Ouroboros

Four

Four:

Maybe this was it like just to be Force sensitive, rather than a master of directing and controlling the power. No matter how much he tried, there was nothing there and no amount of concentration could compel the energy to flow. So Ben Solo, formerly Kylo Ren, had to resort to prying the wall panel off by the door, ripping a deep cut in the palm of his hand in the process, and trying to bypass the locking circuits.

In truth, it hadn't been too difficult for someone who had spent the first half of his childhood in the Millennium Falcon, watching his father and Chewie tinker with the sometimes capricious and often malfunctioning circuits of the modified freighter and who had learned the theory of and then built his own LightSaber. Door locking circuits were pretty much the same whichever side you were on after all. The trick was choosing the time to open the door when someone wouldn't be passing or watching, so he had been reduced to trusting his feelings, listening very hard and praying silently that someone was looking out for him. But he had paused for a few moments before poking his head round the door, ducking in case a blaster tried to take it off, and then he had emerged, checking both directions and then touching the panel to close the door behind him. There was no guard, something that troubled him, for Poe had promised. But maybe they had assumed he was secure in the cell...or maybe they trusted that their own people would respect the wishes of their commanders in keeping him alive-for now.

He wasn't exactly designed for stealth, he realised as he tried to stay in the shadows. He was really too large to sneak around and the base seemed a little light on handy nooks and crannies that could be used to conceal himself-or even much in the way of shadows at all. The natural cave system was utilised skilfully to provide as much space as the Resistance required but the corridors were wide with almost no cover.. Pausing, head bowed, he listened-and then managed to cram himself behind a bank of fuel pipes as two guards marched by, avidly discussing a meeting...about him. Rolling his eyes, he listened without surprise that both were in favour of shooting him-the sooner the better. Taking another quick breath, he ducked towards the clearing that functioned as the hanger...

...and then he stopped. There was something tugging at him, a strong feeling that he needed to go in the opposite direction. He gritted his teeth. His life was in imminent danger and if he was found escaping, he was pretty certain someone would use it as a convenient excuse they needed to blast him-but despite all rationality, he had been trained over the years by Luke and Snoke and both had emphasised that he should listen to his feelings. Growling in his throat in frustration, he turned and ran back down the corridor past his cell and left at the intersection, heading further back into the base.

It was only when he arrived in a silent, cool chamber containing a stasis chamber that he understood. Before him, softly lit and preserved against the corruption of time, was Rey. Her white lips were slightly apart and her eyes closed but she looked almost as if she was sleeping. Only her absolute stillness and the fact he could feel nothing over their Bond confirmed to him that she was gone and this wasn't some horrible nightmare.

Slowly, he walked forward, still limping slightly and never taking his eyes off her peaceful face. He could still recall the last moments through their bond as he hung from that ledge in the pit where he had fallen, her steely determination a beacon as she crossed the Sabers across her body and thrust Palpatine's Sith Lightning back at him, scorching his malignant presence out of the Universe. But the backwash was always going to be too much for one person, the strain overwhelming her systems and granting her only a few moments of peace, of realisation that she had finally won before she, too, died. And he had been too weak, too late, too useless to save her.

He had failed her. As he had failed everyone in his life. Luke, Snoke, Dad. Mom. And now Rey.

Not even aware that he had walked to the side of the stasis chamber, he rested his hand on the smooth plass, feeling the slight hum of the energy that preserved her against the ravages of entropy. Closing his eyes, he reached out for her, straining to try to feel her one last time through the ruptured fabric of their Bond. The blackness seemed to burn the inside of his eyelids, the effort throbbing through his head. But under his hand, the throbbing of the stasis field grew a little more obvious, as if it was having to strain to maintain everything as it had been.