by Yoon Ha Lee
I peered curiously at the wires. The patterns they were in reminded me of the body’s meridians, which made sense. The ship wasn’t alive like a person or an animal, but like any object, it had an energy flow, or gi, of its own. For its systems to work properly, all its components needed to be placed in harmony with its gi. I’d learned that from repairing things back home.
“Cadet,” Ju-Won said. The worry lines between her brows deepened. “I thought you . . . Never mind.” Her eyes scanned me up and down. “Who let you out of the medical bay with your collar crooked like that?”
I should have checked it over earlier, but I’d been too disoriented by the whole situation. By this point I was about ready to fall over. “Sorry,” I mumbled.
Her worried expression changed to a glare. “What did you say, Cadet?”
Sujin mouthed, Say “ma’am”! Haneul shook her head ever so slightly at me.
“Sorry, ma’am!” I said hastily.
“Sloppy, Cadet,” Ju-Won said. “Are you sure you don’t need to go back to Medical?”
“I’m fine, ma’am,” I said. I didn’t want to get stuck in the sick bay.
“Very well,” she said. “Why don’t you report to level two and help them with inventory? Check in with me again if you don’t feel well, though.”
This time I had the presence of mind to salute and say, “Yes, ma’am!” I must have sounded too enthusiastic, because she frowned at me some more.
“Cadets Sujin and Haneul, I assume you know where you’re supposed to be? Good. Dismissed, the three of you.”
Once again, I had no idea where to go. Too bad foxes didn’t know divination magic. I saluted and picked a direction. I had a 50 percent chance of being right, after all.
“That way, Cadet!” Ju-Won said in exasperation, pointing down another corridor.
“Oh, of course, ma’am!” I lied. I saluted a third time for good measure and marched off in the correct direction this time.
Sujin and Haneul accompanied me, although the latter cast anxious glances back to Ju-Won to see if she was watching us.
“Hey,” Sujin said in an undertone, “you look terrible. Let me get a snack into you before I report to my station.”
That sounded wonderful. “Thank you,” I said, smiling at the goblin.
Sujin herded me into a side passage. Haneul shook her head and said, “We’re so dead if we’re caught shirking.”
“I can’t let Jang faint from hunger,” Sujin said reasonably. “Anyone coming?”
Haneul sighed, then peered around the corner. “No, you’re clear.”
Sujin pulled out a spork with a flourish.
Wait, a spork? Really? My nose tickled, and I suppressed a sneeze. That wasn’t any ordinary utensil. Dokkaebi were known for carrying magical clubs or wands. I’d never heard of one coming in the shape of a spork, though.
Sujin waved the spork, and a box of chocolate-dipped cookies magically appeared. I tamped down another sneeze. The goblin snatched it out of the air before it fell to the deck. “Eat these,” they said. “They’ll perk you up.”
Haneul shook her head disapprovingly at Sujin. “You’re not supposed to mess with the rationing system.”
“Are you going to tattle?”
“No,” Haneul said with a sigh.
I tore open the box and practically inhaled the cookies. Too late, I realized I should have been polite and offered some to my companions. Oh well. Maybe they were used to Jang being rude. I snuck a glance at the others. Indeed, Sujin and Haneul looked more worried than offended.
After I’d finished, I considered my options. I needed to find out whether Sujin and Haneul knew Jun—they were a likelier source of information than the lieutenant. But I didn’t want to ask outright, because it might make them suspicious. It would be better if I got to know them first—which would be tricky, since we were already supposed to be acquainted.
“Thank you,” I said to Sujin. “That’ll keep me going until dinner.”
Haneul frowned. “You already missed mess!”
Mess. I forgot that was what they called meals around here. Jun had used some military terms in his letters home, but I hadn’t absorbed them the way he would have as a cadet. Great, I was going to have to learn all the jargon, too. I wondered how long it had taken Jun to adjust to life in the Space Forces. Of course, he hadn’t been thrown in the deep end immediately like this. . . . Or had he?
