Chapter Text
Dagobah is full of ghosts, Rey comes to understand. They don’t intend to harm her, and for that matter, she’s yet to see one. Yet, they’re always there. She feels their presence most poignantly during her meditation sessions, surfacing to her consciousness in the form of tiny blips of light. They are lifeforms, in a way, but different from the multitude of strange fauna that inhabit the planet. They exist inside the Force, and so they accompany it when it flows into her, when she moves it and captures its flow as she trains. Through this, she understands that there are spirits drawn to this tiny, insignificant portion of the galaxy, and as with everything else on Dagobah, she chooses to coexist with them.
In reality, Rey wasn’t initially thrilled about Master Luke’s choice of training grounds, especially when he informed her that she would be going alone. It seemed thrilling, at first. But once he described the terrain and the things that inhabited it, returning to a sand planet like Jakku seemed more appealing. He told her about his time there with the Jedi Master Yoda, how there were times when even though he thought he was alone, he never truly was. He said it would be the perfect place to meditate, to hone her already formidable control of the Force, and to learn to let go. When she asked what he meant, he gave her a look she was coming to recognize as painful understanding.
Anger, he said. It will destroy you. Anger, rage, hatred. You need to learn to let them all go.
In the creaking, sloshing quiet of Dagobah, Rey begins to see what that means. Anger prevents her from emptying her mind completely. Rage kindles a slow burn in her chest that never abates. Hatred creates an image, a symbol of what stops her from letting go, and that image is of Kylo Ren.
The ghosts surround her, and she believes that they understand.
---
Her camp is so rudimentary and rugged that her hollow AT-AT on Jakku seems downright luxurious. Her shelter is an ancient gnarltree, dark green with growth and vines. One of the first things she learns about Dagobah is that there is no such thing as proper shelter, as everything is guaranteed to get soaked. If it doesn’t rain, the humidity does the job well enough. Sweat clings to every available surface of her skin, and no amount of wiping it off fixes the problem. The gnarltree does little other than just give her some closure of having some kind of roof over her head.
Her sparse belongs are scattered between the tree and the X-wing fighter she borrowed. It’s a T-65B, older than her by quite a bit, but General Organa was very gracious, and Poe practically danced around the thing with a mixture of excitement and anxiety. What’s more, the Resistance provided her with an astromech, S4-M1, an excitable little droid that so far has done an excellent job of keeping Rey company. Other than the droid and the fighter, there’s bedding under the tree, a crate of rations, and a firepit Rey managed to build. It’s hardly anything to be proud of, but Rey can’t help herself.
Rey’s time is split between the camp and a little outcropping of rock overlooking a particularly scenic part of the swamp, where the trees part just enough to provide a view of the sky (if it isn’t foggy or cloudy or otherwise dreary) and a pond so still that its surface is like glass. Rey meditates there, in a unique place where the sky, land, and water seem to be of one entity.
Master Luke had told her to seek out a small dwelling on the planet, but Rey hasn’t had luck with that. There’s still plenty of time. More than enough.
---
Dagobah’s nights are strange. They come slowly, with darkness crawling like thousands of creatures, stretching out and languishing in every crook and niche, shadows growing and joining up. They plunge the jungles and swamps into a thick, humid darkness, and even the darkness lives as much as the rest of the planet. It is a tangible thing, and if Rey closes her eyes, she can feel it crawl around her, curl contentedly by her side, whisper to her that all is well, that she is protected. Night is not an entity of the Dark side, she knows. There is so much light in it, from the stars that peek through the heavy cover of the clouds, to the tiny luminous fires that erupt and dance over the swamp when the night settles. Different things come out in the dark, and they are so full of life that Rey relishes in their presence, the way they sparkle like a constellation in the Force.
But it’s in these nights that the ghosts first come.
The first one she actually hears comes one night, nearly two weeks into her stay, if her chronometer is correct. S4-M1 seems to detect it first, as Rey awakens to their persistent beeps and whirs, chirping at something unseen.
Rey cracks open one eye, rolls over to face the droid as they stand sentinel beside the gnarltree.
“What? What is it?” Rey whispers, her hand already inching toward her lightsaber.
Danger? S4-M1 says in binary, but sounds unsure. It’s a query, like they’re asking the darkness itself. Something creaks in the distance, and there’s a splash in the nearest pond, but otherwise, there’s silence.
Rey feels the ghost before she hears it. Nothing physical, but more like a pulse in the Force, and she latches onto it. It’s bright, a luminous little star in the gentle ebb and flow. She knows that something is different about it, as it feels like another person, has a signature similar to Master Luke’s, and one that Rey has rarely felt.
A Jedi.
