Back on landfall, Ben pouted cross-legged on his twin bed with Buzz Lightyear covers—a popular children's program in the Republic. His mother kept his room the same as it had been when he'd left for training, like a shrine, like he'd died.

His vox-com vibrated on his pillow. Text message.

"Yuu. Owt side."

What the hell?

"Who is this?" Ben messaged back.

"AUUrr."

"Chewie? Are you TEXTING me?!"

Chewie, the greatest tech-savant in the Galaxy when it came to sabotaging war machines and jerry-rigging a hyperdrive in the middle of a shoot-out, but with toys like video games and StarNet chats, he was as clueless as Ben's dad.

Ben ran out of his room to the roof, as Mom and Dad were downstairs with practically the entire Republican Guard. Double-take to make sure no one was taking a smoke-break, and he Force-Jumped down to the back lawn. He found the big furry co-pilot peeking out from behind a tool shed.

"Chewie! What are you doing?" Ben threw his hands out, but Chewie shushed him in a panicked whine. After composing himself, he dropped a Death Star keychain in Ben's hand—the keys to the Falcon.

Ben's eyes were a Milky Way of awe.

"But why? My Dad's already irate. He's your best mate. Why are you going against him to help me be a reckless teenager?"

Chewie gave him a knowing look, and said nothing, while Ben lit up in prophetic revelation.

"Destiny."

The wookie threw the kid a good luck smirk, and Ben took off prowling like a burglar toward the central detention facility.

In cell block two, Finn sat on a bench behind bars with his head in his hands. The bailiff reclined on a swivel chair, until a rumbling sound at the other end of the unit got his attention. He stood to investigate, but a quick hand shot to the base of his skull in gripping pressure. Ben cupped the struggling guard's neck until he passed out in harmless sleep. That actually hadn't been a Force ability, but a bit of Jeet Kun Do his Master taught him from the wayward Enclave era.

Fin shot to his feet as Ben grabbed the keys.

"Ben! What are you—"

"Come on, bro. We've got a war to win."

They stole out into the city streets of Endymion, paved with piezoelectric firestones that emanated a magnetic field for hover-sprinters. Spires of crystal and alabaster spanned the skyline's azimuth, creating a noctilescent stratosphere of chromospheric glass above the port. That piece of junk Falcon was docked in the most elaborate holding container.

They bypassed the main lock with a rainbow table hack, and swept past the fleet manager's quarters like space mice. A click on Ben's keychain and the Falcon beeped twice, aft light flickering on and off. They ran up the on-ramp into the cockpit. No time for a systems check. Take off.

By the time security personnel scrambled outside, and radar technicians alerted Air Traffic Control, the Falcon and crew were already at Mach 3 into the stratosphere.

The computer locked on the largest non-land mass in near space and directed the nav straight there. The Finalizer leered like an unholy primarch awaiting Judgement Day in silent absolution. It didn't take long for a stellar tractor beam to lock onto the Falcon and reel her in like Gungar bait.

Flight systems were overridden, emergency backup generators shorted out, and every alarm on board screamed like death was upon them. In a slow tow of transcranial magnetism, the Falcon was pulled against her will into the mouth of the mothership.

But outside the Finalizer's receiving bay, exposed to the void of deep space, two survival suits made their way along the outer paneling hand-over-hand in zero-grav.

"Decoy? You sly dog!" Fin ribbed as he crawled along the battle cruiser's exterior beside Ben.

"They'll be scanning that thing for hours, and now we've got a way out when it hits the fan."

"I don't get it. How are we not getting sucked in by the tractor beam with these space suits?"

"3D printed. We're golden!"

They ducked into a salvage hatch that lead to a service airlock. Finn had done more than enough sanitation detail as a Stormtrooper. He knew the access codes like the alphabet.

