"She's still not answering her communications," Finn said more aloud than to anyone as his fingers tapped nervously on one of the many consoles in the transmission room, his chair swinging side to side as he swiveled. They had packed and been ready to depart when the Queen had asked them to stay a little while longer. For what, they weren't exactly sure, but the young girl had seemed reluctant to be without one of them after she had been injured. "And Ben missed his daily call." Finn was at a loss of what exactly to do. Ben had been able to sneak the storm trooper's armor tracking code to them, but it was no longer registering and they all had to assume that Wayzac had deactivated it. They weren't even sure where to start. The Queen had been keeping them pleasantly in the dark about most of the major questions they had, like where Ben had been going, why the plan of the transmission had changed to him going onto the Finalizer and so on and so forth. The most they got out of her was that Ben had his reasons and they were not to be gone against.

"I am well aware," Poe grumbled, head in his hands. Finn had been muttering the same thing for a while and it was beginning to get on Poe's nerves. "The Queen informed both of us this morning. He missed yesterday's as well, if you recall."

"Do you think something happened to him?" Finn questioned only to receive a shrug from Poe. There was a slightly heavy air about him and Finn knew Poe was holding back a nap about Ben being the one he was caring about instead of Rey and Rose. Poe had been trying very hard to give Ben the benefit of the doubt since Zorii had shone up and Finn could only guess she had spoken to him in some fashion that affected him enough to calm him down.

There was a beeping as a call came in and Finn glanced at the monitor for the calling code. It wasn't one that Finn recognized, but he answered anyway.

"This is Lando Calrissian. I've been informed that the Generals of the Resistance are possibly on Naboo. Can you please confirm? I have an important message."

Poe's head rose from his hands at the voice and traded looks with Finn who was speechless.

"Lando, it's us," Poe said to the disembodied voice.

"I have been searching for you two everywhere, damn it," Lando said with a laugh.

"Why?"

"We found the Falcon," Lando explained. "It's sitting abandoned on Aljan Kloss."

"Did you go there searching for us?" Poe questioned.

"Sure did." Lando took a pause and both Finn and Poe could hear him take a deep breath. "Why is the Falcon here?"

"Rey and Rose went on a mission and are missing," Finn explained, finally finding his voice. "So, they were back at the base." It was again said more out loud than to anyone specific.

"That doesn't tell us where they are now," Poe muttered, again lowering his head into his hands. Finn looked over him for a moment in silence before speaking.

"The Finalizer. She's there. She has to be."

"It is the only thing that makes logical sense," Poe agreed. "Lando, is there any First Order that have been hovering around the base at all?"

"Not that I have seen," Lando's voice answered.

Poe rose to his feet, hands on his hips as he thought. "Can you wait for us to get to you? We may need your help."

"I'm assuming you're going after Rey?"

"You're assuming right," Poe answered.

"I will be more than happy to wait here for my ass to be blown to smithereens."

"We'll be leaving at once," Finn assured as he got to his own feet. "Also, if you see a storm trooper suit on the Falcon, can you ditch it? The First Order has been tracking the Falcon through it."

"Because that makes me feel all the better about this," Lando commented sarcastically. "I will see you in a bit."

Without another word the transmission disconnected and both Finn and Poe rushed from the transmission room to come face to face with the Queen who looked a little flushed under her thickly painted white face. Finn slammed into the back of Poe who steadied the stormtrooper as he caught his own balance. Before either of them could speak or offer a formal greeting, the Queen took a deep breath and the words gushed from her red stained lips.

"I just received a word from Ben Solo. Rey is prisoner on the First Order ship."


A pitcher of Merenzane Gold had been all she was worth. Less than a pitcher. Her older brother was half of the pitcher. But it occurred to her that half a pitcher of Merenzane Gold had been all she had ever been worth to her mother and she couldn't remember anything having ever cut that deeply before.

She could deal with the men at night and she could live with the drugs and drinking that their mother partook in as a daily ritual to drown out the sorrows of their world. She had for years, ever since her father had died. She had been the one to rise up when her brother had been too weak and her mother had eventually fallen into such a deep depression that she had never recovered.

