Earth Afire (The First Formic War)

stand that.”
    Meilin suddenly looked on the verge of tears. “But you can’t ace the test, Bingwen. You just can’t. If you do, you’ll raise the bar. They’ll only consider children next year who ace the test. And that’s when I take it. They won’t even consider me.” And then she was crying, burying her face in her hands. Several children nearby shushed her, and Hopper rolled his eyes. “Here we go,” he said.
    Bingwen hopped down from his seat and went to her, putting an arm around her and guiding her into his cubicle with Hopper. “Meilin, you’re going to be fine. They won’t change the requirements.”
    “How do you know?” she said through tears.
    “Because Mr. Nong told me so. They’ve always done it this way.”
    “Hey, at least you have a fighting chance,” Hopper told her. “They’d never take me. Even if I did ace the test.”
    “Why not?” said Bingwen.
    “Because of my bad leg, mud brain. They’re not going to waste government funds on a cripple.”
    “Sure they will,” said Bingwen. “And you’re not a cripple.”
    “No? Then what would you call me?”
    “How do you know your legs aren’t perfect and the rest of us have bad legs?” said Bingwen. “Maybe you’re the only perfect human on Earth.”
    Hopper smiled at that.
    “But seriously,” said Bingwen. “They want minds, Hopper, not Olympic athletes. Look at Yanyu. She has a gimp arm, and she’s working on Luna doing important research.”
    “She has a gimp arm?” Hopper asked, suddenly hopeful. “I didn’t know that.”
    “And she types faster than I do,” said Bingwen. “So don’t say you don’t have a chance, because you do.”
    “Who’s Yanyu?” asked Meilin, wiping away the last of her tears.
    “Bingwen’s girlfriend,” said Hopper. “But I didn’t tell you that. It’s a secret.”
    Bingwen slapped him lightly on the arm. “She’s not my girlfriend. She’s a friend.”
    “And she works on Luna?” said Meilin. “That doesn’t make any sense. Why would anyone on Luna want to be your friend?”
    “I’ll try not to take offense at that,” said Bingwen.
    “She sent Bingwen something,” said Hopper. “Tell us what you think. Show her, Bingwen.”
    Bingwen glanced at Ms. Yí, the librarian, saw that she was still busy, and hit play. As Meilin watched, more children gathered. When it finished, there were no less than twelve children around the monitor.
    “It looks real,” said Meilin.
    “Told you,” said Hopper.
    “What do you know?” said Zihao, a twelve-year-old boy. “You wouldn’t know an alien if it bit you on the butt.”
    “Yes, he would,” said Meilin. “If something bites you on the butt, you’re going to notice. There are nerve endings just below the surface.”
    “It’s an American expression,” said Bingwen.
    “Which is why English is stupid,” said Meilin, who always hated it when someone knew something she didn’t.
    “When was this vid made?” said Zihao. He climbed up into the chair, clicked back on the site, and checked the date. “See?” he said, turning back to them, smiling triumphantly. “This proves it’s phony. It was uploaded a week ago.”
    “That doesn’t prove anything,” said Hopper.
    “Yes, it does, mud brain,” said Zihao. “You’re forgetting about the interference in space. No communication is getting through. Radiation is crippling the satellites. If this was filmed in space a week ago, then how did it get to Earth with all the satellites down? Huh? Tell me that.”
    “It was uploaded a week ago,” said Bingwen. “That doesn’t mean it was filmed a week ago.” He clicked through a series of screens and started scanning through pages of code.
    “Now what are you doing?” asked Meilin.
    “Every vid file has mountains of data embedded into it,” said Bingwen. “You just have to know where to look.” He found the numbers he was looking for and cursed himself for not checking this sooner. “Says here the vid was filmed over eight months ago.”
    “Eight months?” said Hopper.
    “Let me see,” said Zihao.
    Bingwen pointed out the dates.
    Zihao shrugged. “That’s just further evidence that it’s bogus. Why would someone record this and sit on it for eight months? That doesn’t make sense. If this were real they’d want everyone to know about it immediately.”
    “Maybe they couldn’t tell people immediately,” said Bingwen. “Think about it. The interference has been going on for months now, right?