The fight against the resistance fighters had been going on for a few days. In the beginning the First Order had been carpet bombing the bland, dessert surface of the planet, eliminating large groups of the rebellious natives and collapsing tunnel entrances. The large net of caves and ravines beneath the stone dessert served as a great hideout, providing not only many ways to trap attacking enemies but also many places to hide.
Normally the First Order did not employ many medics. Stormtroopers, and even the mountain troopers which made up a great part of the army on Eks, were mostly expendable and anyone that got hit was anyway a failure. Right now it was different though, given there were many non combat units, including officers, engineers and various experts of different jobs present.
It was a race against time and either of the specialised teams had to be brought inside the planet to do their respective jobs. Your job was to make sure they survived, if they or their personal guard got wounded.
It was not easy but you loved it, no, you lived for it. Being on the battlefield, the blaster shots flying over your head, patching up wounds, cauterizing them and stopping the bleeding put you in some sort of meditative state.
It was similar to when you first learned how to shoot a gun, or to be precise a sniper rifle. The wait for the perfect moment and patching up people on the battlefield was very similar in that regard. The only things that existed for you then was either the target or the wound. Nothing else.
It was what you wanted out of working for the First Order, exactly how you envisioned it. Not many of your fellow graduates chose to work for them, percentage wise, not numbers wise. For you it had always been a dream, joining them, working for them and with them. You could not exactly tell why? Perhaps the black and white uniforms made you feel safe, given they had liberated your planet from raiders and ensured its protection, perhaps it was simply the power that came with being part of such a great, uniformed organisation. It did not matter why you had joined them, the only thing that mattered to you now was making sure you made them as glad you were part of their organisation as you were glad to be part of it.
Even though you were theoretically not a proper stormtrooper, given you had joined afterwards and had only received minimal combat training, you still wore their armour. It was mostly the same, apart from the blue shoulder pad and the writing on your back saying: "Medic", written in big black letters. You noticed the usually bright orange medical bag, which was now dusty and an unhealthy pale brown colour. Same for the rest of your armour, a thin layer of brown dust stuck to it, clumping together and hiding the blood underneath. It bothered you. Not because it was dirt per se, you did not mind the blood smeared over part of your uniform any more than the dust, but because it was a sign of how easy it was to contaminate wounds in this environment.
You scoffed slightly and barely managed to pull one of the unsuspecting officers with you behind some cover. Less than a millisecond later there was blaster fire where the man had just stood. You waited and shot back into the direction it was coming from, not really trying to hit anything, just wanting to ensure that you had long enough to pass the gap to catch up with the rest of the group.
Just in time as well, both of you were grabbed by stormtroopers and shoved behind some more cover while they eliminated whomever had been shooting at you.
"Follow us.", one of them said and the officer, two engineers and you continued your way through the tunnels.
It did not take you long until you had reached a bigger cave, it was secured by a bunch of mountain and stormtroopers and the team you entered with immediately went to work. You were not exactly sure what exactly they were doing, you knew that the rebels were hiding something valuable somewhere. Kyber crystals? You had heard something about that earlier, but you had also heard something about them wanting to train some force sensitives here. You weren't exactly sure, and it was not your place to ask either.
You admired the huge structures built inside the cave. A loud crack could be heard and part of the ceiling opened slowly. One of the engineers close to you cheered quietly. You got out of the way for the incoming ships.
The door opened and out stepped two figures you expected to see the least on such a barren planet. Both General Hux and Supreme leader Kylo Ren stepped out. You had not seen either of them this close before, General Hux was one thing. His eyes were ice cold, scanning the room for the next highest ranking officer, who appeared almost immediately. His pale skin and ginger hair made him seem even colder. While you were intimidated it was nothing compared to Kylo Ren standing next to him. His presence seemed to fill out the room completely, as if someone had just placed a weight on you.
You stared at them for a short while longer before forcing yourself to snap out of whatever trance you were in. With a few quick steps you made your way over to one of the stormtrooper officers.
"Do we have any injured patients, Sir?", you asked and he pointed to a corner of the room.
"Over there. We do have additional medical supplies if you need them?"
"I think I will, thank you, Sir.", you said and made your way over.
You did not have to determine which of the people needed your help the most, as it was pretty evident by one of the stormtroopers pressing a bandage onto the leg of a small woman. You cauterized, disinfected and closed the wound quickly. The woman was pale and had seemingly lost alot of blood. You had barely started administering her some fluids via IV as you heard a stern voice behind you.
