Let the Light In

Chapter 20: Bearing

Chapter 20: Bearing

Rey expected to be bowled over by the two men hurtling towards her. Rey was wrong.

Instead, she found herself twirling through the air as Poe reached her first, holding her close and lifting her right off her feet.

He swung her back and forth, while Finn slapped his back and demanded his turn. When Rey's feet hit the floor again, she was not free of Poe's arms for so much as a second before being captured in Finn's.

He squeezed her close, mumbling incoherent sentences riddled with 'So glad-', '-safe-', '-you're back, you're really-', '-Poe told me everything'.

"Oh, I'm betting he over-exaggerated," Rey said through smiling lips, pinning the guilty-as-charged pilot with a cheeky look as she placed a quick, affectionate peck on Finn's cheek.

Finn took a step back as Rey pushed on his shoulders, allowing her to look him up and dawn as she turned him.

"Rey, as hard as you may stare, you won't see any of the cybernetics through my clothes."

"Liar!" she giggled, spying a thin sliver of silvery metal at the nape of his neck, melding perfectly with the skin, and tickled it.

Finn yelped a laugh and danced away from her.

Poe laughed, his easy smirk right in place, "Finny boy is just a lil more than ticklish around those parts now! Apparently his skin sensitivity is still a little...heightened from the intrusion."

Rey raised a brow, eyeing the two, "And you know this how?"

Both of them maintained perfectly innocent expressions. Suspiciously innocent expressions. They were definitely a special brand of trouble together.

"Hey hey, at least Finny is perfectly healthy, right? I mean, he may set off a few more metal detectors than usual but look at him!" Poe dramatically splayed his hands in the air, moving them around a suddenly flushed Finn without actually touching him, "He's perfect!"

Rey shook her head, cheeks aching from her smile.

It was so good to be home.

Rey let her gaze wander to the others once more, to see that Leia was still transfixed on the ramp, and the joy of seeing her friends again was quickly replaced by erratic nervousness.

Now, everyone except her was watching the robed man make his hesitant way down the ramp. Rey kept her eyes fixed on the General as she slowly walked towards the Falcon.

The air was tense as the twins met face to face for the first time in over fifteen years.

Luke's face was lined with grief, and cracked with years of regret. Leia maintained her previous composure, but the fractures in her own mask gradually began to show as the two stared each other down.

The feeling was not unlike when Rey met Luke for the first time. Both were unravelling in equally as uncontrollable a way, just barely keeping all the pent up feeling and things unsaid at bay.

Only, as they kept their eye contact, there was a tangible rigidity in the air.

Leia raised her hand to Luke's face, and he shied away a fraction, perhaps from fear she would strike him.

But Leia was not so. She cupped Luke's cheek, and he leaned into her touch with relief slowly chasing away the fear in his eyes.

No one in the hangar said a word, allowing the two some time to themselves, if only to find some form of handle on the situation.