Six years ago:

"Powering up the engines." He pushed his gloved finger against the sequence of buttons, then took a deep breath of pressurized air, slowly letting it out as he curled his finger under the final switch.

"Godspeed, Pioneer. Awaiting next contact."

Hyukjae flipped the switch, quickly looking up. Earth was still large in his screen, and he waited two seconds before releasing his breath, annoyed. The math said that this was entirely possible, and the engines should have had enough power to easily create the wormhole. He cursed and hit his hand against the console, frustrated that his nearly three days awake was all for naught. "Mission Control, Pioneer..."

The view out of the window abruptly changed, colors flashing before his eyes in a sickening swirl, and he pinched his eyes closed. Not getting nauseous in free fall was already a difficult prospect for him, but add in flashing, swirling colors and his stomach immediately reacted violently to it. Daring to peek when he didn't see the strobe of colors anymore, he instinctively shrieked. He was close – far too close – to something in his way, and he fought against the controls to orient and right himself, trying to spin out of the way of a spike that was headed right for him. Shoving the flight stick all the way to the right, he rolled out of the way of that one, only to feel Pioneer shudder. Yanking the stick to the left, he gasped and felt his eyes go wide when his ears popped.

He barely had time to shove the protective shield of his helmet down before the simple physics of explosive decompression took over, and he twisted as best he could to gauge the damage, his stomach sinking when he saw that the entire back end of Pioneer had been sheared off and was now exposed to space, the engines swirling away from him and abruptly lighting what he'd just crashed into.

It was almost pretty, in a sickening, fatalistic way, when the engines finally crashed against a flat space and fire brilliantly bloomed from the explosion.

The shockwave and shrapnel caught up to him in less than a minute, and for a few seconds, he thought he managed to escape unscathed, even though half of the control panels were dark from impacts. His attention was caught by a large cloud of gas drifting into his line of sight and he laughed bitterly as he looked at the large rip in the leg of his suit, venting the air that could have kept him alive for a few hours. His ears popped as air rushed out of the rest of the suit, and he welcomed the blackness of unconsciousness when it consumed him.

He hadn’t expected to wake up. Or if he did, maybe he would see if there was an afterlife. His mind was foggy and not comprehending, and he fought weakly against the firm hands on him, wanting to know one way or the other.

“Am I dead?” he mumbled in Korean, any ability to speak in a language other than his native one gone for the moment. Bright lights made him hope that even though he had lost his faith somewhere along the way between Seoul and Canaveral, he was in Heaven.

Cracking his eyes open, he winced at the light that made it seem like ice picks had just been stabbed into his brain. There was noise, but he couldn’t sort out what it was. Cracking his eyes open again, he frowned slightly. There were human-shaped objects hovering above him, and he wished his eyes would hurry up and focus.

The slap across the face certainly helped with focusing and clearing out some of the cobwebs from his mind, even though he felt like he was at the end of a three-day bender and incredibly sleepy.

He blinked a few times, his head ringing from the force of the slap. He noticed the military-like uniform first off, but there weren’t any visible ranks that he was familiar with and he skipped up to the face. Rearing back a little, he blatantly stared at the single-lidded, dark eyes, wondering if he had hallucinated the past few years of his life. Then the man in front of him opened his mouth.

“Di xing ka lop.”

Blinking, Hyukjae tried to figure out what language that was supposed to be. “What?” he tried in English, his voice slurred.

“Di xing ka lop!”

Shaking his head, Hyukjae tried for body language to convey that he had no clue what the guy was telling or asking him.

With another slap, a small vial was shoved up his nose. He couldn’t help the instinctive breath in to protest the indignity, and he really hoped that whatever was in the vial wasn’t deadly.

“Who are you?” he suddenly heard, the vial being taken out of his nose and tossed carelessly away. The voice was stiff and formal and apparently supremely pissed off.

“How do you know Korean?” Hyukjae asked, his head swimming around from the repeated slaps and still drunk-feeling. “Where am I?”

“Your. Name.”

Hyukjae stared for a moment, trying to figure out where he was, who this guy in front of him was, how that guy also knew that he was Korean and suddenly started speaking his native language, and what the hell was in that vial.

“I demand your name!” This time, the demand was accompanied by a punch that definitely made him see stars, and with crystal clarity, Hyukjae knew that he wasn’t dead – yet – but he was in the middle of an interrogation. With that, he immediately fell back into training.

“Lee Hyukjae. Commander of Pioneer. Republic of Korea Army,” he stated, his eyes drilling into the guy who kept slapping him.

“Li.. H… Ek.. Jai?” Hyukjae closed his eyes as he saw the man aiming yet another slap or a punch or whatever at him. Wincing at the impact and pain from a punch, Hyukjae almost wished he was unconscious again. “Your true name! Not some nonsense you have created!”

Shaking his head, Hyukjae repeated himself, wondering how much longer it would be before he was unconscious again.