Sujin ignored my slip. “I wasn’t thinking,” they said with chagrin. “I should have conjured up something more substantial for you. At this point, you’d probably be better off filching something from the galley, though. Snacks are the best I can manage.”
“Please,” Haneul said with a sniff. “You’d live on nothing but cookies and shrimp crackers if you could, Sujin. We have nutritional guidelines for a reason, you know!”
“I’ll take shrimp crackers,” I said, my mouth watering at the prospect.
I’d already figured out that, of the two of them, Haneul was the stickler for following the rules. That could work in my favor. At least she knew what the rules were, and I could lean on her until I got a chance to corral Jang’s ghost. In the meantime, I didn’t care how unhealthy shrimp crackers were—I just wanted something to fill my aching belly.
Sujin waved their spork and a box of the promised shrimp crackers materialized in thin air. This time my nose only tickled slightly, maybe because I was getting used to the goblin’s magic. “Giving him junk food’s better than letting him starve, right?”
It took me a few moments to react. I was going to have to get used to people referring to me as a him. “Right,” I said with a weak chuckle, opening the package. It didn’t look like I would be able to get rid of Haneul or Sujin anytime soon, so I figured I might as well eat while I had the opportunity.
Sorry, Jun, I thought. I’m on my way, I promise. I may not have found out much yet, but I had managed to reach his ship. New clues were sure to come to light if I kept my eyes and ears open. I gobbled down all the crackers, knowing I was going to need my strength for the days to come.
That first day aboard the Pale Lightning seemed to stretch on forever. While on my way to the restroom after inventory duty, I got an officer’s rank wrong and he assigned me toilet-scrubbing duty to “help” me remember. At least toilets, while smelly, didn’t care how I addressed them.
The battle cruiser had unisex bathrooms. Another cadet came in while I was busy working and did her business. With Charm I confused her enough that I could ask some quick questions about the Pale Lightning’s layout. She answered, all right, by using a grease pencil to draw diagrams on the floor I had just scrubbed clean. While she explained the elevators and their codes, I kept straining to hear if anyone else was about to come in. Luckily for me, no one did. After she left, I had to memorize everything before getting down on my hands and knees to erase it. By the time I was done, my back ached terribly.
From the outside, the Pale Lightning resembled a tube with a ring around its middle, which the ship spun when it had to generate artificial gravity the hard way. The ship’s levels were concentric cylindrical shells around that ring, which explained the curved passageways. A series of elevators connected the different levels, and there were backup maintenance shafts in case of power failure.
It was useful information. Unfortunately, learning it all meant that I reported back to the barracks late. I was thankful Haneul had let it slip that Jang slept in Bunk 12 in Barracks 5, like she and Sujin did, or I would have been even later.
The senior cadet in charge of Bunk 12 didn’t seem to care that I’d wandered in past lights-out; he waved me listlessly to the only empty bed. Sujin and Haneul were both asleep. If I hadn’t already figured out that Haneul was a dragon, her snoring would have given her away.
When Lieutenant Ju-Won swung by to check on us, I found out that the senior cadet had reported me for being late.
“You’re going to have to do better, even if you’re not feeling back to normal y
et,” Ju-Won said to me as I slid under my sheets. And she assigned me more toilet scrubbing, starting two hours before mess the next morning.
Despite the fact that I could have used the extra hours of sleep, I did a better job of cleaning the bathroom the second time. I suspected I wouldn’t be sleeping in anytime soon, not while I was on this ship. But Jun had served on it, too, once. If he had survived the experience, so could I. Had he ever been unfortunate enough to be stuck with latrine duty? I wondered.
I kept hoping Jang would pop up so I could consult with him, but no such luck. Maybe he was discouraged by the fact that people kept coming in to use the restroom. He hadn’t seemed eager to reveal his presence to his former comrades.
Once I was finished with the cleaning, I washed myself up, then ran to the mess hall for our level, slowing down only when I heard others approaching. I thanked the ancestors for my fox senses, because the others were officers. Cadets were at the bottom of the pecking order, and anything I did wrong in the officers’ eyes might mean more demerits—and chores.
