The bright, beautiful, solid blue of hyperspace stretched out all around the Mirrorbright's viewport. It was quiet, peaceful, and just what Rey needed. Safely tucked into a hyperspace stream in the familiar surroundings of her mother's personal transport, Rey could savor the feeling of being alone. Not that she didn't like being around people, being with her family, but for a large chunk of her life she'd been completely on her own. So it wasn't too strange to think she might need to be alone for a little a while from time to time.
"Here sweetheart." Leia said as she held out a cup of fresh caf while taking her seat in the co-piolt's chair.
Well, not totally alone. Rey smiled at her mother gratefully. This was actually the first time since her return that Rey and Leia had been totally alone together. And for some odd reason it was making her a little nervous. Maybe it was because of their destination; the ruins of Alderaan. Though Leia couldn't explain why Rey would be drawn to Alderaan while meditating on kyber crystals, they didn't form on Alderaan, she had been more than supportive of the idea of Rey going.
"I would have taken you when you were sixteen." Leia had explained while Amilyn had poured them tea.
"Why sixteen?" Rey had asked.
"On Alderaan, on the sixteenth anniversary of your Name Day, you would have had your Day of Demand." Leia had explained. "You would have demanded your right to be considered one of my heirs. You would have then announced what your three challenges would be, Mind, Body, and Heart, and then you'd spend the next year seeing those challenges through." Leia had to pause for a moment, her mind flooding with memories of her own Day of Demand and everything that had followed. Rey had taken her hand and squeezed it and Leia smiled sadly as she continued. "After the fall of the Empire, Alderaanians would go back to Alderaan, to what remained of Alderaan, to remember the lost. It became known as the Returning."
Over the next few days they prepared for their journey. Rey trained with Luke and made sure the Mirrorbright was running perfectly and well disguised, while Leia prepared to leave command in Amilyn's hands. Then they boarded the ship with R2 and took off on a pilgrimage neither one of them was entirely sure they were ready for.
Leia watched the blue of hyperspace rushing past the windows for several moments after Rey had thanked her for the caf. She'd known that the memories were bound to flow on this little sojuron and she was trying to just let them come. She was grateful that the first of what she knew would be many was of Amilyn. "The very first time I meet Amilyn on was Alderaan." She said suddenly and with a bright smile. She could see Rey turn to look at her through her peripheral vision and continued. "My mother arranged a Pathfinding class for me and invited other members of my Apprentice Legislature class to join. The Pathfinding was part of my training for my Challenge of the Body, she made it a class project because she thought I needed friends my own age." Leia laughed softly. "She was right of course. You're grandmother had a bad habit of always being right."
"That habit must run in the family." Rey said teasingly while giving her mother a bright, loving smile.
Leia chuckled. "Our first Pathfinding excursion took us to Appenza Peak, the mountain I said I was going to climb to the very top of for my challenge. There were about a dozen of us, all dressed in white all weather gear, standard rucksacks on our backs, all expect for Amilyn. Everything she wore was a different color, her hair was acid green at the time, and she had these ridiculous looking goggles on. I honestly had no idea what to make of her." Leia shook her head, a fond smile on her lips. "I introduced myself, and ask if she was looking forward to the class, and she replies, "Definitely! I hope it's dangerous. I want to get more comfortable with the nearness and inevitability of death." and my first thought was, there's no kriffing way I'm letting her handle my climbing ropes."
Rey laughed and shook her head. "Did Ammy have some kind of death wish?"
"Mon certainly thought she did." Leia replied. "As much as Amilyn loves her home world and her people, Gatalenta fit Amilyn like a cocoon fits a butterfly. She was in the process of breaking free to become herself back then, she was just struggling to hard at first."
"You obviously stopped thinking she was weird." Rey said with a cheeky smirk. "I saw Ammy's memory of your first kiss."
"By the end of that first year Amilyn had become my best friend." Leia said softly, her eyes full of love and warmth for the tall gangly girl who would become one of the great loves of her life. "She became the one person other than my parents that I could rely on, trust, and know without doubt would be there for me. She didn't care that I was Princess Leia of Alderaan, she saw me as just Leia, and that meant the world to me."
