Rey was almost glad when Col's shrill cries pulled her out of sleep. She sat up, bleary eyed and still half in a dream, and dragged herself upright to stagger across the room. Col continued to wail as she scooped him into her arms, his voice rising into the high, frantic pitch of hunger. He squirmed, sucking on his fists, while Rey fumbled with her tunic and settled down against the wall to nurse him.

She let out a long sigh as he quieted, running a hand over eyes that burned with exhaustion. Between feeding Col and the nightmares, a full night's rest had become something utterly foreign to her. And what nightmares they had become. A shudder ran through her and she closed her eyes against the image of a dark sky full of hundreds of warships. Of Ben lying on cold stone, eyes open but unseeing as his jaw stretched wide in a scream of anguish.

Col seemed to sense her distress and pulled away from her, beginning to fuss. Rey opened her eyes again, glancing to the deep shadows of the rumpled bed as she cradled the boy a little closer. Ben was safe. He slept not five meters from where she sat. So why couldn't she brush aside the dread that crept through her like a cold mist?

Because Ben's getting impatient to leave. And because I'm going to have to leave Col behind.

Her eyes went back to the baby in her arms, tracing his small features. Strange how familiar they had become in the two short weeks since his birth. She trailed a finger over his cheek to his ear, his skin smooth under her callused fingertips. She saw so much of Ben in him; in the way his little brow wrinkled up when he cried, or in the shape of his eyes as he gazed about with something like curiosity sparkling in the blue depths. Only the nose was hers, something that Ben had pointed out with a laugh soon after Col's birth.

"Thank the Force," he'd said. "It's bad enough that he got my ears."

The smile that tugged at the corner of her mouth at the memory was weak and full of a bitter sadness. The time they'd had with Col had been so brief. A part of her would trade the whole galaxy for one more day with him. But it wasn't just the galaxy at risk now. Col himself was in danger, and she'd stalled for longer than she should have. She'd stolen as much time as she could.

Tears burned in her eyes as she gazed down at Col and she blinked hard to keep them from rolling down her face. She had to hope that everything would turn out alright. She had to believe that she and Ben would come back alive. Would come back safe. Col's mouth opened in a wide yawn and his eyes slid closed as she rubbed a hand over his back, easing him into sleep.

She settled him carefully into the makeshift cradle, brushing a stray tuft of hair back from his forehead before she turned back to the bed. There were still hours until morning. Hours to sleep and gather strength before the trials she would face with Ben tomorrow. Together.

Don't follow me, Rey.

She paused, glancing around as Ben's voice echoed in her head. It reminded her of her dreams somehow; vague, yet more like a memory than a true dream, and fear stirred in the pit of her stomach. She took a step closer, peering harder at the rumpled bedclothes, trying to decide if there was a form lying beneath them. With a cold shock of terror, she darted forward and threw aside the blankets. They were empty. Her eyes flicked to the bedside table, where Ben's saber always lay within a long arm's reach of him while he slept.

It was gone.

"Oh no," she whispered. "Oh no, no, no."

It would be no use to search the ship for him. She already knew where he'd gone.

Rey spun and grabbed her comm where it rested on the bedside table, clicking its button several times to try to raise a response. Mela's voice was muffled and slightly slurred when she answered, and Rey suddenly remembered that it was the middle of the night. But it didn't matter. None of it mattered now.

"Mela, Ben's gone. I need you here now."

The sleep was gone from Mela's voice when the knight answered again, and Rey heard the soft rush of a door opening over the connection.

"I'm on my way."

Col started to fuss again, wakened by the sharp tone of Rey's voice, and she gathered him into her arms before he could start crying in earnest. She bounced him gently as she picked up a satchel and threw it onto the bed, beginning to fling supplies into it while her mind ran down a list of what she might need. Last of all, she reached for her saber. She paused with her fingers almost touching the hilt, gazing down at it, and listening to the crystals as they sang out in the Force.

This was to be their first test since she'd cleansed them. The weapon felt right when it nestled in her hands now, as though a part of herself lay within the crystal chamber instead of something cold and foreign, but it seemed fragile to her in a way it hadn't before. Untried. A reflection of her doubt. Her own power had grown in her months of training and battle, but she was still weak. Still lacking in ways she knew she didn't even realize. She could only hope that it would be enough. That she would be enough.

