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chapter thirty-nine: gone, gone, gone
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    "WE'RE TRAPPED," Finn announces grimly in the silence that has settled over the Raddus. Indira hates to acknowledge the validity behind his words, but deep down inside she knows he's right. "If we try to jump to lightspeed, they'll just find us again and we'll be out of fuel. They've got us."

She looks to Leia, who is wearing a stricken expression. Her aunt seems to be, for once, at a complete loss for words. There is nothing between them and the First Order fleet bearing down upon them. It's officially over for them.

"Not yet they don't," Poe says, clenching his jaw stubbornly. He shoots Indira a look; one full of both longing and sorrow before he looks away. His eyes meet Leia's and he doesn't hesitate. "Permission to jump in an X-wing and blow something up?"

Even though she'd known what he was going to ask before he said it out loud, Indira can't help the sharp intake of breath that enters her lungs. She knows that Poe has to go — that if there's a fight to be fought, he will always throw himself onto the frontlines — but letting him go is still one of the hardest things for her to do. She isn't sure if it's something that will get easier with time, but she doesn't want it to get easier. Not really. She'd rather be scared out of her mind every time he leaves than to ever get used to the thought of losing him.

     Leia Organa looks at the young pilot with a wary sort of pride. "Permission granted."

     Poe Dameron doesn't waste another second after that; just turns on his heel and runs, leaving Indira and the rest of them behind without so much as a second glance or a simple goodbye. For a moment, she does nothing but watch him leave in stunned silence before shaking her head indignantly. He didn't even say goodbye, Indira thinks, outraged. And it might be stupid, but she can't let him go without telling him one last thing. So, without thinking or asking permission to leave, she follows his example and runs.

"Indira!" Leia shouts, alarmed. "Where are you going?"

"I'll be right back," the technician yells over her shoulder, glancing back to look at her aunt. "Promise!"

Her legs carry her down the corridors of the ship at an alarming speed. Chaos has enveloped the Raddus, alarms blaring and people shouting all throughout the vessel. Even so, Indira ignores the chaos as best she can and keeps moving forward until she can see the familiar figure of a man clad in an orange jumpsuit. When he's within an arm's length, she reaches out and grabs him, stopping him in his tracks in the bustling hallway.

"Indira?" Poe asks, bewildered. "What are you doing? I have to go."

"Not," she wheezes, fully out of breath and in pain from the stitch in her side, "without saying goodbye."

He heaves an impatient sigh. "Indira, there's no time for this right now —"

"Just let me say it," she shouts without meaning to. To her surprise, it makes him shut up. Immediately, Indira feels her mouth go dry and she forces herself to swallow. Her heart is hammering wildly against her rib cage, but the pounding stems from something entirely different than exertion. "Before you go and get yourself killed, you have to know. This might be my last chance to say it and I need to tell you. I need you to know."

His face softens, losing some of its hardness and replacing it with warmth. "Tell me when I get back," Poe requests, taking one of her hands and pressing a quick kiss to the palm. "Save it for then."

"But you have to know," Indira protests, frustrated. "I have to tell you."

At that, his lips quirk upwards into a small, sad smile. "I know," Poe replies. "Believe me, Indira. I know."

She exhales sharply at that. Of course he already knows. Her heart swells with overwhelming fondness; this pilot of hers who she'd come to love so fiercely. He means more to her than she ever thought he would, in ways she can't explain to anyone else. She loves him, truly, in a way that she has never loved anyone else before. It makes it that much harder for her to let him go.

Before she can say another word, Poe grasps her head on both sides and presses a kiss to the very top of it, closing his eyes momentarily before pulling away. "When I get back, tell me then," he requests, walking backwards, "I promise I'll listen."

Her protest dies on her lips as he turns on his heel and starts to run, leaving her behind. From a distance, Indira can hear him shouting for BB-8 to prepare his ship as the astromech droid reaches the hangar. Indira turns around to head back to the bridge before an explosive blast rocks the ship. She grips the wall to steady herself, frowning when she sees another familiar figure go running past her at full speed.

"Raena!" Indira shouts. "Where the hell are you going?"

