A/N:

I liiiiiive.

I saw TROS on opening night and was SO FULL OF MANY FEELINGS about the things that happened, I knew I needed to finish this story. I'm going to write things relating to TROS too, but I have to finish this. If you've seen it, you might know why. I won't post spoilers yet, it's not been out long enough, so if you want to talk through your feelings, message me.

I'd planned to write filler chapters between the last one and this, but that didn't happen, so let's just jump a few months ahead.

Next chapter will be up tomorrow. I think the next will be last official chapter, with an epilogue to follow a couple days after Christmas.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: Overwhelmed

B E N

It could have all gone so wrong.

Ben knew this. He knew how differently things might have turned out, had other choices been made, or other circumstances arisen. It had to be some mistake, or perhaps some mercy, of fate that he had not been made to atone for his dark sins with his life. That he was alive, and allowed to be here today, about to marry the girl who had saved him. From himself. From the darkness. From death. He liked to think he had saved her too, but it wasn't an equitable trade. He knew the balance was still tipped in his favor. She'd done so much more for him than she could know, so much more than he could ever repay.

And now they would go on as One, in pursuit of the Force, in search of the answers as to why their souls were mirror images, what it was that had forged this unbreakable bond between them. They would continue to dismantle the last remnants of the First Order, and any other threats that tried to bring back galactic domination. They would find others. Other Force-Sensitives, or even those who didn't have the gift but the desire, and they'd teach them.

That was Rey's wish, anyway. Ben wasn't sure that was his specific calling, but he would walk his own path in tandem with her's and discover a purpose that harmonized.

The murmur of the ocean and the cry of porgs composed a lonely island symphony. Ben stood outside Luke's hut, hands behind his back, staring down the long winding stairs to where the tide sprayed against rocks. The Force was powerful here. It ebbed and flowed around him in waves mirroring the water, violent and peace in equal measure, light and dark in perfect balance. It hummed around and through him, as alive as he'd ever felt it. Luke had chosen a rather bad spot to try to get away from it all. The Force would be very difficult to ignore here.

"To think, this is where he was all that time," a soft voice said, coming up beside him.

He didn't turn to meet his mother's eye. He knew she'd searched for Luke as long as he had — maybe longer, though her intentions were purer than his own.

But her comment wasn't a novel one. Ben thought it himself when they first arrived. This was where Luke had been when Snoke sent Kylo after Poe's trail, the whole time he hunted BB-8, the place he glimpsed but did not understand in Rey's mind. It was this island she had dreamed of. It was this island where Luke was all along. And it was this island where Rey was when their strange bond began. It seemed like everything he'd been searching for ended up being here, just waiting for him to find it. And until he surrendered the person he thought he was, the discovery remained just out of reach.

He felt his mother's gaze turn on him. "Are you ready?"

Now he did glance at her, and saw a twinkle of amusement glinting in her dark eyes. He suppressed a smile and returned his attention to the water below. "I was ready a long time ago."

Almost from the very beginning, he thought but did not say. Almost from the first moment he carried her in his arms on Takodana. Certainly from the moment she came to him on the Supremacy, and crowded him in that elevator, and almost died by Snoke's order and Ben's own hand just in the hope of saving him.

He'd been ready to marry her all this time, even when he tried to convince himself otherwise.

"Is she alright?" He asked after a moment of silence.

Leia laughed. "Now that I'm not making her try on dresses she hates, and now that we're here and it's time, yes."

He glanced over towards Rey's hut, at the mottled scar in its side from new rocks where the caretakers had patched her blaster fire. She'd shown it to him on her tour of the island, after they'd first arrived two days ago, ahead of their entourage. She showed him the cave with the fountain and the ledge, showed him the caretaker's village and Luke's hut and even the dark side blowhole. Her own hut was what most interested him, though. The hut where she tried to kill him, and the hut where she sat, dripping, cold, and sad, and offered him her hand. The hut where she was now, he presumed.

"Rose and Court are in there with her?" he asked.

Leia snickered. "No, they aren't. But Rey isn't either. Rose and Court went to find her and make her get ready."

"You say that like you know where she is."