Without another thought, she clipped the saber to her belt and grabbed a blanket from Col's bed, quickly wrapping the sleepy infant in the fabric. She was just turning to make sure she hadn't forgotten anything when the door to the apartment hissed open. Mela stood there, her eyes flicking from Col to the pack Rey clutched in one hand, to Rey herself.

"I'll go with you," she said quietly. "You'll need someone-"

"No," Rey said as she shook her head, cutting off the knight, "I need you to do something else for me. Something more important."

Mela's face went even paler, and her eyes went back to Col. Rey felt her arms tighten around the baby, and she fought to swallow the tears that constricted her throat.

"Col?" Mela asked.

Rey could only nod in reply. The tears were burning her eyes now, and she didn't trust her voice to remain steady.

"What would you have me do?" Mela asked, her own voice breaking a little as she stepped closer to Rey.

"Take him and run," Rey said, and she heard her pain come out in her words. "Run as far away as you can and don't look back. I'll find you if I'm able."

"If?" Mela asked.

"Just promise me," Rey pleaded. "Please. Just take him now and run. There's no time."

"I can't let you do this alone, Rey."

"And I can't let Sidious take everything that I love away from me."

Rey clutched Col against her once more, then held him out toward the knight. Mela took him, her hands gentle as she cupped the child's dark head and nestled him in against her chest. Col startled from a doze at the touch and sent up a wail that tore at Rey.

"Take him," she gasped, tears beginning to roll down her cheeks. "As soon as I'm clear of the ship, get out of here."

"Rey-"

Col arched his back and shrieked, his fists and feet trembling. Rey could hardly see through the tears in her eyes as she bent and kissed the infant on his forehead. He stilled then, staring up at her with his deep blue eyes. He had such a hold on her, but she couldn't set aside the bond that tethered her to his father. Ben needed her. Col needed her. And her choice was tearing her apart.

"I love you, Col," she whispered. "Don't forget that. I do this out of love."

She looked to Mela.

"Make sure he knows," she rasped. "If I don't come back, make sure he knows I loved him. That Ben loved him."

And with that, she turned from the room and made her way for the hangar, sobs stifled in the sleeve of her robe.

...

The tears had dried by the time Rey's ship shuddered out of hyperspace to slide through the Finalizer's mag-con field, though her eyes still felt gritty and tired from long weeping. She hadn't been back aboard the destroyer since the day of Col's birth, but it seemed little had changed in her absence. The TIEs were still perched in their neat rows, mechanics and flight deck personnel were still darting about on their own errands, and the lights were still harsh and glaring. The ship seemed none the worse for having been in a battle, and though Rey had seen several darkened patches on the hull during the flight in, there had been nothing to suggest damage to any vital systems.

Through the viewport she could make out a small crowd of people huddled at the center of the hangar, the dark robes of several knights in evidence. They all looked up when they heard the high whine of her engines, their eyes following her as she glided gently into a landing in the nearest available space. She was out of the hatch before the engines had finished gearing down, sliding onto the ground and quickly threading her way through several mechanics until she reached the edge of the little knot of officers and knights.

"Where's Kylo?" Cy asked as soon as she reached them.

"Exegol," she said. "I'm going to go after him."

"Then why did you come back here?" Taryn asked quietly. "Surely there's little time-"

"I think Ben's walked into a trap," Rey interrupted. "I had a dream about a fleet of ships, at least the size of ours, except it didn't feel like a dream. If there really is a fleet there, I'm going to need your help. If we don't stop them-"

"If they're real and we don't stop them, Sidious will start a war," Jai said, where he stood on her left. "One we're little prepared to fight."

"And yet, we've known it was a possibility ever since Kylo found the records of those shipments into the Unknown Regions, and Luke first told us about Exegol and its growing darkness," said Cy. "We've been speaking of a concealed enemy fleet as a potential threat, but I've never considered it as anything but a certainty."

"Which means that Kylo's jumped into something without thinking again," Jai muttered.

Rey was watching a dark-haired man in a gray uniform with an admiral's insignia on his chest, studying his face as several emotions flickered over his expression. She saw fear there, followed by anger, before it settled into quiet resolution.

