Chapter Fourteen
Beacon of Hope
"We should be coming up on Coruscant soon," said Rose. "When we get there—"
She was cut off as the Phantom Hawk shook. The blue of hyperspace disappeared, replaced by a starry sky. Ahead of them was a long, angular gray cruiser. A cluster of four spherical gravity well projectors bulged out of the hull near its bridge.
A crisp but bored voice sounded over the comms. "This is the Final Order Star Destroyer Immobilizer. State your ship's name, registration, cargo, and destination."
"This is the Ripe Jogan, carrying droid parts to Coruscant," Rose said, thumbing the comms switch. "Transferring registration now."
Finn and Rose waited tensely for a reply. Finally, it came. "You may proceed out of the gravity well and return to hyperspace."
They both let out sighs of relief. Rose pushed forward on the sublight thrusters and flew past the Interdictor-class Star Destroyer.
"I didn't know they were blocking hyperlanes," Finn said.
"Neither did I," Rose admitted. "They must suspect there's an attack coming."
They were out of range of the gravity well. Rose threw back the lever, and her ship leapt back into the otherworldly blue cloudiness.
The Phantom Hawk dropped into realspace over Coruscant. Circles and grids of light traced across the surface of the darkened ecumenopolis. The ship steadily descended towards the Federal District, passing tall towers visible only by the illumination cast from windows and screens showing Final Order propaganda. The sprawl of the city stretched downwards from the skyscrapers to the underground levels below them, dense and alive, like the roots of a vast, world-encompassing tree.
Finn and Rose observed the nightscape through the cockpit viewport.
"So many people living underground," Finn commented, looking down at the lights visible in canyons and pits that plunged below street level.
Rose pulled a face. "Rich folks don't spend much time thinking about what they're standing on."
"I'm afraid all my knowledge of Coruscant is limited to the upper levels," C-3PO informed them.
R2-D2 beeped.
"Elitist?" asked See-Threepio indignantly. "Where do you even learn these words?"
Finn pointed at the dark shape of the Jedi Temple in the distance. "That's it. Drop Artoo and Threepio at street level."
The Phantom Hawk rose from the boulevard, leaving the two droids behind. It ascended to land atop an abandoned skyscraper. The metal plating had been stripped off the roof of the building, leaving only bare metal beams and girders.
The bay doors of the ship slid open. Rose and Finn carried a large case out of the opening, set it down, and opened it. They pulled out a grappling cannon and unfolded its tripod stand.
There were three loud thunk's as Rose used a handheld bolter to fasten the tripod into the metal of the roof. Finn clipped a sniper scope and a rangefinder onto the cannon's barrel and looked down the scope, aiming the crosshairs at the top of the Jedi Temple's central spire. The rangefinder informed him that the Tranquility Spire was almost a half-kilometer away.
Rose asked, "Ready?"
"I don't know," Finn said, looking at her. "I've got a bad feeling about this."
"Well, no sense worrying about it."
Finn frowned and turned back to the grappling gun, adjusting for the distance and slight breeze. He took a shallow breath, held it, and squeezed the trigger. There was a muffled boom as a small explosive charge propelled a grappling hook out the barrel and across the expanse, a thin metal wire trailing after it.
Finn pressed a button on the side of the cannon. A motor whirred as it pulled back the wire, then stopped as its sensors detected that the cord had pulled taut. Finn gave the wire an extra tug just to make certain the grapnel had stuck firmly in place.
Rose attached a pair of harnesses to the cable. "You don't have a fear of heights, do you?"
"It's not the height I'm afraid of, it's hitting the ground."
"So you'll be fine if we don't fall," Rose said brightly as she buckled herself into a harness and stepped off the edge of the roof into empty air.
They zip-lined towards the temple. Finn told himself not to look down, but did anyway and instantly regretted it. They were whizzing along hundreds of meters above the ground. He forced his head up and looked past Rose to the Temple Spire, which now appeared to be rushing towards them at an alarming rate.
Rose and Finn crashed through a shattered round window. They unbuckled themselves and took stock of their surroundings.
They were standing on a roughly hexagonal platform, just behind a large black throne listing unsteadily to its left. A few meters to either side, there was no floor, revealing a drop into apparently bottomless darkness. Before the throne, a few low steps fell down to a walkway which descended, by way of more steps, into a larger space before ending in a turbolift. The floor of the larger area before them curved upwards, like the bottom of a canal. Stubby black pillars, each with six boxy embellishments sticking out from the top like ugly mechanical flower petals, lined the platform and the walkway. The grapnel had stuck into the nearest column on the throne's right.
Finn spoke into his comlink. "Artoo, you have that message ready?"
