Force Destiny

Loneliness at Resistance

For three days Rey tried her best to keep herself busy. The Resistance had plenty of equipment salavaged from the old base that required rewiring; she could throw herself into work – into surviving – as she had always done. The others, however, complicated her plans. They looked at her as if she were a lothcat in a herd of nerf. Their whispers of mistrust followed her down the corridors. Before, they had seen her powers as a gift, but now she began to understand Kylo's warning.

Stop thinking about him.

No matter what she did, her thoughts would wander back to him. Everything reminded her of him: the vial, the flower, the scar, the ship, the other members, the broken lightsaber, the Jedi texts, the droid parts, the blaster, the bed where he had sat, the bootprints on the dusty stone where he had stood, the corridor where he had lain dying, the room where she had accused him of bringing the First Order to Barkhesh, the temple, the steps, the stars, the jungle, the dark place for him in her mind, the echo of his voice in her dreams. There was a lake she dreamt of every night and she could feel his energy there. It was tormenting.

On day two, Finn asked her if she had killed Kylo. He had asked her with a smile, clearly anticipating from her pensive silence that something must have happened. His happiness as she struggled to come to terms with her loss only deepened her misery. No one understood, not even Kylo. Withholding tears, she told Finn that the bond had been destroyed. He didn't question her further, though his smile faded, and he continued to glance at her with concern throughout dinner. There seemed to be a question behind his eyes whenever she glanced back, but he didn't dare speak it. Rose looked between Finn and her with concern, but she held her tongue as well. After the base, what was there to say? They didn't trust her. That was why they looked at her like any moment she might crumble or explode, why they whispered when they thought she wasn't looking, why they didn't say a word to her other than superficial drivel.

She hated it.

She hated avoiding Leia as well, but what could she say to her? Kylo was gone, forever lost to darkness. She had failed to realize how important saving him had become to her until the Force stole him away across the galaxy. He was by far the most antagonizing man in the galaxy and lived in opposition to everything she fought for, but the thought that he would willingly leave had never crossed her mind. The darkness had convinced her of a great many untruths. Being inside the temple with the others only furthered her misery, so she took off into the jungle. No one would care that she was gone anyway.

There was something freeing about being on her own again. Physical training was exhausting and mind-numbing. She practiced forms with her staff, climbed trees, jumped the expanse between cliffs, and ran until she couldn't breathe. It reminded her of being back on Jakku. The familiarity of it was comforting.

There was no one to disappoint, no one watching her for the slightest misstep, no one deciding for her who she was supposed to be. She didn't have to hide the darkness that surrounded her energy like a storm cloud. She loved her friends, but she couldn't stand the look of concern or fear in their eyes anymore.

There were monsters hiding in the jungle, she knew there were, but she was not disquieted by their presence. Monsters would never fear her, would never be disappointed by what she was. She knew where she stood with monsters, she knew what they wanted from her, and that unambiguous danger was comforting. Certainly, it was simpler in the jungle, where friend was friend, and foe was foe. She almost felt at home there.

When she had nearly collapsed in fatigue from her intensive training, she walked the paths she had scrambled over only a few short days before. She crossed a stream with white, glittering rocks, the water soaking into her boots and tingling on her skin. She passed the stack of rocks she had made into a makeshift grave for both the Jugalor and bat, the hunter and the hunted entombed together in death. She crossed the clearing with the vines where the plant had ensnared her ankle in their trap. The severed, thorny shoots still lay dead and shriveled on the forest floor.