I slid through the shadows of Starkiller Base like a phantom. My chances at escaping the base alive were slim, but I knew clever use of my Force powers could tip the odds in my favor. The only problem was that I barely understood how to use them.

I sought cover in a doorway, closing my eyes and clearing my mind of extraneous thoughts. I sensed the living energy of the base all around me – particularly the low hum of machinery and a high pitched whine that must have been electrical power. The noises did me no good, however, and I imagined carefully twisting a radio tuner in my head to filter out those frequencies. Holding my breath, I could now hear... people. Heavy footsteps marched from the direction I had come, while a floor below me a man sneezed and resumed his muffled conversation.

I dropped my focus down toward the conversation, imagining the Force pulling the soundwaves of every word closer to my ears. The man was discussing a shuttle bay – a way I could escape the base. I poured energy into his mind like I'd done with the Stormtrooper guarding my cell – not merging my mind with his, exactly, but soaking his brain with enough power to strongly influence his thoughts.

Provide directions to the shuttle bay out loud, I thought to him, carefully sliding the suggestion toward his mind. However, it didn't fully catch, and instead hung suspended between us. Though I couldn't see him, I imagined the man had a very glazed look in his eyes.

Your companion just asked for directions. Don't keep him waiting, I added hastily, remembering that providing a motive and a sense of urgency had made the trick more effective against the Stormtrooper. I sensed the suggestion sink into his mind, and then...

"Take the hallway to the right," the man said out loud, "go down to floor five, and follow the signs for the East Cargo Bay."

"I know where it is, moron," his companion snapped as I withdrew my focus and left the shelter of the doorway.

I moved quickly through the base, blaster held high as I routinely paused and pushed my new Force-enhanced hearing outwards. It was easy to avoid the noisy roving squads of Stormtroopers, but then I turned a corner and almost smacked into the back of a silent wheeled sentry droid. I carefully stepped backward, imagining the Force propelling the sound of my footsteps away from the droid's sensors, and managed to retreat before it noticed me.

It took an inhuman amount of effort to maintain my fledgling connection to the Force. I continuously imagined binding its energy to me lest it atrophy and leave me powerless. My concentration wavered with every step, already strained from my earlier duel with Kylo Ren. As I traversed the mammoth First Order base in search of the shuttle bay, I despaired that I would make it off the planet alive.

Then I turned a corner and practically ran into Han, Chewie and Finn. It was impossible to fully express the magnitude of joy and relief that rushed through my entire body. I had truly never experienced the warm glow of having friends who were willing to die to protect me. And when Chewie told me it had all been Finn's idea, I enveloped him in a crushing hug before he could see my lower lip tremble.

"How did you escape?" Finn's chest rumbled as he spoke. As a Stormtrooper, he had firsthand experience with Kylo Ren's temper. I'm sure he was amazed to find me conscious, not to mention scampering about the corridors of the base.

"I can't explain it," I whispered, thinking of my Force powers and mental battle with Ren, "and you wouldn't believe it."

However, I knew that once I could explain it, Finn would believe every word because he was my friend. I held that precious feeling close to my heart.

–

I knew the exact moment Han died, but it wasn't when the lightstaber erupted through his chest. It was just before, when the sun's light faded from the sky for the very last time.

The oscillator core filled with shadows, though none were so dark as the black aura that haunted Kylo Ren. However, I noticed something in his aura that hadn't been there before: brief silvery flashes, like lightning relentlessly blooming and dying inside storm clouds. I couldn't hear the words Han exchanged with his son, but clearly understood the indecision tormenting Kylo Ren.

I tried to connect with his mind, begging him to not kill Han, but my power grew fragile across such a huge distance and was blown away like dust. The silvery flashes slowed and shriveled in size, the frail source of light – of goodness – in Kylo Ren clearly suffocating under the evil that worshiped him.

Thick braids of energy continuously wove around Ren's form and then dispersed, as if in anarchy with themselves. But finally, the last bloom of light, positioned right over his heart, withered from existence and my stomach plummeted to my feet. Then, every single tendril of energy shuddered and curled inward – and exploded outward at the same moment as the lightsaber's blade. I cried out as if my own heart had been punctured.

