"TN-1063, you're up."

The pilot in question had removed her helmet in the hermetically sealed compartment of the Star Destroyer reserved for the TIE Wing. Her black and silver BB-9e rolled at her heels, bumping clumsily into the back of her legs when she stopped.

"I've had my turn, sir."

The CO had the multicolored tab on his chest. In the black visor she glimpsed a reflection of her own face. She knew what he saw, the softened edges of a woman's face, the curve of a dark brow over a blue eye. The cap of black hair had been cut short in the back; longer slats framed her face, tickling her cheek during long flight exercises in the confining helmet.

"You did? When?"

"Just now. I switched with TN-2089. He took my shift and I just returned from his." The pilots were anonymous entities. On the hangar deck, no one knew any different except for her BB-9e who had almost rolled into the wrong cockpit.

"I cleared it with Commander Soren."

"I am aware. That's the…eighth time," the CO's voice came through the helmet modulator polished like the Durasteel surrounding them. "Is there something you wish to do at this time of 08:35 hours? Hmm, TN-1063?"

"Blaster practice." She straightened her pose, her eyes lifting coolly to address the co. "I like to think I'm prepared for ejection into a potentially hostile environment."

Amusement shown through, "need I remind you, TN-1063, the high death rate of TIE pilots? They are the most expendable, highly trained death-dealing machines. They do not fear death; they embrace it in an explosive supernova of suicide. In my day, TIE pilots were considered suicide bombers."

"Yes, sir." She wasn't sure what he was getting at, but a general agreement usually sufficed.

"Now, carry on with whatever you were doing."

She saluted crisply, turning to brush past him.

"Oh and put your helmet on. Don't forget it's regulatory now."

…

"I'm…I'm going for blaster practice." She mumbled to the droid's query. She had missed minutes, wasted them answering her foolish CO's questioning. TN-1063 picked up pace, turning down the clean insectile line of corridor at the end of which a blank featured wall was outfitted with a single large doorway into a vast echoing chamber.

She nearly ran to the panel, pausing only to catch her breath. Her heart was beating wildly; her hand trembled inputting the code. BB-9e rolled up beside her, beeping a quieter query.

"Blaster practice. Blaster practice." Yeah, keep telling yourself that. Impatiently, she waited for the door to unlock, stepping inside the long room lined with separate stalls for marksmanship practice. Rows of blasters hung in racks across from her. TN-1063 passed them without a glance, jogging across the length of the room to the separate door set against the wall. She ignored that one and went for the utility door for the cleanup droids.

The panel needed no access code. Wrapping her hand around the slot, she tugged it open smoothly and stepped into a brightly lit chamber. Multiple columns supported the slanted ceiling line and upper deck above. The room was warm, the atmosphere thick with aggression. She stepped behind one of the columns, hugging close to the metal pillar. The hum of a blade somewhere close by set her nerves on edge.

Kylo Ren stood in the very center of the chamber, performing complex moves in a whirling display of raw brutality and grace. TN-1063 peered out carefully, scowling suddenly. She wanted to see with her own eyes. Fidgeting with the helmet, she ducked out of sight, removing the confining thing. She nearly dropped it in the process.

Momentary fear gripped her. She hadn't known the emotion all the days she had strapped into the circular cockpit of the fighter. She had seen others blasted out of the sky, tangling with Resistance starfighters in violent dog fights that left twisted, burnt out wreckage behind. Nothing had scared her so much as being caught now.

She clutched the helmet to her chest, and peered out again. Ren had heard nothing. Not her exhaled breath, nor the sound of the door opening from BB-9e. She thought the droid would follow her to its shut down, obeying its programming until even the circuitry fried in a fight she couldn't win.

Through some unseen gesture, blaster droids exited from a vent in the far wall. Ren turned toward them; his masked face made of chrome lines and narrowed black sockets. Through it, she could hear his breathing, imagining his full parted lips. The damp strands of wavy black hair, the sharp eyes peering through the tinted visor.

Ren, the creature of instinct, darkness had an all too human face. TN-1063 watched him deflect blaster bolts into the ceiling, into the walls. The last droid learned from its fellows' demise. It evaded him, firing several times at his unprotected back. Once it scored a hit - she gasped - the fabric of his cape smoldered down to the skin. Ren hardly staggered, spinning around with his hand outstretched.

The Force…the mystical power binding the universe together. She watched his hand close in a fisting motion, snatching the droid midair. The skeletal frame crumpled into an electrical discharge of burnt out sectors and wiring. He tossed it from him, sending the shattered remnants spilling across the floor.

BB-9e's head swiveled toward the broken droid then back to her. She ducked out of sight, bracing her back against the column. The length of Ren's strides crossed the room; the tapping sound of his boots drew near. If he catches me…she slid around to the left side, her senses hyper alert. He passed by on the opposite side, missing the flicker of her movement.

"A droid?"

The voice modulator thickened his deep voice. She had heard it raised to the ferocious heights of anger to the passive sarcasm when interrogating Resistance scum. TN-1063 steeled her nerves for the BB unit's destruction.

But, he left it alone, dismissing his lightsaber. The familiar hum vanished into the silence of his retreating footsteps. She waited long minutes, counting them in her head until she was well and truly alone with the droid.

BB-9e rolled around the column, bumping her legs reminding her she needed to move.

"Blaster practice…? Not today."

The droid beeped in binary.

She reaffixed her helmet, "what…? My ID?"

…

"This is the first infraction of the rules."

The CO had referred her to the bridge after the morning shift. TN-1063 composed herself on the long walk through the Star Destroyer. BB-9e accompanied her until the doors where the droid stayed behind the line of white troopers guarding the entrance.

"I'm sorry, sir."

"Spotless record." Hux cycled through her file on the datapad. Pulled from the thousands in the fleet, she saw her own medical stats approved by the CO. She was the ideal height, the weight for perfect weightlessness in the TIE's linear design for optimum speed. "Tell me, is there any reason you switched shifts with another pilot?"

Don't let it happen again.

She had no real answer, so she stayed silent.

Kylo Ren was on the bridge to her left, standing behind the row of technical support, observing the passing meteor shower. She turned her head slightly to keep him in her line of sight.

"Come now, I've asked you a direct question. Surely your conditioning permits you to speak."

My conditioning…? She was glad the helmet hid her face. The tightening of her throat caused her voice to waver. "I wanted to request an afternoon shift. I perform best with Squad 102, sir."

"There is no time in space, TN-1063."

"There is on other planets."

"You're from…Chandrila?"

For an instant, she was back there inhaling the sharp clean air, glimpsing the reflective beauty of Lake Sah'ot.

"I am the oldest TIE pilot on the Finalizer." She kept her tone forcibly neutral. "I have survived sixty-six missions. I can therefore judge the abilities of my squadron."

Hux's green eyes flickered over the mission roster list. "Sometimes you were the sole survivor. How do you do it?" He seemed almost bemused and not at all angry. "Luck or is it the mystical Force the way Ren might say?"

The latter stirred, but said nothing.

"I don't know."

"Well, whatever it is will run out one day. Make sure you take the scum down with you, TN-1063."

"Yes, sir."

…

She walked with heaviness in her step. Another face. Another pilot. Someone nodded to her. She recognized it as TN-2089 from the stiffness in his walk.

66.

Beautiful Chandrila.

Twenty-six years old.

I haven't been back in all these years.

She turned and kept a moderate pace. BB-9e chirped beside her once the troopers had gone past.

"I know."

She could feel someone behind her. A flicker of energy pressing against her spine through the layered uniform and chest plate. Electricity. She stopped and turned, but no one paid attention to her. She was just another faceless pilot recognizable from her black suit and metallic helmet.

She had four hours before a rotating shift put her on tactical support. I may as well rest, she thought, heading for the turbolift. She rode down with another officer, a stern-faced woman whose gaze remained straight ahead. BB-9e rolled with her, silently taking up post beside the door panel. She removed her outer life support vest, loosening the belt that cut into her waist when she lied down. Turning on her side, she fluffed the hard pillow with her fingers, closing her eyes slowly.

The droid beeped close by.

"I'm not asleep. I can't sleep."

She listened to the reply, turning over onto her back. "Everyone needs to sleep, excluding you. Oh, I'm making a fool of myself…go for reconditioning?" A run through of the tests her younger self had been subjected to went through her head. "Yes, I suppose Captain Phasma might call me an error or something. Scum if she's in a good mood."

I don't want to go.

I don't want to hear the condemnation of emotions.

"I can feel."

The droid rolled closer to the edge of the narrow bed. She stretched her fingertips out, brushing the black chrome head.

"I really am foolish, aren't I?"

…

In twenty-six years, she hadn't felt anything.

She must've cried as a child, or thrown tantrums. It was odd, very strange that she could remember little of her parents. Their faces, the looks of brazen adoration in the wake of the First Order's rise. They were staunch Imperials, former or otherwise who had lived in the aftermath of the fall.

Long live the Empire.

The Empire was dead.

Long may the First Order reign.

The words were a refrain she had heard so often it had become second nature to think them.

"You have a gift. Use it and become the sword of the Supreme Leader."

He has an apprentice, his vengeance for the Empire's fall in the form of Ben Solo, prized for his blood. The knowledge came as a blow to her psyche. She wasn't good enough, of course. The parents who had given her up to the First Order knew nothing else.

What place do I have in all this?

The answer had come painfully, slowly to TN-1063 watching a flight exercise of New Republic X-wings above Hanna City's airspace.

I won't use it again.

She went through flight simulators, through rigorous training until she coughed up blood. She was impressive, light, and fast on her feet. But, it was in the cockpit that she shone.

"This one might last two seasons."

On average, TIE pilots lasted through one battle.

One.

Two.

Three.

TN-1063 had the thing that had always been inside her.

"Sixty six missions later." She had escorted commanders, rulers of planets in convoys of black-suited pilots. She had flown over barren terrain, flushing out Resistance scum with a barrage of her plasma cannons. She had survived through it all with the blank deadness inside her masking the emotions of a normal human woman.

"Then, I saw him."

She didn't know how long he had been a part of the Finalizer. The resurgent class Destroyer had become her new berth after time spent on the Tarkin honing her piloting skills.

I didn't want to become a leader.

Commander Duma called them pups until they saw action. Onboard the Tarkin, she had seen missions with high success rates.

"Not enough ambition, TN-1063."

Merits, perfect record, everything had gone in her favor.

"One thing, never get in the way of the Supreme Leader's apprentice."

Unstable.

Violent.

Deadly.

An animal to most.

She had docked her fighter in the main hangar once, glimpsing a robed figure striding across the deck. The few pilots and troopers who carried on their duties, parted for him with subservient displays.

Master of the Knights of Ren.

Darth Vader reborn, whispered some. Ren had become the living visage of the galaxy's nightmare. She wasn't afraid of him. How could she be? TIEs were the space superiority fighters, he was reconnaissance and interrogation. They moved in different circles.

He sparred one hour that passed for morning in the timeless conception of space with one of his knights.

"It was an accident."

She shouldn't have been there.

The squadron had experienced devastating losses, seven blown out of the skies over a bunker said to harbor fugitives. TN-1063 had pulled out of the fight with one wing smoking. She had been with the squadron one aby. She had laughed, told jokes, mildly complained about the cafeteria's nutritional supplements with them. One female and six males. They were as close as a team as could be among the hundreds of crew accompaniment.

They were her team.

All gone.

She hadn't been able to return to her berth after the debriefing on the bridge.

"I can't…,"

It was the closest to tears she had come. She had wanted to run to the hangar and jump into the cockpit of her fighter - find them - she would find them - and destroy…TN-1063 had felt the thing inside her shift, darkening with the violence of her feelings.

I needed something, anything to hold onto.

"They were sparring." Her memory had always been good. Kylo Ren and one of his knights. I had never seen anything like it before in my life. Nothing of the bulky armor, the pulse of rifles could compare to the deadly grace on the floor.

Until the moment when he had removed his helmet, she had thought of him as something less than human. More machine than man. TN-1063 could understand droids, protocol droids, astromech units. Ren had seemed an enforcer, something beyond her understanding until she had seen his face.

He had removed it in the presence of the knight, a Zabrak with the reddish skin and horns evocative of their race. Ren's human face by contrast, was pale, oval in shape. His brows were thin above expressive hazel eyes. Dark hair lay damp with sweat, framing the sides of his face. He was young yet, perhaps close to her age. He was nothing of what she expected behind the mask.

"He fascinated me."

She had never seen someone with a face so open, his every emotion was plain to see. Annoyance. Anger. Hatred. Pleasure. Happiness. The last was something she imagined.

"I learned he always sparred at the same hour unless away on mission."

They all knew it hence the emptiness of the chamber at that certain time.

"He was often alone. Rarely joined by his knights."

Ren never took his helmet off again. I saw him with it enough, but I never forgot his face.

"It was easier to imagine his expressions, his biting sarcasm when speaking to General Hux."

Somehow. Some way, I had found what I was looking for. My feelings had evolved into what I shouldn't feel into what I wanted to make him feel.

"The only thing I want is for him to notice me."

The droid listened to her; the droid was the only one who would.

…

09:50

There was no time in space.

She went through the motions of flight, restrained in outward vocalization. She had been chastised once. Once was enough. BB-9e noticed her silence, observing her with a tilt to its head. The motion was one of curiosity, something the other BB-9e droids never exhibited around their biological counterparts.

TN-1063 noticed the absence of the TIE Silencer and a lessening of the troopers loitering around the hangar. They were off on mission, she assumed depressed. She had no way of knowing the exact purpose of the mission - to question would be to expose her interest in Ren's life.

He had a life, didn't he? Wasn't there something beyond the servitude to the Supreme Leader that made him different than the bland, personality-less officers around them? TN-1063 considered the word apprentice…he was Snoke's apprentice, but in what?

Upon his return days later, she glimpsed him tear through a room of electrical equipment in thwarted fury. The crimson cross-guarded lightsaber thrashed through the console, the keypads and monitors. Incendiary sparks flew, scattering across the floor. The vivid glow painted his ragged flowing cape and hooded masked face into something from a half-forgotten nightmare.

