Chapter 1: Grief

It was a starry night on Ajan Kloss. Through the jungle trees, Co-Generals Poe Dameron and Finn watched concernedly as their Jedi friend, Rey Skywalker, sat at the edge of one of the jungle cliffs. Both men hoped that she would be getting ready to go to bed, if her clothes were any indication.

Ever since the Battle of Exogol, Rey had taken to wearing the same ensemble as her nightgown every night. And it was all black. It would have been scary, if the pajamas weren't much too big for her. The baggy pants were cinched in as far as they could go. The black sweater hung loose on her arms and dangled nearly past her hips. And the cowl - which seemed the most unnecessary article for bedtime - was always draped around her like a comfort blanket.

On the whole, the get-up seemed less like a favorite set of pajamas, and more like clothes of mourning for a grieving widow.

For that was the best way to describe the despondency that had come over Rey, ever since she had returned to the jungle planet from a brief pilgrimage. When the boys had asked her where she had gone, she had replied with a dull, clipped, "Tatooine." A sneaky refresh of the Falcon's scanners had borne this alibi out.

Since then, Rey had sequestered herself in the famed ship, making it her official residence. If the freighter ever needed to be used for a mission, Rey always took some convincing, for she was loathe to part with it. She very rarely emerged to see acquaintances and rarely spoke to anyone. Poe and Finn were among the few that were every permitted to consistently get near her. The trio often had dinner together in the Falcon's hull, sometimes three or four times a week. On these quiet evenings, Rey would take her friends around to show them what she was doing to the ship, to make a house a home. That was how Finn and Poe had first gotten sight of Rey's choice of nightgown. And there were other strange sights as well - most noticeably the tiny white tick marks on the metal wall of what had once been Han Solo's former quarters. On a trip to the restroom during dinner one night, Poe had snuck into Rey's room to study the tick marks closer. What he found had deeply worried him, and chilled Finn: tiny scrawl of handwriting that read DAYS WITHOUT HIM. At least, that was what Poe had made out.

Poe and Finn's closeness to the Jedi was much to the envy of Rey's growing fans and admirers. Respecting her privacy, the two men had quickly started acting as gatekeepers to keep unwanted visitors at bay. Just as Poe and Finn had respected Rey's privacy and her wishes when she asked that they call her "Rey Skywalker."

The timing of this request could not have been more fortuitous, because a few months after Rey had returned to Tatooine, an anonymous source leaked to the press that the Jedi scavenger had been born Rey Palpatine - the granddaughter of the Emperor himself. When Poe and Finn had confronted Rey about it, she had broken down tearfully and begged their forgiveness for keeping such a secret, while renouncing her grandfather's name. And there was more to the story, Rey had tantalizingly promised. So much more. "Just, please, wait until I am ready to tell it."

But gazing at their best friend now, Poe and Finn wondered if she would ever be ready.

"Poor dear..." Finn murmured.

"Hey, maybe we can cheer her up a bit," Poe grinned. He hiked down to the cliff, Finn following warily. Arriving at Rey's side, Poe laid a hand carefully on her shoulder. His expression and tone were big-brotherly.

"Bedtime, young lady."

Rey nodded numbly, the moonlight catching the sparkle of something glistening on her cheeks. Clearly, she had been crying. She started to rise, her energy depleted.

"Another night alone..." she murmured. She whimpered, and then quite abruptly burst into tears, collapsing to her knees.

Finn and Poe were on her in an instant, wrapping their arms around her in the three-way hug they had since perfected. The men held her as Rey continued to weep, her sobs bitter as she clung to their necks.

"Oh, Ben..." she moaned. "I've lost him... I've lost him..."

Over her head, Finn and Poe glanced to each other. Now they had a name to go with the faceless presence that they knew deep in their bones haunted their friend. Ben... was he her lover? Undoubtedly, with how she grieved for him. And Poe and Finn let her grieve. They wanted to help Rey through her grieving.

"Oh, Ben..." Rey wailed, clinging to the boys. "I'm all alone... you left me alone..."

Poe shook his head fervently, reciting the words that Zorri Bliss had taught him. "The darkness wins when it makes you think you're all alone. You're not alone."

Something strange came over Rey's face just then, all at once. Quite suddenly, she was staring out over the cliffs beyond Poe and Finn, past them. Her eyes were far away, as if she was seeing something that only she could see. Then, her expression melted into something that Poe and Finn could only describe as undying love. Reaching out her hand, Rey intoned, "Neither are you."

