Stakeouts are the worst part of the job. The word itself always brings with it a vague sense of irony – if only stakeouts actually involved staking the shit out of vamps – but the actual practice of it is often so dull that Rey finds herself dozing off. She doesn't quite have the patience to sit in one spot and watch something for hours, and Luke's chided her countless times about the significance of waiting and observing quietly before taking action.
Falling out of a tree would be inopportune, and Rey shakes her head wildly to snap herself out of the lethargic lull. She needs to keep her mind active while her surroundings are unchanging, and she runs through the information that her and Ben have uncovered over the past week as mental stimulation.
Brendol Hux doesn't seem to exist. None of the databases that the Resistance have access to have picked up anything on the name, and Rey is admittedly impressed with his lack of presence anywhere. She's considered that it's a fake name, given to her in a desperate plea by the fledgling she'd killed a week previous, but the vamp had seemed honest in his frantic attempt at bargaining for his non-life.
Luke's given them all the intel he's collected, which isn't very much. The rate of disappearance is roughly one teen every few weeks, although they are not always newsworthy. The majority have been homeless, although it appears as though a handful of disappearances were some runaways from perfectly well-to-do households. The media doesn't seem to have picked up on the trend just yet – D'Qar is quite populated, after all, and things fall through the cracks rather easily – and Rey spares the thought that maybe the reason Luke could identify a trending pattern isn't completely on accident.
Whoever this vamp is, he's good. Good enough to exist without any living record, and something seems off, almost sloppy, about how someone picked up on the amount of missing teenagers. If he's the ringleader that's turning an alarming percentage of D'Qar's population into the Undead, it definitely falls under the jurisdiction of the Resistance, and she chews thoughtfully on her lip as she considers the possibilities.
From her vantage point, Rey watches as a twitchy, pale blonde exits one of D'Qar's homeless youth facilities.
Time to get to work, then.
Rey drops down from the tree branch silently and stays a cautious distance away from the vampire. It's dusk, and fortunately she's upwind of the vamp and her scent won't carry, and she trails after the young woman.
To the blonde's credit, she detects Rey fairly quickly. Not to her credit is the way she visibly tenses as soon as she realizes she's being watched. It's far too obvious, and she watches as the vampire leads them into a rather vacant part of town and attempts to lure her into an alleyway for an ambush.
Rey waits her out. It's a strategic move to allow the young vampire's nerves to get the best of her: if Rey approaches the alley, despite the fact that she's most likely a much more seasoned fighter than the blonde, she runs the risk of fighting the vamp when she's feeling confident. But if she exercises patience (and grits her teeth at the thought of more waiting) then it can throw the vampire off-kilter. She's expecting an assault, and if nothing comes, her confidence will be shaken.
When the vamp finally peeks her head out from the darkness of the alley, Rey makes herself known.
"I just want information," she calls out, and enjoys the low, agitated growl the woman lets out in response. Impatiently, she slides a silver dirk from its sheath against her thigh. "Talking only, I swear." The lie feels light on her tongue, and Rey considers the glint of the moon on her knife as she moves closer to the mouth of the alley. This close to her, Rey's sure the vampire can scent the blood that endlessly lingers on her frame.
"I'll tell you nothing, hunter bitch," the vamp snarls, and lunges at her.
Even the freshest of vampires have supernatural speed and strength, and Rey just barely evades the incoming attack by strafing to the left. The woman darts past her before spinning quickly on her heel, and although she has no weapon like Rey does, her fingers are curved into claws as she prepares for another pass.
She doesn't manage to avoid the charge, this time, and the vampire's momentum as she barrels into Rey forces a whoosh of air out of her chest.
Rey hits the ground hard, and regrets the extra second that it takes to retrieve the breath unwillingly forced from her lungs. By the time she's recovered, the vamp is arching over her, fangs bared, and she moves instinctively, slashing her knife across the vampire's stomach to gain some space.
It misses, of course, but the woman beats a hasty retreat at the sight of the silver weapon, and since she's not standing over Rey any longer, she quickly pushes herself to her feet.
The vampire snarls wordlessly at her before lunging again, and Rey quickly evaluates the movement as she dodges. She leaves her arm just a little too outstretched as she moves, and predictably, the vampire latches onto the extended limb. Moving with the momentum of the stronger woman, Rey swings her body around and shoves the vampire off-balance and to the ground.
Within moments, she has the vampire pinned beneath her with one hand forcing the woman's shoulder down and her weapon poised just above the blonde's heart.