"It's time for me to leave," the assassin replies, forcing a brave smile onto her lips. "I've got a mission to complete, remember? General's orders."

Indira gasps. "You're going?"

Raena nods. "The First Order won't know what hit them."

Before Indira can stop herself, she reaches out and pulls the taller girl into a bone-crushing hug. Despite their rocky start, the technician had grown to admire and even care for Raena Nhagy in the short moments they had spent together. She knows that this decision can't have been easy for Raena to make, but she's proud of her new friend for choosing to do the right thing.

"Please, stay safe," Indira begs, squeezing the other girl tightly. "I know you can't die, but that doesn't mean you can't get hurt."

"You, too," Raena says softly, squeezing back before stepping out of the embrace. "I'm glad I met you, Indira Beren."

Without another word, Raena sprints off in the same direction as Poe, leaving Indira alone once more. From one of the nearby windows, the technician can just barely see the battle unfolding outside. Enemy TIE fighters from the First Order attack en masse, swarming the Resistance fleet and wracking their foundations with small explosions. Indira watches, eyes narrowing as one fighter breaks off from the rest. The ship pulls itself around, slipping beneath the Raddus's hull while flying adjacent to the vessel and headed directly towards the hangar where all there rebel ships and pilots are currently congregated.

"Oh, gods," she breathes as an instantaneous surge of dread floods her senses. A shiver runs down Indira's spine and the feeling is so familiar that it makes the hair on the back of her neck stand up; as if someone is walking on her grave. She has only felt this way once before in her life and she knows what it means.

He's here.

Indira starts running as fast as she can, despite knowing that it's hopeless and that there's nothing she can do. Outrunning a TIE fighter would be impossible; the pilots were doomed regardless. Even so, she knows that has to try. She has to warn them — to save as many of them as she can — or die trying.

"Clear the hangar!" She shouts as she runs down the corridor, hoping that someone, anyone, just might hear her voice above all the noise before it's too late. "You have to clear the hangar, now!"

She turns the corner and nearly slips and falls as she sees Poe go barreling through the doors of the ship bay. Raena Nhagy follows close behind him, disappearing just as Indira hears the sound of a torpedo firing from somewhere outside the ship.

"NO!" She screams, the sound tearing from her lips seconds before a devastating blast rocks the foundation of the ship. Indira hears the sound of glass shattering before the explosion ruptures her eardrums and the entirety of the hangar goes up in flames. Heat washes over her and she closes her eyes as debris comes flying through the open blast doors.

For a moment, Indira feels nothing but death washing over her. She can, for the briefest of moments, sense the fear of all the pilots trapped inside the hangar and feel their pain, their confusion, their terror — and then it's gone, snuffed out as they are instantly killed. Grief rushes through her and Indira clutches the wall, falling to her knees. Poe was in there. She saw him disappear through the doors and she can't feel him anymore. The weight of it is staggering; so much so that she thinks she might scream. In her disoriented state, she hardly notices the sound of two solid thumps landing beside her. Her attention is only drawn by the sound of a loud clank followed by a shrill robotic squeal.

     Her eyes shoot open as she takes in the sight before her. "Ow," Raena Nhagy complains, pushing herself off the body of the pilot beneath her. To Indira, it almost sounds as if she's underwater; her ears still ringing from the blast. "That fucking hurt."

For a moment, her heart stops beating when she sees Poe Dameron sit up beside the assassin, wincing and in pain, but very much alive. Tears flood her eyes as Indira crawls over to him, cradling his head and the back of his neck.

"You're alive!" She cries, scarcely able to believe her eyes. "Oh, my gods. Thank Force. I thought you died!"

Poe looks up at her, shell-shocked and confused, before his gaze flits to Raena. They both watch as the assassin pulls herself up from the ground and begins to limp towards the doors she had just been thrown from. "Nhagy," Poe croaks as she walks into the burning room. "Raena, wait!"

Before he can get another word out, the blast doors slam shut, sealing off Raena and the explosion from the rest of the vessel. Just before the doors close, Indira catches a glimpse of Black One going up in flames and for some stupid reason it almost makes her want to cry.

