5

Five minutes later, the orange-and-gold lancer thundered to a halt, blackened by the explosion—but intact. It dwarfed the shorn trees. The cockpit in the head popped open, and a pissed-off fellow Imperial in a navy blue uniform, his face red and his sleeves singed, emerged. “You down there! Who’s your representative?”

Hwa Young flinched at the lancer pilot’s obvious anger. But she had to take responsibility for this mess. Especially since she could hear Geum moaning amid the others’ gibbering and crying. When Hwa Young looked back at her friend, she realized that some of the shrapnel from the exploding shuttle had hit zir in the head. Blood streaked zir face and zir eyes were glassy. Hwa Young’s heart seized, and she swung back toward the pilot. He was her best hope of getting Geum—and the others—medical attention.

She stood up, then tilted her head back in a futile attempt to meet the pilot’s gaze. “That’s me,” she shouted back.

A clever if precarious-looking lift system, formerly hidden, unfolded itself from the body of the lancer and lowered the pilot to the ground. Up close, he looked no less intimidating, even though he couldn’t be much older than eighteen or nineteen, with a face that was all angles and glowering brows, and a jagged scar down the right side of his face. His broad, stocky build included a fair bit of muscle. She wouldn’t have wanted to confront him in a fight.

“Your name, citizen,” the pilot snapped.

Were his eyes orange? No, they had to be a lighter shade of the usual Imperial brown. Her mind must be playing tricks on her.

“I’m Hwa Young,” she said, using an extra-polite formality level just in case. Hangeul, the language common to New Joseon and the clanners, marked courtesy not just with special pronoun forms but also as part of the verb conjugation. She didn’t have a family name, unlike her classmates, and she wondered if he would pick up on that.

“Good for you,” the pilot said with a scowl. “I’m Eun.” He, too, failed to give a family affiliation, but Hwa Young knew it was for a different reason. Pilots owed allegiance to the Empire as a whole—to the Empress herself—and not their blood-kin. They dropped their family names as soon as they passed training.

Bae approached the two of them, brushing twigs and leaves from her hair. Hwa Young had almost forgotten about the other girl’s existence, focused as she was on securing medical assistance for Geum and the others. “I’m Chang Bae,” she said peremptorily, “daughter of Chang Ae Ri, advisor to the planetary governor. Some of the students here are injured.”

Of course she’d make sure the pilot knows about her mom, Hwa Young thought sourly.

“I’ve called for backup transport,” Eun said impatiently. “The fighter ships have taken out the hostiles. Medics will tend to your wounded.” He stared down his nose at Hwa Young. “You were the one behind the rogue attack shuttle?”

Hwa Young’s guilt transformed into dislike at Eun’s gruff tone. “Yes,” she said, her voice icy. Bae would rat her out if she didn’t confess, anyway. She debated explaining the situation, but there was no point. He wouldn’t care.

Eun harrumphed. “Zie is going to love you.”

Zie who? Hwa Young wondered. But she didn’t want to waste time asking questions she wouldn’t get the answers to.

“Congratulations, Menace Girl. Since you’re the asshole troublemaker who shuttle-bombed my lancer, I’m keeping an eye on you so you don’t implement any more bright ideas. You’re riding with me. The rest of you, hang tight until backup arrives.”

Hwa Young had the dubious satisfaction of seeing Bae gape at them both, as though this were an honor instead of some sort of backhanded punishment—although it did feel like a prize to Hwa Young. Scarcely daring to hope this was real, she left the others behind, sparing Geum another worried look over her shoulder, and came over to the lift.

She was going to ride in a lancer, the dream she’d harbored all these years. The dream she nurtured like a seedling every time she meditated. She was about to find out whether her imagined version was anything like the real thing.

Eun’s lancer was a magnificent specimen. Those missile racks looked like they could take down a dreadnought-class starship all by themselves. Even standing still like a vigilant soldier, light gleaming on the scales of its fire-colored armor, the lancer exuded power.

This wasn’t how she’d envisioned getting up close to a lancer. What surprised her more was that the lancer felt wrong. Its very presence grated against the edges of her mind. She wanted a lancer, all right—but she didn’t want this one.

She hoped this wasn’t a sign she wouldn’t be a suitable pilot.

