It came back to her out of her nightmares; raw and ragged and hopeless, rebounding from the stone in a thousand echoes until it seemed to come from every direction. Her heart lurched in her chest and she cried out in an answering agony, her whole body trembling with pain that was not her own. She spun in a panic, disoriented and nearly blind with Ben's fear and helpless anger.
It was Luke's hands on her arms that finally pulled her back to herself and anchored her there in her own mind. She flinched and shivered, throwing off the last clinging tendrils of the bond, to find Luke's face no more than an inch from hers. His eyes darted over her shoulder and back to hers as he shook her.
"Rey," he hissed, and from his tone, Rey realized that it wasn't the first time he had called her. "Rey, your saber!"
Her hand went tighter around her weapon without conscious thought, driven by the instincts developed during the long months she'd spent with Luke. The tension in his voice and the angle of his jaw told her all that she needed to know.
Danger.
The dual blades of her saber blazed to life in the same moment the green glow of Luke's saber bathed the cavern in an eerie glow, throwing sharp edged shadows out and away from them. At the very edges, in the places where the false twilight became true darkness, Rey saw things beginning to move.
"Luke?" she whispered.
"Back to back," he snapped. "Now."
Rey spun away from him to face outward just as more than a dozen figures emerged from the darkness. Scarlet armor obscured them, and they wore visored helmets similar to those of the guards' she'd battled with Ben in Snoke's throne room. All of them clutched electrostaffs in their gauntleted hands, and the weapons glowed with energy at their ends, blue and crackling like the lightning Rey had seen flickering over Exegol's barren wasteland.
She turned to keep most of them in her line of sight as the figures eased away from one another to form a loose circle around her and Luke. Barely a moment later, she felt Luke adjust his footing behind her, and the light from his saber shifted across the cavern floor in a wide arc. There was a buzz she recognized as something colliding with a saber blade, and a heavy grunt as Luke staggered back, bumping against her shoulders.
As if it had been a cue, the armored warriors on her side of the circle lunged forward together. Rey staggered a step to the side just as a blaze of blue light rushed past her head. The electrostaff struck the stone of the floor with a sharp crack and sent shards of rock flying in every direction. She jumped out of the way, twisting her saber to deflect another electrostaff as a red armored guard swung it towards her legs.
"Luke!" she cried, landing and ducking another blow that whistled through the air above her.
There was no answer except for a harsh grunt from Luke and the low hum of his saber as it sliced through the air. Rey jumped another low cut, leaping forward over her opponent's weapon and striking out with her own. There was a hiss and a howl of pain as the blade went home, and she only just managed to dodge a swing from another warrior at the man's back. She flung out her hand as she did, and two more of Sidious' guards fell senseless to the ground, their armor crushed and mangled.
Sparks shot from her saber and a tremor ran through her arms as Rey spun and caught a vicious blow before it could land across her shoulders. The armored figure who had delivered it bore down on her, pressing the advantage of his greater strength, even as she held him back with both hands braced on the hilt of her weapon. It did little to keep her from being driven back, and she found herself forced to give ground or be overcome.
And then her heel caught on a loose stone and she faltered.
Almost immediately, there was a sharp pain in her chest and every muscle in her body spasmed and drew tight. Her saber went dark as her legs gave out beneath her and she fell to the stone, limbs jerking with the electricity that coursed through her from the end of the electrostaff that her enemy still held against her ribs.
Rey's mouth opened and she tried to gasp in a breath, but her lungs didn't seem able to expand. She felt her connection with the Force shatter as the neural pathways tuned to its gentle fluctuation were overwhelmed. Panic took her then, phantoms of brilliant color flickering before her eyes as a high ringing began in her ears. The weight of the electrostaff left her chest just as darkness began to creep across her vision, and Rey rolled onto her side, coughing and gulping in air as her twitching muscles suddenly relaxed.
She could hear the clash of weapons above her, and something else that sent a cold chill over her skin. Footsteps. Dozens of footsteps that came from every direction and clattered over the stone. More of the red armored soldiers had come to finish the job. She could see them shouldering through the first circle of warriors; their long pikes and staffs with blades at their tips all thrust toward Luke.
