part three
The first time Kylo materialized before her was a week after she left. She instinctively fired her blaster at him. But he disappeared as abruptly as he appeared, and she only ended up blasting the pile of logs Chewie had spent all morning chopping. He threw his hands up and growled at her.
"Sorry," she said, "but did you see that?"
Chewie gave her a questioning look. She shook her head. "Never mind."
The second time their connection brought them together, another two weeks had passed. He half-heartedly raised his arms up. "Are you going to shoot me again?"
She tentatively stepped forward. "How are you doing this?"
"I'm not doing this." His voice was distorted, even more so than usual through his mask. Like he was barely here.
His mask. She tilted her head to look at the helmet he had smelted back together, red lines glowing around the cracks. "You put your mask back together."
"Nothing stays broken forever," he said quickly. "Where are you?"
A different question hung in the air, unspoken: Why did you run away?
But then Finn called out to her. She turned around, shouting back that she'll be right there. When she turned back around, Kylo had vanished once again.
"Are you sure the mole is that General Hugs guy?" Poe asked. They had been repairing some damaged ships all morning and were now taking their lunch break sitting under the shade of an X-wing. "Are we really gonna trust him?"
"Hux doesn't have an honest bone in his body," Rey replied. "But an enemy of an enemy is a friend. And for now, he is all we've got."
"Do you remember training at Reeqa?" Finn asked.
Rey choked mid-bite, fighting back the laughter. "You mean the first and only time you flew a ship? And almost killed Hux?"
"Oh, this I have to hear," Poe grinned.
"He was a nervous wreck," Rey said. "We were all taking turns learning to fly on the training grounds. Finn managed to get the ship up half an inch off the ground before he crashed it into three other parked ships. Nearly crushed the Hux and two lieutenants!"
"And that's how I was assigned to be a janitor," Finn deadpanned.
The three of them laughed as they shared the rations. It had taken some getting used to after she joined Finn and the Resistance. There was so much laughter. There were only some thirty-odd rebels, yet they banded together like a tight-knit family, a family she never even knew she wanted until they welcomed her in. She was scared it was all one big dream and that she would surely wake back up on the Star Destroyer.
"What about you, Rey?" Poe asked, leaning over to bump her shoulder with his. "How did you become so good at flying?"
She shrugged. "Flying was something I kinda fell in love with, I guess. There was this old woman who cooked the meals for us as we were training. Her cooking was horrendous, but she told the best stories. Sometimes at night, after curfew, I would sneak into the kitchen and she would tell me stories about adventure throughout the galaxy. I didn't know if they were true or made up, but I didn't care. I wanted to be like Han Solo."
They were silent for a moment. Finn gently placed a hand on her shoulder, giving it a small squeeze. "I'm sorry you didn't get to meet him. Han would have really liked you."
The third time she saw Kylo again, nine months had passed. The Resistance had settled into a new base and were sending agents to different planet systems for reconnaissance. The First Order had been suspiciously quiet since Snoke's death. They couldn't find anyone who had even seen Kylo Ren since Crait.
(Well, except for the two times Rey saw him through the Force, which she didn't tell anyone about. She's half convinced she made it up in her mind.)
Meanwhile, Rey and Finn continued their training under Leia's guidance. She was reading the Jedi sacred texts when Kylo's sudden voice startled her.
"Are you really reading that garbage?"
She shut the book and stood up, crossing her arms in front of her. "You came back. I thought...I thought I was going mad."
"I tried to forget you," he said quietly.
She glanced down and saw that his right hand was bleeding. His gloves were off and his knuckles were cut open, as if he had just punched a wall. "What happened?"
And then she could hear it-his thoughts. A menacing voice calling to him, antagonizing him, telling him to kill himself, telling him to kill her, telling him to kill everyone else, telling him he'll never be as powerful as the Sith.
"It won't stop, Rey." His voice was so pained, she naturally stepped closer, drawn to him like a habit. But then she remembered why she left all those months ago and why she couldn't stay with him. She froze, her arm half outstretched towards him.
"I thought Snoke was the voice inside your head," she said.
He ripped his helmet off and looked at her with wild, panicked eyes. "I killed Snoke. You were there. I killed Snoke, so why won't the voice go away?"
She wanted to tell him it'll be okay. She wanted to ask where he was. She wanted to tell him to come back home. How tiring must it be, living behind that broken mask? After all this time and her resolve still faltered whenever she thought of the night, in his room on the Destroyer under the starlight, when he almost smiled.
Instead, she took another step closer and reached out further with her hand. He stood still, watching her.
"I just need to know that you're real," she whispered.
Her fingers grazed against the fabric of his shirt before she pressed her palm against his chest. She felt his heart beat once, twice, three times. He raised his hand to rest over hers. And then he was gone.
A small droplet of blood was left on her hand.
Then, the message arrived. An auspicious audio recording was broadcast throughout the galaxy announcing that revenge was imminent. While no one could recognize the voice at first, it was strangely familiar to Rey but she couldn't figure out why.
Then, Leia rushed into the room and her jaw dropped as soon as she heard it. "That's impossible. It's Palpatine."
Then, Rey realized why it sounded familiar, and it horrified her. Palpatine was the voice inside Kylo's head.
