Woah buddy the reviews. I am so blessed by every one of them, but the ones that go into detail about the things you guys caught or the lines that hit hard just make my entire week. I wanted to have a chapter up on Monday, but it didn't happen and I'm sorry so I tried to make this one a little longer. Parts of it don't feel quite as smooth as I'd like, but I did some polishing so I think it's good to go.
A few small things first though-I've had questions about ships. There will be no ships. The only ships here will be cannon and mentioned in passing (pretty much just Han and Leia). I am not interested in starting a shipping war. Ship what you like, but there is a ton of Reylo out there and part of the reason I'm writing this is because I want more stories that focus on other kinds of relationships. You should also know that my knowledge of Star Wars is strictly the films and a tiny bit of Wikipedia-ing. Therefore this fic will be built off of headcannons and observations I've made from that material.
I've also done some more plotting and it's fair to say I have no idea when this will end. I had a few things click into place at work tonight and now I have all kinds of bombs to drop so I'll do my best to keep updating so I can drop them. Enjoy!
The air coming off of the sea was cold, and Rey was glad she'd expanded on her wardrobe since her first trek out to the island. Her feet sunk into the damp earth as she walked up to the shelter just fringing the caves Luke had made into his home, and for all her reciting and pondering the entire flight she still wasn't certain how she was going to ask or what she was going to say.
She knew her question, but she was afraid Luke wouldn't want to answer it. She was tempted to keep on re-working the question over and over until it resembled something Luke might consider answering, but she realized how manipulative and un-Jedi that idea was and she kept rejecting it. She just had to ask him.
When she crested the hill she saw him sitting just outside of his cave, taking a long drink out of a little tin cup that was at least as battered as the rock he lived on. There was fish steaming over the fire. She took a deep breath and approached him, trying to let her fear bleed off into the force.
Luke gave a great sigh right as she came on the fringe of his fire and she paused. "I wondered how long it would take after that for you to come and see me." He smiled sadly and looked up at her, holding a second battered cup out to her. "I sensed it wouldn't be long."
Rey took the cup and nodded her thanks, sitting down near him and cradling the warm mug between her hands. "You sensed it too."
He nodded. "Like a spear of ice." He took a deep breath. "I know you want to ask me something I won't want to answer."
Her brow furrowed. "Oh?"
He smiled sadly. "After all this time training you I learned you're never afraid to ask anything, but I can feel the fear you are trying to let go of. The only reason you'd be afraid of asking me something is if you think I won't want to answer." He shrugged a little and poked at his fish. "You're probably right, but I've hidden from what happened and what I know long enough." He looked at Rey. "Ask me anything, I swear to you I'll answer."
Rey could feel her heart suddenly begin to pound, but she kept her eyes on her master and spoke the words anyway. "Master, you told me once that the transfer of life through the force is a rare and very dark power, but you implied that someone had once mastered it. I need to know—could that Sith still live?"
The breath that Luke let out was shaky and he closed his eyes. Rey could feel her master's regret and recoil as he pressed it into the force, steadying himself to talk. When he finally nodded once, she felt a chill go through her.
"There was one," Luke admitted finally. "He became so powerful with the dark side that he figured out how to manipulate the force to change the flow of life. Some Sith claimed he could create life, new life out of the force, but that's impossible. Energy is only transferred. No, what Darth Plagueis did was steal or give the life of one creature to another. First himself, then his apprentice, then anyone he deemed worthy."
"So he isn't just a myth," Rey breathed.
Luke frowned. "You've heard the name before? How? He was strictly kept to the Sith and the Jedi records even before their fall tried to erase him."
Rey blushed and ducked her head. "Only once, and I didn't hear it so much as—feel it."
"Kylo Ren," Luke breathed, realization lighting his eyes. "You sensed Plagueis when you dove into his mind."
She nodded. "If he was so buried, why do you know about him?" she asked, her brow furrowing.
Luke smiled ruefully and looked about to speak, but suddenly he turned his head, as though sensing someone new coming to their circle. Rey looked, but saw no-one. A warm ripple went through the force and she felt it in her entire body.
"My father was a Sith once," Luke reminded her, his eyes still trained away and distant. "And he has refused to let me exile in peace." He looked back at her. "Rey, do you remember speaking with me about those who become one with the force in death?"
She nodded.
"All things go back to the force in the end, but only those who are strong with it can return to us and continue their work. Not everyone can see them, but I think at this level in your progress, you'll be able to." He smiled at the look of shock on her face. "You felt him approach, didn't you?"
