The next several weeks were easily the best of Ben's life. He worked with Rey on the school, getting it ready for students. He helped Rey and Finn design and build their new lightsabers-Rey's crystal choosing an usual gold color.
"That's the color of the temple guards," he said in amazement as she ignited it for the first time. The golden glow reflected in her eyes, bringing out the green in them. "I guess that's you. The guardian of the Jedi way."
She was silent for a very long moment, so deep in her meditation with the crystal that he couldn't read her. At last she looked back at him, her eyes suddenly filled with a maturity he hadn't seen before. "I guess I am," she said solemnly. He was momentarily overcome with gratitude to the Force that he was the one at her side, he was the one who would see what she would someday become. He was also a little afraid but in a good way.
However, as exciting as it was to embark on a new journey with Rey, the most wonderful parts of his life were the most ordinary. In their little community on Ajan Kloss, he was Ben Solo, son of Han and Leia. He walked about the community unmasked. No one secretly plotted to take his life. No voice drove him. No conflicting desires tore him apart.
He had friends. He instructed Finn in lightsaber construction as well, almost as delighted as Finn when the blade flashed for the first time in a beam of sky blue. He helped Rose plant an herb garden beside her quarters. He flew with Poe whenever they could get time in a couple of X-wings.
But most wonderful of all, he had Rey. Nothing dramatic happened. They just worked on the school and looked for students and ate and slept. He went to sleep in her arms each night and woke up the same way.
They even had a disagreement-their first-over the age of their students.
"I left home at nine. You were maybe five when you lost your parents. And just how screwed up did that make us?" he argued.
"Yes, but-" She headed for the bookshelf and pulled out of the Jedi texts.
"Rey, I know what it says. But look at Finn. He is older than you and he is growing stronger every day. Look at you! You beat me every time you fought me and had no training at all," he stated.
"Really?" she asked. "When you were bleeding to death the first time and being spoken to by the Force projection of your mother the second?"
He shrugged. "You still won." Then he put his hands on her shoulders and looked in her eyes. "It's not about the age you start. It's about starting at all. Think about it. Meditate on it."
Then he let her make up her mind on her own. At last she agreed to his deep relief to concentrate on older students-at least at first. In the end it was not even an issue because their meditation sessions had led them only to older teenagers and young adults. Selra ended up being their youngest.
Not every student they approached was interested, but within a few weeks they'd assembled a group of twelve and began training them to the best of their abilities.
And their disagreement didn't end their relationship. He hadn't driven her away. She didn't begin to plot against him. She just kept loving him.
His life was perfect. He didn't want to mess it up by reminding her or himself or their friends of the past. So he pretended there was nothing left to tell, no story of what made him that hung in the back of his mind, demanding to be aired, no level of honesty with himself or her that he hadn't reached.
His life was wonderful just like it was, so he buried the past under a thick blanket of denial, determined to pretend none of it had ever happened. He'd always been Ben Solo. He'd always been by her side.
Any unwanted flashbacks of a life before this were thoroughly suppressed. Any moments when the chaos of the past threatened to spill over into his emotions in the present were firmly denied. He was happy. Not angry. Not sad. He had nothing to be angry or sad about. Not anymore.
At least that was what he told himself.
"I beat you," Poe insisted as they crossed the landing field. "I was at the finish first. That means I beat you."
"After you told me the wrong layout of the course," Ben retorted as he returned his helmet and flight suit to the hanger boss.
"I didn't tell you the wrong layout. I just left out part of it-which should have been obvious to someone with your experience," Poe responded as he stepped out of his orange coveralls. "What's for dinner?"
"Stew. What else?" Ben answered. "Until you teach us a new recipe we're making stew."
Poe sighed. "Well, at least it's been edible. Lately."
Ben grimaced at the memory. "That one's on me," he admitted. "I was the one that put in the ponjac root." Poe shook his head in disappointment. Ben shrugged helplessly. "It smelled good. I thought it would taste good."
They heard Finn yelping before they opened the gate to the school compound. He stood in the wide grassy training area, his new lightsaber in hand, in combat with two training droids. The droids were clearly getting the better of him.
