She closes her eyes and she's back in the Finalizer. The bland black mask of Kylo Ren's staring at her and no, no, no. This can't be happening again. She tastes blood in her mouth, her body sore and her head's spinning so much, she can't even think straight.
Kylo moves closer and bangs her head against the wall, just by raising his hand, and she can feel him, she can feel his presence inside her mind. She tries to focus, tries to push him away like she did the first time, but she can't feel the force around her, and there's nothing she can do to stop him, she's desperate and helpless. She's alone and she's terrified.
"The resistance will not be intimidated by you." She says, but the words feel strange, they feel wrong.
Kylo pauses for a second, but then suddenly he's right there, poking, probing and breaking her mind, going through her memories, and laughingat them.
Rey's five and she's sitting on the lap of this beautiful woman, inside a cockpit. "How do you like it, cariño?" It's a bit confusing because she doesn't think she's ever heard that last word before, but she knows what it means; it means that the woman loves her very much.
"I love it!" Rey answers easily because she does. She always wanted to fly an xwing before. "When I grow up, I'm gonna be the second best pilot in the galaxy!" She turns back and the woman frowns at her.
"Why second best?"
"Because you're the best, mom!" Rey says and it's wrong, wrong, wrong, because that woman isn't her mother, this isn't Jakku, this isn't her past. But then, the woman smiles at her, brown eyes shining with kindness and pride, and Rey doesn't even care if this isn't hers because she desperately wants it to be.
Rey blinks and she's eight. She goes down the stairs, dragging her blanket with her, and searches for her dad. He gave her a goodnight kiss, but she can't sleep and a story will help. It's been a month since mom went on a mission and she hasn't come back yet, but dad doesn't seem worried, so she's not. She's trying not to worry, but when she reaches the ground floor, she sees dad talking to a woman who isn't mother in the doorstep, and he's crying. Rey feels angry for a moment because that woman made dad cry, but before she can take a step towards them, she sees what the woman's holding. It's a jacket. It's her mom's flight jacket. A feeling of dread washes over her because no, that can't be happening. Mom's fine, mommy's the best pilot in the galaxy, she can't be... no...
She sobs and then dad's there, bended knee in front of her, eyes red and voice breaking, but he still tries to comfort her. "Hey... Hey, buddy, it's okay… It's going to be okay, it's…" He's still mumbling things to her, when the woman turns and leaves. The door closes, the light from the streets fades and Rey hugs her dad back and cries.
Kylo Ren laughs.
She cries, sobs, and screams, but he doesn't stop, he probes further and further, mercilessly, until he finds it. BB-8. The map. He releases her mind, with another hand movement, and she knows that now that he has what he's come from, she's no use to him, and she's going to die. She actually wants to die.
No. No! She fights these thoughts because it's not her fault, she could never have resisted, and it's okay, it's… not okay. It's the farthest thing from okay because pretty soon Kylo will have the map to Luke Skywalker. She's just doomed the Republic and the Resistance, she's doomed everything she's fought for, everything her parents fought for.
"Traitor." Kylo whispers in her ears and she has no fight left in her to talk back, and it's mostly because she knows it's true. She blinks and tears fall.
She blinks again and she wakes up. She quickly gets to her feet, and realizes she's not in the Finalizer, she's not tied up, and Kylo Ren's nowhere to be found. She takes a few moments to just breathe, slowly taking in her surroundings. She's with the Resistance, she has her own quarters, but she's in the med bay, waiting for Finn to wake up. It was just a nightmare, but it wasn't her nightmare. It takes her a moment to be confused over whose it is, then her mind clears and it becomes obvious.
"Poe Dameron." She whispers, taking her hand up to her chest, feeling her heart race with his emotions and despair. Despite their brief encounter the other day, she doesn't know much about him, except for what she heard from others. Finn trusts him, and so does BB8 and General Organa, and it's enough for her to make up her mind.
