The night it happened was impossible to forget. That night would haunt Ailsa, it would chase Luke, and it would see the world of the Jedi once more upturned. That night it all changed. It all hurt. It all burned.

The day started so normally. It was a beautiful morning; the snow was melting, the trees began to appear green once more. Water had begun to run in the creeks and rivers and the lake's surface had cracked. The cold breath of winter still lingered but the sun pushed bright and warmer than it had before.

Ben did not see it. The break between classes had seen him withdraw. He was so quiet that day. He seemed so on edge, so angry. He snapped quickly at things, yelling at a child for bumping into him in the hall and watching everyone from under his brows instead of with his usual smile.

Yet Ailsa had woken beside him and all had felt normal. It had felt good – they were headed toward a new Horizon. The Academy was training a new generation of Force users determined to bring about the best in the universe. There was light and there was love and both seemed to be working well.

He'd even helped dress her that morning, making sure her robes were on straight and nothing amiss except the crooked line of her smile. In return, she had messed his hair up and managed to steal his lightsaber twice before they ventured out. He was distant. He did not snap at her. He did not yell. Where all others got a rough edge, Ailsa did not. It was as if he were preparing her for a good goodbye.

But there is no such thing as a 'good goodbye' when an order to burn the Jedi was given. There were to be none alive except Kylo Ren and his knights at the end of it. Only they were to be drawing breath. Only they were so determined.

The moment Ben put that helmet on that day was the day he became Kylo. Ben Solo fell with the rest. He died where they died and was left in the rubble to freeze as dawn ventured to look upon the next day.

Ailsa had been alone when it all began. Those who had come on the supply ship and set up explosives around the Temple. As dusk set in the buildings began to crumble. Walls fell, bricks were thrown, and confusion reigned. The younger trainees were taught to gather in the domed hall when an emergency arose and they went running on small feet.

Murder awaited them. The whisper of the voice of Snoke stood in the minds of the Knights of Ren as they closed the exits and shut Skywalker out and the children in.

Ben was in his room alone. He stared at it for one last moment before drawing a new lightsaber from beneath his desk. He had worked on it in secret, its unstable red blade wavering with a sharp hiss as he turned it on, testing it before turning the weapon upon the room that he had once called home.

The first thing to do was kill Ben Solo. The rest would be easy once he fell. The rest would be fine once he was dead. The helmet went on after the room lay in tatters. His eye caught something in a moment, a little yellow disk. That small kite from a boyhood dream. No one could see his face, no one could guess what was felt at that moment.

A man and a kite and a stretch of silence and memory.

He used The Force to draw the object near, an action he had performed so many times before. Yet this time, as it touched his palm, the kite ignited into flame and began to burn.

Such a small thing was cast upon the shredded sheets, setting them alight and spreading heat to all else.

It all burned. The smoke was intoxicating, its cloud billowing up to shroud the room in shadow. It stained the walls, it heated the building, and the walls began to groan under the weight of anger and flame.

Ailsa had heard the explosions and began to run. Her first thought went to Ben, to the man who had run his fingers along her spine to wake her that morning, and who had pressed his lips to the back of her shoulder when she protested. She ran for him; to find him. They had become a team, an inseparable pair.

She was never going to be a half looking for another to make herself whole. She was an entire being who enjoyed the entirety of his being. It was as simple as that and it was such simplicity that had left her blind.

The smoke from Ben's room had her moving to that wing of The Temple. No one was there when she arrived. The corridors were empty and all that could be heard was the crackle of fire. Even the birds had gone silent.

Not far away stood a cluster of trainees surrounded by strangers in black. Stories of Order 66 came to them and all seemed to lift up with hope. The Jedi had survived once; they could survive this. Light always found a way through.

Yet they were unarmed. They were small. They too were blinded by simplicity.

Luke Skywalker was there. He stood over them protectively as the sun began to set and listened as more of The Temple was destroyed. What remained of the day was blotted out by smoke and what remained of peace shook under the ground and trembled with the knowledge of what was to come.

Blood spilled so easily. It ran along stone floors and followed grout lines. It made patterns on the earth and pooled beneath heads, matting hair and staining skin. Some fell fast. They found peace quickly. Others were not so lucky.