"I do." His mother sounded so mischievous, he almost didn't recognize her. He lifted a brow and waited for further explanation.

"She got ready a long time ago. She's sitting at the peak. Look." She turned and pointed.

Ben squinted at the top of the island high above them. He didn't see much, but he could almost fool his mind into thinking he could barely make out the shape of a human figure on that rocky summit. His mouth quirked into an amused half-smile.

"She'll be back in time," his mother assured him.

"I wasn't concerned." Ben could check on Rey through their bond, could reach out and tune in to her feelings as easily as taking a breath, if he wanted. But he didn't. He let her have this moment of solitude in her lofty refuge. Whatever her feelings were about what would happen today, they were her own, and she could keep them private if she wanted. Meanwhile he would sit in his own, contemplating the cosmic oversight that allowed him this undeserved miracle.

"Interesting that she would choose this place," Leia mused after a few moments of silence. "The Force is strong here. You'll begin your new life together bathed in the energies of the whole galaxy."

Ben drew in a deep breath, acknowledging this truth. When his mother asked them where they'd like to be married, he'd floundered for an answer. He had very few happy memories anywhere in the galaxy. Everywhere held a haunting for him. The ghosts of his crimes lurked on almost every planet.

Rey had gone quiet too, and they'd both been silent on the topic for so long that eventually his mother just sighed and said they could do it on Naboo. But that night Rey's dreams had been entirely occupied with this island, so when she woke and told him she thought Ahch-To might be the place for them, he wasn't surprised.

"I don't really want to show anyone that place," Rey had confessed softly, "It's…too sacred. It's Luke's temple. It's mine. But it feels right. There's no where else."

"If it is sacred to you, it will be sacred to anyone you bring there with you. Your people will treat it with respect," he told her.

Rey laughed. "I think I already destroyed any expectation of respect there."

Ben very much wanted to see it himself, so he didn't say anything to dissuade her. Besides, it was neutral ground for him. He had no memories there. No stains. Luke's presence was all over the place, but he'd gotten over it quickly after they arrived. More than Luke, the Force thrummed with incredible life here. No wonder her powers had developed so quickly, and why their bond flared to life with such immediacy. This island felt like an amplifier.

He could feel his mother watching him again. "What do you want to know?"

She smiled. "Nothing. You're just very quiet this morning. Very in your head, I think."

"Because I'm usually so talkative," he tossed back.

"There was a time when you were really little that I couldn't get you to stop talking," she said fondly. Her soft, reminiscing smile faded at the edges just a little, and she added, "You got quieter as you got older."

Or maybe you got too busy to listen, Ben thought, but again held the comment back. He had given up his feelings of resent - or at least tried to. They were on a rebuilt path now, trying to find their way forward as mother and son. This was the wrong time to bring up old wounds. Today wasn't about the past. Today was about the future.

Finn and Poe were making their way up the stairs towards them from where they'd spent the morning communicating with the new government. Chewie carried BB-8 behind them, while R2 used his tiny thrusters to zoom up the path by himself, Threepio toddling along last of all. The retinue of special troopers had been left behind, given time off with no real explanation for why. That was Ben's decision. They didn't need to know.

"It's still too many people," he said aloud, for the sake of his mother who seemed about to voice another memory of when he was little.

"This is her family," Leia said gently. "And you're, since she brought you in. There's no one extra here."

Everyone who wasn't Rey was extra, in Ben's opinion, but he knew they needed someone to perform the ceremony for it to be legal under galactic law. That accounted for his mother, who he had to admit he wanted there anyway. But Rey wanted Finn with her, and then it couldn't stop there, so soon the whole little ragtag group was together on this island. Ben endured it for her sake.

At least everyone looked nice.

"My wedding was more impulsive than this," Leia reminisced. "But just as small. It's good that way, Ben. It's good to be surrounded by people who care about you."

He didn't say anything to this. He knew his parents had decided to marry on Endor, and they'd done it right then and there. In the heat of their victory. He hoped this decision was a little more thought-out than theirs. He'd held on to his desire to ask for a long time, uncertain and reluctant. He hadn't known if it would be right or good for them. He couldn't say that marriage was good for his parents, after all. But after ruminating over it for so long, he finally made the decision. And if that hallucination was to be believed, it was the right path for them.

