Chapter Text
The durasteel floor beneath Leia chilled her feet and spread cold to the cracks between her bones.
Her eyes darted to the viewport and settled on the stars. She felt a ripple in the force as if a small petal had fallen upon water light-years away. Across the stars, she felt her husband die and a small flare of hope died with him.
Not even Han Solo had been able to bring her son home.
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Although Leia sent Rey to follow the map to find Luke Skywalker, she did not expect him to come back.
But, he did.
Shortly after Rey was projected to arrive at Luke’s location, a comm call came in on their main communication line. Rey found Luke Skywalker and started her training.
One month later, Rey sent a transmission that she would be returning to the resistance base with Luke Skywalker and information to change the tide of the war. The base buzzed with excitement at the landing bay and the thoughts of the people's mingled hope as they strained to catch a glimpse of the Jedi.
Luke and Rey will bring the end of the war, they whispered confidently.
The ramp of the Falcon lowered, and her eyes swept over a beloved face she had not seen in years. Rey stepped out beside him. Chewbacca followed behind them. Luke looked older than her memory with wrinkle marks etched into his tanned face. With how long they had been apart, Leia did not think he looked old enough.
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The last time Kylo and Rey connected over the force, Rey plucked Snoke's location from his thoughts.
"It must be a trap" Rey states as she leans over the back of a tall chair. The leaders of the resistance listen attentively to her words. "Something was wrong. He was off-balanced. He never lets me see important information from him unless it’s for a reason."
Leia holds a breath. She thinks of soft baby curls, abandoned clothes and small feet racing up narrow stairs giggling
"Get back here, young man!"
"You can’t catch me!"
Leia banishes the memories.
“Even if it is a trap, if true, this information could be invaluable to us. We need to be prepared to strike.”
Luke nods in agreement. "And you are strong, Rey. With time, you may exceed Kylo Ren in strength. It is possible that your continued training allowed you to reach into his mind and take the information without him knowing."
Rey shook her head.
"But, he felt desperate. I don't know why, but I could tell. It felt more like he was projecting the memory but trying to hide it. What if he wanted us to know where Snoke is and do something about it?"
There was hope burning in Rey's eyes, but Leia she could not travel down that path again.
"MOOOM!"
A swirl of limbs scrambled onto her bed, over her stomach and knocked the wind out of her.
"Benny, what is it? What’s wrong?"
"He’s lying. You love me! He’s wrong. I know you do!"
She heard Ben cry as he curled up against her side tense and angry.
"Did you have a nightmare again, Sweetheart?"
She asked and his small fists curled into the silky fabric of her nightgown. She engulfed him in her warm arms and burrowed him under the covers over her heart.
"I love you, Ben. I love you more than you could ever know."
Leia's brow furrows. "Unit 7 can run a mission to confirm that the base is First-Order without arousing suspicion. They'll check the area and report back. We have a chance to do some real damage to the First Order with this information. If Snoke is on that moon, we need to strike hard and fast.”
She looked around the room.
It was unanimous.
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A single pilot flew the mission to drop a bomb on the First Order headquarters in a confiscated tie.
The pilot would fly in, drop the bomb and fly out after detonation. Leia felt surreal as she watched Poe fly into orbit, gain clearance, drop the bomb and fly out. The mountainside cliff of the First Order base exploded in a nuclear blast which laid the entire western hemisphere of the planet to waste.
"HAHA! We got them, General!" Poe cried over the intercom. "Those Kriffing bastards didn’t even see it coming!”
The base celebrated, but Leia and Rey’s eyes locked from across the control room with a shared panic.
Somewhere light-years away, a burning pain rippled across the stars from Kylo Ren.
He was burning.
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One week after the success of the mission, the Resistance leaders gathered around a display of coordinates discussing their next attack when a holovid blasted over every open radio channel. They watch it on the center of the table. Hux declares himself Supreme Leader of the galaxy.
"But, why not Ren?" Poe gasps. "That makes no sense unless the bastard died with Snoke."