R2-D2 beeped an affirmative as he led C-3PO up Processional Way towards the Jedi Temple. They walked past several large yellow machines parked on the broad boulevard, then climbed the stairs to the base of the temple.
See-Threepio surveyed the ziggurat's crumbling masonry and the work tools strewn around in disarray before the once-grand entryway. He exclaimed, "Why, this looks more like a construction zone than a temple!"
Artoo-Detoo chirped and whistled.
"An excavation site? And those machines were mining vehicles? How odd. Why would someone dig a mine under a temple?"
R2 beeped that he lacked sufficient data to answer. He continued onwards through arched gateways into the interior of the structure, navigating by way of blueprints he had acquired long ago.
Rose and Finn were engaged in an in-depth examination of the chamber, sliding their fingers across the smooth walls and floor.
"Why is there a throne in here?" Finn asked.
"This wasn't just the Jedi Temple. After the Jedi were all but wiped out at the end of the Clone Wars, Emperor Palpatine turned it into his palace. Seems kind of petty to me." She looked at Finn. "I guess they didn't teach you much galactic history in the First Order."
"Nope," he answered. "Just fighting, physical fitness, and operating military equipment. I also got some sanitation training. Oh, and lots of Bantha fodder about how great the First Order is."
Rose sniffed. Then a horrible thought struck her. What if Palpatine had removed the beacon? Their whole mission might fail because of a long-dead Sith Lord's renovation project.
Rose pressed her ear against the curved wall and tapped it. It rang hollowly. She took a fusioncutter from her tool belt, pulled her goggles down over her eyes, and sliced into the metal. Finn turned to watch her.
After a few minutes, Rose had cut a deep groove around a rectangular area of the wall. She threw her weight against it. The panel broke away from the metal around it, crashing inwards. Rose barely managed to avoid falling with it, grabbing hold of the hole's edge. She shone a flashlight into the darkness. Around a meter inside was another wall. Rose stepped into the small space.
"This must be the original wall of this room," said Rose. She scanned her light across it, then stopped as it lit upon a triangle-shaped socket. "Aha! There's a hole in the wall."
Rose came back out and set to work on cutting open the opposite wall. When she was done, Finn climbed through the hole.
"Found one," Finn said, as he saw an identical slot. He pulled a cloth-wrapped bundle out of his satchel and unfolded it to reveal the pair of Kyber crystals Rey had entrusted to him. He threw one to Rose.
"No!" cried Rose as she caught it. "Very rare, five-thousand year old Kyber crystal here! You hand it to me."
"Sorry," said Finn sheepishly.
They went back into the dark crannies. "Ready?" Finn called. "Three, two…".
There was a loud click as they inserted their crystals into the sockets. The spire rumbled, then there came an awful grinding noise. Rose snatched her crystal out of its slot.
"Of course! The floor isn't original either." Her eyes gleamed. "It'll have to go." She bent down with her trusty cutting torch once more.
Soon, they had pulled up a large portion of the walkway to reveal polished stone decorated with elaborate patterns of dark and light brown.
Rose wiped sweat off her brow. "Whew, I didn't think I would be doing this much heavy lifting tonight. Let's hope this beacon is worth it."
"Yeah," agreed Finn. They placed their crystals into the slots once more. This time, a round section of the exposed floor slid away and a huge copper machine rose up out of it. A complex network of metal tubes and wires surrounded a translucent central conducting chamber humming with power.
Then it shorted out, sparks flying. The machine went dark.
"Can't it be easy?" Rose asked with a long-suffering air. "Just one time?"
R2-D2 led C-3PO through a crumbling wall into a grand hall several floors below ground level. Mounted on a pedestal in the center of the room was a massive white Kyber crystal, as tall as a human: one of the few objects the Jedi had acquired that Emperor Palpatine had not removed. Above was a high, vaulted ceiling with a small hole in the center, leading up into the Temple Spire. The sparse, echoey quality of the chamber lent it a cathedral-like atmosphere. It made Threepio, and even the usually prosaic Artoo, feel rather small and insignificant.
Sparks flew as Rose lay under the beacon, welding a broken conducting tube into place.
"Will this old thing work with modern droids?" Finn wondered.
Rose didn't look away from her work. "You're asking me about the mechanics of a Force-powered antenna."
"Out of your realm of expertise?"
"Out of anyone's realm of expertise." She snapped a panel shut and shimmied out from under the machine. She studied it, then flipped a large, rusty, and important-looking lever.
Nothing happened.
Finn began, "So is there like an 'on' button, or—"
The apparatus thrummed. A crackle of electricity lit up the conducting chamber, then settled into a steady, bright white glow.
