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Rey feels a strange sense of comfort being on this planet’s desert, its rolling dunes and lack of color physical echoes of her days scavenging and wandering and waiting.
Even the sand that flies at their feet feels too much like Jakku, and for some fleeting moments she’s tired and overwhelmed, wanting nothing more than to go back before this fight, before Kylo Ren, before crossing paths with BB-8.
Back to waiting.
Then, she shakes those thoughts away and curses herself.
Never again.
She feels a body stumble into her side, and Finn’s snort of laughter fills the air. Poe waves an apology at her and rights himself.
“Can’t handle a bit of heat, Dameron?”
Poe glares half-heartedly at the other man. “I grew up in a jungle. Heat, I can handle. Humidity, fine. This kriffin’ dry air? I’m dying.”
Chewie grumbles with an air of someone who’s lived with overreactions. Drama queen.
Rey hides her smile in her shoulder.
“I must say, this weather’s lack of moisture does no good to my joints. When I was on Tatooine, I —”
“Threepio, hush.”
Rey looks behind to see the droid’s reaction; the golden robot starts, affecting the droid equivalent of a hurumph.
“You were just complaining, man. And, weren’t you on Jakku for a bit?”
“Okay, yeah, maybe —”
Rey jumps in. “Maybe you were on Jakku?”
“Maybe I’m being overdramatic —”
“Sure, sure.”
“— but, no offense, deserts aren’t exactly —”
“None taken."
“— the hot spot for a guy like me.”
“Hot spot? Was that —?”
“Intentional? Yes, Sunshine, it was.”
Rey turns her head and catches Poe’s eye. She looks back at Finn who’s the first to break.
They all dissolve into laughter.
Rey almost doesn’t hear the creaking of C-3PO as he turns from one human to another.
“Did I miss something? What? What?”
This only makes Rey laugh harder as Chewie joins in with his snickering, and the way her cheeks hurt from smiling only reinforces her assertion that she’s wouldn’t give up these boys or these moments for anything.
As their laughter dies down, Rey leans over and knocks Poe’s shoulder. “Hey, flyboy.”
“Hmm?”
“I miss Yavin, too.”
Poe’s small smile warms her faster than the sun. “I know.”
And, she does. Know that he knows, that is. It’s nice to voice it, though. Hear his response.
And, she does miss the green moon. Yavin 4. Poe’s home. Their base. She misses the green; the wild colors of the fauna and the friendly wildlife; the fresh taste of koyo melon right after waking up; the shade of the old hangar; Rose’s sweet smile as her and Finn clean weapons; Kes’s stories and his warm hugs; the talks she’s shared with Leia.
Every time she thinks of her new home, her new family, she resolves to fight that much harder for it.
The Dark Side seems that much more distant when she has them.
She adjusts her grip on her quarterstaff as they approach the top of a hill; they are on a mission.
(It’s too dangerous. I’m going alone.)
The sounds of music and voices and instruments reach the group in a wave of noise, steadily becoming louder as they climb the dune.
The life forms the Falcon had picked up when they first entered Pasaana’s atmo and surveyed the planetside had led them to a group of native creatures, similar to the fathiers she’s seen traded from time to time at Niima Outpost.
Finn had smiled and muttered something about Rose and casinos.
A second pass of the land had showed a mass of life around this current ridge, larger and more concentrated.
Cresting the hill, Rey feels a wave of wariness from the group; although they may have found their contact — or something to lead them to their contact — they’re still cautious.
(We’re going together.)
Still, the lively music and noise coming from the sea of reds and oranges and browns down below in the canyon radiates a sort of spirited and perhaps friendly energy.
With a twinge of months-long guilt and self-hatred, she shakes her head — she’s learned that she can’t rely solely on the Force to display the genuine nature of a person.
She hears Poe sigh beside her, maybe from relief as he senses the same energy Rey does.
(It hasn’t escaped Rey or Leia that he’s been tapping into the Force more and more these last few months.)
Or, maybe he’s sighing from the knowledge that they only have the name of their contact, not what they look like. And, there looks to be hundreds of potentials down there.
Rey tightens her hold on her staff.
“C’mon,” Rey turns to her friends and nods her head. “Let’s go.”