“Oh, and your gun. Hand it over.” Eun stared imperiously at Hwa Young.

She suppressed her scowl and gave him the instructor’s pistol. Not like she had much choice. He shoved it into his belt after conscientiously checking it over, which only made her feel a little better.

I’m sorry, Geum, she thought, torn between wishing she could stay with zir and her yearning for the lancer, even the wrong lancer. What kind of friend am I?

Sure, Eun had as good as given her an order…but Hwa Young knew in her heart of hearts that she would have been tempted to go with him anyway. She didn’t like finding this out about herself. As she gazed back at Geum’s crumpled form, she promised that she would do everything in her power to make sure Geum received all the help zie needed.

The lift barely accommodated two people, but the cockpit seated two as well. Hwa Young squeezed past Eun into what was either a copilot’s or passenger’s seat, although there was no copilot in evidence.

She stared in fascination at the angular readouts and control panels, momentarily letting go of her aggravation toward the pilot and her worry about Geum. It looked so different from what she had imagined, all fiery colors and jagged lines. Everything about the cockpit made her edgy, and she didn’t like that either. She’d hoped to feel immediately at home, as she had imagined in all her meditations.

“Who’s your copilot?” Hwa Young asked, watching intently as Eun’s hands danced over the panels, casting shadows over them without actually touching them.

Eun glanced sideways at her, his scowl faltering. “We’re dealing with unusual circumstances. It’s classified.”

That’s odd. Was the lancer unit understrength? A full unit should include at least a dozen pilots and their copilots. “Isn’t that an uncomfortable way to work?” she asked, changing the subject and nodding at the panels. “How do you control it?”

He laughed scornfully. “What, you expected a joystick or something? A direct link is much more efficient.”

Hwa Young fell silent. She hadn’t known that, but she should have guessed. It was the same principle that customized interfaces for simpler vehicles like shuttles or cars, but much more advanced.

Maybe the reason this lancer felt wrong was that it was customized for Eun, and not her. The thought cheered her.

Eun spoiled the moment by adding, “Redo that strap. You don’t want to fall out of your seat once we’re airborne.”

The lancer leapt into the air with surprisingly smooth acceleration. Hwa Young was pressed back against her cushioned seat. She gazed out the cockpit window in awe as the lancer flew in defiance of aerodynamics, using larger versions of the levitators the ill-fated shuttle had possessed—antigravity, but of a type mastered by the Empire’s technology.

A hundred more questions rushed into her head on how piloting worked, but she settled for observing silently, her heart alight. She didn’t want to distract Eun when their lives might depend on his piloting…and she was savoring the moment in the private sanctum of her heart, so that she could return to it over and over in her meditations.

Serpentine’s blue-violet sky, with its shrouds of smoke and clouds and the occasional hell-flash of explosions, gave way to heart-stopping blackness and the glittering eyes of the local constellations. Hwa Young remained silent. Eun’s hands shook, but that didn’t seem to impede his piloting. She thought of the morning at the firing range, which felt like it had happened during another lifetime, and longed for a weapon of her own.

Who am I kidding? Hwa Young thought over the rapid beating of her heart as the lancer sped onward. She’d yearned to pilot a lancer since the first time she saw one, the terrible secret she kept embedded in her heart like an icicle. Lancers had destroyed Carnelian, yet they represented power. The ability to make a difference.

If Carnelian had possessed lancers of its own—if the clanners had been able to unite enough to build up their industrial base and master the gravitic technologies that enabled lancers to fly and fire their deadliest weapons, singularity lances—maybe they wouldn’t have fallen so easily to New Joseon.

I’m a citizen of New Joseon now, Hwa Young reminded herself. One of the Empress’s children. The clanners’ failings were no longer her concern.

Besides, she couldn’t afford to lose herself in memories of her unwanted past when she was in an Imperial lancer. While a passing thought wouldn’t affect their flight, she didn’t want to screw up and slip into some clanner habit or ritual that would give her away, or contradict the Imperial rituals that reinforced the lancer’s functioning.

A tiny elongated figure came into view, shaped almost like a carp, if carp gleamed silver and blue. It couldn’t be one of Serpentine’s moons. As it loomed larger, Hwa Young realized that it wasn’t, in fact, small. In space, as opposed to on a planet or a moon, she had nothing to compare distant objects to in order to determine their scale.

