22 || a reunion of sorts

"FINALLY FOUND YOU, YOU STUPID RESISTANCE PILOT."

RESISTANCE BASE, ILLENIUM SYSTEM-

Whatever planet they were going to, Kyra had no clue. She was just sitting inside of the Millenium Falcon in the seat behind Han, quietly conversing with BB-8 the entire ride there. All she cared about and knew was that the base was in the Illenium System, so she had some bearings about where they were going. After that? It was all a little bit fuzzy from there.

BB-8 had kept her well entertained for the entire ride, the two swapping stories about what had happened during their time at Maz Kanata's fortress. BB-8 had run into the woods following Rey, and had gone on a little adventure of his own while Kyra discovered that she could wield a lightsaber- an ability she had never been able to have before.

BB-8 still wasn't over the fact that she had that lightsaber.

Their conversation was quickly cut off when the familiar feeling of engines rushing to a slow halt  began to rumble underneath them, Han turning around to see Kyra still right behind him. Finn was sulking in the seating arrangement where one could play chess. Han couldn't blame the kid, he had left and when Finn had returned his friend had been captured by the First Order.

Han cleared his throat as he made sure that Chewie was doing everything for the landing, the ship shuddering onto the ground with a resounding thud. They were on the Resistance Base now- and whatever mission that the kids had been dead set on completing was now finished with their arrival. Kyra looked up at the man, who just walked straight past her, nodding his head at Chewie to follow him.

Confused by what the man was doing, Kyra waited until Chewbacca had left the cockpit before she followed them, seeing Finn fall into the line beside Chewie and Han, the four of them falling into a circle. None of them knew what was going to happen next, each of them making eye contact with the other. That feeling of uncertainty kept them all there for a couple of minutes, none of them exact sure of  what to do.

Finn was the first to break from the ranks, turning away from Han and Chewie as he went to lower the door to the Falcon. "I'm going to go out there and see what all of the fuss is all about." Finn stated, trying to keep a somewhat calm look on his face as he did so. "If we're going to get Rey back, we might as well get a head start. I'm going to talk to some of the members, see if we can build up the numbers for a rescue mission." Finn looked over to Kyra, who nodded at him with a small smile.

"Go ahead. Take Chewie with you too. It'll be easier for you to get around with a familiar face to the Resistance members." Kyra told Finn, looking over to Chewie as if to ask his permission to go with her friend. "That is, if you're okay with it, Chewie."

The Wookie roared something in response, patting Kyra's shoulder as if to tell her that he'd watch over her friend. Chewbacca walked away from where he stood to the right of Kyra to where Finn was, the two of them watching as the ramp lowered in front of them. The bright sunlight of the Resistance base greeted the two, and they walked out of the ship with a determination and swagger that Kyra wished she had.

Giving a sigh, Kyra walked towards the end of the lobby's hallway, seeing the ramp in front of her. There was a wave of fear as she stood in front of it, seeing the rushing activity of the base in front of her. People were rushing to help unload the X-Wings that had just gotten back from the fight that Kyra herself had just come from, the noise of ships landing and engines roaring prominent.

Hearing footsteps behind her, Kyra turned to see Han, standing by BB-8, who was standing in front of him. There was that same look that was in her eyes inside of his- which, if Kyra had to be perfectly honest, made her feel a little better about all of this. "You scared of someone out there, kid?" Han questioned, coming to stand side by side with Kyra by the exit.

"Not someone." Kyra muttered, crossing her arms as the nerves began to flutter in her stomach. "Something." She corrected, the idea of the Resistance not accepting her and turning her away to fend for herself coming into her mind. She had done everything that she could for them, but now that she wasn't an inside man for them? Well, she was as good as gone.

"Be lucky that you don't have problems with anyone here." Han chuckled, patting Kyra reassuringly on the shoulder. "I'm pretty sure Leia's out for my head, and I only talked to her for about a minute, tops. If I can face my wife, you can face whatever you're fearing down these steps." Giving her one last smile of reassurance, Han stepped down out into the Resistance base with a small sigh, immediately turning right as soon as he got out.

Kyra watched Han fade into the distance, looking down at BB-8, who was the only one remaining besides her. "Be lucky that I don't have any problems with anyone here, he said, huh?" She asked the droid, not expecting an answer back. "I'm pretty sure everyone has a problem with me."

There was another moment of hesitation as Kyra took in another deep and shuddering breath, trying to get herself to not look scared during this whole situation. She had to remain calm, and see that BB-8 got the information he had inside of him to the General. "C'mon, BB. Let's go meet that elusive general of yours." She nudged him, finally stepping outside of the Falcon and onto the ramp below.

