Jakku · Moly

Suns and nebulae, mysteries and conundrums, all were laid out before the viewer. It was a view intended to awe and inspire, hence the presence of the portal where visual pickups and monitors would have sufficed just as well.
Kylo Ren regarded it in silence. He had been trained in contemplation, was skilled in deliberation, could remain meditating just so for hours at a time.
But he was losing patience.
Approaching from behind, all Lieutenant Mitaka could see was a tall, caped figure silhouetted against the spray of stars. He did not look forward to having to make the report. It was his responsibility and he had no choice. Nor was it the firs time he had been compelled to deliver bad news to a superior officer. But Kylo Ren was different. Not precisely a superior officer but something else. At that moment, Mitaka would rather have been anywhere else in the civilized galaxy than alone in a room with Kylo Ren.
The caped figure did not turn. He did not have to. Mitaka knew Ren was as aware of his arrival as if he had watched him approach. He was tracking the lieutenant with something other than eyes.
“Something to report, Lieutenant? Or have you come, like myself, to marvel at the view?”
“Sir?”
A gloved hand rose to take in the sweep of light and energy arrayed before them. “Look at it, Lieutenant. So much beauty among so much turmoil. In a way, we are but an infinitely smaller reflection of the same conflict. It is the task of the First Order to remove the disorder from our own existence, so that civilization may be returned to the stability that promotes progress. A stability that existed under the Empire, was reduced to anarchy by the Rebellion, was inherited in turn by the so-called Republic, and will be restored by us. Future historians will look upon this as the time when a strong hand brought the rule of law back to civilization.”
Mitaka forbore mentioning that the Republics had developed their own codes of law. To do so would have been…indelicate, and he doubted that Ren was in the mood for a political discussion of any kind. Standing at attention, he presented his brief report.
“Sir. Despite our best efforts, we were unable to acquire the Beebee-Ate droid on Jakku.”
Now Ren did turn. Mitaka would have preferred it the other way. He always found it unsettling to have to gaze at the metal mask beneath the cowl.
“It was destroyed? Do not tell me, Lieutenant, that the droid was destroyed.”
Mitaka swallowed hard. “No, sir. At least, not as far as we are able to determine. Reports from the ground indicate—”
He was interrupted. “No aerial survey results?”
“Two TIE fighters accompanied the recovery party. Contact has been lost with both and it is assumed…it is assumed they encountered unforeseen difficulties.”
Ren sneered softly. “You equivocate like a senator. Go on.”
“Reports from our troopers on the ground indicate that the droid escaped capture by taking flight aboard a stolen Corellian freighter, a YT model. An older craft but in the hands of a competent pilot, a capable one.”
A typically, a touch of uncertainty colored Ren’s response. “The droid stole a freighter?”
“Not exactly, sir. Again, according to these preliminary reports, it had help.” Mitaka was starting to sweat. “We have no confirmation, but brief glimpses by our troopers correlated with the location of an earlier crash site lead us to believe that trooper FN-2187 may have been—”
He broke off as Ren reached for the lightsaber at his belt, activated the weapon, and raised the intense red band high. Expecting a swift judgment, Mitaka closed his eyes. After a moment, finding his head still attached to his neck, he dared to open them once more. Ren was slashing at the console nearby, at the walls, at the deck, rending and ripping, slashing long lines of bleeding metal into the very fabric of the ship. His rage was terrible to behold. Mitaka strove to remain perfectly still, to control his breathing, to become as invisible as possible lest he become nothing more than an inadvertent recipient of Ren’s fury. Whether by chance or design, Ren spared him.
Shutting off the lightsaber, the taller man turned to the wretched bearer of bad news. He spoke calmly, as if his mad, destructive rampage had been nothing more than a brief interlude: an illusion.
“Anything else?”
At least the worst of the report had been delivered, Mitaka knew. And he was still alive. He allowed himself to relax ever so slightly.
“The two were accompanied and likely abetted in their flight by a third party, presumably local. A girl.”
Reaching out, a black-gloved hand clutched the startled lieutenant and pulled him violently forward. That metallic visage was now close, closer than Mitaka had ever been to it. As the officer struggled to breathe in that remorseless grasp, Kylo Ren’s voice took on a timbre lower and more menacing than any the lieutenant had ever heard.
“What—girl?”