The island where she and Luke Skywalker stood was surreal. Surround by all this water, they were in the middle of nowhere, not only on this lonely planet, but in the entire galaxy. The little island seemed familiar to her, like something she once saw in a dream. A wonderful, but heartbreaking, dream. The water crashed against the rocky shore, and the distant sound of the waves hitting the cliffs down below only added to the odd surrealism that filled this place. It felt as though it should have been violent, but, like the man in front of her, it was permeated by a long-suffering weariness. She was hesitant to break the atmosphere, but the man was still staring at her. His lightsaber felt heavy in her hand.
"I think this is yours," Rey finally said when the silence between them grew heavy. She had never been good with people. Scavengers on outer rim planets had no need for people skills. They would actually probably be more detrimental than helpful. However, Rey had hoped that meeting Luke Skywalker, the myth, the legend, would come with a great revelation. Maybe not as intense as the strange vision that she had when touching his lightsaber, but something more straightforward and with at least some answers. Rey could really use some answers. But the gray cloak and fly away beard didn't inspire too much confidence.
"Rey." His voice was scratchy and low, probably from disuse, yet it was not a question. Still he did not move from the cliff side. His gaze was intense and heavy.
She nodded, still holding out the saber for him, wondering if maybe she should put it down now. But her name falling so easily from his lips made the curiosity inside her burn. She wanted to know. She wanted answers.
"You should not have come," he informed her in his scratched up voice. He turned back to the water, his back now to her. She lowered his saber to her side. "No, you should not have come." His voice was quieter as he repeated the phrase, but no less heavy.
"We need you," Rey told him. She was getting the idea that she came all this way, that so many people, like Han, died to get her this far, for nothing. The thought was dangerous and she tried to shake it out of her head. "The world needs you, the rebellion needs you." She hesitated a bit. "I need you."
He laughed a laugh that held no humor in it. Somehow the disuse of his laugh was more pronounced and it hurt a little bit to listen to. "Oh, I think I have helped the world quite enough," he told the water, and it carried back towards Rey. The bitterness and the guilt in those words hurt almost as much as the laugh.
She didn't know what to say. The Force worked in mysterious ways, but she did not understand what she was supposed to do. How was she supposed to talk to Luke Skywalker? She was saved by an over excited Wookie and droid coming up the path behind her. Her two companions did not seem to be deterred by the standoffish attitude of the man as Chewbacca immediately went over to greet his old friend and wrap him in a tight hug. It was strange to witness, so Rey stayed where she was as the friends exchanged hellos. The R2 droid they brought also rolled over to greet the man. Her two companions either didn't notice or ignored the way Luke tried to extricate himself from their company.
Feeling like an intruder on this happy reunion, Rey turned away and walked to the other side of the island. It was a small rock outcrop, so she was far enough away to not hear them, but she couldn't get far enough away to not see them. She sat on the edge facing the water to allow them their privacy. He feet swung down over the water far below her. For a moment she feared the fall, but it passed quickly with more pressing thoughts.
Luke Skywalker recognized her. The Force worked in mysterious ways, but it had felt more personal, more like they shared some history. Or maybe that was just Rey clinging onto the desperate hope that she was something. That there was someone out there who could tell her that she had more in life than just a scavengers past. That maybe she came from somewhere and was destined for something, dare she say, better than that. Something more important than wasting away in the sand.
A furry hand fell on her shoulder, and she startled before realizing it was just Chewbacca. He told her that they were being invited in for a meal by their less than gracious host. Rey allowed herself a smile as she let him help her up, and wondered if they were invited or had forced Luke into letting them stay. Deciding it honestly didn't matter as long as she got some food, Rey followed the Wookie down the path they had come up and into a small hole in the rock face that she hadn't noticed in her haste to get to Luke. The hole opened up into a larger cave and from the sparse furnishings it seemed like this was where Luke dwelled.
She followed Chewbacca to the table off to the left and sat down next to him. She wondered why Luke, banished alone to this island, had such a large living space and a large enough table to fit six, but she didn't interrupt the silence that came with the meal. Rey assumed Luke was not thrilled with them staying, so she quietly ate what seemed to be freshly caught fish and some tough green plants. Everything was bland in comparison to what she had been trying when staying with the rebels, but it was much better than what she used to eat back home, back on Jakku.
Rey ate quickly, like she always did, and quickly grew uncomfortable when she finished first. The tension at the table was thick, and she still was unsure on how to break it. Feeling very out of her depth, Rey decided to make a tactical retreat. Standing up, she left with a flimsy excuse of wanting to look at the water again. Rey didn't wait to see what the response of the remaining diners would be, simply heading out the way she had come.
