A/N: Thank you SO much for the favs and follows! And a special shout out to those of you who reviewed (I've replied via PM): I appreciate it! I also wish to thank my beta Emmeth Nigh for helping me editing this chapter! Hope you enjoy and I'd love to get your feedback~
black thumb: chapter 1 - Jan 1: Thank you for your review. I understand your concerns but I don't condone abusive relationships in RL, nor does this story promote it. Why don't you read the rest of the story and find out for yourself? ;)
Hartmannclan: chapter 24 - Jan 9: haha Cliffhangers are such fun to write...fingers crossed this chapter doesn't have one... ;) Thanks for your review!
CHAPTER 25
Ben strode back and forth across the cramped spacecraft, forced himself to stop when he became aware of Hux's feral gaze following his every movement—his taut lips twitching in a pleased sneer—and then inevitably caught himself pacing again to the restless rhythm within.
The General didn't need to be Force sensitive to pick up on the waves of concern that radiated off him. There was no point in hiding his gnawing unease. In fact, Ben half expected it to unbalance the man or have the transport distort and crumple in response to its sheer intensity. But, apart from the occasional spark riddling an instrument or a light strip flickering erratically, his palpable anxiety was contained in his own miserable signature; it spiraled around him in ever stronger currents that constricted his breathing and made his limbs heavy.
And all the while the two Knights stood motionless besides Hux, faceless and looming—the combined power of their minds keeping his own in check. An attempt to escape, to release the Force bottled up inside and around him, would only result in his own destruction. Right now, with Rey and the immensity of the loss of her running its course like a fever, Ben wasn't even sure he could tap into it. If it would obey his will. If he could trust its guidance.
But it hadn't been the Force that had betrayed him. If anything, it had helped him see clearly. He knew now what he had to do. What fate he had to stop running away from.
He could only thank the stars he wouldn't drag Rey down with him—
He came to an abrupt halt, his boot's loud clang reverberating through the grid and against the smooth walls.
For a moment he wasn't sure he had seen right. Maybe his instinctive longing to see her had played tricks on his mind. But even as he stared at Rey's frail form it materialized more solidly. She was lying on the floor of a spaceship many systems away. Worlds removed from him.
And yet she was here...
He stiffened as she stirred, her limbs groggy but obeying her renascent will. Her sun-touched forehead wrinkled with the effort it cost her to open her eyes. She blinked. Blinked again. And then both their breaths faltered and the slits of drowsy hazel flowered into widened orbs of hurt reproach.
Her pointed, deafening silence as she raised herself up on an elbow almost made his knees buckle. Ben clenched both fists, trying to anchor himself in the leather straining against his knuckles and his fingers digging painfully into his palms as Rey got to her feet among troopers that couldn't see her.
She swayed and he nearly staggered with her. Precarious balance restored, Rey balled her hands like he had—their sinews tensing with his.
"Where are you?"
Her strained voice sounded far away yet incredibly close—it mingled with the grating buzz of the energy cuffs cutting into his wrists. Ben realized he had punctured his tongue in the impossible effort not to say anything when the iron-like taste of it blossomed in his mouth.
"Where are you?" Rey asked again, taking a determined step towards him even though her half-dazed body visibly shook. Ben had to stop himself from giving in to the urge to take a step back. It was infinitely harder not to move in the opposite direction and steady her slender, blundering figure. And so he stood there, locked in place; new resolve fighting old longing.
He couldn't take her down with him, Ben reminded himself, locking his jaw hard so that it seemed to crash his teeth together. He couldn't betray her presence with even a look or a gesture-
"Ben..."
Her rigid, stubborn form had melted into one of unmasked despair—her plea and wavering eyes tearing at his heart. It also brought him too close to ruin because his stifled gasp prompted movement around him.
He swallowed down her name, stealing it from his unwilling lips, and simply stared back into quivering amber—his posture unyielding even though he trembled to his very core.
Rey staggered back a little as if she'd received a physical blow, her eyes widening in disbelief and shock. He didn't move. Wanted to—needed to—more than breathing. But he couldn't…
Then her frame became rigid, her signature in the Force bristling and whipping up into a gale—her glare raw and fierce.
"I'm coming back for you," she all but spat, her resolve as immovable as his own. "I will find you."
Even as her edges began to fray Rey was all movement now. Back bent and fingers flying she must be working furiously on a console he couldn't see. Ben had almost called out to her. To tell her to stop. To leave him—to run. But then the violent tremor that upset her balance and made her grab a hold of something ran through him too.
Next instant the sensation of the deck of the shuttle bucking and canting underneath her feet made him reach out instinctively to stay standing on the grid that hadn't moved an inch under his boots.
