Dragon Pearl

by Yoon Ha Lee

  “Your Charm could persuade the ghosts to allow us to approach the Dragon Pearl,” he said.

  “That’s probably true,” I said, “but what guarantee do you have that I won’t turn them against you?”

  “Do you trust yourself to pilot a shuttle, or a starship?” he asked coolly. “Your shape-shifting is impressive, but from talking with your brother, I know you can’t change yourself into a ship—not one that can go anywhere useful. And it’s not just a matter of transportation, either. Do you want to capture the Pearl only to become a target for every bandit and mercenary in the galaxy? You might be able to impersonate me”—his eyes lit up with an unexpected mixture of humor and malice—“but are you going to gamble that you can successfully captain a battle cruiser against mercenary and pirate attacks?”

  I scowled at him, but he had a point. Even though I learned fast, there were limits to my knowledge. “One question, then,” I said. “What happened to my brother?”

  His teeth gleamed in a not-smile. I imagined them lengthening into sharp points, even though they remained eerily human. “I’d originally hoped to work with him,” Hwan said. “Unfortunately, your brother proved to be less than cooperative. I trust you won’t repeat his error.”

  Outrage choked me. It took a couple moments before I was able to speak. “Where is he?”

  Hwan shrugged. “I’ve stowed him where you’ll never find him. And that’s where he’ll stay for the rest of his life unless you cooperate with me.”

  I lunged at the force shield that separated me from him, too angry to care that it was a terrible idea. Sure enough, it sizzled when I hit it. A burning sensation surged through my body, and I was surprised that I didn’t smell smoke or the stink of charred flesh. My limbs convulsed. I had just enough presence of mind to tumble sideways rather than continue to batter the shield.

  “I see you take after him,” Hwan said, very dryly. “You won’t reconsider?”

  I squeezed my eyes shut so I wouldn’t cry from the pain. No way was I going to give Hwan the satisfaction. “If you imprisoned my brother,” I gasped out, “how do I know you won’t do the same to me?”

  A memory nagged at me: Hwan’s sword in his office, the scent of my brother upon the hilt, suggesting a secret they had shared. What kind of game had they played at? But it was too hard to think through the searing pain.

  “Little gumiho,” Hwan said, and I bristled. “Do you really think you hold a winning hand right now?”

  I opened my eyes long enough to shoot a glare at him, although it wasn’t very impressive, because I was curled up on the floor.

  “You should accept my offer before my patience wears thin,” Hwan said, “or your brother suffers any longer.”

  If he wanted my cooperation, that was exactly the wrong thing for him to say. “Forget it.”

  “You’re going to have to learn to control that temper,” Hwan said, as if I was going to listen to him like he was a teacher. “Very well. I’ll leave you until you come to your senses. The guards have ways of making that happen sooner rather than later.”

  With that, Hwan turned his back and strode out of the brig.

  I listened to his footsteps and cursed myself for not taking the deal, if only to get me out of there. I couldn’t bring myself to shout after him, though, not even when the stakes were so high.

  I’d just have to escape some other way.

  Despite my shaky limbs and the agony running through my body, I dragged myself up onto the bunk. Falling asleep took forever, partly because of the pain, partly because of the bright light. I shielded my eyes with my forearm, but that didn’t help as much as I’d hoped. Keeping my arm bent at that angle was its own special form of torment, because hitting the force shield had done something to all my muscles. I kept tossing and turning, hoping for a more comfortable position, until I finally drifted off.

  “Jang!”

  Why was someone calling for me?

  “Jang!”

  I groaned and turned on my side to face the wall, then regretted it immediately. I had never realized the muscles between my ribs could hurt that badly.

  “Go away,” I mumbled, then blinked in confusion. I’d responded to Jang’s name in my own clear soprano pitch.

  Then the owner of the other voice penetrated. It was Sujin.

  I sat up, moving more carefully this time. Yes? I mouthed, looking around me, wondering if this was a trap.