Rey reached over to take her mother's hand and squeezed look in Leia's eyes, the beautiful smile on her face, Rey wanted that someday. She wanted someone to make her feel the way Amilyn made her mother feel. She had no idea that there were already hints of that smile on her lips from time to time, and that it tended to pop up whenever Poe or Finn was around. Rey didn't know that every time she saw one of her boys she got the same look on her face Leia got every time she'd seen Han stepping off the Falcon. She didn't even realize she'd started thinking of them as her boys.
When they reached the coordinates for what use to be Alderaan the only thing Rey could see was a massive asteroid belt. The Graveyard, her mother had called it as they'd come out of hyperspace. It was hard for Rey to wrap her head around the fact that the expansive field of rocks of various shapes and sizes outside their viewport had once been a vibrat, peaceful, planet full of life. Her thoughts drifted to her brother for a moment. How could Ben have had anything to do with Starkiller base and the destruction of worlds when he knew what had happened to Alderaan? The planet that had nurtured and shaped their mother, was gone. Billions of people died, their grandparents had died, in what had to have been the most terrifying moments of their lives. But then again the Organas weren't the grandparents that mattered to Ben, where they? The only legacy that mattered to Kylo Ren was that of Darth Vader. Well, if Ben wasn't going to honor them, then Rey should the hell would.
"What would I have said?" Rey asked softly as she stood beside her mother and watched what remained of Alderaan pass by their viewport. "On my Day of Demand." She clarified. "What would I have said?"
Coming here wasn't ever easy for Leia. The grief she carried with her for her planet, her people, her parents, always raged to the surface when she came here. Standing there watching bits of her beautiful, peaceful world float by the window reminded Leia of all the times she had longed to set foot on her home again, to be held in her parents embrace again. Oh how she had longed for her mother's comfort and strength during her pregnancies, and her father's strong yet gentle words of encouragement when she felt she was to tired and beaten down to go on. Her parents had known and adored Amilyn, but she wished she could have introduced them to Han, to Luke, to place their grandson and granddaughter in their arms. Closing her eyes Leia tried to picture the look on her mother's face when she told her her granddaughter's name.
When Rey spoke Leia actually jumped. "What?" She asked. Rey repeated her question and Leia blinked. Looking into her daughter's eyes Leia saw a kind gentle determination that reminded her of Bail. Leia smiled lovingly as she told Rey what she wanted to know. She told Rey what would have been said by Rey herself and before she could tell her what her responses would be, Rey mimicked the words as she looked out at the Graveyard. When Leia realized what Rey was doing her heart swelled and her dark eyes filled with tears. Rey's Jedi training would easily cover her challenges, and even though Rey never took her gaze from the viewport she did reach for her mother's hand. Leia held on tightly.
Rey hadn't expected to be so overwhelmed by the sight of the Graveyard and found herself needing a little time before she actually got around to doing what they had come there to do. Not that she really understood what that was. Luke had told her to trust her instincts. She'd read Obi Wan's journal and it had told her everything she needed to know about crystals and lightsabers. The rest was up to her. So with her mother watching their backs and R2 linked into the helm, Rey settled on the floor of the small common area of the ship where Leia could see her from the cockpit. She closed her eyes and began to breathe deeply, reaching out to the Force, and seeking out what it was trying to guide her too. The Graveyard had a strong Force echo, probably because of her mother's presence on the planet as she grew up. Rey continued to breathe deeply and reach out with her feelings, her heart, and soon her mind was filled with images.
A man with tan skin, short black hair, a black beard starting to show specks of silver, wearing a long blue coat, carries a tiny bundle in a white blanket though beautiful ornate hallways to a balcony. A woman in a long dark blue dress sits and waits. Her long black hair is in elaborate braids atop her head, a braided coil headdress nestles into the bairds, a long dark blue vail cascaded down from the headdress and over her shoulders. The man places the bundle in the woman's arms.
"She's beautiful, Bail." Breha said in a breathy whisper of awe. Her dark eyes fill with tears of joy as she looks down into the bright face of her new child. "Does she have a name?"
"Leia." Bail answers. "Padme named her Leia."
"Leia." Breha repeats as if she is whispering a prayer of thanks.