The old Jedi slashed wildly, turning weapons aside with each stroke of his saber, and his enemies staggered back with every twitch of his fingers, but Rey could see how the battle would end almost as soon as it had begun. Luke was surrounded, fighting on his own, and no matter how hard she tried she couldn't seem to make her body obey her commands to get up and help him. Only when she struggled harder did she fully realize the futility of her actions. A red armored foot pinned the wrist of her weapon arm to the floor, anchoring it to the ground. Rey twisted and attempted to free herself, but the pressure against her arm increased, driving the back of her hand painfully into the rock until she lost her hold on her saber.
There was another flash of agony as the guard jabbed at her with his electrostaff, and she felt the muscles of her back lock as her spine arched from the floor. As suddenly as it had come, the pain disappeared and she was left, once again, lying on the floor of the cavern and panting for breath. Above the sound of her own desperate breathing, she heard a loud cry ring out through the cave. It was followed a moment later by a heavy thud somewhere nearby and another harsh scream.
She managed to turn her head just far enough to catch a glimpse of Luke. He was lying face up, pierced through the torso by two pikes, his arms and legs thrashing as blue tendrils of electricity arced over him. His eyes and mouth were wide open, but his chest did not rise, and his lips began to go a dusky pale color beneath a froth of blood.
"Stop!" she cried out, beginning to struggle anew against her captor. "Stop it!"
Instead of answering, the man who had felled her bent down and snatched her saber from the floor before hauling her to her feet. Her legs shaking and all but numb, Rey collapsed back to her knees only to be pulled upright again with a hand that nearly jerked her shoulder from its socket. She cried out and almost fell again, but another guard caught her beneath her other arm and held her up.
"Take her to the throne room," it said. "Our lord awaits her arrival."
"Let me go!" Rey shouted, suddenly desperate, as she twisted in their grip. "Let me help him!"
But Luke lay on the cold stone of the cave, his breath coming in fits and spurts as his two guards bore down on their weapons, driving them deeper. As she watched, a third figure strode up beside them, bending to scoop something up from the floor as it came. She craned her head, trying to keep Luke in her line of sight, even as the guards began to drag her away.
There was a hiss and a familiar green light burst into being, bathing Luke's face in its glow. Something inside Rey froze. Luke's saber. Held in the hands of his enemy. An enemy who was raising it above its head, readying itself for a killing blow.
"No!" she cried out. "No, Luke!"
Her gaze met his, and she saw sadness there, mingling with the pain. He knew, and she saw the fear that flickered over his face for the briefest of moments. And then it was gone. Smoothed away until there was nothing left but peace. The green blade of his saber flashed downward, and Rey closed her eyes. But she forgot not to listen. She forgot to close herself off from the Force.
Luke's presence vanished in the space between one heartbeat and the next and left an empty place among the interwoven melodies of the Force. Rey staggered in the sudden absence, biting back a low sob even as the guards dragged her towards a wall of stone. A great cleft opened before them, visible only as a patch of deeper shadow in the darkness. They forced her on, one ahead and the other behind, so that she had no choice but to creep along the narrow passage as it wound its way through the rock.
Her shoulders jostled against the walls and she stumbled on uneven patches in the floor, the hand her rear guard kept clenched around her upper arm her only support. She wanted to stop. She wanted to scream and lash out in the Force for what they'd done to Luke. But she could feel the cold metal end of a dead electrostaff pressed between her shoulder blades and knew exactly what would happen if she tried to resist.
And yet, with every step, her enemies were leading her closer to Ben. She could feel him. The tug against her drawing her forward as much as the hands of the guards. He was close. She just had to get to him…
The walls overshadowing their path fell away without warning on either side, and Rey found herself standing at the entrance of another cavern at least the size of the one that housed the statues. She froze despite the prodding of the electrostaff and stared into the dimness beyond the relative safety of the passageway. Nothing moved. All was silent except for the nearly inaudible rustling of her clothes and those of her captors. But Rey could sense the deeper shifting of sounds beneath those heard by the ears alone. The hundreds, perhaps thousands, of melodies in the Force that crowded the emptiness before her, all of them low and terrible and steeped in the dark side. And there was one among them that she knew as well as her own.
Ben.
