AN: Oh heck, so this chapter ran kind of long, but I felt like a bunch of stuff needed to happen. Also, stay tuned for an announcement next week. I'm planning on doing a thing that I think y'all will like.
.***.***.***.***.
General Hux was fuming as he made the short journey from his office to the bridge. Shortly after he had left, he encountered Phasma in the hall. A short command with no explanation left her walking even with Mitaka, who scampered along in the general's wake, wondering if there was any way he could have told Hux about Poe's escape that wouldn't have caused such an infuriated reaction.
Upon arriving, the general was greeted by a scrambling crew without a commander, and a rogue TIE zipping in and out of sight beyond the view port.
"Stations, report!" he angrily commanded as he crossed the room.
"Sir! Prisoner Poe Dameron escaped his cell, and has commandeered TIE fighter number 382. Unidentified stormtrooper is aiding his escape." Someone called from the controller's pit.
While the general stepped towards the window, Mitaka was quick to slip into his old console. Since they were between shifts, the weapons officer hadn't arrived yet. Mitaka had only had the position for a short while before being assigned as General Hux's aid, but he found the station just as he remembered it.
He didn't have long to skim the readouts before the general came to peer over his shoulder, "Sir, they've taken out our turbolasers."
"Use the ventral cannons." Hux commanded.
"Yes, sir. Bringing them online."
Before the general had the chance to make a harsh comment about the Finalizer's slow response, he was cut off by a new voice.
"General Hux!" Kylo Ren called as he stormed onto the bridge, helmet twisting towards the wild TIE dashing in and out of view, "Is it the Resistance pilot?"
If you bothered to learn any of the goings on of your own ship you would know the answer to that. Hux thought harshly.
"Yes, and he had help. From one of our own." he answered instead, venom from the comment he would have like to make seeping into his words. Hux was left with another remark as he spared a glance at one of the many data readouts that crowded the bridge, "We're checking the registers now to identify which stormtrooper it was."
The force user peered out the window. Despite the man's expressionless mask, an unease settled over the bridge.
"…the one from the village. FN-2187." He muttered, words made almost unintelligible by the static of his mask.
Hux hated how warped and distorted the bridge felt when the other commander brought his strange intuition into play. He hated it even more when he looked to a readout to find that the man had been right in his impossible guess.
"Sir." Mitaka's voice cut through his preoccupied thoughts, "Ventral cannons hot."
"Fire." He gave the command dispassionately.
This was nothing more than a sideshow, a distraction, and a waste of time. And he wanted nothing more than to be done with it.
Beyond the bridge, the rogue TIE swooped and spun and dove in and out of the line of fire. The file had been correct in calling Poe an excellent pilot, but Hux knew that even he would fall to the full onslaught of a Star Destroyer.
In the brief moment Hux had his attention turned to the one sided battle, a second technician had pulled up the stormtrooper's record.
Phasma saw the readout first. She had hoped that Kylo Ren had been wrong when he named the traitor. To her dismay he wasn't, and she was left to look at the same face she had seen in the hanger bay after returning from Jakku.
General Hux wasn't long behind her in seeing the read out. The outcome of the battle was obvious to him, and he saw no reason to watch it all the way through. Especially not when there had been some traitor in his ranks. Without Lori there to ferret them out, he had been increasingly paranoid that another Resistance cell had slipped onto his ship. This only added to his suspicion.
Sure that the general would have a harsh comment, Phasma was the first to speak, "FN-2187 reported to my division, was evaluated, and sent to reconditioning."
"No prior signs of non-conformity?" he asked incredulously.
"This was his first offense," she confirmed.
General Hux had a harsh rebuttal in his tongue, but was interrupted by a technicians update.
"General! They've been hit."
"Destroyed?"
The TIE had turned in a wide circle, back towards Jakku. Just a moment after it did, the Finalizer's cannons clipped the fighter. The liquid oxygen feed went up in a quick ball of flame that was quickly extinguished by the hungry void of space. Left with an uneven thruster, the little ship could do nothing besides careen headlong towards the dusty planet below.
"Disabled," she replied, skimming the report as it came in, "They were headed back to Jakku, the fighter's projected to crash in the Goazon badlands."
The news rankled at Hux.
"They were going back for the droid," he realized aloud, before adding, "Send a squad to the wreckage."
