Love and Vengeance by BynWho
Chapter 13 – A Long, Dark Teatime of the Soul
Day 6. Endeavor. Unknown Regions.
Abby was insane. That would explain everything. In reality, she was back on Hosnian Prime and everything was fine. Her family were still alive. Poe had brought her back home after the fall of the First Order and had stayed, making a home for himself. He had asked Abby to marry him and she and Sage moved into his apartment, not but a few blocks from her parents' home. He taught at the flight school in Republic City while she had her own practice at the hospital. The three of them lived in utter bliss; the last few years were nothing but a bad dream. She was sure of it.
Abby woke from her peaceful slumber when alarms started going off in the cockpit. The disappointment she felt when she realized that this was actually her reality was soul crushing. She had been happy in her dream. Now, though, she faced a certain death. Checking the readouts, she saw that she had better quickly make adjustments to the engine power or she will lose the engines altogether. She ran to the engine arrays only to find that she was too late. The Endeavor was almost dead. Time for plan B.
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Abby was growing tired and weak. The last of her rations had been eaten and her water supply was dangerously low. To top it off, it looked like the life support system had maybe a half a day left, then it would get intolerably cold and hard to breathe. She made her way to the cockpit to send another message out into space. The signal wasn't strong enough to send the previous messages much farther than the local uninhabited system. She didn't even know if anyone would hear her this time, but she wasn't going to give up. She boosted the signal of her distress beacon and piggybacked her message off of it. Unfortunately, the power to do this cost several hours of life support. With the power in the ship fading, this was probably the last plea she could make, so she'd better make it count.
"Poe," she started, her voice scratchy. She cleared her throat and tried again, "Poe, I don't know if you'll ever hear this. Hell, I don't even know if I'll ever see you again." She held in tears. "Force help me, I don't know if anyone will hear this. But I wanted... I... I wanted to say that I'm sorry. I know that you've been angry at me for a long time. And the truth is... the truth is I've been angry with me too."
The tears she tried to hold back flowed freely now. She sniffed, but continued, "I don't like the person I've become. I feel like I'm being swallowed by darkness and I don't know how to escape it. I'm not strong enough to let the anger and the hatred go. You've been reaching out to me, trying to bring me back to the Good and the Light, and all I've been doing is pushing you further away. I really meant it, when I told you that I died when you left. It's like a part of me ceased to exist and this empty, unfeeling person is all that's left," her voice was raw with emotion, "I want to change. To make it up to you. To be the person you love," she swallowed hard. "But now I'll never get the chance." Abby sobbed a little harder at this. "I'm scared, Poe. Please. Please find me." After a few ragged breaths, Abby turned off the commlink and got up to go find a blanket. Nothing to do now but wait, she thought to herself.
Present. Millennium Falcon. Unknown Regions.
Rey, Chewie, and Poe were scanning a nearby system for any sign of Abby and the Endeavor. They had been looking for her in the Unknown Regions for days with no luck, so they widened their scan to beyond the system and out into the emptiness of space. Just as they were about to leave to look in another quadrant, an alarm went off in the cockpit. Chewie recognized the distress beacon's signature and told Rey that they found Abby.
"Poe!" Rey called to the back, "We've got a beacon! It's right outside this system, in the emptiness of space."
Poe ran to the cockpit, excited that they were finally getting somewhere. "Well, it's about time we found something! Is it the Endeavor?"
Chewie growled and Poe looked to Rey for a translation, "He says there's a message hidden in the signal."
"What are you waiting for? Let's hear it!" Poe demanded.
Chewie flicked a few switches and a faint message came through the static. "Poe," He grinned at the sound of Abby's voice. "Poe, I don't know if you'll ever hear this. Hell, I don't even know if I'll see you again..."