"You're Not Alone"
By EsmeAmelia
Chapter 8
"Take care of yourself. Please."
Finn's eyes were pleading, as if he were genuinely concerned about her well-being and would be hurt if something happened to her. He cared and yet he was leaving forever, never to see her again.
Like her parents.
No, no, her parents didn't leave forever, no matter what Ben said, that was why she had to return to Jakku.
Then Finn was gone.
Rey stared after him as if that would make him come back, feeling a tightness building in her chest. She knew she should be angry at him for lying to her, maybe she should even be glad to never see him again, but his words taken from a family I'll never know swirled in her mind. Her heart thumped once, twice, again, as if it were telling her to rush after him, run away from everything and start a new life with him, two souls who lost their families.
No, no, her family was coming back.
"No!"
She looked up, thinking for a moment that she heard a child cry out, soft and pleading, but there was no child to be seen. Just as she was about to dismiss it as her imagination, it came again.
"No!"
There! She did hear it!
"No!"
She sucked in a breath, walking towards the voice, hardly aware that BB-8 was following her, expecting to find . . . what? A crying child? It would seem that would be the logical answer, but somehow she felt like she would find something . . . else.
"No!"
Down a set of stairs, into some sort of storage room full of boxes and crates that contained who-knew-what obtained over a millennium, smelling of layers of dust. BB-8 made a noise of concern, but Rey walked on as if in a trance, feeling as if the small, familiar voice was calling specifically to her.
A small chest, held shut by a single latch, its contents unknown. It didn't enter Rey's thoughts that she shouldn't be poking around in Maz's storage room and opening her chests – she needed to see whatever was in there.
She undid the latch and pulled the creaking box open.
A silver tube, barely longer than Rey's hands, pulsing into her senses as if it were alive, calling her to take it.
She touched it.
And the world shifted.
She was in a dark, gray, metal corridor, incoherent voices crying into her ears, harsh lights flickering on and off, she ran, ran, ran . . .
"Rey, come with me."
She kept running, whether towards Ben's voice or away from it, she couldn't tell . . .
"Rey, come with me."
The corridor closed in on her from all sides, tumbling upside-down . . .
"Rey, come with me."
She landed in a heap on the dirt ground, the choking smell of smoke filling her nostrils . . .
"Rey, come with me."
A hooded figure kneeling among the flying ash and sparks, a silver hand reaching out to touch an astro droid's dome . . .
"Rey, come with me."
Freezing water came pouring from the dark sky . . .
The masked figure who stalked Jakku, plunging its flaming sword through a person's chest . . .
"Rey, come with me."
As the body fell, she scrambled to her feet, seeing that there were more figures, all masked, all clad in black, following behind the one from Jakku . . .
"Rey, come with me, please . . ."
The masked figure from Jakku stared at her, through her, stalked towards her . . .
"Come with me, Rey, join me . . ."
"NO! COME BACK!"
She saw herself, six years old, screaming after the ship vanishing into the sky . . .
"Join me, Rey, join me . . ."
The sky turned red, the air froze, and she was surrounded by trees, there was the figure again, still staring at her, but this time it extinguished the flaming sword . . .
"Join me . . . join me . . . join me . . ."
The figure stuck out its black gloved hand, as if inviting her to take it . . .
"Join me Rey, join me, join me join me join me join me . . ."
She collapsed backward in a heap, once more in Maz's storage room, the figure and Ben's voice vanished as if they'd never been.
And there was Maz herself.
With a tight gasp, Rey stared at Maz, seeing the masked figure's outstretched hand behind her blinks. "What was that?" Her voice came out in a horrified whimper.
Only when Maz got closer did she realize that she might be in trouble for snooping around in the storage room. She quickly pushed herself to her feet. "I shouldn't have gone in there."
But strangely enough, Maz didn't seem angry. "That lightsaber was Luke's, and his father's before him, and now . . . it calls to you."
She said it as if she had been expecting the lightsaber to call to someone for a long time, which only made Rey's nerves tighten harder. "I have to get back to Jakku." She shouldn't have left Jakku, she shouldn't have gotten herself involved in any of this.
"Han told me," said Maz, rotating her goggles to the top of her head before reaching out her hand in a slow, inviting manner – much like the masked figure had offered his hand in Rey's . . . dream? Vision? Hallucination? Yet whatever it was, she found herself taking Maz's small hand in her own, allowing herself to get urged to her knees where Maz could look her in the eye.
"Dear child," Maz said in a warm, motherly voice, "I see your eyes. You already know the truth. Whomever you're waiting for on Jakku . . . they're never coming back."
They're never coming back. The same words Ben had been saying for years, the same words Ben used to try to get her to come with him, the same words that always made her want to come with him, yet she'd always fought against them. So many years she had insisted that Ben was wrong, that one day he'd be proven wrong . . . but hearing Maz say them felt more final, more complete. Ben had an emotional stake in his words, but Maz had none. She said it as a simple fact, not as a means to an end.
Rey's eyes welled up despite all attempts not to cry in front of Maz. They're never coming back. Years and years of waiting, praying, wishing . . . were they really all wasted? She could have told Ben where she was years ago . . . they could be traversing the galaxy together . . . dammit, he could have rescued her from the hunger and the misery, but she chose to be alone!
"But," said Maz, "there's someone who still could."
Ben. Again she wished they would link so she could fall into his arms and tell him to find her.
Then it occurred to her, did Maz somehow know about her strange connection with Ben?
Maz's wizened eyes stared into Rey's. "The belonging you seek is not behind you – it is ahead. I am no Jedi, but I know the Force."
The Force. Was the Force responsible for linking her with Ben? Was she supposed to go with him?
"It moves through and surrounds every living thing," Maz continued as if Rey had asked to be educated about the Force. "Close your eyes," she murmured, closing her own eyes. "Feel it . . . the light . . . it's always been there . . . it will guide you." Then her eyes opened, now giving Rey a look of determination. "The saber, take it."
No, Maz did have a personal stake in her words after all. Rey instantly scrambled to her feet, her teeth grinding, her hands trembling. "I'm never touching that thing again. I don't want any part of this!"
With that, she bolted out of the palace.