Chapter Text
Anger destroys your soul - Marvin Gaye
Chapter 4: Mother of Grace
The grav-car rocketed down the skylane, the decaying red sun across the city planet’s urban horizon flickering behind the towers as other speeders and starships raced in front of its scarlet light. Rey watched the passage through the tinted window with quiet delight. This was not her first time on Coruscant, the Coalition requiring her presence as Jedi then a Champion many times before, but still each visit, she witnessed something new, something different. Colors she had no concept of, food she never tasted before, and the people— the incredible buzz of life that never stilled, never faded, the light that powered this entire planet— after years of deafening, dry silence, Coruscant was an electric constantly-loaded spring; she never knew when or where the next brilliant surprise would come.
Her hand felt warm as it rested against the window, another by-product of the energized city. On her left, Finn sat quietly, his head back on the seat with his eyes closed, no doubt dozing. Next to him, Poe mirrored her, silently gazing out into the red light. Leia Organa was chatting quietly with one of the representatives of Coruscant— Brando— finalizing the opening speeches for the night. And across from Rey, Ben Solo, with his long legs buckled up under him, was gazing at his thumbs in his lap.
He hadn’t moved in ten minutes. Rey had counted.
In the library she had found coordinates to Kenobi’s last known location before leaving for Tatooine for good. The next morning, after about three hours of sleep, she had frantically set off to find any unused ship to immediately fly out to Stewjon, but she had run into Leia instead. While ecstatic that she had found something, Leia quietly asked for one more night of duty. The leaders of Coruscant had planned a banquet for the House and the Champions to give their thanks— as many other planets had done after the fall of the First Order. And of course it was requested that all Champions attend. Rey’s eyes strained from rolling so hard. Leia promised to outfit one of their fastest ships the morning after the banquet— if she could just attend one more silly celebration.
Rey was beginning to wonder when and if the formalities would ever stop. The driver, an old member of Leia’s former security detail, took a sharp turn and began the descent on to the landing platform. The grav-car jolted, rattling the cab, and Rey’s stomach jumped into her throat, her hand making a fist around the door handle.
Ben looked up and met her gaze. In an instance, she knew she couldn’t look anywhere else if she tried, and she could have sworn he was grinning, if only with his eyes. On instinct, Rey locked her mind with the Force, the sudden rush of adrenaline making her heart pump wildly.
Their eyes were still gridlocked when Leia tapped on the glass at the driver.
“Oi, we’re trying to get there in one piece, Bark!”
“Sorry, ma’am! Got cut off at the stop by some nerve burner,” the Noghri replied, scowling. “But we should be arriving shortly.”
“Told ya we should have let Poe drive,” Finn muttered, his eyes still closed.
Beside him, Poe grinned into his hand holding up his chin.
Rey swallowed, the rush of Force giving her strength to break the contact. “Only if we want our front burners burnt to a crisp.”
“Hey, that was one time,” Poe responding, feigning offense. He looked down the row to Rey who was smirking at him. “I’d like to see how you handle breaking off three old Imperial shuttles chasing you through light speed.”
“Name the time and the place, fly boy,” Rey scoffed.
This type of banter was her favorite with Poe. After several years of being around both of them, she realized Poe brought out another side of her, one that was relaxed and easy, and undoubtedly teasing. She had known pilots like this all her life: confident, thrilling, headstrong. They often came through Jakku, looking for spare parts to repair their ships. Some ignored her, some took her pilot abilities as a joke, and some leered in ways that made her skin crawl. But none of them were as kind, gentle, or as brave as Poe Dameron.
That being said, more than once, on training days, they ended up in a physical scuffle, that often ended with Poe pulling her hair or Rey biting into his forearm. If he wasn’t already in the middle, Finn was generally the one who pulled Rey away because the headlock she had put Poe in was about to cause him to pass out.