"No." Leia breaths and the buzzing of voices in the room silenced. "Hux was the leader of the military. He might have had more political power and been more accepted by the organization."
"Ren may have been too injured to assume command," Luke suggests. "With any luck, it will stay that way. We should consider that a blessing. Hux is ruthless, but he is not as clever as Kylo Ren or his master. The First Order uses three locations to supply its fleet with tie fighters and weapons. If we target these, it will weaken them and we can go after their new Supreme Leader. Kylo Ren can be dealt with by me and Rey. Wherever he is, we should expect another change of leadership within the First Order when he returns."
Rey frowns. " But what if he gave us the information to defeat Snoke. If that’s true, he might be a defector from the First-Order? We should try to find him. His help would be invaluable in defeating the First Order."
Leia took a moment to study the girl's thick furrowed brows and the tight strain in her neck from her clenched her jaw. She was hiding it well, but she looked ill. And, her voice was filled with longing. It was a conversation they had before. Rey wanted to find Ben and bring him home.
“Kylo Ren is the First-Order, Rey,” Luke said. “Your feelings from your force bond must not influence your Judgment. We need to be the ones to end him when the time comes.”
Before Rey can spit out the angry reply building on her tongue, Leia steps forward.
"Kylo Ren has been a key figure-head in the First Order regime and a perpetrator of planetary genocide. If he does not return, then make no mistake the Resistance will find him. Allowing him to remain in the galaxies without a trial is something we cannot tolerate. We will find him, and he will face justice along with the other military leaders of the First Order.”
She knows Rey wants to speak against her but holds her tongue against the steel edge in her words.
As much as Leia had hoped and prayed over the years that there was still good left in her son, she wants to laugh as much as she wants to sit down and cry at the realization that her love was not unconditional after all.
She wants the war to end more than she wants him home.
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The first mission to attack the main supply branch of the First Order deploys. Rey, Finn and Poe leave together in the Falcon with a swarm of X-wing fighters. Luke stands by Leia's side in the control room as they wait above the holo table for news.
"I’ve got a bad feeling about this." Poe's voice cracks over the intercom.
"Something’s happened here" Rey replies, "It feels wrong."
Leia and Luke exchange glances. His metallic hand strokes his beard in thought as Leia leans forward to speak into the Comm.
"Abandon the mission if you need to, Commander. We can't afford to lose everyone."
"Roger that, General,” Poe replies.
Only eight hours pass before ships start returning to the base. Poe and Finn race towards the command table from the doorway and stop in front of Leia to gasp for breath.
"Gen'ral! You are never—going to believe this!"
The members of command stand up around the room and turn to watch him in heavy anticipation.
"Gone!" Finn cries. "Every single member of the First-Order was cut down!"
“What?” Noise flickers around them as the excitement grows.
"Lightsaber wounds. Someone slaughtered the entire base. "
Her heart flutters.
"Where's Rey? Why isn't she with you?" Leia barks as she looks over their shoulders expecting her to burst through the doorway. Poe and Finn look at each other with nervous, worried glances.
"We took her to the medical bay. She got sick, really sick. It was bad. Finn had to fly her back to base. She won’t stop throwing up."
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The next First Order bases they targeted were found destroyed. The Resistance salvaged the supplies, searched for intelligence and left. On the third base, they found survivors and were able to confirm what they already knew.
Kylo Ren had been the one to lead the attack.
And, he was alone.
"He was in my head!" A former stormtrooper babbled in fear. "It hurt so much that I—that I thought he was going to torture me. But then he just stopped. He just walked away and attacked someone else and then some of us he killed and some of us he didn't even look at before he cut apart but then some of us he grabbed us and wouldn't let go but then he didn't kill us. He didn’t kill us. He let us go."