"No need to be so rude," she tells the woman, who bucks underneath her in an attempt to break free.
"You will let me go," the vampire barks, and Rey quickly shakes off the tingling feeling that always comes with a vampire's attempt at thrall.
It's one of the only thing she has on the mages of the Resistance – being human doesn't grant her many advantages over the supernatural, but she appears to have an innate resistance to mesmerization that her peers often fall prey to without the utilization of counterspells.
"Don't think so," Rey says, and her grin is feral. "Care to tell me who's been turning vamps in our city lately?"
The woman spits in her face.
Rey winces, but doesn't move her weapon. She's about ready to consider the whole thing a bust when the blonde beneath her writhes angrily and hisses something in a foreign language. She'd thought little of the lightly accented curses as they fought, but now it's clear that the woman is a foreigner. It's unfamiliar to her untrained ear – she's a slayer, not a god damn linguist – but she does manage to parse out the word Hux between the sibilant hisses of the language.
It's better than nothing.
Rey feels no regret as she drives her dirk straight into the heart of the blonde vampire. Her scream fills the air, sharp and agonized, as her flesh peels away from her body, disintegrating as it turns to ash. When she finally falls silent, her body is no more, and Rey looks down at the fine soot littering the ground.
The execution went much smoother than her last attempt at grappling with a half-starved vampire, and Rey grins in the darkness. She doesn't expect low-level grunts to have much insider knowledge, but this was an unexpected treat.
Rey texts Luke a coded message – Won't be home late for dinner after all :) – and pockets her phone as she dusts herself off. She's confirmed that Hux does exist, at least, and it's a step in the right direction.
The sun's barely dipping under the horizon when Rey's neck prickles with the awareness of being watched. She's in the heart of downtown D'Qar after reporting in with Leia, and she swallows down the sudden flash of nervousness she feels. Hopefully she hasn't just compromised one of the Resistance strongholds, but there will be time to consider the ramifications of such later.
"Hello," she says casually, and at least her tail is smart enough to reveal themselves rather than feign ignorance at being detected.
The man who materializes in front of her in front of her is tall, and thin, and his movements are absolutely silent. She's spent far too much time around his kind to be startled by the quick appearance, though, and merely quirks an eyebrow at him.
He inclines his head toward her in greeting, although his face remains placid as he looks down at her. He'd be attractive if he wasn't a damned blood-sucker, that's for sure. He's pale with short ginger hair, and his aristocratic features look vaguely disgusted despite his apparent lack of emotion.
"Can I help you?" Rey asks, placing a hand on her hip. She lightly fingers the dagger hidden just beneath her clothing, and it is a tangible comfort in the face of her enemy.
"Unlikely," he says smoothly, and if she wasn't absolutely convinced he was a member of the Undead before, the quick flash of fangs as he speaks solidifies the belief. He's sizing her up like a potential meal, and Rey refuses to be intimidated by his appearance.
"I'll just be on my way, then," she says loftily before brushing past him. They're in much too public of a place for outright violence, and it is the only reason she considers turning her back on him. Even vampires are held to a certain standard of not exposing themselves to the general public, and it builds confidence to know that even the worst of their kind won't violate such a measure. It's also possible he doesn't know who she is beyond being a hunter, and she's certainly not about to reveal her hand before he reveals his.
"I would tread carefully if I were you, Rey," he says as she walks away, and she's proud of the fact that her spine doesn't even stiffen. The volume of his voice has not increased at all, but even over the distance, she can hear him perfectly. "You might uncover something unpleasant."
It's a silent threat, and certainly not one to be taken lightly. Rey continues on her way, resisting the urge to rub her hands down her arms to dispel the goosebumps that have risen across her skin.
Hux knows they're investigating him, then. It's not the worst-case scenario, but still fairly bad, considering the fact that the element of surprise has now been eliminated. He also knows exactly who she is, which is of more immediate concern. The vamp hadn't even attempted to enthrall her and lure her out of the public area, which means that he's aware of her innate resistance, and if he's that knowledgeable about her then he absolutely knows she's deeply involved with the Resistance.
Rey exhales a calming breath and wanders around the city aimlessly for hours. She returns home only when the sun rises, its warming presence signifying safety in a way that nothing else can.
Ben calls her in the middle of the day, and she just barely refrains from yelling at him as she jerks into consciousness. He has to be aware of her sleeping schedule – hell, he's probably on a similar one, and the quick logical jump has her feeling rather irked.
"What?" she snaps into her phone.