  I saw nothing in the harsh light, not even a shadow out of place. Then I remembered that dokkaebi had invisibility caps, even if I’d never seen Sujin put theirs on before. I couldn’t pinpoint the goblin’s location by smell, so they must have been standing on the other side of the force shield.

  “How did—?” I started.

  “Shh,” Sujin hissed now that they had my attention. “Can you change into the shape of Lieutenant Hyosu or something?”

  I didn’t waste time with questions, like where were we going. I was just grateful that Sujin was talking to me at all.

  I called to mind Hyosu’s smiling face. After all the classes I’d had with her, it was a familiar one. But my first attempt to imitate her went wrong, and Sujin cleared their throat in warning. I glanced at my shoulder tabs—by force of habit I’d magicked up the tabs for a cadet, not a lieutenant. Hastily, I concentrated and fixed the mistake.

  While I was sorting that out, I heard clicking on the number pad, then a faint thrum as the force shield went down. I didn’t waste any time sprinting out of the cell, pain or no pain. I collided into something that I couldn’t see. The breath whooshed out of my lungs.

  “Ouch,” Sujin said plaintively.

  “Sorry,” I said. “Why—?”

  “No time,” they said. “We’ll talk about it later. As a fox, you must have good hearing. Can you follow my footsteps if I stay invisible?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  Sujin didn’t speak again while they led me out of the brig. I wondered how they’d gotten into this area—perhaps they’d used their invisibility to slip in during a shift change or something.

  I couldn’t make myself invisible, and Sujin needed their cap to avoid arousing suspicion, but I had some tricks up my sleeve. As we approached the exit, I put on a frown and used a little Charm to convince the guards that I—Hyosu—had been sent here on an errand. I also persuaded them not to question the fact that there was no record of the lieutenant having entered the brig. They signed me out without a fuss. My attempt to forge Hyosu’s signature wasn’t very good, but it wouldn’t last long on the screen, and I bet that people didn’t check handwriting very closely most of the time.

  We took an elevator up two levels. Several enlisted crew members waited patiently as Sujin and I got out. I admired Sujin’s deftness more and more. Being invisible was handy, of course, but you still had to make sure you didn’t bump into people, especially when they crowded close. In one instance, a corporal wrinkled her nose and glanced around, and I hastily used Charm on her. Whether she was a human with an unusually good sense of smell or someone with supernatural heritage, I didn’t care. I had to make sure no one caught Sujin helping me.

  From the direction we were going, I guessed we were headed for an escape pod. It took an effort to hold my head up high and smile at people as I passed the way that Hyosu did, especially when my nerves screamed that I was going to be unmasked as an imposter any moment now. The continued ache in my muscles didn’t help. Fortunately, I wouldn’t have to use Charm for much longer, because the dock was close.

  Still, I couldn’t afford to get overconfident. It was only a matter of time before my escape was discovered. At that point Captain Hwan would turn the entire ship inside out and try his best to recapture me. Worse, he might do something to my brother to force me to turn myself in again. I had to get to the Pearl so I’d have the upper hand.

  Sujin’s footsteps slowed as we approached an intersection. I cocked my head to make sure I understood where they were going, then followed them around the bend. My pulse
raced as we approached the emergency escape pods for this section. Was this actually going to work?

  That wasn’t all. Standing guard at the doorway to the pods was Haneul. She smelled of fear and dismay, but I could also see determination in her expression.

  I slowed to a stop in front of her and said in a hushed voice, “It’s me, ‘Jang.’ ”

  “We have to hurry,” Sujin said, almost in my ear.

  I jumped, even though I knew Sujin was there. Haneul didn’t bat an eye, but I guessed she was more used to dealing with her invisible friend. I longed to ask why they were helping me. It would have to wait—I didn’t want to delay my getaway.

  The escape pods had very simple entry codes that everyone in the crew knew, even me. But Haneul was the one who punched it in. As the door to the pod swished open, eerie violet-tinged lights flickered on and cool air whispered past me.

  “Get in,” Haneul said.

  I hesitated for a moment. “I don’t know how to pilot this. . . .” And there was more to it. Despite the drills on the Pale Lightning, I felt uneasy about escape pods. On the holos, they were always haunted by the ghosts of people who’d died in them. I didn’t need to fly with yet another spirit who was feeling vengeful and might bring me bad luck.

