Act Two

Chapter Ten – The Generals Plan

After seeing Rey off Finn walked back to the bridge to find the command crew back at their posts and Poe back at his station.

"Did she leave?" Poe asked.

"Yeah," Finn said, and the two exchanged a worried look. "So what now?"

Poe, seemingly glad to have something besides Rey's departure to talk about, said, "The fleet moves out like we said. But we are going to Coruscant. I had hoped that Rey would be with us. Leia planned it out having Rey with us. But we will make do without her."

"Who's coming?" Finn asked.

"The senior staff, basically everyone who made it through Crait, plus the leaders of the various factions that have joined up. The Mon Calamari and Corellian admirals. The Talz chief, one of the Bothan generals. Representatives of the Ithorians, the Aqualish. Everyone. The fleet is a coalition and if we can convince everyone that coalition comes along with the New Republic they will be more willing to join up. And that means peace," Poe said with satisfaction.

"What ship are we taking?" Finn asked.

"Well, all the leaders have their entourages, and that is a lot of functionaries, so we will need the flagship for that. The Mon Calamari would have insisted on one of their ships being used anyway," Poe answered.

"That'll set the Corellians off," Finn said.

"It would," Poe said smiling, proud of his own ingenuity, "except that there is another ship, pretty well known, of Corellian make that will be making the trip."

"We are going to ride into Coruscant on the Falcon?" Finn asked, impressed.

"You, me, Rose and Chewie. In fact, the fleet is going to break up soon. Your ship squared away?" Poe asked.

"Yeah," Finn answered. "I turned the ship over to Squee-Bak."

Poe nods his head several times with a blank expression on his face. "Squee-Bak?" he asked.

Finn nods and repeated, " Squee-Bak."

"Whole name? Last name? Nickname?" Poe said while shaking his head slightly.

Finn, an amused expression on his face, said, "Commander Squee-Bak. Last name."

Hesitantly, aware he is in the vicinity of trouble, Poe asked, "Have I ever met Commander Squee-Bak?"

Finn grinned widely as he answered, "Every time you have been on my ship. She's a Sullustan."

A look of recognition passed over Poe's face, followed quickly by one of embarrassment. "Oh yeah," he said with a grimace. "I think I've been saying 'Hey man' this whole time."

With mock solemnity Finn said, "You have, but I talked her through it."

"Ok, ok, there's a lot of ships, and a lot of second in commands," Poe replied indignantly.

"There are," Finn said exaggeratedly, "…I mean Leia knew her name, and her gender. But no one expects you to be Leia."

"Thank you, buddy," Poe said sarcastically, "For that. It makes me feel lots better."

Finn patted Poe on the shoulder and said, "No problem buddy."

When, a moment later, Rose entered the bridge Poe saw an opportunity for redemption and asked, "Rose, do you know the name of Finn's second in command?"

"Yeah of course," she said. "Squee-Bak. She's awesome. Great card player. Really good rapport with her crew."

"Squee-Bak knows the name of every officer on the ship, and most of the enlisted too," Finn said. "Did you know that Poe?"

Poe nodded while staring at Finn, and replied, "This is great. Great talk we are having. Anyway, we need to talk about Coruscant before the fleet breaks up and goes hunting. I don't expect the field engineers are going to see action, but just in case, Rose, are they set to go?"

Rose nodded and said, "I finished meetings with the division commanders earlier today."

"Great. The flagship is going to head out once we have confirmation that the various divisions have successfully arrived at their posts and haven't had any enemy encounters. We are going to be on the Falcon, with Chewie, and the other Crait survivors. The faction commanders are going to be on the flagship," Poe said.

"We all have to squeeze into the Falcon again?" Rose asked, annoyed. "That was like three months with us on top of each other before."

"They want the visual of all the Crait survivors disembarking from the Falcon once we hit Coruscant," Poe explained.

"What are we doing about the fact that Rey won't be walking off the Falcon with us?" Rose asked.

"It's a problem, but I am hoping I have a solution," Poe said, smiling at Finn.

It took Finn a moment to figure out what Poe has in mind, but when he did he frowned and said, "No."

"You gotta work with me here Finn," Poe said.

"I can't stand in for Rey," Finn insisted.

"No you can't, just like I can't stand in for Leia. But someone had to do the job so here I am. And you are the closest we have to Rey. In more ways than one. You are the stormtrooper who switched sides. You are the general who led the defense of Kashyyk, you liberated Manaan. You were the key to destroying Starkiller Base. And then there is the other thing," Poe said, putting all his charm to work.

"What other thing?" Rose asked, confused.

"Nothing," Finn answered hurriedly. "It's nothing."

"Well, it's not nothing," Poe said.

"What's not nothing?" Rose asked.

"You haven't told her?" Poe asked Finn.

"There's nothing to tell," Finn insisted. "I couldn't do it. Any of it."

"Couldn't do what?" Rose asked sharply, beginning to lose her patience.

