Chapter 1: Two Years Earlier
Finn jerked back into consciousness sharply, his range of motion almost immediately stilted by something holding him down. Shifting his eyes, he saw the seatbelt around his middle. He was still strapped in his chair onboard the TIE...
Except where was the TIE? The gathering of his bearings told Finn that he was lying flat on his back in open air, the glare of the sun having nearly blinded him from looking directly at it, when he snapped awake.
The simple seat was separated from anything at all, in fact, as - unclipping the buckle free - Finn rolled easily onto open sand, landing on his stomach.
That final blast... it had taken out a wing... but had it also caused the entire TIE to break apart, ejecting Finn out into space like a carnival ride gone haywire, only for him to pulled into Jakku's atmosphere?
Breathing hard, panting, Finn struggled to his feet. His white-plated armor was heavy, weighed him down, and made him feel like he was baking within an oven, in this heat.
There was nothing. No landmarks as far as the eye could see.
Glancing to his left, he spotted what appeared to be a slice of wing from the TIE fighter about ten steps off; it must have fallen with him in his little ejector seat. That seat had saved his life, probably in a one-and-a-billionth chance, but Finn did not dwell on this for long.
He glanced to his right, and his heart dropped when he saw a grey plume of smoke rising in the slight distance. It was coming from just over the next dune, and he ran for it as fast as his armor would allow, his brow weeping with sweat in protest.
Finn crested over the hill. And there it was, all right. Almost all of the rest of the TIE fighter, in a debris field about a quarter of a mile wide.
"POE! POE!" Finn yelled as he made the final push to the wreckage.
The front of the ship was still in flames slightly, but that didn't stop Finn from diving for the circular window and peering desperately through the grimy panes. No answer came from within, and his hand jerked back from the boiling metal, bringing a swath of fabric with it.
Poe's jacket... all he could find of his newfound friend was his jacket... Finn clutched it in his fist, continuing to call Poe Dameron's name.
Suddenly, there was a rumble from the earth, followed by a screech of metal, as Finn felt the sand shifting under his feet. Staggering back, he moved clear of the wreckage, only able to watch helplessly as the sandy earth dragged the ship down into its depths with open arms.
"POE!" Pockets of dust sprang up as the TIE submerged, bits of it crushed as it was swallowed whole. Finn stared, gaping, and he fought the urge to cry - something he hadn't done in a long time. If Poe had still been trapped in there, he could only hope, for mercy's sake, that the pilot had been extinguished long before drowning in a quicksand sinkhole. Death... too much death...
KABOOM! There was a final mighty explosion as a giant plume of dust exulted into the air, signaling the final crushing of the TIE fighter down below. Finn jumped, yelping, his fist tightening around the jacket.
He walked for what seemed like hours after that, shedding plates and bits and pieces of his white armor as he went, until he was in nothing but a black shirt. Even then, the choice of undershirt did nothing to help, as the black fabric greedily absorbed the heat from the Jakku sun's unrelenting rays. More than once, he thought about donning Poe's jacket, but the brutal perspiration made him refrain. The coat did help shade his head, however, and guarded him against the wind as he hoisted it above his head long past the muscles in his arms growing tired. He was wandering aimlessly, with absolutely no sense of direction and nothing to point his way.
He wandered past what looked like a vaporator, planted like a buoy in this sea of sand - his only landmark aside from the TIE wreckage for miles. The sun raced across the sky into afternoon, and still Finn walked, over dune after endless dune. Finally, cresting over a particular imposing dune, Finn spotted what looked like a civilization - a village - in the windswept valley below. An outpost!
Finn couldn't get down to the place fast enough, wandering into the midst of a market. He was wearing the jacket now, not caring how much more it would make him sweat. He was stumbling about, his parched throat barely able to form the word, "Water!" Most of the creatures inhabiting this dive brushed him off, and he started to grow desperate.
Leaning against a post, Finn was ready to sink into the sands and give in when, presently, he heard what sounded like a splash. Whirling about, he spied a happabore slurping from a trough, his girth taking up nearly half the circumference of the pool.
It was likely grey, dirty water, but at that point, Finn didn't very much care. He sprinted for the trough, supping two gulps greedily from his palms. Dehydrated through he was, he regretted it instantly, fighting to swallow it down. Rationalizing that it was an acquired taste, he immediately dove back in and continued to drink his fill.
The happabore's snout finally nudged Finn away, and he fell back, only to hear the sounds of cries and scuffling from a short ways away. Glancing to his right, he spotted a young girl - about his age - trying to fight back against two hooded bullies.