  “We can handle that,” said Haneul. “We’re coming with you.”

  My heart expanded in gratitude, and I flashed them a grin. “I hope you know what you’re getting into.” I clambered inside, taking the farthest seat, and began strapping myself in. Haneul was next. Then Sujin, who pulled off their invisibility cap and appeared piecemeal, like a jigsaw assembling itself out of the air.

  “This is going to buy you a lot of trouble,” I said to the other two, seriously this time. “You could face court-martial, maybe even . . .” I couldn’t say the word execution.

  I hadn’t thought Haneul’s face could get any paler. “Sujin managed to sneak in and listen in on what the captain said to you,” she said. “I swore loyalty to the Space Forces and the Thousand Worlds, but what Hwan did, coercing you by threatening your brother, isn’t right. We have to get you out of here.”

  “But you don’t have to desert as well,” I said, as much as I hated the thought of being alone.

  “What, you want to leave us behind to be tiger snack food?” Sujin said.

  “Don’t joke about it,” Haneul said sharply. To me, she said, “We only have one chance to get this right. We’re hoping the captain will want you alive and he won’t shoot down the pod.”

  I gulped. “What about the EMP mines?”

  “I thought of that,” Sujin said smugly. “I downloaded a map of the mine locations on the sly. We’ll be able to navigate around them.”

  “Then we’d better hurry down to the planet so we can look for the Pearl before the captain reaches it,” I said.

  I briefly wondered if I should remind them about the probability of our encountering angry ghosts there, but I decided against it. I needed my friends’ help if I wanted to save Jun. I just hoped my Charm would be enough to get us by.

  “I was thinking of just hiding there until we could signal another ship to come rescue us,” Sujin said. “Are you saying you know where the Pearl is?”

  I nodded without going into detail. I still remembered the landing coordinates and site’s location from the captain’s private log.

  “Then there’s really no reason to stay here,” Haneul said. “Er, Jang”—she faltered, then nodded at me—“Min, whatever you call yourself, you’d better program in the landing coordinates and then we’ll launch.”

  Luckily, there was a control panel within reach. Sujin input the map they’d smuggled out. Then it was my turn. The pod’s system plotted an arcing trajectory that would skirt the mines and take us down to the Fourth Colony’s surface, near one of the ancient settlements, a city named Jeonbok. The communities had been spread out over the planet’s largest continent, but the location I wanted was near a forest. I hoped the trees wouldn’t prove too much of an obstacle when it came to landing.

  I double-checked the coordinates, wishing I had the captain’s logbook in front of me. Using the wrong numbers could send us into an expanse of ocean, or half a continent away from where the Dragon Pearl was supposedly hidden.

  “Everyone strapped in?” Haneul asked.

  “It’s now or never,” I said, and hit the commands to start the launch sequence. The doors to the escape pod’s launch chute slid closed. Then the lights blinked red three times and a bell-like tone sounded.

  Meanwhile, gel cushions came out of the walls. As the cushions inflated, surrounding every part of us except our faces, I fought the panicky desire to claw at them. I knew that in a few moments I’d be grateful for the padding.

  The lights flashed again, and the launch indicator lit up. For a second I thought there had been a malfunction, and my heart sank. Then the escape pod rocketed out the chute and I was slammed back against the couch.

  Something nagged at me. Didn’t we need to get clearance from the ship before launching? Or had Haneul and Sujin somehow overridden the system before springing me? As tears streamed from my eyes, due to the sudden acceleration, it was difficult to think clearly. I couldn’t reach up to wipe my face because of the cushions, but that didn’t matter. At this speed, I wouldn’t have been able to move my arms anyway. I closed my eyes against the unpleasant pressure and lost consciousness.

  “Min! Min, wake up!”

  I groaned and started to thrash, but I was trapped. There was something important I had to figure out, but I resisted opening my eyes and facing it. Just give me a few more moments of rest. . . .

