Side-by-side, Silyana and Poe disembarked from the stolen courier. Silyana halted in the ship's shadow, back straight and keen eyes scanning the vibrant surroundings. The air was practically dripping with moisture, rich with the scent of wet earth. She kept her hands visible at her sides, resisting the urge to wipe the sweat from her face. The stupid mask was blown to smithereens back at the hostel but she wasn't mourning. It was probably for the best, and besides, going bare faced lent an unassuming appearance with her wide blue eyes.
A petite blonde woman wearing a circle of braids atop her head stepped forward. Her sharp brown eyes took in every little movement as she strode to meet them.
Poe straightened. "Commander."
"Lieutenant." The commander's gaze slid towards Silyana. She produced handcuffs from a pocket and approached, spine stiff and eyes narrowed.
Silyana deliberately relaxed, raising wrists as if expecting a kiss on the knuckles. Even though symbolic, the glint of metal carried memories of slavers and poachers stalking through the maze of the Corellian slums, her freezing feet slapping the pavement, always looking over her shoulder. Restraints hadn't held her then and they wouldn't now, but that didn't mean she had to like it. Next came a blindfold of coarse black cloth as if she were a stressed fathier before a race, heightening her perception of the cacophony of jungle insects and birds, Poe at her side, the balmy air, and the Force, rippling and pulsing around every lifeform.
A twig snapped when the commander stepped back. "This way."
Silyana tensed when a warm hand took her elbow. Poe, she realized, and resisted an eye roll though no one would see. This charade was ridiculous. The thick humidity and his proximity was not helping either of their body odor, and even though he whispered thoughtful warnings of roots or drops in the path, she wanted to shake him off.
There were only two soldiers, aside from the commander and Poe. Their confidence was disconcerting and rankled her concentration. Shuffling over fallen leaves and crackling twigs, Silyana gritted her teeth and let Poe lead her blindly through the jungle. Stirring up trouble wouldn't help find Kira.
After several minutes of hiking, the spongy earth underfoot changed to clanking metal. Poe pulled her to a halt, and then the ground shuddered and sank downwards. The the air changed, from sticky warmth to damp cool. The warmth of sunlight on her face disappeared. They must be underground.
Once the platform settled, Poe tugged forward. Something clanked and squealed, and then the ground changed again, metallic but hollow, resounding with every footfall.
"Sit," Poe said. "There's a table, here, put your hands on it."
The cuffs clinked against the tabletop, then a hum emitted from the table and the cuffs fixed in place. Poe removed the blindfold as the commander closed the door they'd entered. Silyana took in the new lodgings. It looked like the inside of a shipping container, retrofitted with a bed, a toilet, and the table where she sat.
"My name is Connix," the commander said, stepping forward. Poe leaned on the wall, hands pressed against it, ready to launch forward if needed. "I recognize this wasn't expected and is somewhat unorthodox. Usually surrenders are negotiated in advance, but given the circumstances we're willing to discuss terms after the fact."
"Surrender is a strong word," Silyana said, arching an eyebrow.
"What would you call it?" Connix crossed her arms and popped out a hip.
A shrug. "Not that."
Connix glanced at Poe. "Yes, well, we can figure that out," she said.
"You seem to be thinking along the lines of capture or imprisonment based on the accommodations." SIlyana pointedly scanned the bare furnishings.
"This isn't ideal for any of us," Connix said with a faint scowl. "This is for your protection as much as ours."
"So I've been told."
The subtle hints of frustration in Connix's expression jumped to the forefront. "Like I said, we'll negotiate a suitable compromise shortly. Meanwhile, Ren, this will have to do."
Silyana slouched in the seat. "Please, Commander, call me Silyana. Ren is my master's name."
Connix's sharp eyes narrowed. Silyana felt the revulsion rolling off the commander as Poe stiffened. "We'll be back for discussion later. Until then, make yourself comfortable." Connix turned to go.
"I'll be right out," Poe said. Connix gave him a borderline glare. "Please?" he added.
She nodded. "Two minutes."
"Wait!" Silyana leaned forward. "I need to speak to Ben Solo as soon as you can drag him down here."
"It'll be part of the negotiation." Connix nodded, a firm set to her lips that broached no argument.