His Stormtrooper conditioning compelling him to help, Finn got to his feet and jogged towards the scuffle. "HEY!" He was almost there when -
Wielding a staff, the girl kicked one of the dark bullies away, only for the other to grab her from behind. Kicking and flailing, she twisted out of the grasp, turned and beat her last assailant twice over the head until he collapsed.
Seeing the display, Finn pulled up short, staring in amazement. A lowly BLOOP could be heard, and the girl turned back to a little sphere shrouded by a rucksack. She set him free, and Finn almost sheepishly glanced about, once again rudderless. Well. She certainly didn't need any help.
Glancing back to the girl, Finn found himself peering closer at the orange-and-white sphere. A droid... hadn't Poe Dameron insisted on going back to Jakku over a droid...? Was it... a BB unit...? Finn only had a cursory knowledge of droids, their makes and models, but there seemed to be something special about this one...
And also his human companion, who Finn now noticed was glancing between the droid and... him. She had spotted him, even as he drew closer. The droid was still chittering.
"Him?" the girl rose to her feet, staring Finn down. Her face twisting into a snarl, she charged. It wasn't until she was nearly on top of him that Finn finally decided to almost comically make a hasty exodus, weaving through the market. He took a zigzag pattern, and he was almost certain that he had lost her when -
THWACK! Her staff slapped across his face, stinging a path down to his shoulder, and he spilled backward into the sand. The girl pointed the end of her staff nearly into his nose, her deep, brown eyes accusatory and feral.
"What's your hurry, thief?" Her voice, accented, was almost dripping with poison.
Finn squinted, nursing his injured shoulder.
"What? Thief?"
The little balled droid rolled up beside him, and proceeded to whip out a prickly appendage from its body and shock him without further ado.
"OW!" Finn hollowed. "Hey! What?"
"The jacket! This droid says you stole it!" the girl made clear, hard-edged.
Finn glared at her. "I've had a pretty messed up day, all right, so I'd appreciate it if you'd stop accusing me of - YOW!" The droid precociously tazed him again. "Stop it!"
"Where'd you get it?" the girl demanded. "It belongs to his master!"
And then it all fell into place. This droid... the jacket... Poe Dameron...
Finn let his head fall back with a sigh. "It belonged to Poe Dameron - that was his name, right?"
The droid's cylindrical head swiveled between the girl and Finn.
"He was captured, by the First Order. I helped him escape, but our ship crashed." He glanced back to the droid, his eyes growing sad. "Poe didn't make it." The droid's head drooped. "I tried to help him, I'm sorry." The little ball could not be comforted, sadly rolling away.
In the midst of all this, the girl's eyes had softened. Her glare had eased into staring at Finn warily, and for the first time, he got a good look at her.
She was quite striking, even pretty, her chestnut tresses pulled up into three buns. Her eyes were soothing pools of brown. Her skin was unblemished alabaster, a high forehead and full rosy lips adding to her beauty.
Lips that now moved to form words, and once she got the aggressive timbre out of her voice, her dulcet tone was actually quite lovely - so lovely that Finn barely took in her curious question:
"So you're with the Resistance?"
Finn stared at her stupidly for a second, registering how her eyes seemed fixated on him with an expression resembling hope. And something else - a deep, almost visceral recognition. I know you. I know you. I don't know who you are, but I still know you.
"Obviously." And Finn stood, straightening himself so that he was keenly conscious of his posture. He even puffed out his chest a little, trying to appear more impressive even as he lied through his teeth. "Yes, I am. I'm with the Resistance, yeah. I am with the Resistance." The confident tone he projected fell flat on his own ears, grating on his almost dopey response. In either case, the girl didn't appear to notice.
She was now peering at him with unabashed admiration, her lips turned up into a soft smile. Finn rather liked her smile. It was youthful and pure - a beacon in this harsh wasteland. "I've never met a Resistance fighter before," she almost bubbled. The warmth of her gaze made Finn grow hot in a way that had nothing to do with the elements.
"Oh, this is what we look like." Then, remembering that he said this even as he wore a jacket taken off a dead man, he lamely amended, "Some... some of us look different."
Rey glanced back in the direction of the little droid, her smile reminiscent of the way a mother would take in her child. The excitement poured from her voice. "BB8 says he's on a secret mission. He has to get back to your base!"
Finn huffed. "Apparently he has a map that leads to Luke Skywalker and everyone's after it..."
The girl stilled, glancing back to him with awe in her face. "Luke Skywalker?" she whispered the name like a prayer. "I thought he was a myth!"
BB8 suddenly rolled into view, chittering frantically. Finn had no clue what he was saying, but thankfully, the girl seemed to be able to translate him.
"What?" She ran out from under the shade of the market stall and Finn followed her. About a hundred yards away, two Stormtroopers were talking to two black figures. The black figures looked like the same bullies the girl had beaten up.