The troopers guarding him started to consolidate again at the periphery of his vision, the warning surge of their blasters coinciding with the indistinct echoes of a wailing alarm. The Force swirled with Rey's flurry of panic, her dawning realization a sharp tug at the agitated mass that it was in the oppressive cocoon around him.
Rey!
The scared outcry had formed in his head before he could stop himself. But it hadn't reached her. She had faded; her energy getting sucked out of his vicinity with such abrupt finality that he had taken a step forward in futile pursuit—a telling step forward.
All around him the transport gained painful clarity again, materializing fully where Rey had disappeared. The troopers' armor glinted harshly in the glare of enveloping, artificial light as a staccato tap-tap-tap of glossy boots hitting steel rattled louder and louder against the inside of his skull.
Ben looked up into cold eyes an electric blue—Hux's knowing look chilled him to the bone. It was nothing to the triumph he saw in those eyes too.
"Did your precious occult grant you a goodbye?" he taunted in a mocking hiss and came to a meaningful halt at the exact place Ben had reached for, the upturned corners of his mouth indication enough that he had guessed at the truth.
Crushing her no-longer-there apparition under his heels, the General clasped his hands behind his back and leaned in closer, the serrated rim of his ear bleeding into the red of his sleek hair.
"Even the universe must know I have won then—"
Ben lunged forward with a roar that instantly morphed from hate to gut-wrenching pain. The electrostaff crackled in unison with the energy cuffs that bound his hands together, the first buried in his midriff while he slumped over the plastoid-encased arm holding it.
He stumbled to one knee with a grunt that sounded strangely animalistic in the transport humming with synthetic life rushing pitilessly through circuitry and vents. And then the sound was smothered by the ominous shape of the Dominance gliding into view—and with it his prison awaiting him somewhere in its labyrinthine depths.
(…)
She resolutely turned away from him, willing his tall, tangible frame to be reduced to the unwelcome specter he had been all those months ago. The distance had seemed less insurmountable then compared to how it felt now; the chasm of his making a gaping hole in their promise.
They were going to do this together...
Taking in the instruments before her, Rey set to work with something close to spite as an icy ache clawed at her spine. She had to find him. Had to turn this kriffing ship around—
A light had started flashing, adding a feverish, reddish pitch to the pale glare of hyperspace. Biting her lip, Rey tried to ignore how its pulse steadily increased and hurriedly felt the console for the right switches. She had only flipped a handful to disengage the autopilot when a mechanical siren rang out. A split-second later the ship shuddered in similar protest and she had to fling out an arm—hand finding a chair and nails scratching its refined fabric.
Even though her hands were nowhere near the instruments the frame of the craft groaned loudly—its floor slanting at an ever-steeper angle. A spike of fear prompted her to try again. She rerouted part of the power feeding the autopilot, dispersing it until she finally cut it off completely. All it did was trigger another terrifying moan of steel. Her feet were starting to slide on the tilting floor now.
They rigged it...
As if in answer other little lights sparked to life, a noiseless choir of bright, threatening colors.
They rigged it and she'd just sprung the trap...
The alarm screeched louder and louder now, drowning what she thought was Ben's voice calling out her name. When she swiveled around he was already gone—his Force imprint fragmenting instantly until she couldn't sense anything anymore.
Reeling from the void he left behind, Rey had hardly begun countering the ship's growing instability when it was slung out of hyperspace.
She slammed against the floor, palms and chin colliding hard with it. At the mercy of the spinning craft, her body rolled helplessly across the smooth surface until she gathered the Force to break her momentum. She scrambled to all fours, then balanced herself with one foot against a wall, the other on a viewport—her sole seemingly pressed against the revolving stars. Rey stretched her body as long as she could make it.
Blinking away spots dancing in her vision, her groping fingers at last stumbled upon the control panel. It came free with a soft hiss and an angry jet of steam. Tongue peeking out in concentration, Rey burrowed between the exposed knot of wires, her limbs and the crown of her head bumping against the unforgiving flank and roof of the ship.
The dying wail became even shriller the moment her hand closed around the one wire she was looking for, the skeleton around her trembling so violently it seemed made of canvas instead of steel. This was it. She either got ripped apart with the ship, or they both stuck around a little bit longer.
Palms sweaty and heart throbbing in the region of her throat, Rey closed her eyes, scrunched her nose and eyes—and pulled.
Nothing changed for another heartbeat, then there was a deafening whine and the ship lurched as it escaped from its wild spin. Rey smacked down hard once more on the floor, all air forced out of her lungs as the ship wobbled and gradually tipped back into a position in which its inner gravity made sense.