His gaze flicked once back up to the peak, wondering how Rose and Court were faring in their search.

"Look, Ben, there's something I wanted to talk to you about," Leia said suddenly, her attention on the men and droids climbing towards them. "Before everybody gets here. It's about what you told me."

Ben turned to face her, ready to offer what explanation he could. He'd been expecting her to ask about their strange force visit ever since they'd first told her about it — about meeting everyone who had died. The family, the Jedi masters, everyone. When they told her, she'd merely smiled and immediately launched in to the logistics of a wedding without really pausing to inquire more about the spectacular vision, or hallucination, whatever it was. Now she wanted to talk about it. Well, so did he.

"I don't think you should let Rey take your last name."

Ben frowned in surprise. That was not at all what he was expecting to her. "What?"

"The name, Ben. You said you wanted to give her a name. Don't give her yours."

"Why?" His voice sounded as bemused as he felt. "It was good enough for you to give it to me."

"I was in the delirious throes of love," she sighed. "The romantic in me wanted you to have your father's last name, but I should have thought about it better. You avoided his problems by throwing it off for a new name when you became a man, but it could cause a whole world of problems now that the galaxy is settling down from this war, and now that you're Ben Solo once again."

"I'm not changing my name," Ben said flatly. He would never say it out loud, maybe never even let Rey see it inside him, but he was proud to have his father's name. Wearing it was the least payment he could make for his wretched mistake.

"I know you won't. But don't make her take it. Solo is a name that means debt and trouble. Let her be a Skywalker instead. She's one of us, she should bear our family name. Your grandfather's name."

Ben rubbed his temples with one hand, closing his eyes against the difficulty of his mother. Coming in last minute to complicate things.

"Whichever one she wants," he said. "I won't tell her what to do."

Leia smiled. "Smart man."

"You can't tell her what to do either," he warned. "Don't tell her that she must be Skywalker instead of Solo. Just let her decide. Either one is fine with me."

Both names still made her his, which was such a possessive thing to think, but it gave him a curl of pleasure in his heart to think it anyway. That elusive scavenger, that creature of irresistible dichotomy, she would carry one of his family names with her from this day forward.

His mother lifted her hands innocently. "Whichever she wants, I promise."

By then the group of climbers had reached the top of the stairs, the three sentients out of breath and the droids chipper.

"Good grief," wheezed Finn. "That's way too many stairs. It was too many stairs last night and it's definitely too many stairs today. Why did they build the landing platform all the way down there?"

Chewie groaned.

Poe shook his head. "I don't know how you did it the first time either."

"Are the ladies still getting ready?" Finn asked. "Where are they?"

"In a manner of speaking," Leia said with amusement. "They'll be along. Rest for a minute if you like, but then rally, my boys. We're climbing further still."

She motioned above them to the saddle between the two peaks of the island, one smaller than the other. That open space could only be reached by—

"More stairs?" Finn said in dismay.

Leia laughed. Even Ben had to smile, just a little.

Poe looked around at the huts, lowering himself onto one of the short stone walls for a brief rest. "This place is something else, huh? I couldn't really make it out when we arrived last night. In the daylight, it looks ancient."

"It is," Ben told him.

They noticed Ben then, and Finn staggered over to shake his hand. "Hey, congrats, man. Big day, huh?"

Ben didn't know what to say. That he wanted it all to be over so they could be on the other side of it and just be together already? That on the other hand, this day was beyond anything he'd ever imagined for himself? That he didn't know how to feel, or what to do?

He just gave Finn a silent nod and said nothing at all.

Chewie came over to ruffle his hair, but Ben's arm darted out reflexively and he grabbed Chewie by the wrist before his big paw could tousle Ben's carefully arranged waves. He shook his head. "Don't."

The Wookiee snickered, pulling his arm back.

Leia hugged him and thanked him for coming. Ben was grateful she didn't try to reminisce with Chewie about his childhood.

