apr 4, 2021

      Growing up in a Vietnamese household, food was a primary love language. I have childhood memories of picking the stalks offrau muong(water spinach) beforeMe–my mother – fried it up, and folding filling into pâté chaud pastries with her. When I went v

      5 min read

    • Article

      Women’s Work

      Dec 15, 2020

      Women’s Work
      12 min read

    • Article

      The MOTHER ODE

      Apr 18, 2022

      The MOTHER ODE
      5 min read

    • Article

      Year Of The Rat

      Nov 24, 2020

      Year Of The Rat
      11 min read

    • Article

      Rising Sign

      Feb 4, 2021

      Rising Sign
      10 min read

    • Article

      Winning Letter

      Jul 22, 2022

      On Friday I was at Pick n Pay in Gallo Manor in the check-out queue. A mean-spirited lady was complaining to me about the fact I had run off to get something and left my trolley in the queue. She had moved my trolley, saying that if everyone did what

      5 min read

    • Article

      THE greatest LOVE

      Oct 21, 2021

      THE greatest LOVE
      10 min read

    • Article

      Some Other Reality

      Jun 9, 2019

      Saturday morning, and I step out onto my balcony, coffee in hand. The street is already full of parents, kids and dogs. Everyone, including the canines, looks healthy and relaxed. Everyone, excluding the canines, is wearing beige or white cotton, and

      2 min read

    • Article

      My First Pet

      Feb 2, 2020

      My First Pet
      9 min read

    • Article

      It’s All Relative

      Aug 1, 2021

      It’s All Relative
      9 min read

    • Article

      Dead Woman

      Jun 5, 2023

      At first it seems like nothing. Headaches. Slight loss of appetite. An overall weariness Emma tries to ignore as she goes to work, yoga, Whole Foods. She’s forty-two and has always taken good care of her body. She stretches daily. Avoids fried foods

      24 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Qualify

    4.5/5

    99 ratings18 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 4/5
      Fans of dystopian type novels will love this book. I know I did. I thought the book started well, developed characters well, and threw in a few twists and turns in the right places. The 'challenges' young people have to face are along the lines of 'hunger games' and 'the testing'. The book was engaging, well written and the plot had a good pace. My only dislike was towards the end, I felt the detail was lacking, and perhaps the final challenge a little 'boring', but perhaps this stopped it from being too 'samey'. I would definitely recommend this book to others, and I really look forward to the sequel!
    • 4/5
      This was a well-written, fast-paced young adult read. The author has a good grasp of moving the action forward while providing necessary information. She also makes no apologies for moving the story along and allowing time to pass. I really enjoyed the characters. They feel like friends and I am excited to find out what happens in book 2!
    • 5/5
      Amazing story! A must read for fans of dystopian stories!
    • 5/5
      This is by far my favorite book series. The first book pulls you in immediately and keeps you captivated by the characters and story. I can't recommend it enough.
    • 5/5
      This was a really good read. Nicely paced and I felt gripped by the story. Refreshingly confident heroine for once! If you like ancient civilisations mixed with future technology, spaceships, all served up in a hunger games style, this is probably for you! The heroine Gwen is pretty clever and uses her brain; she doesn’t doubt herself too much which makes for refreshing reading compared to some other heroines in the books I’ve read.... There’s enough self doubt to be believable and make her relatable but not so much that you’re yelling at the screen with frustration at the huge amount of negative self talk and self doubt to the point that it’s unbelievable - how many magically impossible feats does it take for a girl to believe in themselves a bit?! Seriously what is it with authors making female heroines have such little faith in themselves?! Anyway, *rant over* this book is great precisely because there is so little negative self talk! Please keep going with this, author, we need more confident female heroines!!!

      Really wish that the second book was available on Scribd!!!
      (Some Spoilers ahead!)


      On another note, loved all the classical mythology and historical references and how the author neatly integrated future technology like hoverboards without making it feel gimmicky and overdone.
    • 5/5
      Strongly recommend to romantic fantasy fiction readers. This book is brilliant. And when I say "brilliant", I mean brilliant. Believe me.
    • 5/5
      I was very surprised at how much I really loved this story even though it is written for Young Adults and I'm hardly that! A comet is going to hit earth but in this story we are not so concerned about the comet; it is going to hit and there is nothing to be done. What we become concerned about is who will be chosen from those young people who have been selected to compete for salvation. I won't say who is providing the salvation but needless to say there is a possibility of salvation. The main character is very likeable and I rooted for her from the minute I met her. This was a very engaging story and I can't wait to read the rest of the series.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      This book takes place in the year 2047 and an "extinction-leveled" asteroid is hurtling towards Earth. The descendants of Atlantis (Yes. Ancient Atlantis) are here to offer humanity some help. However, there is a dramatic catch to this and the Atlanteans can only bring such a small percent of Earth's population back with them. Of course, only the fittest teens who must Qualify can go!I won this in a giveaway here and I have to say it was an amazing story! I've read a lot of dystopian novels but this one is the best I've read and it beats out Divergent and the Hunger Games. This book is vivid in detail and truly, the plot is outstanding and gripping! The story is told by the our determined protagonist, Gwenevere Lark who is pretty much a klutz and a geek. Which is amazing because we learn through Gwen through most of the story and none of it will ever leave you hanging. It is easy to comprehend, but oh so interesting!If you are tired of dystopian books, I understand since there are so many out there. But I would really recommend reading this one before you take that break! Qualify by Vera Nazarian is definitely worth the read! You will not be disappointed.I'm honestly curious what the next book has to offer.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 4/5
      I have read several of her books and I believe that Nazarian builds consistently relatable and compelling characters for her stories. Her books are always very readable and this one is no exception. One of the traits that her main characters seem to always exhibit is an inner drive, often unrealized, that allows them to rise above what they think is their potential. Again, this book is no exception. The main character here, Gwen, is self-deprecating bookworm who is physically unsuited to the challenges that are presented to her. But there is determination and a drive that even she didn't suspect she had that moves her past obstacles and over hurdles. I enjoyed this book, though I confess at times it was a bit predictable, nevertheless the plot is well done with a couple of twists, and as always with her writing when you turn the last page, you keep looking for more, hoping there is more - there's not, you have to get the next book. Which I certainly will.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      Easily one of the most compelling works of Science Fiction I have read in many years, I would put Nazarian right up with Heinlein, Campbell, or Niven. With the protagonist a sixteen-year-old young woman (Gwen Lark) from Vermont, the story line takes the reader through a series of tests designed to qualify the teenager to leave Earth on board a space ship operated by the descendents of the ancient denizens of Atlantis, a departure that will save her life when an asteroid destroys Earth in a few months hence. There are actually three tests Gwen and her peers face, beginning with the Qualification Test Gwen, her three siblings, and all other teenagers across the country (and implied around the world) face at the very beginning of the book. It is understood that anyone not passing the test will return home to face anihilation with their parents and (non-qualifying) siblings, hence the saying "Qualify or Die," which is repeated throughout the story. Those students who pass the first test are immediately taken to a Regional Qualification Center (in Gwen's case in Pennsylvania) where they will train for a month before taking their "Semi-Final" exam. The Semi-Final winnows the thousands of students from each regional center (over 6,000 in Pennsylvania) down to 200. Those who survive the Semi-Final are taken to a National Qualification Center (believed to be in eastern Colorado) where they will train for an additional month with all their fellow countrymen before facing the Final exam. The book's six hundred pages take the reader through all three exams as well as the training sessions leading up to the exams. Most students, including Gwen, are well aware that the chances are rigged against them. All know that if they do not pass the Final Exam, they will die anyway when the asteroid destroys the Earth. Make no mistake, this is a long book, but it is never dull, never slow, and the cast of characters is fully fleshed out, whether they be nerds, geeks, or even the bullies that seem to inhabit all levels of teen-age (and even adult) life. Throw in an alien, yet related, race with an almost unbelievably advance level of technology, and the story line fascinates on so many different levels. My highest recommendation!
    • 5/5
      This book will give all the other books of this genre including the Hunger Games a run for their money. From beginning to end the writer keeps you engrossed and guessing about what is to come. Ms. Nazarian tells the story from the mouth of a teenager who is caught in an impossible situation. Bringing Atlantis (which has always been a mystery) to the forefront as the savior of man is an intriguing way of merging the past with the future. The way she shows her main character evolving from a nerdy teenager with a crush on a schoolmate to a leader with the resolve to save her entire family is well done. I can't wait for the next book to see where she goes from here.

