The Extinction Trials
selected praise for A.G. RIDDLE
“Reads like a superior collaboration between Dan Brown and Michael Crichton.”
—The Guardian on Pandemic
“I finished the book fast because I just couldn’t wait...”
—WIRED GeekDad on Departure
“Riddle makes an effort to keep the focus on how his characters react to each other (including to their future selves) rather than to the technological marvels that reshaped their world.”
—Publisher’s Weekly on Departure
“Well-constructed and tightly-wound as a fine Swiss watch—Departure has non-stop action, an engaging plot and, of course, wheels within wheels.”
—Diana Gabaldon, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Outlander on Departure
“This is apocalyptic sci-fi at its best. Plot and character are masterfully woven together…”
—The Daily Mail on The Solar War
also by A.G. RIDDLE
The Long Winter
Completed Trilogy (Nov 2019)
The Origin Mystery
Completed Trilogy
The Extinction Files
Completed Duology
Departure
Standalone
see more books by a.g. riddle at:
AGRiddle.com
About The Extinction Trials
THE END… IS ONLY THE BEGINNING.
After a mysterious global event known only as “The Change,” six strangers wake up in an underground research facility where they learn that they’re part of The Extinction Trials—a scientific experiment to restart the human race.
But The Extinction Trials harbors a very big secret.
And so does the world outside.
From A.G. Riddle, the Amazon Charts and Wall Street Journal bestselling author with nearly FIVE MILLION COPIES sold worldwide in twenty languages, comes an epic STANDALONE adventure with a surprise ending unlike anything you’ve ever read before.
AN EXTENDED LOOK AT THE EXTINCTION TRIALS
Dr. Maya Young is successful, single, and completely unfulfilled. But she’s working on it. Until one morning when everything changes.
After a strenuous spin class, Maya begins coughing until blood comes up. At the hospital, she discovers that her symptoms are far more complicated than she realized. Her illness may be connected to a far-reaching global conspiracy. And she may hold the key to stopping it.
Owen Watts is a firefighter who is slowly losing his job. Not because he’s not good at it. And not because he doesn’t show up and work hard. On the contrary, he’s very good at his job—and hard working. His problem is that robots are increasingly doing the work he’s trained his whole life to do.
The robots aren’t Owen’s only problem. He has a limitation, a condition that has always held him back in life. Because of that, he’s not exactly sure what he’ll do next—when the robots take his job completely.
But one morning a call comes in that will change his life forever. With his team, Owen responds to a fire alarm at an apartment building. At first, it seems to be a false alarm. But it’s not. It’s the start of a global event known as “The Change”—a new era of human existence that will alter the future forever.
As The Change sweeps the world, Owen and Maya both end up in the hospital. With their injuries, it looks like the last stop for them. But the next time they wake up, they’re in an underground research facility along with four other strangers. The group is told very little, only that they’re part of The Extinction Trials, a scientific experiment aimed at finding a way for humanity to survive in the world after The Change.
What they don’t know is that The Extinction Trials hides one very big secret—and a few small ones. And so do several of the other participants.
With time running out to save the last human survivors, Owen, Maya, and the other participants venture out into the changed world. What they find there is beyond anything they imagined. And the key to their future—and humanity’s survival—is something no one expected.
Published in North America by Legion Books.
Published in print in the United Kingdom and commonwealth territories by Head of Zeus.
Copyright © 2021 by A.G. Riddle
all rights reserved.
printed in the united states of america.
The Extinction Trials is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
978-1-940026-30-5 — hardcover isbn
978-1-940026-29-9 — paperback isbn
978-1-940026-31-2 — e-book isbn
edition 1.0.0
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Contents
Stay in the Loop
Prologue
PART I
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
PART II
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
PART III
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
PART IV
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Chapter 61
Chapter 62
Chapter 63
Chapter 64
Chapter 65
Chapter 66
Chapter 67
Chapter 68
Chapter 69
Chapter 70
Chapter 71
Chapter 72
Chapter 73
Chapter 74
Chapter 75
Chapter 76
Chapter 77
Chapter 78
Chapter 79
PART V
Chapter 80
Chapter 81
Chapter 82
Epilogue
Thank You
About the Author
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To the brave souls who keep going—even when it feels like the world is ending.
Prologue
The dinner host tapped his champagne glass with a fork.
The ding-ding-ding echoed through the vast dining room, drawing the attention of the sixty guests.
“Tonight, I’d like to pose a simple question: what is the destiny of the human race?”
He let the words hang in the air for a moment.
“We all know the answer. At some point, our species will go extinct.”
He paced the room, all eyes following him.
“How? What will be our end? Artificial intelligence? Will our undoing come at the hands of an AI project one of your companies is working on? Or maybe another one of your pet projects? Will genetic engineering splinter our species, making some of us obsolete, setting off an unimaginable war between the next humans and the ones left behind?”
The host turned and paced again, stopping in front of a pair of doors that opened onto a wide stone veranda. Beyond, waves from the ocean crashed upon the rocks, a soft symphony punctuating the speech.
“Let’s assume, for a moment, that our extinction won’t come at the hands of one of our inventions. After all, we’re not here tonight to point fingers. Tonight, we’re here to find a solution—to whatever awaits us.”
Murmurs erupted around the room.
The host pressed on. “Consider how vulnerable we are. A solar flare could destroy our planet in the blink of an eye. A supervolcano could blot out the sun, and starve us and freeze us into extinction. Would we stand a chance against an alien invasion? Perhaps our end will come from an old enemy: a pandemic—maybe a more deadly version of a pathogen we’ve already lived through.”