TN-1063 motioned for silence to the droid; a pair of Stormtroopers who were marching down the hallway, abruptly turned and went the opposite way, hearing Ren's feral shrieks of anger.

He stopped, shoulders heaving.

"What are you staring at?"

BB-9e rotated behind her quickly, peering out between her legs. TN-1063 straightened arms precisely at her sides. "Are you alright, sir?" Of course she had heard about Ren's tantrums. His destructive tendencies unleashed in the corridors of the Finalizer. Commander Duma had mentioned them to her previously.

"Mind your own business, trooper. You know what I can do."

I don't -actually. She could surmise destruction from the blade in his hand. "I am an elite pilot, sir, not merely a Stormtrooper."

"A false front of bravery. How long until it cracks?" He sounded almost amused - the almost gave her hope. She was not brave. She could almost amuse him. She was foolish. TIE pilots had no need of courage. They accepted their deaths as a stroke of ill fate.

In her head, she imagined the different things she could've said to detain him, the outcomes possible through a simple difference in words. Instead, she stood precisely in military formation, her words remaining stubbornly on her tongue when he walked past her.

They were all afraid of him.

General Hux hated him; everyone knew about the unspoken antipathy between the commanders of the First Order.

She thought all those things and more, removing her left glove. The room was a mess, metal cloven through, gutted wires, circuits spilling out. BB-9e beeped that it could've been a droid or someone living. The droid didn't know fear, but it knew the possibilities of non-existence. TN-1063 touched the console, her sensitive fingertips smarting from the touch of hot metal.

She hadn't used the thing inside her for a year since transferring to the Finalizer. There was no real need, no actual threat she needed to use more than her skills for.

In an instant, she was in a room interrogating a frightened old woman.

Lor San Tekka. Where is he?

The name was a memory, stirring the chaotic rage inside the soul of the knight.

A map of stars - incomplete - she could see Ren's face, his true face, bathed in the glow of binary star systems.

A map to Luke Skywalker.

That was his mission, his obsession. Frustration fueled his actions. The shadow of Ren ignited the saber and began destroying the room for everything it represented - his hatred of Hux, his chains -

The memory ended.

Stormtroopers marched past.

TN-1063 stared down at her hand surprised. She felt she knew him that little bit more.

…

"A cat? Where?"

On the way back to her quarters, she was alerted by BB-9e's beep. Glancing around, she finally spotted the marmalade colored animal slinking out of the lounge. Surprised, she immediately gave chase. "No way…there's no way a cat could be aboard the Finalizer!"

The furry thing reappeared; ginger tail lifting in a curious twitch. She noticed the gaberwool collar attached around the cat's thick neck, proving the animal belonged to someone, likely one of the officers. "Hello there," she dropped to a crouch, setting her helmet down on the floor. "Kitty-kitty, here, kitty-kitty…," BB-9e remained behind her, the blue photoreceptor eyeing the cat who stalked forward, tentatively sniffing her gloved hand.

The cat seemed to find her pleasant for the furry head lowered, butting her fingers. TN-1063 scratched behind her ears, the thick gloves kept the sensation of the cat's fur dulled to her fingertips. Deciding to risk censure in case they were seen, she scooped up the cat in her arms.

"I wish I had a cat." As she spoke, footsteps echoed up the corridor.

Lieutenant Mitaka looked right to and left and spotted her. "Sir! I found the cat-she's uh…," he seemed a little taken aback seeing her face and uniform. Likely he had forgotten there was something else beneath the helmet of a pilot or Stormtrooper. "She's um…with one of the TIE pilots." Behind the flustered man, the general appeared looking quite annoyed.

TN-1063's eyebrows shot up in surprise. "I didn't know you had a cat, sir."

"Yes, well, she ordinarily stays above floors." Hux stepped closer, eyeing the cat who was currently purring contentedly in the woman's arms.

She scratched the cat's furry head eliciting a rapturous purr. "What's her name?"

"Millicent. She seems to have taken a liking to you." The general frowned thoughtfully. "She barely tolerates the officers on the bridge."

"I can imagine. She's such a beautiful color. I've always liked red." TN-1063 felt herself smiling. On Chandrila, she had seen others with pets, cats and dogs who responded to affection. She didn't think many of the officers were at all friendly with Millicent.

"She's uh- ginger colored."

"Oh, well, here you go." An awkward exchange ensued with the cat struggling to stay in the pilot's arms. Hux ignored the layer of ginger fur clinging to his great coat, wrapping a firm arm around the cat to restrain her.

"Thank you, TN-1063. But, why were you up? Your squadron isn't due for flight in hours."

"I couldn't sleep." She bent quickly to retrieve her helmet. "I'm sorry, sir. I should have my-"

"At ease." Hux almost smiled, glancing over her flight suit. She had left off the heavy life support system over the curve of body armor and rounded pauldrons emblazoned with the black star of the First Order. "Just don't make it a habit."

"Yes, sir." She inclined her head respectfully. "Oh and goodnight to you and Millicent."

…

"It's nice that the general has a cat. He seems so fastidious with personal appearance and he didn't seem to mind the cat hair on his uniform." TN-1063 removed her body armor in the privacy of her quarters, loosening the collar of the under shirt. "I like that about him, its sweet." BB-9e beeped from beside the bed, plugged into the charging outlet.

"I know, I can't see Ren with a pet cat either. That would just be wrong." She chuckled to herself, curling up within the blankets. Within no time at all, she had subsided into sleep, dreaming of star charts and distant solar systems.

…

09:56

She had breakfasted lightly, having a choice between a protein drink and a protein bar. The squadron performed their maneuvers, patrolling the skies above a snow-covered world. The people of the planet wore heavy furs and strange goggles on their faces. They were small and dark, pausing to stare up at the sky at the sound of the TIE squadron flying low overhead.

We're showing off, she thought, seeing little purpose to their practicable cannon fire. They destroyed one remote settlement, devastating the domed houses on the low crystalline plain. TN-1063 watched the tiny figures stream out, shaking their fists at the fighters.

"Another volley." Her comm unit crackled to life.

She glanced at it sharply.

"On me."

One.

Two.

Three. The fighters spread out in a wide circle, the spinning fuselage emitted a stream of green plasma. TN-1063's hands relaxed around the trigger, she felt physically sick.

Something moved from the resulting cloud of white.

A child.

What passed for one on another planet.

She had a clear shot.

"TN-1063, it's all yours."

I don't feel like an elite pilot.

I feel like a murderer.

…

The TIE docked in its row, suspended above and below others. They were the same in shape, wing size, artillery. TN-1063 moved mechanically through the cockpit, leaving everything the way she had found it. BB-9e chirped to remind her not to forget it.

She went through the motions, signing out of the system. She had six hours until the next mission. A few hours to rest or consume nutrients. TN-1063 walked past the squadron, her gaze straight ahead. It had been easier to think and feel automatically, nothing. They believed in a better world, in militaristic glory. She felt none of it walking through the Finalizer, inhaling the stench of smoke and fuel that permeated the corridors.

BB-9e seemed to sense something amiss with her, beeping none of its usual commentary on the officers they passed. TN-1063 went straight to her room. In the center of the room, she removed her helmet, setting it down at her feet. The rasp of air tubes once removed filled her with silence. She pressed her palm to her damp brow; her hair was mussy, slick with sweat. She had been drenched in a cold sweat since the unknown planet they had left behind.

"How can they do it?"

The droid sat at her feet, looking up at her.

"The Stormtroopers?"

She had killed before in air strikes, targeting rebel bases or supposed hideouts. But, nothing so purposeless, so lacking in meaning.

"What is the point of all this?"

She gestured suddenly, hands spread to the room. "This Star Destroyer, the First Order - what is my purpose?"

BB-9e had no answers for her.

No one did.

After a long moment of catching her breath from her outburst, she picked her helmet up off the floor. The droid looked toward the door, head swiveling back toward her.

"No…not blaster practice. I have something else in mind."

The hall was emptied as she had expected it would be at that hour, meetings, rotating guard and meal time for those coming off duty kept the training hall silent. One gleaming protocol droid shuffled around carrying a datapad of recent scores. TN-1063 ignored it, walking over to the rack of stun batons carried by ground troopers.

"I was remembering something yesterday. I had seen moves like that once. Long ago…someone…," she stood in the center of the room, holding it out in front of her. BB-9e rolled to the left, watching her curiously. "Someone was showing them to me." It was more than that…they were broadcasting their memories into my head.

She crossed the baton in a guarding gesture.

Someone was showing me a room where others sparred; someone was watching…a man who wore a long cape fastened over a life support suit His mask had the face of an insectoid, he breathed deeply, harshly in the room filled with the sound of humming blades. I had never felt such malevolence from a single person before. It was like looking into the abyss, the cold was all around you - and somehow you couldn't look away from it.

She closed her eyes visualizing Lake Sah'ot. Her inner self took a running jump into the lake, knowing the lake was depthless in her mind. The cold waters closed over her, sealing over the light from above.

"It was like I was sparring in front of him."

I was one of them - and not at the same time.

She began moving as she never before, conscious of her body, her limbs and the extension of the baton as part of her. She stepped into complex slashing motions, retreating to a loose guard then springing into a matchless display of ferocity and skill. TN-1063 spun around on her heels, performing her dance of blades.

On the point of her turn - she became aware of another presence. The imposing visage of Lord Vader faded into the walls of an obsidian fortress. Someone was there just beyond her sight, clad in ebony robes of whispering silk. TN-1063 completed the elegant pivot of her body to challenge the new foe, but there was something different, something wholly familiar about it.

The figure drew back its hood, smiling razor thin. It was her face in every detail save for the eyes.

"My eyes…,"

They were a deep golden hue; they were the eyes of a Sith Lord.

Startled, she retreated from her mindscape. TN-1063 opened her eyes. She remembered it all in a flash. The memories she had suppressed beneath her conditioning surfaced with a vengeance. She lowered the baton; BB-9e beeped to get her attention.

"Wha-!"

She went flying across the floor. Winded, she pushed herself up, confused. "What….what's…," he stood there at the fringes of her vision. Tension thickened between them.

BB-9e rolled between them, chirping a stream of explanations in binary. Ren extended his hand, levitating the droid off the floor.

No. Please. Please. She could think of a dozen words. None of them adequate. "Please!" Her single word ended on a scream. The hand of the Force ripped the droid's head from its body. BB-9e's chirping ended on a mechanical scream. He tossed it aside with a gesture, a flick of his fingertips. TN-1063 scrambled around on her knees, lunging for the cylindrical head. The droid's eye had gone dark in an attempt to save its system by powering down. TN-1063 hauled it to her chest.

"Are you Hux's spy?"

She stared at him uncomprehending the venom behind the question. "No, I…," the truth was wrapped up in her confusion. TN-1063 felt an invisible force take hold of her body. She became rigid as a board, folded down into a kneeling position. Only her vocal chords remained free.

"I'm not! Please…please…let me go!"

I've never begged in my life.

What is he? Why is he doing this…?

"I sense your confusion." The growl was deceptively soft. "I know you've been following me."

"Liar." She choked out. "I dropped my ID card in here and you-" through the enhanced visor, she watched him extend his hand. Fingerpads scraped the side of her bulky helmet, the gesture was almost gentle.

"I'm…not afraid of you." TN-1063 said, closing her eyes.

She imagined the depths of the lake reflecting the sky of Chandrila. A lake could be many things, hidden depths, serve as a reflection. TN-1063 was gradually aware that she was no longer alone by the lake. There was another presence in her mind, causing physical pain.

It took all of her will and more not to cry out in agony.

"You're very good at shielding your emotions, desires…or is there nothing inside your head?" Ren's voice echoed all around her, coming from nowhere all at once.

"Nothing. Nothing…please."

"I could kill you."

The hum of the saber vibrated the serene air. Molten heat filled the vacuum of the wind. She felt it burn into her shoulder, smelting through the heat-reflective fabric, branding her.

"You won't-I've done nothing wrong. Not even you can get away with murder."

He released her none so gently. The back of TN-1063's helmet struck the floor. Dazed, she lay back, staring up at the ceiling struts.

Consider it a warning.

"Never come near me again."

…

The droid beeped a coherent grumble that made her lift her eyes to it. She was going on patrol through the western reaches with a squad of seven.

"I'm sorry."

The droid bumped into her legs affectionately; one of the pilots glanced at it.

"Is it protocol to carry an astromech into the cockpit, TN-1063?"

"It was on the Tarkin." She replied guarded.

The one who spoke wore the color coding of leader. He was tall, broad chested, unusually so for a pilot. "The Tarkin is from the days of the Empire, is it not?"

"Yes."

"Nothing at all like the Finalizer."

"No, I suppose not." She said peaceably, visualizing the Chandrilan lake with its calm, beautiful water and felt some of the peace quiet her emotions.

The arrogant mindsets of the other pilots had not often disturbed her. They were newer recruits; polished like the floor they stood on, but ultimately useless against a competent Resistance pilot. She had seen so many of the other TIEs blown up due to glaring tactical errors, assuming superiority over the battered fleet of X-wings.

The Resistance pilots were every bit as skilled as the fleet of black suited pilots standing around the Destroyer. Despite the fact that they were trying to blow one another up in a dogfight, they were equals, she allowed them that much. A slight smile curled her lips beneath the helmet.

The call for departure signaled the end of the conversation. Once in the cockpit, she adjusted the belts restraining her into the couch of crash webbing. BB-9e beeped from behind, strapped into the back of her seat.

"I gave up leaving you behind a long time ago." TN-1063 commented, chuckling. Reaching out, she flicked the comm on, connecting her to the rest of the squadron.

"101st squadron, look alive. We're joined on patrol by Lord Ren." The voice of the leader crackled through the speaker. TN-1063 stilled her vision unobstructed through the crimson stained cockpit window out into the deck. Across from their position, 13c held the TIE/vn Silencer with its sharp black lines and pincer-like wings.

"It's an honor, sir-"

She cut the transmission.

BB-9e chirped a question.