One of the caretakers appeared then and jabbered something. None of them knew the language, except Threepio, who translated quickly.

"She informs us that everything in the village is ready for the feast after we are finished, and asks if there is anything else they can do to accommodate us?"

"No, thank you," Leia said gently. "We'll get this show on the road and be down by sunset."

"Down," Finn lamented. Poe patted him on the back.

BB-8 chirped something in excited whistles. Poe looked up towards the ridge above them.

"Oh, I see them," he said, pointing.

The company turned to see Rose and Court making their way across the saddle towards the stairs.

Leia started hurrying up them. "No need to make them come all the way down just to go up again. Come on."

Ben let everyone flow past him, following his mother. Chewie grumbled when he picked up BB-8 again, but dutifully followed anyway. Ben waited a few seconds before starting after them. His pulse had accelerated and he took a moment to breathe and slow it down again.

Finn looked down at him. "Aren't you coming, Solo? I'm pretty sure you're on the one getting married today, right?"

Ben expelled a long breath. Yep, too many people.

At the top of the stars where the earth swelled to a rise where the two summits curved down to meet one another, the company assembled.

"Where's Rey?" Finn asked Rose, eyes wide.

She shook her head and Court shrugged.

"We can't find her!" Rose exclaimed. "We went to her hut this morning to see if she wanted our help to get ready, but she was already gone. We got ready ourselves and then went to go find her. We thought maybe it was nerves or something."

"We've climbed up and down this whole kriffing island," Court grumbled. "She's not anywhere."

"Did she run?" Poe asked incredulously.

Leia glanced and Ben, and Ben let her see the amusement playing at the corner of his mouth. He walked a few yards away to the crest of the saddle, examining the edge of the cliff. Down below, an angry sea churned and smashed against rocks. Porgs squalled at him from their nests on the rocks.

"Run? Run where? What ship would she have taken?" Court fired back at Poe. "The Falcon is there, the shuttle is there, your X-wing is there, every ship we brought is still down there."

"Okay so she didn't leave the planet, but don't those villagers have boats?" He demanded.

Court laughed."You think she's just rowing out to sea?"

Finn jogged over to Ben, putting a friendly hand on his shoulder. "Hey man, you doing okay? I'm sure we'll find her. She loves you. She wouldn't run."

Ben picked up Finn's hand and returned it to him. "I appreciate your concern, but she's fine. She'll come when she feels ready."

"How do you know? This place is crazy steep and there are cliffs all over, what if she slipped and fell in the water? She's a desert kid, does she even know how to swim? She could be in real trouble!"

Ben chuckled, genuinely amused by the absurdity of that fear. He turned away from the ocean below and looked back at the group. Court and Poe were still squabbling, Chewie had wandered away, and Rose was trying to break up the argument. His mother slid in between Finn and Ben, sliding her hand through Ben's arm and hooking him at the elbow.

"Too many people," she agreed, eliciting an appreciative smirk from him.

Finn cleared his throat. "General, I gotta be honest, I've never been to a wedding — is this how they're supposed to be?"

"Messy? Oh yes, all of them. Big ones, small ones, private affairs, galactic events." Leia laughed. "If you want a story of a truly wild wedding, ask Poe about the one we threw for Karé Kun and Snap Wexley."

He chuckled uncertaintly. "Oh, okay. So it's totally normal for the bride to just…vanish, then?"

Leia's voice gentled. "Oh, well, no. I mean, yes, people get cold feet all the time. But I don't think that's the case here. Rey hasn't vanished. She's right there."

She pointed, and both men looked to see a white shape moving down the craggy bald boulders at the top of the peak above them. Ben's mouth quirked into a secret smile. Finn startled.

"What is she doing all the way up there?"

"Mediating, I assume."

"Oh, like a Force thing?"

Leia shook her head. "Not so much a Force thing as a life-evaluation thing. At least, that's my guess. I haven't spoken to her, I only saw her head up there early this morning, before dawn."

"She's been up there all day?"

"Finn, you surprise me. You know her. Is it weird for Rey to seek solitude when she's got something on her mind?"

"No," admitted Finn. "And she can go a really long time without food. Days if she has too. Not me. I'd probably have come down to eat something way before now."

