Chapter 1

The myth didn't live up to her expectations.

Rey lost count of how many times she sneaked up to the cantina at Niima outpost. just to listen to the legends of the past.

"Luke Skywalker," the name that passed from one drunken lips to another stirred something in her. True, she was but a wayward urchin then, invisible and alone. Rey didn't expect to carry that solitude to the legendary man standing in front of her.

Ever since he glanced at the lightsaber, her mouth remained parched with thousand questions. He answered none.

"There's a great conflict within you. You have come too late," he said. Rey's outstretched hand dropped instantly. The metallic weapon burned her as it did the last time she wielded it. No, the memories of her opponent were brightly seared into her mind. The sword was but an instrument of that rage.

"I'm not going to beg you," Rey stepped back," but it is true. You're the only hope we have if the Resistance is to succeed."

She felt vulnerable; like a deer in the headlights when Luke Skywalker circled around her. She heard her own heartbeat and the swishing of his robes on the verdant carpet. The whole island whispered to her, kept her amazed.

"Stop it," she pulled further back.

"You've been mind probed before?" He asked.

"Don't be afraid, I feel it too." She blinked, unsure whether the words were uttered now or in the past.

"I mean no harm," Luke spread-out his hand before her distorted face.

"NO!" Rey put every ounce of energy she had to block his attack. Luke withdrew abruptly. They both sat on the stone formations amidst the grass field. He studied her in his own way and she studied him.

"Remarkable," he noted. "You have bonded in Force in the ways only a Master and padawan usually do."

Rey frowned.

"Search not your mind, but your heart. You resisted the pull of something way stronger and alluring than I can offer you. You know in your mind that coming to me is the right thing to do, but I've seen your heart. Deep within, you can't stop thinking about what would have happened had you said Yes."

Rey kept her gaze locked with the infinite azure canvas in front of her. The sky stretched far on the horizon. It reminded her of Jakku desert more than she was willing to admit. Beige changed to green and blue, but the isolation prevailed.

They didn't speak much that night. He offered her shelter and meal, but not the warmth of another's company. She missed her little droid friend, she missed Chewbacca who stayed on the ship. Why did she come here? This cool reception wasn't what she had envisioned at all.

"How peculiar," she thought," how the legendary Jedi refuses to give what that man offered so willingly. "

Yes, Kylo Ren would show her the ways of the force. The more she thought about it, the angrier she became with herself. As much as she wanted to believe her refusal was the right thing to do, she couldn't.

After three days, Rey realized that the island wouldn't contain her restlessness. She took long walks around the coastline, only to encounter the stone and moss and never-ending grass. Luke Skywalker paid her as much heed as a tom cat or another pet that needed to be fed and clothed. She suspected this to be some kind of a test of determination.

"Just keep going, just persevere and he'll come around." Rey kept telling herself. She could do it on Jakku for fourteen years. What were three days, or weeks for that matter?

She took another walk while humid ocean breeze played with her stray hair. Why was it easier to wait on Jakku? Where did her patience go? She huffed and kicked a rock before her; then another and another.

She desired to drown this whole wretched island she had been dreaming about for so long.

Luke's silhouette lurked in the shadows of a large boulder behind her. She sensed nothing in her fit of rage. He knew she was giving in to the darker emotions of the Force. She was like an ice sculpture and he didn't want to touch her. He melted enough young minds, destroyed enough lives to ever try again. When he mind probed her, he felt the presence of his former student; he felt the emotion surging through her.

Ben had tempted her and she could have given in, but she didn't. That fact alone was a spark of hope for the old Master. Luke didn't want to train her because it was noble. Long gone were the days when he religiously followed the ancient Jedi code. The Jedi were no more. She was here, right now, already past her first true test.

"How long are you going to stand there?" She asked, ashamed. She had never behaved like this. Rey had to control her emotions at Niima outpost; otherwise Unkar wouldn't have tolerated her presence.

"Can't a teacher observe his pupil?" He asked bemused.

Rey's eyes widened. "You agree, then? Will you teach me the ways…" her breath hitched.

"…the ways of the force?" Luke finished the sentence for her.

Rey nodded.

"Yes." He offered his hand, just as she did before. This time, she took it. Eyes of her new Master reminded her of molten mercury. His gaze was luminescent and full of light, unlike the black pair that kept haunting her from the forest of Starkiller base.

"I will train you, but first, tell me everything."

And so she did.