Chapter Text
Your sleeping quarters were cramped and without any personal belongings. It was various shades of grey and black- you hated it there. You only spent as much time there as needed, for the times you needed to actually sleep in a bed and not somewhere discreet among the different inner workings of the large Star Destroyer you worked on. No one ever noticed anyway. As an overall technician; you didn’t have just one workplace. You went from place to place all over the ship and the only repeated constant you had with persons weren’t actually…. Persons. Droid- it was droids. The mechanical beings had become your best friends. They actually paid attention to you! And when they did it wasn’t to insult or push away your tools away from your spot against the wall of the long corridors that guided stormtroopers and officers through the large spacecraft.
So you laid in your single-person bed for the first time in a… long while. You were alone. The last person left just as you had arrived. You didn’t recognise them but that wasn’t strange from the constant rotating shifts, you rarely saw the same person twice.
You sighed as you laid on the not quite comfortable, not quite uncomfortable bed. It reminded you a little all too much about the story of Goldilocks and The Three Wookies your mother had told you as a kid. Maybe your next meal break would be not quite warm, not quite cold. Either way, you didn’t get to be in bed for even five minutes before the datapad in your toolbox screeched out and lighted the room red. You almost punched yourself in the face in your hurry to grab the datapad to see what the emergency could possibly be about. For it had to be about an emergency! Your datapad had never done that before!
You tapped it furiously- riddled with anxiety, unable to get the blaring red ! to go away. A tight ball knotted in your stomach and you jumped into your regulated work pants, and bunny hopped out of your quarters to go find your friend Meek who would definitely know what the kriff to do about your situation.
You hurried- as the best of your abilities allowed as you had casually walked whenever you passed any officers of meaning- to the droid maintenance centre in the sector of the ship where you usually were deployed. It was empty of ‘organics’ and the other droids paid you no mind as your presence was as common as their own. You found Meek inside his designated charging station- resting, as he was prone to do. You knocked hurriedly on the mouse droid's exterior with frantic whispers of ‘ help, help, help ’. You didn’t have long. Sure! You were on your break with several hours left but this ! could mean anything! It could be a sign that your off-hours were cut short and that you had to return to duty- you didn’t know! Couldn’t know! You really didn’t know to… do anything on this datapad! You worked best with droids! Not this doohickey!
The droid whined as you continually knocked- much to the dismay of it and the other droids around it. It whined, telling you to stop and that it was awake ‘gosh darn it ’.
“Please, please, please, look at this,” you whispered and placed the datapad in front of the small droid with no hands or opposable thumbs.
Meek simply beeped to double tab and- huh, you hadn’t actually done that yet. Your finger shook and felt oddly greasy as you tapped the sleek screen so firmly held in your grasp- lo and behold, it was a call back to duty. … Shit.
You jumped to the feet- scaring both Meek and the nearby droids in the process. You were in big trouble. How long had it been since the ! first, popped up on your screen? Ten minutes? Fifteen? The First Order were very peculiar about staff upholding schedules and deadlines and whatnot- and having been demanded to return and not doing so immediately? You were truly in the shitter.
“I gotta go, Meek- thanks!”
And off you went, almost tripping over your own feet in your rush to get going to the bridge where you had inexplicably been called to. That especially was unusual. The bridge? A mechanic of your status? You tended mostly to droids and electrical wiring connected to stuff like… lamps. And especially on such a ship as the Steadfast, where rules certainly were upheld with the firmest of grips, was it strange for a ‘lowly’ technician to be called. Allegiant General Pryde ruled the crew with an upright back and stern grip- not much unlike how General Hux had done before he, for some reason that was never quite clarified, seemed to be cast aside. They only used the very best! Which you wouldn’t deign to call yourself but, hey, you weren’t without your talents. And you were quiet, almost invisible.
You reached the bridge and were quietly pointed to an opened control panel in the wall near the entrance by a sour-looking officer. You mouthed your apologies and quickly got to work. It looked simple enough. Nothing to warrant an emergency other than the fact that it was on the main bridge so maybe the officers felt a little on edge today, maybe. There had been talk about spies and rebels onboard but it hadn’t been something you had paid much attention to. You had much else to deal with.
Your ears perked at the sound of a slight shuffling and whiff of a scent slightly… familiar to you. You looked slightly over your shoulder, hands still fiddling with wires to make yourself look busy, and spied a dash of red hair among all the dark greys that filled the bridge. It was General Hux and at that, you felt your heart jump.