Finn also had been the first to ask if Poe meant anything to her. His brown eyes down cast, he seemed terrified of her answer. Rey had laughed, rubbing her grease-soaked hand across her forehead to get the stray strand of hair out of her face. Of course he did, she said but the grin faded the more panicked Finn looked.
She was confused for days, until one day she heard a clatter of metal in one of the bay hangers and found Poe backed up against a cruiser, Finn kissing him fiercely. Of course, when confronted hours later by their friend, they both turned the color of Sokor, the red giant. They were still figuring things out, they claimed. That night, they each earned a strong punch to the shoulder for keeping something like this from her. So their relationship was a private affair, and Rey respected that, never saying anything to anyone, and this simply meant that every time she and Poe would end up rolling on the ground because someone had insulted the other’s skills in the cockpit, it was really just a friendly matter of defending one’s honor. Or when she fell asleep in Finn’s lap after a hard day of training, she felt safe with her friend. More than once, she had nearly slipped up and called them her brothers in passing conversation, and yet, it felt entirely natural.
She could have lived out the rest of her days nestled next to those two. If Finn was her rock, Poe was her staff, her guide forward to fight another day.
“Now, children, what will the dignitaries think of their Champions are bickering?” Leia questioned, her eyes not leaving the holopad in front of her.
Poe leaned back, still playfully glaring at Rey. “Sorry, ma’am.”
His head still back, Finn discreetly poked Poe in the ribs.
“So there will be a lot of representatives here at the banquet?” Rey asked, finally turning her attention back to the General. Beside his mother, Solo’s face was stone, his gaze trailing out the window. His hand was clasped into a fist on the seat next to him. The impenetrable Force encircling his mind crackled. Rey frowned at him, before looking back at Leia.
“The first official Coalition meeting starts tomorrow, so this is Coruscant’s way of wrapping up the celebrations,” Brando replied. “It’s an excellent way to show a united support among all of the systems.”
Something that felt like derision rumbled from Ben Solo. Rey felt it across the cab. The young man remained motionless, but something in his dark eyes was angry, frustrated.
The grav-car slowed its rapid speed and circled the landing strip of the Galaxies Opera House. What Rey first assumed to be landing gear upon their first approach was in fact a screaming crowd. As the ship dropped closer and closer, Rey scanned the crowd for potential threats, a habit she had grown quite accustomed to over the years.
Again, she bounced into another search light seeking within the crowd. Frustration suddenly spiked, and she glared across the cab again. He didn’t even grace her with a returned look.
Then she felt it, something dark lurked in the crowd. Nothing to fear, but still, an angry disturbance.
The craft landed and the crowd erupted into victorious screams.
“Here we go,” Poe murmured as he opened the door, the cheering quickly filling up the entire cab. Lights flashed in the crowd before them and Rey felt her heartbeat race again. Poe clamored out and began his usual routine of smiling and waving. Finn gave a half-grin to Rey over his shoulder and followed Poe onto the platform. Representative Brando turned to Leia and took her hand, which she graciously accepted. The cab was empty except for the two force-wielders.
“You feel it right?” He asked her quietly, over the din of the noise. His hands rested over his bent knees, his eyes questioning. His eyes locked onto hers again.
“What?”
“There’s something out there,” Ben’s chin jerked to the awaiting crowd. “Not dangerous, but it’s significant. You can sense it.”
She nodded, her throat dry.
“Protect my mother,” he glanced to the floor. His hand flexed on his knee. “I know your friends are out there, but— she’s important. To the success of the Coalition.”
Rey swallowed, squaring her shoulders against the imagined force pinning her to the back of the seat. “I know.”
Ben sighed, and she immediately recognized that he wished to stay in the cab as much as she did. His large frame looked out of place, cramped inside a Coalition craft.
“We had better go,” she murmured.
He rolled chin, his teeth clenching.
“You’re right.”
He leaned forward, about to step out, when he paused. Ben looked back at her, and without any inflection or a hint of emotion, said: “I apologize for prying into your affairs, I had no right,” and strode out of the cab in one step.
