Can't Please All of the People Any of the Time - A Star Wars: The Last Jedi Short Story

I'm still working on BB In Toyland, but I had to get this off my chest. Personally, I loved "The Last Jedi." I liked that it took risks, that it didn't do what  you expected it to do, that it let characters evolve and change. Was it perfect? No, but no movie is. No person is, no matter what people want them to be. Even legends make mistakes. That fallibility one of the issues Rey and Kylo Ren - or Ben Solo - address in this story. This isn't a tale of romance, or one that uses their connection in a romantic way. I saw their connection more as two confused people who were hoping that they'd found a friend who understood what they'd gone through, rather than as a Jane Austen novel in space. 

Oh, and by the way, as you can guess, there's a major spoiler alert for this story. Proceed with caution if you haven't had the chance to see it yet. 

Rating: PG

Pairings: None

Disclaimer: The franchise belongs to George Lucas and the Walt Disney Company.

We'd just gotten into hyperspace and I was working on fixing a few wires in the cockpit when I heard his voice in my head again...and the vision returned. He was there. Tall, thin, and pale, still clad in black. He sat on a shiny, gleaming throne in a perfectly shiny, sterile throne room. At least he was dressed this time. That one time he contacted me half-dressed was embarrassing. (And a little silly, with his pants pulled half-up like that.)

“Are you still messing with that piece of junk?” His little smirk wasn't nearly as warm or pleasant as his father's. “It should have been sent to the scrap heap decades ago.”

“Go away, Ben.” I really wished I could throw things through a Force Bond. “I am not in the mood to talk to you right now.”

He made a face. “My name is Kylo Ren.”

“It's a stupid name.” I wiped my hands on an old cloth I'd found in a tool box. “Where did you get it, anyway, off a cereal box? Besides, I don't see anything wrong with your real name.”

“If you must know, it's made up of the letters of the names of my family.” Ben – I refused to think of him by that silly Kylo Ren name anymore – just gave me that grin. “At least I have a family name. Where's your family, junk girl?”

I glared at him through the Force. “Where's yours? Oh yeah, I forgot, you killed half of them. Even your mother's given up on you!”

Ben narrowed his cold brown eyes at the mention of his mother. “Tell Mama I had nothing to do with her being shot at. I personally destroyed the men who did it.”

“Oh, I'm sure she'll be thrilled with that apology.” I seriously wondered if I could figure out how to Force-choke him, and if I cared that this was considered to be a dark side power. “She almost died out there in space, Ben! Even now, she's not in the best shape. We're worried that all the stress may have been too much for her heart. Do you even care? No, you don't!”

Ben almost leaped out of his chair. “Don't you ever say I don't care about my mama!”

“Then prove it!” I slammed the front of the dashboard shut. “Leave the First Order, Ben. Let Hux run the damn thing. We could use a good, solid fighter like you.”

“I can't, Rey.” Ben settled back in his chair. “I can't go back to being just Ben Solo. Ben Solo was a nothing. A nobody. Even his uncle couldn't love him.”

I clenched my fists. “I've had just about enough of you Solos and Skywalkers, with your whining and crying and damned family drama!” It took all of my will power to not attempt to figure out how to punch him across time and space. “First of all, your name is Ben Solo. That's who you are, whether you like it or not. You have it in your head that if you kill every single thing in your past, you'll escape what happened with you and your uncle. Holo-news flash, Ben. Killing the past is not the way to escape it, and neither is running from it. You confront the past, learn from it, and move on. Master Skywalker taught me that.”

“What do you know?” Ben's fingers were pressing hard around the arms of the chair. “You've had everything handed to you! You can do every single kriffing thing! You fly the Falcon better than Han Solo. You fight as well as I do, and I've been training since I was six. You fight better than my uncle did, and he learned from two of the most experienced Jedi in the entire order!”

I crossed my arms. “Ben, I taught myself how to do those things. I learned how to fly from an old flight simulator. I had to learn how to fight. You don't survive in Jakku if you can't fight. I more-or-less raised myself. I can bake my own bread, fix my own speeder.” Ben shifted uncomfortably in his chair. It did look pretty hard. Maybe he should get a pillow for that hard ass of his. “I don't understand why you and the First Order can't share the galaxy with the rest of us, or what you have against your parents. From what I've gathered, they really cared about you.”

“They never loved me!” I swore the arm of the chair had dents in it from where Ben had been pushing down so hard. “Mama paid more attention to her damn Republic than she ever did me! Pap...Han Solo spent all of the time he wasn't arguing with Mama off at some kriffing race. And Uncle Luke...” Ben's voice broke down. “Uncle Luke saw darkness in me. Nothing but darkness. He was going to kill me!”