      2 people found this helpful

    • 5/5
      Superb! This well plotted novel will keep a Hunger Games lover riveted. I could vividly picture the settings and action as if I were seeing it on a big screen. Here's to hoping this gets made into a movie! I definitely want to read the future books in the series. I received my copy of the novel through LibraryThing in return for an honest review.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      This was an interesting story, well plotted and well told. Like a friend telling you what she did yesterday.But what a yesterday it was! Reach in emotions and challenges, the story that Gwen tells bring us in a world of high sound technology, space shuttles, unreadable and powerfull Atlantean which seem to be so alien but oh! so human in small ways.I was delighted about the "no dating rule" since usually I tend to skip the love part in books, but in this one even the love part is told in a light, subtle way that doesn't interfere with the rest but make the story more interesting. The characters feel real, you suffer and doubt and rejoice with them. The alien technology is plausible and there's interesting science notions cleverly used from the protagonist to qualify.Just a couple of things nagging at me:the qualification challenge seems too easy, I was expecting a harder fight. Seems as the book had only so much space and there wasn't enough for a more articulate end. Or maybe it's me that just wanted more.Then a question: why did the Atlanteans decided to help humans? They don't seem to be such an altruist population. The answer may lay in the second book, which I hope is coming very very soon.All in all a very good and enjoyable reading, looking forward for more.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 4/5
      Great story -loved this author's imagination. Very different end-of-the-world/aliens rescuing humans type story. Some very unexpected scenarios and edge of the seat thrills. A tiny bit too YA for me but very enjoyable.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      WOW what a gripper! Qualify is a dystopian, sci-fi and YA novel set in 2047 after the human race is all facing a fatalistic oncoming asteroid that will wipe out the Earth. The descendants of the historic and sunken Atlantis are the only hope as they offer to save humanity by taking them back to their new home on a different planet; the new Atlantis. What’s the catch? Only those between the ages of 12-19 can apply to be saved and they will ONLY be saved if they qualify.We follow the protagonist Gwenevere Lark through the trials and tribulations of the qualification challenges and through challenges of a more personal nature. Along with the remaining “Four Gees” (her siblings) she must learn all there is to know about Atlantis, how to fight, survive and the limits to which the body can reach before breaking. You either qualify, or you die.This book… wow, this book! Even thought there are a LOT of dystopian YA novels out there at the moment, this is DEFINITELY worth the read. It’s kind of a combination between Hunger Games and Harry Potter… somehow. You are immersed into this world of space shuttles, sound controlled technology and hover boards and just FEEL like you’re experiencing everything along with the characters. It is incredibly well written with a pace that keeps you on the edge of your seat throughout and grips you in all the best ways.Each and every character within this book is interesting as they all struggle through their own personal developments and battles. The Atlanteans add a touch of mystery and power, which somehow intimidates us through the words in the book in the same way as their interactions with the other characters.We actually gain knowledge through the book too thanks to our very intelligent protagonist and can really believe in the sci-fi elements in the book, which is something I personally struggle with usually. I can’t wait to learn more about Atlantis in the next book and see how certain relationships develop!For a 600 page book it was easy to read and digest and I was left wanting more at the end. Some of the best topics covered in this novel are: life and death situations, tests of ability and competence, overcoming bullying, combat and the fighting style Er-Du, sabotage and terrorist groups and a love that you don’t know if you can trust.I had only a few niggles: (****SPOILERS****… kind of)How quickly candidates were prepared to kill after a strict “No Violence” rule, how bullying within the dorms went unnoticed and how easy it actually seems to qualify (since most around the main character never seem to get hurt or struggle even when ranked lowly). Overall a highly gripping, fast-paced book with lots to think about whilst eagerly waiting for the next instalment ☺
    • 4/5
      I haven't completed the book as yet, but 40% of the way through and I've purchased the second in the series. Yes, it's a bit wordy but not so much that I want to give up on it. I like sci fi style novels and this is pushing the right buttons. Perfect for the frequent flying I do for work.
    • 5/5
      This book is similar in many ways to The Testing, by Joelle Charbonneau. Both heroines face multiple tests of their abilities, including life or death races. The Testing is heavier on tests while Qualify is heavier on challenges. Both books involve an untrustworthy love interest and sabotage from the inside.What makes this book unique is that the heroine's siblings are all struggling to qualify for a slot on the ships to Atlantis at the same time. And that they're all being trained as part of the qualifying process.What I found strange was how the rules specifically forbid fighting between the candidates, while a great deal of bullying went on, oftentimes right under the noses of the instructors. I was expecting there to be a revelation that Atlantis believes in survival of the fittest, and giving in to bullies makes you weak, but no, both the bullies and their victims stay.I'm very much looking forward to the next book, which seems to also revolve around a competition; a topic I'm always interested in.I received an electronic copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      What a great book! This story is set in the year 2047, when the earth is being threatened by an asteroid. There seems to be no way to avoid total destruction but for a lucky few there might be a chance for escape. The citizens of the ancient city of Atlantis who fled the earth years ago for an alien planet, have returned to save as many people as they can. In order to be saved you must be a teenager and you must first Qualify for rescue. The Atlanteans don't have room for everyone so they have set up a Qualification process and will only be taking the winners. The story centers around Gwen Lark and her two brothers and sister from Vermont as they make the attempt to Qualify so they can survive. The story goes on to follow the Larks and their friends through the many levels of competition. It is a long and complicated journey but I found myself wanting more when the book ended and I am looking forward to the next book in the series. The real strength of this book is in the world building and character development. I really felt like I knew the world the Larks were living in and I am really looking forward to the trip to Atlantis. The only thing I missed was a little more development of the other main characters. The story really centers on Gwen but I would have loved to see what her siblings were doing in their own competitions occasionally. All in all a great, exciting book!I received a free, e-copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

      1 person found this helpful

    Book preview

    Qualify - Vera Nazarian

    Chapter 1

    March, 2047.

    Today is a day like any other day. Only it’s not.

    Today the Qualification tests begin—at all designated schools, and public sites in remote places where they don’t have schools, all across the country and around the world—and everyone in my family is trying to pretend things are as usual.

    I am at the messy kitchen counter chewing the breakfast scrambled eggs while the smart wall TV is blaring in the living room. Mom has her back turned and she is leaning over the stove making another skillet, which apparently is burning. I watch Mom’s fragile stooped back, the collar of the flannel pajama top, and the yellow cotton scarf covering her head, bald from the most recent round of chemo. The air is thick with garlic and scalded toast and things unspoken. No one else is up yet.

    Need some help burning the house down, Mom? I say, in-between tasteless bites. Normally I love cheesy garlic eggs, but not today. Today, nothing has a taste. Especially not my forced humor.

    Thanks, she says, without turning around. But no, I think I am managing just fine with the arson.

    M-m-m-m, I say. The skillet makes another grand hiss.

    Voices of various morning news show talking heads sound from the living room TV smart wall. Qualify or die is repeated often. I imagine there’s a running marquee with that phrase, interspersed with stock tickers and national weather and the continuing coverage of the mystery of a missing plane that disappeared thirty-three years ago, while the footage of the asteroid and then the Atlantis ships hanging in the skies like balloons among the clouds is running on repeat in a small lower window of the screen. Unfortunately that’s the spot of the smart wall surface with the greatest number of bad pixels. Our old wall needs an upgrade, but it’s not going to happen now that the world is about to end.

