This is a mistake.
Poe's warning echoed in her mind long after his ship had faded to a speck amongst the stars. Finn hadn't said a word, not even goodbye, but Rey could tell he was thinking the same thing.
She sighed, kicked a stone into the shallow crater left by one of the Millennium Falcon's landing struts and watched the dust swirl. This was almost certainly a mistake, but it was the right thing to do.
Hoisting her knapsack onto her shoulder she began the long walk down the narrow, twisting trail that would lead to the bottom of the sinkhole. No ships were allowed at the site itself, that was one of the conditions of access, and it applied to both sides.
Twilight fell heavy here in the forgotten end of the Outer Rim and the path was soon smothered by darkness, the flimsy light of Rey's torch doing little to penetrate the gloom thrown by the canyon walls. She sorely needed to meditate, but the right frame of mind eluded her, every step tightening the coil of tension inside. Some primitive survival instinct thought this was a mistake too.
She hissed between her teeth as a foot skidded, slipping on loose gravel and her fingertips left a layer of skin on the rock walls. Focus. Concentrate. What was it that Leia had said? Breathe. Or had that been Luke?
The problem was not so much the tension, or the nerves, or the fear or whatever she wanted to call it. The problem was excitement. She was excited. Some nasty little part of her that hadn't been listening during Jedi training, that had skipped important passages in the Jedi texts, that deeply buried, shameful little voice kept insisting that this was a mistake worth making, that little voice was glad. Rey walked and tried to concentrate.
Several hours later the path kicked her out at the bottom of the sinkhole and she stepped into a different world. This moon shared the same characteristics as the planet it orbited, all its water having abandoned the surface to the lashing winds, taking refuge underground. Here at the bottom of the hole, trees still flourished, spindly and fragile looking, their branches stretching desperately towards the distant star. Rey passed between the slender trunks, a thick blanket of moss muting her steps. She hesitated to approach the clearing in the centre of the forest, already knowing what she'd find, and instead explored the walls of the canyon, locating a good-sized cave a short scramble up one side which gave an uninterrupted view of the scene.
She was still gathering sticks when she heard it, the distinctive whine of sub light ion engines, throttled back in descent. The excitement inside her flared abruptly and she shook her head at it, retreating into the cave to light a fire.
From somewhere far away an answering light twinkled into being, disappearing at intervals behind the rough canyon walls as its bearer struggled with the path. Rey made dinner, rehydrated stew, enough for one, and left it to simmer over the fire. The plan was to wait, and watch, and make sure that nothing happened – no conversation, no physical contact and definitely no weapons. All the details had been thrashed out in advance, she only had to see it through. But as she set off through the trees Poe's warning echoed inside her head.
Waiting in the centre of the clearing, hands clasped loosely, the pristine white folds of her new ceremonial outfit arranged in the proper order, she closed her eyes and let her senses widen through the Force. She'd thought she would feel him before she saw him, but the Force was as silent about his presence as it had been for most of the last year and in the end, only the snapping of a twig alerted her to his arrival. She gestured, and the circle of lights surrounding the casket switched up a notch, bathing the clearing in a gentle, yellow glow.
He was still wearing black, and the mask was back, although it had been badly repaired and the lines that scored it throbbed blood red in the dim light. He paused, some way away and his attention wasn't directed at her, but towards the object she guarded. There was a faint creak of leather as his fists clenched and he kicked himself into action again, striding forward until all he had to do was reach out and touch.
Rey fell back as he approached, putting the coffin between them, standing silently as she waited for him to make a move.
A hand emerged from the folds of his cloak, the shake in it only perceptible to someone watching very closely but it remained hovering a short distance above the lid. Rey knew that, as agreed, the blank metal would become transparent when touched and once again she would see the face of Leia, her friend, mentor and latterly teacher, laid out in the funeral garb Rey had chosen, holding the flowers Rey had picked.
A sudden lump constricted her throat, her eyes burned and any residual trace of excitement evaporated in the twin passions of grief and anger.
There was a grating noise from the apparatus across the coffin and the voice of Leia's son, a man who had disgraced himself so badly he no longer deserved her name cut the silence. 'How did she die?'
The volume was lower than she'd been expecting, the words garbled and strained and if Rey hadn't known better, she would have thought he was having difficulty speaking.
