Chapter Text
Telling the time on Chrona by looking at the sky was next to impossible. Three suns draped the planet in a perpetual, yellow haze that wavered in its intensity but never turned into real night-time. Though it was hard to tell for sure, Rey felt it was getting very late, the most tell-tale sign being the eerie silence in the hangar which at some point had replaced the steady hum of distant chatter.
She had completely lost track of time. Again.
Not that it particularly mattered, though. There was nothing urgent she had to wake up early for. Tomorrow would be exactly the same as today, the same as yesterday, the same as every other day since they’d made planetfall.
After the Battle of Crait, the last surviving scraps of the Resistance had boarded the Falcon and fled to Chrona, a small agriworld deep in the Outer Rim. During the time of the Old Empire, Chrona had become exceedingly prosperous by cultivating unique, genetically modified crops with — supposedly — triple the yield and twice the vitamins of standard ones.
The planet used to be a quilt of fields in every color imaginable. Now all that remained of it was dull grey ash.
Not even four solar cycles ago, the First Order, enticed by the prospects of more efficient nourishment for their millions of troops, had issued a requisition order for all of their present and future harvest. The Chronans answered by salting the earth and putting a torch to all of their fields themselves. Under the thick cover of smoke as their livelihood was being destroyed, the denizens fled, scattering across the galaxy like ashes in the wind and leaving behind a wasteland no longer worthy of the First Order’s attention.
It was, however, a perfect place for a hideout with plenty of abandoned infrastructure and expensive, albeit outdated, farming equipment that could be stripped down for parts and repurposed.
The Resistance had found refuge in what was previously a distribution complex to the east of a vast, dark blue sea. A large hangar now stood empty save for the Falcon, a couple of battered T-70 starfighters and a sole Z-95 Headhunter in dire need of a new coat of paint. The fighters had arrived a couple of days ago from one mission or another in the Core Worlds, having been spared from the recent attack due to sheer luck.
It was here in the hangar where Rey could be found these days. With Chewie’s kind permission, she made herself busy by restoring the Falcon to the best of her ability. Or, at least, trying to. The ship, as it turned out, was truly a piece of junk. The more time Rey spent re-calibrating the sensor transceiver and scavenging rusted machinery to find replacements for what seemed to be a never-ending list of torn wiring, the more she wondered how the Falcon kept managing to take off in the first place.
Rey smirked to herself bitterly, thinking about the irony of the Resistance being wiped out not in some sort of a heroic last-ditch attempt at battling the First Order but because of faulty tachyon venting overheating and blowing them up to smithereens, scattering their remains amongst indifferent stars.
She also caught herself wondering whether Supreme Leader Ren would be content with that being the anticlimactic end to their war.
If there had been any news on how the First Order was handling their unexpected change in leadership, nobody had deigned to inform Rey. She'd kept silent about her involvement with it because admitting that would mean having to explain her involvement with him, and, frankly, she would rather face Snoke again than go down that particular path with anyone at the moment.
Any thought of him nowadays made her mind flash crimson in a gush of panic. She gritted her teeth, pressing on the wrench a little too hard and breaking off a screw in the hyper accelerator she'd been tinkering with for the better part of the day. The screw fell, leaving behind a trail of clinks so obnoxiously loud it was almost like it was mocking her. Rey cursed and got down on all fours, but it was too late. Finding it among the grey floors was simply too taxing of a task for her exhausted, burning eyes. Maybe it was a sign to go to bed and pick the task up tomorrow.
Just as the idea crossed Rey’s mind, a wave of exhaustion hit her all at once, like her body had only just remembered that sleep was something that human beings occasionally required. She got up and stretched, relishing the pleasant burn in her muscles after a good day’s work.
I must have been up for even longer than usual, Rey remarked as she descended the ramp, looking at the skyline through the open hangar doors.
The lack of real nights on Chrona was something to get used to. It was the perfect environment for farming but not so much for one’s circadian rhythms. However, though it never got dark, for around three hours each night, the soft citrine tint in the sky was replaced by a deep amber, draping the world in a mighty sunset that turned into a sunrise before it had the change to set. Rey had never witnessed Chrona's interpretation of night-time herself until now, but her overworked body urged her not to linger on the view and head towards her assigned room.
She took solace in the exhaustion, embraced the sluggish pace of her fatigued mind with open arms. Apart from the leadership, at the moment consisting only of General Organa and Commander Dameron, the Resistance members’ only task for now was to lay low and wait for more allies to arrive. Most of them gladly used the opportunity to rest, to heal, to mourn.
Not Rey, though. She could not, would not let herself be bored for even a second because when Rey was bored, her mind started to wander, and when her mind started to wander, she started thinking about things that made her want to howl with resentment, things that made her eyes sting with bitter tears, things that made her so frustrated that she could scream into her pillow until her voice wore out. Rey had spent enough time in her first days doing just that before admitting its futility. No matter how many tears were shed or how much she cursed, it changed absolutely nothing. What was done was done, and there was no coming back from the choices that were made.
Let the past die, and all that.
Feeling the unwelcome direction her thoughts had once again started straying towards, she slammed the door of her room hard, too hard, with a viciousness that pierced through the silence of the corridor like a thunderbolt. Rey winced, hoping she hadn’t woken anybody up.
Unfortunately for her, she had done just that.
The loud bang had startled the sleeping figure in her bed, and she saw a broad frame jolt upright and outstretch a hand. A split second later, the room flashed with a blinding red glare, accompanied by the violent song of a particular, unstable lightsaber that was all too familiar to her.
Rey froze, her hand still on the doorknob, eyes wide and in disbelief as her sluggish brain refused to cooperate — too confused to feel anger, fear, anything at all.
It had been nine days since Rey had closed the Falcon doors on Ben while he bore into her with pleading eyes, looking so very lost. The bond had been completely dormant since then. Had been. Until now.
The Supreme Leader of the First Order was kneeling on her bed, his crimson lightsaber raised in a vertical parry, his face bewildered. For a moment the only sound that could be heard was the twisted, electric hum of his blade as both of them stared at each other, utterly transfixed.
Then there was a click, and the lightsaber was switched off, letting the rich amber twilight settle over the room once more.
“Rey,” was all Ben managed to whisper as he leaned forward before the connection cut off with sterile, surgical precision.
She remained frozen for a good minute, still staring at the place in her bed where Ben had just been.