Once through the droid loading deck, they stripped the suits and swiped a side-blaster from a maintenance footlocker. Through janitorial quarters and salvage recycling bays, they snuck their way past non-sentient robotic sentries into the organic wings of the Finalizer and general population, which was where Search and Rescue got interesting.

Fin knew the layout enough to get them around byways where troops would be likely to tread. The Officer's Wing would be deserted around meal time. Never count on higher-ups to work harder than they had to. One exception stopped them dead in their tracks, making them jump behind a trash canister.

Commander Phasma Galatea, the bloody harbinger of war, the left hand of death herself strode down the axis corridor toward Officer's Quarters. She'd already turned in her phaser and blaster rifle, and her personal sidearm would be hidden in her cabin. But right now, she was a walking slaver's easy-catch.

They leapt from the canister grabbing her.

"Hold up, sister! There's been a change in the Chain of Command."

Fin jammed the blaster right up against the underside of her helmet's chin.

"That's right. I'm the boss now. I'm Big Papa. Me—"

"Easy Fin," Ben warned.

A swift thrust hit Fin in the solar plexus as a hand wretched the blaster away. Fin didn't know how, but he found himself wrist-locked and sailing back into Ben. They both landed flopped on the floor with the Commander of the First Order at point blank range and pissed.

"Are you here to kill Starkiller?" she demanded, pistol trained on them in an almost psychic precision.

"Ah, pfft, whah?" Fin stammered. "Um, nnnnn—"

"Yes," answered Ben. Fin choked on his tongue.

The pistol came up, and the Commander undid the seal on her uniform, removing her helmet to reveal citrine-blue eyes over olive skin and hair dark as a black hole. One eye was crossed with heterochromic ice-markings. Cursed.

"Then follow me. I will help you."

She started down the empty corridor with conviction as Ben and Fin scrambled after her in a confused heap. She talked as she walked.

"Starkiller is universes more vicious than his father, and uninhibited by health. He seeks to destroy the philosophy of Free Will. He must be stopped."

Ben couldn't believe their luck.

"No offense, Commander, but what's it to you? You're high-ranking and nothing can touch you, and you don't seem like the altruistic type."

"Galen Marek saved my life in combat, when I was first kidnapped into the Order. I fell in love with him and vowed to serve him unquestioningly. I kept my oath when he attacked my home world. He lead me all the way across the Galaxy, through unforetold wars and countless genocides, forced my hand with the promise of his heart. I climbed all the way through the elite ranks of Stormtroopers, destroyed men who would deny me on my sex, defended legions and bled for the rank of Commander, all to get him to notice me. After all I have done and sacrificed for him, he cares nothing for me, or anyone. His only aim is to use people. I swear on my murdered tribe, on the name of Skywalker, his family name, I will kill him myself."

"Well, that's…inspirational."

She lead them down secret passages requiring codes that took a full minute to input (and she had them all memorized). Their anxiety spiked when Fin didn't recognize what part of the ship they were in. Was she leading them into some forsaken part of the hull where they wouldn't even be able to blast their way out of?

She brought them up through a door straight into Operations. Technicians at computer panels crunching numbers didn't even look up. Fin and Ben held their breaths like giant Kryat lizards ambling through the room while everyone's attention was diverted. .

She hit the door for a side radar room and lead them in to meet the tech at the coms; a little scrub with scraggly hair, a long face and a nose that could poke someone's eye out. He was wearing a fedora.

"This is Matt, the Radar Tech."

"I was supposed to have a bigger part in this story."

"Shut up, Matt!" she slapped him upside the head.

"We have to find Rey. Can you pull up the live feeds?" Ben asked.

"The prisoner. She'll be on the detention level. Special Cell 1."

Matt pulled up the viewfield with a very pouty look on his face.

Nothing.

"Execution Wing 1," Phasma ordered. Still nothing.

"Matt, bring up the execution logs for today's date."

"They keep logs for that heck?"

"For disposing of clones," Fin clarified. Ben's face turned a subtle shade greener.

