10 | a plan gone south

"THIS... THIS IS NOT GOING AS I EXPECTED."

AHCH-TO ISLAND-

Poe was getting more and more antsy by the minute.

While Han and Rey had packed up from their place on Ahch-To quickly, thanks to the help of Chewie, there was something in the back of his mind that was whispering that they weren't fast enough.

The clock was ticking, quite literally, and Poe was afraid that they were going to miss it.

Fox seemed to be calm through it all (which surprised Poe, as the man quite literally had his two closest friends on the line), but there was something in the look in his eyes that made the Resistance pilot feel as if Fox was feeling the same exact thing that he was. He just was much better at hiding it, which probably was thanks to years of worrying for his friends during missions thanks to the First Order.

The rush to find wherever the First Order's ship was located was on, and there wasn't a second to waste.

"Okay, that should about do it." Rey rushed down the steps towards where the small encampment had been, now all hastily packed away into the Falcon, with Han already prepping inside. "I tried to see if Luke would come, a last chance but-"

"He didn't go for it." Fox filled in the blanks, seeing Rey give a small frustrated nod.

"Figures." Poe sighed, running a hand through his hair, trying to give his hands something to do other than shake with fear. "But we really don't have time to try and convince him to come. If he's refusing to help his own daughter from getting actively killed, then that's something that he has to live with."

"Speaking of rescuing Kyra, we really should track down wherever this Star Destroyer is. I might have a few places on where to start, especially with where that is being transmitted from, but it might take another ping of the First Order to actually lock in a location." Fox bounced off of what Poe had been saying, the communicator that the two men had brought with him in his hand.

"We might be able to help with that on the Falcon, but if we all go together, we leave a ship behind." Rey pointed out, gesturing to the small ship that Poe and Fox had brought along with them. "If you're okay with leaving a ship behind- or if Leia is, for that matter, then we can just try and figure this out together. Han has the Falcon ready to go."

"Sounds like a plan to me. Plus, we give the grump who lives here an opportunity to actually come and try to help if he needs." Poe muttered, earning himself a whack from Rey, rubbing his arm in fake offense. "And it gives you an actual excuse as to why you have to come back here eventually." He tacked on, trying to save himself from the snarky comment.

"He's trying, Poe."

"Is he really? Because our hope that we had held onto for the Resistance to carry on most certainly doesn't seem to think that this is a fight worth–" Poe stopped himself from a fit of anger, taking a deep breath as he tried to calm his pounding heart. "He made his choice. And we made ours. We need to move."

Scrambling back into action, the three original travelers to Ahch-To began to set up the Falcon for the journey and inevitable fight wherever the First Order was. It didn't take too long for the group to organize into the Falcon during preparations, Han and Rey taking up the helm of the pilot and co-pilot, much to Chewie's chagrin. Poe and Fox took no time in loading what meager supplies they had brought with their X-Wing into the Falcon, finding a place within moments.

It was strange for Poe to be back in the Falcon, he had to admit. The last time he had truly flown this ship was when he and Kyra had hijacked it those months ago (which Han had still not let him live down, or even get close enough to the Falcon to attempt again). It felt like a completely different lifetime, when the worst thing on the two's minds was the fact that now Kyra had to call the General by her first name.

Shaking himself out of the nostalgic stupor, Poe walked back to the ramp of the Falcon  to see Fox bringing in the last bag of supplies, patting the man on his shoulder as he loaded back into the ship, giving him a look that they weren't the only ones outside on the island anymore.

Looking up, Poe saw Luke Skywalker standing from the cliffs above, staring down from the small village that he had known the former Jedi had taken up residence in. The Resistance pilot couldn't fathom how the man could discover he had a daughter with the woman that he had loved and do nothing to find her, to help her, to help the cause she had sacrificed so much and believed in.

But then again, cowards tended to shrink away at the first sight of danger. And that was what Luke Skywalker was to him– no longer a myth, a legend, or some hope for the Resistance to hold onto. He was a lost man who they could not keep grasping at to be the spark to reign the darkness of the galaxy back in.

Giving the man a cold stare, Poe turned on his heels and walked back inside of the Falcon, hearing the ship's doors shut with a ringing sense of finality as the Resistance left the former Jedi Luke Skywalker in the past.

Finding themselves departing the airspace of Ahch-To within moments, the tension and anxiety the crew felt only seemed to rise. The situation was one filled with lies and unsure scenarios for the path ahead, the only thing known for sure was that a regroup to help keep the Resistance alive was necessary.

Settling back into the dark dusty setting of space, with a spattering of stars the only true light for the five to see, Fox muttered a curse as his communications transmitter lit up with a glow, signifying something was going on within the Resistance.

"Well that can't be any good." Fox muttered, looking over at Poe, the two exchanging a look of anxiety as they considered what it could be. Best case scenario, it was just General Organa asking for an update on the status of getting her brother, former lover, and Rey back into the fold of the Resistance.

And the two of them did not even want to think about what could be the worst case scenario.

"Answer it, kid." Han's gruff voice rung out from the pilot's ship, hearing the small whispers of worry between the two Resistance pilots. "We need to figure out what's going on sooner rather than later, and this might be our clue."

Fox's face darkened as he opened the transmitter, looking at Poe with a worried look that he had been disguising so well until this point. "It's the First Order. They sent the Resistance another transmission."

"Another?" Rey looked confused as she glanced at Poe, looking for answers from the Resistance pilot. Her expression was pressed with lines of worry in her face, although her mind clearly hadn't gone to where Fox and Poe's had in that moment. "Didn't they just send one a day ago?"

