Above Finn's head, Jess' A-Wing twisted in the air to get below a TIE Bomber. Her cannons fired and laser beams punched into her enemy's underbelly. The bomber disintegrated, consumed by its own explosive payload.
All the Resistance fighters were in the air now, blowing First Order craft out of the sky and finally giving Finn and his troops some respite as they crossed the causeways. Poe and his squads held the opposite side, laying down covering fire against the Stormtroopers. Further back, volleys of heavy weapons fire thundered from positions around the ships, even the gunships' turrets opening up.
Under that cover, Finn brought his troops back across the bridges in a leapfrogging retreat, one squad falling back before digging in and providing cover for the comrades they'd just moved past. It wasn't the quickest method, but it was the one that kept the most soldiers alive. Injured troops were bundled quickly aboard the gunships.
Finn had become well-practiced at this kind of manoeuvre, and they'd been fighting like this all through their retreat through the tunnels. Except for when the enemy had got too close, and the melee weapons came out.
It helped that the Stormtroopers who'd been pursuing them had thinned out now. Finn and his men had fought through several squads who'd tried to intercept them under the mountain, taking out dozens. After that, only a few enemy units had managed to give effective pursuit. Finn just hoped that meant they hadn't found Rose, and that Rey had got hold of her and Kaydel.
The Scrappers had returned, minus Rey and pursued by First Order troops – the majority had deployed on the shoulder of the mountain. UA-TT walkers – hunched, heavily armed evolutions of the AT-ST – were with the infantry, lurching towards the Resistance landing site. Their cannons chattered to life, ripping up the scraps before them. If they gained the ridge, they could easily sweep the bridges clear of retreating Resistance soldiers.
"Missiles on those walkers!" Poe barked. A heavy weapons team sprang from cover and fired off a barrage of missiles. The walkers reeled from the impacts, staggering before a volley from the gunships finally felled them.
"Good work!" Poe yelled. "Finn," he rasped when they reached him, "where the hell are the others?"
"I don't-" Finn started. But then he felt a sharp chill, as he'd been plunged into ice. "Down!"
He grabbed Poe's shoulders and ducked, right as blaster bolts snapped through the air around them – coming from behind. Three soldiers went down, blown off their feet.
"What-" Poe gasped as Finn dragged him into cover.
"Knight of Ren," Finn said.
He sneaked a look and there it was – a figure in black armour, armed with a handcannon. Even as he watched, the Knight fired again and two more soldiers were hit.
BB-8 was caught in the open. Poe lunged forward and grabbed him, narrowly avoiding another blast. They hunkered down again, Poe cradling his droid.
Finn saw another soldier go down. He turned back to Poe. "Get everyone back to the ships."
Poe stared at him. From behind other bits of cover, so did the soldiers around them. "What are you gonna-"
"Go!" Finn burst from cover, firing off a burst of shots at the dark figure on the junk heaps.
Poe didn't need telling twice, and Finn heard the thudding of boots behind him, fleeing toward the landing site. But he kept his eyes forward. He felt the Knight's attention lock onto him, the dark warrior seeming to recognise something in him.
He sensed the salvo before it happend. The handcannon in his enemy's hand snapped and spat, and Finn dived into cover behind an old swoop bike as the shots smacked home around him. One near miss blew the head of his shock-baton clean off, and Finn glared angrily at the useless handle. "Son of a…" He tried to ignore the fist-sized holes punched into the scrap.
Peeking out from behind the swoop, he scanned the area. Nothing – no, there. The Knight's presence was a blot on his consciousness, a shadow on his perception.
Finn ducked down again as bolts of plasma battered against the swoop, showering him with sparks. He grimaced. He couldn't beat this murderer to the shot. But – he thought back to a firefight on another desolate world – he didn't need to.
Suddenly, the world seemed much quieter, except for the steps of the Knight stalking him. His vision sharpened. The fingers of his free hand flexed, and he felt the Force as a thrum through his muscles.
He began to rise and took a hold of the lightsaber hilt at his belt. "I can do this," he whispered to himself. "I can do this."
He sprang out, activating the weapon as the Knight targeted him again, and caught the shot on the blade. The impact reverberated down his arms, but the blast flew straight back and smacked into the Knight's armoured leg.
A pained roar escaped the helmet's grille and the Knight staggered. Finn advanced, saber held in front of him. "Yeah," he rasped "That's right."
