ಠ╭╮ಠ (the_scavenger) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2018-04-02 02:41:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, ahsoka tano, rey |
Force Visions are like that. Unclear, filled with double meanings.
Who: Rey and Ahsoka
What: Dancing with the Dark Side
When: 4/2 early
Where: The Falcon
Status: complete
Rating: PG-13
Rey woke with a start, tears pricking the corners of her eyes. She ran her hand down her face, and let out a short, angry scream. The alarm clock next to the bed crushed into a ball and the mirror on the other table shattered.
The Falcon groaned around her from the effect of the Force as she struggled to regain control of it. It would do no good to break the ship - half the time it was held together by spit and bailwire as it was.
Gradually, she felt her pulse slowing down. There was so much to unpack, that for the moment she focused more on the fact that those little nun aliens probably hated her. She really kind of was a walking disaster to them.
But that amusement faded, replaced by the certainty that she was no one. That she came from nothing and she’d return to nothing, and none of her hopes or dreams had mattered.
The tears came more freely now. Luke wasn’t giving her anything to work with either. He was scared and depressed and while she couldn’t blame him for that, he hadn’t been what she’d expected, or needed. And whatever had happened between Ren and Skywalker, she’d only gotten part of the story.
Rey couldn’t focus on that part right now. She was too upset, too angry. She should call Finn, or Cel, or Ahsoka. Someone who could calm her down, make her see reason. But she didn’t want to see reason.
Instead, her mind kept going over the Force Bond with Ren, and over Luke telling her the Jedi had failed, and the cavern, the cavern, and her parents…
She hadn’t been able to see them. Just herself. She only had Kylo Ren’s words to rely on and they weren’t exactly reliable. Was what she was feeling her worst fears, or the truth? Her family had left her to die on a dry, deserted world, and she’d always feared that the reason they’d never come back was because they simply hadn’t wanted to. Ren had brought those fears to life.
Rey crawled out of bed, stumbling barefoot through the Captain’s quarters. She’d left the lightsaber near the door, but didn’t remember dropping it. Yet there it was, on the ground. She picked it up, and stepped out, making her way to what she considered the common room.
There was no one else here - she’d opted to spend a couple nights on board while working on the FTL drive - so she searched for one of the little seeker droids. It was simple, mindless training, but she was too wound up to meditate and Ahsoka had once told her that doing something was often better than doing nothing.
Wrapping a blindfold around her head, Rey ignited the lightsaber, parrying the first laser with ease. She had a flash of memory. Seeing herself in the caverns. Pulling her hair out of the buns as she realized there was nothing to wait for. Nobody was coming. Nobody was coming.
Another parry and another flash. She saw Ren’s future, saw that he could turn. For every blow she blocked or parried, her memories played inside her head. Confronting Skywalker, her anger, her confusion and sadness. The mad plan to get to Ren. The darkness of Snoke’s ship, suffocating her, choking her, the darkness in her mind. It was far, far worse than what Ren had done to her.
The pain rippled through her mind and her head and Rey screamed. She ripped the blindfold off. She’d knocked out the lights and the power at some point, and the only illumination was the blue glow from her lightsaber.
Rage and fear radiated through her and around her and the blade pulsed. For lack of a better description, the colors bled, red slowly creeping along the blade from the hilt up. She didn’t know that was even possible.
Panting for breath, Rey closed her eyes. She saw Kylo turn on Snoke, the two of them fighting, side by side. She twisted the lightsaber around, mimicking the movements from the battle, letting the Force flow through her.
Spinning around, she slashed with the blade and suddenly she couldn’t move it. Opening her eyes, she saw a Togruta standing in front of her, her palms on either side of Rey’s hands and the lightsaber hilt, holding her in place.
Ahsoka’s voice was firm, “Reign in your emotions. I know you feel strongly, but the key is to find balance in your emotions and through that balance in the Force.”
The choice was hers. Ahsoka faded from view, and she saw Ren standing there. Offering her his hand, telling her to let the Jedi die. The choice was hers.
“Luke felt that the Jedi made many mistakes,” Rey whispered, still staring at Kylo’s outstretched hand.
“Luke was right. The Jedi lost their way. Blinded by the Dark Side, by their own arrogance.” Ahsoka’s voice came from somewhere around Rey. “But not all that they taught was wrong. They didn’t need to die. There was hope. There is always hope.”
