The trooper tugged the rifle out of his hands. The one with the pauldron collected Hux's pistol. They were separated then, with Hux led away by a pair of troopers and the other two taking Poe along a different corridor. He hadn't been given binders and they weren't acting like he was a prisoner. The two troopers were relaxed. One of them asked, "So how was it down there?"

"Muggy," Poe answered, trying to fake a little bit of an imperial accent. "I wouldn't recommend it as a shore leave destination."

They both laughed. Just outside the hangar, they turned through doors labeled 'Decontamination'. One of the troopers pointed at the first of several small circles on the floor. "Stand there for scanning." Poe did. A faint light played over him. He could see the same screen the trooper was looking at, where his biometrics were displayed. "Do you have parasites or any urgent medical needs?"

"No," Poe answered.

The trooper pressed a button and indicated the showers to the right of the scanning area. They had transparent doors and no privacy. "Clothes go in the bin. When you're done cleaning, stand on the circle to the right for irradiation and drying. No reason to hurry. We'll need to requisition some clothes."

Poe followed directions. He was far from a prude and he was used to communal facilities in the military, but he was starting to clue in to where Hux's lack of body consciousness came from. No one watched him. He took his time cleaning off the stench of brackish lake water, smoke, mud, blood, and whatever other unlovely scents he'd accumulated planetside. By the time he was done, new clothes had been put on a shelf inside the door, including boots.

He was glad he'd left his necklace on, because they took away his dirty clothes, blaster included. But his old boots were left sitting on a desk next to the door he'd come in through. There was only one stormtrooper waiting, standing next to them. The man gestured at the boots. "What're these?"

"Boots?"

"They're not regulation. Where'd you get them?"

"Ah, hm. Long story, but uh … from a dead Rebel."

The trooper's helmet tilted.

Poe elaborated. "When the alerts sounded, the lights went off and I grabbed them out of my locker in the dark. I forgot I'd left my regular boots next to the bed." He hoped stormtroopers had lockers to keep personal possessions in. Did they even have personal possessions?

The trooper shook his head. "Is it true what they say about the Finalizer crew being bone collectors?"

"Uh … I … You mean human bones?"

"Yeah."

"Not that I'm certain of," Poe said slowly, not sure what the right answer was. Truthfully, he'd never heard of First Order personnel taking trophies. Robbing people, confiscating stuff? Sure.

"You never know about other ships. Anyway, keeping some dead guy's boots is morbid and illegal. You're not allowed to have them." With that, he picked them up and tossed them in a hazardous waste disposal bin.

"Yeah, well, they fit a little better than these." Poe pointed at the ones he'd been given.

"What's wrong with those?"

"Too narrow. Pinch a bit."

The trooper shrugged. "Complain to someone who cares."

Poe nodded and kept his mouth shut.

"Come on. Next we go to labor resources."

He was led toward the center of the ship, still on the same lower level. They went through a door that revealed a large room, most of which was blocked off by a desk not far from the door. Other desks were further back with various techs referencing screens. There was a crudely-taped X on the floor in front of the front desk. "Stand there," said the trooper. The person behind the desk was in an officer's uniform. From the rank markings, Poe was pretty sure she was a lieutenant.

The trooper told the lieutenant. "This is 2-AL-8922- …" He turned to Poe. "What was your creche number?"

"Oh, it's been a long time, I don't remember," Poe said, guessing that the two letter, four number sequence wasn't the entire serial number for a stormtrooper. For one thing, he had apparently gained a two at the start of it.

The trooper made a rude noise. "You forgot?" he said in a mix of disgust and bewilderment. The lieutenant just laughed.

"Everyone just called me Al," Poe said.

"Just like the other ten thousands AL's?"

"I was the Al-est of them," Poe said with confidence, deciding to own the lie and having no idea why there might be ten thousand people whose designations started with AL.