Her head snapped toward the feel of him just as the guard behind her ignited his electrostaff. There was a buzz and a sharp jolt, and she fell forward onto her hands and knees, swallowing down a cry of pain. The two men didn't wait for her to get up again. Instead, they seized her under the arms and dragged her out into the open.
As if it had been waiting for her arrival, the silence was broken with the rumble of many voices. They started quietly so that at first they seemed to be little more than the wind hissing among the stones, but they grew louder with every second until Rey could distinguish words among the murmuring. Strange words in a language she could not understand, but which sounded as harsh and bitter as a curse.
She raised her head once more, trying to find Ben. And that was when she saw the throne. It loomed over her, raised on a dais, familiar and terrifying, and real. The hair on the back of her neck rose with the sensation of being watched and she tensed, only for the guards to take a tighter grip on her arms.
Her muscles locked and she fought to free herself from them, bracing her feet against the floor and throwing herself backward. But it did nothing. A staff slammed into the back of her legs and she fell to her knees before the great stone seat, a guard's hand pressing down on either shoulder. The voices rose louder in the darkness behind her, and she turned her head to catch a glimpse of those that spoke.
A flash of lightning illuminated the world and Rey saw, for the first time, the rows of benches that rose upwards toward the open roof of the cavern. Rows of benches that were filled with people in dark robes. She shifted under the hands of the guards, her fear a cold grip on her heart, turning to mark each of the cloaked figures. There was tier after tier after tier of them in an enormous semicircle broken only by more of the great stone statues.
Her eyes came to rest upon the throne again, and she shuddered, the reality of the power it represented piercing her with a dread that overwhelmed all else. The movement was mirrored by a stirring in the corner of her eye, and Rey's attention immediately jerked from the throne to a pile of torn and dirty robes lying on the cavern floor beside her.
"Rey?" Her name came to her then, sounding cracked and broken, but spoken by a familiar voice.
"Ben!"
She tore herself out of the grip of her guards, heedless of the consequences, and threw herself at his side. He lay face up, his skin pale and his eyes closed. His eyelids flickered as she tried to raise his head and shoulders from the ground, then came fully open and he was staring at her with a horrified expression twisting his face.
"I told you not to come here," he whispered. "Sidious knows…"
He struggled to push himself upright, but his arms shook and Rey had to wrap hers around him, bracing him until he could will some strength back into his limbs.
It was then that she heard the voice. It was a thing straight out of her nightmares; so familiar to her now that she recognized it from the first syllable it uttered. She froze, her arms still wrapped around Ben, and slowly raised her eyes to meet those of the one she had come to kill. Sidious hovered over them, a smile spreading over cracked and purplish lips while behind her the guards fell to their knees and the chanting grew louder, reaching a crescendo as their lord revealed himself.
"Welcome," said Sidious, his tone one of triumph as the echoes rang around them. "I've been waiting for you, granddaughter."
...
Rey's stomach churned with nausea as Sidious spoke. The hiss of his voice sent something cold and slimy crawling down her spine. Her grip tightened around Ben and she felt the blood draining from her face.
"Why?" she whispered. "You say you have been waiting. Why?"
"I have my own reasons," Sidious said.
"I've learned enough about you to guess some," Rey spat back, tears of frustration starting in her eyes. "But I still don't know why you want me. I'm of no use to you."
"My dear girl, you are of more use than you think," he said in a voice that would have seemed gentle if she hadn't heard the malice that lurked just beneath the surface. "You brought me Skywalker."
He beckoned to someone behind Rey, and an armored figure strode forward with something in its hands. She could just make out the dim glint of metal as the guard offered it to Sidious, the thick cylinder resting across his palms. Sidious reached out one withered hand and took the weapon, holding it up before him as if to admire it. It was only then that Rey recognized the hilt of Luke's saber.
She flinched, her throat constricting with her grief and guilt. It was her fault that he was dead. She shouldn't have asked him for help. She shouldn't have let him come with her. She should have done more in the battle with Sidious' guards. The tears burned in her eyes as she stared up at Sidious where the tyrant hung from his mechanical harness, a gloating smile on his face.
"But your use extends so much farther than bringing about the death of my old enemy," he continued, setting aside the weapon. "So much farther than I had ever anticipated."