She knows what she has to do, but before she leaves the med bay, she pauses and holds Finn's hands for a minute or two, until her heart is back to normal. She has no idea where Poe's quarters are, but her legs seem to know something she doesn't and she lets them guide her. In minutes, she's standing outside a door, and BB-8's worried beeps are coming from inside.
She comes in to find Poe trashing in his bed, and a desperate BB-8 rolling around and desperately trying to wake him up. When BB-8 spots her by the door, they immediately let out a relieved sigh and roll up to her. [Please, help!] They ask, frantically.
Rey swallows her uneasiness and goes to the bed, touching Poe's shoulder. She slightly shakes it when she gets no response. She does it again, this time a little harder, because he's still not waking up. BB-8 beeps worriedly by her side, and not knowing what else to do, she decides to trust her feelings. She closes her eyes and reaches out to him, as kindly as she can. Poe, hey, it's okay. It's going to be okay.
The effect is immediate. Poe jerks awake, and BB-8's beeps turn happy. Poe slowly turns to the source of the sound, eyes unfocused and hands trembling. Rey gives him time, gives him space. He blinks once, twice, and feels the tears when he brings his hands to his face. He wipes them off quickly, blinks again and turns to his astromech. "What...?"
[Friend-Poe was having a nightmare and wouldn't wake up! Friend-Rey helped!]
At BB-8's answer, Poe turns to Rey. "You..." His hands are still shaking "You were there, you were..." He doesn't finish his sentence, but the horrified look on his face tells Rey exactly what he means. You were inside my mind.
"I'm sorry." She's saying, before she can stop herself. "I didn't mean to. I fell asleep, and then I was dreaming your dreams, I don't know why... The force, I still don't understand it, I don't..."
"Can you..." He interrupts her, voice quiet and broken. "Can you leave, please?"
BB-8 beeps in protest, but Rey immediately nods, and shushes them.
"I'm sorry." She moves quickly out of the room, and again, her legs take her to where she needs to be. She sits on a chair by Finn's side, takes his hand in hers and lets herself be overwhelmed by what she's just experienced. She closes her eyes, but she still sees Poe's face; he looked betrayed, he looked afraid. He was afraid of her, and she feels her chest constrict. It takes a long time for her to fall back asleep.
xxx
When she wakes again up again, it's a new day, and the first thing she sees is Poe Dameron's face. But he isn't horrified or angry or scared, this time he's smiling. It doesn't reach his eyes, though.
"Hey, there, I brought up some breakfast." He says and pulls a chair to sit by her side. She doesn't say anything back to him, so he quickly adds. "As an apology. For last night. I shouldn't have snapped at you like that."
That gets Rey's attention, and she turns to him.
"I know you'd never do it on purpose, especially now that you know about that." He shrugs, but she can feel the bitterness in his voice.
"Why are you doing this? Why are you so quick to forgive me?" She reluctantly reaches for the food he's brought; she's still getting used to not having to work for food.
"Because I know it was an accident." He frowns, a little taken aback by her response.
"I told you it was an accident, but why believe me?" Believing in people so readily doesn't seem like a healthy habit to have, Rey can name twenty people out of the top of her head who would take advantage of it.
"He trusts you." Poe says, tiny smile in his face when he turns to watch Finn. "Also, there must be a code that prohibits future jedis to lie, or something."
His tone is playful and she realizes it's a joke. It's not really funny, but she knows he's tired, so she won't hold it against him. "I forgive you too."
"Thank you." He says, and for the first time his smile doesn't seem strained at all. It's very easy to smile back at him. "Anyways, I should probably go, I have this new recruits to train, you know?" He says, but doesn't move a muscle, other than to take Finn's hands in his.
"You're not here as much you'd like." Rey says softly, but it still surprises him.
"I… I'm bribing the doctors to inform me in case anything changes. And I'm sure you'd rather spend some time with him alone, right? It's not a big deal."
Except it is. She can see in his face that it is.