With another bellow the Knight flung out his free hand and Finn felt something slam into him, propelling him back into the wrecked bike. He rolled aside as a shot ripped into the metal and heard a vibro-blade activate. The Knight had drawn a scimitar sword from under his robe, and while he was limping, his armour must be durable indeed, because he came on at a heavy run.
Finn regained his feet and met his enemy's charge, the vibro-sword shrieking as its blade clashed against the saber, indigo blade against blood-red power field. He remembered his training and kept his movements tight, trying not to expose himself to the Knight's quick attacks. Sweat started out on his forehead.
The dark warrior was powerful; Finn could feel it burning off him. He fed off his own pain and rage like Kylo Ren had in the forest, continuously on the attack. But Finn saw how the wound hindered his opponent – his footwork couldn't match his speed with the sword.
So Finn moved fast and wheeled, always trying to come at the Knight from his wounded side. Every attack he deflected rather than parried outright, the better to come back immediately and keep pressing his enemy.
Not that the Knight made it easy. Far from it. Finn had fought brutal opponents before – the gladiators of Magna Leptus, the witch-warriors of Dathomir, the various bounty hunters the First Order sent after the Resistance – but the Knight of Ren surpassed any of them. His ferocity was coupled with a lethal finesse and, of course, he was steeped in the Dark Side. Finn could feel the noisome aura of power, radiating off him like feverish heat. It leant him speed, strength and that uncanny precision Finn had come to recognise at a Force-user's precognition.
In response Finn did the same, letting his saber be guided by his instincts even as he tried to read the Knight's patterns of attack, find an opening. He saw the thrust aimed at his throat and jerked back, angling his saber to plunge into his enemy's chest. Only then did he see his enemy's true intent.
It was there in the Knight's left hand falling away from the hilt, the sudden tension in the right arm, the sudden sense that his unseen eyes were on Finn's stomach.
That was all the warning he got. He hurled himself backwards, the scimitar whipping across his breastplate and leaving a shallow cut.
Finn hit the uneven ground hard. He heard the crackle and reacted on instinct, tensing and rolling away as the scimitar came shrieking down. And again.
Footwork. He needed to be back on his feet. The scimitar came for his head again.
But right now, he'd settle for taking his enemy off his feet. He batted the blade sideways, grabbed the Knight's wrist and sent him tumbling after it. He was rewarded with a bellow of rage, but he didn't look back, standing again and resuming his attack, swinging over his right shoulder.
The scimitar moved to block, but Finn threw his full weight behind the saber and with a groan of effort, his enemy's leg gave way beneath him. The Knight jabbed up, nearly catching him in the gut, but Finn darted back. Then he lunged again and with a sweep of the blade, he sent the helmeted head rolling across the scrap.
Finn slumped back against the swoop, breathing hard as he deactivated the saber. His blood boomed in his ears, newly aware of the energy flowing through him. Then he stood and ran, back to the landing site.
/¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯\
In the tunnels, Gwaelyn Ren flinched for a moment. Rey saw it and tried to press the attack, but the Knight screeched and renewed her own assault.
She was blisteringly fast, faster even than the Praetorians Rey had faced in Snoke's throne room and with a feral poise to match. The blows they traded were a constant flurry, painting the metal walls in a wash of crimson and electric blue.
Rey barely blocked a slash which would have taken off the top of her head. She veered away as Gwaelyn drove the glaive at her heart and swung back, only for the Knight to evade the blow and cut at her again. She jerked back, the blade a finger's breadth from her throat.
She was going backwards, fighting as much to keep her enemy at bay as to actually beat her. The staff was too slow, too cumbersome against the glaive.
She rallied, catching another slash and driving forward with the lower end of her staff, striking Gwaelyn's armoured shin. There was a satisfying crack of armour and Gwaelyn staggered, but it was only for a moment and she retaliated viciously, driving her knee at Rey's groin. Rey twisted and instead it thumped into her thigh with a dull clang of metal, still enough to send her reeling back into the wall. Her staff rang against Gwaelyn's helmet in response, but there was little power in the blow and it only stopped her pressing the advantage.
Briefly separated, they both regarded one another. "That wasn't very ladylike," Rey told Gwaelyn.
Gwaelyn made a visceral little noise which suggested that in other circumstances, she'd have spat. "Didn't think the scavenger would be such a prim little creature."
They lunged simultaneously, weapons sparking against each other once again. Again Rey was driven back. The blow to Gwaelyn's head didn't even seem to have slowed her.