That made Leia laugh again.

Ben tracked Rey's descent, warmth washing over him at the sight of her. His pulse quickened again and he carefully regulated his breathing so no one would detect how he thrilled at this distant glimpse of her.

Chewie stood at the base of the steep incline. He'd spotted her too and was watching her come down. He roared to draw the others' attention to her arrival.

"What the hell," Poe said, half-amused, half-exasperated. "Did she transform into a Chandrillan Mountain Goat all of the sudden? Why is she way up there?"

Court looked horrified. "Her dress! She's climbing around rocks in a white dress? It's ruined for sure."

Rose winced too. "Leia spent so long trying to help her find the right one, too."

Poe glanced at Court incredulously. "You care what happens to a dress? You?"

She cast him a narrow-eyed glare. "What, you think because I don't wear fancy things very often and I dress myself the way I do that I can't appreciate beautiful apparel?"

"Ugh, stop," Finn complained loudly to them. "Stop arguing."

He leaned towards Leia and Ben and lowered this voice. "It's a good thing they're rarely in the same place because they've been utterly insufferable since that harvest festival."

Leia sighed. "Court's right, she probably has ruined that dress. And we worked so hard to find her something she could feel comfortable in."

"You succeeded," Ben told her. "She certainly is comfortable."

"Too comfortable, apparently. She'll look —"

"Like a scavenger?" he interrupted. "She doesn't care. I don't care. I fell for a scavenger, after all."

"Wow," Finn said quietly and admiringly.

The white figure in sharp relief against the emerald green slope was beginning to resolve. Ben cleared his throat, a sense of anticipation finally seeping into his veins. Except for those two quick moments of excitement, he'd fine all morning — a tranquil pond of slow moving, contemplative emotions. But now, seeing her draw nearer, his whole soul began to rise to this moment.

Chewie met her when she got down to him and began escorting her back to the group, the two of them obviously joking about something. Ben stepped forward with the intention of going to meet them, but his mother stopped him with a hand on the arm.

"She is yours soon enough, son. Be patient. Wait here."

Then she herself went, striding across the windy expanse towards the figures. Ben straightened, lifting his chin and squaring his stance, drawing on as much patience as he could muster. Court came up to him, grinning wickedly.

"Here she comes. You ready, bossman?"

Ben allowed himself a short laugh. "Everyone keeps asking me that."

"Well, I guess you can't really know if you're ready for something like this," she agreed. "But you do look great. She's gonna melt."

She herself had cleaned up well, though that came as no surprise. He'd seen her on Canto Bight. Unlike Poe, Ben would never accuse Court of not knowing the value of fine clothing.

Rose took Finn's hand and led him to some predetermined spot. All the companions arranged themselves, their little assembly ready. BB-8 beeped excitedly, and R2 whistled in agreement.

The wayward trio finally approached, and Ben's breath caught in his chest.

He had tried so hard not to love her. He'd fought with everything he possessed to keep her out of his head and out of his heart. He tried to cling to what he knew. To his discipline. To the dark. He tried to tell himself that the desperate ache in his chest whenever she crossed his mind was hate, nothing else. She just provoked his struggle against the light, that was all. He hated for her for that. For making him feel weak. He hated her for winning the love and attention of his father when Ben had failed to. That's all it was - hate, right? But Ben knew hate, he applied it to himself all the time, and it was too big a lie for him to believe. He couldn't hate her. He was fascinated by her, and then his soul began to crave her, craved the soothing balm interacting with her brought to the fires of his self-loathing. He needed to be with her. So then he convinced himself that he could get what he wanted, sort of, if he could just persuade her to embrace her dark fate as he had. If he could help her use her pain for fuel, as he did. If she could train with him, be his apprentice or partner, it would be enough.

But stars how he had tried not to fall too far.

It didn't work.

And now she was here, arrayed in dazzling, luminescent white fabric that clung to her in a way that was natural and right, that was both breathtaking and yet somehow also exactly suited to her. He loved the glow of her skin, the curve of her neck, the brown curls which had escaped the elegant arrangement behind her head. He even loved the dirt that caught on the edges of her fine white dress, the tear in the sheer sleeve, the traces of her mountain climb.