Quickly stepping off into the sun of the planet, Kyra heard the familiar rumbles of BB-8 behind her, the young woman stopping at the bottom of the ramp to wait for the droid. "C'mon, BB." She gestured her head towards where the base was, seeing the droid pause right where she had just stopped.

There was a series of excited beeps from BB-8, none of them truly meaning anything as he rushed out as much as he possibly could in binary. All of his words were jumbled together, and he just kept moving his head at Kyra, trying to tell her something. Kyra sighed, bending down to look at BB-8. What was he so excited about?

"BB-8?" Kyra questioned the droid, trying to study him to see what he was so worked up about. "What's wrong?" She asked, placing a hand on his little ball shape. "Why are you so freaked out? Are you missing something?"

"I think he's looking for me, Space Girl." There was a chuckle from behind Kyra, the young woman turning around quickly to see who was standing in front of her. In that moment, everything else seemed to fade away, from the steady roar of X-Wing engines to the excited chirps of BB-8.

Because standing in front of her was Poe Dameron.

An excited gasp flew from Kyra's mouth as she immediately rose from her position by BB-8, tackling Poe in the largest hug that she had given anyone in her lifetime. She gripped him tightly, almost in disbelief that he was alive and in her arms, that Poe was real.

But he was.

He was standing in front of her, now reciprocating the huge hug that she had engulfed him in. Tucking her head on his right shoulder, Kyra's face was streaming with tears of joy, not wanting to ever let go of this moment of happiness. Poe was alive, and she had this feeling of joy and overbounding happiness that was warming up the entirety of her chest. "I finally found you again, you stupid Resistance pilot." She whispered, closing her eyes to just relish in this moment.

Poe was shocked to see Kyra with his droid at first, he did have to admit. But after fighting for so much in that Jakkuvian desert-  Poe was so damn happy to see her there in front of him. He had thought that maybe she hadn't survived the crash, and he would never be able to bring her home with him, to let them finally be happy together outside of the grasp of the First Order.

Now? Now he had that chance.

"And I finally found you again, Kyra." Poe whispered back, giving a soft smile as they both released the other from the hug. When he pulled away from Kyra, he noticed that there were tears on her face, and he instinctively reached out to wipe them away. "Hey, why're you crying?" He asked, a small chuckle instinctively slipping out.

"I missed your ugly mug." Kyra choked out, laughter bubbling over her bittersweet crying as she wiped away the tears on the other side of her face that Poe hadn't already gotten. "We traveled across an entire goddamn galaxy only to be separated again, and then I thought you were dead." She whispered, her breath shaking with a mix of joy and sorrow bringing up the fact that she had thought Poe was gone.

"But I'm right here now." Poe placed his hands around her arms, inspecting Kyra to almost make sure that she was okay after everything she had been through. "And everything is going to be fine. I-" He stopped, finally realizing what material he was gripping onto. "You're wearing my jacket."

"What?" Kyra sniffled, processing the words that Poe had just said, looking down at the jacket that was, in all actuality, his. Right now Poe was just in the standard orange X-Wing jumpsuit that was needed for flight missions like these. "Oh. Yeah. Finn wanted to make sure I didn't completely wear myself out and get any more injuries in the sun on Jakku." She stated, slowly starting to take the jacket off, fibbing about the true reason why Finn had given her the clothing item. "I should probably-"

"No." Poe carefully grabbed the jacket, placing it back over her shoulders, tenderly making sure that everything was in its proper place before he looked at her again. A smile lit up his face as he saw her without a mission suit or First Order branded uniform for the first time. Now? Now she looked like a true member of the Resistance. "Keep it. It looks good on you."

"Thanks." Kyra muttered, a small smile forming on her face. There was a deep flush beginning to rise in her cheeks as she looked at Poe, something inside of her pulling her towards the man. She couldn't exactly describe it, but it gave her a familiar feeling that she hadn't experienced in years.

A feeling of home.

Looking around at his surroundings, Poe quickly realized that while the two of them were off talking in their own world, everyone had already gone back inside the base, most likely debriefing Finn, Chewbacca, and Han on the things that they had seen. It was only a matter of time before the two of them were called inside. "As much as I hate to break apart this bittersweet and lovely moment between the two of us, I think we'd better get inside. General Organa has been expecting us."

"Wait. General Organa?"

The inside of the Resistance base was bustling with as much life as the outside had been, the stairs down to the headquarters filled with people rushing up and down them, a plethora of new information about the First Order coming in from Finn. The general was sitting by one of the information maps, watching the holograms intensely, almost as if she was wishing something could happen. Her talk with Finn had revealed much, and she was sure that in the next few minutes she would be overwhelmed with even more information that she had been before.