"Of course I'm going to be alright. I'm not that nervous. Other than I'll probably come off looking like a fool." She powered up her fighter, feet slipping into the pedals. TN-1063 angled her craft for a lagging pace, leaving the hangar last behind the squadron.

Dropping from the underbelly of the Finalizer, they flew in a loose v-formation with Ren's Silencer at the head. She could see the dip of the craft as he veered off toward the asteroid belt identifiable from her monitor as the Ainides Cluster.

"What is he doing?"

BB-9e leaned out of its straps, its photoreceptor eye fixating on the view through the cockpit window, beeping an opinion.

"He's going to watch."

A green light lit up on her dash indicating proximity alert. They had triggered something they couldn't see.

"It's a tactical maneuver." She recognized the simulation from the training days. "I'm surprised they'd go so far." She broke off from the main flying formation, scattering widely beneath the arc of light. The brief illumination allowed her to see the clipping of the fourth TIE, spiraling swiftly out of control.

"Right….don't get cocky."

"TN-2030, down!"

She gritted her teeth, rising with the thrumming pulse from the boosters. The TIE responded quickly, angling over the next volley. One of the six left wasn't so quick to evade. The tail end of the explosion buffeted her fighter. She heard a scream before the comm cut off. Brief illumination from an explosion to her left signaled 2036's demise.

TN-1063 scowled. "We're being picked off." Checking her speed with a quick look to the side monitor, she upped the power to the turbines, spiraling straight then shot up, angling above the jet stream of plasma. Priming her auto weaponry, she muttered, "I see it!" The weapons array system formed a loose net of cannon fire. Old tricks from the Empire days, meant to protect bases in volatile sectors.

Should I raise them on comm?

No.

Targeting at random, she swiped the fighter from left to right, letting loose a hail of green blaster fire. Feeling the jolt in her body, she pushed up and outward out of reach of the resulting ring of explosions.

"Good instincts, TN-1063." Praised the squad leader patching into her fighter.

Her own breathing rasped loudly in her hearing. She felt sweat stand out on her brow, causing the heat reflective fabric to stick clammily to her skin.

From the corner of her eye, she glimpsed the tail of a dome-shaped body zoom across the empty expanse of stars.

"Heat seeking missiles…that's new tech!"

The droid issued a few blips that sounded like curses. "I know! It's locked onto us!?" She punched it, flying in a zig-zagging pattern. "I can't shake it!" She flew sharply past the TIE Silencer, her glimpse a second of anxiety. If I can't shake it…she exhaled loudly, her mind went blank. TN-1063 relived her life in a brutal moment of self -realization.

Without me, his world will go on turning.

I'm nothing to them, but something to use and discard once it breaks.

In the cockpit of this machine, with him watching and all those on the Finalizer watching us explode. I…I don't know how long I can keep doing this. Through the red tiled window, she glimpsed two more TIEs explode upon collision. Their screams ripped through her mind; TN-1063 jolted in the crash webbing. BB-9e blipped her numerical designation loudly in binary, trying to get her attention.

"I…sorry…I know what to do."

The missile tracked heat signatures. It must've had some kind of native tracker that locked onto a target with the exact size and perhaps shape…she decided to test that theory by flying straight for the Finalizer. The missile arced past her cockpit window, its course altering mid-flight.

The TIE's engines whistled as it broke the speed gauge, tracing the outline of the Destroyer. TN-1063 rotated the fighter upside down, veering along the sharp edge of the battlecruiser upward, thundering past the massive viewport windows. At the last, she swerved with the TIE's notoriously ill-equipped handling into a curve facing the Destroyer in open space. The glow of the missile sparked from the corner of her target sight.

Her hands clenched reflexively, remembering all the times of her target sight lighting up, the moment when her skill came to the fore.

She fired once, then dropped into a nose dive evading a second missile from behind.

The resulting explosion sent shockwaves of heat outward, burning brighter than the light of a star. TN-1063 pulled out of her dive, shooting for the underbelly of the Finalizer. "Requesting permission to dock." She spoke to the interior flight tower.

"Permission granted."

She nodded, signing off.

This is the might of the First Order, where our lives are treated as amusement.

…

Commander Soren was waiting for her below the control tower. "General Hux requests your presence on the bridge."

She felt sweaty in her flight suit, emotionally exhausted from the exercise. "I'll go there directly."

Soren nodded, adding as she walked away. "That was good flying out there."

"Thank you, sir." She wanted to dearly point out it was either do or die. She took the turbolift with an accompaniment of officers up to the bridge. The lift opened up into a corridor lined with smaller offices, widening into the T-shaped walkway. An assortment of officers worked in the pits flanking the walkway, monitoring different sets of equipment. The vast viewport window overlooked their current position, offering an impressive vantage point of the limitless galaxy.

TN-1063's gaze snapped to the view of the stars. She had been on the bridge of the Finalizer before and the Tarkin whose design ran less into a black color scheme and more into silver.

"Ren seems to think our TIE pilots aren't up to snuff." The general detached from the main console, strolling across the walkway, his hands clasped behind his back. "Hence the reason for his little diversion. Thankfully, playtime's over and two of your fellow pilots have returned."

"I'm glad to hear it. Were those heat-seeking missiles?"

"Yes, that was new technology we're testing out for combat."

Testing it on your own people?

"No one else flew the way you did." He faintly grimaced. "They had to work together out there. Any idea why?" He gestured affably. "Remove your helmet. I want to see your face."

"They didn't adapt well to the unpredictability of combat." As she spoke, she found the button that depressed the filtered air supply. That was unheard of among TIE ranks. They never teamed up, never protected one another. Each pilot was for themselves in the fight, knowing that at any moment, their actions could lead to placing themselves in an enemy's target sight.

"Most enlightening. You were trained for combat on the Tarkin?"

"Yes, sir."

"Did Commander Duma have his pilots perform flight exercises similar to today?"

"No, sir. He…wouldn't have acted so rash." She almost flinched at her choice of words. They could've been construed as criticism. "He understood that his pilots weren't expendable assets." He had treated them almost humanely, although he could be merciless on law breakers.

TN-1063 glanced up and met Hux's gaze directly. The general smiled thinly as if amused by something only he knew. There was something in his mind; she could see the outlines of the image taking form of …herself in the form-fitting uniform of an officer. She saw herself as he imagined, reporting to him, subservient in all ways. TN-1063 retreated from his mind quickly.

"Where did you get that droid?"

He was making conversation, detaining her for information a datapad could've held.

"Commander Duma gave it to me after the battle of Hosnian Prime. My fighter had sustained damage and I was forced into a crash land on a neighboring planet." She paused to gather her thoughts in order. The general's gaze lingered on her mouth. "The droid was part of a survey mission who had been taken down by rebel scum. I would say the droid saved my life." BB-9e had found her amidst the featureless rock and sand, transmitting to the Tarkin using her personal code. The Star Destroyer had sent a transport for the droid who had kept a viable record of its pilot's last days - and for her. TN-1063 had assumed as a loose end to be tied up after the failure to subjugate Republic forces.

Commander Gaius Duma, a veteran of the disastrous battle of Jakku, was a grizzled, gruff older man whose loyalty to military precision couldn't be denied. He was one of the few Star Destroyer commanders who hadn't taken his TIE fleet lightly. He remembered the days of the clone trooper pilots, the cadets from the academy fresh-faced youths who died in blazes of glory against the enemies of the Empire.

Once the data the droid carried was expunged, he presented it to her. No one had ever given her something that belonged only to her. Her uniform, her TIE fighter, her quarters and few hygienic essentials belonged to the First Order, but BB-9e didn't.

"Why did you transfer to the Finalizer?"

"I…it was the Commander's suggestion. He believed I could serve the First Order better on the frontlines."

"I can see why with your flying marks." Hux's look had gone beyond feigned warmth into something predatory. "We'll be returning to Starkiller Base, I've put in a recommendation that you receive a transfer into the planetary defense squadron."

"Thank you, sir-" It was on the tip of her tongue to refuse.

"Once we arrive, you'll report to Captain Salonga."

"Yes, sir." She tried to affix a look of polite acceptance on her face. She wanted to refuse. She had never visited the site of Project Starkiller before nor had an interest in performing planetary defense maneuvers.

"Keep doing well, TN-1063. There is always room for advancement in the First Order."

"Sir." She saluted quickly, replacing her helmet on. BB-9e rolled after her when she left the bridge. The droid was silent until they were some distance away, then began a stream of whistles. They passed a cluster of officers returning from the cafeteria. TN-1063 waited until they were gone before replying.

"I could tell too." She listened to the droid's chirp in response. "Don't I want to be an officer…? Why? What's the fun in space flight from the bridge?" The droid beeped something vaguely suggestive.

"I would see him more, but also the general. It would be too distracting." She smirked at her frivolous thoughts. They were some she had never entertained. Becoming an officer on the bridge, her face exposed, her hair tucked beneath the black winged cap.

TN-1063 had never considered her body outside of the bulky flight suit. Nor the attractiveness of her face. Those things were impossible to understand given her limited knowledge on male and female relations. She could admit she was strongly attracted to Ren, although her low level clearance didn't allow her to access personal files; she knew very little about him and couldn't think of a way to get to know him in any capacity.

"I thought Captain Phasma was with the general too."

The droid cheekily replied a stream in binary.

"Hey, watch your language. The captain would use you for blaster practice if she knew you called her that." The droid kept up with her quick pace, nearly colliding into a pair of Stormtroopers patrolling the corridor.

"Blaster practice? No, think I'll rest before the next shift." The droid blipped in reply. TN-1063 scowled behind the helmet. "Hey, it's not my fault the general didn't let me shower before debriefing-I'm not stinky!"

…

They were making their final approach into the airspace of Starkiller Base. TN-1063 shifted the straps of her rucksack from hand to hand. She had assembled along with a contingent of troops Captain Phasma personally led. They were given their own separate shuttle that had left the Finalizer beside several other smaller transports containing officers Hux wished to keep close by.

BB-9e was strapped into a rack of light equipment toward the back end of the shuttle. The droid's head rotated from side to side unable to see much beyond the white helmet of the four Stormtroopers closest. Captain Phasma had taken a seat in the cockpit, giving last minute instructions to flight control.

When she had gone for loading, the troop leader had challenged her reassignment.

"The only TIE pilot to leave the Finalizer."

"Yes, Captain."

"What is so special about you, TN-1063, that the other forty-eight pilots don't have?"

She had parted her lips several times to speak; glad her wordlessness was hidden by the bulky helmet. Phasma stood on the ramp, her blaster propped up against her lowered arm. The chromium armor reflected the black uniform, the snaking air tubes connecting to the filtration system. "I am a survivor, Captain. Nothing more, nothing less." Five days with no food and a little water from desert fauna. The planet had nearly killed her. She had gotten BB-9e out of it and a nightmare.

She drew strength from the memory, enough so that she stepped onto the ramp and brushed past the motionless troop leader. Now as they descended into the white snow-covered world, she felt the slight change in the air. The transport was heated to comfortable levels…or was it something only she felt?

The tension lingered when they docked and began unloading. TN-1063 collected her droid, pausing only to change the filter lens on the visor in order to absorb the monochromatic spectrum of the huge base. Black lied at odds with the stark whiteness of the snow, the cold necessitated the use of snowtroopers whose all-terrain training made them adaptable to the harshness of the ice world. Starkiller was immense, a monster of technologic advancement.

She knew no one, none of the officers by face or reputation passing her by. She recognized none of the troopers who one would think weren't different unless one noticed the tiniest differences in vocal patterns, walk, the way they held their blasters. TN-1063 started moving aware she was drawing attention to herself, gawking like some alien tourist on Canto Bight.

She nearly got lost in the multiple intersecting corridors before she found Captain Tarek Salonga. Salonga wore the uniform of officer emblazoned with a pair of wings surrounding the multi colored tab of rank. He had straw blond hair and watery blue eyes that peered twice at the reassignment beside her name.

"Transferring from the Finalizer?"

"Yes, sir. I was formerly of the Tarkin before the Finalizer. I've seen action in multiple star systems until now."

"Well, your record's good." Salonga checked his datapad. "I see you were involved in the Battle of Hosnian Prime. My brother, Dak, was the leader of the squadron."

"Ah…I'm sorry for your loss, sir."

"Don't be. He was a right fool in taking twenty-four TIE fighters against Republic forces. His actions that day cost him the Tarkin's fleet and gave the senate cause for funding the Resistance." Salonga swiped bitterly across his datapad, changing the view. "Fortunately, I'm going to see his foolishness corrected. There's going to be grand speech made by General Hux later on. Attendance is mandatory, TN-1063. After that, you're up for flight maneuvers." His thin lips didn't come close to a smile when she saluted him. "Welcome to Starkiller Base."

…

TN-1063 showered under real water. Her black hair clung to her scalp; the longer strands framing her face clung to her cheek. She washed with a sliver of sharp smelling soap taken from a rebel camp. She had touched the scar on her shoulder curiously, the wound was the width of a blade, the edges puckered, the center a thin red line of burned tissue.

Ren had rested the lit blade against her shoulder for a few seconds. The menace was unmistakable.

When she had touched the wound she had felt envy had caused it. He had walked in and seen her - watched her perform those movements with the baton in place of a lightsaber- the very same thing he had taken years to master, Form II Makashi.

Who trained her? The words, the astonishment had echoed in his thoughts. This thing that is nothing, not even a Force sensitive.

"I am a thing to him." She pushed her sodden bangs out of her eyes. "Not even a woman or a pilot or a trooper. But, a nonentity." Saying the words embittered her. TN-1063 clenched her fists for a few minutes trying to get her breathing under control. She couldn't have explained the memories, the linking of minds. It wasn't a Force Bond, but rather the reading of consciousness.

She turned the water off, toweling herself briskly. The scar hurt when she brushed her fingertips over it. I am not a thing…I am a pilot. I've survived longer than anyone else on the squadron. She dressed in the light black heat reflective clothing, donning the full chest plate and breathing apparatus. The helmet was last after fluffing out her short hair. BB-9e had been polishing itself with a jar of machine wax.

