A/N: Digital hugs for the follows and favs! Digital hugs AND digital cake for those of you who left me a review: I really appreciate the positive feedback! :D

Hartmannclan - chapter 26 - Jan 16: Well, I do love me some poetry so I couldn't resist that tear there ;) I do feel a tad guilty about the emotional roller-coaster that I'm putting these two through...fingers crossed they'll get that happy ending they deserve to make up for all their current misery. Thanks for your review!

CHAPTER 27

She watched her fingers trace the scratches on the wall—a pervasive numbness detaching her from the wandering digits. Rey vaguely recalled the similar, rough feel of the countless notches she'd carved on the belly of the AT-AT; every single one marking another day of waiting for a family she knew wasn't going to come back for her.

Who had never meant to return...

The memory should overwhelm her. Force her to her knees. Bring her to tears. But Rey felt nothing. The terrible possibility that she would have to scar a wall again so the wounds wouldn't be scored on her heart alone was too cruel. Too fitting. But she wouldn't wait another lifetime for him. Not when she could still save him.

The stars couldn't be so cynical to deny her the chance—

Rey scoffed at her own naivety. After all, her current captivity was hardly promising. The untrusting animosity of her jailors couldn't be called a good sign either. There was always someone standing in front of the door. Even now she could hear the thunk-thunk-thunk of worn boots on a floor nearly eroded away and the tell-tale slap of a blaster being pushed into the hands of whoever had come to relieve the other.

Not everyone she had seen had been guarded and wary. Chewie had practically barged in, leaving the grizzled man hovering nervously in the corridor as the Wookie nearly squashed her like a horned melon—his long arms pressing her to his tall, furry shape. He hadn't said much, he never did, but the bowl of smelly, yellowish stew made the words redundant.

She'd only had time to murmur a quick "Thanks." when the old guard ushered the Wookie out and the door slid back again. Not for long, it turned out.

A short woman with springy black hair that split along either side of her round face like the branches of the trees she'd seen on Takadona, had slipped in soon after—casting a furtive look behind her. The blaster she slung clumsily on her back had clued Rey in that she must have taken over from the older man.

"Hi," she'd breathed, awkwardly raising a hand in greeting before plunging both in the deep pockets of her oil-stained overall. After having cast another covert look over her shoulder and into the empty corridor, she had produced two handfuls of protein bars.

"It's not much," she had commented with an apologetic shrug, spotting Rey's frown at the creased wrappers that had lost a lot of their bright colors. "But they're still edible. A little crumbled maybe..."

After another shrug she had let them tumble on the threadbare blanket on her bunk, adding almost conspiratorially in way of an explanation, "Human stomachs aren't made to take Chewie's Bantha broth."

She leaned in even closer and whispered, nose wrinkling, "It's that Tertium spice."

After giving a meaningful shudder of revulsion, the woman had smiled, then nodded so that her hair bounced merrily, and made to go again. A loud, self-mocking "Oh!" had made her turn around when she was halfway over the threshold, hand already reaching for the sensor of the door. "It's Rose, by the way. Rose Tico. I'm a friend of Finn's."

Rey had simply blinked at her, the corners of her mouth tugging up as if trying to remember how to smile—how to feel about the implied 'and so a friend of you too'.

At a loss for words, Rey had nodded instead, hoping to convey her sincere gratitude that way. She didn't know for sure if it had because the woman had disappeared as suddenly as she had come.

Rey's apathy had nearly been driven out with the woman's—Rose's—selfless kindness; the leap of faith to trust her because they shared a friend. Or had in any case.

Despite those two visits, especially their generosity towards what everyone must tell them was their enemy, Rey's stomach still rumbled unhappily. But she was barely aware of it because of the visitor that had preceded both.

Ben...

Rey shifted uneasily on her bunk, the untouched protein bars scattered around her crinkling with the movement. She unwrapped her arms from the knees she had pulled up to her chin, reaching out again for the collections of scratches on the wall next to her for distraction.

It was like a hollowness had scraped everything inside of her away, right up to the very marrow in her bones—

"Rey?"

For one, frantic heartbeat she was convinced it had been Ben calling out for her. Rey scrambled to her feet, instantly shivering at leaving what little warmth the thin, sagging mattress had offered. Protein bars spilling onto the floor, the utter emptiness of the cramped cabin filled her with an unbearable heaviness that rushed in to replace the void of him.

"Rey?"

Muffled as it was, this time she recognized Finn's voice. He was her new guard then.

