With the unconscious Chamberlain stowed safely in one of the Betrayal's small cargo pods, Ben finally allowed some of the tension to drain from his back and shoulders. The pods were not in any way intended for human transport, and he relished the thought of the large man waking up in the small space and howling for his freedom. Walls insulated for the cold pressure of space would trap any sound he made, avoiding attention.
Walking up the ramp into the ship's cozy interior, he looked around for the first time at the repairs that Rey had managed to make in such a short time. There were still scars across the walls and the metal of the consoles, but exposed wires were neatly tucked back into place and the reassuring glow of her instrument panels had come back to life.
Rey herself was tucked into the pilot's seat, dangerous shoes tossed into a corner and her knees drawn up to her chest. The golden gown was wrinkled and out of place, and as her fingers toyed absently with one of the console's switches she looked distantly out the windows into the spaceport. She seemed small, and lonely.
Though she hid it well, he hated the effect the night had had on her, the position that he had put her in. It had all seemed so theoretical, planning their mission, using their target's cravings against him. Theoretical until it had hurt her, filled her mind with memories of reaching hands that he wasn't sure she could forget easily.
Approaching quietly, Ben crouched on the floor of the ship beside her seat, turning the chair to face him and pulling her hands into his.
"I'm sorry, Rey." He said softly, wishing he could take the memories for her. "I never meant..."
"I know you didn't," she said, fighting not to pull her hands away. "I don't blame you. I blame him." She clenched her jaw. "Alright, I sort of blame you, but only for bringing me here. I saw into his mind, and I knew what he wanted. I didn't think he'd try it until we were somewhere private, where I could break his hand." The words came out acid through her teeth, and she twisted her fingers into Ben's, clenching his hands until it hurt.
"It wasn't that bad," she said. "It wasn't anything more than the Irving Boys tried on Jakku, but then I could fight back without giving anything away. I don't like subterfuge. I'm not good at it." Absurdly, she sort of wanted RD, with its mechanical scrubbing and programmed personality full of pure, robotic intentions. "And I want to punch him a few more times."
Rey's hands were trembling slightly in his own, and the slow ebb of anger in Ben's stomach was turning to pain for her. He pulled her hands towards him, kissing the backs of them without thinking.
He let her go and stood, moving towards the small cubby behind the pilot's chair and digging through the old things he had stashed there. Pieces of his old life. Finding what he was looking for he silently handed her one of his old shirts, the soft black fabric wrinkled, but clean. The magic of the beautiful dress was gone.
"We can't go back to the villa now." He said quietly. "Too much risk." Turning away, he walked back down the ramp of the ship and let it close with a soft swish behind him, giving her a moment alone.
Rey felt absurdly relieved that Ben hadn't tried to hug her. She twisted her fingers in the black fabric, recognizing the feel of it, the grooves worn into it from the cross-straps of the ribbed gauntlets that had once covered Kylo Ren from shoulder to wrist. She pressed it to her face, almost surprised that it smelled like Ben. In her mind, they were separate men. They should have separate scents. But they didn't.
Slowly, she pulled the shirt from her face and stripped out of the dress, dragging the shirt over her head. It fell to mid-thigh. That was long enough for her. She kicked the gilded fabric into the corner with her shoes and stood, flicking a few switches to get the Betrayal started up.
Hearing the slow whir of the engines starting up, Ben re-entered the ship and moved to stand behind Rey at the console. Her shoulders were still tense, and he wanted to reach out and comfort her, but refrained. For the moment at least, she needed her distance.
"Wait a few minutes before we take off." He said quietly, regretting the Betrayal's lack of secondary seating. It was going to be a rough ride up to the moon where they had left the Falcon.
"RD is on her way with a few things from the villa."
Rey nodded, running her fingers over the controls and preparing for launch. She couldn't help running her mind over everything that happened, trying to disentangle the disgust and violation from the excuses floating in her head. That was not the kind of thing she should have had to do, but if it took out the First Order's main source of funding...was it worth it? Yes. She knew that. It was something that she would have given her life for. It still didn't make it right, or easy.
She glared through the transparisteel hull, sickened by the golden veils in that midnight amethyst sky. She hated almost everything on this planet—the glitzy clothing, the ridiculous food, the even more ridiculous parties, and the maneuvering aristocracy with their casual cruelty. It was so far from everything she'd ever known, and everything she'd ever wanted to know. It was the opposite of the grease and gears and deep convictions of the resistance. She'd rather go back to Jakku than spend another minute on this vile canker of a planet.
Maybe some people could handle this. Maybe Ben could slide into the workings of this society and back out again without trouble, but Rey couldn't. And she didn't want to.
"I'm never doing this again," she said into the tense silence. "I'll go into battle with you. I'll root out First Order settlements. But this—" she kicked at the dress and shoes, hating the flash of pink varnish on her toes. "This is the farthest thing from what I want to be that I can think of. If you want to do something like this again, you go on your own."
Ben nodded, hearing the droid trundle up the ramp into one of the cargo storages under the ship and close the door. He had no words to offer her, no comfort he could give. He bundled her pain into his own and held onto it, fragments of beautiful moments they had managed to share under Aurelia's skies seeming distant and broken.
"Let's go home." He said quietly, wondering when he had allowed the Falcon to become so again.
A few hours after launch, Rey made contact with Finn first, and decided to let him take care of the details of their "info drop". She let Ben take over the helm and pulled down the small bunk at the back of the ship, then powered down RD and worked on editing her programming.
No more mascara. No more scrubs and baths. Not for Rey. If it wanted to make itself useful, it could clean up after the Porgs that were undoubtedly turning the Falcon into a living den of downy, squawking misery. By the time they made it back to Aurelia's moon, she had worked out a good deal of her frustration.