It was only after the fourth time did Kylo finally understand what triggered their Force connection. It seemed Rey only appeared whenever he was the most distraught. This time, he was distraught for her own sake.
"There's something you need to know," he said.
She looked at him nervously, quickly glancing back and forth between him and off to the side. She wasn't alone, he realized. "Now is not a good time," she muttered.
"Where are you? I'll come to you."
Her eyes flickered up to his. For a second, he almost believed she looked happy. But then she shook her head, walking away from him. Before she disappeared again, he reached out and grabbed the yellow necklace from around her neck.
Minutes later, he was flying towards Pasaana. His Knights had alerted him to Rey's exact location and he flew as fast as his TIE fighter would go, desperately hoping she was still there when he arrived. To his surprise, he found her standing in the desert, waiting for him.
Since he was flying much too fast to land without going past her, he turned his steering wheel sharply to the right, flipping his ship to be flying upside down. As he approached closer, he opened the hatch and dropped out of the ship, landing on his feet right in front of her.
Like an old habit, he stepped closer and reached out to grab her wrist. "Rey, I-"
Before he could get any closer, she pulled out her lightsaber and activated it, holding it across her as a shield. He pulled his hand back, stunned not at the fact that she was blocking him but at the sight of the double yellow blades. It was still the same hilt she first made, but she must have swapped out the crystals.
He felt an inexplicable pain in his chest. Once, he had found a bewildered girl who looked at him like there was still something left to believe in. Once, he had thought he truly wasn't alone. Once, he had wanted to make her his Empress.
Now, for the first time in a year, she was finally standing before him again, on the same planet, under the same sun, breathing the same air. Yet seeing her in her new white outfit, wielding her new yellow lightsaber, and glaring at him with newfound righteousness, she has never seemed more out of reach.
"Please don't," she whispered.
Behind her, her friends were shouting for her to return to the old ship.
"Why did you leave?" He finally asked the question.
"I picked a side, Ben." Tears formed in her eyes. "Will you?"
Hearing his true name sent chills down his spine and into his heart. When was the last time anyone called him that?
"I thought I wanted to follow you anywhere in the galaxy, but I was wrong," she said. "Where you are now, I can't follow."
She turned around to walk back towards the ship but he called her back. "The thing I wanted to tell you. It's about your parents."
"My parents were nobodies," she replied angrily, without turning back around. "We looked into where I came from. My serial number, JA-4106? The JA is the short code for Jakku. But the First Order doesn't have patrol on Jakku, which means they don't regularly take children from there. The only reason a Stormtrooper would come from Jakku is if they were sold. I was never taken, my parents sold me off. And to think I spent all this time missing them and needing them, so much so that Snoke almost used it against me..."
He frowned. He was going to have to tell her the truth, and it was going to devastate her. And he wondered, for a moment, if it would devastate her enough. How much would he need to break her heart before she came back to his side? "That's not true. Your parents did sell you to the First Order, but they weren't nobodies. They did it to protect you."
She whipped her head back around, shouting furiously, "How was selling me to the First Order protecting me?!"
"Because Palpatine hasn't killed you yet, has he?"
She stared at him, desperately confused. "Why would the Emperor be trying to kill me?"
Before Kylo could respond, Finn came running out towards them screaming her name at the top of his lungs. He pointed towards the transport about to fly up back to the Star Destroyer. "They've got Chewie!"
With an angry scream, she reached out and stopped the transport in midair. The engines revved and the ship bobbled up and down, but her hold on it was stronger. Kylo and Finn shared a brief look over her shoulder. They were both dumbfounded.
And then Kylo felt it. A strong surge rippled out through the Force, stronger than anything imaginable. He knew what was going to happen. It's what always happened when Rey lost control.
You could even call it her signature move.
"No, stop!" Kylo shouted. He reached out with the Force as well and tried to release the transport from her hold, but it was too late.
A bright flash of electric energy surged from Rey's palm and struck the transport. She gasped and immediately pulled back, but the damage was done. The transport's engines sputtered out after the shock and the entire ship hurdled back onto the ground, bursting into flames. No survivors.
Pressing the back of her hand to her mouth, she ran back towards Finn and Poe before they took off in the old ship. Kylo watched them leave before turning back to the wreckage.
One thing was for certain: if he had any doubts before, he definitely knew Palpatine was telling the truth now.
"So we need someone who can reset a droid's protocol." Poe pondered it for a minute. "Yeah, I know a guy. Kijimi."
As C-3PO continued to complain and protest to no avail, Poe and Finn walked towards the front of the ship and were surprised to find Rey already in the pilot's seat setting the coordinates.
"Wait, we're going back to base first?" Finn asked, peering over her shoulder.
She stood from her seat and turned around to face them. Her eyelashes were still wet from tears, but her gaze had turned hard as a rock. "You two are going back to base first."
"Come on, Rey, we already went over this," Finn pleaded. "We're in this together."
"I killed Chewie," she said coldly. "I've killed so many people."
"It was an accident. No one blames you. Please, don't be like this."
"I blame myself." She shook her head. "How am I any different than Kylo Ren?"
"Because you're a good person," Finn said firmly.
"How do you know that?"
"I've known you my whole life."
