The Other Solo - Part II A Shadow of Hope

Chapter 11

Poe stealthily enters the bridge as Lt. Connix relieves the officer at her monitor. Admiral Holdo stands gazing out the window watching as the First order repeat their strikes. Poe blends in standing by the door.

Connix watches Finn and Rose's pod shoot out of the ship just missing the torpedo from the First Order.

Holdo moves toward Connix. "What was that?"

"Nothing, Admiral." Connix replies. "Passing debris."

She steps to the side nodding to Poe, signalling they made it.

Poe nods back and walks into the hall. He runs right into Jaina as she's coming out of the storage closet.

"Whoa." He catches her.

"Oh I'm sorry." She replies sheepishly.

"The storage closet? Again?"

She doesn't answer him.

"What is in there?" He opens the door to check. "Brooms, buckets and cleaning products. Intriguing."

"Where's Finn?" She deflects.

"He's around."

"Around?" She frowns. "Poe, tell me you didn't send him on that insane mission."

"You tell me why I keep finding you in storage closets and I'll tell you my thing."

Jaina purses her lips. She weighs whether to tell Poe about her weird connection with her brother and Rey. He wouldn't understand.

"Fine, you keep your secrets and I'll keep mine." He snaps walking down the hall.

Her heart aches watching him walk away from her.

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Luke stands in awe as Rey wields his old lightsaber. Effortlessly she twirls the weapon faster and faster. He can sense the force and power flowing through her. She gets more confident with each swing as a smile spreads across her face. He's enchanted by her.

The lightsaber slashes through the rock like a hot knife running through butter. It's fragments crash below just missing the caretakers but taking out their small wheelbarrow.

Rey retracts the saber at they're disapproving faces.

Luke has already turned away climbing the cliff in the opposite direction. Rey follows.

"Lesson two. Now that they're extinct, the Jedi are romanticized, deified. But if you strip away the myth and look at their deeds the legacy of the Jedi are failure." He sits at the edge of the pool of water. "Hypocrisy. Hubris."

"That's not true." Rey moves toward him.

"At the height of their powers, they allowed Darth Sidious to rise, create the Empire, and wipe them out. It was a Jedi Master who was responsible for the training and creation of Darth Vader."

"And a Jedi who saved him." She counters. "Yes the most hated man in the galaxy. But you saw there was conflict inside him. You believed that he wasn't gone. That he could be turned."

"And I became a legend."

She senses his disappointment and shame surfacing again.

"For many years, there was balance and then I saw...Ben, Jaina and little Anakin, my nephews and niece with that mighty Skywalker blood. And in my hubris I thought I could train them, I could pass on my strengths."

Frustration and pain lace his voice, "Han was Han about it, but Leia... trusted me with her children. I took them and a dozen students and began a training temple. By the time I realized I was no match for the darkness rising in Ben it was too late."