She straightened her back, chin up but her voice was calm; she cried all her tears already. 'She was blown out of her ship into space. She lost her friends. She lost her husband. She lost her brother. She lost her son. No one survives that. Not even her.'
'Leave us,' he barked, but she was already walking away.
The woman in the coffin, Leia, princess, senator, general, Organa and Solo and Skywalker had been dead for a week, although her health had been failing for months. The medics said the time she had spent floating about without oxygen had damaged her lungs and a lot more besides, and over the last twelve months her body had entered a slow cascade failure where one organ after the next had shut down.
Leia had fought it, but half-heartedly in Rey's view.
Coughing and spluttering Leia passed onto Rey the instructions and Jedi training she'd had from Luke, hanging on just long enough to see it completed and then she'd given up. There were mechanical solutions that could have been tried, cybernetics and transplants that would have given Leia years more life but Rey could see she'd lost interest. Even the resurgence of the Resistance couldn't jolt her out of the depression she'd gone into after watching her son on HoloNet being crowned Supreme Leader, lord of the galaxy; laying waste to the last of her hopes.
Still, Leia's funeral tomorrow was going to be epic.
Rose had been planning it for months, quietly and discreetly, because Poe wanted to use it as a means of consolidating support for the Resistance and as a result the whole event was going to be huge. And very, very secret, of course. The First Order would have loved nothing more than to wipe out all its enemies in one go, so as soon as Kylo Ren was finished paying his respects – however limited those might be – Leia's body would be shipped off world and transferred to her final resting place.
No one had told Rey where that resting place was, because no one was quite sure that the solitary mourner Rey had left coffin-side wouldn't torture her for the details, or pluck the location from her mind without her noticing.
'Of course,' General Dameron had chuckled, in that maddeningly reasonable tone he'd cultivated since the baton of command had been passed to him. 'If you don't go through with it we'll happily tell you. Hell, you can write the invites yourself.'
Rey gritted her teeth, remembering the conversation.
'But it's the right thing to do,' she'd insisted. 'Leia was his mother. He has the right to say goodbye.'
'He has no rights.' Finn was on Poe's side, as always. 'He killed her.'
'Leia didn't think it was Ben who pulled the trigger. You know that, I've told you enough times.'
'He might not have pulled the trigger,' Rose cut in. 'But he's still responsible. The First Order have caused so many deaths already, why should he care about one more?'
Finn squeezed Rose's hand under the table.
'He cares.' Rey was sure. After a year of complete absence from Ben the ripples that Leia's death had sent through the Force had been met with a massive conflagration of rage, an explosion so wild that Rey had rocked back on her heels just sensing it. 'It's too late to hide it. He knows. He knows she's dead and he's not happy about it. If we don't tell him where she is he'll come and find her himself.'
'The Supreme Leader is not getting an invitation to the funeral.' Rose's tone brooked no argument.
'I'm not suggesting that he does,' Rey mused. 'There might be another way…'
The Force no longer connected them so Rey had done it the old-fashioned way – opened a comms channel and sent a message coded as personal. Some time later, the First Order responded and the Resistance leadership had had a little explosion of their own.
'We are not surrendering her body,' yelled Poe. 'She was one of us.'
'We are not surrendering anything,' Finn agreed hotly. 'And nor are we standing trial for negligence, failure to provide adequate medical attention or – ' He consulted his holopad. 'Culpable homicide.'
'I'm not going to any funeral they've organised,' Rose muttered.
So Rey negotiated, although she wasn't really sure why she was bothering and after a few days an agreement was duly signed and sealed and a date was set. Neither side trusted the other, and in fact Rey was pretty sure that the Resistance had mined the entire base of the sinkhole so they could blow it up if the First Order tried anything.
Outside the cave it had started to rain, with the sort of rain that only a planet prone to storms could manufacture. The deluge didn't seem to consist of individual drops, it was more like a continuous river falling out of the sky, battering at the treetops and threatening to flood the mouth of the cave. Rey poked at the fire, threw on some more logs, jumping at the first peal of thunder. Squinting out into the darkness she could no longer see the ring of lights set up around the coffin, assuming they'd either shorted out or been washed away.
He'd be on his way home soon, she reasoned. It was nearly time to contact the Resistance.