"I don't understand," said Rey in a voice that sounded weak even to her own ears.
"By the time I found you, you were too old for me to use as a vessel," Sidious said, "too old and too strong-willed even to take as a new apprentice. But your power, my dear girl, is another matter entirely. Your raw power, that could be passed to a new generation. And you were so naïve, just as your father was. Naïve and too soft-hearted for your own good. You didn't even think to question the bond linking you to an enemy. And because of that bond, you have run into danger, more times than can be counted. But this time it will not just be you that falls, but the whole First Order."
At his words, Rey's eyes flicked upwards of their own accord to the sharp line where the black shadow of overhanging stone met the deep blue-grey of the roiling clouds far above. She could see lights flickering there: the green bursts of the turbolasers Illuminating the clouds from behind so that they nearly glowed. There were shadows moving there too. Shadows of great ships locked in combat, their edges blurred and indistinct.
Even as she watched, a pair broke through the clouds; one bearing the insignia of the First Order, and the other the jagged emblem of Sidious' forces. They fell towards the surface slowly, almost gracefully, thick smoke streaming from burning engines. There were flashes of green light as each continued to fire on the other, tearing chunks from the hulls while TIE fighters streamed around them like swarms of buzzing flies. Rey watched until they were out of sight, and a few seconds later, the earth gave a little shudder under her as the ships at last struck the face of Exegol.
"You have brought every threat against me to the place where I am strongest," Sidious hissed, turning his gaze from the sky above. "And I will eliminate them, one by one."
While Sidious spoke, Rey felt Ben begin to stir against her. He eased himself onto his hands and knees, each movement slow and torturous until he managed to push himself onto his knees. She felt his thoughts bending toward the hilt of his saber where it lay next to Sidious' fingers even as she watched the tyrant's eyes shift lazily to rest on Ben. A slow smile spread over the wizened face and she saw the skin of Sidious' lips split to allow a trickle of dark blood to ooze out over his pale skin. But he paid it no attention.
"And you, Ben Solo," Sidious said with a laugh. "You could not hide your weakness from me no matter how hard you tried. You practically bled it: your desperation for someone to see you as you truly were. It was an easy thing to bind you to her. All I had to do then was wait. One moment of human weakness, and the resulting child might have the potential of both parents: the mingled bloodlines of the last of the great Sith lords. And this time, the child will not escape me."
"You won't have him," Ben rasped, swaying as he fought to keep his balance on his knees.
Rey slid her arm under his and felt him grow steadier; the storm inside him calming by a fraction. But she sensed the moment it roared back to life when the expression on Sidious's face shifted slightly, becoming somehow uglier than it had been before. Sidious let out a low chuckle that made her skin crawl to hear.
"But my boy," he said, his blood-stained smile widening, "I already do."
Sidious lifted one decrepit hand from the arm of the harness upon which it had rested and beckoned towards a hooded figure standing half hidden among the shadows. It stepped forward, a small ovoid capsule floating several feet above the ground at its side. A muffled sound came from inside, indistinct, and yet familiar, and Rey went cold to her bones.
Col's high terrified shrieks rebounded from the stones of the cavern in sickening echoes as the lid of the capsule slid open. Something inside Rey drew tight, and her stomach clenched as if she were about to vomit. She was on her feet before she knew what she was doing, her hands twitching and jerking as she took an instinctive step toward her son. It was only when Ben's fingers wrapped her wrist that she stopped. The trembling in her hands spread to the rest of her body and she began to shiver violently in the cool air, helpless before Sidious.
The cloaked form of an acolyte reached into the capsule and drew out a bundle of blankets that moved fitfully, even as Col's wails grew louder. It carried him across the empty place before the dais and knelt before it with its head bowed, strange words on its lips as it lowered Col to the first of the stone stairs and left the child lying there in a blanket that Rey could see was stained with old blood.
An offering.
Her eyes remained locked on Col where he lay on the cold stone, crying and trembling with the chill. He was so close. A few steps and she could pick him up: cradle him close against the darkness and fear. But Sidious was watching, and the very static crackle in the air around them was a threat. Of lightning. Of pain. Of the dark side.