"I've spent my entire life alone, I think I'm done." She takes Finn's other hand with one of hers, and squeezes it, and Poe quietly follows her motion with his eyes. "Come back after training."
"I will." He stands up to leave, and nods at her.
xxx
He doesn't and she has the same nightmare that night. Rey wakes up with shattered breaths and a racing heart, and doesn't even hesitate before getting up and heading for Poe's quarters. She finds him in the exact position he was last night, tossing and trashing around, stuck in a nightmare, with a worried BB-8 trying to wake him up.
She grabs a glass of water she finds by the bed and throws it in his face, unceremoniously. He wakes up immediately, confused and scared, and looks at Rey like she's a ghost.
"You were having a nightmare, but I didn't want to go inside your mind without permission again." She explains, slowly.
There's a beat, in which he just stares at her, and then he starts laughing, he throws his head back and just lets go, entire body relaxing and it's a beautiful sight. "Rey. Rey, you're amazing,"
Rey feels her cheeks heating up with the praise, but doesn't say anything back to him because what could she possibly say to that?
BB-8 rolls to a corner of the room and then back, handing Poe a new, dry, long-sleeved shirt. Poe takes it and pets their little head, before he starts changing. Then, he turns to Rey.
"So. What's happening? Are we having the same dreams or what?"
"I think you're projecting your feelings to the force, and since I'm force sensitive…" She can feel that they have a connection somehow, but it's too early to say what it means, so she doesn't.
"God, I'm sorry." He takes a deep breath, his wet hair still dripping at his new shirt, and bows his head. "This is all my fault."
"It's not!" Rey's reply is probably a little too quick, too loud, too intense, but she can't help it. She felt his emotions at the torture chair in the Finalizer, she felt his guilt, his shame and his desire for death to take him, and she can't stay quiet any longer. "Kylo Ren took the information from you by force! He tortured your body and your mind, he invaded and stained every memory you held dear, and yet you survived, Poe. Finn couldn't have escaped the first order without you, and if he hadn't, none of us would be here right now."
Poe acknowledges her words with a sound that seems to be a mixture of a sob and a snort, but doesn't raise his head to meet her eyes, and she feels compelled to try again.
"And it's not your fault I'm not sleeping either, I mean, I've never been a sound sleeper." She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. "Every time I go to sleep I'm afraid I'll wake up back at Jakku and this will all have been a dream, and it… It terrifies me." Her voice breaks and that gets Poe to raise his head and look at her.
"We're both pilots, we could be bonding over ships, but we're talking about nightmares, instead. That's fucked up." Poe says and laughs, but there's no humor to it. It just sounds fake, tired and bitter, and the worst thing is he's getting good at it, he's had a lot of practice, and Rey finds it hard to connect this man to the one she's heard so much about the past few days, from both Finn and BB-8.
The Poe she's heard about is fearless, he's strong and determined, the ace pilot of the resistance, who learned how to fly a First Order Tie fighter on the job, survived a crash out of sheer power of will and never gave up until he returned to the base.
The Poe Dameron she sees now is shaking from fear and despair, he's bitter because Han's gone and Finn's still in a coma, and he'd never thought winning would take such a high price, he's got bags under his eyes because every time he falls asleep, he's back there, at the Finalizer, and Kylo Ren's having fun with his mind. He doesn't take any pride in being the best pilot of the Resistance because he ended up betraying everything he ever held dear, and all he wants is for his mother to be alive so he could beg her for forgiveness.
This Poe Dameron is so very human, and Rey feels like laughing and crying at the same time because for the first time since Finn, she feels like she's not alone anymore, like she's found someone who understands.
"Do you wanna talk about ships?" She takes his hand in hers, without even thinking about it, intertwining their fingers together. And when her head finally catches up with her body, she thinks about Finn holding her hand in Jakku and getting yelled at for doing that. She thinks about visiting him in the med bay, holding his hand and praying to whoever's listening for him to wake up so he can hold her hand back. She looks at Poe and thinks about that hug they shared a few days ago. After years of isolation on a planet where touching is bad, she's still wary about it, but at the same time, there's a yearning she can't really control, so she holds his hand and smiles at him.