The figure was a starship, its sinuous curves interrupted by the protrusions and hatches of gun turrets and missile racks and sensory arrays. Hwa Young wished she’d paid more attention to Geum’s chatter about the Imperial space fleet. She’d always been fixated on the lancers rather than the starships that took them from battle to battle.

Geum. I hope zie’s all right.

Eun broke the silence. “That’s the Eleventh Fleet,” he said proudly. “We were assigned to protect this section of the border. We’re going to the flagship, the Maehwa.” Plum blossom.

A bell tone sounded. Eun’s fingers twitched. “Maehwa, this is Hellion. I have one passenger, a refugee from the former city of Forsythia. Request clearance for landing.”

Former city. Hwa Young’s guts knotted up as the implications sank in. The population of Forsythia was over seventy thousand. Surely she and her class couldn’t be the only survivors.

She should open her mouth. Ask. But Eun might answer, and that would make it real. And then she’d fall apart, and she couldn’t afford that, not until she’d made sure her classmates and Geum were safe.

“Maehwa to Hellion,” said a brisk voice. “Cleared for landing in docking bay six.”

Eun wasn’t paying attention to Hwa Young or her inner turmoil. Hwa Young kept her face as still as a mirror, not wanting to reveal more to him than she had to.

The Maehwa grew larger and larger, resolving into fractal vistas of antennae, closed gunports, the blue-silver shine of armor plating. Then all Hwa Young could see was the docking bay, a mechanized maw opening to admit the lancer. Eun’s hands continued shaking, but the maneuver went smoothly. The lancer flew in headfirst, then jackknifed neatly to land on its feet. Hwa Young stifled a sigh of relief as she felt it making contact with the deck, and then the reverberation of the bay door closing.

“Not bad,” Eun said grudgingly.

Hwa Young blinked at him, wondering what he meant.

“Almost couldn’t tell it was your first time in space.”

Long practice kept Hwa Young from shooting back, It wasn’t. She knew better than to hint at her secrets.

Eun shrugged. “Have it your way.”

The cockpit opened, letting in a rush of chilly air. Hwa Young sneezed at the onslaught of unfamiliar smells. Even the city—former city—had smelled of leaves and earth from the small gardens that the city planners and geomancers had planted on every street. You couldn’t walk down a block without chancing across some intimate vista consisting of miniature pine trees or cosmos or ponds arranged so cleverly that they looked as though they had occurred naturally, if nature admitted such perfection.

Here there were no plants, no flowers, no tang of earth, but rather metal and fire and something it took her a moment to place as…meat? Her brain caught up with her a moment later, and she gagged silently. Not food, but burnt flesh.

“Stop gawking,” Eun growled. “Let’s disembark.”

Moving carefully so she didn’t trip and fall to her death, she joined Eun on the lift.

Hwa Young took the opportunity to study her surroundings. Ten other lancers occupied the docking bay. Powered down, they were a featureless dull gray, humanoid and as large as ever, but without armor or weapons or any hint of personality. She glanced back at Eun’s and saw it, too, morph back into its resting state until it was indistinguishable from the others except for a stylized painting of a flame on its chest and the singe marks.

On the side of the nearest one she glimpsed a painting of an upside-down golden antler crown, decorated with comma-shaped jades in green. She puzzled over its significance. The Empress wore an antler crown, a tradition from New Joseon’s founding. Surely it was treasonous to mock her symbol like this? She’d expected some ferocious predator instead, like a tiger, or a warrior out of the histories, or even something resembling the sharp-thorned rose like the one painted on Mi Cha’s lancer Summer Thorn.

The bay’s metal walls showed a greenish patina, and different sections had been painted with cryptic symbols in blue. The deck displayed gouges and scorch marks, some of them crisscrossing the patterned lane markings. One of the gouges, deep and black, was surrounded by a temporary barrier of yellow cones and tape so no one would trip over it and injure themselves.

Hwa Young fought against a pang of disappointment. While some people wore navy uniforms like Eun’s, everyone looked rumpled. The ones bearing welding tools or swarming around strange machinery were dressed in practical gray fatigues; those must be the technicians and mechanics. Others, bearing weapons, strutted about in green; those would be the marines. She’d expected sailors and marines in dress uniform, lined up as though for inspection, or maybe marching smartly. She definitely hadn’t expected the miasma of sweat and anxiety.