For a moment she just lay there, panting and aching all over. Then she noticed just how quiet it had gone. Too quiet...
With an unsettling suspicion writhing in her gut, Rey pushed herself to her feet. Her movements unsteady with her head still trapped in a sickening sense of vertigo, she sidled towards the main console—her back against the inner side of the ship. When she was almost there she pushed herself off, palms slapping instead on the intricate puzzle of switches and keys. It had stilled. There wasn't a single blip of color. No slurring, muffled alarm. Nothing.
Rey gripped the console for support, breathing heavily as she raised her eyes to look out at the vastness of space in which she was now adrift. She was trapped in a lifeless vessel that promised little hope of being salvageable.
She let out a heartfelt curse and rammed a fist into the dead instrument, cursing again as her unconscious call on the Force worsened the impact. Tasting bile in her mouth, Rey stared down at the cracked controls and the miniscule crystals that glittered in the sputtering lights as they swirled out into the air with her short, foggy breaths. The small, vapory clouds made her feel the surrounding cold creeping into her muscles and bones.
Life-support must already be failing...
Fighting back tears and frustration, Rey staggered around the shuttle—popping open this panel and that, disappearing halfway into vents and lowering herself in shallow crawl spaces, trying every trick she knew. But the ship would not be revived. Didn't want to. Couldn't.
But it had to! She couldn't be beaten by this! She was a scavenger. She mended broken things. It was what she was good at.
Not good enough to save Ben...
That single thought sucked what seemed every remaining hope from her. Fingers bleeding and sporting a nasty cut on her cheekbone, Rey collapsed against the main control—not wanting to see the vastness of empty space spread out endlessly before her. She slung the servodriver away from her with a furious growl, it skidded across the floor and out of sight—landing with a resounding, hollow clang in a crawl space she hadn't bothered covering up again.
Ben!
She screamed his name in her head, eyes pricking with enraged tears.
Ben!
Knowing he couldn't hear her was maddening. Was torture. And yet she couldn't stop herself calling out again and again, her voice coming out hoarse after a while when she tried it that way too.
The wet trails on her face started to itch, then they hurt as they froze to her skin. The cold had seeped deep into her body now. She had no feeling left in her fingers and her limbs were going more numb with every precious second that slipped past.
Something hard and angular prodded against her lower back. With a tremendous effort she reached behind her, fingers closing around a familiar shape. Not knowing how to feel but experiencing both resentment and faith she eyed the beacon in her palm. It, like the ship—like her—seemed barely alive; its blue glow soft and fading.
Lips purple and trembling, Rey folded her hands together and pressed them against her mouth hoping that somehow they could leech some warmth from her ragged breaths. That it could renew the beacon's spirit at least. It barely helped. Her eyelids grew heavier and heavier, her mind becoming sluggish and her heart having long since been diminished to a faint thump...thump...thump.
Why did he have to do it?
Thump...thump...thump...
Why did he...
Thump...thump...thump...
Why...
She closed her eyes, leaning back until her head thunked against the battered console. That illusion of sleep she shouldn't succumb to was so hard to resist now, only one thought—one wish—withholding her from it.
Ben...
(…)
The monotonous hum pervading the immaculate walls of his cell was driving him insane. It had already provoked him to bury a few fists in it; the dents left behind a testimony to the futility of his anger. He still felt hemmed in. Blinded. Suffocated.
It had been hours since the Force whisked her away. He kept track by listening to the steady pulse running through the Dominance's veins. Part of him wished he couldn't hear it anymore for it only seemed to emphasize how time, like everything else, was out of his control now. Rey was gone and yet he could still see her everywhere. Closing his eyes only made it worse—sharpening the image of her face until her expression of surprise and fear became too much to bear and he opened them again.
The mangled remains of the energy cuffs ground under his boots with a pathetic crunch when Ben took to pacing again. It was all he had been able to do aboard the transport—and it was all he could do now. He wasn't sure if it caused the four walls to close in around him more—or less. Perhaps all it did was remind him of the dead end he had come to. Whichever way he turned now, it would lead to the same conclusion.
But that wasn't what scared him...
Ben increased his pace, hands clenching. His own destruction was nothing. After all, he had broken himself bit by bit already and it wouldn't entirely be Hux's honor now. No. He feared for Rey. And not just because something had clearly gone wrong on her end.
In the temporary clarity of his decision he had failed to foresee the capricious nature of the Force. Of its ability to test him. Push him. Nudge him another step closer to that edge he had been toeing for so long.