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The Resistance doubled and tripled in size until it kept growing like a wild summer weed. Hux was dead, all the major members of the First Order had been killed, every stronghold was destroyed and only a remnant of First Order remained trickled throughout the galaxy. There were three remaining Stardestroyers orbiting space, but the Resistance knew they would not remain for long. Kylo Ren would find them before they managed to do any major damage, and he would destroy the ships.
Their main concern was what to do with Ren once the FO was destroyed with the end of the war rapidly approached. Many wanted him to face trial, but most of them were afraid. They wanted him killed on sight, and they wanted to hire out every bounty hunter they could to take him down.
No one could deny that the war would still be ongoing if Ren had not turned against the FO, but no one believed he would stop his slaughter once the First Order was destroyed. He had responded to no hails from the Resistance or the First Order. Would he come for them next?
"He isn't fighting for anyone." Rey had spat when the difficult topic of Kylo Ren had fluttered around the board. "Every time the force connects us, he's always covered in blood, he is always with his lightsaber and he always tries to kill me the moment I appear. He didn't change sides. He just went mad."
Everyone accepts her words, but Leia detects a hint of something else in Rey's speech. The girl is bitter. Bitter and angry like a mangled hurt thing. It's not that he is covered in blood or that he is not fighting for the Resistance that bothers her. A glossy sheen had covered Rey's eyes when she talked and Leia felt a ripple of sorrow flutter through the air. She could feel it hanging from her tensed shoulders.
Kylo Ren acted like he did not recognize her like she was just another Stormtrooper to cut down. Somehow, his lack of recognition had hurt her the most and left her bitter and angry and worried.
She understands a little more, why her son had asked Rey to join him.
But the war is ending. There is a new galactic senate to build. Leia does not tell her she knows.
If she did, she would not be able to stop her own tears from finally falling to the floor.
Her son had left the First Order, but he did not come home.
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When the report comes in that the remains of three starships have been found, the official end of the war is announced across the galaxy. They have had months to correspond with local governments to discuss the formation of a new intergalactic republic.
The announcement is strictly a formality.
The war has been over for weeks.
Leia watches colorful blasts of light and confetti rocket into the sky following the announcement. Soldiers wave streamers and click together glasses filled with ale and spirits to celebrate. Cheers roar and swell as private celebrations break out across the base established on Chandrila. She mingles around gleeful faces to share hugs and laughs with her people before retiring. She cannot find Rey, but over the past year the Jedi often retreats to her quarters in search of solitude.
Leia debates searching her quarters, but her upcoming meetings and agenda for the next day weigh heavy in her mind. With five new diplomats from Midrim planets arriving at the start of the day and the trial of low ranking stormtroopers and first-order officials starting in the afternoon, the day would be full until sundown. Before sunrise, a special counsel would take place to discuss apprehending Kylo Ren before his mad killing rage could continue. Her limbs feel heavy, so she turns away from the hallway that might lead her to Rey and returns to her own quarters.
When she reaches the door to her chambers, the hair on the back of her neck stands up as if an electrical charge rolled across her skin.
A short, quick breath shudders from her mouth. She slams the door open.
The light is on.
She steps into the room, and the door hisses shut behind her. Her cup of tea lays undisturbed by her bedside table from the morning where she had left it. The covers of her mint green sheets are pulled back, and her son is leaning over her bedside table gazing at the picture that had been taken of their family before he turned six. She has always liked that picture. It was one of the few where they were all together.
She takes several steps towards him and let out a breath she had been holding in her chest.
"Ben?"
He does not turn to look at her. He is captivated by the photograph, so she risks several more steps until she could reach out and touch him if she wanted too.
She wants to so much she suffers for it.
"Ben." She demands. His gaze snaps away from the picture to her face. It was only when he got older that he stopped listening to her when she used what Han would call her princess voice. But, he seems to listen to her now.
When their eyes met, she is keenly away of every year they have been apart. She has not seen her son in over fifteen years. Perhaps it is because she is still grieving, but she sees Han in his face. His cheeks look hollow. There is blood, dirt and black oil on his face. She had never imagined him to be so tall.