How many hours had passed that it was his turn again?

The panic ignited by the thought pierced through her lethargy and she willed her voice out to answer.

"Yes?"

Her monosyllabic reply prompted a surprised shuffle of feet. There was silence, then a hesitant, "You're... You're not asleep?"

Rey almost smiled at the innocent and illogical inquiry so typical of him. "Come in, Finn."

She bent down to grab the thin blanket off of the bunk—littering even more protein bars around her feet in the process—and flung it around her shoulders when another shiver reminded her that space was a lot colder than a desert planet. That and the fact that a velvoid dress—a shredded velvoid dress—wasn't the best choice to wear when traveling through it.

The door slid open. Halfway, that was. Finn rolled his eyes at it and gave it a persuading bang with a flattened palm. It retreated with a grumpy jarring until only the rim of it was visible in the doorframe.

Finn ambled in, visibly uncomfortable in her presence but determined to face her nonetheless—his eyes looking anywhere but directly at her. He froze, head snapping back to take another survey of the floor.

"Rose has been here," he deduced with something like fondness in the way he knelt down and picked up one of the protein bars. The way he studied it—as if he'd never seen something so interesting in his life—indication enough that he was stalling too.

Rey didn't dare move in case it snapped him out of his reverie, let alone say something that would make him change his mind about whatever he had come to achieve. Eyes wandering, they landed on the scratches above the bunk—on the number that was barely visible because it had been desperately crossed out.

FN2187...

"This is your cabin."

It hadn't been a question, not really a statement either. An obvious attempt at creating an opening; a neutral ground on which they could talk normally to each other. Well, as normal as was possible under the circumstances.

"It was," he replied with amused emphasis, and his eyes lit up for a fraction in good-humor.

"Right. Sorry about that," she mumbled back, both tensing up and breathing a little freer at the evidence that her cell had at least belonged to the first friend she'd ever made.

"Don't be. It's not your fault...is it?" Finn asked, clearly wanting her to answer with a resounding 'no' which they both knew was impossible. She couldn't undo everything that had happened—the different directions they had gone in—any more than he could.

"I don't know," she said, eventually settling on honesty.

Finn nodded absentmindedly, his mouth opening and closing a couple of times as he searched for the right answer to that. In the end he seemed to decide that either there wasn't one or he didn't need it. He placed one hand on his hip, the other rubbing his jaw in momentary pensiveness before he voiced the one question that had really been burning on his lips.

"Why are you here, Rey? Why come back after all these months?"

"Why are you here?" she shot back defensively, cringing at her reflex to lash out and adding in a softer, non-accusatory tone, "I thought this wasn't your fight?"

The guilt that had been there before still shone dully in his eyes, but there was no trace of regret for his new path.

He had really joined the Resistance...

"It wasn't. Until they showed me that this is where I belong. With them. The Resistance can't be allowed to fizzle out. Not now we're the only ones that can wake everyone up to the threat of the First Order. They're ruthless. We're trained to be ruthless. I was trai—"

He stopped himself short and took a moment to steady himself now the fervor of his belief threatened to sweep him away.

"Why have you come back, Rey?" he simply asked her again, turning to face her. "Why? I woke up and...and you were gone. I thought you would bring back Luke Skywalker. But instead you went to the First Order. To him?" Finn's brows knotted together in worry and confusion that seemed as fresh as if she'd just stepped into that elevator, her hands bound by stun cuffs, Ben standing behind her clutching the lightsaber Master Skywalker had rejected.

Along with her...

"I couldn't convince Master Skywalker. He wouldn't listen. Not to me at least. But he did, Finn. He listened. So did I. And I felt the light in him. There is light in him."

Finn took a step towards her, as though tempted to place his hands on her shoulders that had tensed as she clutched at the blanket wrapped around her, but he refrained from it at the last moment.

"He killed Han."

Rey winced and turned away, his next words spoken to her back.

"Nearly killed me too."

It took all of her effort not to sink down on the bunk for support when she was momentarily transported to the pine forest of Starkiller Base. Rey trembled as she remembered just how cold he had felt when she had found him: face buried in the snow; his body seemingly cut in half; and his eyes closed in such a peaceful way she had feared she was already too late.

She kneaded her forehead to dispel the power the memory had over her, her knuckles' hard ridges softened by the tattered blanket. "There is light in him," Rey repeated resolutely, stubbornly, perhaps. After all, her own failure to fight her darkness didn't diminish the remaining light in him.