She looked at him with such a piercing gaze that he almost flinched. "No one knows who I really am."
Poe took a step towards her. "Look, I know everything has gone to shit, but we'll get through it together. We're not leaving you."
She paused, looking at Poe and Finn before she sighed. "I'm a ticking time bomb. Sooner or later, I'm going to destroy everything and everyone around me. I'm so sorry."
Before they realized it, she raised her hands and tapped both of them on the forehead. They immediately fell unconscious and dropped to the floor.
When they next woke up, they were on their beds back in the Resistance base dormitory. Leia stood over them, looking confused and slightly amused.
Rey and C-3PO followed the mysterious stranger as they crept through the shadows of Kijimi. The stranger hadn't been friendly when they first ran into each other on the streets, and then when Rey mentioned Poe's name, the stranger became outright hostile. Still, after some explanation and negotiation, her had agreed to help them. Countless Stormtroopers were marching up and down the cobblestone streets, searching for anyone still out after curfew and loudly berating anyone they found. Rey hadn't realized the patrols have become like this. The austerity and fear in the air hung heavy like a shroud around her.
How strange, she thought, as they snuck around a corner, out of sight of the passing guards. Just a year ago, she had been one of them. For as long as she could remember, she had been one of them. Another solider in a mask, another cog in the First Order machine, fighting for a regime that she never believed in.
Do they even believe in it? she wondered as she watched a Stormtrooper shove an older man onto the ground. Do they even realize they have a choice?
(But, do they really have a choice?)
Later, after C-3PO was reset and translated the message on the dagger, Rey sat with the stranger outside as Babu Frik put the droid back together again.
"I'm sorry, I don't even know your name," Rey said.
"Call me Zorii," the stranger replied.
"Thank you, Zorii. I'm Rey."
"Oh, I know."
Rey stared at this woman, wondering who was really under that helmet. If there's anything she's learned, it that heroes and villains alike all wear masks. "Why did you help us?" Rey asked. "I know it's not as a favor to Poe."
Zorii gave a short laugh, then stretched out her right arm to gesture towards the quiet town. "Look what it's come to. Across the galaxy, there are hundreds and thousands of villages just like this. They've taken all the children and killed anyone who tried to fight back, so now all that's left is just living each day in terror. And that's no way to live."
"You say they killed anyone who tried to fight back, but they haven't killed you yet," Rey pointed out.
The kind stranger raised the eyepiece of her helmet so Rey could see her eyes for the first time. Those were the courageous eyes of a rebel if she ever saw one.
Zorii pulled a small, golden disk out of her pocket. "I saved up for years to get this. It was going to be my way off the planet."
Rey took the medallion and marveled at it in her hand. "A First Order Captain's Medallion? How did you get one of these?"
Shaking her head, Zorii put her hand over Rey's and closed it over the medallion.
"Wait, no I can't take this from you!"
Zorii smiled with her kind eyes. Her hands stayed clasped firmly around Rey's. Suddenly, there was a shift in the Force. Rey could sense that Kylo was here, and she was running out of time. A second later, the large Star Destroyer appeared in the night sky.
"They win," Zorii said, pointing towards the Star Destroyer, "by making us feel alone. But there are more of us, more than they realize. We aren't alone. You are not alone."
The fifth time their connection brought them together, Rey was back in his living quarters on the ship. After she snuck onto the Destroyer using Zorii's medallion and found the seized Millennium Falcon, she couldn't fight the urge to visit his room again. Here, where he trained her. Here, where she held him as he grieved. Here, where she told him her nightmares and didn't feel afraid anymore.
"Wherever you are, you are hard to find." His voice snapped her out of her reverie. How ironic to see him standing there before her, inside his own chambers, yet not knowing where she was.
"And you're hard to get rid of," she replied.
"I still need to tell you about your parents. The reason Palpatine-"
"No!" she shook her head furiously. "I don't want to know."
"You have to know!" he yelled back. "You can't keep running from who you are."
She scoffed at him. "Really? Then when are you going to stop running from who you are, Ben Solo?"
He was clearly taken aback by this, but then his face twisted up in anger as he lunged at her with his lightsaber. She deflected his strike with her own.
"You don't get to tell me who I am," she said as they sparred across space, her yellow blade against his red one. "I am not part of your story, I refuse to be."
She didn't realize she had started crying until she accidentally knocked over the stand and Vader's old helmet fell through their connection and onto the ground before Kylo's feet.
"So that's where you are," he said before the connection abruptly ended.
Rey wiped her tears with the back of her hand and sprinted back out of his quarters, down the familiar corridors, and back towards the hangar. To her surprise, the Millennium Falcon and Threepio were nowhere to be seen. She spun in a circle, frantically searching for another ship, but it was too late. Kylo's TIE fighter landed in the hangar right before her and he stepped out, marching in long, quick strides towards her.
"The Emperor killed your parents because they refused to reveal where you were," he said. "All this time, he's been alive, waiting to find you."
"Why does the Emperor want to kill me?" she asked again. She was suddenly so tired. She didn't want to fight Kylo anymore.
"He doesn't want to kill you. He wants you to join him."
"What?"
"He is weak and he needs you for your powers. Because you have his powers."