Such is the way of things.

Ailsa found Skywalker and managed to cut away into the Domed Hall. Her lightsabers lit up brightly, the trainees rushing out behind her into what they hoped was clear air and an escape. Luke spurred them on.

"Run!" He screamed, eyes confused and wild.

The Skylander was caught in a battle with masked men, deflecting gunshots and blunt weapons. They beat at her all at once, leaving bruises and splitting her lip before Luke intervened.

"Go. Go with the children. Make them safe."

Ailsa threw the attackers back with a blast of The Force, nodding at her mentor. She spun her lightsabers around once; an anxious habit. Her mind could not catch up with reality. Her senses could not comprehend what was going on.

The Jedi Temple was being attacked with terrifying intent.

The grounds were to be a graveyard in hours unless something could be done.

The young woman caught up with the trainees. They had scattered aimlessly, most running for the woods. Ailsa pushed them on in that direction, turning off her weapons to try help disguise them in the night. The ground was slick with half melted ice and many slipped. Many were crying.

"Shhh." Ailsa brought them to a pause, listening. Behind them, The Temple could be seen burning. Roofs collapsed under the brunt of fire and an assault of explosives. Yet nearby something could be felt. In the darkness, something waited for them. The wood felt haunted somehow.

The hum of an engine had the girl's heart dropping. A craft. It was armed and no doubt equipped with heat detectors to spy out any who thought to hide.

It opened fire with brutal force. Ailsa managed to create a barrier with The Force, trying to deflect as many shots as possible as the trainees once again scattered. They ran in fear and blind terror, not looking where they went.

Ailsa felt herself slump against a tree. Their tree. The one she and Ben had sat in so many times. She felt herself fall against the familiar bark as she watched so many young ones cut down. Shock hit her hard. So many faces that had been smiling just hours before now lay in cold slush with no expression. Glassy eyes with no spirit stared up at the sky and down at the earth, all looking but none seeing. Trees were blasted apart, splinters sent flying. The gunfire brought down old bark, their heights groaning as entire lengths of forest were cut down and thrown into the heap.

Ailsa's hand went to her mouth, fingers shaking and not from cold. She wanted to be sick. Her people knew of death – they did not fear it. They did not fear a fight, nor gore, nor blood. Yet they were not unjust and they respected all fallen. Never would they attack a training temple; a school. A place of guidance for those seeking the light.

None of it made sense.

The voice from that day entered her mind. It slid in aimlessly and wandered around, speaking terror in a manner that turned men to cripples. It was not a voice to turn fear into power. It was something to disable her.

Ailsa grew angry, shutting her mind off and rising not as a student of the Jedi Temple but as a child of Skye. The rules of the Academy did not matter if such rules could not save them. Light and Dark were present here, and all they wrought was destruction when they came together.

The woman rose, standing straight in time to see a figure through the trees. He approached her, shoulders broad and upright, head covered and expressionless behind a mask.

The lightsaber that lit up at his side was blood red. It glowed angrily, its beam dancing in fury and instability. It was being torn apart by its own intent and power. Yet it was guided by a single hand.

She did not recognize him.

She did not know that inside the suit stood someone who had held her. He had laughed with her. He knew her taste. She knew the shape of his back, the flow of his hair, the sound of his voice when he was half asleep. But she did not know this enemy.

Ailsa armed herself. Her blades glowed at her sides, their hum distinct. The craft above saw the encounter begin and its guns fell silent. It drifted away, heading over the wood in search of strays.

"Why?" She called out over the space between them.

"You could not understand." The voice was unknown. It was muffled by the helmet, hidden so neatly away. "You could not comprehend what is coming."

"Try me." Ailsa felt her hair whipped about by a sudden winter wind; a cry from the season over the planet.

"No."

With that he advanced upon her, throwing his lightsaber into hers with such force that the young woman had to stagger back. She drove back at him with quick strikes, trying to find a weak spot and attempting to unbalance him.

He was good. He was powerful. He kept his footing even on the ice, mind locked away and hand set upon his task. This was what it took to gain power. This is what it took to move to The Dark Side and follow in the footsteps of his bloodline. Vader. Vader would be proud. Vader had done the same.

