Out in the freezing cold, you and Chewie stumbled through the thick wood. The base was far behind you, but you didn't feel any safer. You could hear the sound of X-WINGS whizzing overhead. The Resistance had located the base and it was only a matter of time before it was destroyed. Or, as you could tell by the quickly disappearing light, the First Order would win by using this weapon to destroy their system first.

The tears streaming down your cheeks were freezing to your face. You tried to quiet your gasping sobs, but every inch further from your father's absent light and your brother's darkness caused intense pain. Your brother. The thought of him disgusted you.

You tripped over a chunk of ice in the snow. Chewie's arms wrapped around you and he lifted you with ease. You patted him just above the elbow, holding on tightly to his arm.

"Okay, okay. I'm okay, I promise. I got it. C'mon---"

It took forever to get to it, but when you finally made it to the Falcon, you simply wanted to die. Every part of you just wanted to die. You collapsed in the pilot's chair next to Chewie, letting him take control of the ship you never learned how to fly. You were shivering and crying and hurting. The ship was coming to life and as you gazed ahead at the viewport, you could see the crumbling of snow and the fiery rise of buildings falling apart.

"We have to go," you said, sitting up straight in your seat. "This whole place is going to fall apart."

The ship raised off the snow as the ground fell beneath the two of you. Chewie told you that he needed to find Rey and Finn first.

"Fine, let's go!" you said. "Quickly!"

As the ship raised over rugged cliffs, you could see them illuminated in the forest. The girl from the base was hovering over an unconscious figure.

"There!"

Chewie landed and the two of you rushed outside. You stopped in front of Rey and touched her arm. She looked up at you, tears streaming down her face. You thought she would gaze at you in disgust, but instead she looked at you with a look of sorrow. The two of you, in that glance, shared one another's grief and understanding. You'd both lost a father when Han Solo was killed.

Chewie picked Finn off the snow. You weren't sure how you knew it, but he was FN-2187. The stormtrooper from Jakku that couldn't kill. That looked at you when you tried to save Poe. You could sense it inside of him; you had a feeling about him that was the same as your feeling about Rey.

Together, the four of you boarded the Falcon one more time and escaped Starkiller Base. You watched behind you as the planet blew up in thousands of bright-orange, fiery red explosions. They swallowed up the stars. Fragments of your home spread. You could feel many lives lost, but not one of them was Kylo Ren's. You wanted desperately to feel upset that he didn't die.

As the destruction of Starkiller grew further away, you looked at Chewie, seated right next to you. Fresh tears filled your eyes. You wondered what he thought of you now. Your Uncle Chewie, who used to carry you through the flower-filled meadow, give you piggy back rides through your home, bring you gifts from far-off places that you longed to visit with him and your father one day.

What did he think of the girl, dressed in black, wielding a red lightsaber?

"Uncle Chewie," you whispered, feeling nine years old again. "Is Mama..."

He responded quickly, telling you that she was alive. The relief that filled you was so intense that you shut your eyes and covered your face. How badly you ached to be held by your Mama, by someone who loved you unconditionally.

Chewie looked at you and you couldn't help yourself. You threw yourself out of your seat and into the safe embrace of him. He didn't push you away. He pulled you closer, comforting you softly with words of care. He was hurting just as badly as you were, but in the midst of that grief, he was grateful to have you back in his life, safe and sound.

Yavin-4. You never thought you would see your home again. The aura of it was so foreign to you as you stepped off the Falcon and onto the dusty pavement. The trees were mostly gone, chopped down to make room for the base that was built on top of where you grew up. The huts, the village, the main square, everything was gone, rebuilt into something that wasn't a home any longer.

Pilots and soldiers rushed back and forth, going to the medbay, turning in status reports of their ships and their fleets, speaking loud orders to one another and relishing in the success and close call of the most recent battle.

And you trudged slowly forward, completely out of place. Your black robes were in rags around your ankles. Your skin burned from the snow. Your lightsaber hung off your belt, an obvious giveaway of who you were.

Poe stepped out of the crowd and paused in front of you. He looked at you and blinked hard, as if he couldn't believe that you were truly there. A smile flickered across his face and you mirrored it, even though no part of you felt like celebrating. Even though this was agony and you were afraid and uneasy, this was the one thing here you were sure of.

"You're alive," he said breathlessly. He closed the space between the two of you and put his arms around you. You held him back with a crushing strength. Your hands made fists around the back of his vest and his palms pressed against the small of your back, pushing you against him. You shut your eyes tightly. "I thought he would kill you. I was so afraid---"

"Me, too," you whispered. "I never thought I would see you again. When you left without saying goodbye..."

He knew you weren't talking about yesterday anymore. "I knew I would. That's why I didn't say goodbye."

"That's so stupid," you said, a tear dripping down as your smile grew.

"I know." He laughed as he pulled back. You both still held each other as you gazed into one another's eyes. "But I couldn't imagine a life where I wouldn't see you again. But then when they said... when my dad told me what had happened to you at the temple, I regretted not saying goodbye every day after that. I regretted it until I forced myself to forget. And then when I saw you... I didn't want to believe that was you, the girl that I saw killing all of those men. But deep inside I think I knew that it was. I just couldn't picture the princess I knew being someone like that."

Guilt panged your heart. "I'm sorry to disappoint you, but that was me."

He shook his head. "No. No, it wasn't."

"I did all of those things, Poe. I killed people you knew." The tears began to overflow.

"Hey," he said, voice soft as the wind that blew your hair back. His hands moved off your back to cup around the sides of your face. The smile on his face was so gentle and the look in his eyes was indescribable. "Kylo Ren killed them. He convinced you that you were something that you're not and used you. Whatever you did... that wasn't you."

You didn't know what to say. Feeling grateful for this best friend of yours from your past, you smiled and nodded, teary eyed and weak. He leaned down and pressed his lips to your cheek gently before he hugged you again. You held him tightly and gazed over his shoulder.

A woman that you knew was approaching very slowly, her beautiful brown eyes wide with hesitation and disbelief.

You stiffened and Poe pulled away, turning to see General Organa walk up. He nodded and looked at you, touching your cheek one final time before racing after Chewie, who was carrying Finn to the medbay. Rey followed them slowly.

And you were left to stand in front of your mother.

You weren't prepared for this.

But she was. She stood in front of you, her hands lifting to touch your face. At the feeling of her fingertips on your cheekbones, you fell apart. You gripped her arms tightly and she looked over every inch of you, feeling the frizzy lock of hair that hung off your shoulder, the line of your jaw, the softness of your face.

"I never knew," she whispered, and her voice was so hoarse and aged and so unlike what you remembered but so similar at the same time. "I never knew that he had you there all this time."

"I didn't know... I didn't know," you cried, and you couldn't explain what you didn't know. But she understood. She nodded and smiled sadly, the tears spilling over her own eyes. And she pulled you against her as you let out a wail. "Mama, oh, Mama---"

"I know," she said. She buried her face in your shoulder. The joy of having you in her arms again and the pain of losing her husband was all too much for her, but she was able to live through it just by holding you.

And you were somehow able to continue breathing just by the hold of your Mama, where you knew you belonged. Where you were safe and warm.