She thought back to the moment she shot lightning from her hands and brought down an entire transport. Her heart sank and she nearly fell to her knees. No, no, no...
"You're his granddaughter." As Kylo spoke those words, it became the inevitable truth. "You're a Palpatine."
"No! You're lying!"
Kylo walked closer. Her mind raced. She could barely think.
"He wants to use you, but we can defeat him," Kylo said, stretching out his hand. "Join me, Rey. We'll end this, together."
And she almost took his hand. It was easier, wasn't it? Things were easier back then, aboard this Destroyer, when Kylo and Rey were still on the same side. But if there's anything that she's learned from all of this, it's that the right choice is hardly ever the easier choice.
Suddenly, strong winds blew in through the hangar's opening, knocking nearly everyone off their feet. The Falcon had appeared, and there stood Finn on the extended walkway, calling for her to jump.
She looked back and forth between Kylo and Finn. She peered intently into Kylo's eyes, desperately searching for the spark of light that he once had. But all she saw was a dark and empty soul. She could hear that voice in his head again, constantly running through his mind. The Emperor had infected Kylo's mind and broken him. She wouldn't let the Emperor break her too.
With one last apologetic look at Kylo, she turned and jumped onto the Falcon.
Once safely inside, she collapsed onto a bench and sobs wracked her body. Finn and Poe both rushed to her side.
"How did you find me?" she asked.
"Zorii sent a message to Leia," Poe explained. "Said you were still on Kijimi and that you needed help."
And on top of everything she was feeling—devastation at learning her lineage, despair over her parents' death, grief over killing Chewie, heartache over losing Kylo to the darkness—she was now overwhelmed with guilt for abandoning her friends. She thought she could protect them if she continued out alone. Turns out, she was the one who needed all the help she could get.
"I'm sorry," she said. "I shouldn't have abandoned you."
"You can try, but we'll always come right back," Finn said with a smile. "Stop trying to go it alone, Rey."
"You're not alone," Poe repeated.
It seemed like that's all anyone ever said to her these days. Finally, she was starting to believe it.
The sixth time they connected, Kylo was in a fitful sleep. He quickly jolted awake to find her sitting on the floor, hugging her knees to her chest, staring off into the distance.
"Did I wake you?" she said softly, still not looking at him.
"No," he lied. He swung his legs over the side of his bed and sat facing her. Then, wanting to be closer still, he lowered himself to the floor beside her.
He should be angry with her. He kept offering the galaxy for her—hell, he'd offer up the entire universe on a silver platter—yet she kept running away. He should be furious with her, but he wasn't. The uncontrollable rage never came. Something in the air changed whenever they were alone in his room. The moments felt tender and sacred. She was in agony and he could sense it, but he didn't know how to console her. There were dark circles under her eyes.
"Why aren't you sleeping?" he asked.
She turned and looked at him. "Nightmares," she whispered with the saddest smile.
Just as he was about to ask what her nightmares were about this time, she surprised him by moving closer and lying down, resting her head on his lap.
"Did you know I almost tried to kill you?" she mumbled, the last few words interrupted by a yawn.
"You what?"
"That one night I came in here when you were asleep," she said as her eyelids fluttered shut. "Snoke had told me to kill you, and for a second, I honestly considered it."
No, he didn't know she almost tried to kill him. Nervously, he wondered if he was now obligated to confess he had also tried to kill her.
"But you didn't kill me," he said.
She smiled, her eyes still closed. "No. And you didn't kill me either. And so here we are."
He reached over, wanting to tuck away a strand of hair, but then he hesitated and pulled his hand back to his side.
After a long pause, he spoke again. "A part of you wanted to take my hand earlier. I could see it in your eyes. Why didn't you?"
She opened her eyes and looked up at him. Here, in the quiet night, lightyears apart and yet impossibly intimate, in her half-asleep stupor, she finally told him the truth.
"I did want to take your hand. Ben's hand."
He sighed and leaned his head back, resting it against the side of his bedframe. "Ben Solo is dead. I destroyed him."
"Maybe," she muttered. "Or maybe, like a wise man once told me, nothing stays broken forever."
Long after she faded away, he could still feel her warmth. The room felt empty without her soft breathing.
Then, he realized just how quiet it really was. For the first time in his life, it was silent.
For the first time, there were no more voices inside his head.
He tracked the Falcon to the Kef Bir moon and flew over his father's old ship parked (read: crashed) against the side of a hill. Further ahead, a group of people milled about a small encampment. He flew by them as well. Reaching the ocean, he parked his TIE fighter on the narrow strip of rocky shore.
Out by the edge of the dark waters, Rey was struggling to pull an old skimmer into the water. The waves were so loud that she didn't hear his footsteps approaching.
He watched her lean all her body weight backwards, grunting as she strained to pull the boat. Finally, he spoke, "You do have the Force, you know."
In her surprise, her hands slipped off the edge of the skimmer and she fell backwards into the shallow water. She shot him an indignant look before standing up squeezing the water out of her hair.
"Also, you're planning on taking that out there?" he asked, nodding towards the tall high-tide waves. "That's a death wish."
"I'll be fine," she said. Taking his advice, she used the Force to move the skimmer the rest of the way into the water.