"Looks good." She said to the droid as they fell in step beside the stream of pilots. The Stormtroopers had fallen into formation as the black-suited pilots formed loose boxy squares below an elevated platform. The crimson banner of the First Order hung behind the podium. General Hux and Captain Phasma were present with a line of officers. She sensed the tension in the air, something momentous was about to occur.

"Today is the end of the Republic! The end of a regime that acquiesces to disorder! At this very moment in a system far from here, the New Republic lies to the galaxy while secretly supporting the treachery of the loathsome Resistance!" His voice echoed all around them, broadcast into the frigid winter air. She watched the Stormtroopers raise a salute in unison to the man. Those around her followed suit and she hesitantly matched them, disturbed in mind. This …this was the man who spoke almost kindly to her? The same man who had a ginger cat…,

"This fierce machine which you have built, upon which we stand will bring an end to the Senate, to their cherished fleet! All remaining systems will bow to the First Order! And will remember this as the last day of the Republic!"

This whole planet…is a weapon.

The ground rumbled beneath their boots. The light of the distant star siphoned off into a brilliant golden haze charged up the cannon embedded within the planet's core.

She had a flash of the Hosnian system. The pitched battle fought over the skies, the collisions, the explosions shattering across her cockpit window tainted red. Captain Salonga stared up at the sky, not at Hux, but on some distant far thing.

Vengeance.

The red beam spliced through the sky gilding everything in an unholy violent glow. TN-1063 caught her breath, the moment suspended in her consciousness. She could feel its power; the brightness of it hurt her eyes through the UV filtered lens. She flowed with the beam as it traveled across space, minutes, seven, the time it takes for light to travel across the universe - the planet of Hosnian Prime - she was there for a second of breathless horror, amid the spires of a city, standing beside senators who knew in a single gut wrenching moment that their lives, their homes, their planet was ending.

The Hosnian System exploded.

The bright light that washed the galaxy, the light of souls became a gaping wound in the Force. The resulting echo of their screams ripped through her body and she staggered slightly, nearly falling sideways. BB-9e bumped into her right leg, she leaned slightly against the droid, her lungs sucking in air through the filtration unit.

Hux's moment was over.

The Republic was dead.

…

She couldn't stop trembling.

"It was glorious," Salonga said, "simply breathtaking." The captain couldn't stop smiling. The sight was rare on any officer of the First Order, on Salonga's face, it was merely disconcerting.

It was murder.

War breeds nothing but cruelty, loss…this was not peace, nor could such a war ever bring about peace. TN-1063 had a cold layer of sweat beneath her confining uniform. The only thing she wanted to do was take another shower, let the water wash down her body, ridding it of the phantom stench of grease and oil - she felt unclean, her soul filthy with horror.

"Captain Salonga, may I request another shift? I-I'm not feeling well."

"Too much excitement, eh?"

She could easily see he was in a good mood.

"Y-Yes."

"I'll…hmm…ordinarily, I would say your tough luck, but," he swiped through the mission roster. "Ah…looks like someone has put in a request for you. Someone with high clearance; I can't change it." He looked up with a shrug. "Report to dock B1. They're moving out soon."

…

"Of course, I'm not alright."

She had gone to the 'fresher closest to dock B1, to splash water on her face. The coldness did little to raise her spirits. The droid sat at her feet, tilting its head at her, beeping suggestions.

"I don't want to go." She almost smiled. "Just don't vomit in the helmet or in the fighter, right. I'll try not to." She fanned her face quickly, then patted her skin dry. Her wrist comm started flashing. "There it goes, they're looking for me."

I'll be alright. She rolled her stiff shoulders, reaffixing her helmet. Switching the lens to the specifications favored for space flight, she headed out to join the squadron. As she climbed into the cockpit of her fighter, she noticed the lift off of several troop transports.

Ground forces…? What is this?

Once she had strapped in BB-9e, she dropped into her seat and switched on the comm unit. "Omega four to Squad Leader. This is more than flight maneuvers. What's going on out there?"

"TN-1063, the parameters of the mission are on a need to know basis."

"Just trying to understand the situation. No one wants to go in blind, sir." She looked straight ahead to where the lambda-class shuttle lifted up from its docking. "I have a bad feeling about this." She switched the comm back on. It was rare for the space superiority fighters to have hyperdrives like hers did.

As one, the fighters lifted off into defensive formation.

"Set a course for the Tashtor system, our destination is Takodana."

…

I don't like this.

The blue-green marbleized world of Takodana emerged into their view. TN-1063 felt the change in atmosphere when they made their approach swooping over lush green hills, low-lying mountains and serene blue waters. The squad leader identified their target as a castle of stone nestled against a beautiful backdrop as their target. The TIEs loosened a volley of green plasma; she fired along with the rest. Unable to hear the screams of those trapped within the wreckage, she performed the next fly over, surveying the damage grimly.

The troop transports had begun their landing procedures, blasters drawn as they began rounding up those who had survived. These would be shot on sight or relocated for further questioning then sent to a prison camp. She soon lost interest on the planet's surface; Ren's shuttle had joined them below, beginning the search.

TN-1063 resumed patrolling the skies. She had been told as much as they were going to let on, although she had her suspicions. "The droid," she commented, "the one that held the map. Maybe it was seen here."

BB-9e beeped in response.

"Yeah, I bet you'd like to meet it too. Oh-" she glanced to her field screen. "Several fighters incoming - guess I wasn't so far off the mark." She positively identified them as Resistance T-70 X-wings. Within moments, the fight had begun in earnest. Red and green spliced the sky, taking down several of the TIEs, while further bombardment took out the ground forces below.

She took evasive action, dropping below the blur of proton torpedoes. Her stomach did flip-flops as she pulled hard to level off above the forest. As she cleared the tree line, her eyes flickered below to movement in the emerging form of troopers surrounding Ren. Instead of the droid she had expected, she saw a girl - at least she believed it was a girl. The form was slim, clad in light-colored garments. Ren was carrying her out of the forest to his waiting shuttle.

The droid started beeping shrilly, rotating out of the straps securing it to her seat.

"I know! I know!" She had an X-wing on her tail. "I-kriff!" Light lit at the corner of her screen arcing for her fragile wing system. Swerving for open ground, she plummeted down, narrowly brushing the forest floor. Pushing the thrusters hard, she shot up for the sky, firing away. The moment her target sight lit up, she was gratified to see the X-wing explode. She soared up and out of range of the rest, doggedly tailed by one that broke away from the main pack.

He thinks he has everything…, she thought, evading fire from the black and orange X-wing. The comm unit crackled near her.

"Disengage! Let the rebels think they've won."

TN-1063 shifted her flight path, following the ascending arc of the TIEs. Ren's shuttle had already breached the upper atmosphere, preparing for the jump to light speed. For a moment, she replayed the image of the girl lying in his arms.

That's strange…why did I think it was something meant to be?

BB-9e punctured her thought process, chirping.

"The rebels…? Yes, it is frustrating. They're right there…they'll be heading back to their base?" She listened to the droid's suggestion. "The base…one fighter could track them and then….yes! You're absolutely right!" She switched channels quickly, piloting steadily out of alignment. "Requesting permission to delay return, Commander."

"Return to Starkiller, TN-1063. That is an order."

Knew it.

"Sorry, the much bigger prize is right here."

She punched in the coordinates for the neighboring system. "Hold on." Outside the cockpit window, the darkness of space became a stream of stars.

"Okay, so the plan is to jump through several star systems then return…," the droid beeped in concern. She smiled beneath the helmet. "Yeah…that's a warrant for arrest. But, it's going to be worth it."

…

Time passed differently in space than on the ship. TN-1063 sat back in her seat, shifting her feet from the pedals. She had inserted a holodisk into BB-9e's visual recorder in order to capture the moment. With the fighter anchored to a low-lying asteroid within the belt near the star, she could easily wait it out in stasis mode.

I saw him…she felt almost sleepy after the initial rush of adrenaline was over. Taxing the suit's absorbent qualities, she felt sweat clinging to her skin, her brow felt damp beneath the confining helmet, the rasp of her breathing apparatus filled the silence.

"He was there for the map and he took her instead. Why? Is the map all that important and why her?"

The droid beeped quietly.

"Skywalker? My mother used to tell me stories about him. He lived in the light…She said he left and no one knew where he went. I never understood the light and why it was so important. People's actions dwell mostly in the grey, in between good and evil, why rigidly contain someone with something so nebulous as light or dark?"

She listened to the droid's reply, smiling faintly. "Hey, I take offense at that! I didn't get us killed - I almost got us killed. There's a difference being that we're still here." She caught the glimpse of movement from the scanner, sitting up straighter.

"There they are."

…

At least I knew what to expect, she thought humorlessly, docking in hangar B1. A contingent of Stormtroopers was waiting below to escort her to the brig.

TN-1063 waited until Phasma had stepped closer before she spoke. "I have an urgent message for General Hux."

One of the troopers paused in securing BB-9e.

"Speak it and I'll relay it to him if it is of importance."

"No, I think not." She let them disarm her. "Take me to him."

…

The vast viewport windows overlooked the breathtaking snowy landscape. Heavy cloud cover obscured the light of the system's star. The general was overseeing preparations of some kind when they arrived. TN-1063 stood with her wrists in handcuffs flanked by two troopers.

"I was aware of one pilot not returning with the squadron. Phasma, what is this?"

"The deserter, sir."

"If I was deserting," she sent a pointed look to the troop leader. "I wouldn't have come back."

"What were you doing?" Hux motioned for Phasma to stay silent.

"I tracked the Rebels to the Ileenium system. Their base is on D'qar." She said in a rush, holding the general's gaze. Then, she dropped her head respectfully. "Lord Ren believed he had everything with a girl. I knew you would find the location of the Rebel's Base far more important." Was that too much emphasis on the girl? Was I too obvious?

"This is unprecedented news indeed." Hux said after a moment. "We'll send out a small squadron to confirm then move to crush them."

"That isn't necessary, sir. My droid has seen what I saw." At her words, BB-9e ejected a tiny holodisk from a hidden compartment. Hux took it, a smile stretching his thin mouth. "I'll apprise the Supreme Leader at once." Hux started to turn away, and then hesitated, returning to her. "That was an unusually bold move, TN-1063. But, well done." He depressed the hidden mechanism on the cuffs, removing them.

"Your future is clear with the First Order." He held her hands a second longer than necessary. "I can see it."

Her eyes flickered to his, demurely dropping them after a long moment. "Thank you, sir."

…

BB-9e rolled after her quick pace through the sprawling corridors of Starkiller. She had been dismissed from two shifts for her report. She could sense the excitement in the air. Something was going to happen or had already taken place. She passed a pair of Stormtroopers walking the opposite way. She caught the tail end of their conversation, surprised.

"They're prepping the weapon?"

The droid responded, head swiveling from side to side.

"What they used on the Republic…," they're now going to use it on the Rebels. TN-1063 couldn't finish her own sentence. She had just signed the death warrant for the Resistance. They…they deserved it for destroying her squad mates - for defying the First Order. But, they were people too. There were faces and names in the X-wing cockpits, living breathing people who she had consigned to an immediate devastating end. Unable to compartmentalize her feelings, she soon gave up.

The only thing I want to do is take a shower and rest. They should've known better than to challenge the First Order. With that thought in mind, she returned to the quarters assigned to her. BB-9e kept up a steady stream of droidtalk as she laid out light thermal clothing. "Did I come off as jealous to you?"

The droid didn't utter a negative.

"Hey! You're supposed to be on my side! I…didn't want to think of that girl's terror. Ren is surely interrogating her now as we speak. I couldn't help myself." She undid the straps of her chest plate. "I really am a terrible person. I can't stand the thought of him touching her -" looking at her. TN-1063 felt something twist inside her, eliciting pain. "I'm jealous of nothing and I can't stop feeling this way."

TN-1063 turned the water on hotter than she normally used, as if to wash away the stain in her soul. That was the thing with planetary defense. Real water showers, sonic was available if she chose to go down a level. Hux was good for something and she felt almost mercenary thinking of the small things she could get from him.

When she came out toweling her short hair, BB-9e had plugged itself into the wall, operating on stasis mode. She smiled faintly, lightly patting the droid's head in passing. Leaving the towel in a heap on the nightstand, she crawled into the bunk set against the wall, her eyes closing to the darkness. Within the cradle of the blanket she pressed to her chest, TN-1063 shuddered away from the distant echo of imagined screams.

If she dreamed, her visions were nightmares.

…

It was the klaxon that awoke her.

The blaring call for all pilots to report to their fighters resounded in her head. TN-1063 struggled up, rubbing her bloodshot eyes. BB-9e had already disengaged itself from the charger, rolling forward until it bumped her legs.

"Wha-what's going on?" Even as remote as the place where the barracks were, she could still feel the vibration of aircraft flying at a low altitude thundering through the super structure. The droid responded to her confusion. TN-1063 pushed herself out of the bunk, fiddling for the wall switch. Light flooded the small room; she blinked in the blinding illumination, trying to find her outer armor. BB-9e rolled to the door, beeping concernedly.

"Whatever it is, it can't be good." She muttered, stuffing her boots on. Running her hand through her hair, she tried to center herself. Panicking wouldn't help the situation. She tried a few deep breaths before fastening her helmet and switching the breathing apparatus on. The last thing she hesitated on was the officer's blaster that had belonged to BB-9e's former master.

She had carried it wrapped in the set of light sleep wear packed carefully along with her hygienic kit. TN-1063 considered the sidearm carefully then strapped it to her hip. "Come on…,"

She ran for the hangar, joining a stream of similar-suited TIE pilots.

"What's going on?" She asked TN-2056, passing abreast with the stocky male.

"The rebels are attacking the base! We've been ordered to take them down."

"Have they fired on D'qar yet?"

"I wouldn't know."

The rebels….they had showed up after the assault on Takodana. TN-1063 glimpsed the anxious faces of the officers they passed, the whirling servos of similar red-eyed BB-9e droids. Stormtroopers were searching for the girl apparently. Who was that girl? They were here for her…weren't they? Just who or what was she?

It was a relief to climb into the TIE's cockpit. Once she was inside, she could distance herself from the questioning part of her mind. With BB-9e strapped in behind her, she briefly touched the butt of the blaster more for luck than anything else.

