FN-2187 worked out a routine. He kept the drawing of the Resistance pilot stuffed up his sleeve and the datapad with him in case Black Leader contacted him again. Since the datapad had been officially distributed, he ran no risk of confiscation or reprimanding. In fact, Phasma might have beamed at him. But that was impossible to tell with the helmets.

Last night, he dug through the datapad for its settings first thing after speaking with Black Leader. Then he silenced all notifications. He checked the datapad several times throughout the day for received messages. If anyone saw him doing so, they'd only suspect he was catching up on the required readings. Black Leader hadn't contacted him since their initial conversation, which seemed par for the course. The Resistance had to be a secretive, heavily guarded sort to stay around for so long.

Today his schedule was cleaning day. He had the datapad tucked away near the small of his back, his belt full of cleaning products and tools. He had so far cleaned several toilets, a few corridors, and was in the process of wiping down the inside of a storage closet when an urge hit him to check the datapad again.

He cleaned his way into another bathroom. Inside a trooper wiped mirrors, and they jumped when FN-2187 entered. "I'll take a stall," said FN-2187. "Don't mind me."

The other trooper nodded and returned to wiping a rag over the mirror.

FN-2187 crept toward the stall, trying hard to appear nonchalant, yet once he stepped behind those walls, he spun around and quickly shut the door, securing the lock. Tearing off his glove, FN-2187 fished out the crumpled drawing of the Resistance fighter, biting his lips as he took in the determined gleam in the pilot's eye. FN-2187 drank in the warmth beneath the pilot's furrowed brow, searching for a hidden softness behind that quixotic smirk. He shook his head, clearing away those thoughts, and flushed the toilet to muffle the racket of the paper getting torn into tiny pieces. Once the resistance fighter swam inside the First Order's pipes, FN-2187 set down the lid of the toilet and sat, figuring he would just spray and wipe his armor with a rag later.

Setting the datapad on his lap, FN-2187 switched on the screen and tried not to cry out in joy when the datapad asked him: OPEN MESSAGE? YES? NO?

He pressed yes, naturally.

Still alive? Black Leader had written him.

FN-2187 promptly replied, Yes. Cleaning toilets.

I leave for Jakku tonight, wrote Black Leader. Thanks for the warning. Good luck with your mission.

FN-2187's breath hitched, his eyes wide and heart thudding.


Fear curled in his gut as the transport ship landed on Jakku. FN-2187 stared at the white helmet of the trooper in front of him, gripping the hilt of his gun that was part blaster, part torch. He didn't know if he were more terrified of the massacre about to take place, being discovered as a fraud, or Black Leader dying.

FN-2187 paid close attention to the gossip circulating among the troopers that day. Apparently they were meant to cleanse Jakku of rebels, which had his guts tangled in impenetrable knots, and prevent a Resistance fighter from stealing the map to Luke Skywalker, who was allegedly alive. He assumed the fighter was Black Leader.

The information spun circles in his mind, twisting and winding until he could barely see straight. He fought to deter his thoughts down another avenue, but only looking at the helmet in front of him provided him reprieve.

The transport ship docked, then the door fell open. Troopers sped out into the dusty, hot air and swarmed the landing zone, weapons at attention. All his fear bled into one constricted ball of dread as the screams of the First Order's next victims rang in his ears. He ran with his gun sticking out in the formation that had been drilled into him. When he broke out of the transport ship, the life was sucked out of him. There was so much screaming, blasts, agony, terror. He tore blind through the panic, turning around to follow the loudest scream when it pierced through the air. Then a blaster shot past him, horror seizing him, and he spun around just in time to see Slip collapsing.

He raced toward him and crouched over him, aching to rip off his helmet and see his face, Slip's hazel eyes as vivid as the aged stone architectures they glimpsed at in holovids. The First Order didn't bring back the bodies of their dead. Slip would rot on Jakku in his armor, if a scavenger didn't tear it off him.

Slip reached out to him, then his arm shook and his hand slapped FN-2187's helmet, his blood soaked palm streaking across the viewport as life bled out of him.