"You have something to say, Admiral Mitaka?" she asked.

"Yes ma'am," the man said, giving a stiff nod. "I joined the First Order to escape the chaos and corruption of my home planet that had grown in the shadow of the Empire. It didn't take me long to realize that the Order was just more of the same. It would be an honor to do battle against a force that would bring about everything I wanted to eradicate. Our fleet may be smaller than it was, but I put it at your disposal."

"If we can surprise them, it might not matter if we're a smaller force, Mitaka," Taryn mused. "How long would it take to gather them all here?"

"A few standard hours, no more," said the Admiral after a short pause in which he seemed to be doing several calculations.

"Call them together," Rey said. "Taryn, can you calibrate the wayfinder with the Finalizer's navicomputer?"

"I think so," he said. "Kylo and I worked together on the one he attached to the Silencer. It should be more straightforward now that I know what I'm about."

"Good. Once it's in place we can use the system to relay the path to the rest of the fleet, right?"

"That should work," the knight said, rubbing his hand over the stubble on his chin. "I'd have to make a few more adjustments but-"

"Do it," Rey said, reaching into her satchel and pulling the wayfinder free before placing it in the knight's hands. Taryn clutched the device close, then took off at something between a trot and a full run, heading in the direction of the bridge. Mitaka followed at his heels, speaking into his wrist comm and gesturing with his other hand to whoever spoke on the other end of the channel, though there was no possibility of his being seen. Rey watched them go, her mind already far away on a dark planet where she saw Ben lying pale and still on cold stone. She could almost feel the ache of it in her own bones.

Don't follow me, Rey. Don't-

"Rey?"

Cy's voice pulled her out of her thoughts, dragging her back into reality. Ben's voice died away slowly in her thoughts, and she was left standing exhausted and frightened under the stark white lights. She blinked and turned fully to face the knight.

"What do you intend to do?" Cy asked quietly.

"I don't know," Rey said, wrapping her arms around herself. Her voice came out weakly around the knot in her throat. "I don't even know for sure that he's still alive. I can hardly sense him under all of that darkness."

Cy laid a heavy hand on her shoulder and squeezed. Rey didn't look up at him, fixing her eyes on her TIE instead. She shifted restlessly and her fingers drifted down to the hilt of her saber.

"He's still alive," Cy murmured. "You'd know if he wasn't. All of us would know. We all have ties to him, and you most of all. We'd all feel it if they were cut."

"It's almost worse to know he's still alive," Rey whispered. "I start imagining what Sidious is doing to him while I'm stuck here, useless."

"Not useless," said Cy. "This gives us a little time to plan."

"Where's Luke?" she asked, her voice quiet. "He was supposed to be here."

"In his quarters meditating," Cy said. "Why?"

"I want him to go with me when we get to Exegol," Rey said. "He's fought Sidious before, and if there's three of us, we might stand a better chance. The rest of you should spread yourselves out among the other ships. You know Sidious best: his strategies, the tactics he's used in the past. You'll be able to give the fleet captains valuable insight they might not have. They're going to need you when the battle actually starts."

"And where will you be in all this?" Jai demanded.

"On the surface," Rey said. "Hunting down Sidious."

"Not without us, you're not," Jai shot back. "We aren't about to abandon you and Kylo down there after all we've been through. Besides, I've waited too long-"

Cy put a restraining hand on the other knight's shoulder and Jai's mouth closed with a snap, though his face set into a scowl.

"She's right, Jai," said Cy. "Numbers won't provide enough of an advantage to outweigh the disadvantage of being discovered before we have Sidious in our sights. And what could we do that she and Kylo and Luke could not?"

Jai gave a low growl and his fingers clenched into fists, anger and another expression almost like helplessness played over his expression. Rey saw it and tried to give the knight a smile, though it didn't reach her eyes.

"You very well might get a chance at Sidious," she said. "If I can't- if we fail…"

She trailed off, her eyes sliding away to stare out beyond the mag-con field to the vast array of stars glittering white in the black field of space. Cy's hand was a great weight on her shoulder as the knight stepped closer, his bulk almost comforting. Rey closed her eyes, trying not to think of Ben, or of Col. The light side was quiet, a bare hum beneath the low rumbling of her terror. She wished for anger- for rage so strong that she could destroy Sidious with the same dark side he thought he controlled, but all she could feel was fear.

