Charisma~ Poe Dameron

Anger.

Aria stood tall with her hands clasped behind her back. Her eyes stared forward, but they weren't catching anything. 

Her mind was elsewhere, even as Leia talked about their future plans to stall the reconstruction of another Starkiller Base, Aria could only think about her father. 

That is, until they spoke her name. 

"Aria?"

She blinked her grief away as she looked towards her General. Leia's eyes softened as they met hers, and Aria found her anger swelling because of it. 

"Yes?" There was an edge to her voice that the entire room picked up on- that being, Leia, Rey, Poe and Chewie. 

Leia shifted, standing up from her desk to walk around it and stand in front of Aria. Aria kept herself tall as she bent her head to look down at her General. 

"I want to hear what happened... in your words." Though Leia knew what she was asking, it had to be done. They all needed to hear it from the woman who stood closest to the murder. 

Aria's shoulders stiffened as her eyes fluttered. A shiver ran through her, but it was only Leia who caught it. 

"I-" Aria's voice shook, and it caught everyone by surprise. Poe- who stood by Aria's right side- looked to her to try and give her some sort of support. Rey- who stood on her other side- gave her a wide-eyed look, she didn't not expect the girl she met to break down so, but she couldn't blame her. Chewie, who stood next to Leia, gave a low growl of encouragement. Even his own remorse was heavy in his voice. With all of them, Aria tried again. "We were planting explosives in the oscillator room. The plan was for- for my dad to plant them on the lower left level, Chewie took the top, and I went across to plant some on the other side." Aria took in a long breath as she lifted her eyes to the ceiling. "I was almost done when I heard... Kylo Ren step into the room. He was right above me." Her voice started to shake again, so to combat it she dug her nails into her hands behind her back. "He walked to the catwalk and my dad stepped out from his hiding spot." She blinked excessively to stop the building of tears. "They talked-"

"What'd they say?" Leia's pressing wasn't for the report, they all knew that now. She wanted to know because it pertained to her. 

Poe knew it, Rey knew it, Chewie knew it. But they didn't say anything. 

They didn't know what to say. She was their General. 

"Han asked him to come home." She cleared her throat as she felt the lining start to swell. She knew soon she would be sobbing. "He said that the old him- Ben- was weak, and he didn't want to come home." Her hands started to shake. "There was a moment when... when I thought that he had reconsidered. I could hear it in his voice... he wanted to come back to us." She let out her breath, but she still refused to look at anyone. "He asked Han to help him with something, and dad agreed." She blinked twice to force the tears away, but they were very persistent. "Then he drove his lightsaber through our father's chest." To show her strength and anger, she lowered her gaze to see the pain in Leia's eyes. "Then he thanked him." Aria gave a low snarl. 

Leia took an unsteady step back and leaned on her desk to keep her upright. "What happened next?" Leia had to keep going, no matter the heartbreak. 

"I stepped out from my hiding place and used every bit of strength I had to push him back. He fled." The room could feel her anger swelling. It was almost tangible to them. "He ran, and I held my dad in my arms as he died. He... he called me Jo."

Poe let out a breath at that. She didn't tell him that, and he knew how much that must have hurt her. In her last moments with her father, he thought she was someone else.