"My prize," Sidious said, almost casually. "And my own personal contingency. He was easy enough to find."
"How?" Rey whispered. "He was hidden…"
"My dear granddaughter," Sidious said, "Did you really think that you could keep him from me? You cannot conceal a presence in the Force as strong as his. You couldn't even set a proper guard to watch over him in your absence. His protector was easy enough to kill."
"No," Rey breathed, realizing what Sidious' words meant. "Not Mela."
"My servants say that she put up quite a fight before her end. But it didn't matter. The child is mine now."
The sudden current of Ben's fury rose around her like a dark tide. Anger and grief for his friend rushed through him, even as she felt an answering emotion tighten in her own chest. But as soon as it had come it was swallowed again by fear. The fear that kept Rey's mind wholly fixed on their son.
"I won't let you hurt him," Rey snapped.
It was a hollow threat, and Sidious knew it as well as she did. Rey could see the flicker of amusement in the clouded eyes of the tyrant. He chuckled, as if what she said had been a joke. But any trace of humor was gone again in the next moment, and a triumphant expression crept across his face, fully revealed at last.
"Hurt him? My dear girl, I have no intention of harming him. He is to be my second, as his great grandfather was before him. He is to become a new Vader."
Rey gasped aloud, the words different than those she carried in her memory and yet familiar in their significance. She'd heard a similar proclamation made over her son on Mustafar, voiced by the creature called the Eye of Webbish Bog. A proclamation that sent a deep dread sweeping through her.
"Given the right path…perhaps even Lord Vader reborn."
She had vowed that she would not walk the path leading to that end. She would not let the darkness take Col. But it seemed that in taking the wayfinder from that ancient altar, she had set both herself and her son on a course that led straight into the tangled net of Sidious' plot. Everything in her rebelled at the thought, rising in a helpless anger against the tyrant.
"No," she rasped.
"You lie," said Ben, his teeth bared in an outward expression of her inner emotion. "You want him as a vessel. A host. Just as you used Snoke."
"Plans change, my boy," Sidious said in a voice that was more like a growl, and he leaned forward, dark veins standing out against his pale skin, "and I have found something much, much better."
"What?" Rey asked weakly, somehow already knowing what Sidious was going to say even before she heard the words.
"You," the tyrant hissed. "Both of you. The life force of your bond. A dyad in the Force that has been prophesied for generations. And it has finally come. When I opened the doorway between you I merely wanted a strong vessel, but you have become something much more. You hold a power like life itself within you."
Rey watched the expression on Sidious' face go from simple greed to hunger. The gnarled fingers twitched on their metal rest, and Rey suddenly sensed the way the dark side was coiling around her. Around Ben. Terror as keen and cold as the blade of a knife sliced into her.
"A power like life itself," Sidious repeated in a musing sort of tone, another trickle of blood running down his chin from his cracked lips.
Rey traced its course with her eyes, unable to move or even to look away. She could feel Ben beside her; sensing a tension rising in him to tighten muscle and sharpen thought. Her own muscles stiffened as she realized what he was planning, and she reached out in the Force, stretching for the light side in preparation.
Ben surged up from the floor, arm swinging up and fingers spread as he gestured toward Sidious with an open palm. Rey saw his saber slide from the arm of the throne to soar through the air even as she turned and thrust out her own hand. The guard that had been standing several feet behind her crumpled beneath the blow she dealt him, her saber clear to be seen where it hung on his belt. With a flex of her fingers, she called her weapon to her, turning back toward Sidious as it snapped against her skin. Her saber burst to life as one with Ben's, the two blades blazing golden and blood red in the shadows.
She glanced at Ben for a split second, catching the faintest expression of surprise before it settled into determination once more. The double blades of her saber seemed to glow brighter as her own resolve grew, as if they were a reflection of the light that she carried within her. But the golden-white light seemed to enrage Sidious. His face contorted into a furious mask as he looked upon them and Rey sensed the Force tighten around her, even as the Sith lifted his decaying hands.
"Stand together, die together," he snarled.