"Yes, please." He says and finds it's surprisingly easy to smile back at her. "The Falcon, you've flown it. Come on, flying it was a childhood dream and now I must fulfill it through you. Tell me all about it."
She does. She talks about the falcon and the controls, from the minute she and Finn stepped on it in Jakku, to the moment they found Han and Chewie, to the first battle with the first order, and when she's done, she doesn't stop talking. She tells him about how weird it was to set foot on a planet with so much green, when she was used to seeing sand all around her, she tells him that she has waited all her life and that she can't wait anymore, even though she has no idea what to do from now on. She tells him everything and it's easy because she wants to talk and he wants to listen.
Her voice is soft, gentle, comforting and it slowly guides him back to sleep. He even apologizes when the first yawn hits him, but Rey says it's okay and then asks if she can stay over because she knows he would never do it.
Poe already has his eyes closed, but tightens the grip he has on her hand and just nods in response. She reluctantly lays down by his side, but there's not much space, so their bodies bump against each other and this time she doesn't have to convince herself that this kind of touch isn't bad. Poe's body is warm against hers and it feels good, it feels safe and she knows that the closer they are, the easier it will be to fight each other's nightmares.
This one night becomes two when she finds him waiting outside her door because "Hey, I think I kind of fell asleep on you last night, which was very rude, so I'd thought we could try again." What he doesn't say is last night was the first time I've managed to sleep more than four hours since I went on the mission to retrieve the map, and I think your presence was what made it possible, so please help, but Rey knows. She just smiles at him, and opens the door.
The third time it happens Rey's the one to call him, she asks about the planets on the map to Luke Skywalker during dinner and Poe's relieved because he was having trouble finding an excuse to ask her to come over. This night, he talks and she listens. He talks about what he's heard of the planets, talks about all the other planets he's traveled to. Talks about his childhood because he was young when he began travelling, he - hesitates for a second, but still - talks about his parents and growing up in the resistance.
"If you fall asleep during my life-story, I'll be horribly offended." Poe says, with a tiny smile, when he sees Rey close her eyes, but his voice is so small it's almost a whisper, almost as if he doesn't really want to her to hear it.
"I'm sorry." But Rey hears every word, she also hears the teasing and the pleading, all mixed together in his voice. "I'm just really tired, maybe you should try to sleep and we'll continue our talk tomorrow night."
"Yeah, sure. I'm sorry, it's late and I'm still bothering you." He misunderstands.
"You could stay." Rey says, her heart racing, because maybe she's interpreting this all wrong and he doesn't really want to. Her moment of self-doubt lasts less than a second, though, because suddenly Poe is there, and he's smiling and his smile is so beautiful, she dreams of it.
They stop making excuses for it the fifth time they do it. They've just left a meeting with General Organa and Rey was asked to go after Luke and train in the ways of the force. She doesn't know how to feel about it because, on one hand, there's something inside her that knows this is the right thing to do, that's drawing her to Luke Skywalker, but on the other hand, there's Finn. There's Poe.
"So, my room or yours?" Poe looks at her, shrugs and laughs, but it's that fake, humorless, horrible laugh all over again. "Mine's closer, but your bed's bigger."
"Let's go to mine." She says and doesn't even try to pretend she doesn't want it or need it as much as he does.
This time, though, they don't talk. She lies down next to him, closes her eyes, listen to his breathing and dreams about leaving and never coming back.
The next day, Rey wakes up alone in her bed and doesn't really sees Poe for the whole day. She knows he's avoiding her and there's a part of her that is hurt, but there's this other part that is relieved because she's also kind of avoiding him back. She has no idea what to tell him, she has no idea what to tell herself.
She goes to see Finn and, by a trick of fate, that's where she finds Poe. He's sitting by Finn's bedside and he's singing. She doesn't recognize any of the words, but the tone is gentle and sweet, and she knows that it's a love song. It's beautiful and his voice makes it sound even more beautiful.