“But he didn't! He changed his mind!” Now, all I could see was that little lost boy Ben couldn't let go of. “Ben, people make mistakes. They make big ones. I shouldn't have come to your ship. You shouldn't have killed your father, or your uncle's students. You can get a life sentence for that on some planets, you know. Master Skywalker should have talked to you about that darkness, instead of trying to kill you. Poe and Finn told me what happened on Cantino Bight and with the Resistance. They both made huge mistakes, and Poe's got a lot of people hurt.”

“People shouldn't make mistakes!” It was a little boy's voice that wailed. “Mama...Papa...they were gods! They never made mistakes, unless you count fighting all the time. Uncle Luke was the greatest Jedi to ever live! You should have seen them when they were younger, Rey. The way I remember them. They were so perfect. They fought together, lived together, did everything as a team. They were the ones who took down the Empire. The ones who destroyed my grandfather. I thought...if I could be more like Grandfather...I could be as good as them.” He was nearly whimpering now. “If I was like Grandfather, I could be strong, too. I could be as perfect as they were. I could destroy the past, like he did.”

“First of all, if Snoke was the one who filled your head with all that nonsense about Darth Vader, I'm glad you killed him.” I pulled back into my chair when I heard voices outside the cockpit. “Why do you want to be like the man who murdered, raped, and robbed half the galaxy?”

Ben's lip trembled. “Because he was powerful. He was powerful like Mama was. I used to sit with Mama at the senate meetings. When she stood up, people listened. Uncle Luke used to say that 'size matters not.' Mama may be short, but she always seemed like the strongest person in the room.” A tear ran down that long nose. “I wanted to be as powerful as her, but no one ever listened to me. People listened to Grandfather. He ran the Empire. He did amazing things.”

“Amazing things that killed half the galaxy and left it in smoking ruins.” Now I was the one who was sighing. “Ben, it's hard when the people we count on let us down. Sometimes, things happen that you don't expect. What would you do if I told you that your Grandfather was redeemed by your uncle, and hadn't always been the awe-inspiring Sith Lord in the stories?”

“I don't believe it.” Ben turned away from me, staring out the wide window to his right. “Grandfather was never like Uncle Luke or Han Solo. He was never weak. Darth Vader was respected by everyone in the Empire.”

“No, they all feared him.” I took his lead and gazed out to the stars. “There's a lot of difference between fear and respect, Ben.”

“Love is weakness.” Ben wiped his eyes fiercely. “I thought you would understand. Uncle Luke let you down, too. Your friends let the entire Resistance down. Pap...Solo let Mama down. What good does love do anybody?”

“Love is the reason we exist,” I said softly. “Love is why your mother continued to hope that you would come back. Love is why Master Skywalker was able to bring Darth Vader back to the light. Love is why my friend Finn refuses to leave the side of a girl he's only known a few days. It's why Poe and the others fight for what they believe in.” I turned right towards where he was in my vision. “It's why I fight. Why I'm going to keep fighting. Why I'm going to become a Jedi. My new friends need me.”

“So,” he said darkly. “You're joining them. I thought...” He turned away. “Doesn't matter now. I thought you'd understand.”

“I do, Ben.” I frowned. “But you're the one who doesn't understand. All you can see is that hurt little boy whose uncle saw darkness in him. You've spent so much time dwelling in that little boy, you can't see all the damage and pain the man has caused.”

“And you're just a nobody.” He wiped harder at his eyes. “That's all you are. Just a stupid little nobody, from some nowhere little planet and a nothing family.”

“Maybe I am. But I think,” I finally said, my smile widening, “I'd rather be a nobody who knows she's somebody, than a somebody who believes deep down that he's a nobody.” I closed my eyes and breathed deeply. “Contact me again when you're ready to be a real friend, Ben. Until then...may the Force be with you.”

I'd just ended the vision when Poe walked into the cockpit. “Hey there, Rey. Who were you talking to in here?”

“Oh, nobody.” I grinned up at him. “Want to go talk to Leia? We could hear her story about how Luke and Han attempted to rescue her from the Death Star and she ended up rescuing them for the fourteenth time.”

“That's my favorite story.” I followed him out the door. Maybe the other members of the Resistance weren't perfect. Maybe Leia wasn't perfect. Maybe no one was. But I knew they were friends, and that gave me hope. Enough hope that someday, Ben Solo would understand, too.

The End