Immediately his pale face was lit up a brilliant stream of lights. He adjusted his coat, his long lashes pulled down as if to block out the light.
Then he turned and extended a hand to her back in the cab. Her eyes traveled up his palm, his square wrists, long arm, to the face patiently waiting. Rey’s heart was hammering now. Utterly exposed, she stared up at the elegant man, patiently waiting to escort her to the platform. His dark eyebrow quirked up, as if to say, if I have to do this, so do you. Rey rubbed her hands on her dress to dry them, before taking his hand and allowing herself to be pulled forward. His palm was cool and his fingers touched under her wrists, barely ghosting her skin.
The procession moved forward towards the Opera House. Poe and Finn waved, smiling and shaking hands with the ecstatic crowd of Coalition supporters. Leia grinned warmly into the flashing lights, Brando nodding every now and again.
Rey tried to keep from frowning against the light. She grinned and waved her fingers. She sighed, and began to focus on the crowd again. Still she couldn’t find the source of the disturbance. It was moving, fast, slipping and sliding through the onlookers, but always ahead of them, towards the front of the procession.
Rey frowned as she sensed an image, the focus of the lurker: Leia Organa. Suddenly, from the center of the crowd, a projectile flew into the air.
Next to her, she heard Ben shout, “GET DOWN!” and she threw out her right hand to stop the projectile from splattering into Organa’s chest. The crowd screamed, ducking—
A rotten Jogan fruit hovered a foot from Organa. The General slowly rose up, her head turning to the back of the procession.
The fingers hanging by her left side suddenly prickled, as though an electric shocked surged through them. Rey looked to her left. Ben mirrored her stance— one arm raised, Force focused on the unknown projectile. Her fingers sparked again and he looked down at her, his face vulnerable out of fear. Without thinking, she dove forward with the Force and began to explore his mind, hers just as open.
She protected my mother.
She’s become so powerful.
Why are you looking at me like that?
She heard her own thoughts echoed back to her, their connection through the Force thrumming like a live wire.
He didn’t hesitate.
He’s terrified.
Why are you looking at me like that?
In the crowd, a voice screamed, “Elitists! You’ve got no love for the poor and defenseless!”
Rey slammed Ben out of her head as he did the same, the gate once again iron-clad. The crowd scattered as black shadows rushed forward, the disturbance now a low roar.
Out of the dusk that had descended, a hailstorm of rotten fruit smattered down onto the procession. But the two in the back simply raised their hands, the Force providing a shield over the Champions and the General.
“Ma’am, we should get moving,” Brando instructed. Leia nodded, but her eyes were lifted upwards, towards the invisible shield. Rey missed the look of curiosity the General sent her as Brando led Leia up the Opera House steps.
Two guards shut the doors behind them, shutting out the noise of the angry mob behind them.
“What the hell was that about?” Finn asked indignantly. “’Elitists’?”
“Ma’am, are you alright?” Poe went to the General immediately, but she shook her head.
“I’m fine,” she responded, but her eyes were strained. “Those sad people . . .”
“The destitute of Coruscant live in the lower levels of the planet,” Ben responded to no one in particular. He still looked vaguely shaken. All eyes fell on him, as it seemed to be tradition. “A group of them rose up amidst the chaos of the Clone Wars and their hatred was aimed towards what they termed the elitists— those of the upper levels, whether or not those on the upper levels had any real significant financial value.”
“But why would they attack us?” Rey asked.
Ben opened his mouth, but Poe’s brazen voice cut across first. “Because when the Deathstar was being built, it was the poor who were recruited because they were desperate to eat. They were turned into cannon fodder for the Galactic Empire. There were in fact good people aboard that battle station. Same with Starkiller Base.”
Ben’s dark eyes finally met with Poe’s steel glare. Neither man moved, the air charged, and Ben Solo swallowed.