"I felt something-" she blinked, stunned at the idea that they could commune with the dead. "Someone," she breathed, eyes wide as the shimmering blue across the fire settled itself on a rock and then solidified into the shape of a young man in Jedi robes, an amused smile quirking his lips. A thin scar marred the flesh near his right eye and something in his bearing was hauntingly familiar.
"Hello."
She blinked. "Hi."
"Rey, this is my father, Anakin Skywalker," Luke said.
She felt a different kind of chill go over her. This was Anakin? This was the man who'd become Darth Vader? If it weren't for the power of his presence in the force she wouldn't have believed it. She'd never felt such a thing in her life, and after battling Kylo and training with Luke she thought she'd understood what a powerful mark in the force felt like. Anakin was different. And yet, so familiar.
"You're Ben's grandfather," she said finally, his familiarity clicking. She could see him in Luke and Leia when she really looked, but Ben—she could really see him in Ben. Perhaps it was because age had stolen some of the resemblance from Anakin's children, but the bearing he'd passed onto his grandson was unmistakable, especially his presence in the force. She'd felt part of that presence before. In Anakin it was cooled and peaceful, in Ben it was violent and hot and alive. She wondered if that was a consequence of their paths or of their forms—was Anakin only peaceful now because he was one with the force?
"I've been watching your progress. I'm very impressed," Anakin said.
She felt herself flush, embarrassed suddenly at the thought of him watching her when she wasn't aware of his presence.
Anakin smiled, as though aware of her thoughts. "Don't worry, I'm not over your shoulder all the time."
"No, just over mine," Luke muttered and Anakin's smile grew just a little impish.
"We had so little time while I was alive, I figured you could use the company. Exile gets boring, from what Master Yoda tells me."
Luke rolled his eyes but Rey saw the smile he tried to hide. "I wouldn't know, my exile hasn't been typical."
Anakin chuckled.
"So you just hang around all the time?" Rey asked, mildly unsettled by the idea. "Is that really all there is to do when you die, follow the living around?" She thought that sounded miserable.
The ghost shook his head, laughing. "There's more to it than that, but I have a lot of family so I check up on them. Sometimes I miss being flesh and blood. Yoda and Obi-wan lecture me about it but I can't help it." He shrugged. "I miss flying. Traveling through the force just isn't' the same." He paused, the fond smile faltering on his lips. "I've actually spent a lot of time with Ben," he admitted softly, and Rey felt the sorrow Anakin bore for his grandson. "But after that swell of power I knew Luke would be looking into it and I wanted to be here for that."
"I can tell you what you want to know about this Sith, Rey, but Anakin will be able to give you more," Luke said. A line of pain seemed to cross his forehead, but he didn't back down. A similar look of regret twisted Anakin's expression and he sighed, glancing at the ground.
"Rey, the first thing you need to understand is that the dark side is very powerful, and it promises much when you get near to it." He looked up and she could see the pain in his eyes that lingered even years after its end.
"It seduces, and the power it promises is real—you just have to be willing to destroy everything and everyone around you to take it. When you become a Sith you're on no-one's side but your own, not even your master's. Darth Sidious claims that Darth Plagueis was killed in his sleep, but that's not completely true. He was struck down, but he didn't die. He pulled life from those around him and continued to suck on it until he gained strength, waiting in the shadows for his traitorous apprentice to meet his end. When he finally did, Plagueis waited for the new generation of force-sensitive children, lusting after the most powerful one to become his new apprentice. He found that in Ben."
Rey swallowed, feeling the cold grow in her stomach. "What happened?"
"Plagueis watched Ben grow up, sensed the fear inside him, the struggles with inadequacy and he seduced him away from the light. When you become part of the darkness Rey, you either become its master or you become its slave. Plagueis promised Ben power and a release from his pain, but when those promises had been granted Plagueis struck. He began tapping off of Ben's power little by little, drawing it into himself to extend his life and strengthen his hold on the force. For a long time, Ben didn't know."
"And by the time he figured it out, it was too late," Rey said.
Anakin nodded. "You go far enough into the dark you have to keep going. Ben is simply too strong in the force for Plagueis to risk losing. If Ben were to turn against Plagueis, Plagueis would kill him."
Rey tried to swallow the sudden lump in her throat. "So I was right, Ben didn't want to become what he did. He didn't want to kill Han."
Anakin seemed to consider a moment, his chest rising and falling with a contemplative breath. "Rey, you must understand that everything Ben has done was still his choice and his to bear when it comes to consequence. Manipulation was the reason he went to the dark, but no-one controlled his hand. He wanted to become Kylo Ren, but killing Han was one of the hardest things he's ever done. He thought it would send him far enough into the dark that he could build in his strength and overcome Plagueis at last, but instead his grief weakened him."
"You can sense all of that?" Rey asked.