As he spoke, Rey's saber ripped itself free from her hand, toppling end over end into the shadows. Her legs buckled beneath her, and she went to her knees on the stone, her arms pinned at her sides. A cry of pain and alarm left her, and she began to struggle against the invisible grip, straining to find Ben with her eyes again. She could hear the sharp edge of his breathing and feel the terrified pounding of his heart as if it were her own, but she couldn't turn to look at him. Her gaze had been locked on Sidious; his cold, unrelenting power holding her rigid.
"And now the power of two restores the one true Emperor."
The words were scarcely out of Sidious' mouth when Rey sensed the Force draw tight around her. Her body convulsed with a pain far deeper than any she had ever experienced. She lurched forward; something deep inside her tearing open and spilling out. Emptying her. She couldn't feel Ben anymore. She couldn't hear his thoughts or sense what he was feeling, and it was as if a part of her had been cut away. Something vital. His music had faded. Her heart beat alone in her chest once more.
She clenched her jaw against the agony of it, bracing herself against the current of the Force that was dragging at her. But she was eroding as sand beneath a wave. The power she held was draining out of her, slipping through her fingers like water to leave her empty and broken beneath Sidious' strength.
At her side, Ben let out a low moan, his voice rising above the rushing in Rey's ears. She longed to reach out to him. To ease the suffering. But they were both caught. Both to be a sacrifice to satisfy Sidious' hunger. And his power was carving deeper into her now, following the threads with which the bond had entangled her to draw out her very life. A numbness began to creep up her arms from her fingers, spreading over her chest towards her heart.
The grip on her grew stronger and, in one moment, the world went utterly silent. The last traces of music vanished from her mind. The sweet song of the light side vanished. Always, before, there had at least been its call. Now there was nothing. Not even the temptation of the dark side remained. Her world had diminished to include only what her body could tell her: sight, and smell, and touch. Her own voice joined Ben's, the agony of being severed from the Force a new and deeper kind of anguish.
And then, as abruptly as it had begun, it ended. Rey felt her body slump, but she could do nothing to prevent it. She slid sideways to the ground, cold and numb, and only half in the world. Breathing seemed all but impossible, each breath a short gasp that didn't satisfy her burning lungs, and an ache settled deep into her bones.
"Look what you have made."
Thousands of voices rose in response, the mingled tones rising and falling in a heavy rhythm. Rey could feel its reverberations in her chest, a shoddy replacement for the deeper hum of the Force. She couldn't hear Col's cries anymore, and she vaguely wondered if he were alright. Ben lay next to her, unmoving except for the shallow rise and fall of his chest as he too fought to stay conscious.
As Rey watched, his fingers curled against the stone and he sucked in a full breath, his back arching with the effort. Though he made no sound to betray it, she saw his pain in the lines of his face and the way he clenched his teeth as he rolled onto his side. His body twitched, and he began to drag himself across the empty space between them. She tried to reach out to him, desperate for the comfort of his touch, but her arm was numb and heavy as lead. She could do little more than lift her own fingers as his drew near.
They were almost touching when Sidious noticed them. There was no warning. As if on strings, Ben lurched into the air, arms stiff and frozen at his side, feet several meters from the cave floor. He hung there, Sidious' yellow eyes fixed on him, now unclouded and glowing with hatred.
"So weak," Sidious said. "Consumed by your fears, just like your grandfather. Like your uncle."
The tyrant's hand did not tremble where he held it raised before him. To Rey, time seemed to stretch in that moment, an eternity within a heartbeat. The world slowed, and all she could do was watch as Sidious' lip lifted in a sneer.
"And now as I fell, so falls the last Skywalker."
Sidious thrust his hand forward and an invisible blow sent Ben tumbling through the air. Rey fought to get to her feet. Tried to find her voice. But her body wouldn't obey her. The earth opened beneath Ben in a wide fissure, dark and jagged edged. He struck the stone with a sickening crunch and rolled for several meters, his momentum carrying him to the very brink of the chasm.
Rey held her breath, begging the Force to return to her so that she might reach out and stop him. But she could feel nothing. Not even the faintest stirring within her. And Ben continued to draw closer and closer to the edge. In desperation, Rey gathered what little strength remained to her and flung out her arm towards him. But it was no use. Exegol swallowed him whole, leaving no trace that he had ever been.
Ben was gone.