What she couldn't deal with was the idea of their small family that could barely scrape by being torn apart all because her mother didn't have enough money to afford alcohol.

In the end she had torn the family apart anyway. She had done it for her brother. Her brother who couldn't see blood without getting dizzy. Her brother who couldn't stand up for himself. Her brother who might as well have been the younger sibling.

When the slave traders put their hands on him and he didn't fight, she had. For both of them. She had shoved at the trader holding her and he had stumbled into the small barely furnished table in their one room hardly a shack, where a single candle, that was the only light they had to see by, illuminated the small room as it set fire to the blanket of the single bed.

She had snatched up Armitage's hand and pulled him from the flames and to the bar the slave traders had mentioned in their taunting. She confronted her mother, whom she had gained all of her beauty from. The red hair and the clear eyes and the awfully white skin that was sun kissed with freckles.

She was drunk, which was nothing new. Her breath could be smelt across the room, her words loud and slurred, each step that connected with the floor beneath them was as if the collision of shoe and concrete wasn't entirely anticipated and she lurched, stumbled.

And something snapped in her, a pain in her chest, something that she made sure never snapped again. It frightened her when she had finally understood hours later what she had done with tears raining down her dirty cheeks.

She didn't remember what happened in all honesty. There were flickers and flashes of memory, but never a full picture. When she came to, her tiny hands were wrapped so tightly around her mother's neck that her knuckles were white and her mother's neck already black and blue.

Her mother was beautiful, even in death. The bruising adorned her skin like a delicately crafted necklace, her skin even more pale now that the color had left her cheeks, a deep crimson painted from her nose and over one cheek and her long red curly locks were fanned around her like a crown. But her eyes were something else entirely.

Even in their emptiness, they were clear and danced in the candle light from the bar. Hauntingly still alive despite the light that had ran from them. The same eyes that she stared back at every day in the mirror.

This was the only moment in Armitage's life where he had done something unprompted. He, without tears or sadness, took her hands and led her out of the now empty bar and hid her away as everyone began to search for the two of them. Hid them away while she broke down again and again and again, until she ripped herself from her stupor and took charge once more.

Made sure they survived. Made them who they were. Someones who didn't need a family. Someones who never needed to sleep in a bed for money. Someones who were powerful and feared and were no longer those pathetic children on the street. Someones who were no longer surviving, but thriving.

Wayzac's fingers trembled as she tried to button up the front of her tunic. She opened her eyes, pulling herself from a memory that she couldn't remember giving herself permission to relive.

She worked her jaw at the swell of anger that was digging into her chest at how her fingers wouldn't obey her commands. She desperately tried to cover up the skin around her neck in its usual black attire, but her fingers continued to struggle until with a cry of frustration, she dropped her hands to her sides.

She had never wanted to crawl back into her skin so badly, especially since now she couldn't stand the idea of her skin being bare and out for the world to see. She knew how to get what she needed with her body when she needed it, but when that wasn't the occasion, she wanted nothing more than to hide behind the fabric of her clothes. It kept her safe. Kept her hidden. Made it so that she could show what she wanted instead of it being demanded.

And every day was the same. Long pants, high boots, long sleeves, high collars, and gloves. Every possible inch of her covered, though she had never been vain or frail enough to sink to wearing a mask.

With as calming of a breath as she could manage through her heated lungs, she returned to the buttons and finally was able to hide away her pale skin beneath the material.

Next came her hair. No one was allowed to see it down without her permission. And no one, absolutely no one, was allowed to see it in its natural curl. Not when it reminded her so much of her pitiful mother.

I like it curly.

He had seen.

I like it curly.

He had touched.

I like it curly.

He hadn't shuttered away and looked at her like a monster when she said what happened with her mother. Something he had done to his own father several years later.

I like it curly.

She, for once in a very long time, let the tears brim her eyes and finally fall. She gripped at her hair and slowly sank to the floor, knees pulled in tightly against her chest. It wasn't often she left herself long enough to feel and it was hardly at all that she allowed herself to be weak and cry.

She couldn't be weak. There wasn't a time or place for such a feeling. Not when she had to carry everything on her shoulders alone. She was going to share it with her brother before he died and that had hurt her far more than she had thought it would have. Maybe that was pushing some of her emotion forward now. She had never cried for him, just let the words wash over her that she was truly alone in this whole universe and then moved on just as she always had.

