Ka'vec in the light of early morning, reminded Rey of when she kicked over a rock on Jakku. Once exposed to the sunlight, all the slimy grubs clinging to the bottom of the rock, squirmed and slithered away to bury themselves in the sand. In Ka'vec, the slimy grubs squinted in the sunlight and drew hoods down over their faces before hurrying from the last open doors in the night district to wherever they took cover in the daytime.
With their hoods and long cloaks, they blended in with the rabble- with the exception of Chewie. of course. He was dead set against clothing of any kind, and had reminded her earlier that his bowcaster afforded him far better protection than a cloak anyhow.
Master Luke walked as though he knew exactly where he was going, and perhaps he did. In all their travels together, Rey had never seen him lose his way. There must have been a time when he traveled a great deal, for he carried no maps with him.
As the streets emptied around them, they came to a square bordered on all sides with long ropes hung with the red and purple lanterns they had seen from afar. Their colors were dull when unlit. Master Luke glanced back over his shoulder and jerked his head slightly.
Understanding his wordless direction, Rey slowed her steps, allowing him to walk several paces ahead as they approached the building. The scarlet banner above the doorway marked it for a brothel. As Master Luke stooped to pass through the door, Rey veered left, with Chewie close behind. The two circled the outer wall until they reached the narrow alleyway behind the structure. Chewbacca exhaled a short growly sigh.
"It does stink," Rey agreed. "Nevermind that now, give me a boost up."
There was no back entrance to the building. A balcony jutted sharply out from the second floor, and with the wookiee's help, Rey was able to get hold of the balustrade and pull herself up. She ducked through the arched doorway, just as the first drops of stinging rain began to fall, and found herself in an empty bedroom.
But what a bedroom it was! Swathes of gauzy red fabric looped across the ceiling and ran down the walls to pool upon a floor which was covered in layers of Dwathene-woven rugs. She could barely take a step without having to kick aside a pillow, and thick clouds of incense created a haze which almost made her eyes water.
Master Luke's voice came from somewhere nearby. Though she couldn't make out the words, she recognized the tone- calm but firm. He hadn't found the girl yet then.
Rey crept toward the sound of his voice, shaking her head to clear away the feeling of sleepiness. There was something off about the incense, some sort of drug in it no doubt. She paused at the door, listening for her Master, but he had fallen silent.
There was another sound, faint but unmistakable. The whisper of silk against silk, the soft padding of stealthy footsteps-coming from behind her.
She whirled and reached for her lightsaber as the cold, sharp edge of a knife was pressed to her throat. A pair of dark eyes, heavily lined in black stared into hers.
"What are you doing here?' the woman hissed.
Rey swallowed hard, and tried to remember her training.
"You don't want to hurt me," she soothed.
"Oh, but I do! I should like nothing better!" the woman insisted, pressing the knife still harder against Rey's throat.
It was worth a try, but the woman obviously was not one of the weak-willed ones. Rey changed her tactic.
"I'm lost," she began.
"You're with that one downstairs, I'm not a fool! What do you want with me?" the woman demanded.
This woman was the one they'd been looking for! The only being who might know the secret behind the First Order's new weapon.
"There was a bounty hunter named Thracen Bitt, a tall man with a scar across his cheek. He was a client of yours-"
"I've had lots of men, I don't remember any like that."
"Your name is Amalia, isn't it? Amalia, and you're from Coruscant originally. We don't want any trouble. We're looking for information."
"What sort of information?" she asked. "I don't give anything away for free, you understand."
The pressure against Rey's throat significantly decreased. She was able to breathe freely again, though the clouds of incense were still heavy around them.
"Of course not. We can pay. My master has-"
"Your master?" the woman hissed and the blade pressed hard against her flesh once again. A trickle of something that was likely blood, ran down Rey's neck. "You're jedi, aren't you? I thought your kind was all gone. Your time is over now, little jedi, finished and done. The Republic has been destroyed, or haven't you heard?"
"I've heard," Rey agreed.
"We don't want your kind around here."
"Fine. We'll leave, after you tell us what you know about Dark Moon."
"Dark... Moon," she whispered, her jet-lined eyes widening. "The Dark Moon, eh? That information's worth more than my life to tell you- get out of here, and take your friend with you."
"Tell me about Dark Moon," Rey insisted, though her words were drowned in the sudden, jarring onset of clanging bells. First one bell, and then another and another until the whole city seemed to ring with a discordant cacophony of sound. Warning, the bells cried. Warning! Something comes!
Rey's captor swore. The knife fell away from her throat as the strange woman sheathed it, and stumbled backwards, her eyes large with fright.
"What- what is it? First Order?" Rey yelled over the ringing bells, but the room was already empty.
Master's Luke's voice cut through the loud, smoky space, and she responded mechanically, drawing her light saber and rushing out the door and down the stairs.
Three men had him surrounded in the tavern-like space, and were advancing on him as the other residents of the building, women of all shapes and species, hurried down the stairs and out the open door into the streets. From what Rey could see, it was chaos outside. The city had come to life. They normally reticent citizens of Ka'vec poured into the street carrying all manner of bags and household goods, all of them fleeing something unseen, stumbling and running through curtains of rain.