"Where have you been?" She hisses like she did when she had caught him sneaking away from her senate meetings instead of waiting with 3PO outside the hall. She spent many hours after they ended searching through waiting halls and closet corners to find him curled up asleep or whispering to no one in some hidden room in the building.
His lightsaber falls from his hand. It rolls away from his feet before it disappears under the bed. A gold chain falls from his other hand, and Han's golden dice tumble to the floor. She feels like she might choke. Where had he found that? She wonders.
"Ben? Where have you been?” She hisses again “ Why didn't you come home?" When your father asked you too. She wanted to say. After Snoke died.
His eyes flutter to her as she speaks but keep drifting away toward the empty space off to her right. She is close enough to smell the blood and odor from weeks of unwashed sweat lingering on his skin and clothes. Her left hand brushes the com at her side, and she knows she must alert the council.
Her mind wanders to Alderaan burning, the screams of the Hosnian system, the families who had lost loved ones to the war and all the people who were still morning instead of celebrating. She remembers making Ben fruit and cheese crackers in their old condominium on Chandrila just thirty minutes away from where they are now if they used the city’s hover streets. His clumsy two-year-old fingers and overstuffed cheeks used to create red berry juice stains in the corners of his mouth that she would wipe away with a wet towel. It was not berry juice, but blood that speckled her Son's face.
But, her son was alive.
The scent of his body wafts in the air around her, and she coughs.
"Come on.” She beckons. “You need to clean up. You’re filthy, Ben." Her hand reaches for him, and when he does not pull away she grips his forearm and squeezes. She can sense him through the force now that they are so close together. He feels and looks as if something has drained his life away from him leaving only a thread. He is not here for a battle, and whatever fear she had flutters away. What did he come here for? She wonders.
Dad said to come home. He speaks into her mind, and she has to strain her neck to look up at him.
A swell of confusion rises in her, but as she reaches for him with her other hand it fades. He's in shock. It took her longer than it should have to recognize the glazed look in his eye, but when she does she leads him towards the bathroom. She lets him lean against the doorway as she crouches down to draw a bath.
The steam swirls into the air.
A strange sense of nostalgia stirs in her heart as she dips her fingers into the water to check the temperature. When she looks back up at him it is easy to see the child in the man again even with the blood and oil coating his skin.
"Will you be okay on your own?" She asks as she tries to discern what blood might be from him and what might be from someone else.
Dad said to come home. She hears him whisper into her mind again, and she frowns. His limbs are stiff as she pulls him to the side of the tub. Like a dead man’s, she thinks. The smell of him makes her gag as she presses on his forearms to make him sit-down on the rim of the tub. She dips a towel into the bathwater and starts to clean the dried blood and dirt from his face so she can see his features more clearly. Her fingers trace around the shape of his eyes and the hook of his nose.
“Ben?” She asks as her palms cups each one of his cheeks.
Dad said to come home. He repeats into her mind, but he has not spoken one word to her.
“Can you hear me, Sweetheart?”
Her thumb strokes his cheek. He projects the same phrase into her mind, and it sparks her worry into a flame.
“Do you know where you are?” She asks sharply. His palm drifts up and engulfs the hand resting against his face. He threads his fingers into hers, and lets them fall into his lap. She watches as his upper body curls down towards her and pulls away before the top of his head can collide with her chest. He rocks forward a second time, and on the third time he drifts towards her she cups the back of his head with her palm and pulls him into her chest. His arms stay limb at his side but he burrows into her warm embrace. She feels him start to shiver and when the clothing at her collarbone starts to feel damp she realizes he is silently sobbing.
“It’s alright.” She whispers as his desperate hands curl around her torso. She has him wrapped him up in both her arms and she rests his head under her chin even though the smell of him makes her nose curl. Tears start to blur her vision as her hands stroke his hair and his back. He keeps whispering the same words into her mind over and over again, and she wonders how long he has been repeating them. If it was before or after he destroyed the First Order. If it was before or after his father had died.