A wave of "Yes, Sir," rippled around the bridge as officers began sending orders around the ship.
Hux turned back to Ren to give him a harsh comment, but found that the other commander had disappeared while he had been hard at work.
Typical!
"Sir…" Mitaka's meek voice came from the generals left.
"What?" he harshly bit out.
"S-Supreme Leader Snoke has requested an audience." He fought not to flinch before adding, "Kylo Ren just left for it."
Hux stifled a heavy breath, "Very well. The Finalizer is to maintain normal operations until I return."
"Understood, sir." Mitaka acknowledged the command, just before Hux stormed off of the bridge, Captain Phasma following in his wake.
.***.***.***.***.
The air had stopped flowing from the vents an hour ago.
Lori shivered in the pilot's seat, aware of the deadly change only because she had nothing to focus on besides the near silent hum of the air conditioner.
Wrapping her hand around her stomach to cradle Ardis more tightly, Lori turned her gaze toward the only light piecing the gloom of the ship.
The emergency beacon was still on. If she remembered correctly, it still had a few hours of battery life left to it.
Huddled against the cold, Lori thought of the compartment around her. Even missing half her rations, she doubted that she'd succumb to starvation. She should even have enough water for a day or two. The room had to hold at least a days' worth of fresh air.
She shivered again. It was the cold that would come for them.
Knowing where death would come from first, she shifted in her chair. She had brought her arms into the body of the jacket, then tried to shift the lower layers around so that Ardis rested directly against her skin.
The infant was still warm, having been swaddled in her blanket and kept under the coat from the very start. She kicked and wriggled slightly at the commotion.
Though she was left to feel rather than see her daughter, Lori found some comfort in her activity. "Looks like you've already got some fight in you."
In response, Ardis batted her little arms. The flicker of movement brought a smile to Lori's lips, only for them to strain and crack. The small pain brought several fears with it.
How thick was the Toleras hull? How much thermal shielding had they lost while fleeing Bastion? The tiles were just as good at keeping fiery heat from seeping into the ship as they were at keeping warmth from seeping out, did the Tolera have enough sheeting to keep them safe for another hour? Another day?
Lori couldn't feel her fingers. If there had been any light to see by, she would have found a thick sheet of ice over the water bucket. For now, she shook and tried to keep Ardis warm.
Still refusing to give in, Lori looked out of the cockpit viewport. The bare expanse stretched on, endless in its emptiness and its apathy.
Hoping against hope, Lori blinked.
She thought something moved.
Unable to stop shaking from the cold, she peered again into the abyss.
Movement. Unmistakable this time. Occasional dots blinked in an out of view, being blocked by some ship in the distance.
Desperate, Lori jolted from her seat. Her control panel was just as dead and dark as it had been for the past day when the distant ship drifted closer.
Still too far away to see the pilots features, Lori caught sight of a fully lit cockpit. Hoping desperately that they could see her she heldArdis in her arms, but still under her jacket. Lori's shivering double in intensity. The cold was near unbearable, and she lost the little blanket of warmth she had gathered from sitting so still.
"…C'mon." She muttered as the unidentified ship drifted closer.
It came to float just above the Tolera, the end of the other ship hanging at the edge of the view from her cockpit window.
A distant clink echoed through the cold halls of Lori's ship, then a faded whirring of machinery just barely drifted through the heavy cockpit door.
Lori turned to the door, brushing against the control panel as she went. She didn't know who her guest might be. Pirates or scavengers, she was more than ready to talk either into being her saviors. She had plenty of angles to work with. Scared, wounded, and alone with a child, she wouldn't have to fake the fear and desperation.
Of course, those same thins made her an easy target as well.
There came a heavy hiss of decompressing air from the cargo hold. It was soon followed by a muttered swear and heavy footsteps.
A heavy creak came from the door as someone manually slid it to the side. Lori hadn't the chance to say a word before a bright light crossed the room and left her seeing stars.
She groaned at the sudden stinging. The man forcing the door open stopped, fumbled around for something at his hip and swore in surprise at finding the lone inhabitant of the doomed ship.
With her eyes closed and arms trapped under a layer of clothing, Lori knew very well how vulnerable she was. She couldn't open her eyes, the oppressive light of a glowstick burning despite having her eyelids clamped shut.