"Raiders!" Master Luke called out, answering her unasked questions.
Rey crouched into her a fighting stance.
"I can handle myself. Go after the girl!" Master Luke ordered.
Rey had no choice but to obey. Doubtless, he could handle himself, she holstered her weapon and raced through the open door into the street- immediately finding herself caught in a current of bodies, all rushing for the western gates of the city.
With the destruction of the both the New Republic, and the First order, raiders were once again a growing threat among the more lawless outer planets. She had seen the damage they could and did inflict on such settlements, entire towns looted and its citizens slaughtered. Clearly, the people of Ka'vec had seen such things or knew of them as well, for their fear was easy to feel.
Rey did not fight the current of bodies. Wherever they were headed, the girl she sought had certainly gone as well, and so she covered her head with her cloak, and squinted her eyes against the downpour. The skies had opened up while she was inside and now sheets of burning, acid-like rain poured down on the fleeing masses. The resulting storm clouds were so vast and dark that it seemed to be night. The only light came from open doorways, flickering torches, and the frequent cracks of lightening that raced across the sky, hastening the terrified crowds along.
Rey allowed the Force to guide her. Letting go of her own thoughts and feelings, ignoring even her own body as it was jostled from side to side, she reached out through the clamorous fog of emotions and memories to find the woman.
Outside the city... she was gone out the gates and onto the vast fields of mud which surrounded Ka'vec as far as the eye could see, and which, Rey now understood, hid a secret. Escape vessels, hundreds of them, were buried only inches beneath the mud, and the fleeing woman was already on her knees, digging with her hands.
It was too late for most of them. The raiders had landed, and now cut through the crowds like a shockwhip through flesh. They wore strange armor of a type that Rey didn't recognize. Strange metal helmets that looked like large, shallow bowls turned upside-down over the head. These were very effective in protecting the raiders from the burning rain. Expecting to be attacked from the side of town where enemy ships had been seen, the citizens had no idea that they were rushing right into a trap. As they poured through the city gates toward their escape vehicles, they were cut down mercilessly, by the long cruel blades of the raiders.
The masses around her had no idea that they were rushing directly into a trap. For a moment she forgot the woman- their only source of information on the First Order and their new weapon, and could feel only the fear and suffering of the people of Ka'vec. She had to help them. She would help them.
Rey drew her saber and ignited it. Those around her, backed away from the glow of her blade, creating a mostly clear path for her to the city gates.
Carnage awaited her there. As the lightening flashed in the sky, illuminating the field for a single instant, Rey saw bodies. Bodies strewn across the mud as far as the eye could see, and still the raiders were clearing the plain of those trying to flee, their blades flashing in the rain, whenever the lighting lit up the sky behind them, and with a jolt, Rey remembered the woman whom Master Luke had sent her after- the prostitute who had threatened her with a knife.
The woman was crouched among the bodies, digging desperately through the mud with her bare hands, and the raiders were near her, and coming closer. A wicked, curved sword lifted against the sky-
"NOOO!" Rey screamed, and charged.
Her hood fell back, exposing her face the rain. She swung, and dodged, and swung again, and her opponent collapsed among the bodies, but they had seen her now. The raiders converged on her, and now she was defending herself as they swung on her. Two opponents down, then three... and she started to think.. started to believe that she might fight through, that at the very least, she could hold out until Master Luke arrived, when all of a sudden, the ground under her feet seemed to slant, and the world went sideways, and every vein in her body seemed fulled of ice. Her head throbbed, and her chest burned.
She knew this feeling... knew what it meant. HE had come, and he was close, very near to her... too near, much too near. Rey was now the one who must escape. Master Luke would have felt his old student even before Rey. He surely knew who was approaching them. He would count on Rey to retreat back to the Falcon. She must not fight against Kylo Ren, not yet.
The group of raiders which previously closed her in, had almost cleared, though not by her own doing, most had gone off to fight some new threat, and she could hear the sounds of metal on metal, and men dying over the downpour. There was only one left now, and he swung with such speed and ferocity that Rey had a difficult time parying his rapid blows. She swung and stepped back, throwing out her hand to Force-push the pursing raider, but he did not react. There was no stumble to his step, and beneath his wide metal hood, it did not appear that he even flinched.
"Scavenger!"
Though not spoken aloud, that one word, called out in anger, caught her by surprise, causing her to stumble and thus trip over the body of a fallen raider. She landed in the mud, and rolled to the side just as the blade came down.
The raider was too fast. Rey had only narrowly avoided his blow when he raised his sword again. She glanced up, squinting against the burning, violent rain, a crack of lightening shot across the sky, illuminating the blade that would fall upon her, bringing her end. She was dead. At least she would die without a scream or a shout. She would not show fear. She was a jedi.
The sword came down... and stopped, as though the raider had frozen solid, and then, a beam of crackling red light erupted from his chest and the man crumpled around the protruding blade of Kylo Ren's lightsaber.
