The Call to the Light
By TheOneAndOnlySlayer
Chapter 29
Ben's jumped off higher lengths than this comm tower before, but he wishes he had a visor against all this damn ash. The missile had hit hundreds of meters away from the ramp, fire and flak swirling about the hell-like surface.
Dameron's nerves go between screaming and falling into a calm his pilot training has conditioned him into. It's enough for a powerful Force-user to zone in on with his eyes closed.
I have to reach him.
His better arm outstretched, Ben allows one more surrender, no longer controlling the Force but letting it read him. If this is what it all takes. He feels himself cutting through the wind, inches away from Dameron's outstretched fingers.
The landing comes quicker than expected, both blinded by the smoke and heat from the explosion below. There's almost no safe space to land, but like a spacecraft skipping awkwardly along a runway, they manage it with scrapes and bruises.
The direct impact of that missile could have killed all the prisoners behind it, but even a severely close blast radius has caused it to severely dent.
Next to him, Dameron's laughing.
Ben's eyes turn to slits at this madness. He's bleeding, he has a massive headache enough to want his eyes closed and the man he just saved has lost his mind. "What's wrong with you?"
There's a stupid grin plastered across Dameron's face as he coughs up another laugh. "Your ears are kriffing huge."
Ben will not blush. Kriff dammit, that's the last time he blatantly saves anyone's life. Shaking as he gets up, he collects himself and his frayed consciousness. He hasn't worked himself this much in a battle without having to use his lightsaber before since Snoke tried to break him in his early years of training.
The comm latched to Dameron's shoulder chirps to life. "Poe! Solo, you guys alive!?"
Poe manages to sit up. "We're alive."
"Commander, the ramp's been damaged in the blast radius, we can't get it open."
"How soon can your reinforcements get to us, planetside?" Ben demands, calculating the cracks to the edges in the massive doorway.
"Five minutes, they say. Their ship's too big to get through the mine field, they're removing a few mines through tractor beams."
Poe shoots to his feet and scans the blurry sky. "Has Mantine launched another missile?"
"Negative."
Poe turns to Ben. "Maybe he knows you'll just deflect it."
What else could be worse than firing missiles at their prison? Mantine said he'd rather see all prisoners dead than…
No. There's an earthquake-triggering mechanism strung through all the weaker cracks in the complex underground, a fail-safe in case the prison had to be collapsed should it fall into enemy hands. But that can't be accessed from the defense hanger, and anyways, Hux's borrowed override codes ensured Mantine can't get to them.
What's left?
It looks like there's nothing left but to pull apart the ramp. "Tell whatever ship that's waiting for us that as soon as they reach the atmo, to get within sight of the defense hanger and threaten them to stand down."
Ben can't see Poe's eyes sharpen in terror, but he senses it. "Solo, what is that?"
He looks skyward. It's not a ship, but it's large, round and dark enough to be mistaken for an asteroid. Through the thinning ash storm, the strange blot becomes larger, eclipsing the burnt-orange sky. As it enters the atmosphere, wind and dust trail behind it.
"Commander - ! Something's broken through from the mine field, I can't get a frequency on it. It's not one of ours – "
"It's one of the mines!" Kelys's voice cries out in panic. "It hasn't detonated, but it will on impact, right over us!"
"Dammit, get one of our guys to blast it out of the way!" Dameron practically screams into his comm.
Ben's hair is plastered with sweat. His heart is ready to give out on him and explode inside his chest, and he wishes his useless arm could just rot off and regenerate anew. If he were to try this display of power – something a dozen more times as hazardous as levitating several dead-engined ships across Sher'hatha – he may pass out, or worse. The idea of causing a brain aneurism attempting such a Force-assisted feat is very real.
She'd do it.
Yes, she would. Wouldn't matter if she could. And so, he must try as well.
The thought of her even being here, next to him, giving him one of those half-smiles, not enough to give them away to Dameron, but enough to kiss the horizon, makes his heart swell in pleasure.
When he speaks the words in his own mind, opening his self – mental barriers opening like floodgates – there is no emotion, there is peace – in a way, now, he really believes it.
"Solo? What are you doing?"
Dameron doesn't shout, instead speaks in a deadened murmur as if he knows what Ben is attempting.
What does it look like I'm doing? he wants to retort. I'm attempting to stop the mine from exploding on top of us.
Ssssssssssssssssss
This is bantha shit!
Angry, grudging curses add extra muscle to every parry and attack against any one or two saber-carriers who try to engage her. Though they are rested and have the advantage of pure numbers, there is trepidation in their trust of such an elegant, dangerous weapon. Rey understands this – even when fighting Ben in the snow on Starkiller, she was so nervous she'd singe one of her fingers.
These people are not the Knights of Ren, who had hunted her and Luke down, greedy enough to overcome them both when their leader Kylo Ren had been should not be holding her behind.