    They’ve been showing the same footage for the last three months. The asteroid is dramatic, a blazing white monster against black space. It’s hurtling at us head-on. And then it’s always followed by the video clip of the same famous spaceship disk, silvery metallic monolith, miles above the New York skyline. Most of Manhattan ground level is two feet underwater these days, but the skyscrapers remain active centers of business and make for a dramatic backdrop amid the street canals congested with taxi speedboat traffic. There are hundreds of other spaceships of course, all around the country and the world, but they only show the definitive New York one, with the Empire State Building in the frame. The ones here in Vermont, over Burlington, Montpelier, and St. Albans, don’t warrant national coverage.

    George comes into the kitchen. His dark brown hair is sticking up more than usual, which means he’s been tossing and turning all night, and probably had very little sleep, much like me. He looks bleary-eyed too, and his good-looking angular face is stuck in a frown. He’s wearing black jeans and a grey hoodie.

    Hey, I mumble at my seventeen-year-old older brother, and he only gives me the hard thoughtful look. How well I know it, since it’s the same look that I’ve seen in the mirror this morning as I tried to comb the snags out of my own brown hair, long, wavy and unruly, and stared into my hard blue eyes. Grumpy and thoughtful runs in our family. Or at least with some of us. George and I are alike that way, prone to serious, prone to scary quicksilver moods interspersed with sarcasm. And now that Mom’s really sick, we stopped laughing altogether.

    Good thing our two younger siblings don’t particularly share this hang-up. Twelve-year-old Grace has always been a giggle machine and chatterbox—though lately she gets weird anxiety attacks at night and has trouble falling asleep, then can’t wake up on time in the morning, and is always late. Dad thinks it’s because she is right on the border of the cutoff age for the Qualification, and it can go either way for her today. So she’s been quietly freaking out.

    As for Gordon, fourteen and sure of himself, he just hums whatever’s playing in his earbuds, and smirks a lot, also quietly, even when he fiddles with his art and woodcrafts stuff. Gordie is convinced he will not Qualify, but he claims he does not care—which is of course crazy, but if it makes it easier for him to deal, then what can be said?

    Have some eggs, George, Mom says. Grab a plate.

    I’m not hungry. My brother pours himself a glass of cheap apple juice.

    "Yes, you are. You’ll need it. You can’t run all day on that sugary swill. And it’s going to be a very long day." Mom turns around and grimaces, looking at the transparent yellowish baby-food liquid that George loves so much. Mom’s skin has an unhealthy grey tint, and at the same time her face is reddened by the heat of the kitchen stove. Both her hands are shaking slightly with the usual tremors. But there is determined focus in her watery blue eyes. I stare at her and see the effort she is making. Margot Lark, my mother, is the strongest person I know.

    You shouldn’t be doing this. You shouldn’t be cooking. George frowns and gulps down half a glass of juice at once. I watch his Adam’s apple move with each swallow, in tandem with the muscles of his lean neck.

    I am not cooking. You call this cooking? Mom smiles, throwing me a wink, in an attempt to get me to make my usual sarcastic commentary that indicates I still have a pulse.

    It’s pretty good, actually, I say, making a show of forking a large piece and chewing and swallowing with enjoyment, even though I am tasting nothing and my insides are filled with rocks. Where’s everyone else?

    I heard Gee Three flush the toilet. George reluctantly takes a plate and Mom dumps half a skillet of cheesy yellow eggs onto it.

    In case it’s unclear, we’re the Four Gees, in order of birth: George, Gwenevere, Gordon, Grace. I still don’t get it why our parents decided to use names starting with the letter G for naming all their kids. Mom says she wanted a neat musical pattern to it, and for us to sound elegant. Mom is a classical opera singer—or was, before she got sick—so elegant is important to her. Dad says it was an old tradition on his mother’s Italian side of the family to use the same initial letter. Honestly, whatever. But everyone in school now calls us the Four Gees, and we’re stuck with it.

    Gracie still in bed? Mom continues, without glancing at George.

    You bet. Want me to go drag her out?

    Mom shakes her head, wipes a dot of skillet splatter off her nose with the back of her hand, still holding a greasy spatula. No, let her sleep a bit longer. Your father will get her when he comes down. Give them another fifteen minutes. And now I want you to eat.

    George shrugs. Whatever. She’ll make everyone late again.

    No. You’ll be fine.

    I am still chewing the eggs, swallowing them dutifully like lumps of unknown stuff, and now I feel a familiar pang of fear twist my guts.

    We’ll be fine. Somehow hearing this makes it worse, brings it all home.

    Today’s the day. The day we’ve been prepping ourselves for, emotionally, psychologically, for weeks and months. And when I say we, that’s pretty much everyone on this planet. Teens and their parents. And all the people who care about them. And really, everyone else too, since they get to watch. They get to find out—even though they themselves are out of the picture, out of the running—they get to witness us make it or fail.

    Today we Qualify for rescue, for Atlantis.

    Or we don’t—which means we’ll die together with all the rest of the world when the asteroid hits Earth, in about nineteen months from now. . . .

    There’s no way to stop it.

    But at least for some of us, there is Atlantis.

    Turns out, Atlantis is not a myth. It’s ancient history. There really was a great continent by that name in ancient times, somewhere in the middle of what we now call the Atlantic Ocean, spanning the infamous Bermuda Triangle, the Bahamas, and beyond, and it was home to a very advanced high-tech civilization that stretched around the globe. Supposedly, they had computers, the internet, super-medicine, weapons of mass destruction, probably gaming consoles, and all kinds of other incredible or obnoxious stuff even more sophisticated than our own modern equivalents.

    And then something happened. Maybe they did it to themselves—basically ruined the planet, kind of like what we’re doing now with the environment and other species, the out-of-control pollution, carbon dioxide imbalance and resulting cascade of climate change. Or maybe it was Mother Nature, at least in part.

    Because at some point more than twelve thousand years ago, something huge and terrible took place—a mega-cataclysm on such a scale that it caused a whole continent to disappear without a trace, in earthquakes and floods and who knows what—and wiped the high-level civilization off the face of the planet. To escape this global disaster—we are told—the people of Atlantis used their advanced technology to leave Earth and flee to the stars. They eventually established a human colony on a habitable planet.

    They called this colony planet Atlantis, or whatever’s the equivalent in their language, in memory of their own ancient roots on Earth, to honor their native civilization and the terrestrial continent of their birth that started it all.

    And now, after all these thousands of years, they’re back. They returned to Earth, their ancient home world, and they are here to help. That is, the distant descendants of the original Atlantean colonists are here to help. They claim to be one hundred percent human and supposedly not all that different from ourselves—if you don’t count the thousands of generations of separate evolution and branching off to live in an alien environment. Yeah, right.

    Anyway, the Atlanteans share our DNA and they’re our cousins. And, just like cousins, it makes them either weird or welcome guests.

    Right now, they are desperately welcome and desperately needed. The asteroid brought them here—or, like some paranoid people in the media say, maybe they brought the asteroid.

    Whichever it is, at this point, Atlantis is all we’ve got.

    When the news of the lethal asteroid first broke, months ago, almost simultaneously the Atlantean spaceships appeared in the skies all over the world. It’s as if they’ve been watching us, and waiting to make first contact. The asteroid just gave them the excuse.

    Okay, at first it was a huge global mess. World governments going into panic mode and military overdrive, people on the streets screaming about alien invasions, religious fundamentalists having a field day, scientists having aneurisms, stock markets crashing worldwide, to the tune of billions.