“He spoke of balance. The Light side and the Dark, two sides of the same coin.”
“That’s true. But there’s a difference between understanding both sides of the Force, and letting the Dark Side consume you.”
Rey exhaled a shaky breath, feeling like this was a conversation she was having with herself, and not Darth Vader’s old apprentice. “Ren gave me a choice. To cast aside the Sith, and the Jedi, to control the galaxy together…”
“And what do you choose?”
In the end, there had been no other choice. For all the the Dark and the Light were similar, Rey knew that one fed on rage and anger, and that Maz had been right; before the First Order there had been the Empire. And before that the Sith. The Dark Side conquered and it controlled, and it hurt people. And maybe the Jedi had lost their way, but Rey truly believed that the galaxy needed them.
Luke was the last Jedi.
Rey was the first.
There was an explosion in the Force and Rey was blown backwards. Dazed, her ears ringing, she shook her head to clear it. Ahsoka waved her hand and the smoke cleared.
Anakin’s lightsaber lay in two pieces, a red layer of light pulsing over the exposed crystal. Rey reached out with her hand, the crystal calling to her. It wasn’t alive, but it had feeling, emotion. It felt … wounded.
But gradually, the red bled away back to blue, the wound in the Force healing. Rey collapsed again, groaning.
“I knew a boy,” Ahsoka said. “Strong in the Force. Untrained. Touched by the Dark Side, and the Light. A lot like you. A new kind of Jedi, taught by one of the last of the old kind of Jedi. But I don’t think he could have cleansed the crystal like you did.”
Luke probably could, and Ahsoka herself had, but she didn’t think Ezra could have. Not at the level he’d been last she’d seen him.
“Is that what I did?” Rey crawled over, picking up the lightsaber pieces and staring down at them.
“A Sith’s lightsaber is colored red, because the crystal becomes corrupted by the Dark Side. They can become cleansed, but you have to be very powerful to be able to do so.” Ahsoka reached out, touching Rey’s hand. “I felt your distress in the Force, but I don’t think you actually needed me.”
“You’ve already helped me a lot, Ahsoka.” Rey gave her a tired smile. She was exhausted, and her next words were quiet, “I thought I could save him. I saw… I saw him turn against Snoke. But it was for his own selfish needs. Not to help me, not to help anyone but himself.”
“Force Visions are like that. Unclear, filled with double meanings. The trick is figuring out what it actually means.” She reached over, removing the crystal from the blade to inspect it. This was Anakin’s lightsaber. She’d seen it with him for so long, and now she held his crystal in her hand. It sang with pain and with hope. Ahsoka’s heart suddenly ached.
“That’s the Light Side, Rey. Compassion. Above all else, Compassion.”
“I thought the Jedi didn’t allow that.”
Ahsoka put the crystal in Rey’s hand, closing her fingers over it. “They don’t allow attachments. They feared that if one were too attached to someone, they couldn’t let go. If they died, the grief could be overwhelming.”
“And someone as powerful as a Jedi with their emotions uncontrolled could hurt a lot of people,” Rey guessed. “But isn’t fear bad?”
“Fear is healthy since it keeps you alive. Letting it consume you is bad. Love is healthy. Letting it consume you is bad.” Ahsoka smiled at her, “There’s a school of thought that we shouldn’t suppress our emotions, merely control them in moderation.”
“I get so angry… but I … feel compassion with the same kind of strength,” Rey admitted. She just… felt. And she didn’t know how to control it, or if she should. She thought of Finn, and was afraid to ask. And yet, she asked, “So love isn’t bad?”
"No, I don’t believe so, as long as you can separate your feelings from the greater good. Emotion, yet peace," Ahsoka started to say.
"Ignorance, yet knowledge. Passion, yet serenity. Chaos, yet harmony. Death, yet the Force," Rey finished for her.
Ahsoka stared for a moment. "I never told you that."
"It... was in these ancient texts that Luke was guarding. He said they were the original Jedi teachings. I took a peek while we were on the way back to the fleet. I like the way it sounds."
"There may yet be hope after all."
Rey looked down at her hand, opening it to look at the crystal. "I need to make a new lightsaber. But I'm not going to ask for your help. Not yet anyway."
Ahsoka nodded, "I'll help you get the materials, and select what the casing will be made of. But the rest is up to you."
Lifting her eyes, Rey met Ahsoka's eyes, "I'm going to make a staff."