10

Hwa Young heard screams, prayers, even a thud as one ex-candidate fainted. Geum rushed to the girl’s side. People milled about, no longer disciplined, as the medic argued with Commander Ye Jun. The former still crouched over Ha Yoon’s corpse.

“You’ve got to abort this,” the medic said, zir voice high and sharp. “Maybe you don’t care how many lives you throw away obtaining replacement pilots, but—”

The commander raised an eyebrow, and the medic flinched at Ye Jun’s sudden aura of menace. “I wouldn’t do this,” Commander Ye Jun said, “if we had another choice. But we don’t.”

The medic waved a hand at Hwa Young. “She’s the last one, right? At least you can prevent her from becoming a second casualty of this Empress-forsaken ritual.”

“Excuse me,” Hwa Young cut in. “I get a say in this.”

“Indeed,” the commander said. “Do you want to—”

“You haven’t been straight with any of them,” the medic snapped, “so it shouldn’t surprise me that you’re not being straight with them now.”

Eun growled, “You have no right to—”

The medic had overcome zir initial intimidation, or maybe didn’t like Eun to begin with. Zie waved at the milling candidates and ex-candidates. “Saving lives is my duty,” zie hissed back. “Even if you and the bastard over there have forgotten it.” Zie closed the dead girl’s eyes, a tender gesture at odds with zir fierce words.

Bae approached and knelt wordlessly next to Ha Yoon. At the medic’s glare, Bae said in a rasp, “She was my friend.”

The medic nodded and made space for her.

Bae cradled the limp body, stroking Ha Yoon’s hair. Her face was blank, her eyes abysmally dark. Hwa Young took back every catty thought she’d had about the two. Bae’s stark, controlled grief, dignified in its way, hit Hwa Young harder than shrieking and sobbing would have.

“It’s hard on everyone to lose someone so young,” Commander Ye Jun said with a quelling glance at Eun. “Nevertheless: it is indeed up to Hwa Young. Candidate, will you make the attempt?”

“At least tell her!” the medic cried.

“Tell her what?” Bae demanded before Hwa Young could ask the same question.

“Get back in line,” Eun said, his tone harsh.

Bae cast an anguished look down at Ha Yoon’s unmoving face, then returned to her spot by Eun.

Dong Yul muttered, “If you hadn’t pushed her to stay in the program, Farseer, maybe she’d still be with us.”

Bae’s face hardened into a cold mask. She didn’t deign to respond, and she looked away from Ha Yoon.

After everyone else had shuffled back into their proper places, Hwa Young stood alone between two groups. Commander Ye Jun, Eun, and the two newly minted pilots, Bae and Seong Su, were to her left. The rejected candidates, headed by Dong Yul, occupied her right.

“I prefer my pilots and copilots not to come into the bonding ritual with too many preconceptions,” Commander Ye Jun said quietly. “The lancers always know. Owing to the circumstances, however”—zie gave an ironic nod in the medic’s direction—“I will tell you this much.

“This specific lancer, as Eun let slip earlier, has not been piloted in twelve years because it killed four candidates presented to it.” The commander ignored Dong Yul’s gasp and addressed himself directly to Hwa Young. “At that time, my predecessor decided to mothball the lancer because of its temperamental nature, despite its extraordinary combat potential. In its place, we were using a different lancer unit that was destroyed at Spinel.”

Combat potential. “The singularity lance,” Hwa Young breathed.

The commander nodded. “It’s the only lancer in the Eleventh Fleet with that capability. Even the admiral agrees that its power would increase our chances of defeating the clanners in this sector. It was my decision to present all of you to it, in the hopes that someone would bond with it.”

“And they all failed,” the medic said.

“Not yet,” Commander Ye Jun said. Zie met Hwa Young’s eyes. “Are you willing?”

To Hwa Young’s surprise, Seong Su spoke up. “Maybe she could have the option of skipping the eleventh?” he asked. “As a compromise?”

“I did not ask for your input,” Commander Ye Jun said with deceptive softness. “My question was for Hwa Young. It is her answer that matters.”

Hwa Young felt everyone’s eyes on her. “I’ll do it. I’ll try all of them.”

Eun’s mouth twisted. “It’s true you can quit in the middle.”

“If an earlier lancer in the lineup accepts her, it’s moot anyway,” Commander Ye Jun said. “Enough. Are you ready?”

Hwa Young tipped her chin up. “Always.”

The commander gestured toward the first lancer’s cockpit: There’s no time like the present.

Hwa Young hated the thought of being Bae’s copilot, but she couldn’t in good conscience refuse to make the attempt. Straight-backed, she took step after measured step until she reached the cockpit. It stood open like the mouth of a tomb, or an invitation to the other side of midnight.