Rose glanced at Finn. "Listen, if this goes sideways—I just want to say…"
"Say what?" There was an uncharacteristic catch in her voice that made him look up at her.
"I—I love you."
"Yeah." Finn squeezed her hand. "I love you too."
The beacon shot a thin column of light down the spire and into the Kyber crystal below.
C-3PO lurched as the ground vibrated. The huge crystal glowed as it was activated, magnifying the energy it had been exposed to by a thousand-fold before shooting it back upwards.
R2-D2 bravely wheeled up to the beam and projected a holographic message directly into it. The light began to pulse, transmitting the stream of data.
Finn and Rose watched in awe as the machine before them focused and aimed the beam, sending it streaming away into the sky.
The poor and downtrodden of Coruscant looked up at the beacon, their faces warmed by its light. Dade climbed atop a crumbling roof to get a better look, smiling hopefully.
The blazing beam of light left the planet and tore through sub-hyperspace, leaving a white streak across the skies of worlds throughout the galaxy.
On Agora Six, hills rose above a dense green layer of palm trees. Atop one of the mounds sat a thousand-year-old receiver station, built in the days of the Old Republic. A beam of brilliant light speared down from the cloudless sky and touched the dish atop the building.
Within the station, an ancient copper machine absorbed the light. Its gears spun and whirled as monitors came to life, displaying Aurebesh text.
An aged monk of the Dai Bendu, his white beard reaching to his waist, rose out of his meditative position. He shuffled to the window and looked up, astounded at the light pouring down from the sky. He had tended to this apparatus almost all his life, as his predecessors had before him, and theirs before them, going back generations; yet he had never thought he would see it in use. He murmured a quiet prayer to the Force.
Lights blinked and flashed on the timeworn console of the contraption as it decoded the datastream and converted it back into an image: Connix, in a plain white shirt decorated only by her new rank badge.
Peasants bustled about a small market. Suddenly, a man cried out and pointed at the light hitting the hilltop receiver in the distance. The others followed his outstretched finger with their gaze.
Suddenly, a nearby R4 astromech droid beeped wildly and projected the hologram of Connix.
"This is General Kaydel Ko Connix of the Resistance,"said the image. "The time has come to forge a path to freedom. The forces of oppression have ruled our galaxy for too long."
The receiver reflected the beam of light, angling it away on a different trajectory into the sky. It connected to Trask, a water-covered moon of the huge gas planet Kol Iben.
A crew of Quarren workers in a dockside shipyard looked up as the light hit a receiver perched on a cliff overlooking the ocean. Every droid nearby simultaneously projected the message.
Connix disappeared, replaced by an old recording of Leia at an assembly of the New Republic Senate, her intelligent brown eyes focused on an unseen speaker. Connix's voice continued to speak. "For the last few years, I have served under General Leia Organa, founder of the Resistance."
The Mon Calamari patrons of a floating eatery paused to listen to the hologram emanating from several droid servers.
"She devoted her life to the cause of freedom. She is now gone, but her spirit lives on in her followers."
A nomadic village of straw huts floated freely on the waters of the planet Gria. Light touched a man-made stone tower on the horizon, then split in two and soared away in different directions. Amphibious villagers watched, wide-eyed, as an outdated machine in their town's center projected a still image of a young man dressed in black.
"Jedi Master Luke Skywalker brought about the death of Emperor Palpatine, freeing the galaxy from his rule. On Crait, he faced down the might of the First Order all alone, giving his life so that freedom's spark would not be extinguished."
Furry, long-snouted Bothans looked up as every screen in Drev'starn, capitol city of Bothawui, displayed Rey's face.
"He also trained Rey, the last Jedi. She still fights for the Resistance, seeking to restore peace and justice."
Bossk was draped regally over the throne of his pleasure palace in the sun-scorched plains of Trandosha, basking in the radiant heat that emanated through his skylight. His eyes flicked at his servant droid, which had disturbed his repose by inexplicably bursting forth with some bit of Resistance propaganda.
"These heroes have done much, but they, and the rest of the Resistance, cannot succeed alone. We must join together and fight. Send your fastest ships. All your warriors."
Bossk looked out an arched window at the light connecting to a jagged spire of red rock in the distance. He hissed at the disturbance. Then a shadow fell over him. He looked up to see a Star Destroyer blocking out the sun. Bossk slowly clenched his clawed hand into a fist.
"Our voices will not be silenced. We can no longer live in the shadow of tyranny. We must step into the light."
The twin suns of Tatooine set behind a brother and sister standing at the base of a moisture vaporator. They watched raptly as their R6 unit played the hologram.
