"That was so close!" Rey pants as they fly towards the stars. "I thought that thing was going to eat me. Did you use the Force?"
Ben nods, handing her back her lightsaber.
"Keep it for now. I'm going to concentrate on getting us as far away as possible. Although I doubt they have it together enough to send a starfighter after us."
Ben glances at the lightsaber, a smile on his face. He kneels and tucks it into Rey's waistband.
She leans over, kissing him on the mouth.
"Are we headed to D'Qar?" he asks. The ship is too small to have a copilot's seat, so he stands behind her, hands resting on her shoulders.
"Eventually."
"Eventually? Are—are we heading back to Stewjon? Because, Rey, I have to tell you that the First Order—"
"No. I'm not quite that dumb, Ben."
"You're smart," he says, as if her joke were distasteful.
She smirks. "I want to go to Jakku. Just briefly. I need to—there are some things I need to take care of there. I mean, I know now that my future isn't there." Maz was right.
They're never coming back, but there's another who still could.
"But I still—I want to settle something."
"Okay," he agrees, because he, too, knows ghosts.
"He took her," Luke confesses to Leia. "Again."
"Where are you?"
"In the air. Chewie's been piloting—we looked everywhere, Leia, but we can't find whatever ship they're in." Luke's voice lowers. "Leia, I don't know what to do. This isn't—the Force—it's not leading me. This time, it's not leading me. It's contradicting everything, there's been a shift and I can't make sense of it, and I don't know what to do."
"The last time you said that," Leia says, her voice ragged. "Is when Ben—"
"I can't bear losing another student," Luke admits. He sounds frailer than his sister, Finn realizes.
"What are you going to do?" Leia demands. "Luke, you can't k—"
"I would never, Leia! He may still find his way home. And as for what we're doing now—"
"We'll keep searching," Finn cuts in.
"Really?" Luke whirls around to face him. "Your friend has a broken leg and a concussion too, most likely. If we continue—"
"We'll go back to D'Qar first," Finn interjects. Shamed, he glances at Chewie, who huffs.
Am I a bad friend to Poe?
Finn stares at his hands. You killed your fellow stormtroopers days after leaving them. The same day you left. The same people you might've called friends. Some you did call friends.
Anxiety climbs up Finn's throat as he tries to swallow it away. He hears Hux's voice, smooth and controlled and powerful, the way it was in all those rallies he'd attended, lined up with his arms at his sides, indistinguishable from the men and women next to him, all those videos he'd been forced to watch…
I'm not like them.
Why? Because you made a different choice?
Yes, Finn thinks. Exactly.
But he can't escape the fear burrowing inside him. What if he can never exorcise the callousness of the First Order?
BB-8 purrs from below him, looking up at him as if in concern.
"Does Poe need to see me?"
BB-8 blips a response. Not that Finn understands it. Or that it matters. He heads back towards the bunk where Poe lies, face contorted as he concentrates on not moving his leg in the slightest.
"How're you doing, buddy?" Poe greets him.
"Me?" Finn says incredulously. "How're you doing?"
"Um, well, I feel like a nexu broke my leg." Poe scowls. "I'm sorry about Rey, Finn. If it weren't for me—"
"What? No! Poe, don't talk like that. It's not your fault. I was about to become lunch when you shot at it." Finn laughs nervously, awkwardly, because he doesn't know what else to do.
Poe smiles, sweat glistening on his brow.
"How much pain are you in?"
Poe closes his eyes. "I'm really sorry."
"Stop doing that!" Finn shouts as he notices goosebumps on Poe's arms. "You cold?"
Poe doesn't respond."
"Poe! Are you cold?"
"I'll be fine."
"That is not—" Exasperated, Finn tugs his arms out of his jacket, placing the familiar leather over Poe. His friend's eyes fly open in surprise. "Here. You can borrow it. Don't think I'm giving it back to you," he adds, keeping his tone threatening and yet light, because if he lets his voice shake that won't help anyone.
"Sure thing, buddy."
BB-8 whirs.
"What?" Poe asks crankily.
The droid leans its head against the bunk, near Poe's head.
"I'm glad I'm okay too, BB-8."
The ship coasts onto the sands of Jakku. Rey's stomach tightens. She's ravenous, and the gruel they'd kept from that morning won't do much to sate her. It's fitting, then, that they're on Jakku. Hunger and Jakku always go together.
"What are you thinking?" Ben asks her.
"That the last time I was here, Finn and BB-8 and I were running from the First Order's bombs. I was so mad at him for getting me involved." Where are you, Finn? she wonders. Are you okay?
"I remember when a lieutenant told me a girl helped the droid escape," Ben says. "I… wasn't happy."
Rey turns to him and decides not to ask what "wasn't happy" might have mean. She smirks. "Did you know it was me?"