“Madame General!” The wide doors opened and in strode the flamboyant representative from Mandalore. He embraced Leia and Brando. “Welcome Representative Brando, and the Champions! The feast is nearly ready!”
He swooped behind the General and Brando, his cape dragging on the floor, completely oblivious to the tension. “Come, come and join the festivities! We couldn’t really start without you!”
Finn followed the General, his head down. Poe threw another razor-sharp scowl at Ben before dragging his feet towards the banquet. Ben watched his strained shoulders before dropping his own gaze to his feet. By his side, his hand flexed into a fist. Rey thought of the crackle at their fingertips and she hid her own hand in the folds of her dress.
Rey briefly shook her head and walked towards the golden banquet, leaving Ben in the dark.
The glass reflected hazel in the glowing light of the banquet hall. Rey leaned back in her high chair, twisting the goblet back and forth with the Force. The night was late and they had been served more food than Rey had ever seen— much less even attempted to have eaten. After the second glass of emerald wine, everything felt far away, as though operating on a separate plane of existence, and yet within this one.
The Representative from Talus had turned away from her again, engaged in a loud conversation about the proper manner to win a holocube game with the Tefaun next to him. Finn had left his seat to join Poe on the hall floor, chatting with an elderly group of men who, despite being dressed in various officer uniforms, all looked remarkably similar. Clones, Rey wondered.
Organa had given a wonderful speech, about unity, and hope and looking forward. She also announced her retirement from the position as General. She was eager to further strengthen the remaining Alderaan outposts, and bring leadership to her people. No one seemed particularly surprised, but the looks of painful sorrow from the commanders, royalty, and representatives in the room were not lost either.
She made no mention of the secret task force set out to acquire artifacts of dark Sith magic, either.
Rey looked up into the crowd again, her eyes dancing from one blue representative, to the furry one with scuttling pincers near the far end of the hall. She, and the rest of the Champions, sat at the top of the hall, on a long table with the Coalition colors spread over the cloth.
The plush seats on either side of her were empty. The hum of chatter was everywhere, except near her, with her.
Rey sat up straighter: the seat to the right of Organa was also empty. The glass stilled as she cast out a net into the crowd to find that solid barrier in the Force.
It rumbled near the Opera House doors. The Force around Ben was warm, ebbing and flowing. Rey found him, a sharp drop of dark brown among a sea of gold and green. He was happy.
Rey concentrated, cutting back through the crowd, through the bright laughter, casual drinks, and sweet finishing desserts. She could clearly see him in her mind’s eye. Still she could not see inside that fortress of his mind, but she hovered around, watching. She did not waver close enough for him to Sense her, and because of that, the images she found were blurry, but she could understand them just the same.
He was seated on the floor with three elderly human women. Their rags bore no military marking, or symbolic alliance of any kind. When one laughed, her face was shown in sharp relief and Rey gasped: the woman’s face was severely marred, most likely by fire or blaster. She couldn’t fully open her left eye, and her mouth was a scar more than lips. Rey shifted her focus from Ben and gazed at the women around him. They all shared similar facial deformities, but if anything their joy was lighter because of it. The woman to Ben’s right whispered something playful, pointed with a stubbed finger at Ben’s emerald sleeve, and the rest broke into hoots of laughter. Rey turned, and caught the young man’s face break into a smile.
It was an unguarded smile, one full of teeth and smooth lips. He enjoyed the teasing, his chuckle a thunderous boom in his chest. He ran a hand through his dark hair, continuing to grin at the ground. His bashful air only encouraged the women more and they rolled back, howling. He muttered something like, “you wish.”
Rey swallowed, again feeling as though she was intruding. She retreated, settling back in her seat once again.
She watched his dark head jumble, as though he had made the joke this time. The women tutted, some shaking their head, and others giggling. Rey wished she had never sought him out. But she couldn’t stop staring at his thick hair.