Kylo Ren's gaze shot to mine like a magnet. The calculated loathing in his eyes transformed into unfathomable anger. Finn and I turned and ran.

–

Finn's agonized scream jolted me wide awake. Hazy purple flashes rent the air nearby, and while my mind struggled to understand what I was seeing, my body wailed at how miserably cold it was. Why was I lying in the snow?

The purple lights separated into separate blue and red light sabers, and all of the horrifying events of the past hour hurtled through my thoughts –- Kylo Ren murdering Han Solo, his father, escaping from the collapsing base, Ren's lightsaber sparking to life before us in the woods – and now he and Finn were battling furiously yards away from me.

The blazing red saber flashed in a downward arc with a powerful finality and the woods went still. A horrifying, numbing dread sunk into my skin.

Black energy snaked across the snow and twisted through tree trunks, seeking Luke's saber buried in the snow. Thinking of BB-8 and the map to Luke, I knew immediately I wouldn't let Kylo Ren take the saber without a fight. It belonged to Luke Skywalker, and I would return it to him.

'It belonged to my GRANDFATHER!' Kylo Ren bellowed wordlessly in my head, sending me a blistering wave of anger wrapped around an image of Darth Vader's helmet.

I flinched but then volleyed my own hatred back into his head, combined with the agonizing moment when he ripped his lightsaber free of Han Solo's chest.

He ignored me, fingers grasping harder at the air. His Force energy descended upon the saber to pick it up, but the black current of power merely slipped around the hilt like grains of sand. The saber was resisting him.

I flung my arm out, using the Force to lengthen my reach across the snow. Beams of energy shot through the air, straight and shining and perfect, and carefully engulfed the saber in light. Ren tried to bully it away with his own mass of black power, and for a moment the saber simply rocked from side to side as our forces collided around it like clouds in a storm. Then, the saber hurtled through mid-air and fit into my palm so decisively I wondered if it possessed a will of its own.

I don't know who charged first, but moments later my lightsaber rebounded off of Ren's with a spectacular crash. Trees crumpled to the ground around us. We fought like demons, our sabers colliding so hard they shaved off sparks of raw plasma energy.

I had never fought with a sword before, much less a lightsaber that could take off my own head, so my blows were unbalanced and clumsy. Kylo Ren steadily beat me backward as the ground trembled underneath us, and I ended up teetering on the precipice of a newly formed canyon in the earth.

"You need a teacher," Ren shouted at me over the blazing hum of our joined sabers. "I can show you the ways of the Force!"

He pushed a tightly constructed image into my brain – being important and lovely and fierce, becoming so powerful together that our shadow of fear suffocated the entire galaxy. The sensations were so sharp and foreign that I closed my eyes to shut them out. I did not want any part of the future he offered.

'Join me,' Ren breathed in my mind, but I ignored him and instead focused on the currents of Force energy threading through the air around me. I tugged several strands closer and wove them around my lightsaber, imagining the power suffusing through my hand til it was bound to the hilt. The blade become an extension of my arm and the plasmic energy pulsed in tune with my heart.

I opened my eyes and Ren already knew my answer.

'NEVER.'

Our lightsabers whirled and clashed, but my blows were heavy and true now that my saber was augmented by the Force. I wailed my saber against his own with every ounce of passion and strength I possessed.

Ren's movements slowed and I viciously pressed my advantage, slicing off a piece of his cloak and then leaving a smoking hole in his shoulder. However, he recovered from every blow like a machine fueled by hatred. If I hadn't been fighting for my life, I would have been awed by the way the dark side rewarded his fury with strength.

A bold kick to the chest sent Kylo to the ground, but he staggered to his feet once more and then used a move I was utterly unprepared for: a whip of dark energy lashed around my hand and pulled it straight into his grip. Unable to wrench it free, I used his own trick against him and sealed my other hand around his.

We grappled for control, gasping and straining as I sought to extinguish his saber in the snow at our feet. The last of my strength was quickly fading like warm breath exhaled into cold air. If I didn't end the battle now I wouldn't survive. Righteous fury bellowed through my veins at the thought of losing my chance to avenge Han Solo and dying at the hands of a coward who hid behind more than one mask.