When Rey was back at the spot she was before, letting her legs dangle again over the water far below, she took a moment to freak out over how over her head she was in. She had no idea where she came from. She had no idea what being a jedi meant. And she had no idea if Luke would help her in any of this. Everything was just very complicated.
After letting herself have a moment, she took a deep breath and focused on the water again. Answers would come with time. They always did.
"It's beautiful isn't it?" A voice asked from beside her. Not having heard anyone sit down beside her, Rey startled, but managed to not fall of the cliff's edge. Turning to face her new companion, she immediately noticed the blue glow that surrounded his figure. He did not seem completely solid, yet he sat next to her, staring out the waves below them. He was young, older than her definitely, but still young with messy hair and an easy smile.
"It is," Rey answered hesitantly, not sure what to say to the man. He must have been sent to her from the Force from what she gathered from his glow.
"I was born on a desert planet," he told her, ignoring her confusion and hesitation. "I lived there for most of my childhood, and sometimes all this water still impresses me."
"Deserts are the only thing I have ever known," she confided, letting her legs swing back and forth. Rey could taste the sea breeze and it reminded her of something, but she couldn't place her finger on it.
"That's a shame," the man answered, and this time he turned to face her. His eyes were piercing and sad. They both turned back to face the water and sat in silence for a few moments, just watching the waves below them and the calm water off in the distance.
"Who are you?" Rey finally asked, when it seemed like the waves would not answer her questions.
"Anakin," he told her as he leaned back putting his palms on the rock behind him. "Anakin Skywalker."
She turned sharply to him. "Skywalker?" Rey repeated hesitantly.
"Luke is my son," the man, Anakin, said to her. He continued to stare out at the water, but his brow was deeply furrowed. Suddenly, he was not a young man anymore. Anakin seemed to age in front of her. His face deepened with more lines, and the hair seemed to gray almost before her eyes. He no longer sat confidently and carelessly on the side of the ledge, but instead was bent with the clear air of regret. It was awful to watch, but impossible to look away.
"Why not appear to him?" Rey asked him, whispering as if she would be in trouble if the two of them were caught together. Luke's father should speak with Luke, or his daughter, the general. Or even his insane grandson Kylo Ren.
"Luke does not wish to see me," Anakin explained to her sadly. "He is blocking me."
"What about General Organa? Or Kylo Ren?" Rey asked, because surely someone else more knowledgeable in the Force should be talking to him.
"Leia never wanted anything to do with me," he told her, and he seemed to age even more. "She learned enough about the Force from Luke to help her better perform as a general and to never see me again." He paused, choosing his words carefully. "And that boy, Kylo Ren as you call him, only hears what he wants to hear, and he has not wanted to listen to me for a long time."
"I'm sorry," she told him. She thought about laying a hand on his shoulder, but wasn't sure if it was possible to touch him.
"It was mostly my fault," Anakin explained and Reya saw a momentary flash of a man in a mask that resembles Kylo Ren's in a strange way, but shakes her head to rid herself of it. "I was not a good man for much of my life." He paused and today was really just a day for an awkward silences.
"Why come to me now?" Rey asked after a moment of wondering if she should inquire more about the man in front of her and deciding that focusing on the present was better. Again Anakin's age shifted at her question, and it only took a second for the age to fall away and for him to take on the appearance of a younger man again.
"I have been trying to contact you for a long time," Anakin told her, now looking her in the eyes and she can see the resemblance between him and Luke in the lines of their faces. "It is more challenging since you never knew me in my life. Plus my son is very strong in the Force and attempted to block you from me. But I know that some of the dreams that I sent you were received. Now that you have started to access the Force on your own, his blocks are weakening."
"My dreams of an island," she realized with wonder, looking around at the scenery around her. "They were this island? You sent them?" He nodded, but then Rey focused on the other important part. "Why did Luke block you from me?"
Anakin took a deep breath, running one of his hands through his long hair, the blue glow around him pulsed. "I think you have already made the assumption that you trained with my son for a bit."
Rey thought about this. She definitely fell into using a lightsaber easily enough. She had thought that it was because of the similarities between that saber and her staff on Jakku, but the lightsaber felt more familiar, so maybe she chose to use the staff because of the similarities. And her use of the Force had expanded in such a short time. She wasn't sure how she knew that telling the stormtrooper to let her go would work, but it did. And Rey had no idea how she fought off Kylo Ren trying to invade her mind, but it seemed to be instinctual to defend her mind against him. After a couple of moments of pondering, Rey nodded to Anakin. But before she could ask anymore questions of the man, they were interrupted.