As Finn shook his head at him, Poe said, "Finn's Force Sensitive."

"What!?" a shocked Rose yelled.

Poe held up his hand with his thumb and his forefinger almost touching, in mockery of Finn's earlier jibe and said, "A little bit Force Sensitive," as Finn scowled at him.

"Since when?" Rose asked, still surprised at what she had been told.

"Leia said his whole life. Said it's probably what drew him to me when I was captured, what drew him to Rey, what helped him survive some of the fights he's been in," Poe said, a hint of pride in his friend pushing through their natural mocking banter.

"I can't do any of it," Finn snapped. "I tried to lift a cup. For hours. And the cup didn't move."

"To be clear, it was with your mind. With your mind you tried to lift it?" Rose asked.

"And failed," Finn said, crossing his arms.

Rose, a look of slight embarrassment for Finn on her face, asked, "Rey can like, move an X-Wing right?"

"Yeah, but it wasn't fully fueled and didn't have its ordinance loaded. Then again, she also didn't seem to be straining herself," Poe said.

"Leia said there are millions of people with my level of Force Sensitivity," Finn explained. "She said back in the Republic days the Jedi didn't even train people like me."

"I read about that," Rose said, nodding. "They were like, agricultural workers and medics right?"

"No, that was for the washouts," Poe said, holding back a giggle. "People who started the training and couldn't hack it. Finn here is in the category of people the Jedi order would throw back."

"Throw back?" Rose asked, confused.

"Like when you are fishing and the fish is too small to be worth eating,' Finn answered impatiently. "You throw it back."

Rose, no more familiar with fishing than she was with the Jedi Order's recruitment policies, continued to look confused and Poe stepped in and said, "But, that still makes him more Force Sensitive than like 99.9% of the galaxy, and probably more Force Sensitive than anyone else in the fleet. And what I am hoping is that you have been practicing like Leia asked you to. And maybe you can lift something large enough to show up in a video feed."

"What?" a horrified Finn asked.

"Also," Poe continued, "hoping you could, while walking off the Falcon, wear some robes and Leia's old lightsaber."

Finn's mouth hung open for a moment before he said, "You are going to try to sell me as a Jedi?"

"Sounds like technically you actually got a little training from Leia," Rose said, trying to be helpful.

"No, I was given a test and I failed it. And had a headache for like two days after," Finn said.

"Did you though? Practice I mean," Rose asked.

With Poe and Rose looking at him hopefully Finn, after shifting uncomfortably for a few seconds, said, "With Rey, a little."

"And did you lift anything?" Poe asked, still hopeful.

"We didn't get that far. She was mostly doing the stuff about opening my mind and feeling things," Finn said reticently.

"How far into the training she got from Leia was that?" Poe asked.

"Well, the thing is…It's the stuff she did with Luke, actually. The first lesson," Finn answered.

"You didn't get past the first day stuff?" Poe said, his hope crashing.

"It's not easy! I did however get the lovely experience of feeling what it is like to be one of the cultures in the food pods," Finn said defensively.

Putting a hand on Finn's shoulder, Poe said, "I need you to level with me. Can you lift anything with your mind?"

"No," Finn said immediately, causing Poe to grimace as he took his hand off Finn's shoulder.

"What if you throw something in the air, can you slow it down as it falls, like to a noticeable degree?" Rose asked. "I mean then you don't have to lift it."

Poe, who was immediately taken with the idea, took off his wrist communicator and said, "I am going to throw this in the air, you try to slow it down and we will see if we notice."

While Finn stared angrily at him, Poe threw the wrist communicator in the air. He and Rose watched it go up into the air, and then fall down quickly while Finn just kept staring at Poe.

Poe, looking up at Rose, asked, "Did that seem slow to you?"

"Maybe?" Rose said.

"I didn't even try!" Finn yelled. "Because this is a stupid plan. So you need to come up with a new plan. One that doesn't involve me playing dress up as a Jedi!"

Rose, while looking at the communicator on the floor asked, "So how did this help you live through fights?"

"Leia said people like Finn often don't know they are Force Sensitive. It just shows up in them anticipating things happening a little quicker, knowing what the right moment to act is," Poe explained.

"Usually people just think we are lucky, and have good reflexes," Finn said.

"Don't worry Finn," Poe said jauntily, "I have never thought either of those things about you."

While Finn gives him an annoyed look, Poe turned to Rose and asked, "Do you think Lando Calrissian is maybe a little Force Sensitive? Now there's a lucky guy."

"He owns like twenty mining colonies by now right?" Rose responded.

"More actually, I think," Poe said. "He is one of our bigger suppliers. Always gives us a break on prices. Nice guy."

"I am happy to walk off the ship with the rest of you. But this idea of yours won't work. We need Rey back," Finn said earnestly.

"Well we aren't getting her back. Not anytime soon. Not before the war ends," Poe said.

"Can we delay the event on Coruscant?" Rose asked.

"Nope. We just all need to get used to doing stuff without Rey around," Poe said.