The lieutenant punched numbers in her system, bringing up a holoimage of an ID card over the desk. Next to the picture of a man who wasn't Poe was an ID number: 2-AL-8922-29. Poe was lucky in the random way of things that the man's appearance basically matched – skin tone wasn't far off, no scars or identifying marks, the picture showed a dark stubble of head hair and dark eyes. But it still wasn't him. He wondered if the others Hux had tried to use for his identity had been better matches.

She looked at the picture, looked again, and then looked at Poe. She looked at his hair. There was no way that was regulation. This was going to be tougher than the boots. Poe felt himself start to sweat.

"How long were you on that planet?" she asked in disbelief.

"A few days. Felt like forever." That wasn't going to fly and he knew it. He needed a story, fast. "I know what you're looking at. My hair has always grown crazy fast. They skipped me last cycle on the hair cut because of an equipment malfunction and … uh, I thought it didn't matter under my helmet and then there was the alarm …" He played up his fear instead of trying to hide it.

"This guy's a weirdo," put in the trooper. "I'm thinking he needs a medical evaluation."

"Definitely," the lieutenant said, turning back to her screen and tapping in numbers. "And a grooming session." She gave Poe a narrow-eyed look, "What was your duty station again?"

Poe pulled himself a bit more to attention. "Finalizer bridge security, sir! I was on sleep cycle when the order to abandon ship came through."

She frowned. "Okay, but you don't look anything like your picture."

Poe didn't know what to say to that. The trooper with him said, "General Hux vouched for him."

"He did?" she asked.

"He did," the trooper confirmed. "Or at least, I guess he did."

Poe nodded. "It's an old picture."

"You'd have to be part shape-shifter for that to be your picture," she said.

Poe chewed his lips. He'd heard enough about the First Order's speciesist attitudes not to suggest that might be true. "You could contact the general. He's here."

"I'm not going to contact the general," she snapped irritably, like his suggestion was offensive.

The trooper sighed. "So what do you want me to do with him? Put him in lock-up until someone makes a decision about him?"

"That wouldn't help." She snorted. "I'm the one who has to make a decision about him!"

"We can just," Poe offered, "get a new picture, right?"

She was silent, drumming one finger on the table while glaring at him. Poe tried to look innocent. The trooper finally said, "What's more likely, that he's not who General Hux says he is, or that someone filed the wrong picture for him?"

She grimaced and stopped drumming. "Fine. I'm going to schedule you for medical eval, grooming, basic equipment requisition, and then leave it up to Lt. Ree to make a duty assignment."

"That's it?" Poe blurted before he could stop himself. This place was insanely easy to infiltrate. His respect for the caper Finn and Rose had pulled off on the Supremacy plummeted.

"Yes, that's it, unless you want to pull some punishment detail for being an idiot?"

"No! No sir."

She huffed. "You'll be integrated on a temporary basis until central org overrides it and transfers you to a different ship, which they probably will given all the evacuees."

"How many were there? How many survived?"

She shrugged. "I don't know. Thousands. Most of them were picked up by the Animosity." He didn't recognize the name, but it followed in the antagonistic theme of older imperial ship designations. Most of the newer ships had more benign names. She added, "You're the first that's been picked up by this ship. They thought the Animosity got all of you."

A short tube emerged from a machine to her right. She pulled it out and stuck it in a port in front of her. A new ID card flashed up to take the place of the old one. It featured Poe's current picture, hair and all, his holo apparently having been taken just seconds earlier. He was glad he'd shaved that morning, even if the tools had been barely up to the task. She waved at the picture. "Make sure to tell Lt. Ree you'll need to come back by tomorrow to have this revised with your duty assignment and a new picture – an accurate picture, with your hair per regulations."

"Got it." Poe stared at a non-fake First Order ID with his face on it. He tried to shake off the weird feeling. "So the … Rebels. They just cleared out?"

"Rumor has it they were all destroyed during the attack, but you know how rumor is." She ejected the code cylinder and handed it to Poe. "Our ship's current assignment is to map the hyperspace anomaly and conduct an investigation on the wreck. I'm sure the captain will make an announcement when and if he thinks we need to know the details."