"I'm afraid I already know how this will end," she whispered, shivering a little. "I don't know if I can stop it."

"Then don't look too far ahead," Cy said. "And don't give up hope yet, little sister. Our futures aren't set in stone."

...

"First set of coordinates," Taryn said, his voice sharp in the eerie silence that had fallen over the bridge. "Make the jump now, Admiral."

Admiral Mitaka nodded in acknowledgement and, with his face drawn and pale, he pushed a lever on the control panel forward. Rey felt the ship lurch beneath her feet, and the view beyond the transparisteel shifted, sliding from the distant stars of realspace to the pale light of hyperspace. Rey watched shadows play over the fearful expressions of the officers around her, then glanced back to Taryn. The knight was bent over the hyperdrive system where it had been attached to the wayfinder with several wires, and spoke in a low voice with the ship's navigator; a man who everyone called Naut. The two glanced back and forth before Taryn straightened abruptly and gestured to a set of numbers blinking on the display.

"Second set of coordinates approaching," snapped Naut. "Bring her out in three…two…one… now, Admiral."

Mitaka responded instantly, hauling back on the lever. The ship jerked again, and Rey had to bend her knees to keep from being thrown to the floor. When she looked up, dusky red light was filtering through the viewport, and the air around her seemed to become thick and murky. There was a collective intake of breath from the officers and a low murmur of voices.

"The Blood Net," she heard someone whisper.

"Quiet on the bridge," Mitaka barked, though his tone was strained. "If I mistime this, we're all dead."

"Approaching the third set of coordinates," Taryn said, "Jump in three…two…one…"

The ship shot back into hyperspace and the knight turned to Rey, fear and determination in his expression.

"Get to your ship, Rey. A few more jumps and we'll be there, but we're not going to go unnoticed when we do arrive. Get out of here as quickly as you can with Luke unless you want to get caught in a firefight."

Rey dipped her head in a brief nod and left the bridge, striding quickly down the hall. The door hissed shut behind her, cutting off Naut's voice as the navigator shouted for Mitaka to drop out of hyperspace. Rey stumbled forward at the change in the ship's movement, staggering and nearly falling before she managed to right herself. The soles of her boots thudded against the smooth floor of the corridor, a dull staccato that sent jarring pain through muscles tight with fear and growing desperation. The ship shuddered around her as she ran, the continued strain of the violent passages in and out of hyperspace evident in the low groan of metal.

The Finalizer bucked again just as she entered the hangar, and Rey tumbled to the floor, her shoulder striking hard. She struggled to her hands and knees, looking up just in time to see a slight figure in gray running for her. She recognized Lita's features as the young mechanic reached her side, hooking an arm through hers and pulling her upright.

"Your ship's ready, and the old Jedi is waiting for you. He was just about to send me to the bridge to find you."

A klaxon started to wail from somewhere overhead as Rey got to her feet and Lita flinched, her head snapping up to look to the control room. There was a squeal as someone clicked the intercom and a voice boomed down from above.

"Final approach. Battle stations. Battle stations."

"You can find him yourself?" Lita asked, her eyes darting toward what Rey could only assume was the mechanic's assigned post.

In response, Rey gave her friend a thin smile and turned away to search for Luke. She found him a few minutes later standing next to a TIE and shifting nervously from foot to foot, glancing toward the swirling lights of hyperspace where they could be seen beyond the mag-con field. He shouldered an old leather pack as soon as he saw her and strode forward, his face set in grim lines.

"Get your ship geared up," he said. "We're getting close to the drop point."

"Think we'll be able to get through?" Rey asked.

"Only one way to find out."

Rey nodded and swung herself up the side of her TIE to drop into the cabin, sealing the hatch behind her. Through the viewport, she saw Luke do the same. Her fingers flew over the controls, and the reactor woke with a low hum, sending power to the engines until they began to take on their familiar shrill pitch. The TIE rose several feet into the air to hover just as the Finalizer gave one final grating shriek and the view through the mag-con field turned dark and starry again.

"Now, Rey!" came Luke's voice through the comm.