Three punches later, he was just on the verge of passing out, and he was bracing for a fourth when the guy was interrupted. “Commandant, I ask for a moment,” a soft, distinctly female voice said.

Blearily looking at her, he wondered how the hell she was speaking Korean too, even if it was extremely stiff and formal sounding. She was using polite forms, where the guy hadn’t been.

“Your report?”

“We brought the remains of that one’s craft aboard and it was inspected. It was found to contain… anomalies.”

“What kind?”

“Commandant, my report reflects that the craft was not manufactured within the Empire’s borders. It is crude technology, the sort that any shipyard would be ashamed to claim as their own. I conclude that it was manufactured in the Wilds. Perhaps that one is from one of the independent-leaning worlds?”

“Hey,” Hyukjae protested. Insulting him was one thing, insulting Pioneer was another. He had put an absurd amount of time and thought into that design, and half the instruments and functioning parts he had to design himself since they didn’t even exist. “Pioneer isn’t crude.”

Forcing nausea down as he was punched again, he just wanted to sleep.

“God, could you aim a little better,” he muttered under his breath.

“What is your world called?”

Hyukjae couldn’t understand how he was on Earth and was being asked what world he came from. “The kind of question is that?” he returned.

He was displeased that the punch he got as an answer didn’t knock him out.

“Your world!”

Giving up, Hyukjae shook his head. This was by far not how he expected an interrogation to go – he expected questions about his work and the technology that came from his work, not what the planet was called, which everyone should really know.

He maybe muttered something about everyone knowing what Earth was called, but he couldn’t be sure as he finally passed out again.

Hyukjae had no clue how long he was unconscious, but when he finally kind of surfaced again, it was because of screaming and the sound of something pounding on metal and fighting. Opening his eyes, he felt an immediate surge of adrenaline as he saw many bodies running by, many of them inarticulately yelling, and he was pretty sure he saw someone just yank something off the wall to use as a makeshift weapon.

Shakily getting up from the floor, he realized something didn’t feel right. Looking down, he nearly died of mortification. He was entirely and he quickly grabbed the thing that he’d been sleeping on, hoping like hell that it was a sheet he could wrap around himself. It was padded and tough to hold closed, but he cautiously stepped out of the open door, wondering how and why it was open. The floor was freezing on his bare feet, but he wasn’t on them for long.

He was obviously caught up in the middle of a riot, and he couldn’t get a moment to think properly. If he wasn’t being jostled around, he was being dragged or shoved out of the way, usually landing painfully against cold metal. Just when he thought things were calming down, he was yanked around and pushed against the wall, and he barely managed to avoid landing nose first.

“This one has to be the infiltrator,” someone behind him announced. “That marking is too new!”

There was a chorus of shouts and agreements and Hyukjae tried to get his body to work so he could get away. Yelping in pain as his short hair was grabbed in a painfully hard grip, he was basically forced to let go of his covering to grab at the hands with his and his face burned from the embarrassment.

“Let me go,” he bit out, struggling to get away.

“Oh we will let you go.” The menace in the voice chilled him far more than what the ambient temperature did, and he was dragged kicking and screaming down a hallway until he was shoved against a wall again, but this one was even colder and it had a nice, cheery circular window like thing in it. The dull red lighting made it feel like there was a rock in his stomach as every single thing he’d ever seen in movie pointed towards that small room being an airlock, and right beyond that would be nothing but space.

The new surge of adrenaline let him work his limbs long enough to shove himself backwards and away from that. “Let me go,” he shrieked. “I don’t know what the you’re talking about!” Digging his thumbnail into the soft underside of a wrist, he finally loosened the grip on his hair, only to be attacked from behind, his arms held out by two different people. The guy who first had a grip on him backhanded him across the face, causing Hyukjae to dry heave a few times, which apparently gave the guy enough time to open the airlock door.

Struggling against the hold on his arms, he fought like hell to keep from being herded into that red-lit room. When he finally got one arm free, he swung his fist blindly, wanting nothing more than to cause pain to someone who had caused him pain. He jerked when his wrist was caught in a firm grip and he couldn’t help the shriek. Two glowing gold eyes were staring at him calmly.

“What the ,” he screamed. “What – who are you?” He finally tore his gaze away from the unsettling eyes and noticed that they belonged to a young woman, her dark hair short, giving her a tomboyish appearance. She was dressed in a black long-sleeved shirt that was tight against her skin, and black pants that were loose, almost like fatigues, which was what everyone else was wearing.

“He is not the infiltrator,” she calmly said, turning her attention to the guy who had dragged him and dropping Hyukjae’s wrist. “You are.”

“Crazy ,” the guy spat, and Hyukjae was relieved for the moment that all of the attention was off him. Protectively covering himself he glanced around as he shifted his weight from foot to foot to try and keep the numbness away. “You are tribute. Are you his?”