    But once the Atlantean shuttles landed, and we saw them to be human and not little green men or big green lizards, it was okay. They met with representatives of governments, the United Nations, and were received with caution and eventually with open arms. We are you, they told us in various languages of Earth. How they knew our languages is unclear, but it’s probably some kind of advanced tech, or they’ve been listening in on us for far longer than we know. They explained who they were—which is kind of insane if you think about it, all that mythic stuff that Plato wrote about is mostly true—and demonstrated some of their amazing technology.

    Only it wasn’t all that amazing when it came to the asteroid.

    Yes, they tried moving it and changing the path of its trajectory, and all kinds of other advanced science stuff, in conjunction with global space agencies and the three International Space Stations we currently have—the largest one in Earth orbit, a second small one on the surface of the Moon, and the barely functional newest one on Mars. They even landed on the asteroid’s surface and drilled and took samples. But nothing worked, at least not enough to make a difference. The asteroid is going to hit Earth and it is going to cause nuclear winter at best. And at worst—well, let’s just say there may not be much of this planet left after the impact. . . .

    However, not all is lost. Because the Atlanteans are going to save as many of us as possible and take us back with them—back to the colony planet Atlantis, a fertile blue-green world that’s supposed to be beautiful beyond belief, with a golden-white sun and not one but three moons.

    To that effect, they have brought enough spaceships to carry millions of people—ten million, to be precise. It sounds great but means they can only rescue a very small portion of the general Earth population of eight point five billion—no more than can fill their present fleet of monolith silver ships, since there is no time for multiple trips between Earth and Atlantis before the asteroid strikes.

    There is only one condition for rescue. Those lucky few that get to board the Atlantis ships have to be young people between the ages of eleven and twenty—teenagers.

    Capable, talented, special teenagers.

    The best of the best on Earth.

    And the only way to determine who these teens will be is to make them pass Qualification. . . .

    Qualify or die.

    The smart wall in the living room is playing TV snippets of a canned interview with the President. Later tonight she will address the nation live. . . . But for now it’s old footage. President Katherine Donahue is speaking in her usual droning and soothing voice that’s powerful and at the same time conciliatory, in that nasty mixture that only politicians manage. Our children and we must be brave together, but rest assured, no one’s giving up and we hold them in our prayers as Qualification looms and the ultimate survival and benefit of humanity might ultimately depend on well-orchestrated air strikes are some of the phrases heard.

    Same old junk they’ve been saying for months, as soon as they figured out that nothing substantial could be done to stop the asteroid, and that the Atlanteans are not all-powerful after all, despite what everyone hoped.

    Thing is, the governments, the global leaders, the media, the scientists, the talking heads—they all feel the guilt-ridden need to keep talking, keep trying, even up to the last, even as the world goes up in flames or ash clouds or whatever. Vaporware Hope, as Dad calls it, is one way to fill up the void between now and the end.

    Sure, there’s Qualification. But for the human spirit that’s just not good enough. To that end, there are also numerous space missions being prepped by the United Nations and private conglomerates, by individual governments and science agencies. Everyone’s building shuttles, rockets and payload delivery systems, whatever that means, to see if they can blast the asteroid into manageable bits or move it out of the fatal earth-contact trajectory. Meanwhile, others are building spaceship arks, just to get off the planet—kind of like the ancient Atlanteans themselves did, thousands of years ago. I guess they think, maybe if they can just get far enough away from the blast and resulting atmospheric turbulence, the Atlanteans might guide them the rest of the way?

    The Atlanteans observe these various efforts sadly, and have indeed volunteered to assist to the best of their abilities. But the reality remains grim, there’s not all that much that can be done, at least not for the majority of living beings on Earth. The asteroid is huge and supposedly made up of mostly heavy metals and some other newly discovered stuff that makes it pretty much impossible to move or damage—or so they say. And as for escape, there are simply too many people, animal species, and too few ships.

    President Donahue’s words are cut off briefly with video-bytes of breaking news, basically public unrest worldwide, demonstrations around school buses that are supposed to take us all to the Qualification sites, various local police forces in riot gear, and people screaming and throwing rocks and demanding justice. Please! Just save my baby! a woman somewhere in the Midwest is crying in a crazed voice of despair. What good are my tax dollars with all your idiot scientists and useless military and failed national defense? Why can’t you nuke that space rock and save us!

    The stairs creak softly under Dad’s familiar steady footsteps. He comes down, fully dressed in his nice beige blazer, black shirt, brown slacks, tweed vest. And he’s wearing a tie, which is a rare thing. My father, Charles Lark, is the epitome of academia, with his rimless spectacles, somewhat tousled, wavy brown hair and greying temples. He is a professor of classics and history at the local University, and is exactly what you might think that means. Smart, and a little eccentric, and living mostly inside his head, his lesson plans, and research, with plenty of oddball stories and trivia to tell to his kids.

    Let’s please turn the awful TV off, Dad says tiredly. He is bleary-eyed too, and he is immediately looking at Mom.

    Good morning! Mom throws him a cheerful look and turns her back again. I thought all of you might want some real breakfast today. Coffee’s ready.

    How are you feeling? You really shouldn’t be up so early, straining yourself. Dad goes directly for the coffee maker.

    Are you kidding? This is good for me. Besides, I would never miss seeing all of you off today, of all days.

    Why, what’s today? George says grimly.

    From the living room now comes the familiar voice of the Atlantean Fleet Commander giving his now famous inspirational speech to the United Nations. The voice is soft, rich and musical. It is pleasant in timbre despite the strange lilting accent, and the Atlantean is speaking perfect English. Which is all kind of amazing. And yet it makes my skin crawl with new pangs of fear. Because there’s all that strange, leashed power in that voice, and it’s held back somehow. How do I know this? I don’t, I have no idea. But Commander Manakteon Resoi (try saying that three times) with his pleasant, sonorous voice, his fixed handsome face, metallic-golden blond hair and contrasting black eyebrows that seems to be typical of his ethnicity, gives me the creeps. Especially when he talks about humanitarian efforts amid failure of hope and technological impetus and a new era for Earth and Atlantis.

    I hate that Goldilocks guy and his BS, George mumbles.

    Goldilocks. That’s the derogatory term being used lately to refer to Atlanteans, because supposedly they all color their hair metallic gold, which is a fashion statement. Or maybe it’s an indicator of rank. No one’s sure. Apparently, gold’s so common and abundant on Atlantis, that it’s considered a base metal. . . .

    In that moment, the stairs groan as Gracie and Gordie come downstairs one after the other, Gracie trailing. My younger brother Gordon is slight and skinny, lacking the sinewy strength and height of George, and with brown hair that’s several shades lighter and so short it’s almost buzzed. He’s wearing his usual dingy jeans and faded black sweatshirt with paint stains on it. And his rimless glasses have dirty finger spots you can see from several feet away.

    Gracie is last. She is a younger version of me, tall and slim, except without any curves and with straight long hair that’s dirty blond instead of dark like mine. Gracie is dressed up in pastel pink skinny jeans and a black sweater with sequins. She is wearing black eyeliner, mascara and lip gloss, and gaudy plastic bangles on her wrists. Normally Mom would say something about the eye junk and the lip gloss, but today Grace Lark gets to wear whatever she likes—whatever gives her strength.

    All right, Mom says. Everyone, get plates, these cheesy eggs are pure magic!

    Thanks, Mom. Pile it on. Gordie heads right for the kitchen counter and pulls up a chair, while Gracie stops in the middle of the kitchen and stares. Her face is very pale, and she looks sickly, despite her mascara and lip gloss. Or maybe because of it.

    Gracie, honey, don’t waste time, please. Mom picks up a clean plate and starts filling it.

    I don’t want any eggs.

    Dad sits down nearby at the small side table with his mug of coffee and a plate of eggs. Your Mom got up early and made the breakfast, and you should eat it.

    Grace is frowning. I hate eggs, and I’m not really hungry.