You liked General Hux- somehow. He didn’t make himself out to be quite an empathic person or someone that would be any easy to talk to. Frankly; he made an imposing figure. And yet; something about him just spoke to you. Not literally. Not ‘ come hither ’ or ‘wrap your arms around me as if our lives depend upon it, darling ’. It wasn’t quite that- but you had thought about it a lot. You had a lot of time for thinking about things such as that. You worked around wires, screens, and droids mostly. Not a chatty bunch. And you were a technician- a simple mechanic. Not an officer or anything sophisticated like that. Even the stormtroopers treated you like crap! Kicking around your stuff like it was nothing! And heavy stuff too! Those boots must be made of the hardest of materials.
So, yeah, your head was filled with intermixed thoughts of fantasizing (all innocent!) about that certain red-head or cursing the lives of the stormtroopers treating you and yours as dirt whenever they passed you on patrols- calling you things like ‘ dirty ’. Like…. Sure, yeah, you were covered with grease and oil stains but it was not easy to fix all the shit that constantly broke around here without getting a bit mucky. But it was the General that mostly orbited your brain. The times his pale wrist was exposed as he reached for something. The times he talked passionately and his accent grew heavier. It made your heart grow heavy and fond. Oh, the things that never would be.
But at least he served as a good distraction as you fixed this menial task. You let your eyes glaze over him as he stood with his back turned to you- talking with Allegiant General Pryde about something deeply serious, surely. Your eyes travelled further- pausing at your favourite part of the General before ultimately seeing something that stilled your breath and heart. A bandage was wrapped tightly around his leg, just above the knee. And something you hadn’t noticed before; a crutch was tightly wrapped in the General’s gloved grip.
But no more could you react or think about any of what you saw before a red light of a blaster shot filled the room and General Hux was flung to the back of the room- so close to you that you could smell the smoke that came from the singed part of his jacket where the blast had gone through. The entire room was quiet as Pryde continued talking. Your legs shook as you stared in shock at the still body of General Hux. Slowly sounds of work returned to the room but you felt yourself unable to move from the sight that was the General. Dead. He was dead. You felt such grief for a man you didn’t know. Wouldn’t know. Your eyes stung as the image of him wavered and became blurry. You bit hard on the inside of your cheek to make it stop. Not here . The sound of the hard marching of a stormtrooper pulled you tentatively out of your thoughts and soon the white presence stopped near you.
“You! Technician, get the body to the morgue,” the trooper demanded with a pointed turn of the head towards the General. You nodded, ignoring the fact that was nowhere near your line of duty and willed your legs to work as you crept towards the… body. How chilling that was to even think. Just a few minutes ago ‘the body’ was a living, breathing being but was now reduced to… nothing.
First, you tried to pull him by the padded shoulders of the uniform. That went nowhere. You had never had to move a dead body before- or a living one for that matter. How were you to know what to do? Your grip was awkward and constantly slipping, but you felt that you might be nearing the right course of action. You moved your hands beneath his shoulders, out from behind his back as you had managed to heave him slightly upward, and snaked your arms around so you had a strong grip over his armpits- and so you pulled, and so you got him moving. But the strangest thing was; you could swear you were feeling a slight pulse under where your fingers rested. A sort of rhythmic beat of life… hope that such a flame as he had not been so carelessly snuffed out. But midst that dawn of hope at the prospect of his survival, you realised; they couldn’t know. If Pryde were to find out his so unregulated execution had failed- he would surely try again, and this time not fail.
Regardless; he was going to the morgue. You had an… acquaintance there. He would probably call you a friend and, in reality, you should too. In truth, it was just strange to see someone… organic as a friend. You had roamed about only droids for far too long clearly. Either way, he would be able to help. If the pulse had been a trick of the mind, the ridiculous notion of hope, then he would do this… morgue business on the General. And if not… well, you didn’t know what then. What could you do about a general convicted of treason on a Star Destroyer filled to the brim with officers, stormtroopers and, not to mention, Pryde?
It was tedious business getting to the lower levers of the Star Destroyer. It was easy enough once you got to the elevators but before that, you had to drag a full-grown man through several corridors, past stormtroopers and officers who really didn’t care about whatever was going on, then listen to the panic beeping of Meek once he heard from the other mouse droids of what you were going through- all while continuously feeling a faint pulse under shaking hands as you tried not to have a full-on panic attack yourself.