She reminded herself that she had faced death and worse than death. That every day she lived among the Imperials, she risked someone unearthing her origins and casting her out. She had given everything up, including her family and people and culture, for this opportunity.

Only the scantest of light inside guided her to the pilot’s seat. No one had told her what to do once she was ensconced within. On the other hand, she’d been in a cockpit before, even if it had belonged to Eun’s lancer. By touch she located the straps and belted herself in, waiting for light, noise, a shining in her soul. Any indication the lancer had chosen her—even as a copilot.

In her meditations, she’d always imagined an immediate connection. The lancer glowing triumphantly as it accepted her. Not this dismal sense of foreboding.

Instead, after an interminable wait in the darkness, while the belt dug into her shoulder, she heard Eun announcing the dreaded words: “No response, sir,” and Commander Ye Jun answering, “You may come out, Candidate.”

Hwa Young’s uniform was already sweat-soaked. It clung unpleasantly to her back as she exited with the same measured steps. Maddeningly, her ankle started to itch, but she wasn’t going to stoop to scratch it, or let it distract her.

Next was the second lancer. Hwa Young endured the ritual again, seated herself in the pilot’s seat, stared into the darkness while afterimages ghosted around her like the phantasms of other people’s futures. She thought she spotted Bae’s haughty face among them, complete with the silver-violet eyes that would forever mark her a pilot; seethed that she herself hadn’t bonded with a lancer on her first attempt. Refused to acknowledge the possibility that, like Geum, she would have to pursue some other specialty.

Eun: “No response, sir.”

Commander Ye Jun: “You may come out, Candidate.”

The third lancer didn’t respond to her either, nor the fourth. Curiously, she felt an antipathy toward the fourth one, Avalanche Four, despite its now-bland exterior. She told herself it was her imagination, or else a natural reaction to a lancer that had claimed someone who wasn’t her.

Hwa Young’s jaw ached as she entered the fifth lancer’s cockpit. She hadn’t realized she’d been clenching it to keep anyone from reading her expression. In the darkness she forced herself to relax, sheathed herself in the cherished visualization of her very own cockpit. But relaxation wasn’t possible, not when the stakes were this high.

Eun and Commander Ye Jun’s refrain had already become familiar. Hwa Young was shocked at herself. I won’t simply accept this, she vowed even as she remembered Dong Yul’s outburst and how much she had disliked him for it.

Next came number six. When she walked out of its cockpit, still unclaimed, the others’ stares, ranging from judgy (Bae) to skeptical (the medic), weighed on her like a physical pressure against her skin. They’d already given up on her. She could tell.

Their opinions don’t matter. The lancers did the choosing. Not the people. Especially not those who had already failed. Even if one of them was Geum. Even if success meant she would be separated from Geum again.

The force of her conviction shocked her. Seven. Hwa Young breathed in and out, in and out, counting each cycle of exhalations. She already knew this wouldn’t be the one, that it had no affinity for her. It didn’t matter that Farseer One and Avalanche Four had taken some time to reveal their choices. She was certain it would be an all-or-nothing choice, rather than a slow appraisal.

Eun and Commander Ye Jun told her to come out once more, so she did.

Hwa Young swept her gaze over the other candidates. Most of them wore pitying expressions. A few kept glancing fearfully at Ha Yoon’s still form. At least Geum gave her a shaky thumbs-up.

I haven’t failed yet.

Still, Hwa Young would have been lying if she said she was confident.

Maybe it will be the next one.

The eighth lancer enfolded her. The sense of wrongness redoubled, stronger than ever. As though her bones wanted to turn inside out rather than remain encased by flesh.

She refused to leave before the full minute had elapsed. But if Ha Yoon had aborted her attempt to bond with the eleventh lancer, would she still be alive?

Hwa Young shuddered and closed her eyes, resuming her breathing exercises and visualization to steady herself. Still, she knew. The lancer that wanted her—that chose her—wouldn’t present itself as an ordeal to be tolerated, but as a perfect congruence, human intelligence meeting an artificial one in synchrony.

What if I’m wrong? What if she had misunderstood the fundamental nature of the human-lancer bond, and it prevented her from achieving one for herself?

Before she could digest the implications of this unpleasant new thought, Hwa Young heard Eun pronouncing the dreary refrain: “No response, sir.”

Hwa Young exited the cockpit while Commander Ye Jun was midway through zir sentence: “You may come out, Candidate.”

It was the same with the ninth and the tenth. Hwa Young strove to keep desperation from showing on her face. She was sure the others smelled it on her anyway.

Only the eleventh lancer remained.

“Last chance, Hwa Young.” Commander Ye Jun met her eyes, held them. “You can say no.”