I yanked a mental handful of energy toward me and suddenly moved faster than my mind could physically process, my reactions enhanced to supernatural speeds by the Force. When my brain caught up to my body I was standing over Ren as his blood sizzled on the tip of my lightsaber.

This time, he did not stand up. A glaring gash split his face from eyebrow to chin and the wound afforded me a grim satisfaction. Triumph and pride and power pounded through my veins.

A rumbling filled my head, resonating at a frequency so deep it vibrated down my spine. A strange voice muttered in my ear. Though the words were guttural and foreign, they pushed against my mind the same way the living silence had in the interrogation cell. Then, with a sinuous grace, the voice overpowered me and merged seamlessly with my mind before I understood what was happening. Hate and bitterness coursed through my thoughts like poison.

Overwhelmed by the dark train of thought, my fingers flexed against the hilt of the lightsaber. The bloodlust firing through my heart created a tempting fantasy where I drove the blade straight through Kylo Ren's heart, just as he had done to Han Solo.

Then the lightsaber zapped me, its angry pulse of energy a glaring reminder of the legacy I held in my hands. This very saber had been crafted by hands that later served the dark side, and it would not suffer being wielded by any who walked that sinister path.

The sibilant voice in my head retreated, leaving behind a throbbing headache and my horrified suspicion that I had briefly been possessed by the dark side of the Force.

The rumbling, however, only grew louder, and I realized it hadn't just indicated the presence of the dark side, but the imminent collapse of the planet itself. The ground literally separated, as if sundered by an enormous hand, and distance suddenly existed between us where it hadn't before.

Kylo Ren and I stared at each other across the gap. He looked so small, lying pitiful and broken and bleeding in the snow.

'We will meet again,' Ren growled in my head, accompanied by a mental vision where I bowed on my hands and knees before him in subservience.

I narrowed my eyes and flung him the entirety of what had just passed through my thoughts. 'The dark side wanted me to end your life. Han was right. It's only a matter of time before it or Snoke destroys you.'

The ground shifted violently underneath me, and my own fragile mortality flashed before my eyes. Mine and... Finn.

I turned and bolted away through the forest.

–

I had never imagined that the ripples of water in an ocean could resemble the same patterns found in vast expanses of sand. The waves glittered under the sun, so brilliant that I had to shade my eyes in a gesture entirely too reminiscent of my life on Jakku.

As we descended toward the planet, my breath completely stopped. We were approaching the island from my dreams. It struck me that I had never once paused to wonder if it was a real place. I landed the Falcon at the base of the staircase and exited the ship, sharing a determined nod with Chewie and R2-D2.

I breathed deeply and began the long trek up the stairs. It was identical to the path I had traversed countless times in my dreams, but anxiety flared through me with every step. What if Luke told me no – that I wasn't strong enough, or good enough to be his apprentice? Yet the Force saturated this island and I felt my own power humming joyfully through my veins in response. I knew I had come too far to turn my back on it.

In the clearing at the very top of the island stood a motionless robed figure. I approached Luke Skywalker, the last living Jedi, and dug his lightsaber out of my leather satchel before I lost my nerve. I extended it toward him, willing the Force to hold my hand steady.

Luke was as silent as the stone around him. His eyes bored into the lightsaber as if it reminded him of a lifetime of failures. Then that pensive gaze turned on me, and I inhaled sharply as a slow, thick wave of energy rolled over me. It coursed through every molecule of my body and soaked up all of the events which had led me to this island. I thought of my promise to Leia to find her brother, and my own unshakable resolve to help the Resistance put an end to the First Order for good.

And then, after a terrifying moment of silence, he pressed words into my head that made my heart lurch out of beat and my cheeks ache from smiling.

'We begin now.'

Author's Note: Thank you so much for reading! I would dearly appreciate reviews. I'm currently writing a sequel with an original storyline and very excited about it! Please subscribe to my author alert or just tell me if you'd like to know when it's posted.