The splosh of heavy boots and a string of explicit curses froze her in the act of searching her pack. She straightened, putting her back to the wall, her hand groping for her missing lightsaber.
Kylo Ren blew in from the darkness, bringing most of the storm with him. Rain cascaded off his helmet, his cloak was plastered to him and the front of his tunic shone with beads of water. Ignoring her, he stalked over to the wood she'd collected for her fire and spent some time jamming sticks into the dirt floor around it.
Then, keeping his back to her, he began to disrobe.
The mask came off first, spilling so much rain from the inside that Rey vaguely wondered about the efficacy of the repairs before he stuck it on a log to dry. The cloak was discarded next, a heavy slap filling the air as it was draped over a hastily constructed tripod and then he bent to struggle with his boots. Once they were upended and steaming gently by the crackling flames, his hands moved to fiddle with the front of his tunic and Rey was jerked out of her silence.
'Don't you dare take that off,' she blurted, without thinking.
He didn't turn, dropping his belt to the floor and tugging at the sodden sleeves. 'Never bothered you before.'
'It did bother me before.' She remembered like it was yesterday, seeing his naked chest and the scar she'd scratched down it, realising he was human after all.
He was wearing a shirt underneath. She breathed a silent sigh of relief, although it was apparent from the back that the shirt too was wet and it clung to him, moulded to all his hard muscle and bone.
He flicked her a pitying glance, clearly aware of the attention. 'You haven't changed.'
There was a sneer in his voice but she met his stare, read his secrets. Although his face was ash white the skin around his eyes was slightly puffy, the merest suggestion of red marked his nose and there was water still on his cheeks that might have been rain and might have been something else.
'You have,' she said, wondering.
He put his back to her again, standing close by the fire with his hands outstretched towards it. There was a silence broken only by the splutter of wood meeting heat and the beat of the rain.
'Thank you for this,' he said at length, although it sounded like the words were being dragged out of his against his will.
'I didn't make it for you,' she snapped.
'Not the fire.' His hands dropped to his sides, twitching in a gesture that encompassed the whole cave, the moon and everything on it. 'For this. You didn't have to.'
She thought she understood the sentiment, although she wasn't sure she understood the man expressing it. 'It was the right thing to do.'
He rolled over a log, crouched on it, and lapsed into silence again. Sensing no danger, she picked up her pack and edged carefully around the fire, ending up sitting on the opposite side.
This new Supreme Leader wasn't exactly the man she remembered. Perhaps his mother's death had changed him. Or perhaps he was simply playing out some wider plan.
This wasn't the first time she'd scrutinised him over a fire and as she sat there watching the interplay of light and shadow across his features it came to her that she'd missed him. That was the excitement she'd felt, the illicit pleasure that she might see him again. It wasn't that they were close, she decided, they'd never been friends, never shared secrets or adventures and most of the time she hated every atom of his being but with Luke and Leia gone there wasn't anyone else left who could do what she could do. No one who understood her as they had. She'd spent the last year training but Leia was sick and frail and there had been no one against whom to test her developing powers. No one who might stand as her equal. And that was what she had missed about him – that was what she wanted – the challenge.
She leaned forward. 'Did you bring your lightsaber?' She couldn't disguise the excitement behind the words.
His eyes snapped up. 'Did I bring a weapon to my own mother's funeral? Did I come armed, even though I was instructed not to? Did I bring anything with which to defend myself against the blaster you have hidden in that bag you're sitting on, or against the baradium bombs stashed in the back of this cave, or against the entire squadron of fighters the Resistance has concealed behind the seventh moon?' He jerked his head. 'I left it on the shuttle. This is a truce.'
She sat back, excitement fading. 'I didn't know about the X-wings,' she clarified. 'And the blaster was just for lighting the fire.'
He scowled at that, reached out for a stick and stoked up the flames, a shower of sparks rising towards the ceiling, camouflaging his face. 'Did she suffer? At the end – was it quick?'
The words were deceptively casual, but Rey could hear the tension behind them.
'It wasn't quick,' she answered carefully. 'It took years, but I think you know that. She wasn't in pain, or if she was she didn't show it. But she suffered. One way or another, you took everything she had.'
It sounded harsh, but she wasn't telling him anything he didn't already know. His choices had consequences and most of them had been borne by the woman in the casket.
