Star Wars: Edge of Hope

Chapter Fifty: When Bloodlines Cross...

The thick oily black cocoon of DARKSIDE energy wrenched Rey's body as she fought against it. The harder she fought the louder the voices in her head became. Voices she'd heard before now twisted and distorted into cruel lies. She could feel the ghosts closing in around her their dark chants of another time feeding energy to the monster holding her prisoner in her flesh. She couldn't feel anything but pain and anger, and loneliness as she reached out to tear and claw at the shroud holding her entombed in it's grasp. Her tears burned her face as she frantically tried to reclaim herself from the darkness that had infected her.

Rey: BEN!  BEN!!

Voices of the Darkside: J'us buti vune. Ilsir Niekas...Amgavsi zhol...Amgavsi tave Jena'tes!

Rey: No. No, I will beat you! I will not submit. This is my body, my mind...MY soul. You will never break me because I am not alone. I am One with the Force...

It came like a whisper, soft a low almost humming static and crackling of lightning....

Voices of the Force: "And the Force is with Us."

Rey could feel the sound of the words moving around her inside her prison. She could feel someone else...someone she knew but couldn't quite place in her minds eye...but the voice brought her calm as she focused in on its tone. Rey closed her eyes as the voice repeated her words back  to her in her own voice.

Rey: I am One with the Force and the Force is with Me.

Voice of the Force: We are One with the Force and the Force is with Us.

Rey could feel the shivers running through the pitch black skin around her, the nightshade barrier preventing her from breaking through to the surface of her mind, she could feel the shadows outside her prison hiss as they retreated back to the black. Rey let her mind relax. She focused in on the one thing she knew she could trust.

Rey:  Ben....Ben? Hear me...Be with me...Be with me...

Ben's voice melded with the others as the silence around her grew louder with the symphonic ring of the voices in the Force.

Ben: Rey...You're not alone...Rey....Rey?

Rey could hear the shrieking trembling mass recede as from within it's hollow a soft luminscent glow began to melt the shadow away. Rey could feel the riveting hit of her body as it forced its self in combat against Ben. She could hear the taunting words fueled by the menacing animalistic growls of her sister's DARKSIDE spit into the space between them. She could also hear the sound of footsteps approaching her from the outside. Rey opened her eyes, the image was a blur surrounded by the brightest white light, pulling against the cords she leaned out towards the greying film between her and the light on the other side. As she did from within the light there emerged a hand slowly it began to push into the shroud. The screams errupted pulling again at ever fiber of Rey's body almost pulling her a part. But then the light grew in its intensity....the blinding rays pulsed and pushed moving through the cocoon until it broke through. The crumbling black fragments of the shroud fell hitting the ground shattering like broken glass then fading like a bad memory in a puff of smoke. But the glowing outstretched hand remained...hovering there in the open air in front of her....

Voice of the Force: Rey....it's alright...it's going to be alright. Take my hand, Rey. Take my hand....

Rey struggled to look past the blinding white light to see what lay beyond the silver glimmering of the beacon burning in front of her.

Voice of the Force: Don't be afraid...Take my hand, Rey...Reach out...

Rey unable to keep her eyes open for long pulled out against the invisible cords still holding her aloft. Her fingers were inches away from touch, but she couldn't fight against the strength of the hold for long. She tried again and again, but never came within reach of the open palm extended out towards her.

Rey: I can't...I can't reach...I can't do it...

Voice of the Force: Try again, Rey. Try again. Let go. The only thing holding you back is your fear. Face it. Let it go. You are stronger than you were then...You can do this, Rey, try again.

Rey pulled against her bonds letting her go and as she closed her eyes, she was back there in the sand...in the darkness and the heavy rain falling all around her. Through the thick heavy sogging mounds of thick wet sand, and the past the piles of corpses laying there around and at her feet Rey opened her eyes...and faced her fears. She watched as the woman raced away from the group of men shrouded in their black mangled clothes, they were like vultures picking the dead over for anything of value, when one of them heard her fall. Rey watched as one of them knelt aiming his rifle after the stumbling soaked woman outlined by the breaking of the lightning through the storm clouds over head. Rey knew what would happen next....the recall of the shot was over before she'd been able to turn her head to see the woman fall....and then she saw her rise. She was wounded but not dead...the murky demon reloaded and took aim as the others around him laughed at the sport their friend had discovered. Then a voice....a voice in the dark she'd heard once before a long time ago....

Kylo Ren: Wait! We should take this one alive....

As one of the motley black garbed pulled a knife and headed towards the wounded bird flapping wildly in the mud trying to reach the safety of the sky again. She turned thrusting her hand out towards the menacing hunter and lifted him up into the air, Rey watched as the man fell squirming in the sand, but the red blotting the wound in the womans shoulder was cascading down her shift in a crimson waterfall. The angered embarassed savage jerked himself up and ran towards his prey, he reached down pulling her up by the back of her hair.

Kylo Ren: No!

Reham: Rey...

Her name whispered went floating away on the wind...Rey prepared herself for the moment she'd shyed away from her entire life, the moment when everything she'd known was stolen from her. She watched...but before the blade could even touch her the screeching growl of the red lightsaber tore through the body of the man standing over her. He fell on top of her, with a swift kick Rey watched Kylo Ren shove the piece of bantha foder off her mother. Reham opened her eyes and looked up into the blank menacing emptiness of the mask of Kylo Ren.

Reham: I...I know you...

Kylo Ren: Tell me your name.

Reham: You know...my name...you've heard it a million times before...

Rey watched as Reham lifted her hand to touched the faded scared mask of Kylo Ren, and then she pressed her hand against his chest.

Reham: Yours...is a good heart. Don't let them decieve you. You are meant for more than this....One day...You will see her again...

Kylo Ren reached up and pulled his mask off the swath of dark black hair falling on his neck, as he looked down at Reham with his own eyes. The first time in years he'd revealed his true face to anyone and discarded the mask of the monster he believed he was doomed to becoming.

Kylo Ren: How do you know about that? Where is she?

Reham: You will see when you are ready to see. Don't be afraid....You are not as alone as you think. May the Force protect you...

Kylo glanced nervously over to where the men had gone back to riffling through the dead. Kylo felt her hand drop away from his chest...he looked down at Reham's blank face and gently closed her eyes. Rey walked over and fell into the wet sand across from him, the rain washing away the tears as she looked for the first time in years on her mothers face.

Kylo Ren: I'm sorry...

Voice of the Force: Rey...Rey...

Rey turned looking at the white fire reaching out to her in the black and she understood then why the Force had brought her to Ben Solo. And as she reached out feeling the warm touch of the glowing hand she could feel the sorrow she'd carried for so many years and the fear fall away....

Rey: Ni mar'eyir....