One of the mechanics in gray stormed up to Eun and Hwa Young. A streak of black grease marred his blocky, squarish face. “What is it with you and explosions, Senior Warrant Officer?” he demanded.

Eun rolled his eyes. “Long story.” He slanted an annoyed look in Hwa Young’s direction, then gestured toward his singed lancer. “Fix her up, will you?”

The mechanic didn’t get the hint, even though a tall young person in navy blue was walking up to them, making no effort to soften zir footsteps. Granted, it wouldn’t be hard to miss them amid the dismaying tumult of the docking bay. “Your lancer is a complete mess!” the mechanic went on. “One of these days you’re going to end up like—”

“Like what?” the newcomer interrupted from behind him.

Hwa Young assessed the stranger with instinctive wariness. Despite the apparent friendliness of zir tone, zie carried zirself like someone used to wielding authority. Zie had tucked a slate under zir right arm. The left hung limply from the shoulder, ending in a withered, clawlike hand. Trying not to stare, Hwa Young bowed in greeting, noting how Eun and the mechanic snapped to and saluted.

Aha—she surreptitiously examined the insignia over zir chest while Eun gave his report. A commander. A quick glance confirmed that both zie and Eun wore the sun-and-lance symbol that signified the lancer units.

Hwa Young sized zir up further while zie spoke in jargon to Eun. Zie had an oval face with a strong jaw and smiling dark eyes beneath asymmetrical short-cropped hair. She’d been fooled by zir height—zie topped her by almost a head, with a deceptive leanness despite the way zie radiated strength, but zie was only in zir early twenties.

In fact, no one in the docking bay appeared to be much north of twenty except the mechanics. Many of the spacers and marines looked sixteen, seventeen, eighteen. Occasionally younger. Hwa Young hadn’t known there were people this young in active service. She’d always understood that she would have to wait until she turned eighteen to apply to be a lancer pilot.

The commander turned to Hwa Young. “You must be Eun’s guest,” zie said genially. “One of the survivors of that terrible attack. I salute you.”

“ ‘Guest,’” Eun muttered under his breath.

She bowed again. “I’m Hwa Young,” she said, using the most polite verb forms.

“I’m Commander Ye Jun,” zie said. Despite the way zir eyes crinkled in a friendly fashion, there was a certain artificiality to zir manner. “Welcome to the Eleventh Fleet. I’m the handler for the fleet’s lancer unit.”

“All one of us,” Eun said, this time loudly enough that both Ye Jun and Hwa Young could hear him.

Hwa Young’s eyebrows shot up. “For the flagship?” That couldn’t be right. There should be a company of twelve lancers embedded in any single fleet, each crewed by a pilot and copilot, plus a thirteenth command-and-control lancer unit to serve as handler. She had assumed that the other lancers all had pilots busy with other duties.

Hastily, Hwa Young scanned the docking bay again. She hadn’t miscounted.

Only two of them, including the one she’d arrived in, had pilots. The two with the painted emblems, presumably.

No wonder Eun hadn’t wanted to talk about his nonexistent copilot.

A great time to change the topic. “Commander,” Hwa Young said, remembering her original mission, “I have friends planetside. One of them has a head injury. Are they—are we all being evacuated?”

“The Empire is cutting its losses in this sector,” Commander Ye Jun said.

At first she couldn’t make sense of zir words. Wasn’t it the Empire’s job to defend its worlds?

Zie kept speaking. “To be frank, Hwa Young, Imperial HQ has decided that we can’t afford to hold Serpentine because it’s too close to the Moonstorm border, and we’re needed for a major offensive elsewhere. What we are doing is evacuating as much of the population as we can accommodate.”

Hwa Young stared in shock, unable to speak.

Eun couldn’t resist opening his mouth. “You mean we’re drafting anyone with two legs and a working pair of hands.”

Commander Ye Jun shifted zir gaze to Eun. “Hellion, am I conducting this briefing, or are you?”