"Wow. Rey's got him moved up to two," Poe exclaimed. "I thought it was going to take longer."
"I convinced her he was ready," Ben explained.
They watched as Finn took a bolt to the left shoulder and right thigh simultaneously.
"He wasn't ready, was he?" Poe surmised.
"Not at all," Ben answered with a laugh. "But he really wanted to try. And adversity can be a very good teacher." He shouted to Finn, "Close off your eyes and ears! Listen with your heart. Feel what you need to do. Quit thinking!"
"I can't!" Finn shouted as he desperately fought off the attacking droids. "I can't quit thinking about how stupid I was to try this!"
"Then you're already defeated," Ben called back. He reached out with the Force to pause the droids and stepped closer. "Stop. Breathe. Find your place of peace."
Finn stood there, eyes closed and took a deep breath.
"Now find that place of determination. That place that drives you to win," Ben instructed. He watched Finn's mouth set in a hard line. "Good. Stand between the two in balance. Feel the peace and the determination." Ben allowed their first padawan to take a few more deep breaths, then stepped back and released the droids once more.
The Force rippled around them as Finn struck that place of balance, handily parrying the bolts that headed toward him and leaping a good six feet in the air over his attackers to strike from behind. Both droids dropped as their fields were breached by the streak of blue light in Finn's hand.
"Yes!" Ben shouted proudly. "That's it!"
"Did I get them?" Finn asked, his eyes still closed.
"You sure did!" Poe clouted him on the shoulder in congratulations. "Man, that jump was incredible!"
They chattered the rest of the way into the main building where Rey stood before their first full class of students, speaking to them about meditation.
"Who won?" She never stopped speaking to the group, but her presence flowed into him.
"Poe," he admitted begrudgingly.
"Rose owes me dessert!" Her answer was entirely too triumphant.
"You bet against me?" he asked in mock horror.
"I knew you'd let him win," she replied gently. "You did let him win?"
"Oh yeah. Absolutely," he answered. He and Poe headed past into the kitchen where Rose stood before a gigantic pot, attempting to stir it on tiptoe.
"I've got it." Ben took the huge ladle from her hand and gave the pot of stew a good stir. "Rey said you owe her dessert from the race."
"Why?" Poe asked as he sampled the broth. "Wait a minute. Rose, did you bet on him instead of me?" He pressed a melodramatic hand to his chest.
Rose shrugged. "Sorry."
"I guess you've got to start making dessert now," Ben informed her. "Since I lost-" he shot a hard look at Poe "-I'll help."
She pointed to a large cake on the counter. "I've already made it."
"Wait a minute." Ben held up a hand as realization hit him. "You bet on me to win, but expected me to lose? What kind of faith do you have in me, Rose?"
She winked at him. "I knew you'd let Poe win. You did let him win?"
"Oh yeah. Absolutely," Ben replied with a smile as Poe bristled angrily.
"No, you didn't!" Poe declared.
"The girls think I did," Ben retorted. "That's all that counts to me."
"Rematch!" Poe shouted. "I'll beat you twice. Rose, you better bet on me this time!"
"I swear you two are going to have to grow up at some point," Rey exclaimed as she entered the room. "I had to dismiss class early because of all the noise in here." Ben felt her spirit wrap around his as she stepped up to give him a quick kiss. It amazed him once again just how profoundly wonderful that commonplace sign of affection felt.
"So we're acting like children?" Poe asked, then shot a glance at Ben.
"Like brothers trying to one up each other," Rose declared.
"My mom kind of acted like your mom too," Ben acquiesced. "I'll claim you."
The group laughed, especially when Finn came in and started the whole conversation over again.
They ate with the students, Selra dropping by the table to ask Ben a question about lightsabers. "It's a little early to be thinking about a lightsaber," Ben answered. "You've only been training a few weeks."
"I can't help it," she replied. "I love to watch the sparring between Finn and Master Rey. Why don't you spar with them too? I only ever see you fight droids."
Ben shrugged her question off. Truthfully he never wanted to cross blades with either of them again, even in practice. "Tell you what, Selra, when you are ready I will gladly spar with you."