"Yes, though it doesn't make sense. I just knew."
She presses her forehead against his face. "Ben, when you told me I needed a teacher—why did you offer? It doesn't make sense."
Ben glances away from her. "I was lonely. I wanted—I wanted someone to journey with, I suppose."
"Isn't the Dark Side all about severing those attachments?"
His eyebrows rise. "Maybe."
Even in your darkest moments, the Light was there. Rey glances out the windshield, at the ocean of sand she'd floated adrift in for so many years and yet called home. Night shrouds the dunes, making them look like swooping, towering mountains. "We should head out in the morning."
"Okay."
"We should eat."
"Okay." He's still looking at her, like she's something special to him, someone who matters.
Rey wraps her arms around him, lips sinking into his. Food can wait. Last night was a new experience for her, the most vulnerable she's ever been—with anyone—and she knows it was the same for him. Both of them survived by refusing to be vulnerable. And now, Rey fully trusts him, and she doesn't even feel afraid. The nagging voice telling her to always rely on herself, only herself, vanishes.
She lifts his shirt off, feels that he's still nervous even after last night, and asks if he's okay.
"Yes," he breathes, one hand against her face, one hand moving down her robes.
Rey leans over and kisses the scar she knows comes from Chewie's bowcaster. I love you, Ben.
"If we have no more information to give the Supreme Leader," Hux snarls. "He won't be very happy with us!"
The understatement rattles Hux. He's never felt this disheveled, this inept in his entire life. And of course it would all be because of Kylo Ren. Damn him. What was the Supreme Leader thinking to send such a reckless man on such an important mission by himself? Hux could have kept him in line.
Ren clearly does not believe in the same principles Hux does. Hux sneers as he wonders whether Ren believes in any principles at all, save that mask he worships in his room. He's always been after his own interests rather than the interests of the First Order.
And what even was the point of this mission? Getting back that stupid girl? What was the Supreme Leader thinking?
Hux clenches his fists. The Supreme Leader always seems to indulge Ren his fantasies of greatness and his personal side interests. Something about the Force. Hux has seen Ren's powers, of course. He can't doubt them. But how powerful can Ren even be if Hux had to pry him off the frozen ground, bleeding and gasping for breath?
"Sir! Sir! We've made contact with King Prana's men and they said two scavengers fled their planet today after freeing—"
"Two scavengers?" Hux has no time for this. "Who is the second one?"
"Nehel says it was a girl—that girl. And from the way the locals have described him, the man is Kylo Ren."
"So they should be coming back."
Lieutenant Mitaka glances at his shoes, breathing hard. Hux's pride swells. See? I don't need to throw temper tantrums to command respect!
"Well—all of our contacts have been monitoring the system, and we haven't seen any evidence of that."
Rage and something else—pleasure—erupt. "What are you saying?"
"Nothing, sir," stammers Mitaka. "They could be—"
Hux waves his arm and storms out of the command room. He will speak to Snoke himself. If his suspicions are correct… A smile twists his lips. Ren will be finished.
And finally, maybe, without Ren in the way, Snoke will begin to appreciate just how valuable Hux is.
Chewie carries Poe down the ramp, Poe scowling and making all sorts of disgusted faces at Finn over the Wookiee's shoulder.
"Poe, you got injured during a mission. This should be a moment of pride," Luke says.
"I want to walk," Poe grumbles.
Angry, BB-8 bleeps something that shuts Poe up.
Finn heads down the ramp as General Organa stops fussing over Poe and marches up it herself to slap her brother across the face.
"Nice to see you too, Leia," gasps Luke, clutching his cheek.
She embraces him. "Don't you ever leave again. The Resistance needs you. The galaxy needs you."
"I'm so sorry," Luke says softly.
"What even was so important about the temple?" Leia demands.
Luke grins. "I learned a lot of wisdom from a lot of ghosts."
Leia's face flushes scarlet. "So you abandoned the living for the dead?"
"We'll talk later," Luke says, noticing Finn. Finn immediately brushes imaginary dust off his jacket as Leia storms away.
"Well, I never—Master Luke! It is so good to see you!" gushes C-3PO, tottering past Finn towards his former master, if Finn remembers correctly.
"Is it true, kid?" asks Admiral Ackbar, clapping a hand on Finn's shoulder. "Did he get away with the latest apprentice?"
Finn nods. "Rey."
"It's time we thought about taking more serious measures," Ackbar says. "He may be her son, but he's a monster now."
Rey hikes across the sands, Ben by her side. She's forgotten how brutal the sun feels on Jakku, the way it broils her skin and sucks the moisture from her eyes. When they pass an all too familiar downed AT-AT, Rey gestures to it. "That's where I lived."