You needed to take a deep breath (the anxiety grew heavier over your heart) but there was no time and you needed the air to yell with a strained voice to your friend when you finally scrambled through the blast doors that lead to the morgue. “Heelp,” you managed to get out with a strained voice as you fell backwards unto your rump as your knees finally gave out. You gave up and let go of the General to fall all the way unto the cold floor. “I’m in a shit situation, Maddox,” you whisper breathlessly as your friend’s face appeared far above yours. He narrowed his eyes at you and your very red face; “so much is apparent.”
He stepped over your body to peer down at the General with a studying look.
“Interesting… he’s not yet dead but here he is… in my morgue.”
You sat up in a head-spinning rush- “truly? I thought he might not be but how can you tell?”
Hands behind his back, Maddox looked at you with a raised brow; “he’s breathing.”
“Oh.”
That was certainly something you had failed to notice. You crawled to the General’s side, not yet feeling like standing up, and saw that… yes, he was in fact breathing. His chest lifted ever so gently and when you really listened; you could hear sharp intakes of breath that surely must have hurt. Meek beeped at your side, sounding unusually sorrowful.
“Yes, he won’t be for long if he doesn’t get immediate treatment,” Maddox nodded to Meek, agreeing to the droid’s similar statement. “He won’t be able to get it here. For that to happen, I need a medical droid and I’ll have to explain why to the medical officers, and if I tried to do it in hiding- the droid would be programmed to report it to them anyway.”
With your hand gently on the General’s wrist, holding on dearly to the faint pulse, you looked up to your friend with furrowing brows. “You would help him?”
“Certainly,” he nodded with the faintest of smiles, “for you and your stupid standard years-long crush.”
You had been that obvious, huh. You didn’t even see Maddox so much nowadays after you both get sectioned off to different ends of the starship. But you were filled with only increasing panic- the panic from before was nothing compared to now. Now you knew for certain General Hux was alive but which only meant that he was in incredible danger. You couldn’t let them kill him! But you had no means to help him- nor did your sole friend. You felt a coming onslaught of tears as you asked your friend; “what now then? I can’t just… give him up to them.”
“You… won’t have to.”
Maddox had a revelation, you could tell. His dark brown eyes grew a sudden bright amber as he hurried to the backend of the small morgue, the thick heels of his boots echoing throughout the quiet room. “Now we have to be in a hurry- he doesn’t have long,” he fiddled around with something that you couldn’t see, “or, well, he won’t have long without our help.”
Maddox turned sharply; a large box now securely in his arms. He rushed towards you and kneeled at the opposite of the General that you were on. Placing the box next to himself- Maddox opened it to reveal several items of Bacta-related objects. You decided not to question why a mortician had such items and quietly watched as your friend opened the General’s jacket and shirt, and lifted up a white undershirt with a large red circle of blood, to reveal the almost killing blow. You hissed in phantom pain as he sprayed the bacta spray hurriedly unto the wound before slapping several bacta patches on top for good measure. You felt sweat roll down your back as you watched Maddox work with wide eyes.
“Will this work?” Your heart beating almost deafened your own words to you.
“For a while- you need to get him to a real doctor before he truly will be in the clear.”
You couldn’t ask him how to do exactly that before he answered you; “I have a heavily modified escape pod just outside the blast doors that will lead you to Resistance space- now don’t ask me how,” which you had just been about to do, “I just do. And count your lucky stars for it.”
“Take Meek with you,” the droid beeped in acknowledgement, “it’s no secret what he is to you and they will use that against us… And he’ll be a great aid to you. There’s more to mouse droids that meet the eyes- as you well know.”
Maddox rose to his feet and kicked aside the box of medical supplies; “now let's get this loth-cat up and away, yeah?”
You carefully rose to your feet; hesitant of letting go of the hem of the General’s jacket after having smoothed it back down after Maddox's medical treatment. “What about you? Won’t you be in danger for helping?”
“Only if they find out I helped,” he said with a nervous laugh. “But don’t worry about that… Best not to think about it.” He mentioned with a hand for you to pick up the General’s left shoulder while he took care of the other. “It’s not far,” Maddox reassured you as the two of you began dragging the General out of the morgue.