"Together, we can make a wind like the galaxy has never before seen. A wind that will topple the Final Order. A wind to shake the stars."
Poe Dameron watched as the beam traveled from system to system, planet to planet, forming a glowing web of light in the night sky. Connix stood next to him, aware that her voice was being heard across the galaxy. Dozens of other Resistance fighters—troopers, pilots, technicians, mechanics, officers, grunts—joined them in silent vigil, their eyes reflecting the light of a new hope.
Finn and Rose watched as the light soared into the darkness. Over the thrum of energy, Finn heard a more ominous sound: the roar of engines. He turned to Rose. "Go. Go."
They ran for the broken window. Finn pulled Rose to the ground as green laser fire flashed towards them. There was a thunderous crash. Stone fell from the ceiling.
Rose and Finn climbed from the rubble, coughing on dust.
"You okay?" Rose gasped.
A trio of TIE Fighters screamed by the tower, then looped around to make another pass.
"Come on!" yelled Finn. He clipped onto the wire. Rose grabbed on behind him. They whizzed away from the spire as its pinnacle exploded in a fireball.
R2-D2 and C-3PO hurried out of the temple, a cloud of dust billowing out behind them. The TIE Fighters pursued Finn and Rose, blasting away. Rose drew her own gun and returned fire. One of her shots penetrated the windscreen of a TIE, hitting the pilot. The starfighter spun out and crashed into a high-rise.
The Tranquility Spire collapsed behind them. The zip-line jerked and snapped. Rose screamed as she fell away, disappearing into the darkness.
"Rose!" Finn shouted as he clung desperately to the line. He swung into an open floor of the unfinished skyscraper.
Finn struggled to unhook himself from the line as the TIE Fighters hovered around the skeletal structure, firing into it. Blasts punched holes in the plascrete floor and ricocheted off of durasteel girders. Finn finally pulled himself loose and ran. A lance of green light almost hit him just as he slid into a half-finished stairwell.
The Resistance watched as the light streaming from Coruscant disappeared, the fire of revolution extinguished. The front of the beam continued to propagate, however, the network shifting and stretching.
Hux had been in the midst of calling his personal speeder to return to his suite when the Capitol control centre had exploded into activity. Now, screens and holographic displays around the room showed security footage of a ziggurat labeled Imperial Palace, the status of the TIE Fighters responding to the disturbance, and recordings of the beacon's light stretching upwards.
"Supreme Leader," said Hux into the holocomm. "The Resistance attempted to subvert the communications blockade."
The pitted face seemed amused. "I am aware."
"Our TIE Fighters destroyed the transmitter, but not before their propaganda was disseminated to a number of systems. Such treachery cannot stand. We must respond swiftly."
Snoke regarded him coldly. "Let them all come. It will save us the trouble of hunting down any disloyal elements."
Hux insisted, "Surely an early demonstration of Base Delta Omega would—" He stopped talking as he felt a tightness around his windpipe.
"You have served me well of late, General," said Snoke, "but do not forget who rules the Final Order."
Hux said, his voice strained, "Of course—not…Supreme Leader."
Snoke's face disappeared. Hux fell heavily into his chair, surreptitiously massaging his neck.
Finn snuck out of the skyscraper, disoriented, blood trickling from cuts on his forehead and hands. Voices echoed around him as flashlight beams played across the side of the superstructure, searching for him. A three-legged UA-TT walker approached, scanning the darkness with a floodlight mounted on the side of its crew compartment.
Finn ducked into a shadowy alleyway. A lone Stormtrooper noticed the movement and entered it cautiously, sweeping a blaster-mounted light across the tunnel.
Finn rose from behind a pile of scrap metal and shoved a shock prod into the back of the soldier's neck. The Stormtrooper collapsed. Finn confiscated the blaster and covered the trooper.
"Look at me," Finn said.
The Stormtrooper moaned, half-conscious.
Finn motioned with the blaster. "Take off your helmet."
The trooper pulled it off. She was a dark-skinned woman with hair that would be curly if it weren't cropped so close to her scalp. Her eyes were scared, vulnerable; disillusioned, even.
"What do you remember? How far back?"
The Stormtrooper looked confused. "Huh?"
"Do you remember when you were taken?" asked Finn. "Remember your parents?"
"I—" she hesitated. "I don't know."
Finn replied, "Yeah, you do. You remember everything. Conditioning camp. Blind fires."
"It was t-training."
"That's what they tell you." Finn stepped forward, some of the light reflecting into his face. He pulled the helmet from her grasp and regarded its ugly, skull-like visage.
"You're him. The traitor," the trooper said. "They tried to suppress it, but we still heard your story."