The start of the echo, Rey realizes. The arrival of her mother on Alderaan, and the joy that brought to Breha and Bail Organa. Another flicker of the past flutters through Rey's mind. The planet celebrates the Name Day of their new princess. Breha sits on a low leather sofa with her baby daughter in her arms and watches as Bail stares into an open wooden box he'd pulled out of a gift box. His face is hard to read, but it's tense, and his eyes show anger and fear. He slams the box closed and takes it to a hidden safe in one of the bookshelves that held real paper books.
"I've never seen one quite so large before." Breha said gently as she watched her husband.
Bail sighed as he closed the safe. He slides the wall panel back in place, and replaces the books. He snorted softly as he read the title on one of the spines. The Political History of Naboo. "Nor one so pure." He added as he turned to face his wife and daughter. "Hopefully she'll never need to use it as intended."
Rey saw flashes of Bail and her mother when she was small and pouting as she stared hatefully at a purple vegetable of some type, of Breha speaking with such command and compassion it was easy to see where Leia had gotten it from. Breha seemed to have pulmonodes of some type, unhidden by flesh for all to see, and Rey wondered why. Several of the memories Rey saw took place in the family's private library and each time Rey's attention was drawn to the bookcase and the hidden safe that held that wooden box. Why? What was in that box?
Rey witnesses flashes of her mother's Day of Demand, the first time Amilyn had braided her mother's hair, and what she realized in horror must have been her grandparents' final moments. Bail holding Breha in his arms on the same balcony where he'd given her their new baby daughter. Why was she seeing this? What did any of this have to do with her building her own lightsaber? What was she supposed to be learning here?
She'd learned that her Organa grandparents were kind, compassionate, and brave. They loved and adored their daughter, and they fought against evil to give their daughter and their people a safe, just, and fair galaxy to live in. Bail and Breha Organa had fought and died for everything Kylo Ren was trying to destroy. Luke had said that when a Jedi finds their crystal the crystal becomes attuned to who they are. Rey was still working out who she was. What Rey did know is that she would fight to preserve what her parents, and her grandparents, had fought so hard for.
Rey could hear something, a faint hum of something, music maybe? She wasn't hearing it with her ears, but in the Force. It kind of reminded her of the feeling she'd had the first time she'd heard Leia humming Mirrorbright. It had that same pull to it, the pull that had drawn her to Leia, and it was now drawing her to something else. Rey reached out for it, pulling it towards her. "R2." Rey called out softly, still in her meditative trance. "Seal the cargo hold and open the hatch."
R2 beeped at Leia who shrugged. "Don't ask me, it's a Jedi thing."
After coming out of her meditation Rey went to the cargo hold to see what she'd pulled in and was surprised to find a small fist sized asteroid. The strange hum she'd heard while meditating seemed to be coming from the rock, drawing Rey to it. Reaching out tentatively Rey picked up the rock and her eyes widened in surprise. Half of the asteroid felt warm in her hand while the other was icy cold. Staring at it in her hands Rey wondered, she could move rocks with the Force, could she break them?
"So?" Leia asked when Rey rejoined her in the cockpit.
Rey smiled and held up the warm half of the small asteroid. Nestled inside was a clear kyber crystal.
"Rey." Leia said, smile beaming. "That's…" She paused, her eyes narrowing a little. "Do you hear that?"
"Hear what?" Rey replied, her eyes wide.
"I don't know." Leia admitted. She looked confused, the soft sound seemed to be coming from where Rey stood.
Rey held up the other half of the asteroid, the half that had felt cold in her hand. Nestled inside the rock was a smaller kyber crystal. "I think this one is meant for you." Rey said as she held it out to her mother. "Actually, I think the whole thing was meant for you."
Leia sank into her seat without reaching for the stone Rey was holding out to her. "What do you mean?"
Rey walked over and set both halves between herself and her mother and then sat in the pilot's chair. She told her mother everything she'd seen, even the parts she knew would be hard for Leia to hear. Then Rey reached over and took her mother's hands in her own and held them tightly. Luke thought it might be another rare Force power, Rey's ability to share memories and dreams with people she had a connection too. Whatever it was it allowed her to share what she had seen of Bail and Breha's final moments. It was just a flicker of a moment in the echo around them, but Rey wanted her mother to know just how much her parents had loved her and that she was in their hearts and in their thoughts always.
"Thank you." Leia said softly, tears welling in her eyes. She stood, and leaned close to kiss Rey's forehead. Then excused herself. She needed some time alone.
