A/N: Thanks for the follows and favs: Welcome Aboard! ;) And a special shout-out to wynteralchemyst for being the first the leave me a review: digital confetti and a year long free candy of your choice! haha (My brain is a little fried right now, I'll PM you tomorrow!)

Also, I've been an idiot and forgot to mention the one, the only...Emmeth Nigh (also known as one amazing (and incredibly funny) Beta): So glad to have you on board for this story as well and thank you so much for all of your help!

Alrighty, time for chapter 2...enjoy! ;)

CHAPTER 2

ARKANIS – 8 ABY

The rain beat down on his head like a drum, the steady tap-tap-tap drowning his half-stifled sobs. He was drenched but still felt the pain through his cold body. His wrists throbbed, angry red blotches blossoming like wreaths around the bone.

'You're a weak-willed boy... Useless. As thin as a slip of paper. I'm ashamed you're my son. My own son... Weak!'

Armitage cowered, feeling again those strong, cruel fingers trapping his hands like vines. He let out a whimper that disgusted him as much as it did his father.

Weak... Weak... Weak! The word resounded in his head like an incessant salvo.

He tucked frantically at the cuffs of his school uniform, a sense of panic rising in his chest and constricting his throat when they wouldn't cover the bruises. Letting out a cry of frustration Armitage crossed his arms, stowing his hands out of sight.

His eyes still burned and he fisted his sides, his sore ribs instantly protesting. Despite his attempt to quench them, tears streamed hot down his face, mingling with the cool rain, their saltiness stinging the cut in his lip.

They're not tears... It's the rain... Just rain...

He let out a shuddering breath, jaw clenching as he forced himself to listen as he always did. Tap-tap-tap. The rain kept pouring down. Big fat drops shattering on the tips of his boots. Tap-tap-tap. It was the repetitiveness of it that steadied him. Tap-tap-tap. The heartbeat that kept him alive. Tap-tap-tap. The fixed pattern that hid him—

Armitage stiffened, straining his ears to detect that same deviation to the unvarying rhythm around him.

Splash-splash-splash.

Shoes walking through a puddle. Shoes. Not boots. Through the puddle? Who walked through it instead of arou—

Two shoes stopped in front of him, their gleaming toes pointing inquisitively towards him. Then the rain stopped hammering down on his head; its tap-tap-tap morphing into a louder but messier splosh-splosh-splosh.

"Why are you crying?"

Her hair was spun of moonlight. That was the first thing he thought.

She looked down at a boy who had flames for hair and eyes with such an icy hue it could extinguish both their warmth. She involuntarily trembled then squared her shoulders and dipped her chin in something between fascination and concern.

"Why are you cr—"

"I'm not!" Armitage hissed like a wounded animal driven in a corner.

As he scrambled to get to his feet, she bent her knees to sit on her haunches opposite him.

"Ouch!"

Being considerably taller than the girl, the crown of his head collided with her umbrella. The transparent holo-canopy shimmered, the halo of hellish blue expanding and rippling the pinpricks of raindrops; their splosh-splosh-splosh momentarily disturbed by a surging zzzzt.

She studied his pale face, his eyes red rimmed and wide with indignation; leaking his hurt into the world.

He looked back into gray puddles that suddenly lit up with what could have been either stars or mischief.

"Why is there more rain on your face than fell from the sky?"

A corner of her mouth curved upward in evident enjoyment at her own cleverness. She was making fun of him. That hollow sensation in his chest should stir, scrape the marrow from his bones. It didn't. All he felt was puzzled. Was she making fun of him?

"I-I'm... I'm not crying," he stammered.

She didn't immediately say something. Armitage watched her closely as his lie made her lips droop—as it stole her smile. Then the lines in her face tautened as if she was steeling herself against an overwhelming disappointment; her eyes oscillated for a fraction of a second like a pebble rupturing the surface of a pond.

"Me neither."

She offered him the umbrella without another word. To his surprise he reached out for it; accepted this gift of a stranger. The sleek handle was warm against his palm but a shiver ran through him as his sleeve slid back.

Her gaze lingered on the blotches that stained his wrists like flowers. His cheeks reddened, nearly matching his soaked hair.

Another tremor ran up her spine. Relief or regret. Both? She had only ever pitied herself...