"Shit." Poe muttered, shaking his head. "The timer's up."

"Worse." Fox threw the transmitter up onto the controls of the ship, a hologram coming to life before their very eyes. "We didn't play their game, and Kyra did something outside of that message she tried to send in their last transmission. The rules have changed. They're sending a different kind of message."

The hologram flickered to life, showing the same opulent throne room that the last transmission had been sent in, the towering presence of Snoke not visible, but the terrifying show of power of his empty throne was a message enough.

Kylo Ren stood on the steps, face sneered into a gloating smirk, looking down at the scene that had occurred in front of him. A gut-wrenching sob rang out through the transmission, Poe's eyes immediately flying to where Kyra was, folded over, her eyes closed as she hovered over something– no, someone.

And there, in front of the throne, underneath the curled figure of the woman Poe loved, was a body. Too still to be sleeping or unconscious, an unfamiliar face to all in the crew but Fox, who immediately looked away, understanding exactly what had unfolded within the clutches of the First Order.

"The Resistance made a choice." Kylo Ren looked down at the scene, his masked face giving no emotions away, the apathy only making the scene even worse than what it was. "And so the First Order made one as well."

"A Skywalker for a Skywalker seems to be fair."

"You bastard-" Poe seethed, his body tensing as he watched the man that he knew had been Kyra's captor and cause of so much pain towered over her, the Resistance pilot helpless to do anything in that situation. He felt the lightest touch on his shoulder from Fox, who looked at him with a stern shake of his head, devastation already written across the former stormtrooper's face.

Something was desperately wrong that Poe didn't understand, and he knew that it was only something that the former First Order members would ever fully grasp. But he had a feeling that whatever had happened was going to change their situation greatly.

"And it turned out we had a spare. But I think your little Skywalker handled that problem, didn't you, Solani?"

Kyra's face flew up in anger as she looked up, the glistening trail of tears evident on her face as her expression was one of ruin and hurt. Her eyes were filled with a haunted expression, the young woman filled with horrors that she had just witnessed and done herself. Not only was she worse off in the 24 hours since she had last been seen by the Resistance through a hologram, her figure even more injured and gaunt, it looked as if something had broken her.

"I didn't–" Kyra cut herself off, eyes coming up to see that a droid was standing in the hallway, very visibly transmitting another message as the droid stood by Hux, who blocked her exit from the throne room. Instead of finishing the sharp remark as the Resistance group expected her to, she startled at the fact that the First Order was transmitting yet another message.

Within moments, her face fell as she realized who would be seeing the video that was being broadcasted to the galaxy. "Stars, no. No-" Kyra folded back in on herself, her body shaking as she went into shock. A million thoughts were racing in her mind, but none more obvious than Fox, whose best friend and brother she had just killed, and Poe, who would finally be understanding the person that Kyra was always trying to run away from– the person she always would be.

"Seems her little trade was pointless after all. Your move."

Fox swore as his own hands began to shake, the man unable to just sit and process what he had just seen. Jolting out of his seat behind Rey, Fox stepped towards the center of the Falcon, his mind racing with a million different thoughts– grief for Silas and what he had just lost, terror for Kyra and what this could possibly mean for her, and a general sense of unease and fear that had crept into his own body.

"He made Kyra do it."

"I'm not following."

"Silas. He's dead." Fox's voice seemed cold and distant in that moment, underscored by a sense of disbelief that what had just unfolded, what he had just seen, couldn't possibly be true. The First Order's ruthlessness and might had just claimed another life, and this time, it wasn't something far away from him. It wasn't something that could be pushed aside or easily used as motivation to continue the fight against them.

This was personal.

"What do you mean dead? How could you possibly–"

"Silas and I had a secret way to communicate. Even when separated, I would know if he was okay. He would send a sign somehow, whether that was a code word or an expression or a motion–" Fox cut himself off, his voice raw with emotion and hurt.

"He was lifeless, Poe. Nothing. No sign, no nothing. He wouldn't do that. Wouldn't hesitate to show something, to tell me something." The former First Order member explained, his own mind racing with the fact that his best friend, his brother, was dead, and that the First Order had done nothing but hurt and manipulate and kill those closest to him. "Even in the first message he sent, I was able to understand that while his conditions weren't the best, he was trying to keep us away. Keep Kyra away. And then she–"

"Played right into their hands." Han finished for him, the man finally speaking up after sitting in silence while the transmission played. Part of the man was terrified at the man that his son had become– the glimpse a few months prior had been jarring, and the stories Kyra had tried to keep from him (but always eventually made their way back to him) were more than he had ever imagined, but seeing him gloat over a dead man? That was more than what the former smuggler could ever expect.

"Worse. They made her worst nightmares come to life." Fox shook his head, wishing that he could all but run to Kyra and burn the First Order for what they did.

"You said he made her do it." Rey paused, her eyes nervously looking over to Fox with a hesitation that seemed to speak what her words couldn't in that moment. "What did you mean by that?"

"Kyra killed Silas."

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

well well well

it's been a while hasn't it

hi welcome to 2025 and it being like two and a half fucking YEARS since I updated

(im so sorry)

I tried to write most of the book (or bits and pieces) so it shouldn't be insanely long between updates, but in my defense, I am a college student who is at an insanely hard school and absolutely zero motivation and I also just finished a full time internship LOL

BUT! I am becoming more active again so if you want to interact with me or know what's going on with me I definitely encourage you to follow my instagram findtheforce.wp !

anyways that is about everything scream at me later

bye y'all!

(omg throwback gif by @sanktham!)