And they were now pointing the Stormtroopers in their direction.
The troopers charged, raising their blasters. The panic rose in Finn's chest, and almost by instinct, he seized the girl's hand.
"What are you doing?" she gawked.
"Come on!" And Finn continued to drag her along by the hand, the girl keeping pace with his long strides on her spindly legs. "Come on, BB8!"
Red blaster fire pinged around their heads.
"Let go of me!" the girl yelped.
"Come on! We've gotta move..."
"I know how to run without you holding my hand..." she growled through gritted teeth, yanking out of his grasp. "BB8, stay close!" she cast over her shoulder. "This way!"
The pair ducked into an empty stall, the girl breathing hard.
"They're shooting at both of us..."
"Yeah, they saw you with me," Finn rambled. "You're marked."
"Well, thanks for that," the girl huffed.
"Hey: I'm not the one who chased you down with a stick!" He pawed around the tabletops. "Doesn't anyone have glasses around here?!"
The girl was now kneeling beside BB8 with loving concern. "Are you OK?"
His answering BLOOP was now shushed by Finn, who raced close, the little group's breathing stilling as they heard a prolonged whine from above. Finn knew that whine... and knew what it meant.
"Stop. Taking. my hand!" the girl growled. Finn just dragged her out of the stall anyway and bolted for a place to jump clear.
And in the nick of time, too, for just then, a TIE swooped in overhead and with several shots of green lasers, exploded the stall they had just been in. The blast flung the pair forward face-first into the sand.
Rey was the first to recover, her eyes tracking with bewilderment as the two TIEs banked to come back around. Glancing behind her, she spotted Finn lying flat on his back in the sand.
All at once, an inexplicable terror, deeper than any she had ever felt before, came over her heart and she frantically crawled over to him. "Hey..." She shook him, and the fear transformed into a powerful wave of relief as he slowly sat up. Finn's eyes snapped immediately to hers, his concern apparent.
"Are you OK?"
She studied him, almost puzzled. While extraneous, she had to admit - his concern for her was also chivalrous and kind of sweet. In any event, no one had ever made it their business to ask after her wellbeing.
"Yeah."
This time, it was she who held out her hand, and he grasped it, allowing her to pull him to his feet. "Follow me."
Fiery explosions and giant clouds of dust roared behind and around them as the two now fled from the outpost, making a break for some parked ships across the sands.
"We can't outrun them!" Finn wailed.
"We might - in that quad jumper!" she yelled.
"Hey - we need a pilot!"
"We've got one!"
Another explosion landed too close for comfort and Finn jerked sharply. "You?" he practically squeaked. Spying a freighter off to their right, he pointed. "What about that ship?"
The girl followed his gaze, and her expression collapsed in disdain. "That one's garbage!"
They were maybe 10 yards from the quad jumper when the TIEs thoughtfully decided to blow it up sky high, cutting them off. The girl shielded her eyes against the explosion.
"The garbage will do!" she squeaked, and she and Finn banked right, windmilling desperately towards the YT Coreillian freighter.
They reached the gangplank - already lowered - just ahead of another dust flare-up behind them, and raced aboard, BB8 rolling after them at a pace that would have looked almost leisurely if not for his frantic beeping.
"Gunner position's down there!" the girl burst into the hold, pointing to her left as she sprinted down the corridor at her right towards the cockpit. Finn had little choice but to follow her lead and clamber down a ladder into a turret gunner's port.
"You ever fly this thing?" he bellowed as he descended.
"No! This ship hasn't flown in years!" her voice echoed back to him.
Finn's heart sank. They were going to die. Two friends made twice in one day, only to be thrown into a life-or-death situation with them. No lucky ejector seat was going to help him survive this time. Yup. They were going to die.
Finn climbed into the gunner's seat. He flicked a switch and the seat actually swiveled sharply enough to startle him. The seat was an extension of the turret guns outside.
"I can do this... I can do this..."
Above him, the girl unknowingly echoed him. "I can do this... I can do this..."
The blue thrusters glowed as the ship roared to life, lifting off too tentatively after being grounded for so many years. A tarp slipped off the hood as it rose, then dipped to grind its stakes along the earth before jolting into a power converter below as the girl banked the ship slightly left. The power of the collision nearly jolted both young people out of their seats and the girl yelped.
The freighter then tilted on its side, dragging along the sand once more before finally deciding to lift off for good, destroying the entrance to Niima Outpost in the process. The girl was jostled again, as the Millennium Falcon finally took to the skies.
It blasted for the atmosphere. "Hey, hey, stay low, stay low!" Finn called up, sliding a headset over his ears.
"What?"