He hadn't said goodbye to her because he knew he couldn't. And now the Force had decided to torment him for his cowardice with its utter disregard for time and distance. Rey was lightyears away. Lightyears away and in trouble. Lightyears away and yet close enough to touch one moment—gone with his next heartbeat. And he couldn't do anything to help her; their bond a greater torture than bliss.
Their bond...
He instinctively probed for its comforting tendrils linking him to her, then quickly withdrew, muttering a dark "Stars!" and punching another pockmark in the wall.
He shouldn't... Not now...
He had made his choice. It was the only one left to him. Perhaps had been for a long time. Ever since he had gone down that kriffing path that had led him so far from his family.
That had turned away from her now...
Again the thread between them stirred, offering solace and anchorage. And again he needed all of his strength to let it slip from his fingers—no matter how much he wanted to grasp it tightly instead.
Their bond was too dangerous. She could follow it to him. It would lure her back.
It would tempt him to let her—
There was a sharp, clinical hiss that made him raise his forehead from its hardly soothing position against the wall. Fragments of duracrete still trickled listlessly down from his knuckles as he looked up to see a trooper hovering on the threshold. She hesitated, something preventing her from moving—the tray with nondescript food rather tentatively held out to him.
Ben half turned away from her, his restlessness urging him to resume his pacing again, when he, too, froze. He could sense a spike of trepidation in the Force around the trooper. But there was something else too. Intrigued, he cocked his head slightly, concentrating on the subtle fluctuations until he recognized it.
Curiosity?
His brows had barely furrowed in confusion at the unexpected sentiment when the stormtrooper jerked as if hit with a stun baton. She dropped the tray unceremoniously on the floor, gave it a cautious shove in his direction. Then she hurried out of the cell, leaving in her wake a few, inadvertent shreds of memories that had been on her mind. Ben clutched at the images of a lithe figure dressed in black robes—robes similar to his.
A figure wearing a mask overrun with a cobweb of silvery steel...
Ben slid down the wall, a grim smile playing on his lips. He dropped his hands to the floor, one leg bent, the other outstretched across what must be half of his cell's width. For one glorious moment he wasn't trapped in it anymore. Not when he thought of Rey. Of Rey being alive. Safe. Safe and maybe someday making it back to the Resistance.
If she did—they could reach out to troopers that remembered Ika Ren's plans...
Then the walls threatened to crush him again, all lightness pressed out of his body with their overwhelming weight.
If it would happen—Ben tipped his head back so he stared at the perfect ceiling, his jaw moving against such a powerful surge of loneliness it seemed to exist outside of himself; an insidious entity that strangled every shred of solace before it reached him—If it would happen, it would happen without him...
(…)
She didn't know if she had lost consciousness. She must have. Which was why it was all the more surprising that her mind was now finding its way back to awareness. Half-dreams of Ben's silent figure and of a sense of abandonment larger than herself, still clung to the inside of her skull. Rey wished she could shake those dreams out—submerge instead in a blissful forgetfulness until they stopped haunting her steps.
Her lashes felt so brittle she swore a few broke off when she blinked her eyes open—they were no more than slants but the pallid glow of faraway stars flooded her vision at once.
Rey lifted a wary hand to block the glare when it remained painfully bright, at the same time craning her neck to trace its source. Just when she thought she had glimpsed movement there was a low groan of durasteel and a none too gentle bump that had the shuttle suddenly rock from side to side. Her reflexes were slow to respond. Too slow. Her shoulder hit the ice-cold floor before she realized her body had moved with the impact.
Gnashing her teeth and ignoring the dull throb of pain, Rey stirred herself into motion at the tell-tale sounds of magnetic clamps latching onto the hull—soon followed by the high-pitched whine of an airlock extending.
Just her luck to stayalive long enough to serve as space pirate bait!
Not of a mind to be wrenched from her would-be grave like one of the power couplings she had habitually harvested from the guts of Stardestroyers, she crawled on her hands and knees—numb fingers feeling around for anything that could serve as a weapon. They had only just closed around a hydrospanner when she registered the sputtering sounds of a plasma welder.
Barely able to get to her feet, Rey was still swaying on her stiff legs and threatened to tumble back down when a rain of white-hot sparks snaked an arch in the hull. Seconds later, its polished, rigid material peeled away like dead skin on a sun-dried carcass.
She increased her hold on the hydrospanner, raising it higher. When she planted her feet further apart for better balance—or at least the appearance of it—the tip of her boot sent something small spinning across the floor. Something blue.
The beacon swiveled to a halt right in front of the makeshift hatch, the fiery orange of the molten steel not quite quenching its softer hue.
Rey's eyes shot up when something moved. Someone. A face had appeared, pressed next to a hand against the small viewport of the airlock. A familiar face.
They had found her...