1/6/2

The Order, like the First Order, like the Empire, works on an Imperial Standard Day. Which is, pretty much, the Coruscant clock. A Coruscant day is 24 hours and three minutes. Since they're not on planet, they shaved the three minutes off the day.

It just makes everything easier to not have to deal with that.

(Why Coruscant didn't make their hours just a hair longer is a question currently lost to history. It does come up on referendums often, but keeps getting defeated because of… tradition, or something.)

Order recruits have four portions of their day. Eight hours of active duty (broken into two four hour shifts). These are hours spent doing whatever it is they do. Four hours of light duty. These are spent studying, in lessons, working off demerits, or on punishment duty. Four hours of free time, which can be used for whatever the recruit likes (Usually broken into two two hour segments). Eight hours of rest time. They don't do bed checks, but recruits are supposed to be located in their (or someone else's) cots during this time.

Robert Ygrine, having finished his second shift on pipe maintenance, moves onto his second free time shift.

He's glaring at the universe around him as he heads back to his bunk. Each of them has their own bunk, a one meter by one meter by two and a half meter rectangle carved into the wall with a soft mattress, a too small and too hard pillow, too rough sheets, and a fairly nice blanket. They're stacked on top of each other, two high. Six of them to a dorm room. Each dorm has it's own eating space, a cooler for keeping personal snacks, a refresher, and whatever assorted lounging furniture he and his bunk mates have managed to buy, borrow, or steal.

The bunks do have a small 'privacy' curtain, so his whole life isn't constantly on display. But it's not the same as having his own suite, containing a bedroom, office, entertaining space, and bathroom. (He really misses the bathroom. He works the pipes, so he knows there's water a plenty on the Supremacy but they don't waste any of it on showers for recruits like him. One of the perks of rank, you get your own rooms and an actual, water shower. Now he's stuck sharing a sonic with five other guys.)

It's especially not the same as home when he wants to do something like have a 'private' conversation with anyone from home. His father made sure he had an encrypted comm when he got here, but he's still got to talk into the damn thing, and… There's just… nowhere he gets to be alone.

Which means he's got to sound like some sort of stupid, excited, Ren fanatic whenever he calls home. He can gush all he wants about all the great stuff he's doing here, and if anyone overhears they just assume he's a half-wit who's really pleased to be here.

(The fact that he's only this enthusiastic when he's calling home makes his bunk mates think he's trying to pull something over on his parents. He doesn't mind that they think he's scamming his parents. As long as they don't think he's scamming them.)

He hopes, really hopes, that bringing yesterday's assignment home will make his parents decide that his sisters can do the job, and he can go back home.

It probably won't work.

Between his sisters and cousins, finding pretty girls who might want to drag Ren into their bed wasn't difficult. Hell, two of them volunteered. He knows his parents and aunts though a man was a long shot, but they wanted the angle covered, and he was the only one of the boys who was even close to being okay with that.

And then the bloody asshole showed up with a… No one's entirely sure. Woman. Whatever it is she is to Ren, she's obviously a woman. A woman he's obviously quite fond of. And his father and aunts' plan to honeytrap Ren have to be withering on the vine by now.

At the very least, their plans to use him to honeytrap Ren should be dead by now…

Maybe…

Between that and what he can bring them… With any luck they'll tell him that he can be on the next ship off the damn Supremacy and back to Ygrith Prime. Let his sisters rot here trying to catch that bastard's eye. He'll help run their election campaigns when they've got their citizenship.

Sometimes, there's more privacy in a crowd than in small quarters. He takes his comm with him to his favorite noodle shop on the D deck, gets a bowl of r'hathran broth and rice noodles, fried egg on top, and finds a somewhat less packed back bench to sit down on.

The only good thing about being here as an Ygrine is that he does still get allowance from home, so he can still afford things like a decent fucking bowl of noodles. (And, well, okay, they've got people here who make some fucking awesome noodles. He wasn't expecting that.)