"How serious is it? Can she still work?", you turned around only to see the general standing behind you. His pale orange hair almost resembled your dirty orange medpack, but you quickly shoved that out of your mind.
You looked at her again and slowly stood up, "That depends on her, Sir. She has lost alot of blood and I can give her something against the pain but it might cloud her-"
"I can", she said weakly.
"Good. Get her to the control panel over there, we need her."
You just nodded and lifted her up, she was small and you were relatively tall for a woman, tall enough that most did not even know you were in fact one. You carried her over to her position, the general following you, and gave her some painkillers.
General Hux watching you carefully made you uncomfortable, you did your best to hide it. It had always been a talent of yours, hiding that is. You just imagined yourself fading into nothing and people around you seemed to notice you less. You prefered it that way, it was easier to work when no one was bothering you.
The woman got to work and you did as well, leaving the general with a nod. As you got back two more medics had arrived and together you started treating the rest of the patients.
Quarter to half an hour later a stormtrooper tapped your shoulder.
"MD-2442?"
"Yes, Sir.", you said, quickly standing up.
"Your help is requested. Follow me."
You made your way across the hall reaching an exit, currently still locked by metal doors. General Hux, the woman and a few stormtroopers stood in front of it. The woman being held up by one of the soldiers.
"Can you stabilize her enough?", General Hux asked in the same stern and cold voice from before.
You just nodded.
"Great, you have 5 min, then we have to be ready to go inside."
You immediately got to work and splinted her leg, gave her some mild painkillers and a blood bag, which you quickly taped to her. It was not the best solution but for now it would work.
The same strong presence you had felt earlier got heavier and closer. You did not even have to look up to know that Kylo Ren was coming. You stood up, told two Stormtroopers what the best way was to hold the woman and stood a bit behind, watching the tall man and leader of the First Order just stand a mere three meters in front of you. His presence was so prevalent that all you wanted to do was hide, you felt like his whole being just took up so much room that there was barely any left for you to breathe.
The woman fell forward and you quickly caught her from hitting the floor. The weight that had been on you was completely lifted and you were once again in that concentrating, meditative state where nothing apart from you and the patient existed. You lifted her back up and checked her vitals. She was weak, no doubt about that, but she was present and she was not going to give up easily.
"Lift her back up.", you said, anger rising up in your voice, "Listen. I told you how to hold her, and to watch out. Did something hit your heads or something? Do I have to carry her myself? Or do you think you are capable of doing that?", you hissed.
The Stormtroopers looked at each other and then apologized.
"Yes, Sir.", one said. You did not even care to bother to correct them. It had happened alot, with your height and the helmet distorting your voice slightly it was no wonder they took you for a man. Not that you cared. If anything they did show you more respect.
The woman smiled weakly, enough to get you to relax a bit. The moment you did however you could feel the same presence again, this time only stronger. You turned around and saw that both General Hux and Kylo Ren were staring at you.
Without saying anything you took a step back again, standing a bit more behind and awaiting further instructions. Trying, once again, to make yourself as small and insignificant as possible.
General Hux looked at the team and then nodded towards one of the engineers. The metal door opened and the stormtroopers entered the tunnel. Kylo got in the middle, after him the woman, you and the rest of the engineers. Your backs guarded by a few more stormtroopers.
You made your way through the tunnels, swiftly eliminating everyone who stood in your way until you finally reached another control room. The non combat unit got to work while the rest waited. A few things beeped, something must have happened, even though you were not exactly sure what and then chaos broke loose.
A round of blaster fired killed the noncombat unit more or less instantly and you quickly hid behind a crate, using your own blaster to eliminate the attacking rebels. Kylo Ren shouted loudly, dismembering multiple rebels who were foolish enough to stand in his way and signaled the rest of you to make your way through a different tunnel. You quickly sprinted towards it. Kylo after you and after him the rest of the remaining stormtroopers.
The tunnels all looked the same, the same metal, a virtual labyrinth for anyone not familiar with them. You could not even tell if you were running in circles because every tunnel looked like any other.
After a while of running, hiding and shooting at rebels, they finally seemed to stop attacking you. Kylo Ren stopped and looked at the rest of the troop. You entered with roughly two dozen stormtroopers plus the engineers. Now you were reduced to less than half.
Kylo Ren talked to General Hux using his helmet, atleast you suspected it had to be General Hux. Your ears were ringing too much from the blasters as that you could make out every word. Apparently they had gotten what they were coming for and the only thing left to do now as leave. Kylo nodded and signaled the rest of you to follow him.