"That's right. We're siblings. All of us." He tossed the helmet away. "Give me your comlink."
The trooper unclipped the black-and-white cylinder from her belt and handed it over.
Finn continued, "It's not what they said it would be, is it? The things we're ordered to do. They're not right."
The Stormtrooper took in what Finn had said. Her structures of belief, the lies she repeated to herself for fear of what would happen if she didn't, had been torn open and were now breaking apart. Soon, they would no longer hold her life together. The prospect scared her.
Finn saw the fear in her eyes. "What's your name?" he asked gently.
"JN-1719."
"Not that," said Finn. "You had a name once. A real one. Do you remember it?"
She shook her head no.
"Get a name. That's the first step." Finn tucked the short-barreled rifle into his belt and kicked open a sewer grate.
"Then what?"
Finn turned back to face her. "Find something worth fighting for." Then he dropped into the dark sewer and was gone.
JN-1719 stared at the hole in the ground for a moment and then walked away into the night.
R2-D2 and C-3PO had wandered away from the heart of the Federal District and into inhabited areas. They passed homeless city-dwellers huddled near fires burning in oil drums. Most didn't look up, but others cast covetous looks at them.
The astromech droid whistled something.
"What do you mean I stand out?" asked C-3PO.
R2 beeped.
C-3PO retorted, "Gold is not ostentatious. Leave the vocabulary to me, you glorified mechanic."
A Vobati vagabond, covered head to toe in a brown suit with a mesh screen obscuring his face, stepped in front of Threepio. Several other beings of various species appeared from behind him, rubbing the protocol droid's shiny metal plating.
"Excuse me!" C-3PO exclaimed, shocked. "Oh my. We've only just met!"
A strobe light blinded the ragged group. "Get away from that droid!" ordered the voice of a Stormtrooper.
They scattered. The light shut off, revealing that both it and the audio recording came from R2-D2.
"Thank goodness," said See-Threepio. "Don't ever leave me again."
Artoo chirped.
"Yes, finding some sort of shelter is a good idea indeed!"
Commander Sellik approached Chancellor Hux. "We recovered the spies' ship, but one of them got away. One of our TIE Fighters was destroyed."
"I've seen the report, Commander," Hux snapped. He knew the officer didn't deserve his venom, but he wasn't in a charitable mood. "Is that all?"
"No, General. We found one of the Resistance agents hanging from a cable snagged on an aerial. We've taken the prisoner to Interrogation Six."
Rose gradually awoke. Her hands and feet were strapped to a rack, holding her almost vertical, but tilted back a bit. Thirty degrees, maybe? She should have been able to tell—the room was brightly lit, with clean lines, and Rose was good at judging spatial relationships—but everything seemed to swim in and out when she tried to focus.
She struggled a bit, but the metal around her wrists and ankles was tight, and a wave of tiredness washed over her. She closed her eyes and slipped away for a while.
When Rose woke up again, Chancellor Armitage Hux was standing before her, another officer and a pair of Stormtroopers behind him.
Hux asked, "Are you comfortable?"
"Yeah, I have one of these at home." She attempted a defiant sneer, but her mouth was dry and the words came out in a rasp.
"You changed the stolen Destroyer's signature codes so we couldn't trace it," Hux stated. "Give me the new codes."
Rose had recovered her voice. "You know, they told me to pick something easy to remember, like Life Day, but…"
"You think this is funny. Very well." Hux held out his hand. He shut his eyes, a look of intense concentration creasing his face.
"Are you trying to use the Force on me?"
"Be quiet," ordered Hux.
Rose tried to hold in a laugh. "Oh no, see…you're not special. I mean, at all."
"Shut up!" Hux yelled furiously. He took a deep breath, attempting to calm himself. "We have other ways to extract information." He turned to the blue-uniformed officer standing just to one side of him. "Bring in the interrogation equipment."
"Is that strictly necessary, sir?" asked the officer in a low, quiet voice. Rose noticed distractedly that he had very aggressive sideburns that stretched down to his chin. "They've probably changed those codes a half-dozen times by now."
Hux's eyes narrowed. "Are you growing soft, Sellik? Someone with your impeccable record of service ought to know we must give no quarter to these filth. If there is even a chance of extracting useful information from her, we must take it."
"Of course, sir," Sellik said, politely agreeing with his superior. "I merely meant that such a mean duty as this may perhaps be left to someone less important than yourself."
Chancellor Hux didn't respond, instead motioning to one of the Stormtroopers. The trooper opened a blast door to reveal an electric torture device, bristling with electroshock arms and thin needles.
Rose braced for a more painful kind of defiance.