"I didn't actually catch this ship's name," Poe said.

"The Outrider."

"Got it." He followed the trooper who escorted him to medbay, where he reported the events of the previous few days mostly truthfully. To his relief, they didn't decide to check his DNA or other biometrics against their databases. They treated his whiplash and the inflamed, damaged tendons in his neck and shoulder. Once that was done, he was cleared for unrestricted duty.

His hair was cut by a droid which performed the dirty deed in seconds. He rubbed uncertainly at the velvety feel of his scalp, having been left with a half centimeter of hair. It was the shortest he'd ever had it. He wasn't a fan. His next stop was the quartermaster, where he was given basic issue equipment for security. In addition to the standard white armor and helmet, it included a fully-charged blaster rifle, binders, a comm link, and the sort of stuff he'd have killed to have when they'd first crashed. His code cylinder fit in a little bracket at the front right of his utility belt.

After that, they hit the commissary, where he was given what to him was dinner but they called it lunch. It was better than anything they'd eaten on the planet, but that was about all he could say about it. He wolfed it down.

Then he was taken to a barracks – a long room with a hundred or so beds, all but two of which were unoccupied. "Here," the stormtrooper who had been leading him around pointed at a bunk. "This one's unassigned. Just hang out here. Lt. Ree will be along eventually, probably at shift end in a few hours. If you don't see the lieutenant, just rack out and catch her on the morning shift. She'll give you an assignment then."

Poe took a seat on the bunk. "Okay. So I just get some shut-eye now?"

"Yep. Welcome back to the grind!" he said cheerfully, heading out the door and leaving Poe to his own devices.

For a crazy moment, Poe thought about what would happen if he just laid down, took a nap, and followed orders for the rest of his life. He could be a stormtrooper – just a cog in the machine, never looking past himself. It would be easy. Mind-numbing, but easy – never having to think, never having to figure things out.

That was only a moment. He had to do something while he waited until his escort had cleared out. Then Poe was up and moving, heading to the brig. He had a mission.

Finding the brig was easy enough. No one challenged him as he wandered the corridors, safely camouflaged in stormtrooper armor. He knew that was an illusion, as the heads-up display in his helmet flashed little callouts next to everyone he passed, helpfully providing their designations (and if he stared at the designation, it would expand to include rank and duty assignment). But he had a designation so no one needed to look at him twice.

Once he was at the brig, though. Well. He walked in. The place had a central monitoring desk with two short wings of cells. The ship itself wasn't very large. Just as it had one hangar, it had one brig, and not very many cells. Thus, few places where they might have taken Hux. Poe announced, "Lord Ren wants the prisoner." It had worked for Finn, after all.

The man and woman on duty looked at one another, then at him. The man was in armor. The woman was in a lieutenant's uniform. "What?" she said.

"The Supreme Leader, Lord Ren, wants General Armitage Hux to be brought to his flagship immediately. I just landed." Poe spoke like he expected cooperation.

She looked at her screens with misgiving. "I don't have a transfer request."

"The documentation should be on its way. Lord Ren does not like to be kept waiting."

She sighed. "The captain hasn't signed off on this. He hasn't even signed off yet on the general being here." She looked back at one of the rows of cells. Poe could just see the edge of Hux's forehead at the front of one of the cells. He'd come to the front. Poe wondered if he could recognize his voice even through the vocoder.

Apparently so, because Hux said, "He's never been one for proper protocol. There might not be documentation. No one wants their name on this." After a pause, he asked, "Do you?" The woman frowned in concern.

Poe gave her another verbal nudge. "I was told to minimize turnaround time."

"You don't have a duty assignment," the man in armor said, having been peering at Poe a little too long for Poe's comfort.

"This is my duty assignment. Lord Ren sent our group back from the Animosity when General Hux didn't arrive with the other evacuees. You do have him, right?"

