Haunting Memories

Chapter XXVIII

Your POV:
"The First Order has mounted an attack, pilots to your X-Wings and ground soldiers be prepared to fortify the base," General Organa's voice rang over the intercom system. "May the force be with us."

It had been about a month since we had killed Snoke and the First Order was all but finished. They had gone into hiding not long after the death of their Supreme Leader, after having had heavy losses due to Resistance attacks. Although we had been unable to locate them for a week or two, we were constantly prepared to launch an attack against them should their location be revealed as well as prepared to defend our base should they attempt an invasion.

Ben and I sprinted down the hallways to the hangars, both of us having been in training to be pilots. With Ben's background, they couldn't pass up the opportunity to have such an excellent flyer and he refused to be a part of the air force with me serving beside him. Both Luke and Rey offered to man X-Wings as well, meaning that all of our force sensitive fighters were in the sky rather than being part of the ground forces.

"Are you sure you want to do this, (y/n)?" Ben asked me as I climbed into my X-Wing, clearly concerned about me fighting when I was carrying a child.

I gave him an assuring smile, "I made a promise to serve the Resistance, I can't back out now. Besides, I'm feeling better than ever!"

"Just be careful out there, (y/n)," he requested, giving me a concerned look.

"You know I always am," I winked at him, pulling my helmet on and closing the cockpit.

~

Ben's POV:
Our squadron took off and met the attacking TIE Fighters. It was strange to be on this side of the fight, shooting down those who had only recently been my allies. And to be honest, I didn't feel bad killing them. They were expendable when I was in the First Order and they were expendable now, all that mattered was making sure (y/n) and our child were not killed.

The one thing I despised was taking orders from that hot shot pilot, Poe. Although he was friends with (y/n), he still had a personal vendetta against me, most likely due to my rough interrogation of him months ago. I could tell that he very much enjoyed being the one ranked above me and that pissed me off.

Even so, I followed the orders that were barked into my ears through the headset, shooting down any TIE fighter that got within my range. Throughout the entire battle, I kept a close eye on (y/n)'s ship, prepared to disobey orders to protect her, if I had to.

A new wave of TIE fighters came through the area, alerting us to the First Order's desperation. They were giving everything they had, clearly a last ditch effort to wipe out the Resistance. Poe had our squadron split into two packs, on to deal with the new fighters and one with the old while requesting back up from the base.

I went with (y/n)'s group, thankful that Poe didn't try to separate us. As we flew towards the approaching fighters, (y/n)'s plane was shot down. I screamed out her name, despite knowing that it would do no good and immediately aimed for the fighter that had shot her.

Below me, her X-Wing burst into flames, causing my breath to get caught in my throat. Rage filled my veins, a desire to kill every last one of the fighters around me coursing through my body. And I did just that, ruthlessly taking down each TIE fighter in the area. I knew by the end I would have a higher death count than even Poe, who was glorified for his agility and ability to take down the most ships in battle.

When there were no more TIE fighters left in my vision, I brought my X-wing closer to the ground and took out the AT-M6's, knowing exactly where their weakest point was. Soon every weapon on the ground was pointed up at me, but I skillfully avoided their blasts then came back around to fire upon them in return.

I stopped firing only long enough to see the unmistakable glow of a red lightsaber not far from the wreckage of (y/n)'s X-wing. There was not another person besides her who carried a lightsaber that color, Rey's using my grandfather's blue one and Luke's being green. She was alive, she had somehow manage to survive the crash.

The relief of seeing her alive was short lived as I noticed how many stormtroopers surrounded her. I called out for backup for her, despite having gone rogue from the group, and began helping her eliminate some of the troopers from my position in the sky. She looked up at me, seeming to know it was my ship, and gave me a thankful smile as she began to make her way back to the base.

I protected her from the sky until she reached the base, leaving a trail of dead bodies in her wake. Once I knew she was safe, I rejoined my squadron and got reprimanded for having gone rogue. I gave no response, knowing it was best not to upset my superiors when I was already on such thin ice.

"Now that you've decided to rejoin us, General Organa has given us permission to bring this fight out to space. The First Order has two Destroyers stationed outside of the planet and we believe that they are the last of the organization. If we can wipe them out now, before they have a chance to regroup and recover, we can end this war once and for all," Poe spoke, leading our squadron as well as two others from the surface of the planet out into space.

We positioned ourselves in our attack position, being met with a few remaining TIE fighters and racing towards the awaiting Destroyers. Poe's instructions were to try to wipe out as many of their surface cannons as possible as we made our runs, thus lessening the chances that one of our X-Wings would get shot down.

It didn't take long before the destroyers began using their ventral cannons, taking down a few of our ships in the process. I ignored the forces that we were losing, trying to penetrate the Destroyer's shields so that we could take down the ship. Out of the corner of my scopes, I noticed a missile aimed towards my ship, causing me to make a sharp turn, coming around so that I could shoot it down.

The battle wasn't one that was won without losses. I sent the final shot at the remaining Destroyer, causing its controls to become ineffective, watching as it fell to the surface of Dantooine. Poe had the squadron regroup to return to the rebel base after our victory, leading not even a third of the ships that had left for the attack.