"No record of her. Your girl is alive. And here somewhere, free."

"After we find her, we need to blow the ship, else they'll come after us for dinner and the Republic as an entrée."

Matt made the most peculiar face up at them.

"I'll have you know, because you obviously don't know already, that your plans are asinine. This ship is indestructible."

"Famous last words," said Fin.

"Aight, where's the trench to the proton-torpedo pad? I have to hijack a Tie Fighter to skirt the surface and blow the reactor."

"Why in the living hell would you think of doing that?"

"Well that's how it worked last time, and the time before that, and the time before…"

"This battle station is the original Apocalypse-Class Destroyer," Phasma informed them. "Drop sticky bombs down the poop-shoot all you want, you'll short out some circuit boards. There's only one weapon powerful enough to destroy this ship, and that's this ship. We'd need to get the big gun to fire back on itself somehow, and hell if anyone can figure out how."

Ben and Fin shot each other wide-eyed gazes. Phasma looked at them imploring as an evil grin crept across Ben's face.

"Set coordinates for the Hell Nebula."

But Matt coughed up a lung.

"No way! Do you think I'm stupid? Is that what you think? You do, don't you! I will not be aboard this vessel when it self-destructs."

"Matt, shut the hell—"

"Do it and head to the Falcon. We'll take you both with us. Deal?"

"Wait a minute," Fin stopped Ben, "how do we know she won't alert the whole station to us?"

"She won't. I can feel it."

"Man she's been hipped to the most powerful Sith Lord in creation. She can fool an acolyte like drinking tea."

At that, Phasma pulled a chain with a barcode from around her neck and held it out to Ben.

"This keycard will open any door in the Finalizer, and by the way, Jedi, Galen Merek is left-handed."

Ben took the card and waved it over the door keypad, which slid it open instantaneously. Fin pickpocketed his blaster pistol back from the Commander as he ran through, while Ben eyed her with a mischievous glint.

"I knew you weren't lying."

Something told them he didn't really.

They used the keycard to access the secret tunnels, all droid serviceways, which would explain why no one used them. Down in the belly of the Finalizer, where wires and pipelines tangled like the intestine of a mechanical dragon, they wandered aimlessly while keeping an eye out for service hatch openings to the surface.

Now without a heading, Ben was Force-scanning, using his mind's eye to sense Force-sensitive lifeforms. Without warning at an intersection of five crossways, Ben halted.

"Come on, man, wake up," Fin tapped him, but Ben's face was a blank stare, eyes like laser beams ahead.

"Hey, do me a favor? Take the lee side of this wing, do a full sweep and head back to the Falcon, but whatever happens, don't come back through this way, alright?"

"Now wait a minute—"

He put his hand on Fin's shoulder.

"If you're my bro, and you care about me, you'll do this for me."

Hesitation, an urge to argue. Fin swallowed it, not knowing why, and nodded. He took off to follow Ben's directions. There had been no deception, Ben hadn't used any Jedi mind tricks, Fin had just…done it.

Ben stayed there alone in the corridor for a long moment, staring into the door ahead like the depths of deep space. Something told him he had always been meant to walk through it, and that everything he'd learned in life up was for now.

An affirming breath, he waved his keycard over the access panel and entered with his heart beating in his ears.

There stood a man like a midnight sun, draped in robes of vantablack and rouge, a carnelian Lightsaber in hand. Starkiller loomed an embodiment of Hyperion, a being of carnal reverence and dark beauty. His eyes were starlit aphelion, watching, awaiting his prey.

Ben approached like an acolyte to an altar, something final coming over him with each step. A feeling of majestic awe dulled his senses, but he was aware of a Sith Lord's power over the mind. A meditative technique cleared the fog as he willed his way forward, a singular fluid concept flowing through him like life itself.

Destiny.

With an understood agreement between foes, he eased his own saber from his belt, striking it from a respectful distance against the rudy backdrop of machine lights and reflective titanium glare. A deep breath, a still moment, time froze on its axis.