Poe stops mid-song, when he sees her by the door. He lets go of Finn's hands and gets up to his feet. "Hey, didn't see you there, I'm sorry."
"Why are you apologizing?" She asks, moving her body so that it blocks the door, when she realizes he's trying to leave.
"I was about to leave anyway." He shrugs and the false smile is back. But it falters when he sees Rey isn't going to move, letting it be replaced by a frown. "I'm sure you'd like to be alone with him, so I'll just..." He tries again, but Rey just stares at him. "I mean, don't you want to be with him?"
"You think we're together." She studies his face, carefully. "I thought you and him were together."
Poe's mouth opens, closes, opens again, and then closes again. Giving up, he pulls a chair towards him because he has a feeling he has to sit down for whatever's happening.
"So you're not..." He wants to be sure.
"No." Rey gets herself a chair too and sits in front of him, next to the bed. She frowns, thinking hard about all the things she was trying not to think about. "Are we together?"
"What? No! Rey, I'd never..." Poe's caught off guard by the question, but immediately regrets his words when he sees the girl clench her jaw. "No, that's not what I mean, let me start again, please." He waits for a nod, then continues. "Look, Rey, you're amazing, and Finn spoke so highly of you, I liked you before I even met you! But over the course of this week, you've became very important to me, our talks... I don't even have words to describe how much they meant to me."
She nods again, feeling something burn at the side of her eyes.
"And then there's Finn and he's important to me too, you know? He saved me when I had forsaken all hope, he finished my mission and he's a good man, no scratch that, he's..."
"He's incredible." Rey finishes, for him.
"He is." Poe's expression turns both fond and sad, at the same time. "You two mean the world to me and I just want you to be happy. You deserve to be happy. And you'll be happy together. You may not be together right now, but... It's obvious how much you care about each other and I don't want to ruin it for you."
"I care for you too, and so does Finn. The only way you could ruin it would be to leave us, so please don't." She grabs Finn hand with hers, and then reaches out to Poe with her free one. "We could be together, the three of us."
"I... Rey. " Poe doesn't know what to say, so he just intertwines their fingers together and gets up from his chair, so he can approach the bed and do the same to Finn's. "Rey, I like you both so much. Is this really happening or is it another dream we're sharing? I'm going to be so fucking embarrassed when I wake up." He turns to her and his eyes are shining with tears, but also with something more, they're shining with a radiant, stunning, extraordinary kind of happiness that can't be contained by his body.
"I don't think we're dreaming right now, but we will, later today, and we'll have the most splendid, wonderful dreams." She laughs, overwhelmed with the sheer strength of his emotion.
Poe kisses the back of her hand, and then moves on to her knuckles.
"But that's later. Now, we have to talk." She says, heart hammering in her chest.
Poe nods because, after thinking about it for the entire day, he feels confident enough to start the conversation. "I think you should go after Luke Skywalker."
Rey finds herself releasing a breath she didn't realize she was holding.
xxx
That night before Rey leaves, she dreams about not having to leave at all. She dreams about a galaxy where the first order doesn't exist, and people are free. It's a galaxy in which Finn is awake and okay, Poe's smile is never fake, and there are no bags under their eyes. She dreams about a galaxy where they are together and they are happy. She wakes with a sense of purpose to make this dream come true.
Poe holds her hand until the last moment. Letting her go is painful, but he keeps the smile on his face when he does it, and it's surprisingly easy to do so; he's rested, he's had a good night of sleep, and dreamed of splendid, wonderful things. "So, do you think the Force handles long distance?"
"We're about to find out." Rey says and hugs him. She doesn't say anything else. She just holds him harder and prays that they'll have time to say it some other time; she thinks he already knows, but it's something worth saying again and again and forever.
xxx
As it turns out, the force does handle long distance and, that night, Poe sings her to sleep.