"I can't give up now. I won't. This could be how we win." Her conviction had grown compared to when she'd said it to Luke—something that didn't fail to surprise her now.

"How?" Finn simply asked, curious and skeptical in equal measure.

"I'm not sure you'd understand," she realized how weak it sounded the moment the words left her mouth.

"Make me," he shot back with something of his old, almost petulant naivety, his earnest expression indicative of the experiences that had changed him since Jakku—the chain of events that had transformed her too.

"Alright," Rey conceded, the ghost of a grin playing across her features before she took a deep breath and tried to explain. "Despite... Despite everything that he's done, he killed Snoke when he could've killed me. He didn't. He made his choice. I was able to make mine because of it. See which one I had really made before I even set foot on the Supremacy. We've been trying to find a way to bring down the First Order from the inside. Finn." She lowered her hands, fingers still curling around the frayed edges of the blanket as she approached him. "They know what you did. There's a growing number of stormtroopers who want to follow your lead. Free themselves from the same tyrant that the Resistance has been fighting."

Finn's eyes grew large and he swayed on the spot. He half shook his head as if in denial but it wasn't sufficient to smother his interest. Both sensations unresolved, he hurriedly regained his focus. "Are you sure about this?"

The unmistakable hope in his voice sounded almost feverish. Rey nodded fervently in response. "I wasn't lying when I said that the Resistance isn't alone in wanting to defeat the First Order."

He mirrored her nod, albeit a lot slower, his thoughts obviously racing again.

"Finn?" Rey demanded his attention to return to the present. "How many of you are left?"

Finn's hopeful expression sobered instantly. "Lieutenant Connix wasn't lying either. There's not even twenty of us. We were double that number but..." He swallowed hard, jaw clenching in a furious sort of grief, as if he couldn't allow himself yet to consider anyone irrevocably lost. "About half of us left in search of allies—"

"Those you sent a distress signal to from Crait?" Rey spoke over him, an ominous feeling shooting up her spine.

First there was surprise that flashed across his features. Then understanding of the logical consequence of Rey's position took its place and he let out a heavy sigh.

"Yes. But not just to those planets. We tried garnering support from others too. So far without much success. If we don't run into First Order spies or troops, there's a high chance we're betrayed by the ones we want to convince to join our cause. That's not to mention the added risk of flying around in rusty buckets and having to stick to the type of spaceports in which the only thing higher than the crime rates are the number of people succumbing to Jundland Pox or whatever disease breeds on malnutrition and pollution. Don't even get me started on what the open sewers on Muskree do to you."

It took Rey a moment to take all of that in, a moment in which Finn visibly second-guessed the amount of information he had shared. She couldn't blame him, no matter how hard it was not to feel sad because of it.

"I'm sorry," she said, hating how feeble and inadequate the apology was.

Finn seemed to appreciate it all the same. He squeezed his eyes gratefully at her, making an indistinct grunt in the back of his throat in acknowledgement. In the silence that followed, he gave the sleeve of the jacket he wore a rueful tug, trying to smooth out the creases of the tired leather. Rey felt something click into place as she watched him.

It was the jacket that belonged to the pilot who he'd escaped the First Order with...

"Poe?" she queried, hoping she got the name right. Judging by the way Finn stiffened, she guessed she had.

"Yeah. He left too," he admitted gravely.

"How long?" Rey asked carefully, not knowing whether she should have.

Finn shook his head as if it had either been too long and he'd forgotten or he didn't want to know—to say it out loud.

"It doesn't matter," she said, quickly forestalling him from having to answer. "I'm sure he's okay. Probably been outrunning the entire First Order armada by a couple of parsecs all this time."

Finn huffed out a watery smile in appreciation but couldn't make himself say anything—couldn't make himself believe in that.

"Wherever he is, all of them are," Rey went on, closing one hand around his arm, "they would stand a much better chance of making it back if we dealt the First Order a serious blow first."

His gaze shifted to meet hers, pupils shooting left and right as if trying to get her in clearer focus—to no longer be haunted by the nightmare that had filled his vision even though he was wide awake.

"I need to speak to Leia."

Finn frowned, doubt creeping into his expression. "So you said."

"Please. There's no time to lose—"

"She already knows we found you," Finn told her and she was immensely glad he hadn't sounded reproving. "We'll be there soon."

Out of everything he had told her, this gave her the most reason to hope.

