Rain dripped out of his hair and into his already soaked robes, but he didn't notice. He looked down into a ruined, female face. Her face. Her blank, staring eyes seemed to bore a hole into his skull, asking only one question : "Why?" He felt the heartbroken, soul-rending, bone-shaking sobs rip through him as he mourned his loss. He looked up at the girl standing only a short distance away, with her double-bladed saber-staff, still lit. Though her saber-staff glowed a bright, vivid violet, he could not clearly see her face through the rain, but he knew it was her. Of course it was her. He screamed through the rain, as his voice cracked with his grief, "Why did it have to be her?" Though he could not hear the girl over the rain, he knew she was sobbing; sharing his pain with him. She fell to her knees as she shut off her saber-staff, shaking her head. He looked past the girl to the field of bodies; Stormtroopers and Resistance Fighters lay slain, side-by-side, and their blood mingled together in the rivers of rain. And somehow, he knew she had done this. She had caused all of this devastation; she had started it all. As he looked back down into the ruined female face in his lap, he knew. He had done this. Of course he had. The girl pushed her thoughts toward him, and he heard her say, "I'm so sorry, Ben"...

Kylo Ren sat bolt upright in his cot, chest heaving. His heart felt like it would pound through his rib cage That dream, again, he thought. He hadn't had that dream since...he viciously pushed that thought away; he couldn't let Snoke catch him thinking about such things now. And besides; the tortured face from his dream had been dead for a long time. And that girl had been there. That...scavenger. His lip curled at the thought. He couldn't stand the thought of that girl; and yet, he couldn't get her out of his head.

He shook his head to clear it. Kylo threw his legs over the side of his cot, and winced a little as his bare feet touched the cold, metal ground. He stalked across his sparse quarters to look at his reflection in the mirror that stood ceiling-to-floor across the room from his bed. He wore nothing but tightly-fitted underwear that came only to mid-thigh. With so much of his skin bare, he took stock of his latticework of scars, being ever so careful to avoid looking at his face. Standing out against his pale skin and well-toned muscles, there were many puckered, angry-looking scars. One who knew what to look for would know that they were light-saber scars; they were the product of his training as a Knight of Ren. Nearly against his will, his eyes were drawn upwards to his face, where the incessant reminder of the scavenger girl was splayed across his face.

Sighing, Kylo began to pull on his pitch-black trousers, tunic, boots, gloves, and robes. Still in only his trousers and boots, there came a beep at his door. Scowling, he stomped over to the door and waved his hand to open it with the Force. On the other side stood a Stormtrooper, who was shaking with terror; very few had ever seen Kylo Ren without his mask. Even fewer lived to tell the tale. Kylo's eyes narrowed as he surveyed the much shorter man.

"Well," he growled? "Why are you disturbing me at this unholy hour?" He could feel his temper rising. He despised being seen without his mask; and then there was the added insult of a lowly Stormtrooper daring to disturb him in his private quarters.

The Stormtrooper trembled with fear; "General Hux has demanded your presence, sir." The Stormtrooper looked down at his feet after he had finished speaking.

Kylo Ren's face flushed with fury as his eyes narrowed and the corners of his mouth turned down in a frown. "General Hux 'demands' my presence?" The Stormtrooper took a couple of stumbling steps backwards when he heard the tone the Master of the Knights of Ren was using. "He 'demands' it!?" Kylo thrust his hand out, and the Stormtrooper was lifted off of the ground by his throat, his feet scrabbling uselessly for purchase, while a terrible choking, gurgling sound emanated from his throat. There was a sudden crunching sound as the Stormtrooper fell to the floor, his trachea crushed. "How dare Hux 'demand' anything of me," Kylo rumbled to himself.

Kylo stepped back into his quarters and let the doors close. He quickly finished putting on the remainder of his robes, picked up his helmet and placed it on his head. As it slid shut over his face, he turned to his grandfather's burned and crumpled helmet. Once his helmet was safely secured, he bowed and said a short prayer to Darth Vader; "Show me the way, Grandfather. I need your guidance through the Dark."

Kylo straightened his tunic and stormed out of his quarters, stepping carelessly over the corpse of the unfortunate Stormtrooper. As he stalked through the halls of Du'Tang Station, Stormtroopers and First Order military personnel alike parted before him. They could instinctively sense that he was in a foul mood, and to delay him would be to sign their own death warrants. At long last, Kylo reached the command center, deep in the heart of Du'Tang Station. General Hux turned as the doors opened; his lip curled in an arrogant sneer when he saw that it was Kylo Ren who had entered. Beneath his mask, Kylo raised an eyebrow in distaste. He had always thought that Hux resembled nothing more than a ginger ferret.

"At long last, the mighty Kylo Ren has decided to grace us with his dark and ever-impressive presence," sneered Hux, enjoying his new-found power. Ever since the disaster at Starkiller Base, Kylo Ren had found his power and authority somewhat lessened. He now answered directly to Hux; a fact which disgusted him entirely. He thought himself entirely above the spineless, slimy little sewer rat. "New orders have arrived. You are to take a small contingent of Knights down to the surface of Yavin 4, and destroy what Resistance Fighters you find there."

Kylo grimaced under his mask, and took three long strides towards Hux so that Kylo was standing directly in front of him, and leaned down to look the man in the eye. "And who are you to give me orders," Kylo asked quietly and menacingly?

"You know from whom my orders come," Hux replied, flushing.

"Ah, yes. Supreme Leader Snoke. You think I fear him," mocked Kylo?

"No. But I think you fear Snoke's master. It is from him that your orders come. He thought you might need a bit more...urging after the disaster on Starkiller. The way you let that girl go; one might think you'd gone soft" Hux licked his bottom lip and his eyes glittered menacingly as he rose to the tips of his toes, and leaned in to Kylo's mask. It irritated Hux that the Master of the Knights of Ren was so much taller than him; it wounded his pride.

Kylo straightened in surprise and indignation. "Very well. If my Master's Master desires that I go down to Yavin 4, I will go. Phasma" he snapped! "Prepare my shuttle."

"Yes, sir," replied Captain Phasma, snapping a sharp salute. She was not fool enough to test Kylo Ren's temper. Perhaps that is why she had survived serving with him for so long.

Secretly, Kylo Ren was pleased with his new orders. He cared little for the Resistance fools that thought themselves so clever as to hide on Yavin 4. Personally, he thought it predictable; which is probably why the Resistance thought it was so very clever. After all, who would think to look for them in an old, abandoned, Rebel Alliance base? The Resistance mattered to him little. As he stalked to his shuttle, he smiled widely under his mask. He was so giddy he could nearly have laughed. She was on Yavin 4. The girl; the little desert rat that had defied him on Starkiller. The little scavenger who dared call herself the next Jedi. Finally, Kylo Ren would get an answer as to why she was lodged so firmly in his mind.