As one, the unit of fighters flew into the skies above Starkiller Base. TN-1063 counted a handful of Resistance fighters clashing against the first wave of TIEs. She glimpsed scattered, smoldering wreckage dotting the snow, allowing the old familiar emotions to rise within her.

Hatred.

Disgust.

Couldn't they see how futile it was to challenge the First Order?

Her targeting sight lit up.

TN-1063 fired a barrage of plasma from her cannons. She darted to and fro, evading the mass casualties of the remaining pilots. Few exploded midair, brightening the cold haze with the light of a supernova. She flew through it leading the charge through the upper atmosphere. The X-wings had seemed to be waiting for something, targeting a specific part of the base…, why?

Unless…but it was impossible. They had flown into Starkiller with the intent of disabling or blowing up the primary weaponry system. She noticed smoke arising from the deep trench cut into the ground that led into the oscillator. As suicidal as their plan was, she had to give them bravado for that spark of hope.

Explosions lit up the ground below. Taken aback, she dove beneath the squad leader, taking her gaze off the target. Something else was happening down there - as if on cue, the X-wings returned flying for the furrow cut into the planet's surface.

"All fighters on me!" She hit the comm button, shouting. "Take them down! I repeat, take them down now!" Two of the fighters angled after her, thundering into the channel. Cannons rotating, torpedoes flew in an exchange of green and red hail. TN-1063 felt the blow down to her soul glimpsing the third sustain heavy damage. The X-wings were willing to gamble everything. It was too little, too late. The one in the lead - a familiar black and orange X-wing - the one from Takodana, was the one who fired into the oscillator.

TN-1063 pulled up and out, her gasp rasping loudly through the breathing tube.

The base lit up below her.

In her shock, she missed the final shot slamming into her left wing.

She felt her craft shudder, dipping down dangerously low. I've been hit - the cockpit's lights went red, multiple screens went black. In her head it was a replay of crash-landing on the planet where she had found BB-9e.

TN-1063 veered off toward the trees, the cockpit shuddering as she made contact with their tops. The droid beeped shrilly, frightened. "I'm going to eject!" She kept her hand wrapped around the control shaft, frantically punching the buttons with her free hand for manual ejection. "If we hit the snow - there's a chance…," We'll get blown up along with the rest of the planet.

She closed her eyes, reaching deep inside herself. Within the light, she projected a sphere of energy. The sudden whoosh of the seat ejecting from the cockpit almost broke her concentration. TN-1063 felt them go airborne, clearing the falling fighter. Their descent slowed as gravity sucked them down to the snowy plain. Somewhere not far, her TIE exploded into a hailstorm of red tile and titanium alloy plating. TN-1063 lost consciousness as they collided into the ground. For seconds, maybe moments she knew nothing.

Then, BB-9e beeped, a tensile arm prodded her side and she opened andher eyes. The visor had a crack splitting her vision. The air tubes were shattered, oxygen noisily escaped in a sibilant hiss. She struggled upright, tearing out of the restraints that had secured her body to the crash webbing. Removing her helmet, she blinked at the fast falling darkness. Beyond the trees to her left smoke arose from crackling flame. Somewhere far beyond them, the roar of the planet killer lay in its final throes.

"We have to get out of here…," she made quick work of the straps from her seat, fashioning a harness for the droid. Hefting the astromech onto her back, she reached for the blaster at her hip, removing the safety. "Keep a look out. If you see something, tell me."

The droid beeped an affirmative. She started walking, her steps unsteady. She felt slow, aware of the impossibility of making it off the planet. Briefly the thought came to her of leaving the droid. The moment she entered the forest, walking in a southwesterly direction, she knew the droid would be unable to follow given the unevenness of the terrain.

How can I even think of it?

Even if I survive…I was part of planetary defense. The TIEs failed to protect the base, that's tantamount to failure. The droid was the only thing that belonged to her, not even her uniform was hers. She wanted to laugh, but as she drew in air to her lungs, the coldness made her gasp, eliciting a coughing fit. TN-1063 dropped to one knee, her back bent beneath her burden. She covered her mouth with one hand, blinking past the sudden onslaught of tears.

Somewhere, she heard the sound of an ion engine displacing snow drifts. The droid began beeping excitedly, drawing her attention to the familiar shape of the Lambda-class shuttle descending not far through a gap in the trees. TN-1063 scrambled to her feet, falling into a ragged run. Clearing a thick belt of undergrowth, she glimpsed the jagged split in the ground exposing the fiery molten core. A pair of white troopers flanked a man as he surveyed the scene in disgust.

It was the general.

"Hux! General Hux!" She replaced her blaster on her hip, putting her hands in the air. The troopers tensed, raising their own blasters at her but caution prevailed seeing her pilot uniform. He turned at the sound of her unfiltered voice, surprise alighting in his green eyes.

"You're…TN-1063."

She stepped onto the ramp, unthinkingly reaching out for him. "Sir! I'm glad you survived - I didn't think anyone else…,"

"Where's your-"

She quickly released him, dropping her gaze in respect. "My TIE was shot down. I ejected not far from here."

"Well, come on then! No time to lose, the whole thing is going to blow up." He motioned impatiently; she followed him into the small compartment. The troopers followed, depressing the ramp lift. The last of the frozen air of the planet sealed away with a hiss as the shuttle lifted off smoothly from the planet's surface. Hux walked past the other occupant, who sat wrapped in his own silence, continuing into the cockpit. TN-1063 stopped moving, frozen by the sight of the man.

"Kylo." A whisper of relief.

Suddenly embarrassed by her informal lack of address, she dropped into the last seat, slowly sliding the straps off of BB-9e. The droid's head swiveled on its magnetic casters, observing Ren, then moved to stare at her in meaning.

TN-1063 felt her heart rate increase, rapidly beating beneath the metal chest plate. She tried to train her eyes on anything else, but found them lifting to him. It was impossible for her to want to look at anything else when he was there. Sometime, somewhere he had taken off his helmet, exposing his face. Ren's dark hair lay damp with melted snowflakes, sweat mingled with the horrific slice across the right side of his face, bisecting his cheek and upper brow, narrowly missing his eye. He caught her stare, glaring with the heat of a star.

"What're you staring at?"

"You need medical attention." TN-1063 said calmer than she felt. She got to her feet, hardly a thought in her head. The droid motioned with a slight nod to the wall beside the rack of blasters. Beyond them, a standard medical kit mounted to the wall. TN-1063 went to it, ignoring the glance of the troopers. Let them think what they liked. She ran her fingers along the edge, finding the lock mechanism. The lid popped open displaying the usual assortment of NU-skin, bandages, sterilizer and antibiotic ointment. The last she pulled out was a pair of plastic gloves.

Ren watched her approach without a word.

"Don't-"

She sat down beside him, perching at the hard edge of the seat. "You're bleeding…," she could see the stain through his dark clothing, the frayed edges where the wound to his abdomen began. TN-1063 removed her elbow-length gloves, snapping on the pair of flimsy plastic. "We'll be onboard the Finalizer soon, I'm sure. But, until then you shouldn't let yourself go."

"You know nothing about me."

She hesitated before putting her hands on him.

"No, I don't."

She swabbed the area carefully, loosening some of the charred bits of fabric from the wound. Knowing she couldn't do much, she finished cleaning the area.

"Your efforts are wasted, TN-1063. Ren is incapable of understanding human kindness." Hux stepped back into the cockpit, knowing his voice carried. "He is little better than an animal - and that's an insult to Millicent. Just let the medical droids take care of him."

Her glance flickered upward; Ren had accepted the insult with the slightest clenching of the fist he rested against his thigh.

"I don't …believe that."

"Do you think your opinions are worth something?"

She restrained her flinch, remembering her training. The emotionality warned against in holovids designed to create perfect First Order soldiers.

He had that look in his eyes, the one he had when he had broken BB-9e and she had screamed. "Ah, yes…you do. You think I'll be grateful to you for the little you can do. You think you mean something because you're here now and not dying with all the rest."

"I don't." She said tightly. "I…," her throat felt thick. It was ridiculous to feel the urge to cry. She wasn't going to give him the pleasure of seeing how much he was hurting her. "I think you're the one who wants someone to notice them. Inside…," her voice had dropped to a whisper. "You're that boy whose mother hasn't seen him in years, whose father doesn't understand him." She pressed the edges of the facial wound with a packet of gauze staining the cloth crimson. "You're so lonely... you want the darkness to hold you."

Ren's hand curled around the hilt of the saber attached to his belt. He ignited it with a vicious thrust, boiling waves of heat poured from it; sparks flew from the unstable blade spattering her shoulder and chest. Any closer and the blade would've bit into her neck, killing her epidermis, boiling her cells the way the lightsaber had done to his face.

"Get away from me."

Hux stepped into sight, his hand twitching toward his holstered blaster. "What's going on?!" Ren switched off the saber, the beam disappeared between them. "First, I have to rescue you from your own mess - next you're assaulting my pilot?!"

"Shut up." Ren breathed; silencing the general.

TN-1063's hand closed over the bloodied gauze. She rose silently and walked past him into the cockpit. Hux glared and kept closely behind her. TN-1063 leaned against the wall unseeing of the blurred stars. Millicent meowed from a wire cage strapped into one of the empty seats.

"I want a full report on Starkiller Base's defenses. After you've turned it in, I want you to resume normal flight duty - after resting."

"Yes, sir."

…

In the hangar of the Finalizer, white armored troopers stood in orderly formation for Hux's return. Ren was first off the shuttle receiving a few nods of respect. He swept by them wordlessly. Hux and the retinue of troopers along with the pilot and copilot of the shuttle stepped down the ramp. TN-1063 was last with BB-9e at her heels.

Without another look back, she broke away from the group and went her own way through the ranks of Stormtroopers.

"Why?" She answered the droid's query. "Because, he was looking at me. He has noticed me now. The one thing he doesn't understand is how I knew those things."

I saw them, the same way I saw his own blows to his abdomen. I saw him draw blood that stained the snow crimson. I saw him invade the girl's mind and watched her fight back -

She finished her report and sent it off. Her old quarters had been given to another pilot. She had been reassigned a berth closer to the turbolift. TN-1063 could hear the metallic hum as it rose between floors in the distance.

"He killed his father on Starkiller Base." BB-9e slotted itself in between the control panel and the bed. "I couldn't hear his words, but I could feel his emotions. He is a monster." TN-1063 absently rubbed the edge of the bandage compressing the wound to her brow. The med droids could've had her as good as new in a few hours, but she had left quickly not wanting him to find her there.

The droid plugged itself into the charging outlet, beeping as it did so. TN-1063 smiled faintly, she leaned back, curling her body into the nest of blankets. "Sounds like a fairytale, doesn't it? The dark prince and the princess…I'm no princess." She yawned, drawing the blankets around her. "When I was a little girl, I used to dream that I was a princess whose parents would rescue her."

She draped one arm above her head, staring up at the ceiling struts. "I wanted them to come and take me away from the Tarkin. I used to pretend I had different parents who were heroes of the Rebel Alliance…they would come looking for me…they would've been looking all that time. They would search the unknown regions and find me among the remnants of the Empire's fleet. They would take me away from there and I would live in a real house by the lake. They would love me and hold me and no one would ever beat me for crying again." She lapsed into silence listening to the droid's murmur of binary.

"What happened? Well, I kept believing and hoping until one day when I realized it was all a fantasy I had built up to cope with conditioning."

No one was saving me.

No one cared enough to save me.

She subsided soon into a fitful slumber, her dreams a mixture of black and silver corridors and a little girl who called for her mother, running through them.

…

The Finalizer had been joined by several other Star Destroyers along the way through hyperspace. Talk buzzed in the mess as to their predicted destination. TN-1063 felt them leave light speed, tensing for the call to arms.

"They're saying we're not to see action," said one of the younger pilots. She had heard he was nineteen, light on his feet, considered for promotion to the Snowtrooper ranks.

"So it's not a fair fight."

"After Starkiller, I would expect the Supreme Leader to wish to make an example of them."

Wasn't the Hosnian System enough? Millions were obliterated in an instant of chaotic destruction. Sickened with the excitement on the faces of her mess mates, TN-1063 excused herself as soon as possible. BB-9e questioned her as she walked down the corridors of the Finalizer.

"Blaster practice, real blaster practice." I need to relieve the tension in my body. She had felt wound up since awakening, discovering the flight roster had been temporarily canceled with all pilots on standby. She took quick steps to the training hall finding a few Stormtroopers practicing hand to hand combat. A silver protocol droid monitored their progress.

TN-1063 entered her code into the blaster rack, choosing the smaller hand-held pistol rather than the larger rifle with scope used by troopers out on the field. She moved into one of the empty stalls, setting the target rotation to medium skill level. She breathed in and out, calming her heart rate, then raised the blaster, squeezing off several shots. The target centers lit green every time she made a direct hit. TN-1063 adjusted her aim faster, clearing the round in good time.

She glanced at her score, lowering the blaster. "Not bad, huh?" BB-9e chirped an affirmative, tilting its head up at her. TN-1063 reached over to up the skill level -

She felt it suddenly.

The primordial scream of hundreds of crew members burning up alive in a sudden flash fire that spread throughout the ship.

It was the Dreadnought.

She could see it suspended in space, interior decks collapsing into themselves. The scream of the officers on the bridge followed by Captain Canady's composure. Their deaths ripped through her, tearing her soul to pieces. Light years away, she had felt the death cries of the Hosnian system, now beyond the Finalizer, the Fulminatrix caused her to collapse.

TN-1063 shut her eyes against the onslaught, kneeling beside the droid; she breathed noisily through the air tubes of the helmet. I have to cut myself off. I have to…in a flash, she saw herself beside the lake with its dark waters reflecting a stormy sky. She pulled back from it, deliberately sealing it off within her mind.

At last, she became aware of her own breathing. The troopers that were training had stopped, she could hear the shock in their voices as multiple comm units reported from the bridge what she already knew.

"Dreadnought down! Rebel forces have escaped!"

…

I saw it.

