III

Mornings are hardest. There's never enough sleep to go around, or space even for the fifty Resistance members who call the Falcon home. If they all lay down at once, the hall would be lined with bodies, each one tripping over the other's nightmares.

So some work, tinkering with the ship's system until she runs cleaner than she ever has. Others meet in the medical bay, planning their next move. Some make the constant lightspeed adjustments to throw the First Order off their trail.

The tiny mess on the Falcon is crammed with crates of freeze-dried, ready-pack food, bartered quickly from the nearest outpost. It's nauseating, not worth lingering over; most people duck in, grab something—from spiced renna-hen to noodles in fermented bean sauce—and eat in corners with their friends. Very few actually bother to squeeze around the table in the mess, but Rey is one of them.

Finn laughs at Poe's joke, jostling Rey's arm so her tube of egg-paste nearly shoots up her nose. Rose giggles and then remembers she's sitting across from a hero of the Resistance. Her cheeks tremble with the effort of holding in her laughter as Rey scrapes gluey egg-paste out of her nostril.

"Go on, before you explode," Rey chuckles herself, wiping her dirty finger on Finn's jacket. He takes her glass of water and starts scrubbing off the stain.

"Hey!" he cries, and Rose stamps her feet and laughs until there are tears in her eyes and the table shakes too.

"All those grease spots and you're worried about some egg? It's not a collector's item, Finn," Poe grins.

Finn pouts. "I like this jacket."

Rey leans her head against his shoulder; his whole body relaxes. "Sorry."

He smiles down at her, then pulls a comical, repulsed face. "You've still got some up your nose."

"Kriff!" she mutters, scraping away again. Laughter bubbles up, ringing through the cloud of fear and exhaustion that fills the Falcon like swamp-fog. That fog blocks everything out, blots friendly faces and hazes everything in a stifling shade of gray. With so much doubt, so much uncertainty, it's hard to cling to the moment, to the friends that remain.

Rey feels her heart swell. Despite everything she's lost, she has been so lucky. So many on the Falcon have lost more family and friends in recent months than she has ever known. Rose still cries sometimes, holding her necklace in her hand like the crushed body of a songbird. Poe's grin, once so frequent, flashes like rare winter lightning, quick and fading before it warms.

Rey leans back against Finn. He's like her; even though their present is grim, it's still brighter than anything they've known before. His smile is still gentle and sweet.

"You okay?" he murmurs, into her hair. The hair that she's kept loose ever since—

No. Thoughts of the past summon—no. She needs to keep all that locked away until she physically can't. If he can catch her during her waking hours too, she'll go out of her mind.

"I think so. I heard we're landing today?"

"Yeah. I'm not even sure where. Leia's keeping things to herself, recently."

"Probably best," Rey doesn't want to know. Anything in her head isn't safe; she's pretty sure Ren hasn't taken anything from her that matters, but he's so determined, so powerful...she can't be sure. The less she knows about Leia's ultimate plans, the better.

"Mmm," Poe swallows the last of his fried toast, "speaking of Leia, she said she wants to speak to you."

Her heart stops. "Oh?"

"Yeah. Didn't say what about, but I can guess," his jaw clenches.

No one speaks. Then, timidly, Rose whispers:

"Um, what?"

"Her son," Poe spits, hiding his frown behind his mug, "The new Supreme Leader of the First Order. Who, if our intel is right, is more unhinged than usual."

"Oh," Rose swallows. "What—what did you think, Rey? You were with him, right? Not," there's panic in her voice, "with him, I mean, but—"

She doesn't want to think about this, about him, about any of it. And she certainly doesn't want to talk to Leia. He's prowling, he feels her thoughts drifting towards him; there's only ever a thin sheet of glass between them, fine as crystal, and if he gets too close he'll smash it and there will be nothing, no distance between them, no space to breathe—

"You don't need to tell us anything," Finn's warm hand anchors her to the moment, and drives cold, dark thoughts away. He squeezes; she returns the pressure until he winces. "But maybe, don't break my fingers?"

Rey laughs and there are a few tears behind the sound. "Sorry. I just," she meets Rose's eyes across the table, "really don't want to think about him right now."

"No, yeah, don't," her words tumble over themselves in her effort to agree. "But...what are you going to tell General Leia?"

"I have no idea."