Ouroboros

Nineteen

Nineteen.

The planet Mustafar glowed in the inky night, the lava flows forming throbbing orange scars on the planet's surface, reminding him of the joins in the last iteration of his helmet, discarded in his Silencer before he faced Rey that last time on Kef Bir. And of the scar she had given him as she had bested him in that snowy wood on Starkiller. Unconsciously, he touched his right cheek, feeling the unmarked flesh and recalling the searing instant when she had slashed him across the face and shown him that she was a power to be reckoned with. Even amid the collapse of the planet, all he could think of was her.

Last time he had come here, he was too distracted, too focussed to just stare at the orb as he approached, marvelling in the unique beauty of the world. Instead, he had been feverishly reading intelligence reports and meditating, clearing his mind of all distractions except his fury and determination to crush any opposition to his rule. He sighed. After killing Snoke and losing Rey on Crait, he had been single-minded for a period of time, utterly convinced that his vision of the future was correct. That she would turn and come to realise that her destiny was to rule the Galaxy at his side. But the Darkness had been so strong, so all-pervasive that he had never realised how desperate he truly was. Every time he repeated the mantra was to convince himself. He had been a pretty good actor, he acknowledged, because his return to the monster had been spectacular and had succeeded in quelling all overt opposition in his ranks and in crushing opposition.

He walked to the cockpit and found the Generals bickering. In fact, everyone had been bickering. Tamini had emerged from the cabin to treat his wounds, shot an enormous tirade of pretty impressive cussing at him and then had locked herself back in because they hadn't turned round to take her back to Kineva. In addition, Zorii had been exceptionally pissed when she had realised that her ship was stranded on D'Nolos along with the rebel ship and it had taken Rose and Jannah a lot of calming down to stop her punching Poe and seizing control of the Falcon. And then Rose had needed to contact D'Acy and Kaydel to organise pilots to collect both ships from the planet while everyone had blamed each other for the catastrophic plan.

And tacitly blamed Ben for everything.

"Looks like a pretty hostile place," Finn commented as he slid into a seat.

"Are those lava flows?" Poe asked, checking the screens for a thousandth time.

"Yes," Ben admitted. "Though last time I was here, I was the most dangerous thing on the planet." They stared at him. "I came here to find the Sith Wayfinder from Darth Vader's castle."

"I presume you succeeded," Finn put in.

"Yeah," he admitted. "I found Exegol, didn't I?"

And I slaughtered the entire membership of a Cult of Vader who tried to protect the Castle from me. Dozens dead-all by my hand. And all I can recall is red rage, fire and blood. The screams, the hiss and spit of my saber, the exultant feeling as I thrust the blade through body after body, the smell of burning meat, the coppery scent of blood, the sudden silence as the last one fell. My breaths, harsh amid the silence and the approaching tramp of the Stormtroopers, slowly catching me up...

"Yeah...that really worked out great," Poe muttered, unable to help himself. But Ben found himself smiling very slightly at the pilot-turned-General's comment. Poe Dameron, the best pilot in the Resistance, had shown no fear or uncertainty when he had been captured by the First Order and he remained confident and smart-mouthed now.

"Not so much for the First Order or the Emperor," Ben murmured. "Or Rey."

He closed his eyes, the images sleeting through his memory.