Eun’s brow knitted. “Listen, Commander, maybe you want to give it to this earthworm with honey words and a ribbon, but she’s going to learn the truth eventually. Especially when you assign her a specialty and tell her to shape up.”

“Hellion—”

“And especially when this is the fourth border world we’ve abandoned! I don’t care how much the newscasters spin encouraging propaganda about how we have the clanners on the run and the periphery worlds have nothing to worry about while the core worlds turtle in on themselves and leave the rest of us to—”

“Hellion.”

To die. Hwa Young, left reeling as though each of Eun’s words had struck her like a kick to the stomach, could finish his sentence for herself.

This can’t be true. The Empress protects her children.

Some children more than others, apparently.

Commander Ye Jun stared at Eun until he lowered his eyes, his face reddening.

“Sorry,” Eun muttered sullenly. He didn’t sound sorry in the least. “But she deserves to know the truth.”

“It’s all true, as far as that goes,” Commander Ye Jun said, turning back to Hwa Young. “But there are good and bad ways to present information. As some of us need to learn.”

This time Eun had the sense to stay silent.

“Let me guess,” Hwa Young said, her mouth dry. “You’re recruiting us.”

“We’re going to be assessing you and your friends,” the commander said. “Then we’ll draft those of you with skills we need.” Zir voice was not unkind. “It’s part of the war effort, citizen. The Empress’s will.”

Hwa Young smiled bitterly. “Trust the Empress. Move at her will. Act as her hands.”

Commander Ye Jun returned her smile. “Quite so.”

She’d always wanted to be a lancer pilot. It beat being assigned some dull duty like checking for mold in hydroponics.

At the same time, this was hardly the triumph that she’d imagined. The Eleventh Fleet in disarray. Serpentine abandoned because of some strategic calculation. The revelation that other Imperial worlds had already been surrendered to clanner attacks—and she’d never heard about it.

It’ll be different once I become a pilot, she told herself desperately.

But first—“I really need to know what happened to my classmates.”

If Geum’s condition had worsened and she hadn’t been there, she would never forgive herself.

Hwa Young could see the abacus calculations happening behind Commander Ye Jun’s eyes. She revised her estimation of zir upward. Despite the amiable exterior, zie must hold the position of lancer handler for a reason.

The mechanic cleared his throat. “Sir, begging your pardon, I should get a start on Hellion’s repairs. They’re liable to take a while.”

“Go ahead,” the commander said, and the mechanic stomped toward the docked, featureless lancer, swearing as he looked it up and down. “You too,” zie added to Eun. “I want an after-action report from you. A real one, no copying and pasting manhwa dialogue as filler, you hear? Some of us actually read those things.”

“You’re no fun, sir,” Eun grumbled, and headed off after a parting salute.

Hwa Young looked back at the commander, willing zir to respond to her question.

“Our medical facilities are state-of-the-art. You needn’t fear for your friend. What was their name?”

“Zir name is Geum of the An family,” Hwa Young said. “Zie would have been with the rest of my class.” Quickly, she rattled off everyone’s names, even Bae’s and Ha Yoon’s, then added, “Our instructor was a casualty. I—we didn’t have any way to perform the funeral rites for her.”

Commander Ye Jun tapped a query into the slate. It didn’t escape Hwa Young’s attention that zie angled it so she couldn’t read the screen. Zie looked up after a moment, zir expression inscrutable. “Your classmates are being transported to the fleet. Your friend will be admitted to sick bay.”

“Is zie—”

“They’ll treat zir there.” The commander smiled sympathetically. “I know you’re worried, but we’ll take care of zir, promise.”

Hwa Young couldn’t help wondering if the commander really cared about a stranger’s fate, or if zie had accessed Geum’s school records and identified some useful skill or talent. “I want to see zir once zie arrives.”

“The medics won’t like that. Let them do their job, and we’ll do ours. You’ll have a chance to see your friend again after zie’s been released from sick bay and given a role in the fleet.”

“ ‘Ours’?”

Commander Ye Jun’s smile became lopsided. “You’re going to make an excellent recruit, citizen.”

Recruit. A painful flare of hope started up in her chest. “I’m not eighteen yet—”

“There’s been a policy change. We take people at sixteen and up.”

Hwa Young stared unseeing at the commander. She’d never expected her heart’s desire to be right around the corner—yet here it was.