Rey understood. Biting her lip as she watched Leia leave the cockpit and retreat to her quarters, Rey turned to R2 once they were alone. "I need a favor." The droid beeped and Rey explained what she wanted and he beeped again. "Thanks R2."
Poe stood at attention in front of Admiral Holdo as he debriefed her on the retrieval of Black Squardion, and the making of new allies. Holdo was so hard to read, and that tended to make him a little more nervous than reporting to Leia made him.
"Well done, Commander Dameron." Amilyn said after a few very long moments of contemplation. Perhaps a few more moments than was really necessary but Amilyn enjoyed making Poe sweat a bit.
Poe held back a smile. "Commander?"
Amilyn smiled softly and nodded. "You've shown a lot of growth and maturity in recent weeks, Commander. I expect it to continue."
"Thank you Admiral." Poe replied, letting his smile bloom fully. "And I promise, I won't let you or the General down again."
"You'd better not, Commander." Amilyn warned.
As soon as he was dismissed Poe went to check on his squad. His first stop was medical since some of his crew had been injured while stranded on a planet with the First Order hanging over head, but instead of finding his crewmates he found Finn. Instantly Poe was smiling as he walked up to the younger man. "Finn, buddy, you alright?"
Finn looked up from putting together medic field kits and smiled. "Poe! You're back!" He stepped away from the table to hug Poe. "Yeah, I'm fine." He gave Poe a smile that could easily compete with Poe's biggest and brightest. "I'm training."
"Training?" Poe asked, eyebrow raised, his smile shifting into one of pride. Finn could fight, he could fight well, but Poe knew that Finn didn't like to fight. He was nurtured into an elite soldier, but his heart wasn't in it.
"We lost a lot of medical staff at the Battle of Crait." Finn told him. "Dr. Kalonia needed help, and General Organa and Admiral Holdo thought I might be a good fit. Admiral Holdo asked if I'd like to train with the Doc and I said yeah. I want to help, Poe, I want to do more."
Poe reached out and clapped Finn on the shoulder. "You're going to be a great medic. We should celebrate! Come find me when you're off shift and we'll have some fun."
"Sounds great." Finn said easily. It had been awhile since he'd had Poe to himself and he found that he was looking forward to it.
There had been enough space in the base for Lando to turn one of the extra storerooms into a cantina. It wasn't much, a makeshift bar stocked with whatever Lando could bring in, and someone had brewed some jet juice. There were empty crates for tables and some old chairs, and someone had rigged up a way to listen to music. Black squadron was already there, decompressing after their mission, when Poe and Finn walked in. Poe really wanted Finn, and Rey when she got back, to meet his crew. It was important to him that they all get along and like each other.
Finn really wasn't a fan of alcoholic drinks and jet juice was by far the worse. He sputtered and whizzed after one drink and Poe chuckled as he pat the other man's back. "I said you didn't have to try it."
The group laughed and told stories, easily welcoming Finn.
"It was something in the puddling." Snap Wexley said with a boisterous laugh.
Jess nearly fell over laughing. "I didn't even know princesses could fart!"
When another round of drinks was needed Snap went with Poe to the bar to get them. While they worked on pouring the drinks Snap smirked as he said, "So, you and Finn."
Poe looked up from pouring jet juice for Jess. "Me and Finn?"
"You like him." Snap said knowingly.
"Yeah, I like him, he's my best friend." Poe replied.
Snap raised an eyebrow. "Poe, man, you like him."
Poe blinked, then he blushed and rubbed the back of his neck after giving Snap's words a moment to truly sink in. "Yeah, ok, maybe I do." He finally said softly so only Snap could hear him. "But it's really complicated, Snap."
"Because he's a former stormtrooper?" Snap asked.
Poe took a deep breath and admitted, "Because of the General's daughter."
Rey had two reasons for returning to Jakku. The first one involved her mother. She had seen glimpses into Leia's life, and Rey wanted to give her mother the same chance to glimpse into hers. She had heard Leia talking to Han back on D'Qar, the night they had spent together after Leia had unblocked Rey's mind. They thought Rey was asleep, and Leia had talked about wanting to know what Rey's life had been like. After having R2 check their intel to make sure Jakku was safe, Rey decided it was time to offer her mother some answers.
