To Be So Lonely // Ben Solo

13

Cyra was startled awake by the sound of a Wookie cry. She was restricted by straps over her shoulders and hips when she tried to sit up. Her head whipped to the space outside of the bed she was strapped into. As soon as she saw the browning panels lining the hall, Cyra knew exactly what ship she was on.

She focused her attention on the clasp of the strap around her shoulders. When it popped open, Cyra sat forward and unhooked the strap over her hips. She swung her feet over the bed, stumbling to the floor when she took a step, and caught herself on the wall. There was now a proper bandage over the back of her calf and she certainly felt better, more cognizant. It was blood loss that knocked her unconscious, she assumed, but the medicine in her would have to do as a treatment for the moment. She needed to find out what was going on.

Cyra caught sight of that big Wookie piloting as she turned the corner into the cockpit. She opened her mouth to call him, though all that emitted was a scream when a blast hit the ship and knocked her forward. She fell against the back of the co-pilots chair, gripping it with white knuckles for balance. Her presence startled the Wookie, but he immediately began yelling at her to sit down and be quiet--he was trying to evade a TIE Fighter.

"What the Hell are you doing avoiding a TIE Fighter?!" yelled Cyra, climbing into the chair and buckling in. She paused as she felt a knocking against her back. She let out a frightened scream when she noticed a bug-eyed furry creature smashed between her back and the seat, to which it replied with a cry of its own, and flew out of the chair. "What is going on?!"

Chewbacca started to yell in his famous Wookie speak, pausing in part to genuinely just yell when he had to maneuver the ship to evade blasts and try to rid the swarm of TIE's on the Falcon's tail. He managed to lose a good number of them before he decided to fly into an overlap of ground underneath the surface. It was a narrow passageway, an underground cave of red salt crystals, and Cyra knew instantly where they were.

"So, Rey and I escaped on Snoke's ship, you got us, I got some medicine, and now we are on Crait helping the Resistance fight against the First Order?" Cyra clarified.

Chewbecca roared.

"Great. Great, fantastic. One moment," she said. She leaned forward onto the dashboard and hit the call button down to the gunners chair. "Rey?"

"Cyra, you're awake!"

"Yes, I am alive, it's true," said Cyra non-nonchalantly. She took a deep breath. "What the Hell happened with Ben? I wasn't supposed to leave him--"

"What?!" breathed Rey, appalled by her reaction. "Cyra, he wanted the Throne. When he put you to sleep, he asked me to join him, too, and just to let everything die. He wants to start a new reign, and he's about to kill the entire Resistance right now!"

"No, he won't, not if I'm there with him," said Cyra. She and Rey grunted as Chewbacca shook off the last TIE fighter and suspended quickly out of the Cave and back into the clear sky. "I left Leia to live on Crait in that base, there's only one way in or out and it's through the front door, which they will close to avoid the First Order. There's thirteen ships, barely workable equipment. They will die in there, if you don't let me go back to him."

Rey did not answer. Cyra repeated her name into the microphone, awaiting an answer.

"I dragged your body out of there so you could survive, Cyra," said Rey. She walked into the cockpit, leaning between Chewie and Cyra to peer out of the cockpit with them.

"He wouldn't let me die," disagreed Cyra.

Rey turned to her. Her head was shaking softly, and she swallowed hard, her voice softer, as she said, "Cyra, I know what Luke saw. He told me he saw you turning to the Dark Side with Ren, yes, but he also saw your death. If you turn to the Dark Side, you'll die, and it's Ren's fault."