"Keep it."

And with that she ducked from under the umbrella and marched away; the puddle sloshing over its undefined edges with her hurried splash-splash-splash.

She tried not to feel her heart pounding in alarm at the dark forest ahead of her. Forcing herself to remember the melody, she hummed along, her throat thick with fear regardless.

The shadows of the trees loomed like pillars around her as she walked away from him; strings of wet pearls showering down on her from their overarching branches.

And yet the rain didn't seem to bother her.

Armitage stared at the droplets bouncing off her silhouette.

It didn't even seem to touch her...

HOTH – 35 ABY

The Star Destroyer blossomed into existence like a dagger poised to cleave the planet's atmosphere. Its sudden appearance, though expected, stopped Aden Ren in her tracks. Around her the crunching of snow under boots didn't falter as her fellow Knights strode on, a unit of snowtroopers marching along in their wake.

Aden gazed up at the ship high above with something close to terror. A slumbering part in her that she should have overcome a long time ago, had hoped for this day. But not as much as she had dreaded it. Now it had come regardless.

I thought it would take him away from me, she thought grimly, taking in the Star Destroyer hull to hull, acutely aware of the irony now it would bring him to her instead.

She was glad when the icy blast hitting her full on and whipping up her robes around her returned her to the present before Cain Ren's remonstrance did.

"Aden! No time to linger. There are no rats hiding here," he barked, flicking an impatient look back at her and the crumbling remnants of the Rebellion's Base, his crude mask flashing in the glare of the surrounding snow.

"Our Master will be pleased with that, will he?" Isak Ren remarked dryly, just as Aden dashed forward to keep up. "That we have scoured yet another abandoned base?"

"By the looks of it, they didn't even return here," Mira Ren weighed in, sounding almost insulted; a predator complaining about the continuing lack of prey.

"I don't blame them," Dessa Ren muttered under her breath, leaning confidentially towards Aden as the two of them brought up the rear.

"You don't feel the cold if you don't think about it," Aden intoned, smiling behind her mask.

"So you keep saying." Dessa shook her frame with an exaggerated shiver, gauging the remaining distance between them and the transport with evident disgust at the current climate.

The familiarity of the gesture nearly brought Aden to another jarring halt. Willing herself to keep up her brisk pace, she balled her fists and prayed none of the Knights would pick up on the surge of anger directed at herself—rattling her very bones.

It's because he's close, she tried to assure herself, that's why it reminded me of him.

"Hurry!" Cain bellowed over the freezing wind buffeting them from all sides, being the first to stalk up the lowered ramp. The Knights followed his lead, the snowtroopers filing into the bulky landers flanking the command shuttle.

Aden made sure to stay furthest from the viewport, though it did little to prevent her eyes from searching for the Star Destroyer. She grabbed the nearest strap, slightly swaying along with it as the shuttle took off.

Soon, they broke through the atmosphere and into space and she saw it closer than before. The large, imposing ship hovered just beyond the asteroid belt, the imperfect rocks like pockmarks on its streamlined silhouette.

After all these years...

The shuttle canted as it slid deftly through the asteroids tumbling lazily around their axis. The timely movement covered the tremor that ran through her at the rapidly approaching prospect of docking on the Steadfast.

"What do you think we've been summoned for?" Dessa asked her softly, having followed her line of vision to the Star Destroyer.

Before Aden could answer, or even tear her gaze away, someone brushed past her.

"More harvesting no doubt," Mira spat, sounding as if she clearly thought that tedious task beneath her.

"Whatever it is, it got us off that lump of ice—" Josiah Ren started but was stopped short by a quelling look from Cain.

"Whatever it is," he repeated with deliberate coldness, "We would do well to obey our Master's command if we are to solidify our hold on the galaxy."

"Our hold?" Mira tilted her mask questioningly.

Cain turned to face her, his signature flaring up for a heartbeat; long enough to have several Knights reach for the hilts of their weapons. Then he relaxed his squared shoulders and the tension reverted to its usual, insidious undercurrent.

"His hold, of course," Cain conceded, his tone the contrasting mix of humility and mockery.

"The First Order's hold, actually," Isak corrected him, and there was barely concealed contempt in his voice.