The second reason for Rey's return was because she wanted to see for herself what Kylo had done to Niima Outpost. She had spent a decade of her life among the people of Niima and Rey wanted to pay her respects, to say goodbye. So after they dropped out of hyperspace and she and R2 ran a series of scans to make sure there wasn't a lingering First Order presence, Rey flew the Mirrorbright planetside. Her stomach twisted a little as the golden surface of the desert planet came into view. It seemed like a lifetime ago that she'd been here, combining those sands for parts that would get her just enough to eat for a day, maybe two. It was such a strange feeling, coming back here now, knowing who she was and why she was there in the first place.
Rey landed the Mirrorbright near her toppled over walker home and smiled. "We're here."
Leia had been surprised when Rey told her they were making a stop at Jakku, but then she realized what Rey was doing and it warmed her heart. She had shared Alderaan with Rey, and now Rey was going to share Jakku with her. All through their hyperspace flight Leia had tried to prepare herself for what she would discover on Jakku. She wasn't really sure how she was going to react to facing the hardships her daughter had lived through alone on this planet away from her, her father, and the people who loved her. Rey had been so young, so small, when Ben left her here to fend for herself until his return. How could he do that? How could he leave his baby sister to fend for herself on a harsh planet like Jakku?
"Here where?" Leia asked as the door of the ship slid open and the ramp extended.
"Home." Rey said as she led the way to the underside of the walker and the auxilly hatch on his belly that served as her front door. Some of the traps she had placed around her desert home looked as if they had been triggered and Rey frowned a bit. The people of Niima knew better, they knew of her traps, they knew to leave her alone. Then again she'd left, she taken the Falcon and gone, they'd all seen her. Maybe Unkar had sent people to pick her clean as payment for stealing the ship, or maybe… Maybe it had been Kylo.
Her daughter had turned a weapon of war and terror into a home. The troop compartment had a small kitchen area, an old Y-Wing computer, a hammock, and workstation. There was a metal mug on an empty crate with a long dead flower stem in it, it's withered petals turning to dust on the surface of the crate. On a makeshift set of shelves Leia spots an eerily familiar sight that makes her chest hurt. Reaching out she picks up the little doll made of scraps of cloth and bits of stuffing and has to swallow a sob.
"I made that when I was ten." Rey said softly when she noticed what her mother had picked up. She'd been looking around to see what had been taken, what had been destroyed, and what she could possibly take with her. "Unkar hired a woman who lived on the ridge to take care of me until I was big enough to do it myself. Ty, her name was, or at least that's what she was called. He gave her two extra portions on top of whatever he paid her for her day's work, and told her to keep me alive, and healthy, unharmed. I'd go with her as she scavagened, she taught me how to find the best stuff and how to pull it apart, but there were places she wouldn't let me go. So I would sit in her sled and wait. She'd give me a bucket of odds and ends and I'd make stuff to play with."
"When you were," Leia began but then had to stop to clear the lump in her throat as she blinked quickly to dry up her welling tears before they had a chance to fall. "When you were two your uncle gave you a doll dressed in a orange rebel flight suit. You loved that doll, you couldn't sleep without it and the stuffed Wookie that Chewie gave you, that I'm still not convinced wasn't made from actual Wookie fur."
"It's proof that deep down I still knew who I was." Rey said softly as she accepted the doll when her mother held it out to her. She smiled and carefully put it in her bag to take with her. She also took her Cloud City postcard, smiling as she slipped it into her bag. She use to daydream about living in the city in the sky, and now she kind of did.
Leia looked around, taking it all in, wanting to commit it all to memory. This was how her daughter survived, she had made a place for herself in this harsh world, a home, with little touches of who she really was without knowing it.
Rey was surprised that more of her stuff wasn't wrecked or stolen but as she collected the last of what she wanted to take with her, including the helmet she'd taken her name from, she figured maybe they simply hadn't had the chance too. After saying a bittersweet goodbye to her walker home Rey flew the shuttle to Niima Outpost.
There was hardly anything left. The tents and stalls set up around the concession stand were all burned to the ground. The concession stand itself was covered in blaster fire on the outside and inside Unkar's hut, the walls and shelves were covered in scorch marks that Rey knew were caused by a lightsaber. "He killed everyone because I got away."