Just as she was about to jump onto the ship, he called out to stop her. "You don't need it. The Wayfinder."
She paused, turning back to him. "Of course I need it. How else will I get to Exegol?"
He shrugged with a sly grin. "You can use mine. Or you can drown to death. Whichever you prefer."
"I don't have time for this, Kylo," she said with exasperation. She jumped and pulled herself onto the skimmer.
She thought he was another Force projection, he realized with amusement. But how will she react once she realizes he is here, in the flesh? Will she fight him again, like they did in Kijimi? Or will she smile at him the way she did when they were last at an ocean, like they did in Chandrila?
"No seriously," he said, pointing behind him towards his TIE fighter, "I have it right over there."
When her eyes flickered out past his shoulder and saw his ship, she gasped. She jumped back down into the water and ran towards him, grabbing the sides of his arms with her wet hands. She held onto him and stood on her toes, scrutinizing his face.
"You're actually here?" she asked quietly. "Here here?"
He nodded. "I'm here here."
"But...I don't understand." Her eyebrows furrowed as she let go of him and took a step back. "Why are you here? I'm...I still can't join you."
"I know. I came here so I could join you, instead."
He watched her intently as her emotions changed from confusion to surprise to pure joy. She smiled and her eyes lit up the sky. And for the first time, he smiled back.
She suddenly jumped towards him, wrapping her arms around him. He stumbled back half a step but caught her in his arms just in time before they both fell. Then she was laughing and he was laughing and she pressed a quick kiss on his lips and how strange it all felt. It was as if he'd been locked inside a pitch dark basement and was finally seeing the light of day for the first time in a decade.
Rey was always good at breaking things. This time, she finally broke through the mask Ben wore on the inside.
"We can't trust him, Rey!" Poe cried out. "He's trying to manipulate you!"
The others certainly did not welcome him with open arms. When he followed Rey back up from the shore towards the camp, they were met with a group of angry faces and weapons drawn.
An argument ensued, with Rey, Poe, and Finn shouting back and forth, while Jannah, the leader of the Kef Bir tribe, occasionally interrupted to point out that the three of them were arguing in circles.
"I know that's he's truly turned!" Rey exclaimed. "I can sense it through the Force. Can't you, Finn?"
Finn glanced over at Ben desperately. "I...I think..."
"Oh no, this doesn't get to be some Jedi mind trick party," Poe interjected. "We are not bringing the Supreme Leader of the First Order back to base. That's final."
"What about as a prisoner?" Jannah suggested.
The trio fell silent. Poe and Finn shared a devious look. Rey turned to look at Ben and he shot her a pleading look. With one hand of her hip, she tilted her head to the side, thinking about it for a moment. "Yeah, alright. That works too."
"Wait what-" Before Ben could finish his protest, Rey reached up and tapped his forehead and everything started going to black.
Oh for hell's sake. He should have never taught her that damn trick.
When he came to, he was lying on the old leather seats in a familiar ship. He'd recognize the smell of the Millennium Falcon anywhere. Equal parts exhaust, blaster powder, and rust.
He sat up and noticed that his wrists were tied together with metal chains. At the sound of the chains clanging together, Rey walked over to him and happily sat down beside him.
"We're almost there," she said. "Gave the rest of the Resistance a fair warning that we had important cargo aboard."
"Is this all really necessary?" he asked, holding up his restrained hands.
"Yes, until everyone can trust you."
"And what do I need to do to make everyone trust me?"
She grinned like a child unable to keep a secret. "We've decided to defer judgement to the General."
Just then, he felt the ship land on the ground and everyone began departing the Falcon. His heart raced as he followed Rey down the walkway and out onto a jungle planet. A large crowd had gathered outside. Everyone wanted to get a look at him, it seemed. But standing before them all was the woman he'd been running away from for so long, yet his heart always came back to her. His mother.
Rey leaned over, gave his arm a supportive squeeze, then pushed him forward. He walked towards his mother and suddenly felt like a teenager again, not sure how to control his awkwardly long limbs. He tripped over a spare ladder on the ground and stumbled the last few steps until he finally stood in front of Leia.
His mother had gotten older. There were more grays in her hair, which she still wore pinned up in the Alderaan custom for grieving. The ache in chest grew stronger as he stood there, unable to think of what to say. Sorry for burning down Uncle Luke's temple. Sorry for giving in to the dark side instead of fighting it. Sorry for killing Dad. I regret it every single day. Sorry for everything. I miss you.
Leia reached her hand up and he bent down to meet her halfway. She placed her hand around his cheek, like she used to do when he was a child. A silent tear drop fell from his eye and down onto her fingers.
"I..." he trailed off, still not sure how to say it. There weren't enough words that could ever construe his million apologies. There weren't enough hours left in his lifetime to ever repent his wrongdoings.
Instead, Leia just smiled. "I know."
Finn stood by the windows and watched as the freighter entered the Exegol atmosphere and through the thick layer of thunderclouds surrounding the entire planet. Suddenly, the Emperor's Final Order fleet came into view. Finn heard several gasps behind him as the others took in the sight. Hundreds and hundreds of ships with enough power to destroy the entire galaxy. The task before them grew exponentially more daunting.