She smiled in delight. "I bet you're a really good teacher," she said. "Who taught you?"
"I had a few teachers. I got something from all of them." He avoided a direct answer, not allowing any memories of training with Luke or Ren or Snoke to surface long enough to visualize. Pretend none of it happened, he reminded himself. There was only now. Rey laughed at something Poe said and he soaked in her happiness like it was his own.
After the meal, they regrouped at Ben and Rey's house. "I really like having dinner together like this. I used to always eat with Paige in the evenings," Rose admitted as they gathered in their mismatched seating area. "I miss that."
"Who is Paige?" Ben asked as he took a seat next to Rey on their small sofa.
"She was my sister," Rose replied.
"Yes! The one Jehan used to date back on Hayes Minor," Ben recalled suddenly. "So she's not...around?" He suddenly grew very uncomfortable.
"She died at the evacuation of D'Qar." Ben sensed the grief behind her words.
His blood ran cold. He didn't kill Rose's sister at D'Qar. Surely he didn't kill Rose's sister. "How?" he made himself ask, his heart pounding with dread as the past came to get him once again.
"She was on the bombing run. Her ship destroyed the dreadnought but got caught in the explosion," Rose replied quietly.
Ben nodded, relief coursing through him. He hadn't shot down any bombers. That much he knew.
"I guess none of us have brothers or sisters," Rey said as she glanced around the group.
"I used to have eleven," Finn commented, though he shifted uncomfortably as he said it.
"You what?" Poe asked incredulously.
"My squadron," Finn replied solemnly. "Even after everything that we've been through, I still think the hardest thing I ever did was leave them."
"Have you seen any of them since?" Ben asked despite his determination not to look back. "Did you connect with FN-7321? Was she part of your squadron?"
Finn shook his head. "Not part of my squadron. We just knew each other from the platoon. We did meet up again on Kef Bir when she got resettled. It was good to see someone I knew, but we weren't close like I was with my guys. I'm not sure if any of my squad even survived."
Ben recalled seeing Finn for the first time. He had the blood of a dead teammate on his helmet. It had been Finn's surge of horror and grief that had caught his attention. Part of him had felt the same way-horrified and grief stricken by what he'd just done to Lor San Tekka, a man who'd been nothing but kind to him.
He had dismissed these emotions as weakness at the time and turned all the guilt FN-2187 engendered in him into more hatred and rage. But he had been completely wrong. Finn's compassion had been his greatest strength.
Now the guilt came back to him in full force. Finn had been forced to make that hard decision and leave the only home he'd ever known because of the atrocities he had asked of him.
"You should try to find them. Like we did with the first students," Rey suggested.
Ben nodded in agreement. If Finn wanted to meditate with Rey, he would be fine with that, he told himself, denying the little surge of jealousy at the thought of anyone but himself meditating that deeply with Rey.
But Rey turned to him and gave his knee a squeeze. "Ben, I think it would be more likely to succeed if you worked with Finn," she said, almost as if she'd read his thoughts. "I mean you and he are First Order brothers. You know the energy of that group much better than I would."
"We've settled plenty of troopers on Kef Bir," Rose reminded them. "That might be the best place to start."
"No, you guys." Finn waved his hands at them in denial. "That's too much trouble. And they probably never want to see me again. I mean I left them behind."
Ben couldn't help but feel the sudden wave of regret and loss that poured from the former trooper.
Rey reached over to give Finn's hand a squeeze. "You need to do this," she informed him. "We're family now, but you were family then. You should at least get the chance to make it right between you."
Then her brow wrinkled in thought and she turned to Ben. "Do you have anyone from the First Order that you were close to? Someone you knew well?"
Ben was taken aback by the question. Only one person came to mind. If ever two people were bound by shared suffering it would be them. Ben shook his head. "No."
"Even I can tell you're lying," Poe declared. "Who?"
Snoke's gigantic holographic face loomed over him as he knelt. "You fail to make progress on the map. Perhaps I should turn this task over to someone more dedicated to the First Order. Someone who has proven his loyalty," the image sneered.
How he'd panicked at the thought of losing his place in the hierarchy. "No. I will not fail," he'd assured his master.