A wide door opened into the mess hall, which was filled with tables and benches bolted to the deck. I spotted Haneul first, thanks to her distinctive bluish hair, and hurried to take a seat across from her. Sujin was there, too, idly toying with their spork.
“Put that thing away,” Haneul told Sujin. The air around her felt staticky, like a thunderstorm was about to break out inside the ship. I made a note never to anger her. I didn’t want to get zapped by any lightning bolt she might summon by accident.
Sujin grumbled. “The food here’s terrible.”
“You didn’t sign on to be a restaurant reviewer,” Haneul said. “And you can’t magic up enough candy to make everyone happy, so it’s best you keep that opinion to yourself.”
The mess officer called us up by tables to collect our food. I got in line behind Sujin and Haneul, picking up a tray, chopsticks, and a spoon, all made of plain gray metal. The spoon handles were engraved with the Space Forces’ flower-and-spear emblem. The chopsticks featured an elongated version of the same thing.
A pair of girl cadets behind me whispered to each other as they cast sly glances at Sujin and Haneul. With my fox ears, I could hear them quite distinctly. “Don’t you think it’s weird how he’s hanging out with the supernaturals?” one of them was saying. “He’s just as human as we are.”
I realized with a shock that she was referring to me. I kept my expression neutral while continuing to eavesdrop, curious.
“Maybe he’s practicing his sucking up,” the other girl said snidely, “so he’ll be ready for the captain.”
The exchange left a sour taste in my mouth. What was their problem with supernaturals? Sujin glanced back at me when I fell behind, and I made myself smile reassuringly. Haneul and Sujin had been kind to me, and those girl cadets had no idea that I was really the lowest of the low, a distrusted fox.
I wondered if Jun had run into this kind of prejudice. Was that what had made him run away?
No, that couldn’t be it. I couldn’t imagine him ever revealing his true heritage, and Jang had been shocked to see me, a fox, on the ship. Besides, my brother wasn’t the sort to be discouraged by a few nasty remarks.
It was a relief to make my way back to our table. I was glad the two mean girls sat far from us. I was famished from all my exertion coupled with not eating much the day before. But Sujin was right—the food was dismal. Rice gruel with a few small pieces of abalone, underspiced gimchi, and oversalted fiddleheads. I did savor the abalone, which tasted like the real thing, not vat-grown protein. I’d had it once at a festival, as a treat, and I’d never forgotten the chewy texture and mild meatiness.
“What comes next?” I whispered to Sujin. “I know I should remember, but my head is still a little foggy. . . .”
Lieutenant Ju-Won hadn’t told me what to do after I finished with the toilets. I doubted that meant I could spend my time doing whatever I wanted. Until I saw a good opening to ask people questions about Jun, it would be best for me to keep trying to fit in.
“You’re in luck,” Sujin said brightly. “We have class with Lieutenant Hyosu. She said we’d learn about the weapons systems today.”
Considering how miserably I’d held up against the mercenaries on the Red Azalea, that sounded useful. Granted, a battle cruiser as large as this one would normally keep pirates at bay, but the fact that Jang had been critically wounded on his rescue mission told me we weren’t entirely safe, either. The more I knew about our defenses, the better. Besides, I had to stay in the mix. I’d promised Jang’s ghost I’d find out more about what had happened to him. And while I was at it, I could also listen for any gossip about people going AWOL, including a certain cadet.
The mess officer dismissed us by tables. In spite of myself, I felt a pang of homesickness. Sure, I’d had chores and lessons there, too, but I’d also had more freedom. Life on this ship was so strict, with rules for every little thing. I even missed squabbling with Bora over the best food scraps.
Stop complaining and do your best, I could almost hear my brother say. Jun had chosen this path, hoping to rise in the ranks and use his influence to help Jinju someday. I had always wanted to follow him into the Space Forces, and now I had, two years sooner than I was supposed to. But it was hard to care about that when I didn’t know where Jun was.