Suddenly, his back froze, and Ben’s profile opened as he caught the sight of someone across the banquet hall. Rey followed his gaze and watched Poe stand up, saying something about getting some air. Finn was entranced by the wild gestures of one of the old clones, no doubt sharing a war story. Poe patted Finn’s shoulder before heading towards one of the hall doors.
Ben stirred and stood up, excusing himself from the women, before following the pilot through the hall.
At that moment, she sensed it.
Rey stood up immediately, her chair grinding against the floor.
Something was coming, something bad. She felt the Force shift around them. What did it have to do with them? By the stern focus on Ben’s face, he was unaware, as he dove through the crowd.
She had to warn them.
Rey left the table without anyone trying to stop her. Her heels clicked as she bounced down the platform stairs, her dress held in her hand out of her way. She wove past representatives and cloaks and silk slippers. Ben’s green jacket trailed around the corner as she managed to narrowly avoid a Gungan jumping to his feet in a bout of laughter.
Her heart was pounding as Rey ran into a darkened corridor. Men’s voices echoed in the quiet, the din of the banquet dulled in the darkness. Above the Opera House, in the spacious sky of Coruscant, something flickered, something terrible. Without much consideration, she ran towards the only other Force-wielder in the building.
“Dameron—,”
“No, I don’t care. You destroyed your mother when you left. You destroyed your family. I don’t care who you’ve manipulated into believing this is a new you— I ain’t buying it!”
“We were children, together. You were my—,”
“NO,” Poe’s voice viciously replied,” I was never your friend, and if that’s your definition of a friend, then you’re more pathetic than I ever thought you could be. We were not friends, and we never will be.”
In the sky, two ships dropped out of hyperspace and opened fire on the Opera House. She found the two men around the corner of the corridor.
“Ben!” she screamed. His dark eyes locked with hers and he moved forward.
The corridor exploded in a storm of blaster and smoke. Rey was launched backwards, the ceiling collapsing into fiery debris. In the distance, someone screamed and fire erupted from the rubble.
Organa.
Coughing, the smoke clouding her eyes, Rey rolled onto her knees, her ears ringing. Nothing broken. Something bleeding.
Organa.
She tripped onto her feet, the heel to her shoe cracking, and she tossed her elegant shoes to the side. The doorway to the banquet hall had crumbled, crippled under the weight of the fallen ceiling. Rey threw up a hand, and the rubble blasted away.
The banquet hall was burning. Bodies littered the black floor, tables upturned, and flames crackling. Someone was wailing, and soot-drenched guards were trying to rouse unconscious forms. Above them, the enemy ship swooped low again.
Rey clamored over rubble towards the banquet table. She shoved aside another lump of hot black steel, and found the General—
Alive. But Brando was not so lucky. She knelt next to him, hand over his burned face.
“Ma’am, we have to get you out of here!” Rey snapped, grabbed the elder woman by the shoulders, pulling her up.
At the entrance to the hall, several blasters went off and guards groaned. Rey pushed herself and Leia down behind what was left of the banquet table.
No less than fifteen Trandoshan bounty hunters climbed the stairs, their golden eyes glittering in the smoke. The leader, a green-scaled creature flexed its muscles, adjusting the large Proton rifle in its three-fingered claws.
“Good evening, Coalition members, we’re s-s-sorry for the interruption.” A large tongue darted out from between two-inch long fangs. “We’re your entertainment for the evening. Where’s-s-s-s the famous-s-s General Leia Organa?”
Rey felt the General shift under her hand, trying to rise out from behind the overturned table, but Rey shook her head.
“I can get you out of here, but you have to trust me,” she whispered.
“Rey, why are they here? What are they looking for?” Leia hissed back.
Rey shook her head, her gaze offset as she ran through the endless list of possibilities. Military plans, soldier outposts, trade routes, rations drop sites—
The General grabbed Rey’s arm as the two women came to the same realization.
“Rey,” she murmured breathlessly, “they want our information on the Sith artifacts. In the wrong hands, the dark side could return.”