  “Come on, Min, you need to be awake for this.”

  Eventually I recognized Sujin’s voice. I peeled my eyes open. The goblin was unstrapped from the crash couch and their hair floated around their face like they’d been zapped by Haneul’s lightning. Belatedly, I realized this meant we weren’t accelerating anymore—we were back in free fall.

  “What’s going on?” I asked, hating how weak my voice sounded. “How’s Haneul?”

  “I’m right here,” she called from the next couch.

  “If we’re alive,” I said, “that means Captain Hwan hasn’t shot us down yet. So what’s the bad news?”

  “The bad news is down there,” Sujin said. “Haneul, show her.”

  Haneul brought up the scan display. Or rather, failed to. The scanner was blank, refusing to tell us anything about the Fourth Colony. We couldn’t even determine whether we were headed toward the correct coordinates.

  If we landed planetside, I could probably find some way to survive. The Fourth Colony had been settled at one point, so it should have a breathable atmosphere and, with any luck, edible plants and/or wildlife. If we missed the planet entirely and floated out into space, however, we would be at the mercy of whoever found us—if anyone came to rescue us at all.

  “How long was I out?” I said.

  “A couple of hours, I think,” Haneul said. The air around her was moist, and it crackled with suppressed lightning, a sign of how miserable she was. “I didn’t think the ghosts would be able to influence our systems this far out.”

  So the spirits were already making their presence known. “Well, if the ghosts are affecting us, maybe they’re affecting the Pale Lightning as well,” I said. “I thought it would have caught up to us by now.”

  “I might have done a little extra sabotage on the way out,” Haneul said. The air around her grew even more crackly. “It was you who blasted the wires on Deck Three, wasn’t it, just before you escaped with the mercenaries? That’s where I got the idea.”

  Clearly, I hadn’t been a very good influence on these two. “Help me get out of this couch,” I said.

  “What are you going to do?” Sujin said.

  “See if I can fix the system,” I said, “before we swing past the planet and into outer space”—Sujin turned green—“or crash-land in some ocean.” I was pretty sure I could deal with the problem, given my k
nack for repairing machines, but I had to get free of those cushions first.

  “Well, ocean wouldn’t be horrible,” Haneul said, “although I’m not sure how much control I would have over waters on a planet ruled by ghosts.” As she spoke, she came over to unstrap me. I suppressed a yelp when she touched my shoulder and static electricity sparked at the contact. I knew she hadn’t meant to hurt me.

  The acceleration hadn’t helped my battered body recover, but I had no choice but to get moving. I clomped over to the interface and began digging through the menus. It became clear pretty quickly that the problem wasn’t in the scan software, though, but somewhere in the hardware.

  Sujin wordlessly handed me the repair kit. I unscrewed a panel and took a look. A little quick testing confirmed my worst fears. Some of the computer systems had shorted out.

  Still, not everything was lost. The computer contained survey data for the Fourth Colony, which it would have been updated with when the Pale Lightning Gated nearby. I hastily looked over the maps for what remained of the city of Jeonbok and committed them to memory.

  “There’s a slate with local scan capability in the supply kit,” Sujin said. “Won’t help us out in space, but once we get on the surface, maybe we can use it to gather some information.”

  “You don’t think this pod somehow got sabotaged, too, do you?” I asked.

  “Well,” Haneul said slowly, “when I sabotaged the Pale Lightning, the escape pods were technically part of the ship . . .” Her voice trailed off unhappily. “Given the way luck works, it might have backfired on us.”

  I continued poking at the systems. I might not be able to repair it entirely, but I could restore the most basic navigation functions and guide us toward our original destination. “Since we have time before we land,” I said as I worked, frowning at the delicate wires, “tell me why you turned coat.”

  Haneul winced, but Sujin said steadily, “Because some things are right and some things are wrong. We had to do what was right.”

  “The captain has lost it,” Haneul said. Her voice was subdued. “I know Jun—he’s a loyal cadet—and what happened to him is horrible. Hwan is holding him hostage who knows where. When the captain threatened us as well, I figured all bets were off.”