She greeted her friends with hugs and warm words, laughing when they teased her, the warmth of her soul bathing them all in comforting sunlight. Ben couldn't hear anything they said. He couldn't think of anything but her.

For so long he'd waited, not daring to hope, forbidding himself from the dream, for someone who wouldn't turn away from his monstrosity. He'd told himself to get used to isolation, to find strength in solitude. He didn't get to imagine companionship. He wasn't destined for someone who cared. Kylo Ren had constructed around him a fortress of rage and hatred and desperate loneliness.

She cut through that fortress in clean, powerful strokes and dragged him out of his own ruin.

Now she turned to him, her eyes meeting his. He was overcome, utterly drowned in awe of her. He swallowed, holding out his hand as he'd done once, twice, three times. She took it, her skin sliding against his, warm and calloused and familiar. In this place where they had first touched. Ben couldn't stop looking at her, even as he walked her to last few steps up the rise to where his mother had taken her place as the officiant.

You're staring, Ben, she thought to him, her cheeks warming beneath his gaze. The effect was irresistible.

You're beautiful, he returned helplessly.

His mother began speaking, saying something meaningful, probably. Ben didn't care what she said. He couldn't focus on any of it. He was overwhelmed with bewilderment and awe and gratitude. He tore his eyes away from her, staring past his mother, into a clear blue sky. But even when he wasn't looking at her, he could feel her light engulfing him. He thought of the Force vision from that kyber cave and felt confident in whatever future came. Because she was his, and he was her's.

Ben went through the motions, the rituals, and turned when Rey gently took his other hand, vowing in the Force the things she had already promised before, promises that meant everything to him. That she wasn't going anywhere, that they were two halves of one whole, that they were the balance. Ben vowed too, but everything he said felt so inadequate. Words failed to convey the emotions sweeping through him on powerful tides. Luckily, he didn't have to speak them well. She was there, inside him, her soul mingled with his, and she could feel exactly what he wanted her to know. And at the last, just before his mother concluded, he gave her back the words she had once given him.

"If we stay, we stay together. If we go, we go together. Whatever the Force wills, we will meet it together."

And then his mother said the impossible thing about them being husband and wife, and then Rey was laughing, and Ben ran his fingers along her jaw, tipping her face up to him so that he could kiss her again, with all the shy wonder of the first time. Except the first time had been a violent breaking of a dam and they had fallen headfirst into that kiss, and he could feel the same wreckage impending now, for even as his lips met hers in reverence and hesitation, fire raced through them both. He broke away from it, expelling a soft, unsteady breath.

Their friends were applauding. Rey blushed and hid her face in his shoulder.

Why did we invite so many people? She wondered to him.

Your idea.

And then everyone was around them, pulling them apart to give them hugs of happiness and congratulations. Even though there were only nine of them, counting the droids, they seemed like a much bigger crowd.

"I can't believe it, Rey," Poe said, hugging her tight, "You're a Solo now!"

"Actually," Rey glanced at Leia and then at Ben, "I've taken his other family name. Leia made a good point, Han made a reputation for that name."

"So you're Rey Skywalker?" Rose asked, unmasked awe in her voice.

Court whistles low. "Now that name will get you all kinds of places in this galaxy."

Ben found her hand and pulled her out of the fray and to him.

She smiled, and his head spun dizzily at the way her eyes glittered with joy. "Your mother said you were alright with it."

He gave her a nod. "I am."

"You have a name now," Finn said with good-nature envy. "Where do I get one?"

Court nodded at him. "I know a guy."

Finn laughed, Court laughed, and then as if they'd planned it, they grabbed Ben and Rey's hands and began to drag them down the mountain. The others followed, pushing or pulling the couple through the golden light of sunset down the path that led to the caretaker's village.

Ben held tight to one one of Rey's hands, allowing them to lead him to the feast but not whisk her away again. He looked back and saw his mother standing there, watching them all go with a peaceful smile on her face. And he had to look again, because he could have almost sworn he saw his father and uncle standing beside her.