Silyana scowled, then shrugged, slumping once again. "Fine. Have your little power trip."
Connix smiled thinly and repeated. "Two minutes, Poe."
When she'd left, Poe pushed himself off the wall and stood across the table. "What the hell was that?"
"What?"
"Being..." He waved an agitated hand at her.
"Myself?"
"No. No, not yourself. Baiting Connix like that."
She snickered. "I'm doing it to you right now, you realize that?"
"Yes. Definitely. Obviously."
"I don't know what this is, but you must have really undersold my villainous nature. Two guards? Really? It's insulting."
He set his hands on the table, leaning over her.
"It's not insulting, it's trusting. I vouched for you, and I'm surprised they went for it, but could you do me a favor and not be a Knight of Ren right now?"
"You prefer my seductress persona? Sorry, I'm not going to go around kissing everyone so they like me."
He pointed a finger. "As you've pointed out so many times, you didn't seduce me. That was mutual. And for Force's sake stop holding it over my head. It's juvenile."
"Aha!" she perked up with a glib smile, "So you admit you wanted me."
"I never denied it," he griped, looking up to return her fierce gaze. "No need to act like you've won something."
"I just like hearing you say it. It's growth."
Poe closed his eyes and sighed. "Okay. I'm going to leave now."
Silyana smirked.
His eyes opened and he snorted at her expression. "But seriously. Please don't unnecessarily harass people?"
Rolling her eyes, she sighed, "Fine."
He straightened, nodding his head. "I'll try to get things moving."
"Any chance I could get something to eat? It's been a while and the last thing I ate I threw up."
He laughed, she glared.
"Sure," he said.
When he'd gone, the hum from the table stopped and lifted her hands free. The cuffs also detached from each other, helpful for whenever a meal found her. She twisted a hand, inspecting the bracelet. Some kind of magnetic locking.
After several stoic minutes staring at the far wall, the silence began to close in on her. She shut her eyes against the feeling and laid her head on the table to wait.
BB-8 was the one who found Ben first.
Ben wasn't proud of it, but he resorted to hiding from certain Resistance members. Mostly Connix. She had developed a frightening habit of finding him anywhere and peppering him with disturbingly insightful follow-up questions.
"Who's here?" he demanded, sure he'd misinterpreted the spew of binary from the bubbly astromech. But no, BB-8 repeated it word for word. Shaking his head in slight disbelief, he looked around for an ambush, sure Connix wouldn't make this easy.
He had sat down with her for an extended interview the day after arriving on Ajan Kloss and she was excruciatingly thorough with her questions. They covered everything since the night the Academy had burned.
He left out any mention of the bond with Rey. It was tricky at points, and he was sure Connix intuited the falsity of some of his lies and obfuscations. She didn't press further, seeming to know that if she did, the easy flow of answers would shut down. Anyway, it was awkward enough because Poe had apparently learned something from Silyana about the nature of his relationship with Rey.
How much did she know, and how much had she told Poe?
Any scenario where he admitted the entire truth would immediately get him arrested. Detention in a Resistance cell would be a major hindrance on his top priority: utilize the resources here on the base to find Rey - Kira - as soon as possible and go to her.
Funny, then, that Silyana Ren's plan was so similar, yet ultimately landed her in the very situation he was trying to avoid.
"There you are!" Poe said, appearing from a clump of jungle fronds that obscured Ben from the rest of the base. "I've been looking all over."
"Did you really bring her back here?" he asked.
Poe gave a sheepish grin. "Yeah. She's, uh, secured though, so you don't need to worry."
"Contained my ass," Ben growled.
"Yeah, well. She wants to talk to you."
"I'm sure she does." He stood with a sigh. "Let's get this over with."
Poe and Ben followed BB-8 to one of the access points for the underground storage center and took the winding metal stairs. Their boots clanged with each step, but BB-8 caused the entire structure to reverberate. He careened down with a squeal, bumping against the walls. Dim orange lights illuminated the sealed containers, full of fuel and energy cells, tactical equipment, food stores, and more. They wound through the warren created by the rectangular reinforced boxes.
"I'll have to go in with you. Part of the protocol," Poe explained, stopping in front of one of the containers. He hit the keypad and the first door clicked open. "Anyway, there's video monitoring, but, uh, Command doesn't want to take chances. Wait out here, Beebee."