Dad said to come home.
“You're home, baby. You came home. It’s alright.” She whispers back to him as his body continues to shudder. She starts to hum an old lullaby as she pulls him away from him. He is rail-thin, dirty, tainted and covered in sweat and stain, but he is her son. He has come home.
She kisses his forehead, then each of his brows, his cheeks and his nose before she forces herself to pull away from him.
“Wash up. I’ll find you something else to wear.” Leia says as she leaves the room and closes the door behind her.
She finds a short-sleeved robe from her closet she knows will be too small and a large oversized floor-length vest she hopes will suffice enough before she can find him other clothing. She drapes them over a chair in the kitchen. He needs to eat, she thinks as she places several pieces of fruit and bread on a plate. There are several ration bars in her bedside drawer. She unwraps two and places it next to the fruit. She fills her teacup full to the brim with water. Arms filled with food and clothing, she returns to the bathroom door and knocks several times with her elbow.
“Ben, can I come in?” She calls. She pushes her ear against the door, but the room is silent. “Ben?”
She counts to ten in her head as she balances the plate of food on top of the teacup and reaches for the door.
“I’m coming in.” She calls and swings open the door.
He is exactly where she left him.
She sets the food down by the sink and drapes the clothes over the counter.
“I brought you something to eat, and clothes for after your bath. We will have to make them work for now until we figure out what to do. I’ll bring you something else to wear soon.” She takes a moment to study his face again and the wild look in his eyes. He is never going to wash without help. Her verbal commands for him to slip down into the bath and undress fall on deaf ears, so while humming old lullabies, she manhandles him gently into the warm water after taking off his clothing. He does not flinch even when she cleans the blaster burns on his arm and calf.
He is like a lifeless doll when the water finally runs clear from blood. She left once to retrieve medical supplies, and when she came back into her room almost certain that she had dreamed the entire encounter he was in the same position she had left him.
She does not hear him whispering into her mind anymore. Perhaps, like her, he realized he was not caught in a dream.
She drains the water for the last time.
“Can you stand up for me? “ She encourages as the water makes a whirlpool around the drain, but he does not move. He is too big for her to carry now, but she wishes he was smaller. She uses several towels to dry him in the tub instead. He ignores the food she brings to his hands and lips even though the health scan she took of him tells her he is starving. She waits a while, hoping he will leave the bath now that the water is gone or start to eat now that she is no longer trying to push it into his mouth like he was one year old. Instead, his eyes start to droop closed.
She brings in a pillow from the bed and several blankets to tuck around him in the tub. A chair is brought in from the kitchen area so she can watch over him for several hours as she decides what to do. He is already asleep when she attaches an IV to his right arm. She keeps playing the events of the last several months in her mind, but nothing adds up. Something had changed in her son, but she is missing it.
She thinks of the meeting scheduled in the morning to decide his fate. Relief floods into her soul as she realizes she had only been lying to herself before now. Her love has never been conditional. She will love him until the last breath leaves her body and after.
While tracing the lines around the edges of his fingernails and the wrinkles on the back of his palm, she watches him sleep and thinks of Han.
(Not bad for a bit of rescuing, huh? You know, sometimes I amaze even myself.)
Me too, Han. Me too.
(My hands are dirty too. What are you afraid of?)
Nothing anymore.
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She does not show up to the meeting she scheduled with the new diplomats or the meeting about Kylo Ren. She has never missed a single briefing before, so the Resistance leaders immediately send a team to find her.
When the door to Leia's office swings open, the first thing reported is the blood covering the floor by the side of her bed.
When they search the entire room, the only clues they find are blood-smeared over the bathroom doorway. There are bloody towels in the bathtub tossed carelessly to the side, and the air feels damp.
There is blood on the chair in the kitchen and an empty IV and needle in the trash compactor. A plate of food is left in the kitchen
Days, turn into weeks which turns to years.
It is four years before they find her.
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