“Oh.” Rey hears it, and almost thinks it was a hallucination. S4-M1 seems to disagree, judging by the crescendo of beeps signifying that they’re aware of someone else.
“Hello?” Rey calls, glancing around the gloom but only seeing the outline of the gnarltree’s roots and the ghostly light of S4-M1’s chassis.
No answer for a long stretch, and then, “Hello. I’m surprised you can hear me.”
It’s a man, his voice deep and lilting, but pleasant. He sounds old, maybe a little gruff, but friendly. His light in the Force brightens, and Rey feels at ease, like she’s in the presence of an old friend.
“You’re a Jedi,” she says matter-of-factly, although there’s a distinct thrill that passes through her at the notion. She sits up on her bedroll and pulls her knees to her chest, biting down on her bottom lip as she looks around. “Isn’t that right?”
“It is,” the ghost responds, sounding amused. “And I seem to have the honor of addressing a young Padawan.”
The excitement coiling in her chest blooms and she can’t help the smile that unfurls across her face. It’s the first time she’s truly felt the Force and the Light side since she began her training with Master Luke, and the first time that anyone has spoken to her not just as Rey, not as a scavenger or a desert rat, but as a Padawan. A Jedi-in-training.
“My name is Rey,” she says, still glancing around. S4-M1 gives its callsign as well, but manages to sound a little frustrated and not being able to catch sight of the Jedi ghost.
There is another breath of silence before the ghost speaks again, and there’s a brief waver in his presence. “I am Qui-Gon Jinn,” he replies. “Or, I was. Ages have come and gone since I passed.”
The name sounds familiar, although Rey can’t seem to catch the drifting memory that would supply the reason. Instead, she nods to him, wherever he might be. “Were you a Jedi Master?” she asks, grinning to herself, her toes curling in her boots.
“I was,” he says, the amusement still present. “I was not known for being completely obedient to the Code, but I like to believe I did well by my Order. Perhaps.”
Code. Order. The words alone send another rush through her. They make her think of another time and place, of people like Master Luke, in great quantities. Different people from dozens of races, bathed in the glow that was the Light side of the Force. She finds herself yearning for it, even though she knows so little about it. There were others like her, she knows. Others she might have been able to train with, find some camaraderie, a sense of belonging.
She senses the ghost peering at her, although he still doesn’t appear. “I must ask though, Rey,” he says, and she’s immediately alert. “Who sent you here?”
“My Master,” she replies. “His name is Luke Skywalker. He’s a very powerful Jedi. A hero.”
Although it’s faint, she feels some kind of tension emanating from the ghost, a ripple of something that might be pain. But it’s gone in a breath, fading back into the tide that binds her and this ghost together. “I see. I can sense many things in this galaxy, and I have felt in the past, as with now, that there are so few of you. There is a darkness that spreads.”
She knows what he’s talking about. The First Order, the Sith, the Empire. It has so many names, so many heads like some horrible beast that cannot be killed. The Dark side is just what it is, and even on Dagobah, she feels it pushing against the very edges of her awareness, insistent and cruel. It chases the Light, tries to snuff it out at every stray turn. She senses that the spirit of Qui-Gon Jinn understands this, as bright as he burns.
“There was a massacre,” she explains, her eyes trained overhead. “All of Master Luke’s students were killed, he told me. Anyone who had promise.”
“By one of his own,” the spirit says, although he did not need to. They both know it.
There is an image that sears across Rey’s vision, projected outward to the ghost. Darkness, and then ugly, burning red that highlights the steely edge of a mask. Anger boils, rage is the steam, fury pours forth. Then, the face of a man, eyes hot like embers, a bloody gash across his face, cauterized by the blade of a lightsaber. Malice and hatred metallurgically combine, and Kylo Ren is the result. Images dance after him, of Han Solo pierced with that terrible red blade, of Finn lying motionless in the snow, of Leia’s tear-streaked face and the warmth of her arms around Rey as they cry against each other.
The images fade like coals to gray ash, and she feels nothing but utter sadness from the ghost.
“History does have an unfortunate tendency to repeat itself,” he says solemnly.
Another image flickers in her mind’s eye. Red beams of a dual-bladed lightsaber, horrible red and yellow eyes set in a face of undulating patterns of black and red. One of the Sith, Rey knows, although this monster’s name is nothing but a whisper in the back of her mind. Then, she sees a young boy, his eyes bright and his grin wide. Promise, so much promise, she hears.
“Who was he?” she asks, although deep down, she knows the answer.
And the answer comes in three different voices, two different names. Master Luke’s first, familiar and sagely, but so mournful. Kylo Ren’s voice, only in his mind, respectful but searing. They say the same thing, in two different tones:
Darth Vader.