The escape pod was cramped- clearly only meant for one person. But you managed to get both yourself inside and the General, with Meek as far away from him as possible in the pod. Too many bad experiences getting kicked by the heavy black boots that were regulated among officers. You said your goodbyes to Maddox- struggling to get words out as you felt your chest tighten at the thought of this possibly being the last time you would see your friend.
The pod rattled as it left the confinement of the Star Destroyer and you held your breath until you were way out of its laser reach. Your knuckles had gotten white and sore from how tight you held onto the seat that you were fastened to and you found yourself staring at the General and not the wide open space that you had found yourself shot out into. It’s fine. It’s fine, you had to remind yourself. You wouldn’t be deserted here and your fate wasn’t to crash down into Exegol, the most hostile-looking planet if you had ever seen one, surrounded by starships of all sizes from all factions. The escape pod had a destination- you had a destination.
The escape pod was gearing up to do something. You could feel it in its walls; a slight shaking, different from the one that came naturally from space travel. Meek could feel it- whining as he was, excited or nervous about something. You could hardly tell with the little guy- it was always one or the other. But Meek must have been louder than you thought for suddenly you found yourself at the bad end of a blaster.
The General.
He had unfastened the buckle holding him down on his seat and now stood on shaking legs. He was clearly in pain, trying to hide it with a stern, hard look but his blaster's hand slightly shook while the other was placed on the wound on his chest.
“Who are you,” he didn’t ask. He demanded.
You blinked up at him; still seated as you were. Meek had gone to hide behind your legs with a low whine. You didn’t know what to say- finding your mind fumbling with various rambling thoughts now that the General was alive and… so close to you. You only ever saw him from a distance and, well, he was even prettier now, though his eyes were cold and calculating. But who could blame him- it was a strange situation.
“I-” you were about to explain yourself when the escape pod suddenly lurched forward, shooting itself into hyperspace. Meek whirled around the floor as the General danced around trying to balance himself. You could only pray he wouldn’t fall on you as you were tightly shoved down into your seat by the force of the hyperjump. The pod rocked to a still and the General fell to the fall, barely missing landing on Meek who yelped at the close encounter. You hurried to get free, fumbling with the buckle and hurried to your knees to check on the General.
“It’s alright, it’s alright,” you made quick to tell him as you placed a careful hand on his shoulder, though it had felt more of a reminder to yourself. He quickly shook off your hand, hissing in pain in the process as the shot he had received earlier was far from having healed. He stared you down and stared down any further action to help him, as he forced himself to raise himself to a seating position on the floor. “I was shot,” he stated; his cold eyes trapping you in place.
You took a deep breath, feeling your cheeks grow warmer; “yes.”
“Why am I not dead?”
“My friend and I helped you.”
He glanced at the droid mouse that peaked out from where it was hiding behind you and raised a brow. “Not him- my friend who’s still on the Steadfast .”
His eyes met yours yet again; “then he’s dead.”
“I hope not!”
“I’m a traitor,” he said the word with such venom, “they tried to kill me, and they will kill anyone who helped my escape.” He ripped off his gloves and carefully folded them in his lap. He smoothed out his hair back then; it had gotten ruffled and wild from all he had gone through the last hour and a half. He bit down into his lip before pressing out the words; “ thank you. ”
He sighed; “that is if you’re not Resistance out to have me killed.”
“I’m not,” you shrugged, “but we are in Resistance space.”
He turned his head quickly to the viewport with wide eyes; there it was. A large green planet orbiting two moons, one of which the escape pod was heading directly towards. You didn’t recognize any of it; galaxies and the planets belonging to them never having been one of your interests. But the General seemed to do so as he took a deep breath and glanced back at you.
“You’re not Resistance?”
“No,” you shook your head and looked down at the uniform you were wearing. First Order regulated Technician uniform; dirtied with oils and dust, but still good. “I’m just a mechanic wanting to help the General out.”
“I’m no longer your general,” he shrugged off his jacket with thinly veiled anger. Clearly, the statement hurt him, though it rang true. You couldn’t return to the First Order- and he certainly couldn’t. “Call me… Armitage,” the name felt weird on his tongue. It had gotten unfamiliar to him, strange, but it was music to your ears. Your heartbeat grew so much you could feel it in your throat, in your veins.
“Armitage,” you repeated; tested it out, wanting it to be heard over and over again as the escape pod neared the jungle moon.