BB-8 complied as the two men stepped into a small anteroom and the outer door closed. Poe wiped beads of sweat from his forehead before activating a panel on the inner wall. "Hey, Silyana? Ben's here. Could you put your hands on the table?" he said through the intercom, and turned to Ben. "It won't open unless she's restrained."
Ben grunted noncommittally. He didn't know how this was going to go, and the anxiety rolling off Poe in waves certainly didn't help.
"You ready?"
"Just open the door, Dameron."
Silyana's eyes were already fixed on him as if she had been able to see him through the thick metal, and he met her unblinking gaze steadily. She sat at a table, wrists resting on its surface. She looked much like he remembered – white-blonde hair in a long braid down her back, sharp blue eyes, slight frame – but he could sense the dark cloud of deadly power inside her had grown since he'd last seen her.
"Last time I saw you, you were being dragged like a sack of tubers to the detention center." She grinned. "How things change."
"Do you know where she is?"
She crossed her ankles. "I thought you'd be the one to tell me that."
"I don't want to play games."
The next thing he knew, his back slammed into the container's wall and his skull hit the metal with a clanging crack. Poe yelped. Ben thrashed in surprise, but he didn't push back. She wasn't choking him, not yet.
"If you don't want to play games, tell me why you've been acting the idiot for years?" Silyana leaned over the table, half-out of her seat despite the restraints still fixed to the table, her fingers curled into claws.
"Kriff, Silyana, let him go," Poe begged, although he made no move to assist Ben. In fact, he was similarly, if voluntarily, plastered against the opposite wall. He almost looked sick. "Please?"
Ben watched as Silyana cut her eyes towards Poe. The Force pinning Ben to the wall relented and he settled on his feet.
"You're lucky I like him." She relaxed into the chair with a little noncommittal sigh. "But seriously, I hate you for what you did to her. I'd probably kill you if I didn't know it would ruin her."
He rubbed the back of his neck. "I made a lot of mistakes."
"Ha! No shit."
"And I'm trying to fix them."
"Is that what you told her? I bet that went over well."
Ben cast eyes to the ceiling. Silyana wasn't at the top of his ideal list of allies, but life hadn't been cooperating with his wishes for a long time. "She's angry with me."
"I can't, because my wrists are stuck to this kriffing table, but if I could I'd be doing a slow clap right now."
"I told her that I forgave her."
She stared for a long time. Long enough that Poe was preparing to fill the silence, taking in a breath to say something, anything, when she laughed, howls reverberating in ear-splitting echoes. Poe looked about ready to crawl up the walls.
"You absolute fool," she gasped, cricking her neck to wipe tears on her shoulder. "Tell me that was a joke."
"Switch off."
"Did you ever consider that your forgiveness is not what she wants?"
"I thought we weren't going to play games," he snapped.
"Then quit treating it like one and get serious. Forgiveness isn't going to break your little toxic pattern. You need to give her commitment. Reassurance. Trust."
He snarled. "That won't matter if she's dead."
"Fine," she sighed, "you're not entirely wrong. We need to find her before Hux does. Or she does something stupid."
"She's already doing that," Ben griped. "That's why I'm here."
"You know where she is?"
"Not exactly."
"But you've been in touch?"
"...Yes."
"How? I've tried all her comm channels, encrypted, private, all of them, and I can't get through."
Ben ran a hand through his hair. He glanced at Poe, who raised his eyebrows in question.
"Don't clam up now," she prompted. "I'm pretty sure I have a decent guess already."
He let out a shuddering breath. "I haven't told anyone, and I'd ask that you don't share it any further."
Silyana shrugged. "Sure."
Ben looked to Poe, who crossed his arms. "I'm trusting you," he said.
"Alright." Ben closed his eyes. "Rey and I have a bond within the Force. It allows us to manifest physically in the other's location and speak to one another, although we can't visualize their surroundings. We can't control it and as far as I can see, the manifestations occur randomly and spontaneously. It's been happening since Starkiller over a year ago."
Ben dared to open his eyes and found Silyana's countenance unreadable. Her face went red, then white, then red again.