Ailsa dodged a blow, her assailant's blade hitting the ground and giving her enough of an opportunity to slip around him. She launched up at the trunk of the tree she knew so well, leaping up and off it, aiming at the man. Perhaps it was a weakness, but she did not bring her lightsaber down upon him. Instead, she aimed a kick at the helmet, knocking him sideways and forcing him to lean upon a nearby stone for balance.

He growled in anger, glaring through the visor at her. He did not know her. Kylo Ren did not know this girl and he did not think her strong enough to save.

"BEN!" A voice reverberated through the wood. The blue of Luke Skywalker's lightsaber signaled his coming. "Ben. Stop this now!"

Ailsa was about to drive forward with another attack on her briefly stumbled foe when she came to a dead halt. Brow furrowed, then eyes widened. Ben. Ben Solo. No. Her head shook, but Luke kept coming, he kept saying that name.

The man in black turned and spun his lightsaber in an act of gentle rebellion. "Ben Solo is dead, Old Man. You will not have the chance to mourn him for long."

"No." Ailsa swallowed. "Ben would not die so easily."

"Oh, he didn't. But he is gone now. I am Kylo Ren – I killed him myself."

Her jaw grew tight. Luke did nothing to advance upon his nephew. "Your name is not Kylo Ren. Your name is Ben Solo. I can see you in there. I can see you and you know it!"

Never had anyone seen Luke Skywalker so angry. He was furious, he was full of angst. So many had died. So much destroyed. His life, his work, his dream for the light – all gone when no one was ready to look. The darkness had come so fast. It had come and it had brought so many black shadows with it.

"Do not call me that!" Kylo Ren yelled through his mask, forcing himself at Skywalker with a heavy blade. Luke was already wounded, that much was obvious. He was tired and his body was bowed.

"BEN!" Ailsa called, wanting to see what his response might be. The new name was still so fresh, the old one still tied to instinct.

He turned. His uncle knocked him with The Force, sending him to stand between the pair who claimed to know him best. Yet they did not know this man. Neither knew of Kylo Ren or what he had been born of.

"Ben…" The woman turned her lightsabers off and dropped them to the ground, hands open and palms bare in the cold. She was shaking a little at the revelation, but she stood tall and called out. None of it made sense. None of it. "It's me. It's Ailsa. You woke up beside me. You like the smell of my hair; you say it still has the scent of the sea even after all of these months. I know you. I know you sleep on your front. You are a man who challenges me, who changed me. You are a man who loves me."

Luke watched all with a sinking heart. He saw so much of his father in the moment. He saw so much of Anakin and the way he had been torn apart.

"Ben…"

"Ben is dead!" The assailant screamed. He threw his hand out at the young woman, catching her by the throat with The Force. "Do not speak of him. The boy you loved is no more. You will join him soon."

Ailsa felt her feet leaving the ground. She could not speak and for a moment, she could not move. Her own hands went to her neck, clawing at the skin there as if such a thing might help relieve the pressure. She felt the muscles there strain; she felt her airway stifled and crack. Lungs burned like the fire that had now reached the wood. Flame touched the trees, spreading hot and fast and seeing all lit up in a new light. Ailsa was dying in his embrace, and he had every intention of completing the job.

He watched her there as he held her. She had to die. She had to for him to complete the task. He saw her eyes; he knew their color so well. Behind the mask he closed his own gaze and tightened his grip, the other hand coming out to halt Skywalker as he lurched forward at what remained of his nephew.

"Why, Ben? Why?" Luke staggered back to his feet, armed and advancing. "Put her down and tell me why!"

Ailsa reached for her lightsabers, she called them to herself with The Force. As soon as they lifted toward her they fell flat again, Kylo Ren casting the weapons aside in a break from his uncle.

She wanted to say she would not fight him. She wanted to take that mask off and look him in the eye and see that he had changed. Such thoughts wavered as spots of black climbed into Ailsa's vision. She gasped for air, the veins in her eyes turning red as he deprived her of air and sought to snuff out her life.

The moment he had taken to move her weapons aside was moment enough for Luke to get a hit on Kylo Ren. Their lightsabers met and with a snarl he threw the girl aside, tossing her as far as he could toward the river. He watched for a moment as she hit the snow, limbs lax enough to indicate that she was no longer conscious. The water could kill her. The cold would make doubly sure of it. And just in case; the falls to the lake had begun to flow again and their force might pin her under for long enough to remove what remained of the air in her body.