"Some of it I saw, some of it I sensed, but most of what I know I know because he talks to me," Anakin said sadly. "Not me, exactly, and he doesn't know I'm there, but every time he talks to Vader I listen. I listen and I try to tug him back, but he resists it so carefully. He expects me to linger in the dark and so when he feels the light he pulls away from me."
Rey felt the strangest desire to comfort Anakin, but what could she do or say to a Jedi long dead? He was part of the force now, she couldn't offer him anything. She pressed her lips together and tried to let her sympathy bleed into the force where Anakin might feel it.
"He's been stronger at every turn," she said carefully. "Every time we've fought I've felt it—why would Plagueis risk letting him get that powerful?"
He shrugged sadly. "The lust for power clouds judgment, and Plagueis' position gives him an advantage no other Sith master has ever had—the stronger his apprentice, the stronger he becomes. He learned after I overthrew Sidious, and he's been draining Ben of his living energy little by little his entire life. He's keeping him below his full potential. The life inside of someone young and strong with the force is a very powerful thing. Plagueis is drunk off of Ben's abilities."
"He finally realized, didn't he? That Plagueis has been draining him, That he wasn't going to be free?" Rey asked, a lump forming in her throat.
Anakin nodded gravely. "Only Ben will be able to tell you exactly what happened. I wasn't there when he was attacked and he's been harder and harder for me to read these past few years, but that wave of power we all felt was the bond between Ben and Plagueis breaking."
Rey stared into her cup, slightly unnerved by how much she'd guessed herself. "Snoke has been Plagueis all along," she whispered. "And Ben has been his life support." She looked up at Luke and Anakin, her brow furrowed. "So why is Ben still alive?"
SWSWSWSW
"Why is he still alive?" Finn was seething, pointing at the door to Leia's quarters where he learned Kylo Ren was. The only thing that was holding him back was Poe's hand on his chest.
"Finn," Poe tried to reason. "We kill him we're no better than he is. He deserves medical care and then a trial, just like any prisoner."
Finn's shoulders tightened and he huffed an angry breath, batting Poe's hand away from his chest. "Not every prisoner can throw people around the room. Not every prisoner can freeze a laser blast or is responsible for an entire star system's destruction!"
"Finn-"
"NO POE!" Finn exploded, jabbing his finger towards Poe's face. "I don't think you get it! I've seen what that guy can do first hand. I've seen him hurl people across a room with a gesture. I've seen him freeze people and the screams from the prisoners he mentally shredded are burned into my ears. Once I saw him get so angry that he clenched his fist and a man's heart stopped right on the bridge. He threw Rey against a tree, killed Han Solo! The scar in my back still burns sometimes, especially when it's cold," he said, his voice breaking near the end. He blinked furiously, angry at the tears that had risen unbidden. Poe's brow twisted in sympathy and he put his hand on Finn's shoulder.
"Finn, I know what he did to you. I know what he did to Rey and Han and I've been on the receiving end of his interrogations. I know. But we have to be better than him. We have to get rid of the First Order, not replace them."
Finn's jaw worked and he looked away, his breathing unsteady as he tried to stop crying. He dashed away his tears with an angry hand and Poe let him, just gripping his shoulder and waiting.
"You don't have to go anywhere near him," Poe assured him. "If Rey or Leia need help with him I'll go."
"It won't make a difference," Finn said, finally getting himself under control.
Poe's brow furrowed. "Why not?"
"Because I know he's there. Because that pressure of fear that I lived under most of my life working for him is back. He doesn't belong here, Poe."
"You're not working for him any more and you never will," Poe said firmly. "He is a prisoner and might not make it even with our help. He's barely strong enough to stay alive. Right now, he's not a threat. You trust Rey and General Organa, right?" he pressed.
Finn nodded. "Yeah," he sighed, looking suddenly very tired. "I do."
"Rey wouldn't have brought him back here if we couldn't handle him. Besides, after what happened we might need him."
Finn raised an eyebrow, scoffing. "Yeah we need him, we need him like I need a hole in the head."
"Well you'd look a little funny with a hole in your head but I won't judge," Poe said, shrugging. Finn actually smiled at that and huffed a laugh.
"Okay then surprise me. What could we possibly need from Kylo Ren?"
"Someone beat him and then dropped him near our base. Whoever can beat up Kylo Ren is not someone I want to meet without a lot of preparation, and if he dropped Kylo by the base then that means he knows we are here. How long do you think it'll take before Snoke decides to show up on our doorstep? If Kylo wakes up we have a much better chance of knowing what's coming."
The idea that Anakin might be the light Kylo keeps feeling was a tumblr idea. I'm just borrowing it because I think it's legit.