The TIE pilots sat around the few tables, some in animated discussion about the destruction of the Dreadnought. A few commented on the lack of action on part of the bridge, they were eager to restore the reputation of the TIE fighter squadron by combat after Starkiller's devastation.

It was arrogance, she thought. Hux believed the Dreadnought would end all within a matter of moments. She hadn't been there on the bridge, watching the inevitability of the larger ship's demise.

"The Supremacy has joined our fleet!" TN-3002 said, looking up from a datapad. The others crowded around him, curious. "It's really happening; the rebel scum are going to meet their end!" A few cheers came from those gathered, watched over by a Lieutenant of the squadron.

Or Hux is going to be censured, she thought, glancing over to the displayed projection of Ileenium space. The Finalizer was minuscule in scale against the larger proportions of the flagship. BB-9e beeped to get her attention, prodding her leg.

"My mother transferred there from the Tarkin years ago." She held the cup of caf, her fingers curled tighter around the plastic container. "I haven't seen her since." It was enough once to know her mother was alive. The child she had been had stopped crying to be rescued once Jessika Ionone had left her behind.

I didn't need her - how many times did I tell myself that. How long had it been before I began to believe it? TN-1063 thought back to her childhood in a blur of faces, memories, something like madness. Back then, she was the one who helped me. She made those things go away. TN-1063 stood up abruptly, replacing her helmet on. The droid rolled out from beneath the table.

"Come on, let's go visit my mother."

…

She found Commander Soren alone in the flight tower overlooking the main hangar.

"Requesting permission to visit the Supremacy before light speed."

"Out of the question. You've been absent for too long, TN-1063." Soren didn't even look up from his paperwork.

She reached up and removed her helmet, aware the voice modulator distorted her voice. "You will grant my request and say nothing of it to anyone else."

Soren stiffened, his glance flickering upward.

"What did …I will grant your request and say nothing of it to anyone else."

TN-1063 smiled slightly as BB-9e looked up at her. She held her finger to her lips. "When is the next transport?"

"With Captain Phasma, she and her troopers are going aboard with General Hux."

The troop leader might question her presence going onboard the Supremacy. Rather than risk confrontation, she opted for something else.

"You will authorize a TIE fighter craft for my use.

…

The flight was brief into the hangar. She had felt the pull of the tractor beam guide her to a docking post. I don't know where she is…it's been years. I'm positive she never left the Supremacy, but the ship is so massive, it's going to take some time to find her. I hadn't thought this far ahead.

Somewhat embarrassed with her lack of foresight, TN-1063 disembarked with the droid following closely behind. Once on the hangar floor, she blended in with the milling pilots, unnoticed by troopers. TN-1063 walked past rows of docked fighters, pausing only to consider the droid.

"You stay here."

A predictable number of complaints in binary came.

"Not at all. Pilots here don't have droids unless they're doing maintenance on their fighters."

The droid nudged her legs, beeping.

"We're being watched? Of course, we are. There's security feeds in here and some of the other droids will notice you." She patted the droid's head, futilely trying to straighten the crooked antenna. "Now, stay here and keep yourself out of trouble. I don't know how long I'm going to be gone."

…

The droid watched her stride through the archway leading deeper into the ship. A few other BB-9es consulted each other concerning an elite fighter's malfunctioning weapon system. The droid considered rolling over to give its expertise - likely it was a fried chip or circuit in the main panel that was causing the trigger failure; but decided it was better to let the other BB-9es figure it out.

They didn't have a personality chip embedded in their directional programming that overrode directives to obey the First Order, and humans second. The droid's former pilot was reconnaissance in deep space missions, he had gotten the chip off the black market and been tinkering with the droid's programming during a long journey through hyperspace. The droid was aware that this made it different than the other BB-9e models who considered themselves rotating pieces of machinery rather than assets to the pilots.

The other BB-9es scattered for someone's passage. BB-9e's blue photoreceptor eye flickered in alarm. Its head swiveled on its magnetic casters; someone had walked up behind it. The droid associated the man with rendering it nonfunctional, tearing its head off while TN-1063 screamed. Other images surfaced from the droid's databank. The man's lightsaber held to the pilot's neck while she stared so calmly into the man's eyes.

Kylo Ren stood there seemingly looking at it - perhaps trying to remember where he had seen a blue eye on a BB-9e model before.

"The pilot's here."

The droid wasn't going to take any chances. Rotating swiftly around, its body rolled fast across the hangar, disappearing through a gap of Stormtroopers. Through several snaking corridors, the droid spotted TN-1063 stepping into a service lift and started rolling faster to make it. The pilot held the door open as the droid slipped inside, rolling to a stop at her feet.

"I told you to wait - oh, never mind. My first mission on the Tarkin after I got you - and you wouldn't listen then either." She subsided into silence, lapsing into her own thoughts. There was a slight shift in the Supremacy around them as the ship made the jump into light speed. When TN-1063 spoke it was without a trace of hesitation in her voice. "I know where she is."

…

TN-1063 faced the wall, arms loosely crossed. BB-9e had resisted her attempts to leave it behind in the main hangar. The droid tilted itself at a slight angle, resting against her leg. She had tried to compose herself for the meeting, running through a litany of mantras programmed into her since childhood. None had offered her what she needed, clarity, guidance.

I can't even think of him now without remembering the vivid spark of his anger, the viable threat of his lightsaber held to my throat. In short, I have nothing and no one. She wasn't sure how to feel anymore. She certainly felt nothing at the prospect of chasing down the Resistance's pitiful fleet through hyperspace.

The door opened and closed with a quiet snap.

BB-9e rotated to look at the woman.

TN-1063 removed her helmet, caught between a smile and a nod of respect. Her mother had aged, fine lines stretched beneath her brown eyes, her dark hair was shot through with silver. She wore it up fastened into a heavy bun at the nape of her neck.

"Mother." She almost couldn't speak the word. It choked in her throat, reminiscent of her younger days.

Her mother wore her peaked cap at a slight jaunty angle; the dark uniform was neatly pressed, creaseless on the slight form. Jessika was thin, almost dainty in her trousers and trooper boots. She didn't smile looking upon her daughter's face.

"Why have you come here?"

She had expected rejection. It was fine; she had only come for information. TN-1063 kept her expression implacably calm. "I came to ask you something. I couldn't ask through holocall." Plus, I wanted to see you. I feel such disconnect in the fleet. She studied the woman's face hopefully. "The Supremacy hasn't left the unknown regions in years. I thought this was the time to come. I…I'm glad to see you're doing well." Embarrassment was a new sensation for her, one she wasn't pleased to discover.

"What did you want to know?"

She held onto her helmet tightly, gripping it almost painfully to her chest. "When I was a child, I used to have visions. I used to see things that had passed years before. I would see things to come and I could see things others had seen, viewing them through my own eyes."

"No-"

"I saw Darth Vader's death. I saw the fall of the Jedi Order. I've seen so many things - then they stopped. I need to know how because they're happening again and I…I can't shut them off."

Jessika bit through her lip, her impassive façade shattered. "I told you they weren't real. You were six years old, you believed me. You wanted to believe me so you closed off that part of your mind."

"What are they?"

"Force consciousness. You're a Force sensitive. Contact with a strong Force user likely triggered an awakening of your latent ability."

Kylo Ren.

"You are…strong with the Force." Jessika drew closer, her voice dropping intently. "Pol was the one who wanted you to become Snoke's sword. But, I had seen - I knew the dark side corrupted the body and soul. My father was an Inquisitor of the Empire. He was a monster beneath his mask - I-I couldn't let you become what he was."

"Were you and Pol …gifted in the Force?" Her old training surfaced. She couldn't think of Pol Ionone as her father anymore.

"No. My father hated me," Jessika's tears shone. "He hated me so much because I couldn't even feel it the smallest bit. Pol was jealous of those who could manipulate the Force. But, he too was deadened to it. I wanted to keep you safe -"

"You let me go! They used to hit me for crying for my mother! When you left - they dragged me kicking and screaming through the Tarkin. They locked me in a dark room by myself with an endless loop of First Order conditioning playing! I could've died out there." TN-1063 felt pain, the old familiar ache in her heart. "And all this time, you've never once tried to call me or look for me."

"You did what you wanted to do. A pilot in the most dangerous military in the world. You used to tell me when we lived on Chandrila that you wanted to fly through space. You have your father's skill in the cockpit." Jessika brushed her cheek with folded fingers. TN-1063 felt the rasp of leatheris against her cheek. Jessika's hands were warm.

Pol wasn't…he was an intelligence officer.

"Who do you-"

Jessika drew her into her arms, breathing the words in her ear. "Snoke ordered the destruction of Force sensitive children once he realized Ben Solo's rival in the light was rising. That's why I wanted you to suppress your gift for the time when the purge happened. Never doubt I do love you very much. I've done so much to protect you."

She saw her father's death in a searing flash. Pol Ionone was going to present her to Snoke the evening of his death. In her vision, Jessika lowered the blaster, remorselessly watching her husband fall to the floor.

"Stay away from Kylo Ren. He will sense you and he will kill you." Jessika threaded something small around her neck. "Once he knows who you truly are, then he will not hesitate."

She stepped back, her hand sliding to catch the pendant where it lay against the hard chest plate. "Why would he want to kill me? I'm just a pilot; I have nothing to do with the Jedi or Sith."

…

In the turbolift, she studied the pendant her mother had given her. It was a red crystal wrapped with a tongue of tarnished metal suspended on a hemp cord. "Someone once told me, the strongest hearts are made of kyber." Jessika had imbued the crystal with her thoughts. As TN-1063 held it, she heard the words whispered in her ear as if Jessika had stood there and said them to her.

"It belonged to your grandfather. The crystal will produce a red blade once it is reunited with its other half. Use it wisely."

It was once used for dark deeds. She could feel the hum of its power, a shadowed echo of the past overlying the jagged shape.

"Only you can shape it to be what you want it to be."

She held it out and saw the metal guard and slim handle. She saw herself ignite it with a crackling hum, the blade a vivid red splashing the floor with a brilliant fiery hue. Someone breathed in the darkness, less man than machine. What was meant to be….who was I…facing?

…

She moved slowly through the vast cityscape of the Supremacy. Officers milled about, some off duty, others overseeing the more mundane aspects of the flagship's operations. She had heard six Star Destroyers could comfortably be housed within, another two were its full accompaniment. The mega-class Dreadnought had its own production line, producing All-Terrain walkers, parts for the armada. She watched personality-less BB-9es accompanying officers, their photoreceptors shining red.

"I wouldn't want to be stationed here. It's so…big and impersonal." The Tarkin was large enough for its accompaniment of crew and troopers. She had been raised there along with the other children, trained under Duma's watchful eye. She had never been sent to one of the First Order's secret flight schools.

"Let's go."

TN-1063 noticed the stationary forms of the TIE pilots standing at rigid attention. Someone was making an inspection or - she shook her head, she needed to get back to the Finalizer. The Supremacy had left hyperspace not long before. Ship to ship communications weren't great and she needed to make sure her name hadn't come up for flight duty.

"Lieutenant ...," The voice almost gave her a pause. She skirted the outer edges, purposefully moving toward the lift that held her fighter.

"And you, TN-1063."

She stopped, the droid ducked in front of her.

"With all due respect, I'm not part of the Supremacy's TIE Wing." She felt the pilots tense. They were aware of the instability of the individual who had called them for selection. They were likely bracing themselves for a blow up.

"But, if it is your command." She turned to him, glimpsing the livid scar. I suppose I have no choice in the matter. Scowling behind her helmet, she climbed into the fighter she was directed to. The cockpit came alive at the touch of her fingertips. TN-1063 listened to the murmurs of the other pilots. Ren was taking a light squad. The best with the red-striped helmets of the elitist ranks.

"Follow my lead."

Accordingly, they dropped behind his TIE Silencer.

She couldn't speak to the droid; ship to ship comms had to stay open. TN-1063 began the assault the moment the others did. Firing on the Resistance cruiser as it ponderously turned to face the First Order task force.

This is wrong.

She didn't feel the usual thrill from space flight, the excitement from the possibility of instantaneous death. She felt nothing except the wrongness of the attack. Where were the T-70 X-wing fighters? Where was the challenge she had come to expect from the Rebel forces? Ren sent the Silencer into a tailspin, firing on the cruiser as if he alone could eradicate the memory of it.

He's trying to destroy something.

Or someone.

Unable to break formation, she followed along the side as he entered the runway. The resulting sonic boom from his proton torpedoes tore through the Resistance hangar obliterating their fleet of X-wings. Ren emerged, leading the TIEs in a thundering sweep past the main bridge.

She braced herself; it was coming. The end. Complete obliteration of the Resistance high command.

The TIE Silencer drifted above, cannons charged.

She didn't move, waiting for command.

Whoever it was…they were there.

I'll help you - I'll help you destroy your chains.

She began her firing sequence. Her hands were wrapped around the controls, thumbs depressing the trigger. Her companion fired beside her and then they were soaring up and through the resulting wreckage. TN-1063 felt more than she could see the look Ren shot them.

….

She docked first.

The only TIE to return.

One more mission under her belt.

She unstrapped the droid, lifting it onto her back. On the lift down to the hangar floor, she heard the particular high-pitched whistle of the Silencer as it swooped in low through the tractor beam.

She started walking. It didn't matter where. They were bound to gravitate toward another. She was a dead star and he was the galaxy. He caught up to her outside an empty room. Ren was pale, bereft of his helmet. TN-1063 looked at him once and dropped her gaze. The Force pushed her into the room; she felt it at her shoulders, a pressure that built up beneath her temples. Something whispered to open herself up to it, surrender her defenses, but she held back afraid.

"It was you."

She froze.

"Remove your helmet."

Mechanically, she did as she was told. Something in his eyes warned her, burned her down to the core. There was hatred within them, an abyss so deep she felt herself drowning in his grief.

His hand shot out for her throat.

She had seen it before. The closure of the esophagus, the pinch of the flesh like the squeeze of immaterial fingers. TN-1063 sputtered, her lips turning blue. She couldn't breathe any more than she could hope to loosen his grasp.