"Perhaps Hux can find it. He has been most successful of late in assuming his late father's responsibilities. He is a devoted son of the Order," Snoke's insinuation being that Ren was not.
Jealousy and hatred surged through him. He seeks to replace you due to your weakness, a weakness Hux does not share. "I will not fail you, Master," he declared confidently.
Snoke's face grew even larger. "See that you don't."
Ben shook the memory away but heard himself ask, "I don't suppose Armitage Hux turned up anywhere?"
"No," Rose replied. "He didn't."
Ben nodded, unsurprised. Hux had been on Steadfast, probably cursing the Resistance to the very end.
"Hux? Your First Order brother was Hux?" Finn sounded horrified.
"No!" Ben denied it firmly. "I hated him. He hated me. Snoke constantly pit us against each other. We had to compete for everything," Ben continued defensively. "He even tried to kill me a couple of times. We were absolutely not brothers."
Poe started to laugh, though he tried to hide it. "What?" Rose demanded, slugging Poe on the shoulder. "What is so funny right now?"
"I'm just remembering getting him on comms at D'Qar," Poe snickered. "I was trying to delay him long enough to give the fleet time to escape and give us a shot at that damned dreadnought. I kept 'holding for Hux' for a good two minutes while he kept saying, 'Can you hear me? I can hear you.' It was hilarious."
Ben just stared at him in amazement then started to laugh, making Poe tell the entire story.
"He just got more and more confused," Poe ended triumphantly, wiping his eyes. "That was so much fun." He took a breath and his expression changed to regret. "Then it all went to hell."
Rose patted him on the arm. "Paige died doing what she believed in. I still think it was the right call."
"In hindsight, probably. We'd have never gotten out of that dreadnought's range," Poe stated. "Anyway, it was a lot of fun to prank Hux. Was he really that stupid?"
Finn shook his head. "General Hux was not stupid. He was a psychopath. He actually enjoyed hurting people."
The door to Snoke's throne room on Supremacy opened. Ren watched as Hux stepped through fresh from his latest audience with the Supreme Leader, his shoulders back proudly. But once the door closed behind him, he staggered a few steps and bent over, hands on his knees. Ren continued to walk toward him, amused by how quickly Hux straightened up and tried to appear unshaken the instant he noticed Ren's approach.
"Your turn, Ren," Hux said bitterly. "I softened him up for you."
The general's normally immaculate uniform was rumpled and a stream of blood ran down the side of his face onto his collar. Hux scowled in disdain as he passed, but could not hide the look of defeat that lay just beneath. Ren knew it well. He rarely left an audience with Snoke without the same expression. But Hux would never know. The mask hid it all, he thought in satisfaction.
"Hux was an asshole," Ben agreed. "But he never really had a choice. He worshipped the First Order because Brendol Hux beat it into him from the day he was born. Snoke tortured it into him every day after that. It was all he wanted. He belonged to it."
"I don't know about that. I mean he did turn on them," Poe commented as he rose to pour himself another drink.
"He did what?" Ben asked.
"Turned spy. Out of nowhere we started getting all kinds of intel and we had no idea who was doing it or why," Poe explained as he sat down again. "It was Hux."
Pieces of an old puzzle started to click into place. "Hux was the spy? All along?" Ben repeated in disbelief.
"Yeah," Poe answered casually as he took a sip. "He gave up all kinds of secrets."
"He what?" Ben exclaimed despite himself and shook his head as he tried to make sense of their accusation. "That's not possible. He lived for the First Order."
Poe shrugged in confusion. "I guess he changed. He's the only reason we all got off Steadfast alive. I couldn't believe it either."
"He told me to shoot him in the arm to make our escape look more plausible," Finn added. "I shot him in the leg instead. It felt good to do it at the time, but now I feel kind of bad considering he didn't make it out."
Starkiller Base. Ren lay in the snow, bleeding out, barely conscious, his thoughts full of his father, the lightsaber's rejection, the girl who'd bested him.
"Snoke ordered me to evacuate you," Hux grumbled as he trudged through the snow. "I picked this up on my way out. I figured you'd miss it." He tossed Ren's helmet directly onto the gaping hole in his side, causing Ren to groan in pain. Then Hux stepped forward and crouched beside him.