The other trainees are squeezing by on a thousand credits a month, which… Well, he supposes if you eat in the canteens (free), spend your free time studying (free), or training (also free), that thousand will last a long time.

But he's got a taste for real food (much too expensive, at least compared to home), real entertainment (buggering shit, whoever's got the monopoly on that is bleeding them dry of credits), gambling (once upon a time, he was considered good at that, and now he's got the sinking suspicion that he won a lot because people wanted to get in good with Myrton Ygrine's son. But he's learning new tricks, fast.) and whores (actually, they're fairly reasonably priced. At least some decent company is easy to come across here.)

So, if he had to live off of it, his thousand credits a month would last him about five days.

But he doesn't.

For which he is grateful.

Just not as grateful as he would be if he could go home.

Which reminds him of why he's out here. He takes the comm out of his pocket flicks it on, punches in his father's number, and waits.

"Robert!"

"Hey, Dad," he forces his mock excited tone into his voice.

"And how's our newest member of the Order doing today?"

Fucking awesome. "Just great. I've got two extra free shifts today, because I was on round the clock yesterday. Got a really cool new assignment."

"Excellent, and what did they have you doing? More pipework?"

"More pipework. I never thought I'd be good at something like that," I never thought I'd have to do hard, annoying, physical labor with my own two hands. Rescue me, you bastard! "but at the end of the day, seeing something I built myself is pretty satisfying."

"I'd expect." His father's just oozing satisfaction at that. "There's nothing like knowing that you, personally, put something together that will outlast you, and benefit others for a long time to come."

Robert takes that to mean he's not going home anytime soon. He's also muttering under his breath, thumb over the microphone on the comm about how his father has never built anything in his life. Or, for that matter, ever did anything more taxing than count credits.

"So, just good pipesetting?" his father asks.

"No. Me and my team, because we're the best," or the ones who had a free shift "got picked to go and set up the water system for Ren's personal vacation spot."

"Oh… That's wonderful! I'm so proud of you!"

And that's exactly what his father says it is. He's very pleased to hear this.

"I know. It was a major honor. We were there for almost a whole day. Set the whole thing up. It's… not what I was expecting. It's not like we see him regularly, but… You kind of get a feel for him, but this… It's a little farm."

"Ren has a farm?" Myrton Ygrine can't keep the surprise out of his voice.

"He and his lady. He was there to see what we were doing, check in I guess. Make sure we did it right, and we did him proud. His lady was there, too. It looks like there's an overseer, someone who lives there full time with his wife, and a few hands. I think he breeds faviers."

"Good grassland then?"

"Lots of grass, gentle hills, orchards. Domes. Apparently the man likes domes. There was a lake, or at least the smell of a lake, I didn't see one, but you know…"

They have lakes at home, beautiful ones, and they just… shift the air around them. He misses them. Misses grass and sunlight and real air, and…

"Anyway, Captain HR-0098 came up to us, and I was nervous because… Well, you know, it's usually not a good thing when the Captain shows up to get you to do something, but this… We were on a transport for two hours and seventeen minutes, hyperspeed. I'll never get used to that, stars streaming by us, and then we were landing on the grass, and… There it was, a little farm that needed a water treatment system."

"That's excellent. Did you see him personally?"

"Yes. When we wrapped up, he came to thank us for the work we did, and told us he appreciated the effort. The Cap blushed like a school girl. I'm not sure if an officer, let alone anyone even close to as high ranked as he is, has ever thanked her or told her he appreciated what her team had done before."

"Would you say your team enjoyed the job?"

Robert thinks about it. "Actually, yes. It's precision work, but still, nice to get out for a while. And when you work a double, or in our case a triple, because we were out, though eight of the hours were rest time, you get extra off time, and the time we were in transport counts as work time, but there's nothing to do but sleep or relax, so that was good. Him saying thank you on top of it… Yes, I think they liked that, a lot."

"I see. Have you talked to your Aunt Andromeda recently?"

"Aunty Dra? No, not recently."

"Pity, she was on board for the year-end extravaganza."