    Okay. Mom sighs. How about a banana and toast? You need to eat something today. You know you do.

    We’re out of bananas, I recall. Gracie, come on, why don’t you just eat the eggs, just this once, okay? They’re really good! Yummy-yum-yum! Protein and fuel!

    Gracie shrugs. I can’t believe she is this quiet. She’s not even calling me an idiot.

    We have ten minutes, George says. Move it, Gee Four.

    Gracie silently slips onto a chair at the counter and reaches for a slice of toast.

    A few minutes later we’re in the old minivan, headed for school, with Dad at the wheel. We still feel Mom’s tight desperate hugs and ringing-hard kisses on our cheeks. In my mind, she’s still standing at the porch, waving, and her eyes are red and swimming in tears as she watches us drive away. If we Qualify, this will be the last time we ever see Mom. Already I am fixing this image of her, searing it into memory.

    Usually George drives us in his peeling truck, but today Dad is bringing us in, as if to make sure we are delivered properly in time for the Qualification tests. All our duffel bags are packed in the trunk, in addition to the usual school backpacks. Everything’s according to the official Qualification instructions that have been handed out, weeks in advance, by the schools that are designated RQS, or Regional Qualification Sites. Our bags contain a basic travel kit, a change of clothing, and a few personal items that are up to us. The assumption is, if we advance in the Qualification preliminary stage, we will be taken directly to the Regional Qualification Centers where the next stage of the process will take place. And we don’t get to say goodbye to anyone.

    My duffel bag has a few of my favorite books including The Iliad, The Odyssey, The 101 Dalmatians, and The Birthgrave. Okay, it has a lot of books, and is heaviest, almost exceeding the forty pounds limit. That’s because these are actual honest-to-goodness books, printed on paper. Yeah, you heard that right. Some of them are rare collector editions from Dad’s library. Dad often says that an electromagnetic pulse or EMP disaster can strike any moment and destroy our digital information storage capability, so he’s been hoarding the paper print editions like precious treasure for most of his life. His personal library is amazing. And now here’s my chance to save some of those classics before the asteroid takes them first.

    In addition to the load of books, my bag also has a small pouch of trinkets. There are family photos, a tiny rose crystal Pegasus figurine, and a sterling silver dancing fairy locket my parents gave me for my sixteenth birthday a few months ago. It’s not electronic-enhanced smart jewelry, but it has heart.

    George has chosen to pack close to nothing of personal value, only an extra pair of running shoes and some flat rectangular thing wrapped in brown paper, plus a bunch of paper books for Dad’s sake. In contrast, Gordie’s duffel has micro-bead CDs, rare sheet music, and his skinny Backpacker travel guitar, in addition to his favorite weird quartz pieces from his extensive rock collection, a purple geode, a Swiss Army knife, a portable color pen-and-pencil art box, and a sketchbook. As for Gracie, she has taken her costume jewelry including a pair of latest version smart earrings, a cosmetics pouch, and her flute. And yeah, more of Dad’s books.

    I stare outside the window at the bleary landscape. It’s March, but snow is still on the ground, and the sky is overcast.

    However, as I stare southeast, the Atlantean ship in the sky over St. Albans can be seen in the corner of the window, through the tall pine and maple trees. From this distance it looks like a flattened weather balloon, silvery metal. In reality, I know it is massive, almost a mile in diameter. It hovers, motionless, silent, eternal.

    Gordie, Gracie, George, my Dad, all of us glance at it periodically.

    George is up in the front passenger seat next to Dad, and he voice commands the car radio on. Immediately there is a blast of riot noise, and the radio deejay comes on with frenzied commentary. The mayors of Chicago, St. Louis, Dallas, and Inland Los Angeles are being interviewed about the ramifications of crowd control and widespread urban looting, and next up, expert practical advice from a pop psychologist at something dot com: Five Tips for Teens—how to maximize your chances to Qualify today.

    Oh great, do we have to listen to this? Dad says.

    George invokes the scan function on the radio and it jumps to a music station.

    No, don’t turn it off! Gracie clutches the back of George’s seat. I want to hear the five tips!

    No, you don’t.

    "Yes I do!"

    George groans.

    Gordie just stares out the window with blissful indifference and his earbuds are crackling with his own entertainment.

    All right. Dad is turning off the main highway onto a smaller road that’s near our high school and Gracie’s middle school, both in the same complex. Our schools are a designated Regional Qualification Site. The traffic is busier than usual, as parents from other school districts are dropping off their children, and everyone wants to be on time. Car horns are blaring. We make the turn into school grounds and the rows of yellow buses are already lined up in the parking lot, ready to take those of us who are lucky enough to pass the preliminaries on to the next stage of Qualification, hours later.

    You want five tips? Dad says seriously. I’ll give you five tips. Number one—

    "I don’t want your tips! I want what that program was going to say!" Gracie’s voice rises in that same whiny awful noise that has been produced by her for weeks now, whenever something doesn’t go her way.

    Oh, jeez— George shakes his head.

    I want to hear Dad, I say.

    Gracie turns around and glares at me. Her hand is still clutching the back of the seat in front of her with a white-knuckled grip.

    Speak fast, Dad, because we’re almost here.

    I see my father’s sad, drawn expression reflected in the rear view mirror. He looks old suddenly, old and exhausted. He takes a silent breath and pushes his spectacles up his nose. Tip number one—be yourself. Number two—do the best you can under the circumstances and never let fear control you and make you freeze. Number three—okay— He pauses and I see him make the tired effort to say something constructive and hopeful. Number three—listen to your gut instinct, always. Your gut is one smart buddy there. Listen to it. Number four—never give up. Never, ever, ever, times infinity. Number five—make the choice that will ultimately make you feel good inside about yourself—as a human being. That’s always the right choice.

    Are you done? Gracie says.

    Dad sighs. You know how hard it is for all of us, Grace. Take a big breath. All right, we’re almost there.

    Thanks for the words of wisdom, Dad. That’s actually gold in thar’ them hills. I bet you wrote it up last night in your lecture notes. Am I right? George mumbles while looking straight ahead, as he begins to get ready to unbuckle his seatbelt even before we are parked.

    Yeah, well, Dad says. What if I did? Couldn’t let you all go without saying something brilliant to help you remember your old man by. There’s actually more, but I thought the ‘five tips’ gave me a nice excuse to summarize. Want to hear the rest? No? I didn’t think so. It was worth a try.

    The minivan is still crawling along in a line of cars through the parking lot and onto the football field that has been designated as supplementary parking. Security guards stand, waving the cars into parking spots or designated drop-off points. There are also several media news vans and vehicles with video and sound equipment. Even now, they are filming us live. It’s weird to think, but all that’s happening right now is being recorded, is breaking news. . . .

    We stop not too far from the side entrance to the main school building, in the yellow zone. Kids and parents are everywhere, opening cars, carrying bags. Many people are crying.

    We get out, and Dad pops the trunk, which sails open slowly.

    Shivering in my jacket from the chill morning air, I stand waiting for George to get his duffel bag, while Gordie has his already. Grace stands right behind me, breathing down my neck.

    Dad stops the engine and comes around to help us. Or more likely he is gathering himself for the big goodbye.

    I glance around, seeing students I know, other classmates, heading up the stairs and inside, past security. Carrie Willis, a girl from my class rushes by with tear-reddened eyes, dragging a bulky, ugly purple-and-orange travel bag that’s rolling along on squeaky wheels. Her mom and some other relatives watch below, waving and sobbing.

    Gordie watches her also, shakes his head and adjusts the strap of his heavy duffel bag, then pulls his knitted ski hat over his reddened ears. This is all seriously messed up.

    Yeah, that one there seriously needs new luggage. George steps back, shouldering his bag and his backpack with muscular ease.

    "No, I mean, this, all of this situation—she, they, us, everyone, the world," Gordie says.