"If I thought I could get away with it, I'd kill you now," he said, too quietly for the stormtroopers flanking them to hear. Instead he pressed the standard first-aid injection to his neck. "I have no idea why Snoke keeps you around. Probably just to annoy me. One day he'll be gone and the First Order will be mine. Guess what my first act will be?" He then backed away and gestured for a pair of troopers to help Ren to his feet.
In the chaos of his emotional state, Ren found Hux's animosity reassuring, a constant he could rely on, a steady source of antagonism in the upheaval of his world.
"So Armitage Hux died a traitor to the First Order? Helping you all escape?" Ben couldn't help but repeat the words. They nodded at him.
"That idiot! he exclaimed. He wished he had Hux's throat in his hands to throttle some sense into him. "If he didn't care about the Order anymore, he should have left!" Ben tried to fathom what Hux had been thinking. "I know how bad he hated the Resistance. Why risk helping you? It makes no sense," he declared. "Did he say why he did it?"
The room went quiet.
"When we asked him why, he said he didn't care if we won as long as you lost," Finn admitted quietly.
It took a moment for the words to soak in. "He was still trying to beat me?"
Maybe it was the Force, maybe it was his imagination, maybe it was every memory he'd tried so hard to deny, but suddenly his old nemesis stood before him, that slicked over red hair, that prim uniform, that supercilious look on his face. Ben leaped to his feet, barely aware that Rey had taken a tight grip on his hand.
"You idiot!" he yelled at him. "You betrayed everything we said we believed in! You turned on the only family you had! And for what? A chance to get at me?" The floor trembled and the glasses clinked together in the cabinet as he momentarily let his emotions rule. His friends stared at him, shocked expressions on their faces. Rey sent a flood of calming energy into him through the death grip she had on his hand. But the spectre of his old enemy haunted him still.
"When I killed Snoke, you were free! Everybody who ever drove and tortured you was dead and gone!" Ben's voice broke. " You had a choice! Snoke didn't still live inside your head!" Ben twisted the fingers of his free hand into his hair as if he could rip out even the memory of the darkness that had driven him all his life.
"All you had to do was walk away if you didn't care anymore!" Ben shouted, his voice rough with emotion. "But no! You had to throw it all away just to try to get at me! As if I meant anything! I was just Snoke's other target!"
His breath caught in his chest as the image began to fade. Suddenly all the rage abandoned him and there was nothing left but grief. "You dumb bastard, I wasn't your real enemy. I was the only one who ever understood you." The words choked in his throat. "Why didn't you just leave?"
Then Rey's arms were around him as he wept for the other lost soul of the First Order, the brother in misery he should have reached out to instead of tormented, the one he should have made his ally and not his enemy. He held her for a long moment, then forced himself to pull it together.
"I'm sorry," he said to the group at last. "I'm glad he helped you. He did the right thing for the wrong reasons. I just wish it had all been different. All of it."
He turned to Finn. "If there's a chance you can mend things with your squad, you should do it. Even if you all choose never to see each other again, they were your family once. They understood what you went through. I will help you find them. I promise."
Ben scanned their faces. "I'm sorry," he repeated. "I don't know why I lost it like that. I hated him. I did. But just knowing that none of it really meant anything to him. That he could have walked away and didn't because of me."
Rey continually poured reassurances into him through the bond. Then Finn spoke up. "I get it, Ben. I hated them and loved them too."
Rose finally sat back in her seat, but Poe kept leaning toward him, elbows on his knees, staring at him as if he were trying to see into him. Ben was suddenly very glad Poe was not Force-sensitive.
"During your little rant, you let something slip, Ben." Poe sounded reasonable, but there was a steel underneath his words that Ben had never heard before from the otherwise easygoing pilot. "There's something about you that I don't think you've told us. Something pretty important about who you are. For Rey's sake-for Rey's safety-I think you need to spill it." Poe's tone made it a non-negotiable. "What do you mean when you said Snoke didn't live inside Hux's head? Whose head did he live inside? And where might he live now?"