Twenty of us marched to the wardroom, where Lieutenant Hyosu, a woman with a round, friendly face and black-framed glasses, was waiting. She smiled at us, and I couldn’t help smiling back. “Hello!” she practically sang out when the last cadet had entered. “Go on, take your seats. Today’s the fun stuff.”
“You think everything’s the fun stuff,” Sujin said under their breath, although they were smiling, too.
Haneul rolled her eyes at Sujin.
Lieutenant Hyosu made us follow the rules, but she wasn’t too exacting about them, and she was a pretty good teacher. She introduced us to the Pale Lightning’s armaments, from its point defense system to its missiles and laser cannons. By the end of the lesson, my head ached from all the figures I had memorized. Not surprisingly, everyone else in the class was far ahead of me. As long as I was here, I’d have to study hard. The mercenaries had caught me unprepared on the Red Azalea. I didn’t want that to happen again.
“Here’s the part you’ve all been waiting for,” Hyosu said. “Simulator time!”
Everyone sat up straighter. It seemed that this was everyone’s first time, which was a good thing—my lack of experience wouldn’t be as obvious. Besides, I was dying to see how well I would do, even if it was “just” a sim.
Hyosu briefly explained how the simulator worked. It tested how a pilot and a gunner would cooperate in a battle situation. The targeting system sounded similar to the Red Azalea’s: The gunner designated target priorities, and the computer did the rest. Put that way, it sounded deceptively easy. But after my battle experience on the freighter, I knew better than to take the job for granted.
“It’s almost as good as the real thing,” the lieutenant said, “except you don’t die if you mess up.” Then her tone became serious. “Remember, I’m recording everything you do so I can help you improve.”
A door from the wardroom opened into the sim chamber. Hyosu had shown us holos of the Pale Lightning’s bridge, and the room resembled the area where the pilot and gunner sat, except this was grimier. I wrinkled my nose at the reek of nervous sweat that emanated from it, coupled with the harsh smell of disinfectant, which, for a fox, never canceled out scents—it just served to further irritate the nose.
Hyosu paired me with one of the gossipy girls from lunch. Her name was Gyeong-Ja. She didn’t look happy about being separated from her friend.
“Hello,” I said. “What’s your preference, pilot or gunner?” I figured that was a safe topic.
She laughed. “Pilot, of course! I want to be a navigator, and I’m good at the math.”
That suited me fine. I would much rather try my hand as a gunn
er.
Gyeong-Ja sneaked a nervous glance toward Haneul and Sujin, who’d been assigned to each other, then lowered her voice. “Do you find them easy to work with?”
“They’re pretty nice,” I said. “Haneul snores, though.”
Gyeong-Ja grinned. “Dragons! I guess they can’t help themselves.”
We were up next. We climbed into our seats while Hyosu scolded the exiting pair about their inability to work together. I resolved not to make the same mistake, even if I wasn’t thrilled about being partnered with someone who didn’t like supernaturals.
Gyeong-Ja and I strapped ourselves in and adjusted the seats so we could reach the control panels. I wondered if the real panels on the bridge were all scratched up like these.
The overhead illumination dimmed as Gyeong-Ja’s fingers flew over a series of buttons. All the lights turned blue, and the chamber hummed in a way that reminded me of the Red Azalea’s engines. “Preflight check looks good,” she reported.
Hastily, I inventoried the weapons, which ranged from lasers to missiles and mass drivers that used electromagnetism to fling metal projectiles. I had blue lights across the board—blue lights for heaven, as Byung-Ho would say—and I hoped Hyosu wasn’t about to hit us with inventive equipment failures.
An alarm screamed. “Incoming!” Gyeong-Ja cried, and she began listing coordinates as her hands triggered evasive maneuvers.
I could see the enemy on my own displays. “Got ’em,” I said, before realizing that was too informal. “I mean, acknowledged.” I remembered that the session was being recorded for Hyosu to review, and I winced.
The targeting system showed two hostile fighters. I checked the tactical scanner, which told me the ships had identical capabilities. I marked the closer one as the priority—it would be best to concentrate my lasers and take it out of the fight first. If I shot at both of them haphazardly, both would be able to return fire and do more damage in the long run.