I like it curly.

She didn't regret her decisions. They had gotten her to where she was, where she deserved, because she did fucking deserve it. But right in this moment, for the first time in her life, she realized she had made a mistake. She had been blind. She had pushed away something- no, someone who had been there. Someone she could talk to. Tell things to. Someone who had made the world lighter. Someone who had made her not feel alone. Someone who had offered to help carry the galaxy with her. Someone she had turned away without a thought.

And she doubted that the man she had... Fallen in love with had been Kylo Ren. No one could love a mask like that. Kylo Ren was an armor for a scared little boy. But that scared little boy... That Ben Solo... He had been hers for a moment and a half.

And it occurred to her that maybe he had loved her back. He had said that, among many other things, but for once in her life she knew what it felt like to truly be loved. But that wasn't in her plan, in her ideal picture, so it had been pushed aside. And she knew she would never get it back.

She had seen his eyes. The way they had looked at that Jedi that was strapped to a chair. He had looked at that woman in the same way he had once looked at her. Those deep, dark eyes full of so much more emotion than his face. Eyes that had always been Ben Solo and never Kylo Ren. Eyes that had told her over and over he cared before they had shattered like that mirror in her bedroom.

A dark mass swirled dangerously inside of her chest at the idea of him belonging to someone else. She would never admit it to anyone, not that she had anyone to admit it to other than the empty room around her and her reflection in the mirror.

She pushed her hair away and wiped at her eyes.

No more tears.

There was no place for that.

No more feeling sorry for herself.

There was no place for that.

No more emotions.

There was no place for that.

She had a ship, a fleet, a war and a galaxy to run and she was not about to let some poor lost Jedi and a traitor get in her way. Not even if he still made her heart beat awake from its death like sleep or her stomach flutter with butterflies that had been hibernating for most of her life. This was her moment, she worked for it, she deserved it and it would be hers.

She rose to her feet, fetched and carefully dabbed a cool damp towel over her flushed skin and red eyes before pulling her hair up into its pristine bun. When satisfied, she pulled on her gloves and nodded in approval at her appearance in the bathroom mirror, then left the room to attend her early morning meetings. She would check on her new play toy after.

When Ben didn't show for the meeting, Wayzac had to bite back her anger. He was with her. Wayzac had to take care of this now, quickly, before it spun out of control. They both had to be dealt with and she sure as hell wasn't going to be gentle.


Rey's mind was swimming as she again floated to the surface of her consciousness for the second or third time that night. Or maybe it was morning? She couldn't tell anymore. She had tried to keep track of time, but the hours continued to scrape past her, slower than an unoiled droid's gears.

She tried to piece together the flashes of memories, but she couldn't put them in any logical order. But then again, did it truly matter if her finger was broken or the bottom of her feet were burned first? All that had mattered was that she hadn't told Wayzac anything about the Vergence Scatter. And it would stay that way.

There had to be a reason why that place was so hidden, so secret. It was just too much of a temptation for anyone who found it. They could change anything they wanted and that truly was a terrifying idea. Rey didn't know much about Wayzac, but in the few intimate hours they had spent together, she didn't want the woman getting anywhere near the containment of all time and space.

An ache was beginning to set into her body, a dull pain all the way through her. She could barely recall someone telling her that she would need to heal normally because it would be too suspicious to heal her out right.

She could almost hear the deep, smoky voice through the fog of her mind and with a great effort was finally able to place it as Ben's. She couldn't exactly place his presence at this moment, but there was a feeling of safety around her that she was sure was him. Nothing else would make her feel that way on an enemy ship.

There was a shift in the room and a loud, echoing voice made Rey wince, but she couldn't bring herself to move from where she was laying.

"You weren't at the meetings this morning. Care to explain?"

It was Wayzac. Cool, collected, calculated Wayzac. Somehow it felt like the woman showed less emotion than Cordella did. Maybe that wasn't right. Wayzac showed emotion. You could hear it in her voice, see it in her movements, but they were emotions she wanted you to see. Rey couldn't seem to upset the woman in the slightest, even when Rey wouldn't answer the questions given to her Wayzac stayed put together in a way Rey was sure would drive any other person to snap.

