The Water Sign

Book excerpt: The teachers taught us how to kill and made us dream for death. It is the only place the Struggle leads. And even it was a lie. I am too old to be a child. Still too young to be a soldier. But I am trapped as both. My name is Ayax, though some call me the Water Sign - and this is the story of how I died so that the world might live. In a future torn apart by catastrophic climate change, biological warfare, and geopolitical upheaval, corporations have taken over the role of nation states. Protected by the re-purposed United Nations and their dreaded Peacekeepers, these corporations and their mercenary armies wage endless wars across all that remains of civilization. And hidden in this chaos, someone or something is stealing children and programming them to fight. The warriors that emerge at age fourteen are vicious and unlike any the world has ever seen. Exploited by his teachers, and pursued by others who would use him for their own ends, Ayax must navigate our dystopian future filled with treachery, unlikely allies and forbidden AI technology. Is he the Water Sign as the Kafkari believe he is, or merely another experimental weapon?