A/N: Title borrowed from "Crystals" by Of Monsters and Men. This takes place in the same 'verse as softly, gently, but it can also stand on its own. Thank you for reading! I hope you stay healthy in this crazy time.

It still surprises him sometimes, how good he is at being good. How gentle he can be with the porgs who have made the Falcon their home, scooping them up with careful hands when they must be moved for their own safety. How softly he can speak to D-O, the little droid rolling its wheel back and forth excitedly at his side while he tinkers with the ship. How he can hold Rey so tightly, so closely to him, with a tender fierceness.

How he hasn't hurt her since that fateful day – the day that he died. Twice.

It makes him think of all the time that he had lost to being not good. Had it really been this easy all along? It couldn't have been.

It's Rey, he thinks, turning to her now. She sits beside him in the cockpit, in the copilot's chair. She draws out the good in me.

Catching the thought through their bond, she meets his eyes with a soft smile. "It's not just me. Give yourself a little credit, Ben."

He huffs and rolls his eyes playfully. "Most women would want to hear their husbands say things like that."

"First of all, when I have ever been like most women? Second, you didn't say it. You thought it. And third…" She trails off, reaching for his hand where it rests on the console between them. "I meant what I said. You're too hard on yourself."

"Old habits die hard," Ben murmurs. It's been nearly two years since Exegol, and only a year since Rey found a way to bring him back from the World Between Worlds. Though being good comes easily to him, there are still a few parts of his past that he can't quite shake. Not yet.

But I will, he thinks, with sudden conviction. And that's all that he will allow himself to think about his own journey back to the light – "back to yourself," as Rey calls it – for now. Today is about her, not him.

He runs his thumb along her knuckles. "Are you sure about this?"

She takes a deep breath, straightening her shoulders as she looks out the viewport at the barren landscape before them. Jakku, her old homeworld. "Yes. I'm sure."

They exit the Falcon hand-in-hand. Rey's grip on Ben tightens a little the moment their feet hit the sand, and he tugs on her arm in reply, drawing her closer to his side. Their shoulders brush as they walk.

It had been Rey's idea to come back here. Just as she had buried his mother's and grandfather's lightsabers on Tatooine, she had proposed that they bury Ochi's Sith dagger in the dunes of Jakku. "The final piece of the past laid to rest," she had said. He had agreed, of course. He could feel the pain of her parents' death still festering within her heart, no matter how much light she poured onto it. If this burial can give her some sense of closure at last, he is more than willing to see it through at her side.

Surefooted in the sand, she leads him out into the middle of the desert, far from the old wrecks she had scavenged as a child. "I don't know where it was that I last saw them," she says quietly. "I only remember Unkar Plutt's hand on my arm, and Ochi's ship disappearing. It couldn't have been Niima Outpost, because there weren't other people around us." She stops walking and gestures to their surroundings with her free hand. "It must have been somewhere empty like this."

Ben nods but remains silent. He has seen the memory in her mind many times. The thought of it now hurts him nearly as much as it did that first time.

Sliding her hand out of his, Rey extracts the dagger from her belt. She flinches when her fingers close around the old hilt, echoes of her parents' screams still ringing through the Force. Ben offers her mind all the warmth and comfort that he can.

They kneel down. Rey lays the dagger on the ground, and together – Ben's palm pressed to the back of Rey's hand – they use the Force to push the weapon down into the earth, so deep that no one will ever find it again.

There are tears in her eyes when they finish.

Ben leans close, resting his forehead against her temple. The Force winds around them, painting their connection the colors of the sunset at their backs – yellow, red, orange, and pink.

"Let's go somewhere green," Rey whispers.

Ben kisses her cheek. "Anywhere you want."