Chapter 5
The sleek walls and floors of the First Order flagship were just as Poe painfully remembered them.
Clad in ion cuffs, he and Finn and Rose were led by a lowly First Order officer from the hangar bay, after their ship had been caught in the Finalizer's tractor beam. Poe felt a twinge of regret at using the Millennium Falcon as their transport - the ship was quite a prize, and even if they managed to get Ben onto the famed cruiser, would he still want to return to his mother's dominion on the vessel his father once commanded? Poe had learned from Rey just how triggered Ben could get from the past, which made his hopefully-soon confrontation with the Supreme Leader all the more nerve-wracking. One wrong word or move and they could lose him forever. And maybe lose their own lives in the process. And Rey might never forgive any of them for that.
Stepping out of an elevator with a WHOOSH, the trio of prisoners were met by an officer with a fine head of red hair.
"These Resistance fighters surrendered to us. Although they deny it, I believe there might be more of them, and wish to conduct a further search of the area. Nearby systems. They were aboard the Millennium Falcon, and were armed only with these." Their guard handed over Finn and Rose and Poe's blasters.
The red-haired officer looked thoroughly delighted by the report. Then he spoke, and Poe recognized his voice instantly: it was the same commander he had trolled during the Resistance's evacuation from D'Qar. "Private, do you not know whom you have apprehended? This is Poe Dameron, the new Commander of the Resistance! I shall see to it that you are promoted to higher rank, and granted a new commission."
"Thank you, Armitage!" the Private chirped.
"Order of Vader, Second Class - First Class, if I can wrangle it..."
"Thank you very much indeed, Armitage."
Poe audibly snorted. They had essentially mailed themselves to the First Order, practically gift-wrapped, and this... fuddy-duddy was getting a promotion? It had taken Poe years to receive similar advancements, years of doing, you know, actual work, to get to be where he was: seated at the right hand of Leia Organa and then, unexpectedly, her successor.
Neither Armitage Hux nor the Private registered Poe's scorn, and the former instead merely ordered, "Take them to the Supreme Leader."
Poe did his best to hide his smile. Perfect.
The throne room in which the Supreme Leader sat seemed to have certainly undergone recent renovations - that much was clear when Poe and Finn and Rose were escorted in. Poe could smell the lacquer of fresh paint coating the red walls. Was it possible that this was the place Snoke had been assassinated? Rey had not divulged much of that night beyond that, but surely there had to have been a fight, a physical grapple for command, in the wake of such a sudden power vacuum.
And now, ahead of them, the Supreme Leader, Kylo Ren, sat. He was clad in his black mask - how typical! - and surrounded by six figures in similar garb. Poe's heart nearly stopped when he realized these must be the famed Knights of Ren he and other Resistance fighters had heard tell about, and for the first time since the scheme had fallen into his head, the young Dameron wondered whether this had been such a good idea after all.
"Your diligence will be rewarded, Private," Kylo's deep voice resonated. "I will be sure to discuss your future with Armtiage Hux. But for now, leave us." As soon as the Private had taken his leave, Kylo rose from his throne. His boots squeaked into the polished black, obsidian floors, every step making it look as though he was walking on oil. A Christ figure partaking in tales perverted. No, the Anti-Christ himself. At last, the fearsome Dark-side user knelt so that he was eye-level with Poe, forced to his knees like the prisoner he was. Poe could not help but harken back to a similar tableau, when he had been captured on Jakku.
"Why have you come here?" Kylo rumbled.
Poe felt his blood turn to ice. Did he know? Did he suspect that this capture was absolutely no accident? Poe would not have been the least bit surprised if that turned out to be the case. The Force did trippy things; he had seen Rey in action enough to know that. Telekinesis. Worse - perhaps psychological warfare. Still, he tried to be brave as he replied:
"I don't answers questions asked by a creature in a mask."
The particular phrasing was deliberate, and from the way Kylo Ren froze, he - and Poe - both knew it.
"What did you say?"
"You heard me."
Kylo stood, and with a wave of his hands, dismissed his Knights. "Leave us." With a bow, all six obeyed. As soon as they were gone, Poe watched as the mask was lifted from Kylo's head with a simple click and a hiss. Still, his back remained to the trio, so they could not yet see his face.
Even since Jakku, Poe still did not know if he should talk first, or let Kylo talk first. But in this moment, he decided to take the initiative. "We bring you a message from the Supreme Leader's... mistress."
Kylo spun about with a snap, giving Poe and his friends their first look at the man who was supposedly Ben Solo. He was every bit as handsome as Rey had described, in what had been one of the many activities they encouraged her to undertake, to keep her mind off stressful worries during her pregnancy. He was tall, with full lips, a fine mane of black hair that tumbled down to his shoulders. If Poe had known this was what Rey's paramour looked like, he might never have tried to woo her. He never stood a chance. Meanwhile, Kylo re-approached Poe, hauling the Commander to his feet. "Yes? How does she fare?" Perhaps it was because the mask was now gone, for his voice seemed to take on an earnestness, an earnestness that seemed almost human and... gentle. He did not ask how Poe or his friends had learned about his and Rey's relationship; the thought did not seem to cross his mind. And Poe thought perhaps it was better that it didn't.