FN-2187 flinched, then jerked to a stand, stumbling back. Somehow he managed to walk away. He dragged his feet forward and shook his head, trying and failing to delete the memory of Slip perishing from his mind. As FN-2187 attempted just that, he caught sight of an X-Wing in time to see a spherical droid get sucked inside and a man race underneath the laser canons toward the nose of the ship.

Then he saw troopers charge up a wide range blaster. His heart stopped.

He ran over to the troopers, who at first paid him no heed. Adrenaline seized him, otherwise he couldn't explain why he slapped the hands of the trooper who worked to fire up the weapon.

"What the hell are you doing?" the trooper spat, turning to face him. He must have been a head taller than FN-2187.

FN-2187 had never been more thankful for his helmet, as he definitely looked back at that trooper in genuine fear. Yet he couldn't let him shoot down Black Leader. He also had to explain himself. "I'll kill him personally," said FN-2187.

The troopers all stared. Despite their armor, their disbelief was palpable.

A trooper clapped a hand on his shoulder. "About time you joined us."

FN-2187 nodded, then he ran off, wanting less to stay with them than he ached to meet Black Leader. His boots were designed for Jakku's sand dunes. Running to the X-Wing took no time at all, especially when he slid down the other side of the sand dune and wound up skidding to a halt at the rockets. He jogged around to the front of the ship, and, for appearance, fired off a blast.

Black Leader had yet to get in the pilot's chair. He slid off the ship, blaster in hand. FN-2187 took a step back. When the pilot got close enough for him to see his face, he took another step back.

Black Leader was the man on the Resistance recruitment drawing. I flushed you down the toilet, thought FN-2187. Then, You're real.

"Don't make me kill you," said Black Leader, voice in a growl.

"Wait, don't," said FN-2187, not sure where this conversation was headed, or what his mouth was doing. "It's me."

Black Leader halted, blaster pointed directly at FN-2187's head. His eyebrows furrowed deeply, a hard crease between them, and his brown eyes, in the poster so full of warmth, guidance, and a spirited beckoning, now glinted with a fury that sent shivers racing along FN-2187's spine. He sneered like the rebels in the simulation, yet with the pilot's newfound tangibility and the memory of the poster—this hurt. FN-2187 dropped his arms, blaster clanking against his hip.

"I'm the spy," he said, voice breaking as the defeat settled over him. Black Leader saw only a trooper, which was all that defined FN-2187. "You know, the one you've been talking to. I clean toilets."

Black Leader didn't drop his weapon.

They hadn't spoken enough for FN-2187 to attempt bargaining for his life with evidence of their shared experiences. "I warned you about this," said FN-2187. "Jakku. Today—tonight. What's happening right now."

Black Leader watched him, countenance stoic and unreadable. "You're not from the Resistance," he said, then looked him over from head to toe.

FN-2187 fidgeted as Black Leader's gaze lingered. "I'm not."

"You're a trooper." Black Leader quirked his head. "You saved me. Why?"

The memories flashed through him again: the miners, Slip shooting innocent people, Slip dying, those houses sent up in flames. A pressure heavy in his throat, FN-2187 shook his head, not sure what to say. "I don't want anyone to get hurt."

The crease eased between Black Leader's brows, the glint in his eyes evaporating and joining the night sky. Then a grin broke out and a black eyebrow rose high up onto his forehead. "I'm going to get you out of there," said Black Leader, full of bravado. "Once I complete my mission, I'm getting you out of there."

Hope sprung up, such a deep-rooted ache lifted from FN-2187's shoulders. He made to thank this stranger—to plead, more accurately, Please don't feel obliged—but sand kicked up in the air and a wind knocked into him. Terror crawled up his spine as he saw Kylo Ren's transporter landing on Jakku.

He sped toward Black Leader, grasping his shoulder. He didn't pause to contemplate that Black Leader allowed his touch. "You gotta get out of here. That's Kylo Ren. I can't save you from him."

Black Leader didn't waste a second. He nodded to FN-2187, then raced back to the X-Wing and grasped part of it to hoist himself inside the cockpit. FN-2187 ran backward to give him space for lift off. The engine roared to life, and FN-2187 realized how bizarre a picture he'd painted—a dangerous, deadly scenario a trooper would never want to be caught in. He aided a Resistance fighter.