    I lean forward and take my turn with my stuff. It feels surreal, like someone else is going through the motions. My backpack is hoisted up and lands on my back with a thud that’s lessened by the stuffed lining of my winter jacket. I adjust the straps on both arms, then reach for the heavier duffel.

    Gracie is starting to sniffle behind me, and I hear Dad embrace her in a bear hug.

    Well, this is it.

    I suddenly feel a burning in my eyes. In the back of my throat a huge horrible lump is gathering. No, I am not going to cry.

    But the pressure is building in my sinuses, and as I keep my eyes open wide, afraid to blink, already I can feel the first stupid fat teardrop starting to well in one eye, as my vision gets blurry. I back away from the minivan, while Gracie disengages from Dad’s hug, wipes her face with the back of her hand—which smears her eyeliner on one side—and goes for her bag with trembling hands.

    I stand watching the peeling spots of paint on the wall of the school building, while blurs of students are going past me up the stairs. I am momentarily distracted from needing to bawl by the familiar faces. Mindy Erikson walks by with her stuff, and her flaming red hair. . . . There goes football jock Nick Warren and his younger brother, whatshisname.

    Gwen, honey . . . Dad’s voice cuts through everything, and it makes me turn around and look at him, and face him at last.

    Here, my sweet girl, there you go, Dad says, reaching out for me, and I meet his eyes, and it breaks me completely. Dad. . . . This is my dad, and he is going to die.

    I am glad that next comes the great big hug so he doesn’t see me start to lose it. Instead I lose myself in his chest, and crush my face against the beige blazer, and think about how he’ll have to have it dry cleaned to get my stupid tears and snot off the fabric. I stay that way for several moments, shaking silently, feeling Dad’s powerful embrace and smelling the faint aftershave and wool scent of his clothes.

    My brave, smart Gwen, Dad says in my ear. Love you, honey, stay strong! Promise me, never give up! Watch out for your sister and brothers—

    Love you, Dad, I will. . . .

    I let go, and stand back, and smear my face with the back of my hand, and that’s it.

    I watch Dad take Gordie in a quick tight hug, and pat his back, and then George, who evades the hug and instead gets a grownup handshake.

    Well, this is it, Dad says. He takes a symbolic step back and nods at us, and says, God speed, go on, all of you! I promise you, the Lark family will Qualify, hands down, all four of you! I see Dad’s eyes are sort of red too, as he just stands there, looking at us through his spectacles.

    George nods briefly, and just for a moment he is suspended, motionless, like a post. He turns and gives the rest of us a serious look. Okay! Let’s do this. See you on the flip side. And George heads up the stairs.

    Gordie follows, trudging silently.

    Gracie and I take a moment longer, to give Dad another last look.

    Go on! he says. Don’t be late now, hurry! Your Mom and I are rooting for you one hundred percent. Go!

    And so I take my sister by the arm, and pull her along, and we start up the steps.

    We enter the school building without looking around again at Dad.

    It’s easier this way.

    Chapter 2

    In the hallway, the crowds are insane, with many unfamiliar faces from other neighboring schools. The Qualification instructions say we are supposed to report to our own homerooms. Meanwhile the strangers are assigned as extras to our own classrooms and herded around campus by teachers, to begin the Qualification process.

    In moments the Lark siblings are all separated. Gracie gives me a deer-in-the-headlights last look as she is made to go to an adjacent building with other middle schooler seventh graders. George’s a senior, so he heads upstairs to his own homeroom. Gordon’s freshman class homeroom is far down the hall to the right on the ground floor.

    I’m a junior and my homeroom is downstairs in the basement floor past the rows of lockers. Just as the bell rings, I move quickly down the stairwell, jostling past classmates and trying to keep my head down, out of years of habit. Nerds and smart achiever kids like me have learned it’s best to minimize eye contact, because we get punished for it by the usual suspects.

    I enter the classroom, grab my seat in the second row near the front, stuff my bags under my feet, and watch others start filling their seats. My homeroom teacher, Mrs. Grayland, is already at her desk, looking anxious and exhausted, and it’s not even 8:00 AM yet. Next to her, some unfamiliar woman administrator is standing at the board, dressed in a suit jacket and skirt. She has a red-green-blue-yellow striped armband wrapped around her sleeve, which is the familiar color swatch of Atlantis. She is in no way Atlantean herself—no, she looks too bland and homegrown-stocky to be anything but local Earth material. I’m guessing she is simply a designated representative. However her expression is stone-blank and authoritative.

    Hey, Gwen. . . . Ann Finnbar takes the seat next to me. I glance at Ann’s freckled nose and stressed expression. I am glad my closest friend shares homeroom with me this semester, because I really don’t want to be alone right now.

    Hey. . . . So—ready for this thing? I try to speak lightly. It’s not like you can prepare or study for it.

    Ann shakes her head and grimaces painfully, then bends down and starts messing with her bags on the floor. I notice her hands are shaking.

    A boy I don’t recognize sits down on the other side of me. The classroom is filling up quickly. There are additional chairs that have been brought in, and I see many completely unfamiliar faces of students from other schools. There are more desk rows than usual, so everyone is packed closer together, and for once every seat is taken. At some point they run out of desks and chairs and, a few latecomer students end up in the back of the classroom and at the sides, sitting on the floor against the walls. Voices are high-strung, angry, and there are a few nervous giggles.

    Good morning, everyone, for those of you not from Mapleroad Jackson High School, I am Mrs. Grayland. Our homeroom teacher clears her throat to silence the noise and talk. All right, I am going to take roll call, so please everyone find your seats and keep your desks clear. The faster you settle down, the faster we can begin. When I say your name, listen closely, because I will read your next designated classroom number. That’s where you will be going to take the next portion of the Qualification test. Write it down. Now, let’s begin. Abbott, Gary—

    Here!

    You’ll be going to room 115-B. Andrew, Nancy—room 25-C.

    My eyes switch back and forth from Mrs. Grayland as she reads names, and the other woman, who is standing motionless, holding her hands together behind her back. The white board behind them has the words Qualification Day written in large letters. I stare at the letters and almost start to space out.

     . . . Lark, Gwenevere. Room 217-C.

    Here! My normally low voice sounds abrupt, breathless and squeaky. For a moment even I don’t recognize it. As I turn slightly, I see Mark Gardner give me a hard and obnoxious smirk from a seat in the back. Big and burly, good looking and popular a-hole Mark’s one of my regular tormentors. You’d think that today of all days he’d have other, more pressing things on his mind, but I guess bullying does not take vacations, not even for end-of-the-world stuff.

    Next to Mark, there’s Jenny Hawls, his most recent girlfriend, equally bitchy and popular. She stares at me with her model-perfect pretty face, then flips her long honey-blond hair. She and Mark and another guy, Chris Jasper, exchange mocking looks and then cover their mouths. They’d started in on me early, at the end of the first semester of our freshman year, when they first noticed how I always raised my hand in class and spoke up, and seemed to know all the correct answers.

    I try not to think of them as I repeat in my mind, Room 217-C, over and over, even though I’d just jotted it down in my notebook.

    Mrs. Grayland is done with roll call. She turns to the woman in the suit and introduces her as Ms. Wayne, from Qualification, who is going to administer this first portion of the test.

    Ms. Wayne steps forward and begins with a canned introduction about Atlantis, our long-lost earth colony, the asteroid situation, and how the best and brightest of us have been given this lucky chance to save our lives in the face of this global misfortune, and how we are the hope of humanity. Qualification is for your own benefit, she says with a stone face. It is the most fair method of choosing the next generation, and instead of a chance lottery you have the opportunity to prove yourself and showcase your talents.

    The students around me stare, and again furious whispers are heard.

    Settle down, Mrs. Grayland says, then nods to Ms. Wayne to continue.