"I was making sure that your new toy didn't die in her sleep."

That was Ben. His voice was colder and darker and Rey remembered the first time she had heard that voice. Kylo's voice. His shield, not him.

"When did you become the good guy?"

"Don't insult me," he shot back coldly.

"We don't have time to wait around. We need to know what that key unlocks."

"What key, Wayzac? The one for the camtono?" There was a taunt to Ben's tone that Rey couldn't remember having heard before, something that said he knew more than she wanted him to and he was going to flaunt that he did. "This wouldn't happen to be the same key as the one that was stolen from your private quarters, would it?" There was a tense energy behind Rey's back and she didn't dare turn around to look, though she was sure Wayzac was seething silently. Ben chuckled darkly. "This is how you have it under control? Torturing this Jedi even though she told you everything she knows," he said, his voice mocking her.

"She's lying."

"I read her thoughts," Ben pushed. Rey could hear fabric rustle behind her from movement. "There's nothing else."

"She's a gifted force user," Wayzac shot back, her voice muffled and Rey could only assume she was speaking through her teeth to stay calm. For as perfectly collected as she was when she was torturing Rey and getting nowhere, Rey couldn't help but note the way that Ben got under her skin. She bristled every time he spoke, rose to his taunts when she couldn't help herself any longer.

"Not better than me."

There was a lengthy silence and Rey did her best to keep her breath steady and quiet to hear the whole conversation if more was going to be said. The silence dragged on, the creaks in the ship being the only sound among the medical equipment. Were they still behind her? Rey was about to cock open a curious eye when there was a large inhale.

"Make sure she's back in that room within the hour," Wayzac stated strongly. "I'm not done with her yet."

"You're done until I say so."

It was Wayzac's turn to laugh. It was a laugh the edge and that sent a shiver and chill down Rey's spine. Her fingers clutched a little tighter on the thin scratchy blanket that was around her.

"May I remind you that your job is to run this galaxy, not get soft for a girl!?"

"I'm not soft," Ben argued with a huff. "You can have at her all you want, but her being on the brink of death isn't going to make her answer any quicker. Let her get her strength and then you can crack her."

The brink of death? Rey knew what it felt like to die and she was nowhere near it. Being a little sick to the stomach and slowly slipping into a comforting warm darkness were two very different things. He had to be exaggerating. She couldn't remember anything too horrible happening to her that would make her come close to dying again.

"Within the hour," Wayzac insisted.

"Irwilig, in your dire need to be in control you have seemed to have forgotten that I am the Supreme Leader!" The last two words were harsh, powerful, cutting. They shut the woman up. Without another word spoken, her footsteps rang out and then disappeared from the room and Rey could hear Ben sigh tiredly as if he had used all of his energy for that one conversation.

"Ben," she croaked out when she was certain that no one else was close to them. There were rushed movements and she could make out a blurred Ben racing to her side and kneeling down to be level with the bed she rested in.

"I'm here," he whispered, gloved fingers brushing at her hair. She winced as the material they were made of snagged at her hair and Ben snatched back his hand in concern. "I'm sorry."

Rey shook her head. Or at least she thought she did, and with the new wave of dizziness, she must have. He didn't need to worry. She desperately wanted to tell him those words, but the dryness of her mouth kept her lips shut tight. "We're going to get you out of here. I promise. Rose and I have been working on an escape plan. I'm going to get the both of you to an escape pod. You are both getting out of here. You never should have ended up here," he said with regret.

His words were so quickly spewed out it took far longer for Rey to string them together than it probably should have. She licked at her lips trying to make her mouth not feel sandy. Her eyes blinked as she took in the grey room around her, machines beeping in the distance and reminding her fondly of the small little orange bot that was being taken care of somewhere back on Naboo.

Rey took a deep breath to fill her lungs as much as she could and did her best to sit up. Ben had a concerned look, but helped her in the movement. She glanced around and saw several more beds in the small dim room. All were empty and most of the droids were in their charging stations, the few that roamed around were busy cleaning.

