Rise

Chapter 26

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If one was close enough, then they'd be able to look past her thorns;

and they'd see that, like everyone else, she was a rose–

delicate and fragile, and just as vulnerable to the world as anyone.

-- Me

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In the days following the attack on the Ravager, everyone within Echo Base was rather solemn. Many people had died that day, in the effort to save the prisoners on the ship. We'd lost many people.

But we'd saved a lot of people, too; we'd left the Ravager with more people than we'd arrived with. This was a comforting thought that helped to reassure the many rebels that felt as if the mission shouldn't have even happened.

The rebels were recovering; there were many new recruits in need of conditioning and training now, so people were putting aside their sorrows and drowning them out by working, working, working.

Now, two weeks later, people are trying to rebound from their grief. The current attitude around the base now is one of victory; we'd succeeded in our mission to save the prisoners on the Ravager, so we had been victorious, no matter how many people we'd lost.

But I haven't been training very much. I've mostly been hanging out, in my room, by myself. I know that Han, Luke, and Leia are a bit worried about me, but despite their worries, I'm not as sad as they fear I might be.

I've just been quiet and solemn, these past few days. Here lately I've been speaking only a little bit, only when it's needed. And though it seems like I'm falling back into the old Ellie, that's not the case.

All I'm doing is trying to process Stephan's death and Ramala's death. I've been thinking about Stephan dying for so long that the fact that he's gone has yet to be set in stone within my thoughts. Ramala's death has been hard on me, but I've been strong as I've slowly come to terms with her passing.

Sitting in my room alone, though, has been somewhat good for me. I've had time to actually think about everything that I've gone through within the past month or two, and I've been able to actually ponder about what the future holds. I'd been focusing so much on the past and the present that I'd never had time to consider the future.

Thinking by myself, I've managed to look back on my childhood and early teen years...before I'd met Stephan. As I've relaxed in my room, I've suddenly remembered things I'd done, things me and my friends had done together. I've remembered conversations that, though I'm just now remembering them, have somewhat shaped me.

But, though this feels like the end of it all, I must remind myself that that is not the case. There are more things to come, and though that sounds like a negative thought, it is merely the truth. It's not over.

Stephan may be dead, and I may have gotten over my past, but that doesn't mean that my story is complete.

During my private time in my room, I've come to realize just how evil the Empire truly is. I think of the looks of the prisoners on the Ravager and I feel sick; I can't get the image of the gashes lacing up and down Ramala's arms out of my head. Those prisoners had had families, homes--lives of their own. But the Empire had snatched all of that away from them, and had set out to execute every last one of them. Had us rebels not saved the prisoners, they all would've died.

And as I think more, and more, I remember that Stephan had worked for the Empire. He had joined forces with such a terrible alliance. I look back on my dream with Darth Vader, and feel slightly dizzy--because that, I know, was no normal dream.