"She pines for you in her chambers. She cries for you, but nobody comes."
Something Poe could not describe flashed through Ben's eyes. "You break my heart, Commander," he drolled, sounding like a correct politician, "to speak of her tears." And yet, there was something about his timbre that seemed to Poe like he was genuinely moved, genuinely heartbroken. There was a tense silence before Ben suddenly guessed:
"She wants me to come for her, doesn't she? Leave this behind."
"Yes," Rose whispered.
"And she thought I would listen to you? A band of misfits?"
"She misses you. She's miserable without you!" Finn tried to explain.
Kylo suddenly lifted Finn off his feet with the Force and bore down on him. "Oh, I'm sure! And she thought I would listen to you, FN-2187? Defection is one of your areas of expertise, after all!"
"Now, listen to me!" Finn tried to reason with Ben. "There's nothing to get upset about! You have a chance to start a new life - make a break for freedom!"
"Freedom, the Resistance, the First Order - what's the difference?" And Ben's countenance seemed to calm, melt from anger to resignation.
"Oh, now hold on a minute, being Ben Solo is much better than being... Supreme Leader!" Finn argued. He talked even as Poe watched him with hopeful encouragement. Now that Finn was doing the talking, and talking remarkably well despite being under deep stress, the Commander decided to wait and see if it would lead anywhere productive.
"Yeah, right."
"No, it is! Look - out in the galaxy somewhere is a girl who thinks you are the greatest! Have the greatest potential, and it's not because you're Supreme Leader, pal. It's because you are Ben! You are her Ben!"
"But why would Rey want me?" And Ben actually sounded crestfallen.
"Why would Rey want you?" Finn spluttered. "Look at you! You're Ben fucking Solo! Any other life-form would trade their dreary existence in a heartbeat just to be you! You have the Force! You're good-looking! A legendary family! Your lightsaber does that... CRACKLE thing! You could be a cool guy!"
Throughout Finn's whole speech, Ben seemed to slowly stiffen up again, and Poe's heartbeat quickened. Perhaps the former Stormtrooper had overplayed his hand, said too much, and it certainly looked that way, as Ben now stalked back over to Finn.
"So she does want me to return to the Light! She just wants Ben Solo! And she didn't have the guts to come here and tell me so herself! She sent you!" He seemed unusually fixated on the fact that Rey had sent them here at all, which Poe found a little... unusual, but he didn't have much time to dwell on it as Ben suddenly seized Finn by the throat and backed him up, towards an energy well, crackling with purple plasma.
"Finn!" Rose cried, distressed.
"Please..." Finn croaked out weakly.
But Ben was unmoved. Kylo Ren was back, his irises dark and cold and unfeeling. "Goodbye, FN-2187."
"YOU HAVE A CHILD!"
Poe did not know how Finn managed to blast that statement out into being, what with his throat so constricted. He didn't even know if it was too late to change the Supreme Leader's heart with this revelation. And yet - and yet - the gambit seemed to work. Slowly, by degrees it seemed, Kylo dragged Finn back away from the open energy well, until the two men were practically nose-to-nose.
"Where?"
"She... she sleeps with her mother at the Resistance base," Finn managed to gasp out, as Ben's grip on his throat loosened.
The pronoun usage was not lost on Kylo Ren. "Is she pretty?"
"She's beautiful, she's..." Finn's voice trailed off, thrown by the question and by the intensity with which it was asked. "They're both waiting for you. Rey needs the man she loves. And your child needs its father."
That last word seemed to finally do it. Father... Ben dropped Finn to the ground. His eyes were wide, and he appeared to be slightly shaking. At last, he regained some semblance of composure and bellowed: "HUX! KNIGHTS!"
The Armitage and the Knights of Ren appeared in the throne room. Before any of them had time to react, Ben hit all of them with Force lightning, electrocuting every last man until their bodies crumpled to the floor, dead. The Supreme Leader then set to work, undoing the prisoners' chains.
"Take me to her. Take me to... my family," he ordered of Poe, and his eyes seemed lighter than they had perhaps been in years. The Commander smiled victoriously.
"OK. But first..." And taking a deep breath, he pecked Ben on the lips, springing away a second later. Gross. Ben looked positively flabbergasted.
"Please don't ask me to do that again," Poe entreated. "Rey asked me to give that to you."
Ben blinked. And then... he laughed. Hauling Poe to his feet, the quartet made their way to the Falcon.
It was not hard to get to the main hangar bay and free the famed cruiser. And Ben did not have the reservations of boarding his father's ship the way Poe thought he might. Soon, the Falcon was flying through deep space, back to the Resistance base. As Poe piloted, he checked back through the hologram messages they might have missed while they were prisoners. The first one was from Lieutenant Connix. And she sounded panicked.
"POE! I have distressing news about Rey! The baby's fine, but her mother... we don't know what sickness has befallen her. It is almost as if she was lost the will to live. She's... she's dying."