    This is the most important day of your life. Ms. Wayne looks around the room. You will be tested in more ways than you or I can imagine, and some of these tests may not seem to make sense. Please understand that we are only administering them as instructed by the Atlantis Central Agency, in cooperation with the federal government. All interpretation of the final results for each stage of Qualification will be made according to Atlantean criteria. We have no control whatsoever over test results or the final outcome. Nor have we set any of these criteria ourselves.

    What’s that mean? What criteria? a boy interrupts from the back.

    It means, we don’t know what kind of test answers are ‘correct’ and we don’t know what they are looking for.

    So how are we supposed to do the test? says another student, and her voice cracks with a hint of tears.

    Do your best. That’s all anyone can expect of you. Do the best you can, take your time with your answers, and good luck to all of you! And now, I am sorry, but I cannot answer any more questions. We need to begin. Ms. Wayne sighs, checks the clock, and suddenly she is no longer just an automaton in a suit but a tired ordinary woman.

    She turns to Mrs. Grayland, and they both begin passing out test booklets, answer sheets, and number two pencils.

    "Clear your desks of everything, and please put away all phones and electronic devices—that includes smart jewelry—keep it turned off. And— Ms. Wayne pauses meaningfully—Please don’t bother cheating. Truth be told, this is one test on which you cannot cheat."

    There are more whispers throughout the classroom.

    Now, Ms. Wayne continues, coming around the room. This is the general knowledge portion of Qualification. It includes math and science and history and spelling and analytical sections. And yes, it is long. We do not know how much weight it carries in the overall examination. Format is standardized multiple choice, intentionally low-tech paper and pencil, because no computer use was designated for this portion. However you should all be sufficiently familiar with this. Be sure to use your pencils to fill in the bubbles in their entirety.

    Groans are heard all around the room. Excuse me, how do I use a pencil? someone cracks.

    Easy! Just stick it in your—

    Snickers start in waves.

    "Why on Earth do I need to take the SAT to get to Atlantis?" someone else whispers behind me. More snickers, quickly stifled.

    Mrs. Grayland stops by my desk and hands me the test materials, then moves over to Ann’s, and then the next person.

    I stare at the super-thick text booklet. It’s so thick it’s ridiculous. It’s got a pale blue cover and a printed Atlantis logo of some kind of cube. I’ve seen this stupid logo before on TV, together with the four-color swatch. Supposedly it represents the Great Square in the constellation of Pegasus—the general region in space where the star system with the planet Atlantis is located.

    Everyone, please open your booklets and turn to the first page of the test. You have exactly an hour and forty-five minutes. This is critical—be sure to fill out your name portion in the front of the answer sheet before you do anything else. And now, begin.

    An hour and a half later, I fill in the last answer bubble, put down my pencil and look up. Most everyone else is still marking their answer sheet.

    The test was easy. At least I think it was. I feel confident about ninety percent of my answers, and if anything about this is an indicator of what’s to come, this bodes well for me totally acing Qualification.

    Yeah, right.

    Next to me Ann is still biting her pencil and has a few pages of the booklet to go. She gives me a dazed look then returns to her answer sheet.

    Ms. Wayne, who is pacing quietly through the rows of desks, and watching us like a hawk, immediately notices I am done, and comes up to me. I silently hand her my finished test.

    As I turn to watch Ms. Wayne’s retreating back, I see Jenny Hawls glare at me, before returning to her test. Jenny’s a dim bulb when it comes to schoolwork, so I am sure she is having a rotten time with the test material. If I weren’t so generally stressed, I’d feel a rare moment of satisfaction. But honestly, this is not the time for petty stuff—we’re all in this sorry mess together.

    Soon, the bell rings. The teachers tell us to put down our pencils. We are reminded that our names should be clearly marked on the answer sheets in order to get proper credit, and that we’re supposed to go on to our next designated classroom.

    Crud, I couldn’t even finish. It was so long! Ann is frowning as we grab our things and head outside into the hallway. How did you do?

    Okay, I guess, sort of. Some of the questions were super hard. I feel bad for Ann, so I underplay it. Ann’s smart and a good student, but she doesn’t always do all that well when it comes to timed, standardized tests. And this one’s life-and-death, literally.

    Easy for you to say. You always ace these things. I panicked. My brains turned to mush and left the building, right in the middle of it. She fiddles with her navy blue backpack and travel bag nervously, adjusting the shoulder strap. I wonder what she chose as her personal stuff to put in that duffel. What special items, to keep with her as mementoes of Earth, if she Qualifies and makes it to the stars? As though reading my mind, she glances meaningfully at her bag. I took antique family photo albums and two of my Grandpa’s wood carvings. And Mom’s pearl necklace—with an added smart phone bead, since Mom insisted. And my skating trophy.

    That’s great, I say. I’ll show you the stuff I’m taking, during lunch.

    You think they’ll let us break for lunch?

    I don’t see why not—

    Hey, move it, Finnbar and dork. Jeremy Carverson is shoving past us, and he snaps the strap of my maroon backpack. Stop taking up the hallway!

    Dork doesn’t even rhyme properly with Lark, but I am used to it.

    We break away and I mutter good luck, see you soon to Ann, then hurry upstairs to the second floor, to room 217-C. That’s three long flights of stairs from the basement, and by the time I get to the final landing, carrying both my heavy backpack and the book-stuffed duffel, I’m somewhat winded, to put it mildly. Okay, I am kind of dead. It occurs to me that if any part of Qualification involves going up many stairs while carrying luggage, I could be screwed.

    The classroom is one of the larger ones, and it’s already halfway full. It’s divided into rows of desks and additional chairs and a strange partitioned area that has a sign posted Testing Area. Do Not Enter. Two women teachers stand near the partition, and again one of them is wearing the four-color Atlantis armband. Since I don’t know either one of them, I am guessing the one without the armband is just faculty from another school, and the other’s from Qualification.

    The teachers watch us dispassionately as we enter the classroom. It’s the same beaten-down, resigned look in their eyes that most grownups have these days—a sad mixture of weary despair and grim acceptance. I am reminded once again that, as adults, they’ve had weeks and months of agonized panic, denial, and eventually resignation with impending death, to deal with. At least we have a shred of hope, while they’re all living on death row. They get to stay here on our doomed planet, and the best they can hope for is, if they have teenage children, maybe their kids might Qualify, so their DNA gets to be saved.

    Take your seats, please, one of them says in a voice with little inflection. When I call your name, you will come up here and be tested. This is an individual portion of the test. It is not timed, but should take no longer than five minutes per person. The rest of you please remain in your seats until your name is called. And no talking!

    I find an empty seat near the middle in the fourth row, between an unfamiliar round-faced girl with dark hair and some skinny kid in a grey hoodie, both of whom look way younger, like freshmen. And it occurs to me that this is a mixed classroom, not just juniors like me. Pretty weird to be taking a test with people from other grades.

    I look around the room and I see some familiar people I know from my class, and a few seniors and sophomores. Everyone’s muttering, whispering, students are looking around warily, and I see fear and uncertainty in their eyes.

    And then my stomach drops out from under me, and suddenly I am ice-cold and scalding-hot at the same time. Logan Sangre is sitting only a few seats in front of me and to the right, in the second row.

    Logan Sangre. . . .

    Dark hair, longish and wavy, a rare black with rich brown highlights. Olive skin, chiseled angular features, dreamy hazel brown eyes, and the longest dark lashes I’ve ever seen on a boy. Add to that, wide shoulders, muscled arms underneath his black hoodie, long and powerful runner’s legs encased in black jeans, and perfectly defined abs that belong on a classical Greek statue.

    Logan Sangre, a senior, the hottest guy in Mapleroad Jackson High, and an all-around amazing combination of track star athlete and honor roll student. Beauty and brains. He can have his pick of any girl, any time. And as far as I know, he does, because they’re always falling all over him—though I think he might be between girlfriends now, since I haven’t seen him hanging around Joanie Katz, his latest GF, for more than a week. . . . And, oh yeah, he’s got time to play lead guitar in a band. Just kill me now.