Then, quietly, careful as if stepping on stones crossing a river, Qui-Gon Jinn says, “Anakin Skywalker.”
Rey feels a complicated collection of emotions at the response. There’s sadness that clenches at the base of her throat, up to the back of her head, edging her eyes in hot tears. There’s anger that burns acid-warm in her belly. And then there’s loss, independent of sorrow, an empty gaping wound in her chest. She wonders which of the three men that answered her felt each thing.
She doesn’t say anything. There’s no need to.
“I knew him once,” Qui-Gon Jinn goes on. “He was a wonder, an anomaly. The possibilities really were endless with him. His mother told me he had been conceived from the Force itself, and I never had a reason to doubt it.”
There is another wordless exchange between them, filled with images of that same boy, tagged with a huge variance of feelings. Stubbornness, pride, excitement, loss. Then, the images fade but Rey feels something come after, concealed in the Force itself. Faith in another, faith in a future yet unseen, faith that it wasn’t all for nothing.
“I passed from that life believing in him,” Qui-Gon Jinn says with finality. The Forces moves though him and Rey like a great heaving sigh. It isn’t disappointment, she knows. With it, however, she feels the spirit began to flicker away.
“He did redeem himself, didn’t he?” she asks, perhaps a little too insistent. She doesn’t want this spirit to leave yet.
“I suppose,” is the reply, and although it isn’t unsure, it does sound resigned. “He was older by then, and the Dark side is powerful and cunning. There was so much of it in him.”
“But it’s possible,” she says, more statement than question. “People can change, right?”
“Those dedicated to the Light side have gone to the Dark before, Rey. They can change, but not always for the better,” he says calmly, sounding much like a teacher.
She sees Kylo Ren and Anakin Skywalker simultaneously in her mind. Both started so similarly, training under wise people, taught from a young age to do good, to take their strides in the Light, to avoid the encroaching Dark no matter how much power it promised. Both turned away from what they had been taught and chased the shadows.
“You can also change,” Qui-Gon Jinn reminds her, but not unkindly. It comes across like a lesson, from Master to Padawan.
Before she can reply, she feels his spirit fade away, washed up in the Force’s unending tide. It doesn’t feel like that will be the last she hears of Qui-Gon Jinn, nor the last spirit that reaches out to her.
---
The second ghost comes during her meditation one morning, almost a full week after Qui-Gon Jinn spoke to her. She sits cross-legged on the rocky outcropping, palms flat on her knees, willing away the itch of bug bites and the persistent drips of sweat on her face. There are dozens of distractions, and her mind is nothing but bumpy terrain. When she tries to hone in on the Force, some traitorous part of her agonizes that her breakfast isn’t settling well in her stomach and the rations are awfully bland. When she quiets those complaints, another pops up reminding her that her night was sleepless and she really should try to go back to sleep.
Every time she silences one part of her, another appears with some grievance. It feels like an extremely annoying game of chase, and Rey is dangerously close to giving up after she feels a straining ache in her spine from her position.
“Focus, you must. But focus, you do not do,” a strange little voice says, and with it, a bright beam of light pours into her mind. Her eyes shoot open and standing before her, right at the edge of the rock, is a creature Rey has never seen before.
He looks like a hologram, blue and fuzzy, and Rey has to glance over her shoulder to make sure S4-M1 isn’t projecting it. The droid is nowhere in sight, so Rey stares at him, mouth agape.
He’s small in stature, hunched over like a little old man, one clawed hand resting on the head of a knobbly cane. He wears a dusty robe, not unlike one that Master Luke wears. His head is wide and squashed, enormous pointed ears sticking out on either side. He seems to sniff at her, his eyes half-lidded before he blinks slowly and nods. “But a novice, you are,” he says, sounding very sure of himself in his odd creaky voice.
“Who are you?” she asks, mentally patting herself on the back for keeping her voice stable.
The creature surveys her before sighing and shaking his head. “Your Master only told you so much,” he says.
The realization comes all at once, and as a shock. A creature from Dagobah, strange and old and infinitely wise. His spirit is a beacon of light in the Force, and she has to marvel at it. “Yoda,” she breathes, wide-eyed and maybe a little light-headed.
“Imagined this, you did not,” he replies as an affirmation, and the amusement rolls off of him easily. “Not uncommon.”
Rey has to ground herself, tether her mind so that she doesn’t start talking uncontrollably, asking him one of the hundred questions she has about him, the Jedi, Luke, and everything else that comes as a rush. It’s no small effort to dam the flow, and she ends up sitting on the rock, practically vibrating where she sits. Master Yoda, the one who taught her master and so many other Jed, stands before her as a ghost.
Somewhere below her, S4-M1 gives a shrill shriek of frustration. Ghosts apparently baffle them.