"You should not be here," Luke's scratchy voice, quiet though it was, rang across the rocks. He was making his way over to them and there was an angry glint in his eye that was mostly directed at his father.
"Someone needs to help Rey understand her past," Anakin shot back, and it was odd to see him in his blue glow looking young and full of youth when his son had an overgrown beard and streaks of gray. He remained sitting on the ground, but his fisted his hands tightly in his lap.
"Rey needs to move on," Luke implored him, and Luke also shot a desperate look at her. He was towering above where they were sitting on the ground. "She needs to be safe."
"Rey," Anakin said more gently than before, turning from his son to face her. "Do you feel very safe?"
An image of Kylo Ren cutting Finn down and planets that could destroy other planets came to mind. "No, not very," she told them both.
"See," Anakin turned back to Luke and gestured in a very I-told-you-so way. "Rey doesn't feel safe. You need to help her."
Luke was shaking his head. "No, I can't. I won't. It will make everything worse."
Anakin stood up suddenly, and both men were the same height. It was odd to seem the Skywalkers standing toe-to-toe, one glowing blue and the other wrapping his cloak about him despite the warm weather. "She needs you!" Anakin said angrily pointing down at Rey, who thought it might be best to remain sitting out of the way. "They all need you! You cannot turn your back on the world when it is like this!"
Luke, who was so passive and quiet before, got right back into his father's face. "And whose fault is that?" Rey was a bit worried that they would come to blows if they actually could touch each other, but they were interrupted again.
"It seems that I can never leave you Skywalkers alone," it said, and there was a short laugh that defused the tense atmosphere around them. The new voice was a man, surrounded by the same blue glow as Anakin, that looked to be a bit older than Luke, and wore a similar white beard. But the man, like Anakin, wore Jedi robes. He walked up to them and stood between the Skywalkers, ignoring the last bit of anger between the two men, facing Rey.
"Hello, young Rey," he greeted her, and she recognized the accent.
"I've heard your voice before," she told him as she stood up to face him, and he smiled at her words. "In a vision I had."
"You two were sending her visions?" Luke moaned in a pained voice.
"Of course we were," Anakin answered sharply. "You sure as kriff weren't doing anything."
The man between them ignored their words. He was looking at her intensely, and the eye contact was getting a bit uncomfortable, so Rey settled for looking at his nose rather than his eyes.
"I am Obi-Wan Kenobi," he told her with a warm smile. He seemed so familiar. "I also go by Ben."
"Hello," she answered. He felt so familiar.
His smile grew wider. "It is good to see you again," He turned to Luke, who stopped glaring at Anakin long enough to pay attention to what Obi-Wan would say. "Could you please give Rey her memory back?"
Rey looked at Luke too, excited at the prospect of remembering more than flashes. He looked uncomfortable at their scrutiny. He could not meet their eyes. "I cannot."
Rey felt her heart sink. Luke still didn't want to help her, even when she was so close. She could almost taste the truth.
"You can't or you won't," Anakin asked hotly. Obi-Wan laid a pacifying hand on his chest, making their blue glows mix.
"I cannot," Luke answered again. He turned to Rey sadly. "I am sorry. When I did it, I never wanted you to be able to remember. The memories are not hidden, they are gone."
An overwhelming sadness washed over Rey at his words. Nothing but memories of hungry, lonely days and sand. Lots and lots of sand. "Oh," she answered because there were no words to talk about that kind of loss. She felt an awful pressure behind her eyes and examined the rocky ground at her feet.
"I will explain it to you," Obi-Wan reassured her. Rey looked up at him and tried to smile, but the smile turned out watery.
"I will help," Anakin said at the same time Luke offered, "I'll help, since it is my fault."
Obi-Wan shook his head. "No. I will do this alone with Rey. Here, let us sit down for this."
She sat back on the rocky ground as he did. Rey turned her back on the water so she could face him. She wiped her eyes roughly with the back of her hand to prepare herself, but both the Skywalkers were still standing next to them.
"Go on." Obi-Wan shooed them away. "Anakin can give you a lecture in responsibility, Luke. I'm sure it will be refreshing for him to be on the giving rather than the receiving end of it." His voice grew sharper at the end and the two Skywalkers slunk away to the other side of the island without another word.
Obi-Wan turned back to face Rey, humor and excitement lighting up his eyes. "Now, dear Rey, I will explain what you need to know."