"When do you expect us to get out of here?" Rey asked, rubbing at her eyes with fingers that ached dully beneath their bandages. "I don't think that she's going to just let me sit about for long."

"I will take care of all of the details," Ben assured her, sitting on the edge of the small bed beside her, the metal frame giving a protesting squeak from all of the added weight.

A silence settled in around them. It wasn't exactly a comfortable one, but it wasn't uncomfortable either. There were so many words that floated about their minds, words that needed to be said, words that wanted to be said, words that clawed at their tongues, teeth and lips, begging for an out. But neither of them could seem to find the courage to say everything. And it really was everything. So much had happened while they had been apart and at the same time, it had been so little.

Rey watched as Ben slowly pulled his hands free from their material prison and he placed his gloves aside. He reached out to her and again brushed her hair away from her eyes, this time as gently as he could so he wouldn't hurt her again. His hand rested against her cheek and she let herself relax into the safe touch.

It had been a long while since they had been close like this. The universe kept ripping them apart, or at least that's how it felt to Rey. Every time she finally got to be with him, something else came along to push between them, to create a space between them. A space she didn't like.

She wasn't blind to the pull that was there as well. There was something out there, be it a cosmic being or a single star, that was bringing them together with the same intensity that they were being ripped apart with. Two different forces fighting, just as the two of them had always fought. At first it was against each other and now it was for each other, but it was a fight nonetheless. A fight that she would keep participating in until she won and was able to keep this man by her side and she knew he felt the same.

She blinked several times, coming back to the dingy grey room and realized she had simply been staring into his eyes. She wasn't sure how long it had been, but Ben didn't look like he cared much with that small smile on his lips that Rey had come to adore. The deep earthy browns, the color of Jakku sands after a sparse torrential rain storm, were the kind of beauty that expanded a moment into a personal eternity.

She reached out a hand and took hold of the front of his shirt, pulling him close enough that she could feel his breath against her lips. His eyes were wide with the movement and she gave a small, almost inaudible laugh before kissing him lightly. Simple, sweet. Something that filled the silence around them snugly.

"Rey-"

"-You're coming with me-"

"-I can't come with you-"

"-right?"

She released her hold on him, that dull ache of pain bursting into a fire now that the reality of his words were setting in and allowing her pain to come back into her body. His thumb caressed her cheek and he sighed heavily through his nose, taking in the disappointment in her large eyes.

"I can't come with you," he repeated softly. She needed to understand, she would understand, wouldn't she? With the light that turned dull in her eyes he knew she didn't like what he was saying. "Rey, someone needs to be here. I can't keep letting Wayzac run amuck. She was planning to go after Jakku and Chandrila again with another set of transport ships. She wants to blow Naboo off the face of the map, she wants to know where those blasted keys go to-"

"It was her," Rey muttered. It didn't surprise her to hear the words. Of course it was Wayzac, who else could it have been? She just hadn't put two and two together until now. "Does she know something about the Vergence Scatter?"

"Nothing, as far as I am aware, but I have to make sure it stays that way," Ben explained. He didn't need to explain it. Rey understood exactly what he had to do. "Until she is gone and I can offer a ceasefire, this war is going to keep going. We just have to keep playing it by ear and it is better for everyone if I stay here."

The words burst from Rey before she really had the time to weigh them and hold them back. "I'll miss you."

Ben's face turned to shock, something Rey wasn't used to seeing in his expression. It softened once more into that half smile he liked to give, something Han-like in nature. Cocky but reassuring. "It won't be forever," he replied.

Rey didn't want to keep this conversation going any longer. She didn't like the idea of leaving him behind. Especially after she had come all this way to find him and she was just going to be dragged back to where he had left her. Sitting in an overly furnaced bedroom, eyes turned up at that sky, watching his X-Wing fly away without a single word of goodbye.

"I promise," he whispered kindly.


A/N: I haven't done a super close update in a long time, but my beta was super awesome and got me this chapter back super quick and we're getting to some good parts and I just couldn't wait, plus I am super hella bored now that we have a full shelter in place where I live. Please be sure to let me know what you think in the comments, they are such a joy to read.

Thanks again to my sister and my wonderful beta, PitaGonzalezMe on twitter.