“I can’t believe this!” Rey exclaims, bunching her hands to fists beside her. The grin on her face is wide, and she leans forward as if trying to get a better look at him. “You’re Yoda! You’re... I’ve heard so much about you from Master Luke. I mean, no, I didn’t know you would look like... I’m so sorry, I should have known and--”
He silences her by raising his other hand, a peculiar smile on his face. “Understand, I do. And questions, you have many. But here, you train.”
Her sorry excuse for meditation comes to mind, and her smile recedes into a frown. “Well, I’m trying,” she mutters. At the thought, she adjusts her position, but all it manages to do is shift the ache from her mid-back to her tailbone. “I don’t know if this is what Master Luke had in mind.”
There’s a peculiar glint in Yoda’s eye and he slowly nods. “Trained on Dagobah, he did. Hm. Came here to seek training, to seek the Force. But focus, he had little.”
That thought alone baffles her. Master Luke seems so focused and meditative that it’s hard to imagine him as anything but.
There isn’t a doubt that Yoda reads her mind. He blinks slowly, nods again. “Luke Skywalker, young he once was. Inexperienced. Doubtful, yes. Quick to learn, but much like his father in ways, he was.”
Rey tries to divine meaning out of that and she arrives at so many different conclusions that it just leaves her feeling confused. She thinks about the images Qui-Gon Jinn gave her of the young Anakin Skywalker with all of his potential and his energy, as well as the darkness that took root and grew inside of him. The image he left her is incomplete, but Rey believes she knows how the rest of the story goes. It’s not hard to imagine a similar darkness trying to make its way into Luke, but she finds it difficult to think of it overcoming him.
You can also change, she hears again, and the words chill her.
“Can you help me, then?” she asks. “Train me like you trained him?”
“Not like him, no. Similar, you are, but different. The same, it will not be,” he replies, sounding just as old and tired as he looks. Like Qui-Gon Jinn before, his presence in the Force wavers. But then, he nods. “Help you, I may.”
If she could hug him, she would, but there are infinite difficulties involved with hugging a Force ghost, tangibility being the biggest one. Instead, she sits there, all of her excitement returning like a cascade of pure energy. The magnitude is not lost on her, having Luke Skywalker as one master and Yoda as the other, and the promise of Qui-Gon Jinn closeby. It’s like nothing she could have imagined otherwise, and barely close to anything she could have come close to concocting by herself on Jakku. There’s so much she doesn’t know, but she feels that this is a fairly good start.
“First, focus,” Yoda starts, and Rey snaps back to her original position, complete with her spine protesting. “Feel the Force, you must. Reach out to it, yes.”
It’s one of the first real exercises she did, even before she met Master Luke. Her first step to it is always a rocky one, but it never fails. She imagines snow, trees sprawling black against an ash sky. A beam of raw starlight drawing deep into a great machine. The red of a lightsaber, the blue of another. Two clashing forces, Light and Dark, and the Force comes to her.
It works its way into her from her toes to somewhere above her head, touching on certain points along the way. Her tailbone, gut, navel, chest, throat, forehead, and then that certain non-physical part of her mind. Once she feels it touch on every part, she allows herself to be enveloped by it. It draws her in, light and airy, but warm and deep. It settles into her bones, her muscles, her skin, every fiber and cell.
In Yoda’s presence, the distractions do not come. She focuses on his beacon, his specific point in the great ocean that surrounds all of them, that reaches out past the stars they can see and out to the ones they cannot. Although he isn’t alive in one sense, he is a life, one of trillions or more. It feels as though she’s looking out at the sea in the dark, and the stars above reflect onto the surface below, and it’s endless. She’s just one microscopic part of all of it, hardly even a speck of dust in its grand scheme, but that doesn’t scare her.
“Strong with you, it is,” Yoda’s voice cuts in, but she doesn’t see him. She doesn’t see Dagobah either. She’s hardly even aware of her own physical body. There’s a glorious harmony rising around her, melodic and so beautiful, and Rey just wants to listen to it forever. “What do you see?”
She tries to speak, but the words fade. Language seems just so insignificant where she is, surrounded by so much eternity.
But there is an interruption, a jagged red slice somewhere closer to her. She feels as if she’s honing in on something, flying past the endless stars, the galaxies, the dust clouds, down and deeper. The life forms are fewer as she filters through them. Animal, plant, spirit, and then...
Her eyes snap open, her chest heaving and sweat dripping down her forehead and her neck. Dagobah comes back into view, as does Yoda’s ghost. Below them, S4-M1 says danger with far more certainty. Dread crawls cold into the pit of her stomach.
“Kylo Ren is here,” Rey says.