Poe, meanwhile, gaped a little. "Is that even possible?" he asked.
"Apparently, yes," Ben said.
"Isn't that an invasion of privacy?"
"I suppose."
"Is she here right now?" Poe asked in an almost-whisper.
"It's not like that. She's not a ghost; you'd be able to see her." Ben paused. "At least, I think so. I – we can touch each other, so it's not like a hologram. Although it hasn't ever happened with others present."
Poe was extremely unnerved, running a shaking hand over his nape and squeezing. Ben cleared his throat. He preferred Poe's interrogation to Silyana's nonreaction. "I understand if this undermines your trust, Dameron, but I promise I haven't allowed it to compromise the Resistance."
"Could that happen to anyone?" Poe asked nervously.
Ben shook his head, rubbing the back of his neck. "No. Our bond... It's almost unheard of."
"Silyana and I had sex," Poe blurted.
She let out a long sigh. "Wow. Okay. Your timing could have been better with that."
"What? He should know. He told us his secret," Poe defended.
"Mmm, yes, but I don't think those secrets are of the same caliber. Also, it's your secret, not mine. I'm not the one who thinks it was a mistake."
"Well, sorry I'm not ready to have an unpredictable, metaphysical, uncontrollable bond with you!"
"Their bond doesn't have anything to do with sex," she hissed. "Look at that man! Obviously a virgin. No, the Force chose them." Poe opened his mouth but Silyana cut him off. "Not the time, alright?"
"Fine," Poe griped.
Any congeniality in the room had evaporated. Silyana deliberately relaxed her hands, palms flat on the table. "Ben, when was the last time you spoke to her?" she asked.
"Yesterday," he answered testily. "That's how I know that she's no longer on Mustafar."
"She was still on Mustafar?" Her jaw tightened. "What did you do?"
"We argued. She's going to look for a way to contact Vader."
Silyana paled. "Tell me you're joking."
"I'm not."
Silyana let out a string of expletives with such venom that even Ben flinched. "So she's alone, angry, distracted, hunted, and trying to commune with a dead Sith. Did I miss anything?"
"No."
"Do you have any idea where she might be going?"
"I've been trying to think of possible locations or artifacts, but it's difficult given the lack of consistent record keeping since the Empire fell."
"Wouldn't she just stay on Mustafar?" Poe inquired cautiously. "That was where Vader's castle was, right?"
"Yes, but the New Republic removed and destroyed most of Vader's possessions," Ben said.
"At least they were supposed to," Silyana muttered.
"True," Ben admitted, running a hand through his hair. "But what was left behind was picked up by cults or other adherents to the Dark Side. What remains is too dangerous and volatile to provide a stable medium to commune with spirits."
"Sounds lovely."
"Have you thought of anything promising?" she asked Ben.
"Maybe. Mostly I've been trying to think of things she'd know without having resources to research. She seemed to have her mind set on something already."
Silyana settled back. "I'll try to come up with ideas, too. Meanwhile, you need to talk to her again, but without pissing her off."
"I can't guarantee that."
"Yeah, trust me, I know." She closed her eyes and leaned back. "Get out. I'm done looking at your stupid face."
Ben took the dismissal without protest and gladly turned to the door. Poe followed. Outside, BB-8 was waiting, impatiently chirping a question at Poe as soon as the locks were secured.
"You can see her when we bring her dinner, buddy," Poe answered. He looked up at Ben a bit reluctantly. "Sorry for the inappropriate, um, personal info."
"I'll admit I didn't expect that. But I'm likely one of the last people in the galaxy who could hold that against you, and you're smart, Dameron. Just be careful. I know better than anyone how much a relationship with someone who has different beliefs can damage your life if you're not careful."
"We're not in a relationship."
"I'd technically have to say the same about Rey. Unless, it was a one-time thing."
Poe looked at BB-8, who seemed very interested in the answer. "I, uh, don't know."
Ben nodded, then said, "I'm going to go work on research."
"Alright, sure." Poe cleared his throat. "Um, only Leia knows so far."
"I won't tell, Dameron."
"Thanks."
Ben rubbed his temples. Why did everything have to be so complicated?
A/N: I apologize for the lateness. was being a butt last night, but of course this morning nothing's wrong. Next update Oct 11 CDT