As BB-8 rights himself and reattaches his broken pieces to his body, Finn comes racing down the hallway, stopping abruptly when he sees Indira and Poe. "Poe, Indira!" He shouts. "Are you guys alright?"

"We need to get out of range of those star destroyers," Poe replies grimly, taking the hand offered by Finn and allowing himself to be pulled off the ground.

Indira follows suit, scrambling to her feet. "Let's get back to the bridge," she says. "Someone needs to tell them, if they don't already know."

"I'm sure they do," Poe replies, mouth falling into a grimace. "But I don't know if it will be enough."

    THEY DON'T MAKE it to the bridge. As the onslaught of TIE fighters continue their assault, wracking the ship with explosion after explosion, the trio meets another familiar face in the hallway. Kaydel Co Connix looks exhausted and distressed, but her shoulders sag in relief when she sees the three of them.

     "You survived," she says, breathing a sigh of relief. "Leia will be glad to hear it. We all saw the explosion at the hangar and feared the worst."

     "It is the worst," Poe insists, frowning. "All our ships got destroyed. Nearly every pilot that we have was in that hangar. Connix, we are beyond screwed right now."

      "I know that, but you three aren't dead, so I'll count that as something to celebrate," the lieutenant snaps as they continue making their way down the hallway. "Gods know that we all could use it —"

     Indira stops dead in her tracks, feeling that cold prickling sensation once more that makes her whole body shudder. Beside her, she can see that Finn has gone rigid; as if he can feel it, too. She looks at him with wide eyes, knowing inexplicably that something terrible is about to happen.

     "Something's wrong," she mutters, looking out the window. From where she stands, she can just barely see the tip of the Raddus where the bridge is located.

     "I know," Finn agrees. "Something isn't right."

     Poe looks at them, brow furrowed with confusion. "What are you guys talking about?" He asks warily

     Indira shakes her head, feeling nauseous and both hot and cold all over. "Just a feeling," she says, but she knows it's more than that.

     Before another word can leave her lips, the biggest explosion so far wracks the ship, sending massive tremors throughout the vessel. Poe, Finn, Indira, and Connix are all thrown back by the force of the blast; sprawling out on the floor of the Raddus after tumbling to the ground. When Indira tries to take a breath, she struggles to inhale. For a moment, she thinks that there is no oxygen is left in the ship and begins to panic. But then her lungs start working once more and she finds herself able to breathe.

     Even so, she cannot shake the feeling that all is not well. As her companions pull themselves up from the ground, Indira drags herself back towards the window and presses her face to the glass, peering out at the ship. When she looks to the location of the bridge, she gasps in horror. The bridge had been annihilated.

     "Leia," Indira breathes.

She starts to run.

     "Indira, wait!" Poe says, but she slips past him and doesn't stop.

      A sense of déjà vu washes over her as she runs, taking her back to the night on D'Qar when she had thought that Leia was going to be killed. She had been scared out of her mind then and she is even more terrified now, sprinting as fast as she can towards the bridge. Not Leia, she thinks, equal parts desperate and enraged. You can't take her from us — you can't, you can't!

Her feet come to a skidding halt when she reaches the bridge, seeing that the blast doors have already been sealed shut, closing off the command center entirely from the rest of the ship. Through the window of the hatch, Indira sees nothing but floating debris and the faint flickers of holograms that continue to shine their light in spite of the devastation that has been wrought. Not a single soul is left alive.

Leia is gone.

"No," she whispers, the word too small and insignificant to capture the weight of her despair. "No, no, no!"

Panic begins to climb its way up her throat as her breathing comes in short, sharp gasps. This isn't real, Indira thinks, feeling tears building up in her eyes. She hasn't felt this desperate in years — not since the day that she was told that her mother was dead and that she would never be coming home again. Tears spill down her cheeks as she stumbles backwards and chokes on a sob. This is all a bad dream. Any minute now, I'm going to wake up and none of this will have happened.

But it isn't a bad dream. It's real.

As she blindly backs away from the bridge, Indira can hear the faint sound of someone yelling behind her. She doesn't turn around, too shocked to speak or think or do anything at all. Leia is gone. The First Order has all but won by robbing them of their last hope. Nothing else seems to matter.