"I've found something," he says coolly and without preamble. He sounds almost too nonchalant, and Rey reads between the lines: this something is important. "Can I come by?"
She scowls. One of the tragic downfalls of the proliferation of technology in the 21st century is how difficult it is to maintain a secure line of communication. "You woke me up. Give me thirty minutes and bring Luke, if you can."
As annoying as it is to have her sleep interrupted, it will provide her with a good opportunity to tell them about her encounter with the redheaded vampire from yesterday.
Ben tersely agrees and hangs up, and she flops back onto her bed in frustration.
A quick glance at the time informs her that she's only slept for about three hours, and she gives herself a grace period of ten minutes before finally forcing herself out of bed. It means she doesn't have time for a shower, but her (mostly) unwelcome guests can surely deal with her general grossness. It could be considered fair punishment for waking her up.
Fortunately, the shirt she'd slipped into before passing out in bed is baggy enough that she doesn't even bother with a bra, and she quickly throws on a pair of shorts before running a hand through her hair. Her room's a bit of a mess, with laundry strewn about haphazardly and hunter weapons littering the floor, but she doesn't have time to pick up. She'll just shut her bedroom door so the boys don't see the mess, or something.
Heading to the bathroom, Rey grabs her toothbrush and wearily brushes her teeth as she stares at herself in the mirror.
The bruise across her face has mostly faded into a yellowish green monstrosity, and the dark smears underneath her eyes complement the one sprawling across her cheekbone. She looks utterly exhausted, and growls a curse under her breath at Ben.
She tugs her hair through a hairband and into a high ponytail, quickly applies deodorant, and meanders into the kitchen.
The kettle's already prepped with filtered water, fortunately, and Rey flicks on the stove and grabs a clean(ish) mug.
"Ugh, almost out," she mutters to herself as she pulls out the Folgers canister of instant coffee from a cabinet. It's nearly empty, and she doles out the proper amount into her empty mug as she makes a mental note to run out and grab some more within the next few days.
Ben finds her leaning against the counter, eyes closed as she inhales the scent of the still too-hot coffee cupped between her hands.
"How can you drink that filth?" are the first words out of his mouth, and she wistfully regrets allowing him to come over.
Rey will also defend her crappy instant coffee to the death. "Not all of us have the luxury of freely accessing the Skywalker fortune," she says, opening her eyes and glaring at him as she protectively curls the mug closer to her.
"It's the Skywalker fortune that gives you paychecks in the first place," he shoots back. "And you're the brat who refuses additional help outside of what the Resistance pays you."
"Because I'm not a charity case, Solo," she says, and then a bit more frantically: "Don't you dare throw it out," as he dangles the plastic container over her garbage.
Luke arrives, then, and he is her saving grace because Ben shoots a disgusted glance at the instant coffee before gingerly placing it back on the counter instead of the trash can.
Her mentor's arrival makes her feel a bit under-prepared for hosting guests, and she moves to the pantry after setting down her mug far, far away from Ben Solo. "I don't have much to entertain you guys with," she says as she rummages through the shelves for some kind of snack for them to munch on. "But... Ah! Here we go." In her stash of sugar-filled treats, she's uncovered an unopened carton of Oreos. It will have to do.
Ben accepts the package with a sarcastic, "Thank you, oh gracious host," and Rey manages to refrain from smacking him in the head.
Instead, she grabs a few precious cookies from her treacherous partner's grasp, and motions for Luke to sit at her mismatched dining table and chairs.
"I've never been more grateful that you both have a large age difference," Luke says as he takes a seat. "I don't think my sanity could have taken it if I had to train the two of you simultaneously."
Although she knows it's a joke, Rey can't help but flush at the words. "I was a flawless student," she says lightly, raising her voice to drown out Ben's disbelieving snort. "And I bet Ben was awful."
"He really was," Luke agrees, as though his nephew isn't in the room, and she's grateful that her mentor acknowledges how much of a brat Ben Solo can be.
Luke and Ben set to bickering, which is mostly enjoyable to watch considering the fact that Rey knows that Luke takes no shit from any member of the Organa-Solo family. She lets them throw jabs as she pulls apart an Oreo and licks at the cream filling, but then Ben's clenching his fists in frustration and looking like he wants to storm out of her apartment, so she speaks up.
"Someone was following me yesterday," she says to get them all back on-topic, and their attention snaps to her. Luke's never been too successful at hiding his concern for her, and she can see his small smile drop after she speaks. "Oh, stop. You both know that I can handle myself. A redheaded, tall vamp trailed me yesterday after I met with Leia at Maz's, and did this whole mysterious threat thing."
