Across the Stars (Reylo fanfiction)

Loyalty and Strategy

Someone was shaking her shoulder. She opened her eyes.

"Rey," Bryt said, leaning over her, "there's a holo-call for you," she paused, and bit her lower lip. "It's Poe," she said.

Rey sat up. Her side stung and her shoulder ached. Pushing away the blankets, she stood. "How did he seem?"

Bryt's brows furrowed. "Concerned."

Rey walked to the cockpit. When she got there she could see that off to the left of the main control panel stood a foot tall, blue hued projection of the Resistance commander. It looked as if he hadn't shaved since the evacuation. She took a breath and then stepped into his line of vision.

"Rey," he said upon seeing her.

"Poe."

"Are you ok?"

"On a deadline," she grimaced at the unintended morbid pun. "How's Rose?"

"Leading the corp of engineers as if she was born to do it. Some morning sickness, but she's hanging in there." He frowned, "You disobeyed a direct order."

"If I recall, we hold the same rank."

"That's true. But you, Last Jedi, are too important for suicide missions. Finn kne--knows that."

"Finn," she emphasised the word, "is too important to leave to torture and death at the hands of the Knights of Ren."

"I know," his face melted into a strained expression. His eyes seemed portals to a never ending void containing deepest grief. "He is too important to us," his voice caught on the word us, he flicked his gaze down. Then looking back up at her, he said, "But you are the only one capable of taking down Ren. The greater good means that we can't lose you, at any cost."

"Then send someone else."

"Believe me, I'm trying to get to him. But he's being held --"

"At the palace on Coruscant," she interrupted him, "I know."

"Then you know that we can't just go waltzing in there and snatch him out. Resources are stretched thin. And my informants say that he's under constant guard by stormtroopers and at least one Knight at all times."

"Janna and Kol," Rey breathed even as the idea came to her. "They can do it. They're mustering reinforcements even as we speak."

"They're on their way to you with a new cooling pump and extra fluid."

Rey slammed her fist down on the dash. "Dammit, send them to him! He's already been there too long."

"My priority at the moment is to get your jedi butt to Moarghulis and that antidote," his eyes bored into her soul, "Finn has put everything on the line for the Resistance. Don't make a fool of him by throwing your life away."

She closed her eyes and sighed. "I understand," she said quietly.

The image of him crackled. "Rey? What's wrong, the signal --" the projection disappeared.

Rey looked out the window. "I've got a bad feeling about this," she muttered, and then ran down the corridor back to the cargo hold. The others were sitting in a circle eating grey cubes and laughing. "We've got company!" she said.

Her companions scrambled to their feet. She grabbed the cloak from her sleeping place and belted it around her waist.

"Friendlies?" Quoll asked, grabbing his blaster cannon.

"I don't know, but you'd better put that in neutral. They've got us surrounded."

Quoll strapped the weapon over his back. Chewie groaned in protest before doing similarly with his bowcaster. Heul stuck her twin blasters into her shoulder holsters and zipped up her leather coat over them. Bryt slipped her cloak over her full sized lightsabre and shorter sabre-dagger hilts.

"Ready?" the jedi looked around at her companions. They nodded. "Then there's nothing for it but to try and come to some sort of understanding with our hosts." She led her crew to the main gangway hatch and pushed the button. Immediately blasters shot at the hull of the ship. "Hold your fire!" Rey called out. "We come in peace!"

Outside a deep voice barked orders in a language that she didn't understand. "Come out with your hands on your heads, and no tricks!" it then yelled out in common speech.

Rey did as the person said and stepped onto the gangplank. As she walked down the metal she could feel the tension pulling at the air. She saw that the ship had come down in a forest clearing that backed onto a rocky upward slope. Her breath escaped in puffs of vapour.

"On your knees!" the voice commanded. Rey looked up and saw that its owner stood on top of a boulder. The being was tall and broad. Horns curved up from his skull -- one from each temple. His scaled skin glistened in the sunlight. Behind his back folded two richly feathered black wings. Fur and leather formed his armour. His bare feet seemed some kind of elongated claws with black talons as nails. In his hands he held a blaster cannon aimed straight at her forehead.

Rey obeyed the order and kneeled, as did her friends. There was a rustling in the trees around them. Then six warriors stepped out of their cover, blaster rifles and spears at the ready, and circled the strangers to their planet. They were of the same species as their commander, who at present had dismounted from his boulder and glided down to stand before Rey. His tail flicked from side to side as he walked around them and he periodically inhaled deeply through his nostrils. At this distance, Rey could see that his pointed ears were pierced with gold loops. A scar stretched across one side of his visage from his forehead all the way down to his chin; the eye on that side of his face was completely milky white. The other eye was a fracture of reds and golds and held a vertical slit of a pupil. He came to stand in front of Rey again. "I am Captain Garuk Shiya'nac of the Teleri," he said, his elongated incisors showing as he spoke. "Why have you come here?"

"Our engine malfunctioned as we came through the asteroid field," Rey said, trying to keep her tone even. "It was an emergency landing. Had we not done so we all would have perished in cold space."

"So you say," he stroked his chin. "Ti-chala nyaha'lak!" he bellowed to his comrades. Two of his warriors, a male and a female, immediately stepped forward and cuffed Rey's hands in front of her. As they moved to do the same to her companions, Chewbacca roared.

"It's alright, mate," Quoll soothed him. "We've plonked our dirty budgie smugglers out of nowhere into their territory remember."

"It's ok, Chewie," Rey assured the wookie, keeping her gaze fixed on the Captain's.

"Lanochhan!" He said to his warriors. Then he turned back to the Falcon's crew, "I have told them to remove your weapons. Do not resist." His subordinates stripped Quoll of his blaster cannon and Chewie of his bowcaster. The wookie mumbled a curse under his breath. Then the winged creatures began ruffling through their clothes. They took Heul's blasters, and the knives out of her boots. When they came to Rey and Bryt's sabres, the warriors turned to their captain and held them out. "Jedi?" he said, raising a thick eyebrow. Then he snapped his fingers. His troops pulled Rey and her friends to their feet.

"Where are you taking us?" Rey asked.

The Captain turned and looked down to meet her gaze. "Her Majesty will decide whether or not I shall kill you."

***