More and more of the Resistance's ships appeared as Poe led the pilots down to the ominous Final Order fleet. Further out below them, two X-wings were landing on to the planet surface. From the distance, Finn could just make out the glow of the yellow double-saber and the red lightsaber. Instinctively, Finn reached down to his waist for the hilt of his own lightsaber.
"Hey, you ready?"
Rose's voice snapped Finn out of his thoughts. He let go of his lightsaber and turned to her. "Yeah."
She crossed her arms as she studied his face. "What's wrong?"
He sighed and turned back to the window. The two lightsabers on the ground were now no longer in sight. "I just feel like I should have gone with them," he said.
Rose gave him a knowing look. "I know, but we need you up here to help take out the signal tower. We need to stop these ships, just in case..."
"They'll be okay," Finn argued, more to convince himself than to convince Rose. "They'll kill the Emperor and stop all of it. But yeah, we need to take out the tower, just in case."
"Just in case," she nodded.
The large stone slab slowly descended and brought them into the depths of the ancient Sith temple. From the glow of their lightsabers, they could make out the tall, menacing statues, still perfectly intact in the dark ruins.
"You've been here before?" she whispered.
"Yes, he's right up there," he replied.
They cautiously walked down the long corridor, watchful of every shadow, ready to take on any attackers. Yet there was no one. The entire cavern was hauntingly silent.
Finally, when they reached the gallant Sith throne, they found the Emperor not attached to the giant machine as Ben had previously seen, but instead sitting helplessly on the ground. His skin was shriveled and decrepit, his eyes were sunken impossibly deep into his skull, and his back was hunched forward so he appeared even smaller than he was. This is what was left of him without his mechanical life support. The Emperor Palpatine, Darth Sidious, the last Sith lord, reduced to a pathetic heap of bones in an oversized robe.
"Ah, my dear granddaughter..." the Emperor said in a raspy voice, "I finally found you."
She immediately lunged forward, thrusting the edge of her lightsaber mere millimeters from his chin. "I am not your granddaughter."
The old man smiled sinisterly and the skin around his lips creased so deeply Ben was scared it would fall right off. "You can't change what's in your blood, Rey," the Emperor said. "My power already flows through you."
"And I will kill you with that same power." Rey pushed her lightsaber further forward, burning part of the Emperor's skin. Yet Palpatine didn't react, as if he felt no pain at all.
Something wasn't right. Ben spun on his heel looking around the empty chamber, not finding any sign of all the equipment and workers who had surrounded the Emperor the last time. Where was everyone? Why did the Emperor detach himself from the dark Force machinery that was the only thing keeping him alive? Why was he sitting there on the ground where the throne was less than a meter away? Why was he waiting for them?
"Rey, wait," Ben called out, taking a step towards her.
But she continued on, ignoring him. She pressed her yellow blade deeper into the old man, trying to incite a reaction but getting only the Emperor's twisted smile.
"Your parents tried to keep you a secret from me. I didn't even know I had a granddaughter until you were four. Then, they sold you off as a Stormtrooper! Your father was always so clever, I'll give him that."
"You killed him!" Rey pulled back and swung at the Emperor from the side, burning through his robe and knocking him down onto the ground. "How could you kill your own son?!"
Lying on the ground, already nine-tenth dead, the Emperor jeered her one last time. "Because he was useless."
Ben jumped forward to try to stop her, but it was too late. Rey was angrier than he had ever seen her and in one swift move, she positioned her lightsaber vertically above the Emperor and brought it down to the ground, fatally piercing him through his stomach.
The ground began to tremble underneath their feet. Disembodied voices began chanting in the ancient Sith language. Ghosts of all the Sith lords that came before now appeared in the empty amphitheater, cheering.
Rey pulled her lightsaber up and stumbled back against Ben. "What's happening?"
"I don't know why," he said, "but I think the Emperor was baiting you to kill him."
Suddenly, the ghost of Emperor Palpatine himself began to rise over his old, decaying corpse. He threw his head and laughed.
"Foolish girl!" The voice of his ghost was stronger, and sounded just like the maniacal voice that was in Ben's head. "You are a Palpatine after all, for you have such hate in heart."
"Why did you want Rey?" Ben asked, stepping forward in front of her. "Why did you want to be killed?"
"So I can be reborn."
The Emperor's ghost flew forwards and into Rey's body. She screamed in pain before her body began convulsing. Then, her body was levitated several feet in the air and her lightsaber fell out of her grasp and onto the ground.
"Rey!" Ben ran towards her but was propelled backwards, as if there was a strong shield surrounding her.
After a second, her screaming stopped and her body fell limp. Still floating in mid-air, she opened her eyes and the sight terrified Ben. In place of her warm, brown eyes, now a pair of yellow slit eyes glared back.
"The only way to become a Sith lord is to kill the former in an act of hate." Rey's mouth was moving, but it was the Emperor's voice that spoke. "As the Sith master, every Sith who ever existed lived inside me, and now we all live inside her."
All at once, all the ghosts who had appeared now flew towards Rey, entering her soul. Ben struck helplessly at the invisible shield with his lightsaber, but it was no use. He couldn't save her. This was all his fault. He should have never told her who she was and what happened to her parents. He fell right into the Emperor's plans and didn't even realize it.