“A free-for-all for hunters like the Trandoshan.” Rey unbuckled the strap on the back of her left calf. Her saber fell into her hands. “I can clear the way, but once we get onto the platform, we have to get you out of here.”
“You have to get back to The Elite. They’re in my safe, in my room.”
Rey reached across Brando’s dead body, and pulled the blaster from his holster. She handed it to the General with a small grin.
“Here, it’s the best I can do.”
Leia Organa smirked. “It’s all I need.”
Rey huffed, steeling herself for the coming fight, and switched on her double-sided saber.
Out of the smoke, Rey stood, engulfed in a blue light. The Force thrummed within her and she stretched, her power unfurling.
“Oh, and who is this?” The Trandoshan chuckled, lowering his rifle. However, the other four around him raised their sights. “I didn’t suppose they made Jedi as tas-s-sty-looking as you.”
“Let the survivors go. Or else I will have to fight you.”
“You’ve got me all ruffled in my trousers now, little thing,” the Trandoshan turned off the safety. “Come give us a—,”
Across the room, a blaster shot fired and knocked the rifle from its owner’s claws. The creature shrieked in pain.
Ben did not hesitate and fired into the group of hunters, scattering them behind the debris for cover. Behind him, Poe was badly bleeding from his cheek and he held his arm at an odd angle, but he was undoubtedly alive. The hunters returned fire and Ben called a broken table to them to hide behind. Before his ash-covered face was covered behind the rubble, Ben’s look was fierce— every angle of his eyes, lips, jaw was drawn tight. The guards outside were returning the shots, consuming the attention of the hunting party at the back.
Behind her, Leia opened fire into the hunter patrol. The Trandoshan screamed, hissing and fired back into the smoke. Rey ducked and grabbed Leia by the wrist, dragging her down and against the far wall. Rey deflected several blasts that came their way, and did not miss the look of relief on Organa when they saw Poe and Ben move to deeper cover.
“You stay here, I’ll clear a path out,” Rey muttered. Leia nodded, her blaster held tight.
The young Jedi focused, sensing a Trandoshan behind the wall of debris in front of them, and shoved the blackened husk forward. The creature screamed, burning from the ashes, and Rey leapt forward.
Gliding on the Force, she swung left than right, taking two out in the same motion. Their comrades turned and opened fire, but the double-bladed saber knocked the blasts aside with grace. A threat moved on the horizon and hurled him into the ground with a single blow from the Force.
“General, now!” Rey roared over her shoulder. More hunters found their attention, and began blasting at the two women, but hand-over-fist, Rey countered the fire with her saber, covering Leia as she moved along. Leia fired into the collapsed door and immediately, the smoke poured out of the opening into the night air. Rey knocked back a hunter into several of the other Trandoshans as they slipped outside. The remaining guards were locked in a fierce fight with the rest of the Trandoshan clan, but above the thunder of battle, Rey spotted an intact cruiser and a speed bike. Leia saw it too.
“I don’t know how to get you there, Ma’am, we’d need a lot of cover and—,”
An old Resistance transport descended out of the sky and opened fire onto the clan of creatures. The creatures scattered, at least enough for the ship to land. A Resistance Commander rushed down to the platform.
Before the commander could say anything, Leia turned to Rey, grabbing her wrists. “You have to get to the information first. Trandoshans don’t care about anything but the hunt. They’ve been hired to do this by someone and that someone isn’t any good. I’ll send troops to The Elite as soon as I can.”
Rey nodded, pulling away, but Leia grasped tighter. Her brown eyes were etched in worry. “Be careful.”
The saber active again, Rey sliced through the side of the Republic-style dress, her legs now free to their full range of motion. “Always am.”
Cold wind snapped at her bare heels as she sped through the skylane towards the burning Elite, her brown hair coming loose in the stream. Medical transport passed her in the opposite direction, racing towards the scene at the Opera House, and more still zoomed ahead, breaking every speeding law in the city. She had seen the smoke billowing into the night sky a mile away and her heart tightened as she thought of the people inside the crumbling hotel—
Of the people she had left back at the Opera House. She hadn’t seen Finn anywhere in the wreckage. And Poe looked terrible, his arm—
She had left Solo to defend them all. She had left Ben.