A beat of confusion passed before a distantly familiar voice called from the other end of the bright light.
"Lori?"
.***.***.***.***.
The cavernous meeting room echoed with Supreme Leader Snoke's every word. General Hux had entered shortly after Kylo Ren, yet he had stumbled into a tense moment between the master and aprentice.
"It was no mistake that the Resistance pilot had help from one of our own." The supreme leader's voice bounced from the walls and beat down on the general and the knight both.
Hux had only just arrived, but he was quick to attempt to gain the supreme leader's favor, "A mistake that will not be repeated, Supreme Leader."
The ghostly hologram turned its piercing gaze to the general, in part contemptuous of his late arrival, in part grateful that he could move on with his reason for summoning them.
"For your sake, general, you had better be correct," The massive projection shifted to peer down at both commanders equally, "There has been a disturbance in the force."
"What?!" Kylo Ren hissed.
Hux gave the masked man a sharp glance just before Snoke's voice shook the room once more.
"Silence!" His projection lurched forward before settling back down, "There has been a disturbance of unknown origin. It is imperative that I have the map, but… If there comes a moment that the Resistance might claim the map before the First Order, see it destroyed. They cannot know its contents."
General Hux knew better than to smile. He wasn't even sure he still could, with dread and despair for Lori and Ardis haunting him. But, he was sorely tempted to. Any excuse to turn that map into space dust was a boon, and one less obstacle between him and the search for his family.
Kylo Ren, however, was nearly frothing at the mouth beneath his mask, "Supreme Leader! That map is our only lead to Luke Skywalker. Without it, he might bring a whole new group of jedi to-"
"I will not be debated, Kylo Ren. Your uncle is but a small menace." Snoke cut him off.
Hux had never been one to rely on intuition, but even he could feel the tension in the air. He almost took joy in seeing Ren's shoulders stiffen at the mention of a familial relationship, but he had more important matters to attend to.
"Understood, Supreme Leader." The general almost stood at attention when he spoke, a rare show of respect that he only ever used to speak to Snoke.
"Good. You're dismissed." The hologram gazed down directly at Kylo Ren, "Both of you."
And with that, the projection was gone in a blink.
.***.***.***.***.
Slowly adjusting to the first light she'd experienced in over a day, Lori creaked open one of her eyes.
The beam had moved to the side, though she still couldn't see the features of the man. He put what she assumed to be a blaster back on his hip. He stood taller than her, and had broad shoulders. With a grunt, he began pushing at the door once more.
In the time it took for him to finish the job, Lori had come that much closer to succumbing to the cold. Her eyes had also adjusted, finding a familiar face in the process.
Lex. One of the mercenaries that had taken shelter in her apartment.
"What are you doing out here?" He asked as he stepped into the cockpit.
She hadn't much energy left to spare on small talk, "Freezing to death."
A trace of annoyance crossed his features while he walked through the gloom and across the room. Just as he was about to say something about it, there came a sudden bout of movement from under Lori's jacket. With it came a muffled cry.
Eyes widening, Lex asked, "Is that-?"
"We'll talk later" she interrupted, "We've been sitting in the cold dark for hours."
Understanding, Lex stepped to the side. Lori teetered passed him and into the hall. What little moisture had been in the remaining air had dropped and turned into a layer of frost. It crunched softly as they walked over it.
A bright shaft of light cut through the cargo hold. The personnel hatch was open and connected to Lex's ship. A ladder had been dropped hallway into the room, Lori wasn't sure if she was in shape to climb it.
"I'll hold onto the kid while you climb up." He offered, not sure that she could manage even with both arms free.
"She goes up first."
Lex had seen nothing on Bastion that made him trust, or even particularly like, Lori but he did respect the determination on her words. "Alright," He held out his arms.
Lori didn't like the idea of handing her daughter over to the rebel, but she didn't have much of a choice. Shuffling to free Ardis and herself from the jacket, Lori was hit by the full force of the cold. Trying her best not to shake like a leaf, she gently handed Ardis and her blanket to Lex.
The infant didn't cry out as the man carrying her quickly made up the ladder. As soon as there was room, Lori tried following Lex. The cold metal of the ladder stung against her frigid hands.