You made your way through the tunnels again, you were unsure of how Kylo found his way through, given they all looked the same to you...but he did. It was odd being so close to him. You would have never thought that you would once be fighting side by side with the Supreme Leader of the First Order himself. His whole demeanor and attire was impressive. He towered over every other stormtrooper, his broad shoulders only making him seem even taller than he already was. His reflexes were far quicker than what you had seen with elite soldiers, and theirs were already impressive on their own. His distorted voice from under his helmet would have sent shivers down your spine if you would not have put your utter and complete trust into him.
You eventually reached a hangar, the doors were open and rebels were leaving on their speeders.
Even though he did not speak you could hear his voice inside your head, resonating, invading your mind in a way that you had not wanted anyone to ever speak to you. Still, it served its purpose, each of you knew what to do.
You swiftly made your way over to the speeders, Kylo Ren using the force to set other speeders aflame by knocking some gas over.
'Fuck' was all you could think as you saw that the only available seat on the speeders was on the Supreme leader's. You did not even know if he'd wanted anyone on his speeder at all, but there were no more left. You swallowed it down and got on the back, you had not even taken a proper seat as he already flew out of the hangar. Leaving the screams of both pain and anger behind you. You were not entirely sure if they had realized what had happened, but you did not care to stay to find it out. Instead you readied your blaster, held onto the back in an awkward position, not wanting to get closer than you had to to your unconventional pilot.
Kylo sped up and him taking a sharp turn through one of the ravines almost caused you to fall off.
'Just hold on properly', you heard him speak in your mind, startling you almost as much as the quick turn.
Hell no, you were not going to hold on! This was the Supreme Leader, you were not just going to hold onto him like he was one of your comrades! There was no way tha-
He grabbed your arm and put it around his waist. You could feel the heat rise up to your cheeks, but it did not stay long as a blaster shot hit one of the other stormtroopers from his bike.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. This was not good. You turned around as much as you could, holding on properly this time without thinking about it.
You could count atleast five more speeders behind you, you raised your blaster and waited. You felt a similar pressure to before, but this time it was different. Impatient. You ignored it and waited. Then you finally shot, hitting one of the rebel pilots straight in the head, the speeder crashed into another one and they both hit the stone walls of the ravine.
'Two down.', you thought and once again took your sweet time to aim at the pilot of the next. Another shot. You had hit the bike, but not the pilot. Kylo took another sharp turn and you almost fell off, being abruptly torn back into reality, where time seemed to pass so much faster than when you aimed at something. You pulled yourself closer and shot again, the drive was far too wild now to properly concentrate. The first shot had been lucky, now it was not possible to take those extra seconds to hit someone. You opted for just shooting normally like the others. That was definitely not one of your strong suits however and instead of hitting any vital parts you seemed to hit their bikes and especially the walls behind them far more often.
The ravines got narrower and curvier. Shooting was almost impossible for you now if you did not want to hit your own men, holding on also got more difficult, so you finally put your other arm around Kylo's waist in order not to fall off.
It still felt weird but the adrenaline rushing through your body kept you from worrying or thinking about it too much.
You heard a sirring noise and before you had time to process what was happening something exploded on your right side. Your ears started ringing and the only thing you could see was a huge shrapnel sticking out of the side of Kylo Ren's abdomen.
He barely avoided the wall, almost crashing both of you into the stone walls to your sides.
You opened your medpack and got a syringe out of it, stabbed his leg and immediately felt the intense anger from your pilot swell up. Your throat closed and you started to feel lightheaded before it wore off.
You had not thought about whom you were administering adrenaline to. It was a reflex. You had seen that he was in pain and close to crashing the speeder that he, and you, were on. The thoughts circled in your head over and over again. Kylo moved the speeder up a slope and left the ravine, the temporary push from the adrenaline was enough to keep him going now but from his demeanor it did not look good. He barely managed to drive into a cave, you quickly got off and almost collapsed under his weight as he fell onto you. You sat him down carefully, you were wrong. As far as you could tell there were atleast three big and lots of smaller shrapnel shards that had penetrated his armour and abdomen. You cursed yourself for not having seen it incoming.
"MD-2442 here. Kylo Ren is with me. He has sustained multiple puncture wounds. Requesting immediate medical assistance. Transmitting coordinates now. Over."
Annotation:
Hey! This is my first fanfiction. I originally published it on AO3, but upon request I now made an account here and will publish the chapters here as well :)