"Getting tired, little pet?" Rastro teases somewhere nearby.
She is. There's no time to waste here – Niall and the others need her. Spinning away for a second, Rey collects herself to Force-push everyone against some hard surface, knock them out, but to no avail. In fact –
"Oh," she groans. Her body hurts, aches. What is this?
It's as if she's drugged. The other ghost inside her, dictating her, keeping her safe, singing to her through the air and the sky – the very Force itself...flickers away.
She's never been more scared in her life. "Wha - ?"
Oh, but then it changes, rapidly. The last remnants of strength push through, a riot of sensations in a matter of seconds before it gives out. Clouds part away from inside, where only she can see.
Realizations flood her. Like paintings in the rain, the colors drain into her very soul. All of it – this mission, Chiroh's family, the captured Force-sensitives…
Rey didn't expect this to happen. It wasn't part of a plan. It was a minor errand, she thought, compared to the fate of the galaxy against the First Order.
And yet her feet on these poorly cobbled roads, hot breath coming out cold in the Lautori night, her knees aching, the sudden concern of becoming separated from the others…dimming into a firm comprehension.
This was meant to happen.
There's only one person she can tell now before she's taken.
Ssssssssssssssssssssssss
The mine descends ever closer, spilling from the distant heavens to the infernal surface. It could be coming hundreds of kilometers per hour, much like Han Solo's impromptu landings.
With his dark, incinerating eyes, Ben stares it down. His entire being is fused in concentration, the Force positively scorching through him. It soars and blasts through until he could choke on the pressure, until he could weep from the immense power, more power than he had ever dreamed of, than he ever could have desired as a vessel of the Dark Side.
He is alight with his conviction, though, stamped through with every blind heartbeat: If she could do it…I can stop this. I can do this.
They will live.
"Solo, kriffdammit…this isn't gonna work – "
Every tendon in his neck is about to spring from under his skin, and yet he must tell Dameron to shut his big damn mouth. Groaning, gritting his teeth, his arms waver. The blood and burns in his shoulder wail in attention.
I will stop this mine. I will stop it…will stop…
Something…it is so slight, like the first time he made a rock wobble in his first year of lessons. He feels it. The damned mine slows down, only by so slight a fraction it will hardly make his and Dameron's deaths come any slower.
His body is being torn, sinew by vein, until oxygen does nothing.
Now just push it away a few thousand feet…..
"Motherffff….fucker…" Dameron could be heard whispering under his breath.
Not that Ben can see; he's sure he just went blind a second ago.
It doesn't matter – the familiar whooshing sound of oncoming TIE fighters swirl overhead. They come so suddenly, Ben didn't even sense them (he was so blind to anything beyond the sinking mine and Dameron's stupid slack-jawed breathing).
As many as a dozen TIE fighters ascend madly like insects after a slovenly predator, shooting at the mine for it to detonate prematurely.
It's like a slap against Ben, disorienting him from the stupid immense feat. Behind him, Dameron shouts, crouching from the sounds: "Hell yes! Kelys, is that the defense hanger fighters?!"
Blinking madly, Ben searches the mottled skies. Please, Force, where's the backup, he thinks.
A storm of durasteel flak and fire bursts above them. Ben will have to deflect the debris from reaching them, but that can wait a few seconds. The shadow of doom is gone. They can breathe again; they'll live.
"They're…Commander, their second-in-command's just surrendered. That Mirana woman – "
"Are their weapons down?"
"Aye, sir. The Rising Sun's arrived and surrounded the hanger. The Boshtar's on its way to transport our prisoners."
His breathing under control, Ben distantly hears the familiar name and eyes Dameron with a shocked, dubious expression. Boshtar, the Nakorkian?
"Very good, fellas – send a transporter over as soon as you can, and we can help out with evacuation."
That's all Ben needs to hear.
By accident (because they still despise each other), they look to each other in an aimless intent to check for physical damage. Eye contact, especially in the face of victory (especially escaping death), makes them both unexpectedly shield themselves.
There's one thing Ben needs to ask. "You were so sure since the beginning that you could use the First Order's loyalty to their own against them."
Poe finds himself nodding despite his guarded, narrow expression. "You've done it to us enough times."
"Our…" Ben has to shake his head; he's seeing sunspots. "The First Order would never sacrifice such a tactical advantage to save a few precious officers. Even siblings."
Dameron's scoff is overdone. "You were the one who suggested Finn coordinate sub-channel messages to the Stormtroopers to turn them around. It's been working, by the way."
Finn. Ben almost forgot, though he's interested to hear his suggestion had been taken seriously. Hm. He wonders how Hux is taking that; his precious conditioning gone awry by one single outlier.
Shaking his head, the knight rests his hands on his knees. There's more chatter coming from the transmitter at Dameron's shoulder.