    It’s such a cliché to say it, but Logan Sangre is completely out of my league. Like, miles-to-the-Moon out of my league. And he doesn’t know that I exist. I’ve been crushing on Logan since my first month of freshman year, which makes it three years now—from the very start when we first moved to Vermont from California to get away from the West Coast and all its disastrous mess. Pacific coastal radiation was determined to be the primary cause of Mom getting sick, so Dad got his University of Vermont faculty position, and we all ended up attending Mapleroad Jackson School.

    Anyway, Logan Sangre. What really got to me from day one was not so much his amazing hotness and good looks, but his confident coolness. Okay, that does not make sense, but see, there I go already, losing IQ points just thinking about him. And the fact that he regularly wins academic competitions makes it even worse. Sure he also brings in track-and-field trophies for our school, but come on, there are plenty of hot jocks out there. But how many of them are also mathletes and National Merit Scholars?

    So, yeah, Logan Sangre. Whenever I’m in the same room with him, I lose about 20 points off my IQ score and acquire a speech impediment and, I bet, a permanent skin rash from blushing so much. I pretty much cannot function within a twenty-foot radius of him. The funny thing is, we’ve never spoken a word. . . . Okay, except maybe once there was a sorry exchanged in the cafeteria when I nearly ran into him with my tray, my sophomore year. That was the one time he met my gaze and looked into my eyes directly with his dreamy dark ones, and of course that was precisely when I tripped on my own shoelaces and spilled milk all over my best pair of sneakers.

    The fact that Logan is in the same classroom with me now makes me crazy. How in the world will I be able to concentrate, to deal with Qualification and not make some kind of stupid klutz mistake? Logan Sangre is going to ruin everything.

    I take deep breaths and try to stare straight ahead and not to look at him, even though I am aware with every cell of my body that he’s right there, at the edge of my peripheral vision.

    Mrs. Bayard, the teacher with the Atlantis armband on her sleeve, calls the first name, and it doesn’t seem to be in alphabetical order, probably some kind of freaky Atlantis-only-knows order. I watch Mindy Clarence, a fellow junior, get up with a very pale face, and hesitate. Should I leave my bags here? she asks timidly.

    Up to you, sweetie. Go ahead and bring your things, if you like. But you won’t need them for the test. You can collect them on your way out.

    Mindy nods and leaves her bags lying under her desk. She walks through the classroom, then steps behind the partition with Mrs. Bayard.

    For a few seconds there’s silence. Then the whispering begins. The remaining teacher whose name I missed sits down in a chair right before the partition and watches us blandly, but does not shush us yet. She periodically checks the paperwork in her lap, then the clock on the wall.

    What’s happening there? a boy whispers behind me. What if it’s some kind of alien brain experiment thing where they take over your body and suck out your grey matter?

    A few nervous titters sound.

    They’re not aliens, stupid, they’re humans just like us, only from an ancient genetic branch— says a girl’s voice, also from the back.

    "How do you know?"

    The teacher up in the front looks up and says, Quiet, please.

    I sit and mostly stare ahead of me, running my fingers against the surface of my desk, sticky in places with old gum residue. And I throw occasional glances at Logan Sangre. He is leaning on one elbow and his posture is relaxed and casual, as if he’s not nervous in the least. He turns his head occasionally, and his gorgeous face is almost sleepy looking, that’s how calm he seems. His grey outer jacket is off, hanging from the back of his chair.

    I examine his long black sports bag on the floor next to his backpack, and wonder what personal things are inside. One of his guitars? If my baby brother managed to stuff his skinny portable guitar in a duffel, I wouldn’t be surprised if Logan did the same thing.

    A couple of minutes later, a funny noise comes from beyond the partition. Everyone immediately stares and the classroom goes really, really quiet as we all strain to listen.

    The weird noise comes again and it sounds like Mindy Clarence’s voice. She is saying Eeee or maybe singing. Weird! Eeeee, eeee-eeee-eee, eee-eee. . . .

    What did I tell you? the same boy hisses from the back. They’re sucking her dry!

    Shut up! someone else says in a genuinely frightened voice.

    The silence in the classroom is overpowering. Even the teacher in the front frowns and turns her head, appearing to listen.

    I watch and listen, transfixed. Even now I cannot help noticing the angular lines of Logan’s profile as he partially turns around then looks forward again. Just for a moment, our eyes seem to meet. . . .

    Mindy’s voice stops. A few seconds later, Mindy Clarence emerges from the partition, looking ordinary, if somewhat troubled, and heads back toward her empty desk. She picks up her stuff, shoulders the backpack and heads out the classroom door without a glance.

    The teacher up in the front marks down something on her paper, then calls out the next name.

    The next student to go up is an unfamiliar guy, probably a senior, and probably from another school. He walks with a swagger, but you know it’s all for show. He disappears behind the partition and again everyone’s staring and the whispers are down to a minimum. About two minutes into his test, we hear the boy’s voice. It cracks on a laugh at first, then he sings badly, Eeeee-eeee, eee-eeee.

    Someone in the back of the class snickers, and it starts a minor wave.

    A few girls in the front turn around with affronted looks.

    Soon the senior comes out, with a sheepish expression, then also goes for his bags and leaves the classroom.

    The next name is called. This goes on for about forty minutes, maybe an hour, maybe more, like an eternity—I can’t tell since the classroom clock is out of my line of sight—and by now the room is getting sparse, as people take the test and leave somewhere. The general classroom whispering resumes, but it keeps to regular levels. Except for a few stifled giggles, there’s no unusual reaction whenever a student being tested sings Eeee-eeee in a particularly awful way.

    I tense up when I hear the name Logan Sangre getting called. He gets up, tall and sleek, and calmly walks to the partition. Wow, I so envy him. If only I could bottle all that cool attitude and smear it all over me. . . .

    A few minutes pass and I hear Logan’s voice. It is confident and smooth, and has a nice velvety quality of a real practiced singer. It actually sounds good. I remember that Logan not only plays guitar but frequently sings vocals for his band, taking turns with the regular lead singer and his good bud, Josh Merrow.

    If Logan doesn’t ace Qualification, I don’t know who can.

    Soon Logan is done and I am gifted with the sight of him standing there for a moment as he emerges and looks around the classroom, then goes for his seat to grab his things. I watch him put on his grey windbreaker jacket, and sweep the black hair out of his eyes as he moves. He carries the large sports bag with ease, and for another moment I again wonder what’s inside.

    Logan’s gone and the room suddenly loses all its leashed electricity, like an energy balloon deflating in my mind. I am suddenly bored, and the nervous worry surges back full force, to sweep me in its relentless ocean. I return to staring at the front of the classroom, and listen to some poor girl sing Eeeee-eeee, terribly off-key.

    In some ways this feels like the longest class period of my life.

    At last, when the room is nearly empty, my name is called.

    Chapter 3

    My heart starts hammering as I walk behind the partition. Mrs. Bayard is sitting at a large table that appears to have all kinds of things and equipment on it. Gwenevere Lark? she confirms, glancing at a sheet.

    Yes.

    Take a seat please, right here, and try to relax. This will be very quick and painless, I promise. I will ask you to perform several brief tasks, some of which may seem a little odd or unusual. Just do them to the best of your ability.

    Okay. . . . I head over to the empty chair across from her. My hands rest in my lap, and I feel them clamming up.

    Mrs. Bayard places a blank sheet of paper on the table in front of me, and a pencil. Please write your full name on top of the page, on the left.

    I do as she asks, making a painful effort to print my name as clear and large as possible, since usually my handwriting is messy and kind of unreadable.

    When I look up, Mrs. Bayard is holding up

    Enjoying the preview?
    Page 1 of 1