Now, Rey's voice turned even deeper as she spoke from the collective conscience of all the Sith. "We were searching for the strongest Force user so we could take their body. At first, we thought it was you."
She finally came back down onto the ground. She walked towards Ben like a predator, stepping through where the invisible barrier was. She raised her arm and sent a Force so strong it sent him flying all the way across the chamber and into one of the tall statues. The impact caused a large crack, either in the stone statue or in Ben's back or in both. He rolled down onto the ground and just managed to scramble out of the way in time before the pieces of the statue came crashing down.
"That's why we got inside your head," Rey continued in her deep, ominous voice. "We pushed you until you cracked. We made Kylo Ren. We thought you would be the one to carry on the Sith legacy. But then, her powers awakened."
He struggled back onto his feet. The pain in his back was piercing, but he stood firm and swung at the possessed Rey with his lightsaber. In a simple swiping motion, she sent the lightsaber right out of his hands. It flew towards the direction of the entrance, bouncing against the ground before it fell over the ledge and into the abyss.
"Now that we have her, we are unstoppable!" Lightning shot out of her palms as she reached up towards the sky. The lightning surged, stronger and brighter. Ben looked up to see that the electricity was interfering with every Resistance ship flying above them.
"Rey, stop! Please," he pleaded. "I know you're still in there. You have to fight this."
"Rey Palpatine is dead," the voice said. "And so are you."
She pulled her hands down and aimed the lightning directly at him instead. The shock completely immobilized him as he flew backwards over the ledge and fell and fell and fell.
This is how I die, he thought. Not as a villain or a martyr, but a fucking disappointment.
As he was about to hit the ground, he closed his eyes and braced for impact. But the impact never came. He opened his eyes to see that he was floating half an inch from the ground. Then, the Force gently released him onto the cavern floor.
He sat up and looked around frantically. No one else was here. So who just saved him?
Something was calling out to him. A subtle voice, too far away to make out clearly yet undeniably familiar. He listened intently for several seconds before he realized it was coming through the Force. He shut his eyes and focused, opening himself to the greater Force, trying to remember what Luke had once taught him about meditating.
The mysterious voice drifted closer. Ben...Ben...Be strong, Ben, and get up!
His eyes snapped open as he realized the voice was undoubtedly his mother's.
How are you here? he asked through the Force. How did you save me?
This is our last chance. You have to fight, Ben. You are the last hope.
Rey is the last hope, he argued back.
And Rey needs your help, Leia replied. Go to her. It's not too late.
With every ounce of willpower left in his body, enduring the pain of broken bones, he leaned against the side of the cave wall as he stood back on his feet. He gazed up to the top of the ledge from where he fell. The height was insurmountable.
I can't make it, Mother. I can barely walk.
You can. I will help you. I'll be with you the whole way.
He felt a jolt of the Force go through him and was suddenly invigorated. The pain was dulled, he regained his breath, and he climbed and climbed and climbed.
"Poe! Poe, are you alright?!" Finn was shouting into the comm-receiver, but got no response. They were standing atop the main carrier's left wing after successfully taking out its guns.
"The lightning probably fried the signal," Jannah said.
"What if something happened to Rey? How is the Emperor doing this?" Finn asked desperately.
"We don't have time to think about all that," Jannah said, pointing to the carrier's bridge that was transferring the signal to launch all the others. "We need to bring that transmitter down now."
Finn looked around before his sights set on the final set of guns which were still functional. It sent a large blast in their direction and Finn and Jannah ducked just in time.
He glanced down at his lightsaber, activating the blue blade. He had an idea.
When Ben arrived back in the throne chamber, Rey glared at him with those foreign, demonic eyes. He came to a stop before her and stood with knees bent, ready for the attack this time. He hid his right hand behind his back.
"You are a Skywalker after all," her low voice growled. "You just won't die."
She brought her arms up to strike him with lightning again. Just in time, he brought his hand from behind his back to reveal his lightsaber which he retrieved from the pit below. He deflected the lightning with his lightsaber, sending it ricocheting across the chamber. Rocks and boulders came tumbling down.
With a shove of her arms, the strength of the lightning intensified. He felt his feet sliding backwards as he strained to hold on, pushing against her force. With a pained grunt, he angled his blade so that the deflection turned back onto her. She let out a low-octave yell.
In the back of his mind, his mother's voice was a constant encouragement, telling him to be brave and strong and valiant. Telling him he has always been all those things. Telling him he has always been worthy. Slowly, more voices joined hers. His uncle's, his grandfather's, and hundreds of Jedi poured into his conscience. The voices filled him with more light than he ever knew possible, until it drove out the last of the shadows that still plagued his mind.
(What if he had grown up with these voices in his head, instead of Snoke's? Would it have been enough?)
Overhead, there was a loud explosion as ships fell from the sky. Whether it was the Final Order or Resistance, he couldn't tell.
Rey continued sending the surging lighting towards him and he kept reflecting the Force back to herself. He couldn't hold on for much longer. Even with the strength of all the Jedi past, he couldn't hold on. The act was slowly killing him.
At least, he thought, he was causing a diversion and giving the others more time. Giving Finn more time to destroy the signal. Giving Lando more time to call out to the others. Giving the rest of the galaxy a few more moments to decide there was still something left worth fighting for.