Half way up, Lori lost the rest of the feeling in her hands. Body shaking from the punishing cold, she teetered back, only to be caught by Lex. He was laying in his own ship, arms reaching down to try and pull Lori up the rest of the way.
With the extra help, she made it. Instantly collapsing onto the floor, she found a brightly lit storage compartment around her. Within the room stood a second person.
"Lori?!"
From her place on the ground, she looked up. Above her stood Brixie, arms filled with a bundle of blankets and face painted by surprise and confusion.
While the medic stepped forward, Lex pulled the ladder up and kicked the hatch closed. Lori was slow to come to her feet, only for Brixie to carefully guide her towards a stack of crates. They groaned slightly as Lori sat on them, rough rope creaking and grating against her bare palms as she steadied herself.
Brixie lay Ardis down next to Lori, then quickly readjusted her blanket to support her head.
"Go get a bucket of warm water, and a bunch of bottles." she told Lex, "And get plenty of blankets!" She had to shout the last bit after him as he left the cargo hold.
Hoping that he got the message, Brixie turned back to Lori, "Can you hear me? Hey."
The medic watched Lori, noting the unmistakable signs of hypothermia. Dulled by the cold, Lori was slow to reply.
"I hear you," Lori began, speaking though bone shaking shivers, "I hear you."
"Great, I'm going to need you to lay down. Can you do that?"
Her body might be slowed and sore, but Lori's mind was still perfectly intact, "Give me a minute."
With that, Lori leaned over. Brixie did her best to guide her patient to the side. The going was slow, and by the time Lori was down so that her head lay next to Ardis, Lex had returned.
"Fill the bottles, then wipe them dry." Brixie instructed
"On it," he acknowledged before setting about the task.
While he was at work, Brixie turned back to place a blanket over Lori. It didn't do much at first, her body below still barely producing any heat. Brixie then turned back to collect the first bottle of warm water that Lex had filled. One after the other, she laid them against Lori's sides. Once fully surrounded by warmth, Lori got another layer of cloth. The process didn't take long, and not a second after she was done with Lori did Brixie begin making a self-warming bed for Ardis.
"How long were you out there for?" The medic asked.
"Days." Lori answered back, though her gaze was locked on the bundle of blankets that held her daughter.
Brixie accepted one more bottle of warm water from Lex, "Here, take a drink. Getting something warm on the inside will help too."
With Brixie helping to prop her head up, Lori took a long drink of the hot liquid. For a moment it felt like her stomach was thawing out as well. While her neck was craned, Lori tried to catch a glimpse of Ardis.
Brixie saw the effort and tried to reassure Lori, "She's ok. A bit on the cool side, but I don't see any signs of frostbite.
"You sure?"
Looking back to Lori, Brixie nodded, "I'm sure."
No sooner had the words left Brixie's lips, when a third person spoke from the hall.
"We're either of y'all ever going to come and get me or-" Dak stepped into the room. It only took a second for him to take in the scene, "Lori?! What in the hell are you doing out here?"
"Good to see you too," she said, despite seeing nothing beyond the ceiling and Brixie in her periphery.
"Wait, it was you who was flying around in that heap? You got to stop flying around in the cheapest junkers you can find. They'll be your death one of these days."
"Hasn't killed me yet." She croaked out.
Coming to stand at her side, Dak took in the sight of his old friend. Her face was the only exposed part of her, and that was a bright red. Even though the rest of her was under layers of cloth, she shook enough to make the whole pile tremble.
"Looks like this one got real close," he observed before glancing to the side, "and it could have gotten both of y'all. Isn't that right, Little Lori?"
Lori clenched and released her hands in effort to get her blood flowing, "She's got a name, Dak."
"Whatever it is, I'm still calling her Little Lori." He replied.
While they talked, Lex left the cargo hold for the cockpit.
Nervous and keen on keeping her patient talking and awake, Brixie sat next to Lori, "What's her name?"
Looking to the medic, Lori replied, "It's Ardis."
"That's a beautiful name," Brixie said as she peered into the makeshift bed, "She's got your eyes."
The observation wasn't wrong. Lori knew that Ardis still had the puffy round features of a newborn, but she liked to think that Ardis would grow to look like Armitage.
Especially if he's-
She stopped herself from finishing the thought, but still spoke off the same worries, "I think she'll take after her father."