Now, she just felt tired. Tired and empty, and in need of a shower. Part of her wanted a hug, too, but the larger part of her wanted more time to disassociate the feeling of unwanted hands from the confusion of Ben pressing up against her back. She refused to conflate the two, or let the boiling feelings destroy the good things they'd managed to build.
They'd talked. She and Ben had established a few truths. Now was not the time to hurl herself into it and pretend the feelings of violation and disgust could be erased by the touch of a different man's hands. Now was the time to reestablish who and what she was, and rely on him as a friend first. Everything else they were, or could be, would have to wait until she felt more like herself.
She got up, snagged one of the golden shoes, and went to work unbending the delicate wires. At Ben's glance, she said, "Gold is good conductive material."
Ben shrugged, admiring the practicality of her actions. He had enjoyed having her closer to his height--it had been a pleasant change-- but down to earth, stable Rey felt more real. He had missed this Rey, the practical and determined girl who never gave up on anything.
It was impossible to ignore the impact she was having on him, the over-sized black shirt he had given her draping over her long limbs and falling nearly to her knees. Somehow the dark and shapeless fabric gave off a feeling of deeper intimacy than the barely present gowns had, and it was hard not to wrap his arms around her and pull her close to give her comfort. Not wanting his thoughts to tease at open wounds that her time on Aurelia had left her with, Ben locked them tight behind his walls, holding them close.
He distracted himself with the minutiae of piloting the ship, and darker thoughts involving his missed chance to confront Hux. He took some meagre satisfaction from imagining Hux, dazed and confused, staring around an empty room like an idiot and wondering how he had gotten there.
As the Betrayal slowly slid into dock near the Falcon, the familiar lines of the other ship caused more relief than aversion, something that Ben avoided examining for the moment. He wasn't ready yet to face the older memories the ship bore in its scarred body, but the newer ones were becoming precious to him. Standing, he held out a hand to help Rey to her feet in the confined space, and waited.
Rey looked up at Ben, examined the frank misery on his face, and sighed, some of her anger relenting. He'd never meant for her to be hurt, and the last thing she needed right now was him descending into some pit of guilt that would only fuel the darkness inside of him. And right now, that hand didn't seem to be asking her for anything she didn't want to give. She reached out first with the Force, brushing against his consciousness, showing her need for that hand to mean friendship, and support.
It stayed extended. She took it.
Strong, warm fingers closed around her hand and she pulled herself up. Ben had stripped off the long velvet coat, the neck cloth, and thick belt of his fancy suit, leaving behind the simpler cut of the black shirt. Something more Ben Solo, and less Leyto Tahn. With a sigh, she leaned her forehead into his chest.
"I'm fine," she said, and squeezed his hand. "I'll be better once we're back on the Falcon."
"If there's anything left of the Falcon." Ben said quietly, one hand coming up automatically to rest on the back of her head and pet her hair comfortingly. He caught himself as his fingers touched her hair, falling away as he questioned himself. So many things on Aurelia had spiraled out of control, and too much of it was his fault. "I'm afraid of what the porgs have been up to in our absence."
A faint banging from under the ship helped to distract him, and he scowled. "Talk to the portmaster, make sure he doesn't remember anything he sees. I'll get this trash moved into the Falcon's hold and secured. We can stay at port long enough to question him and for your Alliance team to arrive."
Moving away from Rey with difficulty, Ben strode down the ramp of the Betrayal and stopped, staring. Across the bay a mechanic was working on a small shuttle, a porg perched merrily on his shoulder as he worked. Through the bay doors, Ben saw a small huddle of the feathery creatures trundling along behind a transport hover heading out of the station and into the main city, and no one seemed to pay them any mind. What the hell was going on?
At Ben's ripple of confusion, Rey swiveled around in the pilot's seat and levered herself up. "What?"
Approaching in the doorway, she saw what. Everywhere she looked, there were signs of Porgish domestication, from the nest box built halfway up one wall, to the pair of women walking along an upper mezzanine, fluffy porgs peeking out of their handbags.
"Seriously?" she said. Reaching over to RD, she flicked the droid's switch on. "RD, go with Ben to the Falcon and... clean up." Turning to Ben, she said, "I reprogrammed her to clean up after the porgs. It probably smells terrible. We never did figure out where they were putting the excrement."
Nodding helplessly, Ben followed orders and as the Falcon's ramp lowered with a hiss, a small contingent of panicked porgs flooded out around his ankles. The tiny porg chasing them skidded to a stop at the top of the ramp, staring at Ben as he stared back. The fluffy creature was half the size of the others, and in its tiny mouth it clutched a single spoon.
"I don't even want to know..." Ben groaned, heading up the ramp. As he passed, the tiny porg attacked his ankles with its improvised weapon, lashing out violently.
The interior of the ship was a mess, and RD began beeping woefully as she scurried around, tidying and sweeping feathers out of vents. The angry, spoon-wielding porg following in his wake, Ben headed for the cockpit to check on the falcon's systems.
With protest, the old ship slowly woke, and one by one the lights flickered on. If nothing else, the porgs didn't seem to have done much damage to her internal systems. Leaving the ship booting up, Ben paused in the lounge room, looking around. The last time he had been here he had been so angry... angry at Rey for leaving, angry at himself for not saying the things he wanted to say.
He sighed, scrubbing a hand through his hair. They had come so far on Aurelia, and now with the planet behind them it seemed almost like a dream. Rey was distant again,her equilibrium thrown off balance by the things she had endured, and Ben wasn't sure where that left them.
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(Authors' Notes)
Here's a question for you: If you had a domesticated porg, how would you dress it and what would you name it?