Chapter Text
Ben
I have failed. My first thought as I fall. Failed Grandfather. Failed Dad and Mom. Failed Rey. I reach with the Force to stop my descent but power slips like water through my fingers. Palpatine has drained me.
Wind-whipped hair stings my cheeks. How much farther until I am incinerated by dark lightning or shattered in the bowels of a Sith temple?
Please. I stretch into the void where I used to feel the Force. Please, for Rey. I have never sensed them, but Luke taught they are always with us. If I cannot help her, perhaps the Jedi will.
A gust knocks me against the jagged wall, shredding my shoulder. I tumble down and crash onto an outcropping, one leg snaps back, and the other swings over the ledge. Fire arcs down my spine. Black encroaches at vision’s edge. I retch into the crevasse. Pain lashes and I rage against it.
Then the Force vibrates, twanging for my attention. Words filter through the haze, less than a murmur yet soul deep. Be still. I cease fighting and gaze up.
Blue light outlines the overhang, maybe fifty meters above. I hear Rey’s saber sizzling against Palpatine’s lightning. Hope squeezes my chest. She is alive. I must go to her. I must. Even if I die trying.
I call the Force again and this time a trickle meets my fingers. Not enough to jump, but enough to stifle the pain and allow me to climb. I roll off the outcropping and begin to pull hand over hand up the cliff.
Muscles quiver. Fingers abrade. Sweat burns my eyes, but I will not blink. My focus narrows to the crackling blue light. Hold on. I’m coming. I speak more to myself than Rey. Even were I able to push words across our bond, I would not risk distracting her.
Three meters from the top I pause to gulp air. Light flares and flashes, and the din increases. Rey’s soul screams with expended energy. She is unyielding but nearly spent. Her agony reverberates in my soul. I shove exhaustion away and swing my body, using momentum to impel myself faster toward the top.
Blazing light explodes outward then retracts with a deafening boom. Thunder rattles the planet’s very foundations. A shockwave crests the ledge, prying my fingers loose and casting me down in a shower of pebbles. I fall a meter, heart pounding, before two fingers catch and I dangle over the abyss.
The light above dims. Rey’s lightsaber is extinguished, but so is the death shadow that marked Palpatine’s essence. Thunder continues to roar, this time from the walls and statues crumbling and crashing, no longer sustained by sinister powers. Boulders bound over the side. I flatten against the wall and they vanish into the black pit. I latch my other arm onto a handhold and pull. Five mighty heaves and my fingers summit.
The next moment I’m over the edge, panting as I take in the devastation. A blast pattern scores the rock wall, radiating out from where the dark throne reigned. Debris coats every surface and dust hangs. The chamber is empty save a single form collapsed in the dirt. Rey. My heart stutters. I see her, but I cannot sense her. No. I will not yield to despair. Not now. Not after everything we’ve come through.
I stumble forward, collapse to my knees, then drag my ruined leg behind me. She is white as Crait’s crystalline surface, her lips grey. Dead, the darkness cackles. Not dead, not dead, not dead, I chant with every tortured step.
I scoot beside her, my ravaged leg making it awkward to tug her into my arms. Her skin is clammy. I lean over her face. No pulse. No breath. Dead, the dark revels. Temptation beckons. I have walked in darkness half my life. Her own grandfather reversed death. I could find a way to bring her back. I could.
Her peaceful face accuses me, and I crush her to my chest. No. I have not forsworn evil only to embrace it again. I will not dishonor her sacrifice. I will never again deny who I am. If only I could breathe my life into her. She should live, not me. Kylo Ren may be vanquished, but that does not absolve me of monstrous crimes and unspeakable acts. I would lay down my life for her—she who has been hope and light, compassion and strength, she who has saved this galaxy. Saved me.
I peer into the chamber’s twilight depths, physical eyes unseeing, vainly seeking the Masters. No help comes. I settle her across my legs, support her head in one palm, and press my other to her waist. Memory rises with the touch. I was dying and she healed me. Her fingers just there, knitting closed the mortal wound I received at her hand, scars reverting, darkness unraveling and light breaking through the seams. Her tears coursing with seawater. Vivid emotion searing across our bond: regret, heartbreak, determination. Love. How is it possible she could love one such as I?
I close my eyes, sink into the Force. It wells up within and around, a sea of light buoying my haggard soul. I pray it will be enough. I slow my breathing, uncertain how to proceed. A vision appears. I am standing before a stone table draped in white linen and set with the three goblets of an Alderaan hand-fast ceremony. I know what I need to do, Force grant me the strength. I lift my goblet, pass over the middle cup, and pour its meager contents into Rey’s. So simple but so little. The last drops—the last vestiges of my being—hover on the rim. Let it be enough. I tilt it further. Rey’s warm hand covers mine. I open my eyes.
Color is rising in her cheeks like the dawn of a new day. She is my sun, has always been, even when I battled to quench her radiance. Her eyes brighten. She sits up and her mouth pulls into a hesitant, disbelieving smile. I want to weep, I want to shout. But my heartbeat is fading, the blood slowing in my veins. I study her face, not wanting to forget the smallest detail. If only I can carry her image to the stars. She is beautiful and alive. It is enough.
“Ben,” she says. Three letters imbued with reverence, gratitude, and love. My name bestowed by her voice. A declaration. A benediction. Who I was born to be.
I long to speak but cannot find the breath. Her fingers cradle my cheek and curl into my hair. She burns like fire against my cooling skin. Then her lips meet mine and every cell whispers yes. We are one for this moment in eternity.
She pulls away, searching my eyes. I have nothing left. No words. Nothing I can push across our bond. I have poured myself out. I am empty. And I am filled, knowing she has won and she will live. I will be with her, if the Force allows. It is enough. So I give her all that remains: I smile.