Despite the cold burn on her knuckles, she cranked the handle on the speeder, urging it faster. She was sure she could no longer feel her toes, but still she rattled forward.
Rey ignored the officer sirens and landed on one of the platforms still intact. Officers were urging people out of the building, medical and management droids tending to victims and attempting to put out the fire. Circling the hotel, another band of Trandoshan hunters shrieked and hissed, snapping their jaws and firing into crowds.
Rey ignited her saber and, tossing back a hunter rushing after a woman onto his back and off the platform, she stormed into the burning building.
Around her the fire raged, hot licks of flame scorching the metal skeleton of the building, consuming carpets and tapestries and furniture. Immediately, the young Jedi broke into a fierce sweat, pools racing down her neck and forehead. The lobby was deserted, the fire too hot for anyone to use it as an exit, and yet on the edges of the Force, she sensed movement. Gathering her strength beneath her feet, she launched herself twenty feet into the air and tumbled onto a stable hallway on the third floor. A wall to her left collapsed and she blocked the falling debris with a swipe of her hand. In the room beyond, a Trandoshan hissed and opened fire. She sidestepped the blast and returned it back to its origin. The hunter snarled as it fell.
The fire was reaching unbearable temperatures and she felt sweat run down her legs. Leia’s temporary quarters were on the fourth floor. Rey collected her strength again, and bounded up through a crackling hole in the ceiling.
It was Leia’s room, Coalition flags draped in black tatters along the wall. The building gave an unsettling shudder and outside she heard more screaming, more gunfire, and the sound of approaching ships. Rey danced along the edge of the bedroom, a large hole down to the first floor melting open as the flames reached higher and higher. Sweating profusely, feet cracking from burn blisters, Rey sighed, trying to ignore the pain, the yelling, the way Master Luke once had instructed her. She opened a hand towards the tapestry above the bed and yanked it away with a tug of the Force. The Elite safe was designed to withstand fires like these, but perhaps not the powerful grip of a Jedi. She turned her attention to the sleek metal door— and heard a roar in the distance.
Thud. Thud.
Across from her, the remaining intact wall shuddered as two giant claws broke through. The wall began to crack as the claws dug deeper in and with a violent jerk, an entire section was removed by a giant Trandoshan. It was at least three times her size— her head was the size of one of its bulging biceps. It gnashed its teeth, screeching into the night.
“Jedi,” it snarled, “you won’t get in the way of what I’ve come for.”
Rey concentrated, her hand forming a fist, and the metal door blew back into another room of the hotel. “Let’s make a wager. Whoever gets there first, gets to—,”
She noticed something swinging by its two-foot wide hips. Crudely so, Obi Wan’s journal had been wrapped up in a layering of cloth. The creature had stolen it, undoubtedly hoping to make a profit off it.
“Is this-s-s-s yours, little Jedi?” It snickered. “Come and take it.”
The lightsaber ignited a blaze of fire.
“Okay, lizard-brains, suck laser!” Finn, with a swollen eye and a broken rib, blasted down the final hunting raider ship.
From the cockpit of a cruiser, Poe whooped in victory. “Get ‘em!”
She was close, somewhere nearby, but where?
Her movement in the Force suddenly clashed with Ben’s net and he pointed over Poe’s shoulder to a landing platform on one of the higher levels of the Elite. “There. She’s in one of those rooms.”
The moment Poe touched down, Ben was already down the landing strip, blaster raised at what remained of the terminal doors. Her friends came tumbling down after him.
He had yanked off his firm necktie before leaving the opera house, leaving his collar bone exposed. Hot wind from the burning building burrowed against his throat and down into his starched shirt, deepening his sense of panic. His hair, blowing in the ash, plastered itself against his bruised jaw.