"An alliance that has proven beneficial," Cain was quick to point out, though he too sounded disapproving.

"For now," Mira chimed in enigmatically, making sure she had turned her back on the two pilots so they wouldn't hear.

"For now," Cain agreed, the surrounding Knights parting to make room as he moved to the front of the transport, pacing behind the pilots like a tenacious sentinel.

Now that it loomed larger and larger, Aden couldn't bear watching the Star Destroyer any longer. She averted her gaze and locked it on her hand grasping the strap instead, banning the memories that once again threatened to resurface in her mind.

In spite of her own reluctance, the shuttle soared through the Steadfast's shields and it touched down in the massive hangar bay what felt like the very next instant. There was hardly time to breathe before the ramp opened with a hiss and her position in the back forced her to be one of the first to set foot on the Star Destroyer that was to be their new, albeit temporary, home.

It was impossible not to instantly find him among the waiting army, his vivid red hair like a daring breach of protocol among all the sober black and white; icy-blue eyes a similar contrast with his pale skin.

And then Aden strode forward with the other Knights, eyes anywhere but on him, her heart beating wildly against her ribs regardless.

There was one comfort that came with the Force's cruel twisting of old paths: for the first time in a long while she was grateful for the mask that covered her face.

THE STEADFAST – 35 ABY

She made him hear the rain again. After nearly a decade and a half spent mostly aboard Star Destroyers where climate was tightly controlled and there was no capricious weather to contend with, Armitage heard the rain again.

There was no logic to it. No reason that he could think of. And yet ever since the Knights had arrived, since that Knight had arrived, he was increasingly aware of a maddening tap-tap-tap that caused his thoughts to stray where they shouldn't.

He hadn't been the only one to inwardly scowl at the six irregular shadows following the Supreme Leader, all of whom displayed a glaring lack of the uniformity of his troops with their obvious differences in height and built. Even their masks marked them as individuals instead of a group; their black, billowing robes the only conformity among them.

Still, it was irrational to claim it was because of this single Knight that he was plagued by a meteorological phenomenon that was impossible on the Steadfast, but his conviction that she did only grew.

Somehow, she seemed to exacerbate the phantom raindrops. Not every time she neared him. She didn't. She kept a conspicuous distance between them during the handful of meetings he had to endure in the presence of her fellow sorcerers, their Master restlessly pacing the length of the conference room like one possessed.

Whenever Armitage had passed her in the corridors, too, she exhibited similarly aberrational behavior: she would either give him too wide a berth not to be deliberate, or simply make an about turn and disappear around the first corner.

It was even more apparent on the bridge where she would occasionally be stationed with one or two other Knights, providing unseen eyes and ears for the Supreme Leader. She would hang back as the other Knights leered behind officers and all but interrogated them and himself on every strategical movement, setback and advancement.

He was disciplined enough to detect the deviating pattern of her movements. It set her apart as much as a hare among Saph-Wolves—

Armitage turned swiftly on his heels and headed for the expansive viewport, only just biting back a curse at his own wandering mind. It had been years since he had thought of...of that time. Just like he had forgotten, or tried to forget at least, Arkanis' dismal climate.

The only thing he used to be able to tolerate about the perpetual rain, was its unvarying pattern—its reassuring monotony. Now, it felt like he was listening to a building downpour feigning to be nothing more than a drizzle; the fixed, predictable rhythm a ruse until a louder splash-splash-splash would upset it.

The memories were arguably more detrimental to his sanity. Armitage thought he'd gotten rid of those a long time ago. That, like with the creases in his uniform, he had smoothed them over until the incriminating folds in the fabric of his past were pulled taut. He couldn't allow those years to hold power over him still.

Clasping his hands behind his back, he straightened it and stared pensively at the Mega-class Star Dreadnought suspended in one of the First Order's shipyards. The Outer Rim was a sufficiently obscure region in which to spawn a new fleet and repair their former flagship. Its backwater position, however, also made it more difficult to maintain a steady supply chain of both materials and laborers due to the frequent harassment by local monarchs or pirates.

Armitage didn't manage more than a grim snarl at the thought. Would this nuisance have been an unbearable aggravation, he found himself barely affected anymore by the repetitive skirmishes and consequent delays.