"Do you think he saw you come out of the Cantina?" Ben always gets a bit defensive when his mom plays into things, and she reluctantly moves to placate him. After all, she'd die for Leia too, and it isn't worth irritating him when he's expressing rare worry.
"Mm, I didn't feel him following me until I was a good mile or so away. Everything's so close together downtown, too, so I could have been coming from anywhere."
"What did he say?" Luke asks, and she can see that Ben's paying her words close attention, now.
"You know how cryptic the bastards are. Something like, 'Tread carefully, or else.'" Both Luke and Ben look much too serious for what really was a fairly simplistic vamp encounter, and she raises her hands to wiggle her fingers at them an attempt to lighten the mood. "Said my name, too, so he obviously knows who I am."
Ben sucks in a breath. "How could he know that? Where'd you screw up?"
"First of all," she says, pinning him down with a glower, "I did nothing to screw up. Second of all, how dare you assume a breach in security is automatically a fault of my own?"
"Rey," Luke says, and she backs down only for his sake. "You're on the same side, remember?"
"Doesn't feel like it when I'm being accused of being sloppy," she mutters, jerking out of her chair to retrieve her now-cooled mug of coffee.
She didn't really think it possible for a thirty-year-old man to sulkily eat an Oreo cookie, but the image is displayed in front of her as Ben grabs a few from the plastic tray.
"You're not exactly one of the more prolific members of our organization," Luke says, probably in an attempt to placate her. "I think what Ben's suggesting is that it's peculiar for a leak about to you take place at all."
Well, that's a much more diplomatic way of putting it. And a slightly more terrifying one, considering the fact that confidential information about the Resistance is warded heavily with magic and nearly impenetrable.
If someone's doing their research on her, then they've been very good at covering their tracks.
"What'd you call me for anyway, Solo?" she asks, mostly to distract herself from the idea of being spied on in an undetectable way.
"I think I've honed in on a nest location," he says after a moment, adjusting to the shift in topic. "You've been tailing some of the homeless vampires, but I managed to track a newborn somewhere that reeked of vamp stench."
"You think it's one of Hux's?"
"Covens are rare around here because of the Resistance strongholds," Rey reasons, and it does make sense. If there's a nest of vampires somewhere close by, chances are it has something to do with the missing teenagers.
"The two of you should scout it out, then," Luke decides. "Do not engage, but go see what's going on. Ben, are you alright to prepare the necessary spells, or should I ask Leia to assist you?"
"I can do it on my own, uncle," Ben says, almost a bit petulantly.
Luke smiles at him fondly. "Of course. I was merely asking."
"Give me a day or two to recover," Rey says, interrupting what is probably some weird Skywalker familial moment. "Someone woke me up when they knew I had just finished a night of hunting, and I need more sleep than you mages do, anyway."
Ben looks like he's about to snark at her about a perceived weakness, but Luke casts him a sharp look and he wisely keeps his mouth shut.
"Two days," Luke agrees, before pushing away from the table and standing. Ben does the same, but not before grabbing a few more Oreos. Rey pretends she doesn't see it. "We'll leave you to it. Get some rest."
The mages leave shortly after, and Rey slouches in her chair after they're gone, considering the conversation.
They've only been on the case for about a month, now, and where Luke appeared to be at a standstill, Rey and Ben are uncovering more about the plot with every day that passes.
It almost seems too easy. She's not so unseasoned as to shove down any instinctual feelings, and Rey feels a distinct sense of uneasiness in regard to the mission.
Ben does recon on the potential hideout and Rey takes point, protecting him as he casts detection spells. They're in the middle of a forest, thankfully with the sun high in the sky, and almost out of her line of vision she sees the magicked shroud that is his current target.
To her trained eyes, she can pick out the seam of magic that cleverly disguises the vampire's hideaway. She knows that, to an ordinary human, it would just seem like a steep rock face, and if nothing else she's grateful that Ben was the one to track the newborn through the forest. She might've missed it if she didn't know what to look for.
Ben looks much more peaceful and at ease when he's not trying to communicate with a member of the human race. He's surrounded by his element as the magic sends careful tendrils toward the hideout, and Rey sneaks a look at the calm, emotionless visage of his closed eyes and relaxed lips.
Maybe it wouldn't be so hard to get along with him if he was always this tranquil, but wishing for impossibilities does her no favors.