As the X-Wing's wheels picked up speed and accelerated over the sands, FN-2187 watched in a mixture of awe and horror as the starfighter took off into the skies, the blue and orange flames blasting out of the rockets and blending into the sky until the ship was indistinguishable between the stars and moons. He thought, How beautiful, and a foreign presence penetrated his mind.

Then he fell asleep.


The lights were bright, blinding. He saw pure white, a searing pain splitting at the seams of his mind.

"...did you do with the map?"

"I don't... I don't..." FN-2187's heart rammed inside him when he realized that scraggly, weak voice was his.

"Administer another round. I want his mind wiped clean. No Resistance scum gets the better of us. Understood?"

"Yes, General."


FN-2187 gained consciousness while Nines and Zeroes hauled him down a corridor, his arms hooked over their shoulders and ankles dragging. With his helmet secured over his head, they had no way of knowing he was awake, and for that FN-2187 was glad. His temples pulsated, his very brain felt tender. He dug through to recall the final blow from their training session that earned him this hairsplitting concussion. They carried him to the FN barracks, thumbed in the security code, then tossed him on his bed, not bothering to make sure his legs got on the mattress before they left.

He lied on the bed for an eternity, limbs refusing to move and brain refusing to fire signals to his nerves to make his limbs move. Time moved slowly, so slowly that he passed out for a brief minute, not realizing he'd done so until his helmet began beeping, alerting him that lunch would be served in a few short minutes. FN-2187 mustered up the energy to sit up and remove his helmet, then struggled to untuck his blanket, wanting nothing more than to crawl under the covers and never come out, especially if he had managed to earn a rare break from his duties. He settled back down, drawing his knees to his chest and moving his head on his pillow in attempt to find an angle that didn't exacerbate his headache, but a hard object under the pillow kept piercing his temples. Reaching underneath the pillow, FN-2187 was staggered to pull out a datapad.

Curiosity got the better of him. He rested the datapad against the wall and tapped on the edges in search of the on switch. The datapad fired up, an orange insignia for the Resistance-Ouch-appearing. His bewilderment over the datapad's existence disappeared as soon as he took in all the Resistance embellishments. Had Phasma given him Resistance propaganda to study?

FN-2187 thumbed through the datapad, eyebrows scrunching tighter and tighter the further he dove into the datapad's resources. Either the First Order had uncovered a treasure trove of Resistance intel, or he had been reconditioned for centuries and woke up in time to reap the benefits. The datapad disclosed little, yet it had personality, tailored to the preferences of a Resistance fighter who presumably knew a lot yet was wise enough to not keep the information laying around. FN-2187 stopped thumbing through once he discovered a folder entitled, Recruitment posters. Unable to believe what a ridiculous contraption he'd found, FN-2187 rolled his eyes and shook his head—and promptly seethed, the pain ensuing from the flamboyant movements hitting him in waves. When the pain eased, FN-2187 pressed the folder, expression blank as the first poster appeared.

His first thought was: That's a handsome man.

He attempted reading the words written in bold, loopy letters, but a sharp pain jabbed at his mind after his eyes skittered across "resistance." He returned to examining that man. The man looked good in his orange rebel flight suit—A pilot! I need one of those—yet that thought disappeared as quickly as it came, lost in the mists of his foggy brain. The pilot beamed with a grin that was both infectious and enamoring. His eyes were easy to gaze into, a dark brown, like tree bark in rain soaked woodlands. Judging by the shadowing, the pilot's eyes were lighter than his yet darker than Zeroes'. FN-2187 smiled, not sure if the pilot made him smile or if that were the work of his jumbled brain.

An alert popped up: OPEN MESSAGE? YES? NO?

Since FN-2187 never had much fun, he decided to press yes.

I'm back.

What's your name? I'm Poe.

Status? Three days no response.

Buddy, you're killing me. Status?

It's been a week. Please respond. Status?

Status?

FN-2187 squinted, his eyes not appreciating the screen's brightness. He had the strangest suspicion these messages were meant for him, but he couldn't be sure since no one had ever spoken to him so familiarly. Or, if FN-2187 were honest, did anyone speak to him outside of necessary protocol and procedure. Clumsily, as his gloves didn't allow for precision, FN-2187 wrote, I'm alive.