The wreckage burns around them, though it's swallowed away by the winds and ash. Ben will inspect his newfound abilities later, once –
"Ben."
Ben didn't even notice it at first. Dameron's never said his first name before. Much less like that. He turns back to the pilot, brows furrowed despite his stern attitude.
"Ben!"
Dameron's on the ground, dirt kicked around him. The desperation and direct informal tone makes Ben's jaw drop. It's Rey.
"Rey!" In a strange show of urgency, he's at Dameron's prone side. He cannot help what he does next – touching, albeit with shaking hesitance, Dameron's shadowy jaw and cupping the back of his head; as if there is a fragment of her appearance, the same shape of her eyes in this man's face.
"It's – I'm in a little trouble. I'm on Lautori, there's six people with lightsabers - !" Dameron, his voice soft and hurried, cries out in a gasp.
Ben grasps the head a little tighter, to search without a care inside of this borrowed mind. Rey is light-years away. Ben's emotions are wrought, undisciplined. If he scatters while in this mind-probe, from the connection from Dameron to Rey, it could cause brain-damage, he's sure of it.
But this woman would never call on him for help, always so stubborn, unless something were terribly, awfully wrong.
Without a care to this shell's well-being, he dives inside.
Sssssssssss
Rey once believed very little in visions and destiny, fate. Ever since that old lady Maz told her to stop thinking about her family who left her on Jakku, that they would never come find her. The fate of being the one Jedi to overthrow the First Order was not something she could believe in accomplishing.
All of it, unreal, unbelievable. Unwilling to accept it as part of a plan.
And yet her heart beats, her mind expands, her lungs make her sigh with a strange peace.
They're going to take you. And you are going to let that happen.
She… Rey understands. She sees it all, even in its jagged, watermarked shapes and images.
A kind of darkness, grand yet gentle as a wave, overwhelms Rey, almost rendering her inert in the middle of a slashing arc. It's Ben.
I'm here, I'm HERE what's happening?!
His alarm at her call for help soothes her, even with whatever happens next.
"There's – there' more of them. More than just Lorra and Jirah," she whispers, mouth barely moving as she fights. "We didn't see this coming - !"
She moves into an attack, and this time she can sense him holding the oncoming strike with her, like both of their arms hold her saber aloft.
He struggles to respond in her consciousness. Rey has to close her eyes from the effort.
What are you talking about? Where are you? What do they look like?
"Ben…I have to let them take me. In order to find them – I can't explain it. I just know…I'll be all right."
Arms holding her in a phantom vice grip make her biceps numb even here.
Where are - ! Where are you going!? The panic in his voice is a new weakness he exposes to her. It's sweet as it bleeds into her. He cares about her. He loves her.
She doesn't feel worried, doesn't doubt that he'll come and find her (even if he has to tear the whole galaxy asunder).
She stands straight, armed with a cleansing breath. "I'm going with them."
Ssssss
"Rey. Rey, no! Don't – stop and listen to me, who are they?"
Poe Dameron is a shell as the woman who rules him, whom he cannot let get away, speaks in calm, hushed directions.
"I have to wait until I'm deep inside..I have to find out the rest…there's so many of them, and they're stuck, they need us!"
There is nothing to say, nothing to tell her no, it doesn't matter who they are, whoever she's talking about…
Stop caring for so many others and come back to me, don't LEAVE me with these morons!
It is absolutely repulsive, almost comical, the way he holds back the shell's face and strokes back his hair, pleading with these touches.
"Rey…" don't leave me, he thinks. He'll quash the weak thought immediately, though he screams inside to say it.
"I'll be all right, I swear. You'll come find me. I know you..." the tenderness she projects into the man's voice makes Ben's guts clench. "Don't be scared. I trust you. I trust you – "
"Rey, RUN!" he screams, right in the other man's face. Even though she will not obey. The fruitlessness of it all, gone in an instant, the triumph of his willpower a minute ago a mere graveyard of a shot-down mine device.
Didn't he…he came here, to protect her, to keep her safe…! Whyyyy…
When she leans Dameron's head forward, holds his cheek with his own larger, thick-knuckled hand, Ben feels already desolate, forsaken and alone that he accepts the ghostlike kiss without protest.
ssssssssssssssss
He's going to murder you.
Rey could quite possibly be making a very huge, colossal mistake, but Luke had always said to trust the Force, even when you don't know what it's telling you.
It's telling her to turn off her lightsaber, surrender and let them kidnap her.
Luke wasn't sure how many Force-sensitives Rastro's been behind kidnapping, but she'll find out soon.
If they don't kill her.
They won't, she realizes. The sequence of events about to unfold in her mind are like pieces of a generator, or a junkyard speeder ready for her to re-assemble. She just knows this as truth.
If only it all didn't feel like tumbling through a black hole, or Force forbid, waiting on Jakku again.
Ssssssssssssssss