A warm hand settles over her wrist, tugging her backwards until she somehow finds herself in Poe's arms. Everything seems to be happening in slow motion; as if her head is trapped under water and the world has gone completely silent around her aside from the ringing in her ears.

Poe sets his hands on her shoulders, forcing her to look him in the eyes as he speaks, but Indira finds that she can't respond. Leia is gone. The words leaving his lips don't compute in her head; almost as if he isn't saying anything at all. Leia is gone. Her head turns to the window, looking out at the starry sky and the tumultuous darkness of space. Leia is gone. Indira can hardly breathe. Leia is gone, gone, gone.

She's not coming back.

As she watches the floating debris from a distance, Indira thinks she can almost see the faint outline of a person in the distance. She can't tell if her eyes are playing tricks on her, but she thinks that she just might be looking at the figure of her aunt's corpse in the distance, fixed and frozen in the weightless embrace space.

But then it moves.

At first, Indira doesn't believe her eyes. She wipes at the tears blurring her vision and rubs at her eyes in disbelief, unable to manage anything else as she watches the floating figure reach out a hand and start to fly. Too stubborn, too determined, and too damn powerful to go out without a fight, General Leia Organa does the impossible. She reaches out with the Force and bends it to her bidding. She pulls herself back to the ship through the sheer power of will. She saves her own life with her own hands; death be damned today.

This is not how Leia Organa dies.

"Get to the air lock!" Poe shouts and the sound comes rushing back into Indira's ears as she watches him scramble away from the window towards the blast doors. "Someone get a medic right now!"

He makes it to the doors first. When Leia presses a hand against the glass, Poe smashes the button that forces the doors to open and catches her in his arms as she falls into unconsciousness. He feels for a pulse, heart pounding desperately in his chest, until he finds a faint throb of life beneath the general's skin.

"I need a medic!" He repeats, screaming the words to anyone who is listening. "She needs oxygen; someone find me a medic right now!"

Beside him, Indira falls to her knees. Her hands reach out, trembling as she takes in the sight of her aunt's pale, blue-tinted skin that has been coated with frost and stardust. She grasps Leia's fingers in her own, needing to feel for herself for just a moment that her aunt is still alive; that she is really here in front of her, that she isn't gone.

Her chin quivers as she feels the unmistakable pulse of blood beneath her aunt's skin in spite of how cold she is to the touch. A small noise — something between a sigh and a sob — escapes her mouth before she bows her head and holds her aunt's hand. Indira stays like that until Connix returns, sprinting down the hallway with Doc Cosimo and a medical droid hot on her heels.

As soon as they reach the unconscious woman, Leia is lifted onto the stretcher before an oxygen mask is slipped over her face, pumping air into her lungs. Her hand falls from Indira's grasp as she is ushered away, but Indira follows close behind.

Outside, the onslaught of TIE fighters and ships has fallen back, retreating to the First Order fleet as the Raddus pulls out of range. As Leia is led away from the fray, the blinking binary beacon that had been on her wrist falls to the ground; still flashing faintly on the floor of the ship. Slow footsteps approach the device before careful hands pick it up, handling the bracelet with the utmost care.

Finn cradles the beacon in his hands as if it is something precious; like it is the only thing that matters to him in the entire galaxy and — to some extent — it is. This small, seemingly insignificant tool is his one link to Rey; the only tether tying them together with thousands of miles keeping them apart. His fingers close around the beacon, clutching it to his chest as he desperately wishes he could be standing at Rey's side.

Where are you, Rey? He thinks, feeling a sense of overwhelming loneliness. Come back, please.

Half the galaxy away, a small girl sleeps curled up on a bed of stone. As she dreams, her hand holds tight to a beacon of light. Her dreams, restless and filled with chaos and death, startle her awake. In spite of the coolness of the planet around her, she can feel the phantom sensation of heat surrounding her and taste the bitter flavor of ash on her tongue.

Rey's fingers find the beacon and she clutches it desperately. "Finn," she whispers in the darkness; knowing deep down inside that her friends are in trouble. "Leia."

It was time for her to go back.

EDITED ON:
11.01.19