The Art of Broken Pieces

Spoon Attacks an Intruder, Lunch Still Naps

Rey felt Ben vanish from her senses, watched him react and stumble, and for just an instant, the only thought in her mind was Han's shocked face, the lightsaber hot and red jutting through his heart and out his back. Dead.

How. There had been no blaster fire. Nothing...

Then Ben lifted his head, big hands scrabbling for purchase on ground and on the lightsaber at his side, and Rey understood. It wasn't Ben. It was the Force itself...

She whirled, blaster in hand, and fired off three shots. The commander and two young ensigns dropped to the deck with fatal cries, and Rey was already moving, already seeking the source of the threat.

There was something on one of the lift platforms, some large box or tank, and though her mind reflexively reached for the Force to probe it, the Force didn't respond. Fear latched on the back of her neck, sinking in its fangs, but Rey battered it away.

She'd fought without the Force. She'd done it her whole life. She could do it again.

"Ben! The ship!" She screamed, swinging her blaster toward the generator block at the base of the shield towers. It was far, but her aim was true. She hit, saw sparks, but no crackle. The bolt attenuated too much over that distance, light redrafting off. There wasn't enough power to blow the generator.

No time, no time. Stormtroopers were already appearing in the arena's doorways. She ran toward the ship, firing off more shots. Troopers fell, and more bolts of light streaked toward them.

Rey's voice cut through Ben's mind, clearing his head as he let go of his panicked struggle to reach the Force. He had never imagined how empty and cold he could feel without it, even when he wasn't actively using it. He cursed the moments it had cost him, trying to function without its presence. Hand finding his lightsaber he rose with a roar, the crackling heat of it rising before him as he spun to cut down a stormtrooper that burst through one of the side doors.

Letting muscle memory take over, Ben fell into the natural patterns of swordplay as he moved after Rey, guarding the path behind her. He felt sluggish, unbalanced without the Force to power his movements, to increase his response time, but a lifetime of training helped to guide his feet. As a blaster bolt crackled towards him he threw up a hand instinctively to freeze it and barely managed to dive sideways in time as it scored a shallow line of blazing heat across his hip.

Rolling to his feet, Ben spun his lightsaber into a whirling shield between them and the oncoming stormtroopers as he backed quickly towards where Rey was already leaping nimbly to the old ship's ramp.

"Get us inside!" Ben yelled, deflecting bolts back at the oncoming troops as quickly as he could.

Rey scraped her gaze across the access panel, untangling the circuitry in her mind. She dug into the pouch on her belt, thanking her years of scavenging junked Imperial war machines for her familiarity with their systems. She pried back the outer panel and dove into the neatly-bundled wires. The increasing frequency of blaster fire, combined with the slashing red light of Ben's lightsaber reflecting off the panels, stretched each second into five until, at last, she tripped the circuit and the hatch hissed open.

She whirled around, gaze skating past Ben, past the stormtroopers...no. One of the platforms lifted high, blocking any shot the Lambda class shuttle had at firing on the generator.

Rey pressed her lips, calm determination settling over her. There was only one way they were getting out of here. She'd need to be light, fast, and unencumbered.

Rey ripped off her bounty hunter mask and dropped the knee-length jacket.

"Get inside!" she shouted, grabbing Ben's shoulder. "Power up the guns and lay down cover fire! I've got to take out those shield arrays or we're never getting out of here!"