Ren was going to kill her now.

I have nothing, absolutely nothing left to lose.

So she reached out.

One hand faltering in the space between them.

TN-1063's fingers closed on a handful of his tunic. Her vision blackened and she pulled backward, falling with the presence in her mind deep into the depths of the lake in her mindscape.

They emerged into the afternoon light of twenty years before. The day her parents had gone into the service of the First Order, the day when they had renounced her as their child.

"Let go of the past."

I did. I had to in order to survive.

"I couldn't be the sword they wanted me to be. So I became something else, what I was meant to be." TN-1063 mirrored her emotions, the loss, abandonment. The sensation of being an outcast. They were emotions she saw in him.

"You are nothing. You're a pilot among hundreds."

"I am only a cog that's true, part of the wheel that keeps the First Order in power." TN-1063 felt the physical grip on her throat loosening. "But, that doesn't mean my life is worth less than anyone else's."

She surfaced from the lake, her conscious and subconscious merging. TN-1063's eyes flickered open; she let her hand fall to the side, fingers curled over the remnant of warmth from his chest.

"Someone was there on the Resistance cruiser, someone you couldn't let go of. Remember your duty, Ren. Don't lose sight of who you are meant to be."

His eyes narrowed and for a moment she thought he would clasp her throat again in the embrace of the Force. TN-1063 steeled herself for the assault, for the inevitability of her death. But, he did nothing.

"Return to the Finalizer…and speak of this to no one."

"Yes, sir." She inclined her head respectfully. "Is it…is it at all possible to transfer to the Tarkin?" The hopelessness of her situation took hold of her again…once she had bared her emotions to him; the need for darkness, for a place to hide possessed her. She had lost her mind for a moment, convinced he would see something similar between them. In her wildest dreams, she had hoped he would open up to her…none of it began with the feeling of the Force crushing her throat.

He seemed to consider her request; she glanced upward, peering through her lashes. TN-1063 could read nothing in his expression to tell what he was thinking.

"No."

"The Resistance will die within eighteen hours by the cannons of the Supremacy. The First Order has won. They have no need of one space superiority fighter." She said with a hint of desperation coloring her words. She knew she needed to get away from him. Something about him made her feel reckless, needy, wanting more than the occasional glimpse or word. TN-1063 stepped closer, her hand lifting to catch the side of his face. It was frightening to her, just how much she wanted him.

Beneath her gloved hand, she felt the uneven edge of his scar and felt hatred for the one who had harmed him. Ren's dark eyes turned down to her, fathomless, alight with something like curiosity. The moment stretched into eternity before her lips brushed his.

"Goodbye, my Lord." She stepped back the moment she felt him respond. The ever present hunger was there in his eyes, naked, brought to the fore by her stirring of his emotions.

"I hope to see you victorious." She bowed from the waist formally before walking away with BB-9e trailing after her.

…

TN-1063 reported for duty sometime in the early hours. In the mess, talk had still buzzed about the destruction of the Dreadnought by Resistance bombs. She had listened with interest to the details she hadn't known, fascinated by the desperate ploy of the single starfighter.

Poe Dameron.

The pilot was the very same interrogated by Ren days before, captured on the surface of Jakku. Dameron's BB unit had been carrying a vital piece of a map that would lead to the galaxy's living legend, Luke Skywalker. She suspected part of the ploy to utilize heat-seeking missiles against the 101st squadron had been Ren's way of getting back at the TIE pilots who had failed to retrieve the BB unit from Jakku.

TN-1063 rubbed her throat absently; her vocal chords were still raw from the night before.

Why was he so angry she had fired on the bridge?

It was you - you -

It hadn't been just her. There were two twin jets of green fired onto the Resistance cruiser. She had been the only one to survive, returning to the Supremacy under orders. Only for him to send her back to the Finalizer.

Her lips tingled.

Absently, she brushed her thumb pad over the smooth puckered surface. It had been nigh impossible to sleep for a few hours in between shifts. Ren had utterly possessed her thoughts, her waking mind. TN-1063 knew she was falling hard for him. Dropping her head into her hands, the edge of her chest plate bit into her chin.

She needed the openness of space.

She needed to be in the cockpit again.

The stasis of waiting for the Resistance cruiser to come within range had sapped the energy of the chase. Now that victory was on the cusp, she wanted to go back to the days of dog fights, proving her skills as a TIE pilot. She thought distantly of the black and orange X-wing…Black Leader…who had shot her down above Starkiller Base. Tangling with him had been almost…fun. She morosely reflected that the pilot was likely one of many casualties experienced by the Resistance.

It almost didn't seem fair - hunting them down like animals.

I can't take it anymore.

She went to find Commander Soren.

"Requesting permission to join patrol."

"TN-1063…very well. Looks like the Supremacy pulled something in." Soren glanced at the information running on his datapad. "Join the 103rd, dock D3."

…

"I'll feel better I think. I'm sure I will."

The droid expressed doubt in a series of blips.

"Things were much simpler before I dropped my ID card. I still don't know why you didn't tell me."

BB-9e protested volubly until she held her hands up.

"Alright, you did. He picked it up with the Force or something. Calm down, okay?" She switched the comm unit on, falling into formation. Dropping from the underbelly of the Star Destroyer, she became one with the dark, fathomless nothingness that was space.

TN-1063 let her thoughts go.

Her hands knew which controls to manipulate, which flight path to follow. The cold beauty of the distant stars captivated her with the promise of freedom, new worlds, alien tongues, the rich life of the galaxy so different from the harsh sterility of the First Order.

I want to let it go.

If I could be with him once it would be enough.

Reluctantly, her eyes flickered to the inescapable bulk of the Resistance cruiser. It was within range of the fighters if they chose suicide. She averted her face from it, performing the sweep over the Finalizer. The Supremacy's own TIE squadron moved in slow arcs over the width of the mega-class Star Dreadnought. TN-1063 drifted beneath its shadow, her thoughts passive.

Ren.

He knelt like a knight from a fairytale.

Her heart dropped to her knees.

She could see a red room, vast, occupied by a single black chair. A throne room she had never seen before. He was there screaming in fury and sorrow. The blue blade twisted itself through the air piercing the body of the scavenger.

"Ben."

She pulled back from the vision, her heart slammed painfully in her chest. "I saw the Supremacy. It was -it was -"

Guards covered in head to foot armor wielding an assortment of weapons she had never known existed.

"Snoke…," Snoke killed the girl - she switched off the comm quickly. "I saw it…,"

The droid beeped a reply that she failed to smile at.

"It hasn't happened yet. They're onboard the Supremacy. If I focus hard enough, I can sense where they are. The girl - whoever she is, is still alive." The air tubes rasped with her deep inhalation. She felt like she had run a long distance without breath, but at the same time felt her blood rising. There was darkness to the Supremacy, within it, something truly malignant resided. "I think what I saw is going to happen."

"Kill him!"

He's going to fight alone.

TN-1063 changed their flight course for the Supremacy's tractor beam. Switching frequencies, she cut to the air tower onboard the flagship. "Requesting permission to dock. Change of schedule."

A crackle of static preceded the response.

"Pilot TN-1063, return to your established route."

No!

She had to think quickly. "Lord Ren requested my presence for a future mission debriefing!" I must be crazy. What if I'm wrong - what if I'm not? What can I do…,

Interminable silence, then a reluctant docking number was sent to her fighter's computer.

Thankfully, they're so afraid of him, they wouldn't question it. No one would think to lie with his name out of fear. She bit her lip, guiding the fighter into the hangar. The brightness of the overhead lights made her blink several times from the darkness of her cockpit. BB-9e beeped and she nodded.

"I could be wrong…but I can't just ignore it." If it happens…or is happening. She hurriedly unstrapped the droid, reaffixing the spherical body on her back. Climbing out in seconds, she headed for the lift between fighters, reaching the ground level. With a glance as she ascertained the TIE Silencer was still docked where it had been before.

I can help him - maybe - I won't even be a distraction because he doesn't care if I get hurt…the thought almost made her pause, but she shook it off and ran for the turbolift, catching the notice of a few troopers.

"Is everything alright, TN-1063?"

"Yes! Yes, it will be." She pulled off her glove quickly, hesitating. The keypad was locked only to those with high security clearance. TN-1063's fingers brushed the metal plate. In a split second, she had seen the code. Her fingers flew over the keys, waiting for the doors to slide open.

In the lift, she removed her helmet, setting it down at her feet. The droid had rolled in after her, beeping a stream of binary. "If I'm wrong -" she glanced at the counter indicating the floors they had rode past. "I'm probably going to be executed." She reached for her blaster, clicking the safety off. "I want you to get away…find my mother. Tell her, I'm sorry." BB-9e nudged her leg gently, head tilted back.

"They'll probably reprogram you." She dropped to one knee, setting the blaster down. Enfolding her arms around the small round body, she hugged the droid closely. "We've pulled off so many crazy stunts together." The droid beeped quietly in agreement. TN-1063 loosened her grasp, straightening. She stopped four floors down below her destination. "Mother is in quadrant forty-four. She's at her station. Stay with her."

The doors revolved open.

BB-9e rolled a few feet and stopped to look at her.

"Go on." TN-1063 tried to put on a brave front. "Go!" The droid backed up and watched until the door closed sealing away their last sight of each other. She felt her expression crumple. This is devotion, isn't it? Running to save someone who doesn't care…I really am stupid. She looked down at the pistol in her hand.

Blaster practice, right. Right. She took in a deep breath and watched as the panels slid open to the throne room, a place she had never been before.

"Ren!" She surveyed the slain, her heart in her throat. He was struggling in the grasp of a Praetorian Guard, the staff edge of the weapon held across his throat as a second guard wielded a segmented whip like a rapier blade. Without hesitation, she raised the blaster and started shooting -

…

BB-9e rolled to a stop. Something was going on. One of the other BB units had discovered Rebel scum sneaking aboard. While it wasn't against protocol to congratulate the other droid, BB-9e observed the platoon of troopers led by Captain Phasma escort the interlopers from a particularly sensitive area of the flagship. BB-9e waited until they had been cleared from the sector before continuing to the service lift used by common troopers.

The droid considered the actions of its pilot during its slow progress. TN-1063 was unlike the rest of her squad mates, unique, human, and susceptible to emotion. The last was something the droid's superior programming defined as a strictly human fallibility. She was willing to do anything she could to protect someone…even to the point of putting her own life at risk. When the droid had gotten between Kylo Ren and TN-1063, the droid had calculated the odds of being destroyed by the volatile young man as increasingly high. But, the droid still had, ignoring basic reasoning programming.

Why?

TN-1063 had saved the droid once.

TN-1063 was as good or a better pilot than the droid's former master.

But, none of it explained why the droid reversed course, picking up speed as it zoomed through the corridors back to the distant turbolift.

…

The shots bounced off the armor.

A dozen curses went through her head.

She halted her advance, stricken by the realization that maybe this was a fight she couldn't win. Sorry, mother…I just couldn't stay away.

The Praetor dropped Ren. She had seen his glance at her. A slight struggle as he shifted with difficulty to see who had arrived.

Who are you?

The unspoken words vibrated between them.

Someone who cares.

She ran for the vibro-arbir blade thrown near the edge of the platform. Her hand closed around it as the guards charged at her. Ren had collapsed into strangled unconsciousness. For now, she was prey. TN-1063 went into a dive, evading both narrowly, tucking her body into a roll; she sprung up to her feet in a defensive crouch. She couldn't imagine how they could see through their flat featured helmets. They were broad and tall in height, with greaves on their arms and thick gloves on their hands. They reminded her of old guards of the senate she had seen once in a datapad.

The vibroblade crackled with an electric charge. She drew it back, parrying the high blow that came for her face. The other went for her side, wielding a bilari-electro whip chain. The edges scored close to her flight suit. She aimed low, kicking the guard in the chest, disrupting his balance.

Kriff…who are these guys?

Retreating a few steps, she ran through her options liking none of them. The pair was mismatched with one long reach weapon and the shorter rapier whip. They paced around her, assessing her, she was an unknown variable in their eyes. Something they couldn't predicate unlike Ren whose presence they were familiar with.

That fact alone made them cautious.

Which meant she had a slight advantage. She tensed when they came at her. Ducking sharply, she struck low against the guard's thigh. The blow made him stagger as she completed her turn; she slid herself between his wide-legged stance, jumping up to slash at his back. Sparks flew from the contact between the armor and the blade edge. He started to turn, wielding the whip in a crackling hail. She bobbed and swayed, evading the next lunge from the voulge-staff - the edge of the axis shaped weapon struck the floor. Switching grips, she slashed sideways, searching for the soft edge where the ornate robe met the edge of the helmet. Blood flew, sparking on the edge of the second blade. TN-1063 drew it out as the whip lashed across her back. Her scream stuttered to a groan as she bent forward, kicking out.

He was ready for her this time however, catching the slack in the chain. It snapped through the air threateningly, catching her around the ankle. Thrown off balance, she crashed to the floor, bruising her shoulder. Restraining her grunt of pain, tears sprang to her eyes, blurring her sight. The chain had bit unmercifully into her boot, slicing through her skin as he unraveled the length for his next attack. TN-1063 lunged for the vibro-arbir blade that had flown from her hand, scrambling up to her feet; she winced at the suddenness of putting weight on the ankle. When he came at her again, she weaved beneath the whip slower than before. Now on the defensive, she tried to put distance between them, finding the platform narrowing behind her.

Kriff!

The next blow sent her off balance, catching her right wrist. The sharp curved links spliced through her thick flight glove, ripping her flesh. She screamed in pain, dropping the vibroblade. The Praetor sent her stumbling with a swift, brutal kick to the abdomen. Teräs Käsi! She had been trained and become an adept in the form of hand to hand combat, recognizing something of the fighting style. Despite the pain blurring her sight, she evaded his next blow, moving her body in sync with the whip. TN-1063 tried to loosen the grasp on her wrist - the edges around them darkened. She felt the pressure in her temples increase until she was three places at once.

Oh, .no.