“I belong to no one,” she answered, her voice just as composed as it had been, though Hyukjae did notice the twitch of her hand. “That one has only confusion and no intent to harm. He is simply new. Your intent is to harm and control.”

Hyukjae started as he heard a growl and after a panicked look around for a dog, he suddenly realized it was coming from the woman.

“Shabi. You can go with him.”

“I would not recommend that,” a new voice said. “Her twin has already caused one riot for her.”

Hyukjae was even more confused as about half of the group gathered around the airlock suddenly dropped to their knees and bowed their heads to the floor. Others were just slower getting there, leaving only him, the woman, and the guy who grabbed him standing.

He suddenly realized he was still as the day he was born, and his feet were going numb. He’d given up wondering why and how everyone was speaking Korean, deciding that saving his life was a little more important. The woman looked at him, her eyes a startling brilliant gold, but now without the disturbing glow. She showed no fear in turning her back on the guy that had dragged him and calmly walked to the tall, thin man who was the new arrival. “I will acquire clothing for that one. He is becoming uncomfortable.”

Tall and Thin nodded once, stepping to the side slightly to let her pass. “A moment,” he said, stopping her in her tracks, her head tilting inquisitively. “What is the situation?”

“Infiltrator,” she replied, jerking her chin to the guy who had dragged Hyukjae by his hair, and Hyukjae didn’t kid himself that he was above feeling a spurt of vindication. “Accusing the bare one of being that.”

Tall and Thin nodded. “My thanks. Bare One, come,” he ordered, waving his hand in a ‘come here’ motion.

Hyukjae looked at him suspiciously for a moment, but Tall and Thin was farther away from the airlock than what he was, so that was a no-brain decision. “My name is Lee Hyukjae,” he corrected once he had scampered over to the much taller man.

“Hekjai?” Tall and Thin asked, obviously stumbling over the pronunciation.

“Oh my God, all of you are speaking Korean but you can’t pronounce my name?” he asked, finally exasperated. Then it dawned on him that he had been next to an airlock.

He was in space. He was in space, on a spaceship, surrounded by people on a spaceship, and people who he suddenly realized would not be from Earth since he wasn’t floating in freefall, and the coldness on all the metal meant that they were really in space. He knew his eyes were wide as he looked up at Tall and Thin.

“We’re not on Earth, are we?” he asked quietly, already knowing the answer, but wanting someone outside of himself to confirm.

“I am not familiar with that location.”

“Oh,” Hyukjae replied, a sudden grief crashing through him.

“That shabi accused me!” the guy next to the airlock suddenly roared, shaking Hyukjae out of the downward spiral of thoughts and making him realize that he was still in a very precarious situation. “She is covering for her owner in saying that I am an infiltrator!”

“She did not accuse,” Tall and Thin said, his voice firm. “She only speaks in truth. If she says that you are an infiltrator, you are one.”

“She lies,” the guy said, spit flying from his mouth.

“She does not. Relinquish your weapon. There is no one left aside from you. You may join those who surrendered peacefully, or you may join the others in death,” Tall and Thin replied. Hyukjae jumped and barely held onto the startled yelp when he felt a soft hand touch his shoulder from behind.

“Bare One. Clothing.”

Hyukjae had to take a couple of deep breaths before he could shakily reach out with one hand and grab the pile of fabric. Feeling better as he actually had something to cover himself with, he wondered if he should just get dressed right there or if he could hold onto the clothing enough to cover his while he dressed.

“There is no reason for embarrassment,” the woman whispered to him, her voice pitched under the heated argument brewing between Tall and Thin and the other guy. “Most are born with ia.”

The pain from his feet finally overrode the mortification and he quickly dressed, stepping into the shoes that looked like a cross between sneakers and combat boots. Feeling inordinately better now that he was clothed, he glanced around. Most everyone had risen out of the bow, but remained on their knees, and he wondered what kind of deference they were giving Tall and Thin.

“Hey thanks,” he said to the woman, who nodded. “What’s your name?”

She turned her head and blinked at him curiously. “Twin and I do not have one. If you require a designator for use, I was referred to as Two during my servitude.”

Hyukjae felt a sick sensation roil in his stomach. “You were a slave?” he asked, horrified.

“Your reaction is most peculiar,” she replied. “Aside from Zhou Mi, I have not known others to be appalled about servitude.”

“Who’s Zhou Mi?”

She pointed at Tall and Thin.

“Okay I like him way more already than I like that other guy.”

The corners of her lips tilted upwards slightly. “Your speech patterns are odd. What world do you come from?”

“Earth,” he replied, not feeling any hesitation in letting her have that information since she’d just literally saved his life.

“I am unknowing of that world. Is it in the Wilds?”

Her question was so forthright and matter of fact that it really drove home the fact that he was lost in space and surrounded by non-Earth humanoids. “I don’t know,” he answered, his voice getting choked up.