"Do you want to stop?" Ben asks.
She shakes her head.
When they arrive at Niima Outpost, Rey smiles. "This is where Finn and I met. BB-8 told me he'd stolen Poe's jacket. I knocked him to the ground with my staff." Which she wishes she had with her.
You have a lightsaber, she reminds herself. It's a better weapon. Infinitely.
"Did you make the staff yourself?" Ben questions.
She nods, and he gazes at her in awe.
"I made everything myself. No one else was going to help me."
"Rey!" a voice snarls.
Unkar Plutt, now armless and still as hideous as ever, totters towards her. "This is the girl who stole my ship!" Spittle flies from his lips.
Ben ignites his lightsaber. Unkar Plutt freezes.
"I have questions for you, this time," Rey informs him.
Plutt's eyes run up and down her body. "I'm not answering any—"
"Yes," Ben snaps, the lightsaber sizzling inches away from Plutt's skin. "You are."
"Who the blazes are you?" Plutt grunts.
"No one," Rey interjects. "Except someone who happens to be very skilled with the Force."
"That mumbo-jumbo?" he scoffs.
"At my word he'll dig into your mind. It hurts, I assure you." Ben glances at her in alarm. It's a bluff, she tells him.
Oh. She feels him relax as he raises his free hand, cupping it ominously.
"What do you want to know?" Plutt wheezes, glaring at Rey as if he'd like to see her drowning in the quicksands.
"Let's go. Over here," Rey says, beckoning to a deserted tent, flapping in the wind.
"What do you want?" Plutt spits out the moment the three of them disappear inside.
"When Luke left me here with you—"
"I didn't know his name; he was just a man who told me to make sure you survived or else." Plutt scowls.
"Did he mention anything else?" Rey demands. "I'm not a scared little girl begging you for any information on my family any more, Plutt. I want answers. Now."
"You knew there was someone else looking after her, didn't you?" Ben prompts when Plutt hesitates, chins bobbling.
"An old man. I never knew his name either," Plutt snaps. "He disappeared the same time you did."
Ben looks at the sands, anguish riddling his features. The lightsaber still hovers close to Plutt's face.
"What else?" Rey prompts.
"I gave him reports on you. Every month. He said it was for someone important."
"Luke," Ben says.
"No. Not Luke. Luke would have mentioned that," Rey says, heart racing. "It was my mother, wasn't it?"
"How would I know, girl? The old man paid me, I gave him reports—for years."
"Fine." Rey backs away. The tent flap flutters, sending dust at her. The grit sticks to her skin. "You will leave us alone for—for however long we're here."
"I will leave you alone for however long you're here."
"When did my mother die?" Rey asks Ben as she marches away.
"I don't know. If the First Order was involved, I wasn't." Ben swallows. "The old man—he means Lor San Tekka. I killed him, Rey. I'm so sorry."
She sighs, looking out at the sand. The sun shimmers against it, setting off a glare that hurts her eyes. "I just wish I knew something about her. Anything."
"I'm so sorry."
She takes his hand. "I know."
"If she was Force sensitive, even if she was untrained… like my mother," Ben says slowly. "It's possible Snoke tracked her down."
Snoke.
He's been trying to track me from birth, too, she realizes. Luke saved me.
Just like he tracked Ben.
"Why does he want Force users so badly, if he can use it himself?" Rey asks, trying to control herself. Breathe. Don't move. Not one muscle.
"He kept a lot from me," Ben admits. "With me, he said I was special because I came from the Dark, and the Light."
"He would have thought the same of me," Rey says.
Ben nods as comprehension dawns on him.
"He's such a monster," Rey spits. "Manipulating all of us—" It's too much. Rey yanks her hand out of his and kicks the sand in rage. She buries her face against her forearms and tries to hold in a scream.
"Rey!" Ben grabs her, whirling her around to face him.
She leans her face against his chest. "I'm sorry. It's just—Snoke. All he's done. To the Republic. To your family. To mine too, maybe. To you." She feels a tear sneak out of her eye, tracking its way down her sunburnt face. "I know it's wrong, I know it's the Dark Side, but I want to kill him. I do. I just can't—"
"I know, Rey. He's—" Ben swallows. "He's driven by evil. And when we get to the Resistance base, we'll help my mother—we'll help Luke, even—figure out a way to take him down. I'll tell them everything I know."
"We've found them, sir. They're back on Jakku."
Those two sentences are all it takes to put a smile on Hux's face. "Make sure they stay there. Tell Teedo to do whatever it takes."
In his head, he replays Snoke's orders. Take the girl. She is your priority.
And Ren? Hux inquired, hardly daring to hope.
You may try to kill him. If you cannot—and Snoke's tone made it clear he did not expect Hux to be able to—I have plans to take care of him.