Ailsa died there in his mind. She went weakly, as someone blinded by love and its simplicity. She saw only the light in him and had not been prepared for the darkness.

The ice of the water embraced her form, digging into her skin with the pain of a thousand knives. It knocked her system hard, bringing her head around enough to gasp for air. Her eyes saw red and blue lightsabers in the trees. That was it. The current pulled her hard, ancient fingers reaching into her clothes to weigh her down. Ailsa could not move, her nerve endings felt as if they had been frozen shut. Her body ached and cried for air, screaming at her for it in pure desperation. Yet her mind wandered to all the moments of the months gone by. She searched for a sign of change. She looked for a point where this had all been obvious and could find none.

Betrayal burned her more than all else. The loss seared through her soul. The young woman was thrown about by the river mercilessly, the snow melt rushing past in a bitter current. Her body drove up for air, occasionally getting enough to prolong the inevitable.

What happened at The Temple from there was unknown to her. From there things went dark. She felt herself falling toward the lake, thrown through the cold air and hearing nothing but the water. Ailsa pretended that she heard the sea. She believed she would see Ben soon – that such an attack could be him, even if he wore a mask.

The water took the Skylander and pulled her deep. She did not take a breath before going under. Something about the silence under the water brought a new fight to her. It was so quiet down there. It was peaceful. Ailsa faced death in the dark, cold embrace of the winter water and she finally decided to fight back. She swam up only to be thrown back down by the weight of the falls. Her body was bruised from the drop, but she could not feel it. She had a split in her hairline, cuts and grazes from the rock face that the waterfall lay upon. The cold numbed it all. Fear made it irrelevant.

She pushed up again. Her hand reached the surface, breaking the air and trying to pull her up. Nothing. Again. Splashes, cries under water. Nothing. Desperation clawed at the surface. Grief powered adrenaline and such a thing prolonged her torture. Each attempt grew weaker until finally her fingers found a solid rock. Ailsa pulled up, palm sliced open by the attempt. Finally, her head broke above the water and she clung to the base of a cliff beneath a waterfall. It drenched her, it kept her hidden. It kept her cold and disguised from the craft that searched the shore. Yet humans were not designed for such things. Her limbs grew heavy again. She began to shake from the cold and then she felt no chill at all. After all the fight, in the end, she slipped back into the lake, floating on her back as silence fell. All that could be heard was the burn of the temple and the cry of the falls. Ailsa paid no attention to any of it. She looked at the stars, at the two moons.

She and Ben had lain side-by-side and stared upon such a view. They had been together with each other, invested and trusting, loved as friends and then as whatever had come after.

This was it.

This was the end.

Such a thought was the final memory Ailsa had. She had been found on the shoreline, lips blue and skin white. Help had been sent. Dawn had come and the ships had landed, men and women running off. Han Solo and Leia Organa were amongst them. They found flags from The First Order. They discovered the power of the Dark Side when it awoke and made itself known.

They were not the ones to find the young woman. Things would have been different if they had. Perhaps.

Black and blue she was pulled from the land. Scavengers had arrived with the ships and been lost in the confusion. An enterprising man had gathered the Force User up and put her aboard his craft. No trace of her was found at The Jedi temple. It was assumed that she had drowned and was at the bottom of the lake, forever entombed in water. Her blood had been discovered at the waterfall. Pieces of clothing had been torn and left upon the rock. Her lightsabers had been taken from the snow and brought to Han and Leia. That was all that remained. That was all that was sent back to Skye.

Yet as such a message went one way, she went the other. Death shrouded the planet and all who touched upon it. Death clung to her hard and fast and argued with those who would bring her back from the brink.

Such a discussion had one of two outcomes. Before the decision was made she would stay in an area of grey. Such a thing was fortunate. Grey is what Ailsa knew best.

A/N: Thank you for reading so far. Please let me know what you thought by dropping a review. Constructive criticism is always welcome!
We do not know much about the fall of The Jedi Temple. It was difficult to write this chapter as a result, but I hope you enjoyed it nonetheless.