They're a safe distance away from the vamp nest, and protected by the sunlight, and while Rey will not let down her guard when her partner's in a vulnerable position, she does allow herself the luxury of resting against a nearby tree as he performs his spells.
A few days later, Ben wakes her up with a loud knock on her flimsy apartment door. The harshness of winter has set in full force, and her heater is pushing warm air into the room as she stomps to wrench it open, annoyed.
"We're going to the hideout," he says bluntly, stepping past her as soon as she opens the door.
"Sanctioned by who?" she asks, stifling a yawn. It's only after he stands impatiently in her tiny living room that she realizes he means now, and she looks down at the thin tank top and worn boxers she's wearing.
"By me," he replies a bit flippantly. "They triggered the spell I cast before we left last time. Significant movement means they may have found out we discovered them, and we've got to move quickly if we want to catch them off-guard."
Rey doesn't miss the way he didn't say anything about Luke or Leia, but keeps her mouth shut. She has to believe that he's responsible enough not to march them directly to their deaths, and he is the leader of the two of them, after all.
Holding up a palm, she says, "Five minutes," and heads into her room to prepare.
An hour later finds them trekking through fresh snowfall. It is way too cold to be meandering through the snow at six in the evening, and Rey has no qualms whatsoever about informing Ben of it. Several times.
She can almost see the aura of annoyance surrounding him, and decides to switch it up as she bundles herself up tighter in her jacket.
"I can't believe his base is a cave," Rey grumbles disbelievingly as they move on foot through the snow-filled forest. "It's positively neanderthal."
"You'd be surprised at how easily things can deceive you," he says, and because it's not a sarcastic or rude retort, she doesn't respond.
She's trying not to think of how bad of an idea it is to go this far into vamp territory unsanctioned by their superiors. Ben seems harried and rushed, and she knows it must be the magic he laid over the vamp hideout that's communicating with him and has him so on-edge.
Rey presses her fingers against the scabbard of the sword resting against her hip. She's wicked with her sword, although it's much more difficult to conceal than her silver dirks and daggers, and she's glad that she opted to bring the larger weapon with her rather than rely on smaller ones.
The air is tangy with the humming presence of magic as they arrive at the mouth of the cave, and she steels herself for battle. They step inside, past the illusionary barrier, and somehow, it's chillier inside than it was in the crisp forest air.
Things go to shit fairly quickly after that.
They're well into the carved-out tunnels of Hux's nest without spotting a single living (or Undead) soul when the path diverges in two separate directions.
"No," she says immediately, because Ben's already opening his mouth and pointing toward one of the darkened corridors. "We're not splitting up."
"I'm your senior," he says, and she can tell his jaw is clenched by how he grates the words out. "And in charge of this operation, if you cannot recall."
She's better at combat than he is, but they work better as a team. Mages require time to cast offensive spells, and while she knows Luke would never allow his nephew to rely only on magic in the heat of a battle, splitting up is not a wise option.
It comes down to committing treason or letting him figure out how bad of a judgment call he's making, and Rey hefts the comforting weight of her sword onto her shoulder. "Yes, sir," she says caustically, even as a niggling sense of foreboding worms its way into her consciousness.
"I've got the tracking spell still on you," he says, and then, "And if you're hurt, it'll protect you. Nothing too major, but it might heal a wound or mend a bone if need be."
"Of course it wasn't just a tracking spell," Rey spits. It feels wrong, even knowing that the spell was cast in an effort to protect her. She doesn't need his help, or she'd fucking ask for it.
Ben just looks at her warily before he heads down his own path, and she's reluctantly pleased to see that he has unsheathed his own sword before leaving her to her own route. At least he's taking it seriously.
Her way down the fork in the cave leads her to the fledgling barracks, and she doesn't come across a single vamp that's strong enough to be Brendol Hux. They're all weak newborns, untrained in battle and unsure of their own physical limits, and she slays them relentless with little thought. If she weren't such a seasoned hunter, it would pain her to cut down the very same teenagers that Luke had been searching for, but they've all been tainted by the infection of the Undead. Turning a human into a vampire is no easy task, and more often than not it warps minds radically until they've become monsters that need to be taken down as swiftly as possible.
Despite her annoyance at Ben's meddling spell, she is thankful for it. A clever vamp had managed to land a good hit directly into her solar plexus, and although he died a quick, painful death, she had felt the bones crack under the pressure of his outstretched hand.