"Thank you," she said, voice thick with emotion.

Finn dipped his chin at her, something of the characteristic twinkle restored to his eyes.

"Finn," Rey called after him before he reached the doorway, giving in to impulse. He turned back to her, hands gripping the frames on either side. "Tell her that her son's life is at stake in this."

His brown eyes widened once he connected the dots between the enemy he knew as Kylo Ren and a son he thought their leader had lost a long time ago.

His jaw flexed ever so slightly as the newfound resolution in him seemed to waver, then solidify. At last, he nodded. "I'll make sure you get to tell her yourself."

His solemn promise was enough to almost bring her to tears. Picking up on the change in her expression, he tapped an upbeat rhythm against the doorframe as he started to back out of it. "You better eat those. They're her favorite. I wouldn't put it past her to steal them back in the middle of the night."

He waved a hand at the protein bars strewn all over the floor, a real smile breaking through on both their faces. Then the door haltingly slid back into place and he was gone—leaving her to kneel among the myriad of glimmering wrappers with a stomach a little more prepared to consider their tasteless contents.

(…)

The bright sunlight perforating the Palace's many, high windows gathered in oval puddles in the endless hallway. The elongated shadows of interceding pillars covered him alternately in darkness then light as Ben strode through it. He assumed the rays touching his exposed skin must contain warmth, but he didn't feel any of it. He was chilled to the bone and unable to forget Rey's frail, hunched form—the crown of her head mere inches from his face.

And he had told her to let him go...

Ben only just managed to repress the impulse to harbor her in his embrace, though she had faded away hours ago.

To hold her one more time before—

The meaningful, crackling surge of an electrostaff wrenched him from his painful reverie. He was surrounded by his usual convoy of elite- and stormtroopers. The menacing figures of Yara and Marrek glided at the head of the procession—both seeming to cause the patches of brightness to recoil whenever they approached one.

Although far from relinquishing their vine-like hold on his mind seeing it pressed the encircling Force back in on him, the Knights were beginning to get careless. As they approached the Atrium—it glittered like a crystals-filled eye at the end of the hall—their evident excitement and ambitions cast a haze over their hold on the Force.

Ben slowed down his pace just enough to buy himself the time he needed. Determined to take advantage of their temporary blindness, he took a deep, steadying breath, then reached out. He slammed into the immaterial wall around him at the first attempt. At the second try he felt it for the weak points that the Knights' transient inattention had created. The third time he managed to slip through, expanding his mind farther with every cautious probe until he could sense things beyond the Living Force that ran through the troopers moving with him like an obnoxious swarm of Mynocks.

Most of the elegant, airy rooms they passed felt empty save for the occasional flicker of energy coming from serving and maintenance droids. Ben reached out again, his awareness traveling further and further until it finally brushed against the mind he had been searching for. The sleeping mind—though it was nothing like natural sleep that had Ika Ren trapped in her own body. Yara's powers and knowledge of torture drugs had practically entombed her spirit in a mind paralyzed between dreams and waking.

Trying to ignore the pressure of seconds slipping through his hands—seconds that probably wouldn't be enough—Ben concentrated hard on that one mind. If he himself couldn't shatter his own cage for fear of risking the precarious agreement to let Rey go free, then the least he could do was try and rid Ika of hers.

Rekindling her waning Force signature was like setting fire to mist—it was too cold and diffused to work. Hurriedly changing tactics, he inadvertently slowed his steps even more. Ben was vaguely aware of the rising energy of the troopers and their weapons, as if both were trying to decide whether or not to prod him in the back and goad him to increase his pace. He couldn't spare that possibility another thought. He was getting closer now; driving the mist apart inch by difficult inch, but it triggered a reaction. Like plucking the string of a vast, sticky cobweb, the bars trapping her mind rattled with the tremor.

And the tremor ran on instead of losing its momentum—

"Pick up the pace!"

The scrambled, mechanical voice yanked him back into his own mind and Ben almost staggered with the sudden transition. The stormtrooper gave him a push for good measure, the barrel of his bulky blaster rifle colliding with his spine.

Ben squared his shoulders and strode on again, hating the net of Yara and Marrek's making as it returned in full force, but nevertheless close to hoping that he'd done something good.

Something good other than walking into his enemy's greedy hands alone; without Rey...

And then he stepped through the archway and the pride mingling with sadness was crushed into nothingness as the volatile energy of the life-filled atrium swelled before him like a hungry, bloodthirsty beast...