Rey responded without thinking, pushing the throttle forward to propel her ship out through the barrier and into the darkness. They screamed around the Finalizer's flank just in time to see the rest of the First Order fleet flash into view as they dropped out of hyperspace. But it wasn't until she sent her TIE arching over the bridge that she caught her first sight of Exegol.

Rey froze, a sudden dark tide of fear surging through her at the very sight of the place. Her hands jerked on the yoke before she could stop them, her instincts reacting without the input of conscious thought. Everything inside her was screaming to turn about and run as far and as fast as she could in the opposite direction. Her thoughts scattered as panic took her, Ben's voice whispering through her mind.

Leave me, Rey. Go.

Her hands locked around the yoke, her breath coming in sharp gasps while her heart pounded in her ears. She could feel him, a pull against her that drew her toward the planet spinning far below. But there was another tension that grew with every second, pushing against her until merely piloting her ship toward Exegol became a battle that required her whole concentration.

Turn back, Rey. He knows you're-

Ben's voice went silent in the same instant that the pressure against her vanished. Rey flinched at a sudden sharp pain at her temple, a burning sensation running like a shudder over her skin. An image rose before her eyes, as clear and sharp as if she were really seeing it. Ben lay in a chamber of stone, his eyes wide and panicked as he jerked and thrashed, blue lightning arching over him. Rey saw blood on his face and matting his hair, and her stomach twisted. She closed her eyes against the vision, but it remained behind her lids, as agonizing as ever.

You can still save him.

Her jaw clenched at the voice that echoed in her head. She had heard it too often in the last months not to know who it was. Rey forced herself to blink away the vision of Ben's torment and focused again on the controls even as the TIE shuddered in the throes of its first encounter with Exegol's atmosphere. A flat plain of clouds stretched beneath her, lit almost continually by brilliant flashes of lightning. But it wasn't the lightning that frightened Rey. It was the hundreds of ships that were appearing one by one, trailing vapor as they rose through the cloud layer.

"Rey, are you seeing this?" Luke asked, his voice crackling as it emerged from the comm.

"They're mobilizing," she said. "Do you think-"

"Sidious knows we're coming."

Rey sucked in a sharp breath and edged the TIE into a steeper dive. From the corner of her eye she saw Luke's TIE doing the same. They screamed toward the surface, letting gravity speed the descent. The first ships of Sidious' fleet passed in so many blurs of shining metal and a few heartbeats later the world turned gray and dismal as Rey plunged into the clouds.

Lightning flared around her and the comm hissed and died with a sudden burst of static while the instruments on the control panel jumped wildly. Rey clung to the yoke as the wind tossed the ship back and forth, wrestling to keep it on a steady course. She broke through the cloud cover like a diving predator bird, easing her ship into level flight several hundred meters above the ground to bleed off some of the speed she'd gathered. She looked over her shoulder just in time to see Luke's TIE slicing through the gray mists, the vapors roiling in his wake.

Rey took the lead, letting herself be guided along by the tug of Ben's presence. He was near. She could feel it in the ripple of the Force around her; an undercurrent that could barely be sensed beneath the ocean of darkness that surrounded her. She shivered and pushed the throttle forward, the TIE passing over the landscape like a gale wind.

In the distance, she caught a glimpse of an irregularity in the horizon. Something rose up from the desert to tower hundreds of meters above the vast emptiness, standing stark and black against the lightning filled sky. The pull of Ben's soul against hers grew stronger, and she knew. He was there, in the place from which all the darkness was radiating. And she was rapidly drawing near.

Her TIE slid into a landing at the base of the strange structure, Luke's ship coming in a moment later. Rey pulled herself through the hatch, perching there to stare up at the black stones that angled upwards toward the clouds. There was something oppressive about it. Something that made her feel very small and reminded her of how weak she was. It seemed to absorb all light, reflecting nothing back so that it appeared as a black hole in the air.

Luke emerged from the hatch of his own TIE and gestured to something a few meters away. Rey followed his motion and nearly gasped aloud when she saw Ben's Silencer resting dark and dead on the sand before the monolith. The sight of it sent another wave of fear sweeping through her, nearly overwhelming her already overburdened mind. She struggled with her panic for a long minute, calling desperately on the light side to help her. It came as a gentle music, settling her spirit until her thoughts cleared and the knot that had tightened around her chest loosened enough to allow her to breathe.