Being in charge of the repair of the Supremacy was, to his own surprise, of increasingly less concern to him too. The ship was a shell of what it had been; both wings clipped and its hull welded together from its broken parts. As seamless as it would end up looking, Armitage knew he would always see the scars underneath its new skin.

Maybe it reminds me too much of myself...

Armitage gnashed his teeth at the foolish thought. He wasn't ready to admit he could resurrect a dying ship to something seemingly whole and functioning, but that the same could perhaps not be said of him.

"Will it fly again?"

Lieutenant Mitaka had stepped up to him unnoticed, the naivety and simplicity of his wording not inciting the ire it would have done. His belated and hurried "S-sir?" did slightly annoy Armitage, but that stemmed more from his own, recent and tiresome tendency to be less vigilant and aware of his surroundings, including approaching officers.

"It might," he replied without much surety or interest when Captain Stynnix joined them.

Both noticed his waning zeal. The Lieutenant seemed relieved, if anything. The Captain, on the other hand, appeared nothing short of irked.

"It will," she amended sternly, "It should be our flagship again. That alone will send our enemies the right message: we cannot be broken. Besides, it is of your own design too, I believe, General?"

Armitage didn't bother retorting to the veiled admonishment, as insolent as it was.

"So was Starkiller Base," Mitaka proudly piped up, only to instantly realize his mistake. He blanched, nearly gagging in fright as he stuttered a string of unintelligible apologies.

Ignoring the man's discomfort, as well as the reference to perhaps the beginning of his own unraveling, Armitage asked instead, "Have all preparations been made?"

Mitaka broke off his effusion of regret, hastily consulting the datapad in his hands. "Y-yes, sir. We leave according to schedule and will arrive after approximately twenty-seven standard minutes, sir."

Armitage arched a meaningful brow, prompting the officer to sputter, "Exactly twenty-seven standard minutes, s-sir."

The fact that he was close to a dry grin perhaps unsettled him more than the coming mission and Armitage dismissed the man with a curt nod.

Captain Stynnix didn't move an inch but her displeasure practically radiated off of her stiff form. "I do not presume to lecture you, General, but you should have flailed him to within in an inch of his life for th—"

"That will be all, Captain," Armitage snapped, wincing with bruises that had long since faded.

There was a tense silence, then Stynnix inclined her head with a formal but resentful "Sir." and withdrew.

He still felt strong hands grabbing his wrists when first the shipyards and then hyperspace had been replaced with the fiery orb that was their destination. Irritated by his renascent inclination to pull his cuffs as low as they would go, Armitage resolved to keep his hands on his back all the way to the shuttle.

The rain that wasn't there was a subtle whisper in the background as that one Knight boarded last. Armitage wondered, not for the first time, if she was purposefully playing tricks on his mind. It wasn't unlikely that the Supreme Leader would deploy one of his puppets to attempt to unsettle him by means of the mystical powers that had given him undue status and protection.

They made planetfall before he could navigate his troubled musings to a satisfying conclusion. He scowled both at that and the arid torrent wafting inside the transport as the ramp opened to a world that, quite frankly, looked dead. Worse than dead.

Armitage had to exert considerable effort of will not to scoff as his boots sunk in a thick layer of ash that, as became evident when he lifted it for inspection, invaded the grooves of his sole.

He chanced a glance sideways as that one Knight stood still next to him, a mere step away from the ramp. She took in the barren landscape with what he assumed was a different abhorrence than his. Apparently, the sight had been disturbing enough to cause her to become lax in her consistent avoidance of him.

"Charming," Armitage remarked cynically, he hadn't been able to resist taking advantage of the rare occurrence.

She seemed to startle, clearly only now realizing who she was standing close to. She visibly hesitated between acknowledging that she had heard him or walking away. Strangely, she raised a hand to her mask either to give herself more thinking time or to check it was still firmly in place. Then her voice came scrambled and grating through the layer of blackened steel.

"At least it's dry."

That gave him pause. He hadn't fully internalized her reply until she had set off after the other Knights and the stormtroopers swarming behind them in neatly ordered rows.

She did make him hear the rain again, Armitage thought, something like curiosity mingling with the bitterness, and it hammered against the inside of his skull louder and louder...