He wished he knew who this Poe was. He reread the messages, feverish for extra morsels and meaning behind the text, and flushed when he realized Poe asked for his name. He contemplated lying and tossing out a name that was anything other than FN-2187, mortified at what his lack of moniker represented, but his brain was too tired to conjure a name, and he simply didn't want to lie.

My name is FN-2187, he wrote. FN-2187, for short.

Silence. No response. The area where Poe's rebuttal ought to be stayed blank for seemingly an eternity. FN-2187 feared he'd stumbled into a simulation for withholding information under duress, but then three dots bounced beside Poe's username, Black Leader, and his response came lightning quick. That's not a name. I'm not using it. Can I call you Finn? Do you like that?

He loved that.

I love that.

He rolled the name over on his tongue, warmth blooming in his chest. Invigorated in the conversation, Finn hoisted himself into sitting, head pounding as he set the datapad on his knees and leaned over to write. Have we met? Sorry, I think they did something to me. I forgot a lot, I think.

Little dots bounced under Finn's message for the longest time. Eventually, Poe sent, What do you last remember?

It was a blur. That was what other troopers called reconditioning: a blur. After reconditioning, a person neither remembered their last meal nor proper fighting technique. It was fog for two days. Highly inefficient in utilizing resources, they joked.

Still, Poe seemed nice. He deserved a response. Finn definitively remembered Nines, Zeroes, and the drawing of the Resistance—Ouch—pilot. He wracked his memory for the image of the pilot. I have this poster. It's a man. He's attractive and has the kindest eyes I've ever seen. Have you ever wanted to take off your helmet, not say "Reporting for duty" but "good morning"? I want to tell the man good morning. He's wearing a rebel pilot uniform. There's a round white and orange droid beside him. It says to join the Resis—Resis— The pain seared into him. His fingers slipped and sent the message by mistake. Finn didn't mind, not in the least. Talking to Poe felt better than unsupervised duty.

Attractive? replied Poe.

Finn's cheeks burned. He fumbled with the keyboard. He seems friendly. Friendly and attractive are synonyms.

Buddy, if you're describing what I think you are... I'm not backing down on my word. You're getting out of there. Finn reread the words, feeling like he had missed more of the conversation than he first perceived. I gotta fly out, so I'll keep this short. We can't trust those goons not to hurt you again, and we can't trust our line of communication to stay secure if they already suspect you. So here's your first official mission: Break open the datapad. Inside will be a lot of chips. There's going to be a long, thin black device. It's a droid, if you can believe it. It doubled as a comm for Kea, the ambassador who had this datapad before you. Her comm links to mine. Hook it up to a writing device, it sends written messages. Hook it up to audio, and we're having real conversations. Do you get to keep your own helmet? Does it have a comm unit?

Finn lurched back, skin prickling. His mind spun in circles, the words on the screen blending together. Nothing in Poe's message made sense. He shook his head to clear his thoughts, but that just made it worse. Still, he managed to type out, Of course, I have my own helmet.

Perfect. Gotta go. Good luck. I believe in you, Finn.

Finn dropped the datapad onto his bed, half convinced it would combust and prove itself to be a figment of his addled brain's imagination. He shook his head and scratched nails over his hair, peeking out of the corner of his eye at the datapad. The messages from Poe were smudged from the distance, yet he still made them out.

Nothing made sense. From how Poe spoke, he didn't seem to be part of the First Order, but that was impossible. Poe had to either be in on some game the troopers were pulling on him, or he was someone more troubled than Finn.

"I should sleep," Finn told himself. "Sleep makes everything better." He had earned it, too, after the reconditioning.

Finn laid down on his side, looking out at the barracks. He searched the room, finding that he remembered the first time the FN unit entered it and set up house. Everything became fuzzy as he tried to recall specific days or events.

He saw the bed directly across from him, the bottom bunk in one of the two bunks in the barrack. It was Slip's. Finn remembered that because he'd panicked, worrying that the guilt of not picking Slip up would haunt him, as the other trooper would be the first thing he saw in the morning and the last thing at night.

Slip's bed was empty. No blanket, no sheet, no pillow. Nothing.

Finn knew what that meant.

Slip was gone.

Gone from the galaxy and memory.

Gone.