The Last Knight

Ch. 2: Laundry

10/13/2022: Edited & Reposted

***

Your favorite thing about waking up in the half-built fortress of Starkiller Base was the cold. It reminded you of home. The hallways were breezy and the wind outside was unforgiving, but waking up in your quarters curled under the covers was one of your favorite parts of the day. Sometimes, in the quiet of the early morning, you'd imagine yourself back in your family's hut. If you thought hard enough, you could still hear your mother preparing breakfast over the fire.

The embers from last night's fire were dying in the small fireplace across the room as the alarm went off on your data pad. You know you didn't really need to have a fire going in your room- they weren't even actual fires. They gave off little to no heat and were purely used for decorative purposes. You could change the color and strength of the flame with a click of a button on your data pad. Either way though, the embers comforted you.

You groaned and rolled over to turn off the alarm before jumping out of bed. The floor was icy under your feet as you crept out of your room and into the dark common space that you shared with your companions.

"Shit!" You yelped out as you tripped over a pair of steel-toed boots and tried not to impale yourself on the large cleaver resting against the back of the huge leather sectional. You had to admit, there were positives and negatives about living with six men. At least you got your own room, isolated to one side of the living quarters, whereas they each had to share the three other bedrooms amongst themselves. And, you always had someone to reach the top shelf. The negatives were... well, you almost died trying to get to the refresher in the morning. And just about everything else.

You carefully moved the cleaver a few inches back into its original position, afraid that Ap'lek might suspect that it was touched. You'd never openly admit this to anyone, but you didn't like to try the Knights of Ren's patience too much- especially when it came to their precious weapons. No matter how friendly they acted toward you, after all these years, you didn't think they considered you a friend. You were a roommate and an acquaintance at best. At worst, a nuisance. The annoying little sister they never wanted and never asked for.

You padded over to the refresher and pressed a few buttons on the sleek keypad that was inlaid into the wall. A thin window slid open to reveal a small washer and dryer stacked on top of each other. You knew that you could always get one of the service droids to do your laundry, as most of the residents of Starkiller base did, but you preferred to do your own. You grew up scrubbing your clothing in a large tub that also doubled as a bath sometimes—it had been hard enough to learn to use these machines. Even at the Jedi temple, everyone had washed their clothing by hand. You had grown up hearing a few legends of spacecrafts and large, wonderous cities. Metropolises in the sky. However, it seemed to be the small nuances that surprised you the most. It had taken you several periods of trial and error to learn how to use most of the daily commodities of the First Order when you became a member. You had never once asked the other knights for help, afraid that they would merely just shake their heads in disappointment. That was the typical reaction you got from your master, anyways.

You opened the dryer to get your clean clothes, only to discover them in a pile on top of the machine, still soaked from the wash the night before. "What the hell?" You breathed, peering into the dryer. What greeted you was a lone pair of socks.

Clearly, your roommates didn't care at all about trying your patience.

You scrambled around your room for a while, trying to find something to wear to your morning training session. If you were late again, you would either be met with your master's seemingly endless looks of disappointment, or a training session that left you bloody and bruised. Or both. Probably both.