Hwa Young hesitated and hated herself for it. She didn’t want to end up like Ha Yoon, a casualty of the selection process. Couldn’t bear the thought of Geum grieving over her the way Bae had for Ha Yoon.

But this was her last chance. Her only chance. And she’d come so far.

“I’ll do it,” she said, biting off each syllable. She didn’t look at Geum, afraid of the expression she’d find in zir eyes.

She approached the eleventh lancer, whose name, if any, Commander Ye Jun had not given. At least she knew that, as with the rest of the information zie had withheld, was deliberate. Zie had only mentioned the four it had killed. It wouldn’t surprise her if its history included more deaths.

Since this was her last chance, Hwa Young did her best to savor the experience and notice any details she’d missed earlier. Maybe “savor” wasn’t the right word. Her heart was pounding so hard she could feel it knocking against her rib cage. After all, this lancer had killed Ha Yoon. She might not have liked Ha Yoon, but the other girl hadn’t deserved to die.

Her eyes adjusted to the darkness yet again. The same haze of afterimages enveloped her. In the variegated shadows she saw herself, or perhaps Mother Aera, from a lifetime ago, long-haired. Instructor Kim, her face stern as ever despite the broken neck, the blood. Fire and the aftermath of fire. Perhaps the images, despite their grim aspect, were a promising omen, a sign of a budding mental link with the lancer.

Shit. She’d lost track of time. Her neural implant included a basic chronometer, but she couldn’t remember when she’d entered. How much of the single minute did she have left?

And if the eleventh lancer hadn’t claimed her, was it ever going to? What if she’d already failed, and it was only a matter of waiting out the choke hold of seconds?

Outside, she could hear a rising murmuration of voices. One of them carried clearly, as though sniper-aimed: “It’s been fifty-two seconds. There’s no hope.”

Hwa Young closed her eyes and wished Bae would shut up, or better yet, that the deck would open up and swallow her.

Numbness cocooned her from head to toe. She’d failed. All that hard work, all that effort attempting to outdo Bae, and—

At that point, Hwa Young realized, from the red glow against the inside of her eyelids, that the interior of the cockpit had lit up.

She opened her eyes. Frost-colored fractal patterns had formed in every direction, like the labyrinthine heart of winter, more beautiful than even the most optimistic of her imaginings. Light dazzled her: first white, then storm-blue, then the brilliant silver of ice beneath starlight.

Hwa Young looked down. The same mazy patterns glowed beneath her skin, turning it an uncanny arctic white. It was hard to connect what she saw with herself, with her small and frail human body.

She’d never thought of herself in those terms before, but she understood now that her real body wasn’t a construct of meat and bone and nervous impulses. She inhabited something greater, something grander, a frame of metal many times larger than a human. She had bones of alloy and armor for skin, and the singularity lance she carried had destroyed starships single-handedly in battles past, and would again in battles future.

Now and forever, she was a weapon, and she would never again have to cower in the reeds, unable to retaliate against those who had hurt her and her family.

We are winter, said a chilly voice in her mind—or perhaps it was her own voice, grown dark and strange and commanding. We are the death that waits in the dark. We are the beginning of the end, and the silence beyond the end. We are one, always.

“—shouldn’t have let her!” As though from a hall of infinity mirrors, Hwa Young heard the medic’s shrill voice. “If there’s a second casualty, I’m going straight to the admiral, and I swear by the Empress’s consorts you’re getting drummed out of the Imperial Army.”

Hwa Young landed back in her own skin, breathless and disoriented.

“Hwa Young.” It was Commander Ye Jun. “Come out now.”

It took her another moment to remember how to puppet the machinery of her body. In passing she noted that the shoulder strap was no longer digging into her shoulder but had molded itself perfectly to her body so it caused her no discomfort. It fell away before she had touched it, as though the lancer itself had sensed her desire to exit.

Hwa Young’s eyes readjusted to the light outside, dimmer though it was than the icy glory of the glow within the cockpit. She saw everything through a lens of winter clarity, every detail available for her contemplation. The hot envy in Dong Yul’s eyes, Geum gaping as though she’d grown a second head, even the rage in Bae’s face.

Commander Ye Jun was the only one who didn’t recoil from her regard. Zie inclined zir head to her, like one monarch to another.

“Hwa Young,” the commander said, “you have bonded with Winter’s Axiom. Your callsign will be Winter. Well done.”

“Your hair,” Geum burst out. “Your eyes.”

My hair and eyes what? Hwa Young wondered, but no one had a mirror. If Bae had come out with violet-silver eyes, what had happened to her own?

But she didn’t really care. She had found the other half of herself, the missing part of her soul that she had yearned for all these years. That was all that mattered.