'Why didn't you come to me when it became obvious she was ill? Why didn't you ask for proper medical help? I could have saved her. I would have tried.'
Rey raised an eyebrow. 'I never knew you cared. She didn't either.'
He jumped back from the fire as if he'd been scorched, hurtled towards the mouth of the cave and then stopped, one hand outstretched.
'What are you doing?' She rose to her feet but he simply stood, his face knotted in concentration.
To her amazement, from out of the deluge appeared the unmistakeable shape of a flawlessly white, upsilon class command shuttle, all its running lights and engines off, propelled only by the power of the Force.
'Fetching my lightsaber,' he said.
She was just the slightest bit impressed.
The ship landed yards from the cave and the moment the ramp was down he was off, barefoot and still damp, storming away into the dark interior and leaving her alone. She waited a while, but he didn't come back so she ate her dinner, repacked her bag, confirmed the existence of the cache of explosives he'd mentioned and considered whether or not to follow him.
This could quite easily be a trap. He could be attempting to lure her onto his ship so that he could incapacitate and capture her, before carrying her away to face another interrogation. Or he could simply be trying to process his grief in as much privacy as possible. Rey didn't imagine for one minute that this sort of weakness would be tolerated back at the First Order. And he did appear to be genuinely grieving, his behaviour suggesting he was open, vulnerable in a way he hadn't been since the last fireplace on Ahch-To.
The shuttle was still dark as she crept up the ramp, fingers grazing over walls that were scarred with plasma burns, past equipment cleaved in two and badly repaired, over smashed screens, missing switches, hopelessly mangled wiring. Perfect on the outside, the inside of this shuttle clearly bore the brunt of its master's rage on a regular basis. Rey almost felt sorry for it.
There was a single spotlight on in the main passenger cabin and through the gloom she picked out a back clad figure, hunched over something concealed in a drawer. If he heard her approach he gave no sign.
His whisper cut the silence. 'It calls me again, grandfather. Show me, show me the power of the darkness.'
His body went completely still for a few seconds, half a minute maybe, and then he exhaled in a rush before begging all over again. 'Show me the power of the darkness.'
Moving as quietly as she possibly could, Rey crept up behind him, taking advantage of the intervals during which he was rendered immobile to make more progress until she could see over his shoulder.
'Why do you have Darth Vader's mask in a drawer?' Surprise sprang the question out of her mouth before she could stop it.
He froze and his hand fluttered out as if he was going to seal away the evidence, before he dropped it to his knee. 'When I have doubts, this helps.'
She didn't know what to be more surprised by – the fact that he was hiding a melted helmet or the fact that he was willing to answer questions about it.
'And – do you have doubts often?' she asked, sensing the importance of his answer. There wasn't one forthcoming, so she answered it herself. 'Often enough that you need to carry around this, this piece of garbage with you everywhere you go so you can keep reminding yourself how great the dark side is, yes?' She put a hand on his shoulder, noting absently that he'd changed into dry clothes. 'Ben, we should talk about this.'
He flung off her hand with a savage jerk of his shoulder, lurched away from her touch and suddenly there was the Kylo Ren she remembered, gazing out at her with rage blazing in his eyes, fury apparent in the stiff lines of his lips.
'I do not need to discuss anything with you,' he spat. 'Touch it. Go on. Put your hand out, touch it and say the words. Then tell me what you know of the dark side.'
He had gone mad. Power had turned his mind. There was no other explanation. Why else would he be sitting in the dark praying to a hunk of melted plasteel?
She put her hands up very, very slowly, took a single, non-threatening step backwards but he lunged for her, the red blade springing to life in his hand and completing its swing inches from her neck.
'I said, touch it.' The humming beam wavered closer. 'Now.'
With her lightsaber back on the Millennium Falcon, Rey was going to have to humour him if she wanted to get off this ship in one piece so she reached down with a single finger and rested it on the bent mouthguard.
'Say the words,' he gritted, his eyes boring into hers.
'Show me the power of the darkness,' she repeated, already plotting the manoeuvres she was going to have to complete in order to disarm him.
And then everything changed. The brutalised interior of the command shuttle disappeared and Rey was somewhere else.
'It's a holocron?' she gasped in shock, staggering backwards.
The part of her that was still in her own body knew that the red threat had been extinguished and a hardness against the back of her legs was a chair that someone had positioned behind her so that she could sit down.