Next instant, the moment ended. The spell was broken. Shaking her head to clear it, sniffling, Rey murmured meekly, "I'm ready now." Poe and Finn did not have to ask to know what she meant. Keeping her in their embrace, seating themselves around her criss-cross applesauce, they listened as Rey told them the story. Her story.

Rey told them everything: how ever since she was a little girl, she had had visions of this dark, striking, beautiful but haunted man. How she had finally met this man of her dreams on Takodana, when he had swept her off her feet and carried her away like his bride to his ship. How they had formed a connection when he had interrogated her on Starkiller Base. How she and he had discovered they shared a Force Bond, able to communicate and see each other in secret from lightyears away. How they had touched hands by a fire's glow in a stone hut, on Ahch-To. How she had run to him on the Supremacy, and he had killed his own master to save her. How they fought the Praetorian Guard together. How they had tearfully been torn apart by ideology, personified in a lightsaber torn asunder. How their Force Bond had only grown and deepened into something even more intimate, allowing them to pass objects to each other across space. How they had healed each other, first with Rey healing Ben and confessing her love for him. How her Ben had come to save her while she was fighting Palpatine. How their Force Bond had blossomed so as to be considered a Dyad in the Force - two souls joined as one. How Palpatine had cast Ben off a cliff and Rey had defeated him, to the point of her death. How Ben had healed Rey to bring her back to life, and how Ben and Rey had consummated their union with a passionate, desperate kiss before Ben died in her arms.

Throughout all of this, Rey made the point of telling her friends that, although both personas had been physically embodied by the same man, Ben Solo and Kylo Ren were not the same person.

At the end of her sad tale, Poe nodded slowly in understanding. Finn copied him, though his head was hurting and far more dizzy, straining under the weight of obtaining full comprehension. At last, Poe smiled. If he and Finn were going to help Rey through her grief, her pining for her soulmate, he knew of a great first step to help her do that.

"Tell us about Ben," he murmured quietly, with a smile.

Rey took a shaky breath, and for the first time, her face was radiant, beaming. "He was very brave. Stoic. Incredibly handsome." A tinge of pink bloomed on her cheeks.

"As handsome as me?" Poe teased, playfully tossing his dark curls back.

Rey smiled, giggled. "More so, I should think." Poe clapped a hand to his heart, pretending that she had wounded him, but his eyes were twinkling.

"He was kind," Rey continued. "Soft spoken. Very well read. He enjoyed calligraphy." Thanks to their Bond, their Dyad, she had grown to know intimately every little detail about him, her mate. "He could be a little cocky, but he was charming, in that way." Wiping at her eyes, she smiled weakly. "That's all there is to tell, really."

"He sounds like he was a wonderful man," Finn mused. "Is that why you wear his clothing? Why there are tick marks on your wall? Why you took the Skywalker last name? To honor him?"

Rey swallowed the lump in her throat. "That's why, Finny," she whispered. "That's why."

Glancing to each other, Poe and Finn thought for a long moment. At last, Poe hugged Rey close, rubbing her arm gently.

"Rey... Dr, Kalonia is putting together a counseling support group, to help with grieving. There are so many others who have lost loved ones." He tamped down his own tears as he thought of Snap Wexley. "If you want, I can register you and you can go and talk with somebody."

Rey hesitated. She most definitely did not want to have her head shrinked. To talk to and see a therapist. She wasn't weak. She wasn't insane - she was just distraught. But for Poe and Finn's sake, if for no other reason than to ease their minds, she nodded her head. She would do this to show thankfulness for their love and concern for her.

Poe dropped Rey off on the support group's first day of meeting. He had a conference to attend with Finn, but promised that they would both swing by to pick her up when she was done. Giving her a parting kiss on the forehead, he left.

Dr. Kalonia was a kind, giving woman. For their first session, she instructed her patients to take sheets of paper and write letters to their deceased loved ones. The doctor clarified that no one would be required to take part in the letter reading, scheduled for their next meeting.

At this, Rey blanched. There was so much she wanted to write to Ben, so much she needed to say. One page would not be enough. Maybe not even ten. Could she let out everything she needed to express and still leave enough paper for the others?

Coming to the front of the paper line and hefting up a modest stack, Rey sat by herself at a table, and slowly began to write...