A sea breeze swept in through the doors, tugging at the man’s white hair.
“And there’s another great question that should haunt us all: why d
o we seem to be alone in the universe? Is that a clue to our true destiny? Tonight, I’d like to propose a simple solution to those twin enigmas that have always haunted us.”
He held his hands out to the crowd, palms up.
“We know the truth: we can’t stop what’s coming. We can’t prevent the next extinction event. What we can do… is control what happens after. That is the key to the future.”
He let his hands drop to his sides.
“What I’m proposing is a new kind of experiment. A project with one purpose: to restart the human race after the Fall. A project that will witness the rebirth of our species and unravel the deepest secrets of our existence. I’m calling it The Extinction Trials, and I want you to be part of it.”
PART I
The Fall
Chapter One
Every morning, before work, Owen Watts visited the nursing home.
The halls were mostly empty. Only a few doors stood open. Residents sat outside their rooms, knitting or reading, glancing up as he passed, most staring at his uniform.
At his mother’s door, he paused and peered in.
Owen had a dangerous job, but that moment every morning was easily the most frightening he faced every day. One morning, he knew he would find the room empty. The narrow bed made. His mother’s pictures and belongings gone.
But not today.
She sat in a chair by the window, a book in her lap.
He breathed out as he crossed the threshold, his heavy footfalls drawing his mother’s attention, and instantly, a smile.
Life had taught Owen the value of time. How precious it was. How quickly things changed.
His work had left scars on his body. Life had left a few on his soul. They were what made him cling to the time he had left with his mother.
“Reading anything good?” he asked as he took the seat across from her.
“Well, I just started. But it looks promising. An original premise. And a likable main character.”
She studied him a moment. “What’s the matter?”
“Nothing.”
She cocked her head.
“Work,” he said simply, hoping she would drop it, knowing she wouldn’t.
“What about work?”
“Work… is getting weird.”
“Weird how?”
“Weird as in I’m slowly being replaced by robots.”
“It’s safer that way.”
“True.”
“You’re worried about what you’ll do next—when the robots have completely replaced your job.”
Owen smiled. “You can read me like one of those books.”
“That’s what mothers are for.” She paused. “I know what’s really bothering you.”
He raised an eyebrow.
“Your limitation.”
Growing up, Owen’s mother and father never used the word handicap. Limitation—that’s the word they used. Because everyone has limitations.
“Can I bore you with a piece of advice?” she asked.
He exhaled and nodded.
“Life isn’t about your limitations. They matter far less than you think. You make a living doing what you’re good at. That’s what’s important—your strengths, not your limitations.”
“I’m going to put that on a t-shirt. That’ll be my new job. T-shirt salesman.”
She smiled. “Always a tough one. But I know you listen too. And I know you’ll land on your feet. You just need a little faith. In yourself, most of all.”
She reached over to the bookcase and took out a small paperback and handed it to him.
He read the title: The Birthright. He opened it and flipped to the first page and read it:
Every human is born with a birthright. That birthright is happiness. Our greatest challenge to achieving happiness is not the obstacles we encounter in our life. The true barrier to happiness lies inside of us—and it’s the one thing we can’t ever escape: our own mind.
From birth, we are educated on countless aspects of life, from personal hygiene to personal finance, but there is no widely accepted curriculum for understanding and managing our minds. Indeed, almost every human remains the victim of their own mind throughout their entire life, never learning to master it, or manage it, or even understand it. The Birthright was written to change that. This book is an owner’s manual for a human mind. If you read it and do the maintenance it recommends, your mind will run smoothly. It will break down less often, and in the end, it will take you to your birthright. Indeed, a well-tuned mind is the only road to true and lasting happiness.
Owen closed the book. “It’s not exactly… my type of thing.”
“Your type of thing?”
“Self-help books.”
“It’s not a self-help book—not that there’s anything wrong with them. The Birthright is a book about science and psychology, and most of all, understanding yourself and the world around you.”
“Wonderful,” he muttered. “By the time I read it, the world will probably be changed again.”
“The world is always changing. Always will be. The key to success is accepting that the world will keep changing. The ideas in that book transcend worlds and time.”
Owen’s armband buzzed. The three fast pulses signaled an emergency alert. He activated the band and read the message.
“Sorry, Mom, my disappearing job needs me.”
“An alarm?”
“Probably just a false alarm. See you tomorrow morning.”
He hugged her and turned to leave, but she called to him, “Owen, don’t forget the book.”
Fifteen minutes later, Owen was in the front seat of the fire truck, barreling through the city, sirens blaring. The truck wirelessly shut down the traffic lights and crosswalks ahead. Driverless cars pulled to the side and waited as the hulking vehicle rumbled past.
Owen studied a tablet and called to his two teammates behind him.
“It’s a kitchen fire. Oasis Park Building. Eleventh floor, unit 1107. Auto fire suppression has already extinguished it.”
He was about to continue when the pleasant computer voice of the central AI came over the truck’s speakers.
“The apartment building has fifteen floors and seven hundred and twenty-three registered residents. Scout drones confirm sixty-five infrared signatures currently inside. There is one adult female and one juvenile female in unit 1107. Vital signs normal.”
Owen set his tablet down, annoyed. The AI didn’t even trust him to give the briefing. What bothered Owen the most was that he had to admit the AI was more efficient at the briefing than him. And, in a raging fire, he was glad to have the robots there. They never panicked. They were built to withstand extreme temperatures. Most of all, they were replaceable. Humans were not.