“I don’t see her,” Poe yelled above the crackle of the flames and the siren of the Coalition ships on the decks below.
“She’s here. I can feel her.”
With a crack like lightening, something very large crashed backwards through the terminal door. A trandoshan, two feet taller than Ben and three times as thick, flew towards them, looking as though it was well on its way to losing a battle with a trash compactor.
From the flames and wreckage, a figure emerged. Her hair snapping in the molten ashy wind, dress torn up the side to her hip, her bare legs bleeding and burned, the fire in her eyes crackling brighter that the burning saber in her hand, Rey approached. She moved like she commanded reality to move around her. Barefoot and bleeding from the back of her ear, down her throat, the Living Force within the young Jedi roared.
Ten feet in front of her, the trandoshan was shuffling to its feet. It was bleeding profusely, but as most ignorant species went, it seemed unaware that it had lost the fight. Pathetically it raised its claws as if to continue the blows, but Rey shot out a hand, raising the creature off its massive feet.
Beneath his sheer awe, Ben’s heart quickened. No, don’t do that, that’s darkness—
The creature struggled but Rey had yet to clamp down on its throat.
“The disk, if you please,” she said curtly.
It snarled and thrashed— and Rey tightened. The creature gasped and her eyes glittered, her lips pulled back into a snarl. She was Force-choking the hunter.
Ben opened his mouth, but Finn’s voice was heard. “Rey! Stop!”
The Jedi blinked, shocked for a moment, before slamming the trandoshan into the platform. The tab fell out of its meaty claw, loose in exhaustion.
Her hair and dress billowed in the wind.
“You’ll never win, Jedi,” the creature hissed, “the Dark side will always find a way.”
“If you’re what the Dark side has to offer, then I remain unafraid,” Rey responded. Ben swallowed. She was bleeding worse than he originally saw. “My book. Now.”
Defeated, the hunter unbound some package at its hip and tossed it to her. Triumphant, Rey grinned. “Smart. You’ll do fine in maximum security prison.”
She raised her eyes and Ben found himself staring directly into hers. Then they were gone, greeting her friends. She raced towards Finn, throwing her arms around him, thanking the Stars that he was safe. And of course, Poe welcomed her with a one armed hug, the other wrapped up in a sling.
Then she found Ben again— and froze.
“Thank you,” she said and Ben knew it was meant for everyone, despite being absolutely controlled by those hazel eyes.
“Rey, look out!”
The trandoshan had clamored to its feet and lunged at the girl. She ducked—
And Ben, with a sweep of his hand, launched it from the platform.
As Poe flew them back to what was left of the Opera House to regroup, Finn sat next to her, rubbing bacta on her open burns. She felt foolish, being fussed over. She felt even more so that Ben Solo watched the whole event transpire. Despite having an entire ceiling falling on him, the greatest injury he seemed to have sustained was a large bruise blooming green and purple up the side of his sharp jaw.
Her feet, now red and black, were cold again, the transport ship’s metal rather unforgiving. She focused determinedly on a spot on the ground, letting Finn clean the blood from her neck.
“You know it doesn’t mean anything that you choked that guy, right?” Finn muttered.
The shuttle jolted. Ben listened with his eyes diverted. Finn seemed determined to ignore him.
“You just lost control for a minute, and it doesn’t mean anything. Light or dark, okay?”
Rey’s stomach knotted further. She hadn’t lost control. If anything, she had been in exact and precise control, and she had done it anyway. The only other time she had done something so cruel was—
“That’s not true,” Solo muttered.
Finn’s scowl darkened. “I don’t remember asking for—,”
“That’s not true, Rey, and you know it.”
The shuttle bounced and the lights flickered.
Again, she couldn’t remember another time he had spoken her name so clearly. So firm. Reverent. Their gaze held yet again.
“Believing the Dark side has no influence on you only makes you vulnerable.”