'Not exactly. It's something else. I'm not sure what. Just – tell me what you see.' His voice came from far away, calmer now that she was doing what she was told.
Rey was fascinated. Most of the Jedi holocrons had been destroyed and the one or two that Leia had managed to track down had given only a small glimpse into a vast landscape of knowledge that Rey badly wanted to explore.
'I'm on a step. No, it's not a step, it's a dais. I'm in a throne room. There's a throne in front of me and there's someone sitting on it. It's a man. I can't see him clearly. He's…'
It was like looking through fog. There were shapes in the fog but they were indistinct, formless until she got right up close, until she willed them to coalesce with a flicker of power. The fog shifted.
'He's you. I see you, Ben. You're sitting on Snoke's throne and you're Supreme Leader of the First Order. Is this a recent recording? Why did you want me to watch it? Your coronation was all over HoloNet, everyone saw it.'
'It's not a recording. It's my destiny. Ever since I first found this mask years ago, I've seen what you can see right now. Before I killed Snoke I knew I'd take his throne – my grandfather foretold it.'
But the fog continued to clear and Rey saw more. 'There's something wrong with you,' she breathed. 'You don't look right. Your face is different, you're younger. You're…you look…' She struggled to put words to the swirling impressions that had taken over her sight. 'Happy? Content?'
'In the vision I am whole,' he said. 'No doubts. No conflict. I am Supreme Leader and I am sure. Focused. Keep watching.'
The Ben in her mind's eye was looking to his left and as she followed the direction of his gaze she discerned a bulky shape and something stretched out from it, something thinner, delicate.
'There's another throne. Someone is sitting beside you with their hand out. You're sharing power with someone. It's not Hux is it? Or that new general, what's he called? Pryde?' She frowned, correcting herself. 'No, it's a woman, I see her now. She has a black dress and her hair is brown, and long and I think she's smiling at you and she's familiar. It's...' She stopped, realising. 'I'd like to finish this now, thanks very much.'
She shook head to clear it, concentrated on the feeling of her legs on the hard chair to bring her back to herself and groped for the awareness of her hand, so she could remove it from the mask.
Back in the real world another hand clamped itself over hers, refusing to let her escape and a strident voice in her ear demanded, 'Keep watching. Tell me what you see.'
The image spooled on and she described it with mounting disgust. 'It's me. I'm sitting next to you. I'm ruling with you. This is why you asked me to join you last year, isn't it? Not because I meant anything to you, but because Darth Vader told you to.'
The woman on the throne simpered, and smiled and made Rey sick to her stomach.
'I knew.' His words breathed into her ear, a whisper of secret revelation. 'I'd always seen a partner, but I couldn't make out her face and then when I was told Dameron's droid had escaped with a girl I knew. Or I suspected. It was only when you read my mind and the first thing you mentioned was Darth Vader that I was sure. After that, I knew you'd come to me. This is your destiny too.'
If Rey had been able to remove her hand from Kylo's grisly heirloom she would have run and run and never looked back. But he was holding her in place and the vision had more horrors yet to divulge.
'Keep watching,' he said. 'And listen.'
She continued narrating, resigned now, and determined to show him nothing but her iron disapproval. 'I'm pregnant. I'm sitting on the throne, holding your hand and I'm pregnant. I expect it's twins. I'm waving to my loyal subjects. No, I'm not, I'm turning around. There's someone behind me. Someone's behind the throne.'
From somewhere distant a flicker of pain brushed her awareness and she had the distinct sense that back on the shuttle her fingers were being crushed.
'You see it too.'
'There's someone there. He's tall, dressed in black. He's shiny. How can he be shiny? Oh no, it's…'
She heard it then. A rasp of laboured breathing, the tortured respiration of a mask she had never heard in life, but was clutching now in death. 'It's Darth Vader.'
'Listen,' Kylo Ren whispered into her ear.
The figure in her vision stirred slightly. 'Find me,' he said.
Rey yanked her hand off the helmet, snatched it back from Kylo's grip, kicked over the chair and staggered away from the drawer as her eyes swam painfully back into focus.
In front of her Kylo straightened, his face bright with a zealot's fervour. 'You heard him,' he crowed, clenching a fist. 'I knew you would. He's alive. Darth Vader is alive.'