Finally, the red blade of his lightsaber sputtered out and he fell to the ground in exhaustion. The lightning now struck him in the center of his chest and pain seared through every inch of his body. Through it all, he kept his eyes locked on hers. Underneath the possessed voice, underneath the yellow eyes, he held onto hope that Rey was still inside. In desperate times like these, hope was only thing left, however foolish. Nothing stays broken forever.
His vision began to blur. His breath slowed. The voice of his mother came closer, as if he was about to join her in the realm beyond. His heart broke as he lay there dying, watching Rey stand above him while the monsters inside consumed her alive.
Just as his life Force was about to leave him, the onslaught of lightning stopped.
"NOOO!" The scream morphed from the low, demonic voice into Rey's own. She was overpowering them. She was battling for survival inside her own body. She screamed louder than he had ever heard. "GET. OUT. OF. MY. HEAD!"
She fell to her knees and her arms shook, a thousand souls fighting to control the limbs. She managed to bring her hands up to the sides to her head, pressing her palms into her temples.
With a guttural scream, electricity shot through her palms and into her own head. Her voice morphed back and forth between hers and the deep timber of the Sith.
She was killing herself. He struggled to push himself off of the ground.
His lightsaber was destroyed by the lightning, but hers still worked. On his hands and knees, he reached out and beckoned her lightsaber to him. As it flew in midair, one of her hands stuck out and stopped it, pulling the hilt towards her. He clenched his fists as he pulled harder.
"Ben!" Her voice was strained and distorted, but it was hers. She was begging him. Tears fell from her eyes. "Please!"
He staggered forward another half step, using the last of his strength to pull the hilt closer to him.
He couldn't overpower her. The lightsaber twitched between them in the tug-of-war, practically close enough to touch. Leaning forward, his extended fingers wrapped around the edge of the metal hilt. She leaned forward and did the same. He couldn't overpower her, so there was only one thing he could do.
"Please," she muttered through strained breaths. "You have to."
It must be done, the Jedi voices agreed.
He knew what he had to do, but didn't know if he had the strength to do it.
Squeezing his eyes shut, he activated her lightsaber.
She gasped.
The lightning abruptly stopped.
The twin yellow blades ignited, piercing them both in the chest.
Finn stood ready in front of the blaster. Jannah kept protesting that he was going to get himself killed, that he was a madman. And maybe he was. But it's the madmen who won the wars.
The blaster lit up as it ignited and the blaster bolt shot out right in Finn's direction. Holding his lightsaber like a bat, he swung at the blaster bolt, deflecting it up towards the window of the bridge. It shot through the glass, past the unsuspecting captain, and into their main controls. Soon, the entire bridge burst into flames.
"Nice shot, Finn!"
His heart raced as he heard that familiar voice again. "Poe! You're alive!"
"Yeah, almost crashed but I'm okay," Poe responses through the intercom. "The others answered our call. They're all here. We're going to win, Finn!"
And for a second, Finn truly believed it.
But then, a tangible shift occurred in the Force, strong enough that it knocked the breath out of him. It was what he felt when Luke had passed, but this time immensely stronger. Not one, not two, but three strong Force users disappeared, all at once.
Finn fell against the side of the ship. Clutching the wall for balance, he closed his eyes and searched through the Force for another call. He searched for Rey's Force signature, for Leia's, for Ben's...nothing. He searched for any possible sign at all, and only felt silence and stillness.
In this moment, he had become completely alone in the Force.
After the debris had settled, Ben peeled open his eyes. Rey lay on the ground beside him, a gaping wound in her chest. He crawled over until he could hold her in his arms, pressing her lifeless head against his shoulder.
Fate hadn't been kind to them, but despite it all, they found their way to each other. In this vast universe, perhaps that's all you could ever ask for. Of everything that ever was and everything that will ever be, he was glad he found someone who made him feel a little less alone, a little less small.
Then, she faded away until he was only holding onto her hollow clothes.
Does it hurt? Dying? he asked.
It feels like nothing at all, Luke's voice responded.
But don't our word for it, Leia added.
Then, a voice he never thought he would hear again called out to him from the Force realm beyond. Rey's voice, her true voice, whispering his name, beckoning him to join her. It's peaceful here, Ben. Don't be afraid.
Slowly, he laid down on the cold ground and with a final, heavy sigh, he closed his eyes.
Finn placed the three lightsabers in the cloth. His own, which had once belonged to Anakin and Luke Skywalker. Ben Solo's. And Rey's.
He stood and used the Force to send the lightsabers deep into the sand.
When he looked back up, an old woman was standing there, watching him.
"No one has been here in years. Who are you?"
He glanced down at the serial number on his skin. Even after all this time, he couldn't escape his past. "I'm Finn."
"Finn who?"
He glanced back towards the old Tattooine building and saw four ghosts materialize. Luke, Leia, Rey, and Ben. Luke gave Finn an encouraging nod.
They couldn't escape the past, but the future was for the taking.
He turned back to the old woman.
"Just Finn."
note: sorry this took so long. let's just say this final tros chapter really derailed... whether that's a good thing or a bad thing, you tell me. thanks for reading this small chaos of a story.