Daylight pricked the edge of her vision and then they were on a causeway. Rey ducked away and leapt a pile of scrap, putting distance between herself and Gwaelyn before she saw the Knight's gaze had wandered.
Quick as she dared, Rey looked – and saw Rose and Kaydel, moving low and slow to avoid fire from the Stormtroopers now moving down the ridge. Suddenly there was an unbearable tightness in her throat.
Gwaelyn raised her hand and a wall of air slammed into Rey, nearly knocking her off her feet. By the time she recovered, the Knight was past her and racing along the bridge.
Rey followed, gaining, but too late. Gwaelyn stretched out a hand and Kaydel was yanked backwards as if by an invisible wire. She landed hard on the metal, the Knight pouncing on her.
"No!" Rey yelled, seeing the glaive rise.
And then it plunged into Kaydel's back.
What followed was the product of pure instinct. With a primal howl of rage, Rey threw out a hand behind herself and shoved, propelling herself forward. It wasn't elegant, but she cannoned into the Knight and knocked her off Kaydel.
She attacked before she even regained her feet, left-right, the blows ringing against her enemy's glaive. She was screaming, giving guttural voice to her wrath. Gwaelyn slashed at her again but this time Rey barely tried to evade it, seeing the Knight expose herself.
The vibro-blade bit into her cheek, leaving a long gash. But even as bloody smoke flew from the wound, Rey slammed the crackling staff home. It struck with enough force to stave Gwaelyn's breastplate in.
The Knight flew backwards, slamming into a jagged metal outcrop with a grisly crack before she dropped to the floor.
"Kaydel!" Rey rushed over to the other woman, letting her staff fall. Kaydel was slumped on her front, a red stain spreading across her back. Her life force was a mere flicker, her breath the same.
Rose was already kneeling next to Kaydel. "It's too late, Rey," she whispered, already seeing how deep the wound was, already resigned to losing Kaydel.
But Rey wasn't going to let this happen. She wasn't going to let Kaydel perish. Blinking away the stinging tears, she took a breath and laid a hand on the wound. "Stay with me, Kaydel," she whispered. Then, with the Force, she reached into her.
"Rey…" Kaydel's voice was barely even a whisper.
"I'm here, Kaydel. I've got you." She tried to keep the sob out of her voice, found that a whisper was all she could manage herself. "Stay with me." The technique she was using was one the Jedi held in little favour; indeed she'd only found it through the Grey Jedi's holocron. Rey called upon the energy within herself, dredging it up and carrying it across the link.
It hurt. A groan of effort issued from her mouth, but she didn't relent. She let her own life force spill out of her and into Kaydel, urging her to heal, taking charge of muscle and sinew and forcing them to knit back together. She was dimly aware of Rose staring at her, dumbstruck.
It was working. She could feel it, even as she felt the effort sapping her own strength. Every cell in her body urged her not to do it, but she overrode those instincts and kept on, demanding that Kaydel's heart kept beating, demanding that she lived.
And then, miracle of miracles, Kaydel took a proper, heaving breath and rolled over. Her eyes were wide, out of focus for a moment before they found Rey. Instinctively, Rey cradled her, barely hearing the gunfire in the distance. "Kaydel? Are you alright?"
Kaydel nodded and sat up as Rose joined them. She was breathing heavily and a bruise was darkening on her chin, but otherwise she looked fine. But concern kept Rey looking, searching her face. Realising how close she'd come.
Only Kaydel stopped her, motioning past her shoulder. "Rey…"
She turned, and saw Gwaelyn clawing weakly at her helmet. She got up, shaking – healing Kaydel had severely depleted her strength – but she mastered her aching limbs. Cautiously, still bent over to avoid being seen by the enemy on the ridge, she approached.
The Knight saw her approach and drew a dagger from her belt, but her strength was fading quickly – Rey kicked the blade out of her hand and knelt to remove the helmet, Gwaelyn pawing feebly at her arms.
Underneath the skullish mask was a face that must have been beautiful once, before the skin paled to corpse-white and the eyes yellowed to a shade of bile. As Gwaelyn took a blood-laced breath, she bared teeth which had been filed to sharp points – or perhaps that was the corruption too.
The rasping breaths resolved into guttural words. "The Ren marks you now, Jedi. The blood… knows you." Rey shivered, feeling as though a cloud had suddenly moved across the sun. Then Gwaelyn's head tipped back and Rey heard the death rattle in her throat.
"Rey," Rose said behind her. "We've gotta go."
She took a breath. "Right." And the three women pelted back to the landing site with the other stragglers.