They rushed each other akin to planets exploding, whirling whips of crashing fraylight bashing off their blades. They sheered in monumental arcs of pulsating fire as they jockeyed for position. While Ben fought with two hands on his hilt, Starkiller fought with one.

"So that's why you left. He did abandon you."

A feral slash knocked Starkiller's lightsaber up, but the taunting persisted.

"It's not the first time he's turned on his family."

Ben crash-locked up with Starkiller's blade, crossing their searing beams of razorlight in a scatterheart star. The Sith Lord flicked his wrist, circling the acolyte's saber up and away. As Ben swiped back, Starkiller whipped him off his attack lines with minimal effort as if he were instructing the boy, a resonating tap, tap, tap against Ben's sword.

"You're going to let him get away with that?"

Ben diverolled away from a down-slash and recovered in low-guard. Oil cloak furling like black wings, the Sith Lord flowed across the ground to bash-shatter Ben's block in a fulminating spiral-slash, chopping down on Ben's upslice like swinging an axe that knocked the young acolyte to a knee.

"You'll always be huddled in that cave, Young One, naked and alone. Shouldn't he be there instead?"

Ben rushed in fragmenting slices, slitting cuts like scorpion tails. But his anger grew, beginning to get the best of him, beginning to throw him off.

"Does your father know what he did to you?"

Another slash, another rebuff. Whirls of crimson sheerlight traced leylines like blood splatters in the dark.

"Give him up. He's long since given up on you."

Starkiller drove him back toward the faunt, a peripheral drop into the engine mechanisms of the deeper machine. In a desperate Force Jump, Ben back-somersaulted up to a catwalk above. A deep breath, sweat soaking the collarline of his acolyte's tunic, he peered down onto his stoic adversary with eyes of innocence.

Do we really have to do this?

He knew Starkiller couldn't hear him. His defense against a mere acolyte's thoughts was far too high, walled off behind a calloused steel heart. Starkiller strode forth in encroaching darkness, snuffing out Ben's ephemeral light.

"Revenge is not the way of the Jedi, but it's not revenge, it's justice."

A swirling lightsaber throw hurled up at Ben, who ducked it as it sliced a support cable. The catwalk snapped, careening to the floor as Ben tumbled off. The saber returned to its master's hand to meet Ben in a whirling tirade of feyslices at ground-level. Starkiller moved in shadows so fast and fluid that Ben couldn't even see him, falling back on blind defensive sword-forms from his training. His vision blurred, lungs burning in adrenaline-edged exertion, he resorted to running back to catch his breath. A defensive about-face, eyes whirling in exhaustion, saw the Sith Lord unmoving. Starkiller did not pursue him.

Instead, the Master of the Finalizer stood at bay, weapon down and brow unfurled. He watched Ben recover himself, drenched in a rage of sweat that reeked of fear and despair.

"It wasn't your fault, son."

Ben stood shaking, his lightsaber trembling in hand. As Starkiller approached, he prepared to attack, mustering all his remaining strength and courage. But he faltered, in the face of his adversary he lowered his weapon, letting his head sink down with a resounding sigh. A gloved hand fell like a flower upon his shoulder.

"Let's make him pay…together."

Ben's eyes rose to the dark Sith, and found only compassion staring back at him.

But at that moment, Fin and Phasma ran through the doorway, a geo-locator tracking her keycard. She wasn't as honest as she claimed. Fin snatched the lightsaber from his own belt, rushing forward.

"Snap out of it, Ben!"

A blue line screamed toward Starkiller, who whipped around smashing it away. Phasma dropped into combat stance, firing her plasma rifle full auto at Starkiller, who deflected the beams telekinetically. A huge powerslash threw Fin back into Phasma, sending them toppling across the cleated ground.