"Rey." Leia said softly as she reached out to wrap her hand around her daughter's arm. "Don't. Don't blame yourself."
"It's hard not to." Rey said softly.
"I know." Leia replied. "Believe me, I know."
It had been months since the attack on Niima and the reports the Resistance had gotten said there'd been no survivors. So where had the bodies gone? It wasn't like Jakku wasn't littered with bones and bodies mummified by the sand and heat, so who had cleared out Niima Outpost if there were no one left? The answer to Rey's question had come as she and Leia made their way back to the Mirrorbright.
The woman's voice was rough and deep as she spoke. "If I had known you'd grow up to join the rebels I'd have told Unkar to kriff off and let you die."
Mother and daughter drew their blasters simultaneously, aiming them at the woman several feet away. She was around Leia's age, maybe a bit older, it was hard to tell. Her skin was tan and leathered from years spent scavenging under Jakku's sun. Her hair was cropped short, salt and pepper in color, and she was dressed in the light colored tattered clothes common to desert dwellers. What had Leia holding her blaster a little more firmly, her finger ready to pulled back on the trigger, was the faded tattoo half way up the woman's forearm; it was the Imperial crest with tie fighter wings on either side.
"Ty?" Rey replied. She was surprised to see the woman she'd just been telling Leia about. Surprised, and honestly a bit relieved. Not everyone had been killed.
"You know, sandmite, I always wondered what the hell was so special about you?" Ty said as she stood there with the butt of an old Imperial blaster rifle resting on her hip. "I mean, why would a greedy old son of a hutt like Unkar give out extra portions to keep some little brat alive? But I didn't ask, extra food was extra food and you were handy to have around when it came to small tight spaces."
Rey was watching the woman's movements carefully. You never knew when a competing scavenger would attack you for your haul, you had to watch them, watch for the slightest tick of their muscles.
"I find myself asking once again." Ty continued. "What is so special about you? Why would they leave us all to rot on this hell of a planet? Why didn't they come for those of us who survived? Who managed to avoid capture by the rebels? But they send a whole unit of troopers to search for you? Lord Vader himself came here looking for you."
Rey blinked. "Lord Vader? Ty, are you alright?"
"You were a Tie fighter pilot." Leia says to the woman staring at her daughter in a dangerous way. War and years lived on this planet had clearly done something to her. The woman must have seen Kylo Ren, with his cape and red lightsaber, and thought it was Vader. She had no clue the First Order had razzed Niima to the ground, she thought it was the Empire. "You fought in the Battle of Jakku."
Ty tore her gaze from Rey to look at the woman standing beside her. She narrowed her sharp green eyes and scowled. "Age can't hide who you are." She raised her blaster and took aim. "Princess Leia Organa of Alderaan, traitor to the Empire!"
Rey shot first. It was a disarming shot followed by a Force grab at the blaster. Rey sent it flying close enough that Ty could find it later, but far enough away that she couldn't make a grab for it now. Rey watched as Ty reached for something in her garment and reacted quickly when the sun gleaned off something metal. She grabs it with the Force and brings it to her own hand. "Communication beacon."
"The people who came here, who did this, they weren't Imperials." Leia said to the woman now clutching her blaster wounded arm. "That was not Darth Vader. That was not the Empire."
"No one is coming back, Ty." Rey said softly. Kylo had killed so many innocent people to get to her. She wasn't going to let him ruin another life. Holding up her hand Rey looked into the eyes of the woman who'd taken care of her for the first couple of years she was on Jakku. Then she said in a firm and commanding voice. "You never saw us here."
Ty opened her mouth, blinked, and repeated. "I never saw you here."
"You will find a safe place to live out your life." Rey continued.
"I will find a safe place to live out my life." Ty repeated.
Rey lowered her hand. "Goodbye Ty."
Leia knew that Rey wasn't simply saying goodbye to the woman who'd been apart of her life here on Jakku, she was saying goodbye to that life. She wanted nothing more than to reach out for her daughter's hand but knew now wasn't the time. They needed to get back to the ship and be on their way. It wouldn't be until they were safely in hyperspace making their first jump towards home that Leia finally asked, "Are you alright, Rey?"
"I don't know." Rey said softly after several moments of thought. She turned to look at her mother, taking in the concern, support, and love in Leia's dark eyes. Rey smiled softly. "I will be though."