Ben's spell tingles as it melds the bones back together, but it's effective, and she spares the thought to begrudgingly thank him after she kills him for sending her into this field of landmines.
A few well-timed exploding silver grenades and sword slices later, she's cleared the living quarters of the vamps. Rey doubles back down the slightly dank corridor to find where Ben split onto his own path, and the sharp pain of her broken ribs resides the longer she walks down the path.
She finds him covered in the ashes of their prey, leaning heavily against a doorframe.
"Shit, Ben," she curses as she moves to support him. A quick sweep of the room indicates no immediate threat, and his weight is heavy as he leans against her.
"Hux is dead," Ben grits out, pressing a hand to his neck as he breathes raggedly. "As are his fledglings."
Rey's never found it this difficult to focus before. It's fairly clear that Ben's cleaned house: the hideout of Brendol Hux is littered with the remains of vampires, and they're the only living creatures left. But Ben looks – wobbly, for lack of a better word, and she's never seen him so vulnerable before. His typically cocky facade is cemented in her mind, and it's as if the illusion has been shattered.
"Are you okay?" she asks, and it's obviously a stupid question, because he huffs a breath of laughter against her neck as she maneuvers him into a better position.
Rey thinks better of trying to half-carry him out of the cave after he doesn't respond, and swallows down the panic as she carefully lays him down on the stone floor. With dread, she realizes that her repositioning of him has revealed the fact that he's been bitten. Blood loss from vamps is deadly more often than not, and shit.
She doesn't like Ben, of course, but he's Leia's son and Luke's nephew and her fucking partner at the moment, and she doesn't want him dead. It's also not the first time she's been on a mission for the Resistance and had things go sour, and she needs to get her head in the fucking game or else Ben's in more danger than he needs to be in.
"Okay," she says, more to herself than him. "Okay."
Setting to business, Rey slips a hand into Ben's pockets to search for his Tokens. Withdrawing a small bone and a golden ring, she murmurs the incantations he'd taught her earlier on their walk, and is satisfied by the glow of the small objects before they dissolve entirely in her hands.
Physical manifestations of spells only hold their form until they are summoned, and Ben inhales loudly as the dust from his Tokens swirl in the air and envelop him in a subtle green glow.
"Rey – "
"Shut up, Ben," she hisses. "Your reserve spells should stabilize you until we can make it to a hospital."
"Rey."
"You just need a transfusion, stop talking and wasting your energy – "
"Rey."
Something in the tone of his voice makes her stop, and she glares down at him. He's a fucking idiot, is what he is, but the glow settles around him and solidifies in the slightest bit – she wouldn't have noticed if not for the fact that she's paying excruciatingly detailed attention to him right now – and she purses her lips.
"Hux didn't bite me," he says. Rey can feel her heart thudding against her ribcage, and she wants to yell at him, Obviously, a single vamp couldn't have drained you this quickly, but then he's grasping at her arm with a shaking, blood-slicked hand.
"What – "
"It was an Elder," he says, voice almost a sigh, and she feels herself go still. Ben's pale from the blood loss, and Rey feels sick as her eyes fix on the still-oozing puncture wounds that stand out starkly against his neck.
Alright, fuck stakeouts. This is the worst fucking part of the job.
The Resistance has laws that all hunters must abide by. They were put into place centuries ago, and exist for good reason, but Rey has always considered herself lucky that she was never put into a position where invoking the laws was necessary.
Her luck has definitely run out.
Elder vampires are almost nonexistent, born in vampirism rather than being turned, and the presence of one indicates a much more serious threat than they'd originally thought.
"We underestimated Hux," Ben affirms, and even through the translucent green aura surrounding him, attempting to fight off the infection, Rey can see he's dying. His breaths come faster, shorter, and urgently she finds him pressing something cold and metal into her hand. "He wasn't a leader, just an underling. Tell Luke it's the First Order, okay?"
He's talking too much, Rey thinks through the odd haze that's settled in her mind. It's common sense when you're injured: conserve your energy, wait for a savior, don't move. Your body's already working in overtime, there's no reason to stress it unduly –
"I need you to do it," Ben says, and Rey swallows around the sudden lump in her throat.
She opens her mouth to speak, to deny him, but the words don't come. Instead she stares down at him, at the near-white pallor of his skin that contrasts with the grey ash that he's covered in, and lets out a high, desperate noise.
"Do it," he growls at her, and then his teeth snap shut as he starts to convulse. It's one of the first steps toward transformation, she knows.
Rey closes her eyes and does what is necessary.