Ben came to in a whirl of momentary psychosis, crashing down on Starkiller's blade in monumental rage-slashes. But mercy was gone. Starkiller twirled his saber in a phenomenal arc that caught Ben's weapon between the hilt and crystal, smashing the resonator and destroying the blade. He shoulder-checked Ben back into his friends, and all three lie sprawled on the floor like idiots.

Starkiller threw out his hand to summon the legendary lightsaber at Fin's feet. The weapon flew from the ground, but not to Starkiller's hand. It sailed past him to another held aloft behind.

Rey stood at the entrance to their impromptu arena, the lightsaber of legacy flying to her grasp. Ben and his friends sat up with awe-filled eyes, and a deep, immaculate glow lit up Ben's face.

"I knew it!" he whispered.

Rey stood tall in the dull temporal light, bathed in an aural hue of sacred technology. Her lightsaber struck on her mental command, casting a parhelion umbra around her silhouette like a halo.

Starkiller stood in momentary dissonance before striding to meet her as she rushed to meet him unafraid.

A phenomenal slash from both blades met in a stratovariant cross, matched in terse rage with sparks flown. She tapped his blade in quick wisps to match his flurry. He was strong but Rey was fast on delicate feet, floating to his weak spots like some otherworldly energy guided her. Starkiller smiled for the honor.

He slashed down as she spun away into her own chop, he arced up just in time. But enough was enough. A swift kick to her torso knocked her down, her blade receding.

Ben snatched his broken lightsaber leaping up to Rey's aid as Fin called after him.

"Ben, you'll be killed!"

"I DON'T CARE!"

He struck his lightsaber for all that was dear in life. It crashed against Starkiller's blade in a searing, scorching, jagged line of frayfractal lightning, screaming in a static flareon with two laser rays jutting from the hilt like crossguards.

Ben's eyes flew wide, as did Starkiller's.

"Whoa…cool!"

The Greatsaber sheered in a crescent sheen, throwing Starkiller back. Ben stood strong with an evil gleam of victory in his eye, and Rey stepped up by his side. With her own pulsating cyan blade, together they rushed the Sith Lord.

Ben upslashed as Rey downslashed, Starkiller stammering to hit both blades in succession. Ben remembered what Phasma had told him about Starkiller being left-handed, and swept behind to his right side gaining the advantage. Starkiller whipped his saber down over his back to block, then back over his shoulder to deflect Rey. His cerebral swipe skirted Rey off balance, and he flew around bash-checking Ben back. As he whirled back to deflect a high-bash, a low-shot met him instead.

Rey's blade stabbed straight through his torso, freezing him where he stood. A look of beguiled horror crossed his face as he fell to his knees. Ben rushed in a bloody rage with saber raised for the finishing kill, but Rey whipped her blade up crossing with his.

Ben shot her a wild look, but in her own eyes was only worry. She shook her head from behind the scorch of laser edges, and the realization dawned. She'd just saved Ben's life.

It was so easy to fall.

Alarms blared all through the hull. They all four raced out with Phasma leading the way topside as she knew the ship like field-stripping her weapon. They ran straight through maingate, as everyone was too busy running to battle stations and all who did try to question were outranked and scratching their heads anyway.

The Falcon waited like a perfectly parked limousine right in the wide-open hangarbay and pre-prepped for liftoff due to being powered on by scanning. They all four barreled for the onramp, but a voice in Rey's mind stopped her at the bottom.

Come back, Revan.

"Rey! Come on!"

Ben and Fin called to her and she tore up after them. Matt waited for them in the cockpit as they shoved him out of the way.

"You disabled the tractor beam, right?"

"Yes. Please don't yell at me anymore."

The Falcon pulled in her landing gear and rose for takeoff, but no one even raised an alert. They were all clamoring to their own Tie-Fighters flying in the other direction.

Rey gazed long out into the void of space as the Falcon tore away from the Finalizer, the mournful voice of Galen Merek whispering in her heart.

The True Way. It's you.