At that, finally, the woman stood. "Come see for yourself." She led him over to the cell. Hux gave him a displeased look. He was in a fresh uniform, although the rank markings weren't included. Poe supposed they had more sets of spare stormtrooper armor than they did of unused general's outfits. He was also cleaned up, though he'd managed to get through the process retaining the full length of his hair. Rank hath privileges.

"That's him," Poe said, and took the liberty of opening the cell. No one stopped him. "The shuttle is waiting, sir."

Hux sighed and walked out.

"I don't know how to log this," the woman said.

"Probably best you don't," Hux told her as he went down the steps out of the cell block unopposed. "Your captain will be able to give you the proper direction. But even then, he won't know how to have it recorded until I've seen the supreme leader and had my case adjudicated by him."

"Yes sir," she said, acquiescing. And with that, Hux walked out the brig with Poe immediately behind him. Hux's hands weren't even bound, although he was missing his weapon belt.

As they went down the hall, Poe came up even with him and said, "You guys have a crazy huge hole in your security."

"Not my problem anymore," Hux said. "You should have left me in there and escaped on your own. You didn't need to come for me. This just added a layer of danger for you. If they hadn't accepted your story, you would have been in a cell next to me."

"I trust my feelings here. And my feelings say you don't abandon someone who threw away their career for you. You could have ratted me out, blamed it all on me somehow, said it was a Resistance plot and I'd infiltrated your ship and sabotaged it or whatever. You didn't."

"Hm." Hux cocked his head thoughtfully. "I don't think they would have bought it."

Poe snorted. "I think the likelihood of you trying to sell it is zilch. So we're getting out of here. There's the hangar." He gestured ahead of himself with the barrel of the blaster. "What do you think? One of those shuttles?"

"Don't use your blaster that way."

"What?"

"Don't point it- never mind." Hux surveyed the hangar, then said, "No, not one of the shuttles. That craft in the corner. It's a reconnaissance vessel. It will have a stealth package."

"Fantastic," Poe said, and the two of them headed to the slender ship Poe had previously mistakenly pegged as a civilian craft. "I've never seen one of these before."

"Because it has a stealth package," Hux repeated.

Poe chuckled. "Yeah, probably." There was no one working on it and all lines were disconnected. (Poe checked this time. No more mistakes like during the escape with Finn.) They went up the ramp without incident. Poe warmed up the engines, glad the craft was off by itself so as to minimize the chance of anyone noticing them.

They were just about ready to go when the comm blinked to life. "Recon ship Valkyrie, this is Lt-Cmdr. Frakes. What is your assignment? You are not cleared for take-off."

"Let me handle this," Hux said as Poe drifted the ship out of the hangar anyway. For now, he was keeping to normal speeds. There were two keys to their escape, both of which boiled down to time – he needed to fly along a straight vector long enough for the navicomputer to calculate their hyperspace jump, and he needed to not get snagged by a tractor beam in the meantime.

Hux spoke with a flatter, less imperial accent than normal for him. "Sir, we've finished making the modifications to the nose maneuvering jets that Chief Engineer Dodd sent over. We're just going to take it out for a quick test flight. We'll be right back."

"What? Who is Chief Engineer Dodd?"

"He's on the Absolution, sir."

"What? Why-? You are not cleared for flight!"

"It's not an actual flight, sir. We didn't want to do the performance test in the hangar. This is safer." The man on the other end of the comm started to say something, but Hux spoke over him in a calm drawl, "We've been working with Dodd on a project to optimize performance. You should check with him. He told us to do this and all the calculations show-"

"Turn that ship around right now or I'll make you turn it around! What's your designation?"

"Prime D-646." Hux muted the comm and looked to Poe. "How much longer?" In the background, the officer was sputtering something about 'primes always think they know more than the rest of us!'

"Seconds," Poe told him. Lights blinked green on his console. The little spy ship was faster than most in picking a course. "There!" Poe pulled the lever, not waiting to see how the conversation turned out. Streaks of light streamed past the cockpit, replaced by peaceful swirls of space beyond space. For a long moment, they both stared at out it. "We made it," Poe said.