She was there standing on the bridge of a cruiser as it turned in slow motion, beside a woman she had never seen before. She knew innately the woman's name as sure as she had heard it spoken in her youth. Vice Admiral Amilyn Holdo. She saw what Holdo saw, the might of the First Order firing on the Resistance transports, disregarding her and her mission to protect the light.

They're not going to win.

She wasn't going to let them win.

TN-1063 saw through Holdo's eyes as the blue streaks of light speed thundered past the cruiser's viewport windows, her final surrender not of pain or loss but of triumph. She wasn't only there. There was another place, a room of black chrome with computer stations. She stood behind Jessika as she quietly worked processing files, watching on with a feeling of inescapable futility as Jessika stilled, lightly pressing her hand to her brow.

"Sweetheart." Her mother was thinking of her, always was. She had never forgotten her not even for an instant.

"Mom."

TN-1063 wanted to reach out through the space between them, cross the lost time spent apart - most of all she wanted to say she forgave her.

The cup next to Jessika rattled, the floor vibrated.

The two parts of her recognized the imminence of a moment, a second when there was life and when life had been extinguished. The last second of consciousness coinciding with a blinding flash of white light splicing through the Supremacy, its reach scoring deep into the stationary Star Destroyers. It was the most beautiful and terrifying thing she had felt or witnessed the sheer nature of sacrifice.

TN-1063's lips parted, her scream echoing up from the depths of her soul harsh, unrelenting. She flew apart into atoms, flesh and body disintegrating, Holdo, Jessika, and countless others gone in an instant.

She slammed back into her body, screeching into the face of the guard, the Force rose within her released with the surge of emotion. The whip loosened and she toppled over the edge of the catwalk with the sickening finality of the collision.

…

The doors opened.

BB-9e rolled out, photoreceptor eye probing the interior of the massive room. There were five Praetorian Guards lying in various states of dismemberment, the fifth whose throat had been slashed lay not far from the bodies of Kylo Ren and a woman who was not the pilot.

A sixth Praetorian Guard had fallen across the catwalk. BB-9e risked a trill of binary, calling the pilot's numerical designation. The droid rolled down the catwalk as close as it dared to the guard.

"BB-9e!"

The pilot's voice was muffled, but came from the left. The droid backed up, drawing closer to the edge where red platform lights contrasted sharply with the ebony plating. She was down there, dangling by a cable wrapped awkwardly around her arm. TN-1063 had begun the arduous process of climbing back up. The droid noticed she wasn't using her right wrist, blood and lacerated flesh dribbled from the raw-looking wound.

BB-9e asked if she was alright in droidspeak.

"I've been better." She grunted, hauling herself up one-handed, she swung to the side and braced with her gravity boots. The droid tilted its body at an angle, various tensile arms emerging from hidden compartments. TN-1063 had reached the underside of the catwalk, slotting her fingertips into the grooves; she clumsily reached upward for the droid's metal claw.

"Almost."

BB-9e noticed wetness in her eyes, a shine to her sweaty face streaking sweat and blood. She had been crying. Her hand grasped ahold of the metal claw; the droid rolled backward a few inches, pulling her weight. For a second, it felt itself sliding toward the edge, set off balance by her weight dependent on its interior cable.

She grabbed the top edge of the catwalk, her head emerging. TN-1063 relaxed her hold on the droid and started to lift herself up, her sudden shout seconds too late.

A shadow fell over the droid - the only warning before sharp metal cut through it, splitting its chrome skull down to the body.

…

Her scream deafened her, tearing through her raw vocal chords as if she could deny what was happening feet away from her. TN-1063 swung her body sideways, grappling onto the catwalk. With the propulsion of her legs, she rolled up and onto the narrow footpath as the Praetor faced her with his bilari-electro whip.

She could see herself surrounded by the lake in her mindscape. The water at once so reflective was a deep dark blue-black choppy with emotion. She felt nothing inside and everything on the outside. The pain gave her strength and she knew what she had to do.

Her hand shot out of its own accord, fingers curling into a clawing gesture. The guard felt the brush of invisible fingertips slowly crawling up his collarbone, encircling his throat. She felt the Force as an extension of herself, feeling the guard swallow beneath her curled palm. Slowly, she hooked her fingers into his flesh, piercing through to the sticky gurgle of blood. TN-1063 drew her hand toward her, closing into a tight fist. A shower of blood erupted from his throat, the hold of the Force loosened. The guard collapsed into a sack of meat.

Her hand fell to her side.

She hurried to put BB-9e back together. The droid beeped weakly once its head rolled back on the magnetic casters. "I know." She glanced around. "I'm not finished yet." Leaving the droid, she picked her way across the room grabbing the vibro-arbir blade and the bilari-electro whip. She studied the circular depression in the floor where the throne had rested. She glanced at it then dropped at Ren's side. Contusions marred his brow; he had a slice across his chest, but he was still breathing.

"I'm coming back." She bent forward quickly pressing her lips to his. It felt good even for the fleeting second it lasted. Reluctantly letting him go, she moved around the body of the scavenger. A clean hole had been punched through the girl's chest. TN-1063 felt the malevolence within the ship, the Supreme Leader was alive. He was hiding somewhere licking his wounds. Removing her remaining glove, she brushed her fingertips over the depression in the floor, taken back in time. Phantom-like the images were recreated around her, Ren bringing the girl - kneeling in respect. He had brought the prize, a Force sensitive who knew where Skywalker was.

He thought she could be turned.

The girl was powerful, untrained still. She was power in its rawest, untamed form. He saw potential in her to match him.

"Why did he kill her?" Despite the flare of jealousy, the girl was younger than her. She had her whole life ahead of her. The scavenger's murder was a loss of life, ultimately purposeless.

Snoke had considered bringing them together - Snoke looked into her mind. He saw everything - not just the conflict in the girl's soul. He saw a vision of his own destruction - she looked through the Supreme Leader's eyes and saw something she had never hoped to see again.

Darkness, a hooded figure and the flash of golden eyes.

A new Sith Empire.

One that wasn't controlled by him.

He was afraid of the girl becoming one with the dark side.

She withdrew from the vision, her lips pressed tightly together. Shifting her weight, she bent and depressed the hidden mechanism. The circular indentation opened into a seam as the floor around her began to lower.

BB-9e trilled after her.

"Yeah, I'm scared too." She tried to smile one more time reassuringly before descending into the darkness of a subterranean corridor lit by flickering red lanterns.

"Snoke's boudoir indeed." TN-1063 muttered thinking of a joke she had heard cruder troopers say, stepping off the lift. The moment her weight was off of it, the calibration sensors lifted the platform back into place closing off her sight of the throne room above. She moved slowly away from the sharp corridor end into the richly carpeted hallway, fumbling momentarily to find a glow tube from her belt.

She had walked on for some time before a set of double doors loomed ahead of her. I can feel it…Snoke's Force signature, that's what it is, isn't it? That intense feeling of evil that Kylo doesn't have. But, even Snoke is nothing compared to Vader. She laid her hand on the keypad, glimpsing the code put in by the Praetorian Guards he had taken with him.

The doors unsealed to a massive room filled with glass display cases. She glanced at the history of the Galactic Empire, remnants of the Sith Empire, and relics from Korriban…the latter she shuddered at, repulsed and somehow drawn to them at the same time.

"Korriban…,"

She drew near to the legacy lightsaber of Emperor Vitiate whose will was that of the stars, framed by a panel depicting Ashla and Bogan, the moons of Tython, light and darkness.

Where did he get it? She touched the glass reverently. And how do I know the name? Why does it…,

"Who are you?"

They were behind her.

She could hear the clink in the armor, the sizzling snap of their weapons. "It doesn't matter." She turned slowly, shielding the Force within the darkness of the lake. The moment before they came at her, she gestured with a flick of her hand. Their weapons flew to each other's throats, biting deeply into flesh. They uttered no screams, nothing but the wet gush of rich, warm blood.

"The dark side is strong in this place." TN-1063's eyes flickered around the mausoleum hidden within the heart of the Supremacy. "So much malice and evil has been done with these objects."

Someone moved between the cases into the center aisle. Tall and thin, clad in a gold khalat robe, Snoke's withered face observed her. "I was wondering when someone else would come. I thought mistakenly it was her - young Rey, but I see I was mistaken." There was some surprise, some awe in his deep sepulchral tones. "What are you?"

"It doesn't matter," she said, imagining the lake beneath a serene sky. "At least, I don't. But, I know who you are, Snoke or should I say Starkiller, murderer of Jedi?"

"And how do you know that?" The ancient face smirked in amusement, the widened gash down the brow shifted into something less monstrous.

"You've had many names. Your first was Galen Marek, a name you shed when you became the secret apprentice of Darth Vader." She shifted stance into a defensive position. "That was why you sought to corrupt Ben Solo. You, who were the child of Darth Vader's creation couldn't abide the living flesh and blood of the man and were abandoned when no longer of use!"

"In the end, Vader was betrayed by his children!"

She shook her head vigorously. "You promised Ben Solo the world and your affection. The love of a father - only to take it away from him. You didn't want Ben to rule beside you - you just wanted to destroy him!" He was never meant to become the new Vader.

That was why -

"That's why you killed the girl - you thought it would hurt him!"

"Yes…my apprentice wasn't as distraught as I would've expected from him. His hatred for her destruction wasn't even enough to kill me."

She refused to wonder about that now. She needed to focus, keep projecting the darkest of Starkiller's emotions around them. "Vader cast you aside, the man you looked up to as a father that was why you preyed on Ben Solo's loneliness." She could see it all with everything she had touched. TN-1063's lips curled into a sneer. "That ring on your finger has stone from beneath Vader's castle. It's your most precious possession of the man who never loved you!"

"No!"

She withstood the Force, the blackness of his control. "Deny it all you want! Lie to yourself- but it's the truth. Instead of setting yourself free, you've chained yourself to his memory!"

"Pah! Bold words from a pretty face! What do you know of Lord Vader-when you've never held a lightsaber before!?" He summoned his blade, the haft was silver-black, the blade a thick crimson swath.

"I've held many throughout the years." She curled her ruined fingers around the kyber crystal, inhaling the strength the crystal gave her. TN-1063 released it and parried the blow that came for her. "You're a failure, Starkiller. The Sith code is…,"

Peace is a lie, there is only passion.

Starkiller disarmed her swiftly. The vibro-arbir blade crashed into the one of the cases, shattering the glass. She snapped the whip from her belt, tangling with the lightsaber, wrenching it aside. The blade thrust dangerously close to her body - she grappled with his free hand, their hands joining for a second of connection.

Through passion, I gain strength.

She pushed through his mental blocks, digging deep past the protections he had placed - if the day ever came when his apprentice surpassed him and found his way into his mind.

Through strength, I gain power.

Into the decaying recesses of the old man's memory, she tore open the wounds from his past. The darkness and sorrow he had wallowed in after Vader had discovered Skywalker was his son.

Through power, I gain victory.

Behind the corrupted essence of his body, she saw the man he had been, the faithful apprentice within the embittered old man who had taken the reins of a fallen empire, bringing it back from its collapse to the near height of its glory. She let go of his grip, breaking the crushing hold he had maintained.

"Through victory, my chains are broken."

She swiped her hand out, calling the ancient blade from its resting place. The metal hilt flew into her grasp, thrumming with renewed life; the blade once ignited was a vicious deep reddish black, ruby light danced around her. Starkiller released his lightsaber, thrusting his hand toward her chest. Force Lightning crackled to life between them. The immensity of the pain almost made her lose concentration.

"The Force shall free me."

The blade spliced upward, sweeping his head from his shoulders. "And you're wrong - Vader wasn't destroyed by his children. He was saved by them."

…

It was done.

She staggered up to her feet, her grip sweaty around Vitiate's lightsaber. She wanted to let go of it…only I can feel it…the darkness in it. The suppressed memories long dormant within the blade. Her hand shook clipping it to her belt. Slowly, by touch, she found her way out of the mausoleum into the hallway. Activating the lift, she watched the light from the throne room become clearer as the platform lowered. Clambering onto it, she tucked her memories, her emotions into the lake of her mind. Within it, her Force sensitivity sank within its depths.

Someone was standing there beyond her, reaching for their blaster.

BB-9e chirped, sighting her.

TN-1063 stumbled from the platform, her legs felt like rubber, refusing to carry her weight. The man started forward, catching her in his arms, supporting her as she sank to her knees. "Don't try to talk…," Hux steadied her. "Shush. I don't know how you got here-"

"You don't want to know." She tried to smile, looking into the general's green eyes. His folded fingers tentatively brushed her cheek.

"TN-1063-"

"It's Jaina, sir." My name…the one I was called for the first six years of my life. Leaning against his shoulder, she closed her eyes, drifting into the sea of her subconscious.

…

"I suppose you're going to say you don't know what happened here?" Hux's voice instantly put him on guard. Ren clambered up to his feet, glancing around the room. Memories surfaced from the lake he had visualized, sluggish with the churning of water. A lake…, his gaze fell on Rey, someone had closed her eyes. Guilt stirred his conscience. He had brought her to her death. Almost reluctant to tear his gaze from her, his glance narrowed on Hux.

The general tensed for an attack, grip tightening around the woman he had lifted into his arms.

TN-1063…Jaina.

The vague memory surfaced of someone fighting for him, someone who had promised to return. The pilot's damaged droid rolled closer to Hux, silently analyzing the woman's injuries.

"I'll take her." He summoned the Skywalker lightsaber to him from where it had been left beside Rey; he clipped it beside his own, noticing for the first time that another, one of burnished metal with simplistic gold styling, was clipped to Jaina's belt in place of a blaster.

Blaster practice.

Someone had said that…after his training sessions, when he had walked out into the shooting gallery. It had always been her with the droid sitting at her feet. She had always been right in front of him, the entire time. The one who would stand at his side. Neither seduced by the light nor the dark, but balanced between them. Hux relinquished her with no little sneer, fury sparking in his gaze.

Ren now knew she was a Force sensitive.

-TBC

AN Update: Since this is fanfiction, I'm going to disregard a few cannon facts regarding Snoke's identity. That was a major disappointment for me reading the TLJ novelization. Anyway, onto the next one :-)

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