"Ah… And how did she like that?"

"She said it was a blast. A very nice young man, an officer by the name of Jon Frakes, made an impression on her. Apparently, he's a friend of Master Ren and Mistress Rey, and enjoys a good party."

Robert knows what that means. He's not leaving here anytime soon, and his parents have indeed decided his honeytrapping skills are no longer necessary, for Ren. But, like everyone else, he's also noticed the young Lt. Colonel who is often near Ren, so…

Better than the Grand Marshall or the Grand Admiral, both of whom appear to be only slightly older than Snoke.

"I've seen him around from time to time. He's not generally in my circles, though. He's in design and diplomacy."

"Ah… Well… I suppose that's a specialty you could aim towards."

If his test results were anything to go by, the answer to that is a resounding no, but he doesn't see any reason to inform his father, if he doesn't already know, that not only did he not test into any officer track skills, but that the skills they did think he'd be useful for should only put him in the path of Frakes, or any other highly ranked officer, if his personal shower were to explode.

And, honestly, on the ship, someone with a higher security clearance would likely get picked for that.

Granted, he did get picked for Ren's retreat, so… There's something.

"Did you see what sort of ship the Master piloted to get to his home?"

Robert thinks. And for a second there's this sense of cold on his back, and goggles digging into his eyes, but… "No. I know he's got a command ship and his TIE Silencer, though. He came in after we were bedded down for the night, and left after we did, too."

"Of course. I'm sure he works all the hours of the cycle."

"I think so, too."

"Thanks for calling in, Rob. I know your down time is precious, so I won't keep you."

"Thanks, Dad. Give Mom a kiss for me."

"You know it."

And then the comm goes dead. And Robert Ygrine goes back to his noodles, and his dreams of getting off the Supremacy.

Myrton Ygrine closes off the comm call, and ponders for a moment.

Ren has a 'vacation home.'

That's… intriguing.

Add in what Andromeda was able to glean from the First Year party, that apparently Ren's lady has a… monastery… maybe…

It's possible that Robert may have stumbled into one of the most valuable, and currently unknown pieces of information in the galaxy.

The location of the Maji.

Maybe.

Or perhaps Ren does just have a little out of the way spot for when he wants some time with his lady, alone. He certainly wouldn't be the first powerful man to decide that he wanted a place outside of the prying eyes of the rest of the world.

Rather foolish to let outsiders do work on it, and know it's his, though.

Granted, when it comes to personal security, Ren does seem to border on rather foolish, frequently.

Myrton notes the date. Working back to when his son would have had to have left the Supremacy. He also notes the transit time.

And then sighs. Robert didn't tell him when in the day they left, and depending on how fast the Supremacy was traveling, that could make a lot of difference.

His son, whom he loves, because he is his son, is… well… something of a professional dilettante, and… honestly a stint in the Order might not actually be the worst thing that's ever happened to the boy. (Though he can certainly feel Robert thinks it is.) But, from what Myrton can tell, and from what the girls are telling him, Rob is never going to move above drone level work, not on his own talents.

And, again, worse things could happen to him. Making him spend five years actually doing something could possibly help him appreciate his position here more when he gets home.

Cynteenia, his second child, on the other hand, tested into the Navigational program. It's possible, that when he speaks to her next, he might be able to get across the idea that he'd really appreciate knowing where the Supremacy was on when Rob left, what speed it was moving, and at what heading. From there, they can chart a few hours at hyperspeed, and narrow down the collection of potential planets for Ren's private house.

Long, slow, boring, and likely expensive work.

But, good information always is.

Also slow, and likely expensive, but not boring is figuring out what to do with that information once they have it. If it's Ren's private home, it will fetch a very pretty price, in favors if not gold. If it's his Lady's monastery… That's the hottest question in the galaxy right now.

If he could get eyes on her, and what she's doing…

Who is Lady Rey? Where does she come from? What is a Maji? What does she do? Getting those answers and then leveraging them…

That is well worth the time and money to find out.