Chapter 3: Women Always Figure Out the Truth

Han flew his new crew to the lush, green world of Takodana. Touching down at the side of a lake, Rey disembarked to behold what looked like a palace in the near distance. Back on the ship, Finn approached Han as he was making final landing checks.

"Hey, Solo - I'm not sure what we're walking into here, but..."

"Did you just call me Solo?" He turned away again.

Finn tried again, flustered. "Sorry, Han. Mr. Solo. You should know: I'm a big deal in the Resistance, which puts a real target on my back. Are there any conspirators here?" No answer was immediately forthcoming. "First Order sympathizers?"

Han faced him sharply, talking turkey to the young man. "Listen, Big Deal, you've got another problem: women always figure out the truth. Always." And slamming a long gun into Finn's chest, he walked away.

Finn stood there gaping. Was he really that obvious? Not just about his growing attachment to Rey, but also the fact that Han Solo - a master con man - could see right through him and tell he was full of bantha shit?

The group walked to the palace for help from one Maz Kanata, an old friend of Han's. She was a petite little alien with orange, scaly skin and big goggles around her eyes. Seated in the corner of her little dive bar, Maz postulated how they must fight the First Order.

And that's when Finn's anger compelled him to open his big, fat mouth.

"There is no fight against the First Order - not one we can win!" He could feel Rey's perplexed eyes on him, and he tried not to wilt with shame under her stare. Finn continued to prattle on about how likely they were to be caught. His voice only trailed off when he noticed Maz adjusting her goggles, then literally crawling across the table to him as she examined him.

"If you live long enough, you see the same eyes in different people..." she mused. "I'm looking at the eyes of a man who wants to run."

Oh, Sithspit. She had his number, too. First BB8, then Han, and now her... Finn felt himself start to sweat. Still, with a false sense of bravado, he tried to counter her. "You don't know a thing about me. Where I'm from... what I've seen..." And then he confessed it - almost, but just about. "You don't know the First Order like I do. They'll slaughter us. We all need to run."

Next to him, he could feel Rey's confusion grow. Maz resignedly pointed out two men who could help Finn book passage off world. He jumped at the chance.

"Finn!" He finally willed himself to look Rey in the face, his heart twinging with shame at the deep hurt in her eyes. The betrayal. And something else that she seemed to feel all too well - a keen familiarity with abandonment.

Finn gazed at her sadly, then earnestly. "Come with me." He and Rey could get far away from here, to the Outer Rim, and then... and then what? Finn didn't know, but at present it didn't matter. He and Rey could get to safety first, and then... maybe they could build a life together. Start fresh and new, by each other's side, if she'd have him.

Rey gawked at him, turning her face away to hide the heat blooming on her skin, betraying - deep down inside - how tempting his offer really was to her. No one had ever stuck by her for this long before, and now with the prospect of even him leaving, just like everyone else... she wanted to hang onto Finn with both hands.

But... "What about BB8? We're not done yet. We have to get him back to the your base!"

Finn glanced between her and the droid, forlorn.

"I can't," he murmured weakly. Then he shamefully got up and walked towards the far table where those aliens were. He tried to give Han his gun back, but the old man declined.

Anguished, Rey scrambled out of her seat and followed her friend. She couldn't believe Finn would just bolt like this. She wiped fiercely at her eyes, mad at herself for wanting to cry. But all the same... hadn't she meant something to him? "What are you doing?" she demanded when she found him in conversation with two lifeforms.

"Don't leave without me," Finn hissed to the pair, then he followed Rey into a corner of the bar. She turned to face him, wounded but resolute.

"You can't just go!" Rey pleaded. "I won't let you."

And finally, Finn blasted it out. "I'm not who you think I am..."

"Finn, what are you talking about?"

"I'm not Resistance!"

She stared at him. And there it was - the even deeper hurt of realizing she had been lied to. Finn bravely pressed on anyway, despite knowing that any chance he might have had with her was likely gone now.

"I'm not a hero... I'm a Stormtrooper."

If the hurt Rey had shown him was agonizing, the disgust now roiling onto her face was unbearable. Still, Finn plowed ahead, hoping his true story could salvage whatever she might have thought of him.

"Like all of them, I was taken from a family I'll never know, and raised to do one thing. At my first battle, I made a choice. I wasn't gonna kill for them. So I ran... right into you." For a parsec, his eyes flashed with soppy tenderness, his expression easing into something almost lovesick. "And you looked at me like no one ever had."

If his feelings were given away on his face, Rey didn't let on. The beautiful girl's expression slowly began to melt into something at least placid at his tender words, quietly listening.

"I was ashamed of what I was. But I'm done with the First Order. I'm never going back. Rey..." and he stepped closer, reaching for her hand. "Come with me."

She gazed at him, the siren song of his offer stirring her heart. He was offering her a chance beyond her heretofore dreary existence. The chance for a life. Friendship... a family. Perhaps someday, maybe she and Finn could even...

But then BB8 danced in her mind and she held his eyes beseechingly. "Don't go." The tears threatened to fall, but this time, she tamped them down.

But Finn's mind was made up. Voice breaking, he begged: "Take care of yourself. Please." He almost got up the nerve to kiss her cheek, but wigged out at the last second.

And with her heartbroken expression in his mind, at his back, Finn trudged sadly away...

Finn had been searching for her in a blind panic ever since the First Order had attacked, sidewaying his travel plans. The lightsaber in his hand, he paused, gaping in horror as he at last spotted Rey, nestled in the arms of Kylo Ren himself. She was swooned in his embrace, the beast carrying her off like she was his bride.

Finn's heart clenched in anguish, mixed with a potently blind, jealous rage. That creature had no business touching her like that. No, no, no... he was going to take her away!

"NO!" He sprinted for the ship, not caring that it was too far away, hoping that he might be able to claw his way onto the retracting gangplank and fight a path inside. "No... No, no... No! NOOOOO!" Watching helplessly as the First Order ship took off into the sky, Finn flung into the heavens his anguished scream.

"REYYYYYYY!"