"Stay low! It confuses their tracking!" Finn gripped the handles of the turret guns tightly and willed himself to focus.
"BB8! Hold on!" The girl called out. "I'm going low!"
The Falcon plummeted into a dizzying dive, swooping tight over the dunes, and making a charge run at and past the firing TIEs. They screamed into a sharp turn, following the freighter and landing a hit that bounced Finn in his seat.
"What are you doing back there?" the girl shrieked from above. Her ire at his impotence doused Finn like a cold bath and he scrambled to be of some use. They had only just met, but already he knew he never wanted to feel her displeasure, the sensation roiling his stomach. "Are you ever gonna fire back?"
"I'm working on it! Are the shield's up?"
"Not so easy without a co-pilot!" her voice sounded strained.
"Try sitting in this thing," Finn mumbled.
They careened through the desert, the shields coming up at last and allowing Finn to lock in on the TIE's signal. Their green lasers matched his red, and the Falcon narrowly dodged another barrage.
"We need cover!" he called.
"We're about to get some!" the girl assured. "I hope..."
The Falcon shrieked towards a downed Star Destroyer, its exhaust pipes wide and gaping, the size of craters. The girl skidded the ship along the sand slightly through a steep turn and pelted for the ruins. All the while, red and green lasers pinged back and forth between each other as the TIEs refused to be shaken. Right before the anticipated cover, the TIEs got in a lucky hit, and smoke plumed from the roof as some important system gave. Finn cursed.
"Damn it."
The girl feinted, yanking hard to the left and out of a collision with a downed ship wall at the last second, fooling one TIE into crashing, but still tailed by the other.
"Come on," Finn growled. "Come on!" He pulsed out another barrage, and hit the other TIE right in its wing and causing it to flame out.
"Nice job!" he heard the girl praise and his heart fluttered with warmth.
"I'm getting pretty good at this," he breathed, surprised by himself.
A third TIE swooped into view, seizing on the momentary lapse of complacency to fire a wickedly good shot, freezing Finn's turret guns in the downward position. Finn jerked at the controls. No response.
"The cannon's stuck in forward position. I can't move it. You gotta lose 'em!" he reported. The girl took a deep breath, her face hardening in determination.
"Get ready!" she yelled.
"OK. For what?"
They reached the exhaust port at last and zoomed in, Finn scanning out his small window as they submerged into near total darkness. "Are we really doing this?" and he seemed to throw out the question to the galaxy, bemoaning his upended life.
The girl cried out as the passage through the bowels of the Star Destroyer grew tighter and tighter. "Oh no..." she whimpered, willing her brain to remain focused. She peeled out a crevice at their immediate right, emerging back into bright sunshine, the TIE on them like a shadow.
Then she made her move.
Flinging the thrusters forward and then rapidly shutting them off, she sent the Falcon into a backflip, free-falling so that the turret guns could get a clear view...
... and Finn blasted the TIE as soon as its signal was locked. The girl pulled back up immediately, gunning the thrusters back to life. The maneuver had worked perfectly; it was as if she and Finn had spoken with one mind.
"Whoo!" Finn exulted, and the Falcon tore out of Jakku's atmosphere.
On autopilot, Finn and the girl met in the center of the hold, talking over each other.
"Nice shooting..."
"That was some flying..."
"Thanks," the girl blinked.
"How did you do that?"
"I don't know!" she beamed. "I've flown strange ships, but I've never... your long shot was dead-on..."
"That was amazing..."
"That was some blast..."
"You set me up for it!" Finn laughed.
"It was perfect!"
The pair's voices trailed off, BB8 glancing between them at their feet, like a child watching its parents celebrate. The girl turned to him.
"You're OK. He's with the Resistance. He's gonna get you home..." Then, with new resolve, she amended. "We both will."
Only BB8 noticed how Finn glanced away out of guilt at his fake alibi. The girl at last stood, and turned to her new partner. Her face was all at once quite shy.
"I don't know your name," she confessed meekly.
"Finn," he croaked out. "What's yours?"
In that moment, he could have sworn her cheeks turned pink. Her smile was almost imperceptible as she replied, "I'm Rey."
Rey, Finn thought. What a beautiful name. Like... sunlight.
For a long moment, the pair simply stared at each other, gazing into each other's eyes. Eyes that were warm and filled with the promise of camaraderie and... safety.
Held in the warmth of her eyes as she peered at him, Finn's guilt flared and he stepped close. Now was as good a time as any to tell her the truth; he would die if she thought him a liar. "Rey..."
A cloud of steam suddenly blew up from below, ruining his chance.
"Help me with this!" Rey cried.
"Whoa! What's going on?" Finn asked, as moving a grate, Rey led the way in setting to work doing maintenance on the ship...