Rey pulled her saber free from her belt and slid down the side of the TIE, her boots making a soft noise as they struck the ground. A sharp wind blew over the surface and her tunic snapped against her skin, doing little to shield her from the chill. Dust eddied around her feet, clouds of it billowing into the air, revealed by the almost constant lightning.

With a deep breath, Rey took a harder grip on her saber and strode across the wide expanse of empty sand that lay between her and the edifice that loomed over her. The rustle of Luke's passage followed her, and they passed into the darkness beneath the structure together. A prickling sensation ran down her spine as the shadows closed over them, and the hair on the nape of her neck stood up.

She crept along until she came across a patch of stone devoid of the ever-present dust, a thick crack splitting the stone in a shape that was too precise to be a natural occurrence. Rey paused at its edge, unwilling to set foot inside.

"Luke," she murmured in a voice that could barely be heard over the hissing wind, "come get a look at this."

"It's a door," said the old Jedi as he drew up next to her. "It looks similar to what we saw on the temple doors on-"

"On Moraband," Rey interrupted, squatting to trace several faint etchings ringing the portal.

Luke nodded and stepped over the fissure to stand on the stone beyond, one hand outstretched and thrust at the ground. There was a low grinding and then the platform on which Luke stood began to descend into the earth. Rey leapt after him, falling several feet before her heels struck the flat stone with a hard shock of pain. She hissed in a breath, but bit back a low oath as she caught a glimpse of the statues.

Rey gasped and shrank back from the edge, staring upward at the silent faces while the platform continued to sink. Luke watched them too, as if he half expected the carven figures to come to life and attack. The trip to the floor of the cavern seemed to take a short eternity under those empty eyes and Rey scrambled off as fast as she could when it came to a stop, only to find herself at the end of a long corridor lined with more towering images that stared down at her out of the gloom.

She froze, cowering beneath the sudden weight of a terror so strong it nearly sent her to her knees. The dark side was stronger in this place than anywhere else Rey had ever encountered it. In all her travels, on all the worlds she had seen, none of them bore a wound like Exegol. Evil had been allowed to grow here, perhaps for eons, cultivated and nurtured until it tainted the very air she was breathing. Its roots ran deep into the ground so that she could almost hear the earth groaning with the burden of it. The very planet was crying out against the torture laid upon it by the dark side.

And above it all, she could hear the song of her grandfather.

Hands shaking, bile rising in her throat, Rey managed to straighten. The shadows seemed to drag against her, creeping into her mind to cloud her thoughts. Her grasp on the light side slipped, notes of her song disentangling and dissolving into a cacophony that she knew all too well. She closed her eyes, forcing her mind into stillness. And there below the noise, below the overwhelming fear and darkness, was the light. Rey reached for it, and it came to her as strong and as bright as it had ever been, enfolding her in a peace she had no right to feel in the lair of her enemy. The muscles of her shoulders began to loosen as its music swept over her. Whatever was to come, she would not have to face it alone. And if death found her, as was so likely, what had she to fear but a passage into that glorious light?

It gave her just enough strength to take a step, and then it gave her the strength to take another. With her mind fixed on the light, Rey began to move, passing each statue on legs that shook under her but nevertheless held her upright. Luke strode beside her, his expression betraying nothing of what he thought or felt. She could sense him drawing on the light side, but little else beyond the quiet shifting of notes in his song.

"Luke?" she murmured.

He slashed a hand through the air in a gesture for silence, his head snapping towards a gap between two of the stone figures. Rey followed his gaze, her eyes widening when they came to rest on what lay beyond the great stone feet. Her heart skipped a few beats when she saw the familiar tanks of fluid and the strange and twisted forms they held. She understood then why Luke had hushed her. Shadows moved in the deeper darkness of the lab, and the cold realization took her that this place, unlike the one on Coruscant, was not abandoned.

She and Luke crept past quickly, heads down and boots making no more noise than a soft scuffing against the floor, but the tension Rey felt in her back and neck didn't ease until several minutes had passed without a sign of an alarm being raised. She was just about to release the breath she'd been holding when the music of the Force surged up around her. For one moment, there was only a sensation of oneness: of the familiar knitting of her soul with Ben's.

And then she heard the scream.