Thinking back to their chats on Bastion, a sad flicker crossed Brixie's features, "Well, he must have been very handsome, because she's beautiful."
Lori blinked away a stinging in her eyes and tried to cough a lump from her throat. She had lied about Armitage being dead before, and now that she wasn't sure what was true and what wasn't she couldn't bring herself to talk about Armitage in the past tense.
"She sure is," Lori settle on saying before trying to change to topic, "Now, as glad as I am to see y'all, what are y'all doing out here?"
Brixie faced Lori once again, "Looking for you, actually. I sent an update, but didn't hear back from you. And then we heard about the Alignments attack…"
"And the First Order's." Dak tacked on.
A shock of surprise shook Lori along with the shivers, "Wait. A second invasion?" she worked to put her features and racing thoughts back under control, "I made a run for it after the Alignment started bombing. When did the First Order get involved?"
A little flicker of hope warmed Lori, though she was careful not to show it. Armitage had never been a graceful loser, and launching a full scale invasion in response to being attacked was definitely something he would do. She even let herself imagine that he might organize a secret rescue effort.
Through the little hope, a fear nagged at her. Armitage might be a sore loser, but he would never propose a violent invasion of the planet where she was living. Maybe the First Order's attack was retaliation for a slain general.
"The First Order showed up half a day ago," Dak answered, "I figured you'd be fine if it was just the Alignment, but those folk… they might be true evil. I don't know what stakes they've got out here, but stars help whichever side they're gunning for."
Before Lori responded, Brixie interjected, "No. The Fels, the Alignment, and the First Order all need to go. They're monsters, through and through."
"Just like the Empire?" Lori fished for a clearer explanation.
Hearing the edge on Brixie's words told Lori that now wasn't the time to try and twist the medic around to her point of view. But, she did see a chance to learn what made the medic tick.
"Worse," the medic answered back, "At least the Empire pretended not to be evil. I guess the Fels do too, but the First Order… You were right to run." she took an unsteady look at Ardis, "They kidnap children. And they torture people to death. They caught one of our pilots, he's strapped to one of their tables and they're putting videos out. I… I can't watch them."
Releasing footage of a torture session was news to Lori, but she was no stranger to the fact that they happened.
With the news of the First Orders involvement, Lori almost wished she had stayed on Bastion. There was no doubt in Lori's mind that Armitage would find them if she had just stayed in place.
Assuming he's not-
"Damn." She muttered at her thoughts and Brixie's words.
"Damn is right," Dak agreed, "Before I came down here I was trolling the holonet. Apparently that general of theirs has gone off and invaded Jakku too." He looked over to the medic, "Batuu was just a taste. They've been threatening war for years now, and I think it's finally started."
Lori's breath caught, and she felt her blood rush with adrenaline. Her body shook from shivers and nerves alike, and for a moment her lingering chill was all but forgotten.
"Which general?" She asked, talking over Brixie in the process.
There was something rough on Lori's words. The medic assumed that Lori asked her question out of anger, or fear from an encounter she had only nearly escaped. So outlandish was the real reason behind Lori's tone, that neither of the mercenaries even suspected it.
"General Hux." Brixie answered before disdainfully adding on, "Born to an imperial family, he's a fanatic. Last time I checked, he was head of their research and development."
Dak jumped on to the end of her comment, "Yeah, along with their army intelligence, their propaganda, their stormtroopers, and everything else."
While hearing someone use Armitage's list of accomplishments as a list of insults grated at Lori, she was far more focused on the growing possibility of him being alive, "How reliable is that source, Dak?"
"Hasn't steered us wrong before." He replied.
Lori almost didn't let herself believe that Armitage was alive. The news seemed too good to be true and she feared that if she were to latch onto it, she might be crushed completely if it proved untrue.
"Up to date too?" she pushed.
Dak thought he recognized a dark current to Lori's question, and even he began to wonder what personal vendetta his old friend might hold for General Hux, "Damn near to the minute."
She held on to her hopes a little more firmly. She could figure out what had dragged Armitage all the way to Jakku later. The tentative news of his being alive warmed her almost as much as the heated blankets. Looking to the side, her gaze settled on the bundle of cloth that held Ardis.
"Good."
He was alive. They were alive. And she was going to bring them all back together.