Stronger Together (Kylo Ren x Reader | Maia)

Comforting Touch

Kylo, Kuat Shipyards

Maia did not return to me at all during the journey to Kuat, which inexplicably made me feel restless, making the extended journey seem twice as long. She spoke to me like normal: as little as possible. I found I could not sleep, instead using the hours to plan the build of the dreadnaught. I only had the vaguest idea of what I could actually customize, but I let my imagination wander, finding solace in the act of designing.

When the hours kept coming but sleep never came, I began from scratch, creating a mega-class heavy cruiser that looked nothing like a Star Destroyer.

I tore my focus away from the screen when my comm beeped, feeling disoriented. Squinting, I saw it was almost 0530, and we were fifteen minutes from dropping out of hyperspace.

With a deep sigh, I uploaded the first drawing to a datachip and closed the rest out.

"Ren," I finally spoke into the comm as I stood for the refresher.

"Sir," Ushar's modulated voice came out. "I've prepared the command shuttle. We are ready to depart when you are."

"Good," I said simply, shutting it off and shedding my clothes.

The Kuat system was a massive, bustling hub of activity. The various planets and once-empty areas of space housed different sectors of the Kuat drives. The Finalizer would be docking in a largely secretive space station designed to connect up to eighteen heavy cruisers at a time.

However, I needed to meet with a design team on a planet nearby, as well as visit with one of our biggest supporters and funders, the heir of Kuat. It would be a busy week, to say the least, while I jumped around the entire system.

———

Kylo, the following day, a private suite

I spent over six hours yesterday with the design team and got absolutely nowhere. I understood more about just how much goes into building something as massive as a dreadnaught—but I was in luck, on that part. They began building one a year previously that was put on hold, only the frame and some of the layout currently complete.

We broke for the night with the understanding that we would each return the next morning—today—with a better idea of what we were going to build.

Unfortunately, I'm no closer on my part. I knew what I wanted in the ship, but I couldn't for the life of me decide what Maia would do. The possibilities were so endless, and Maia had many unique qualities to go off of.

She did not need a Siege Dreadnaught, like the Fulminatrix. No, she didn't require battle cannons to dominate space; she was too strategic. Positive she would think outside the box, I was leaning closer to the old Assertor-class Command Dreadnaught of the Imperial days, giving her almost total view of the battlefield. To my pleasure, the already completed frame was larger than the old Executor-class, which was good, because I planned on stocking the ship with more landing barges and walkers, and that required an extra hangar. She liked to join her troops in battle, so more ground vehicles were needed to protect the admiral. I wanted the nose extended and the additional hangar would also need to be built onto the frame—by the time we finished the designs, it would likely be the second-largest ship ever created.

But still, I did not know what Maia would want.

So, twenty minutes before I was supposed to be picked up from the suite provided to me, I finally picked up my datapad and found Maia's private connection.

If you built a ship, what weapons would you choose? Having a debate with Trudgen.

Her response was delayed, and I could imagine her frowning at the datapad. Though, it turns out she was getting a second opinion.