"C'mon." Poe intertwined his hand with Kyra's as they got to the heart of the base, the stairs leading down to their headquarters surprisingly less busy than Poe had seen them seconds before. "We gotta hurry." He pulled her down the stairs, not allowing any time for Kyra to hesitate.

Kyra kept a tight grip onto Poe's hand as she was led into the Resistance base, expecting it to be a place bustling with noise and busy people. She was just greeted with silence, all eyes immediately trained upon her as she entered the room. Nervous, Kyra leaned into Poe's right ear, the man falling to her left side.  "Why did they all go silent? And who is everyone staring at?"

"They're staring at you, Space Girl." Poe muttered back, making sure that he was on the good side of her hearing, leaning in close to her to make sure only she could hear him as the Resistance members shook themselves out of whatever shock they were in, the base returning back to its normal chaos. "You're kind of a myth inside of the Resistance. No one believed that someone as high up as you in the First Order could betray them the way that you did and survive."

Poe took in another deep sigh, savoring in the fact that he was home again. He wasn't on some sand planet or traveling the galaxy in his X-Wing- no, he was back where he belonged. On base and in the comfort of the family that he had found the Resistance to be. "C'mon." He looked around the room, finding General Organa in seconds.

Weaving their way through the room, Kyra could tell that she was getting many stares from the members of the Resistance. Not only was she with one of their own pilots, she was also considered a myth herself. Which, to be perfectly honest, Kyra found quite strange.

It wasn't long before they had found the general seated in front of them, Poe clearing his throat to notify the woman of his presence. She immediately turned to see the both of them, rather surprised to say the very least. "General this is-"

"Solani." Leia interrupted Poe, earning a wince from the young woman given that title beside him. Leia had studied the information and the file that Poe had gathered over the years enough to tell who this young woman was. However, this time, there was something different in the way that she saw the young woman. She could tell that there was something more going on between Poe and Solani at that moment, as she saw the reassuring squeeze that Poe gave the First Order assassin. A comforting gesture in the presence of authority, she assumed.

"Actually, it's Kyra. Kyra Cerydea." The young woman introduced herself, seeing the same look in General Leia Organa's eyes that she had seen Han give her earlier in that day. It made her somewhat concerned- because if the two of them had that same look it didn't mean anything good for her.

"Ceydea?" Leia double checked, earning a nod from Kyra. Leaning back in her seat, Leia almost fell over in shock at the fact that one of their family still remained. She herself had heard the rumors of one of the royal family escaping, but she didn't believe them to be true. "My god." The general whispered, trying to steady herself from the feeling of her head spinning as she thought about what this could mean.

"Does that name ring a bell, General?" Poe asked for both him and Kyra, the two curious about why the hell she had such a strong reaction to Kyra's last name. When Poe had thought about introducing Kyra to General Organa, he never thought it'd end up being anything closely remote to this.

"The Ceydeas were the ruling family of a planet called Ceradicia during the Empire's days of ruling." Leia explained, seeing no form of recognition light up in Kyra's eyes that the young woman understood where Leia was going in all of this. "There was a rumor, a secret that this ruling family had a power strong enough to take the Empire down. An imm-"

"Immunity to the Force." Kyra answered for Leia, her face molding into an expression of shock as she stared into the General's eyes. In that moment, Kyra skipped all formalities, the shock that she was related to  a ruling family of a planet somewhat of a surprise to her. "That's where it comes from." She whispered, some of the pieces in her life slowly coming together like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.

"It would explain as to why I felt a strange disturbance in the Force when you arrived on base." Leia agreed, taking both of her hands and resting them on her lap, trying to seem as formal and leader-like as possible. 

"But how can I be related to them?" Kyra asked, confusion now finding its way into the creases of her face, her expression folding into a frown. "I grew up on Sorgan. There's no way that I could be related to royalty." She scoffed, almost laughing at that fact. "My mother Alora was a farmer, not a princess."

"You grew up on Sorgan?" Poe interrupted Kyra, giving her a shocked look as he almost laughed. "That old farming planet?" He questioned, unable to think of Kyra spending her days as a krill farmer, doing nothing but living in a small village all alone.

"Hey!" Kyra stomped on Poe's foot, hearing a small grimace from the man as she did so. "It wasn't all that bad." She muttered, feeling sort of upset at the fact that Poe was making fun of her home planet. "I don't suppose you grew up on a shining beacon of a planet either."

While the two were bickering, Leia was pondering over something that she had heard the young woman- Kyra- say. Her mother was Alora, the only woman that her brother had ever gotten close to during the times of defeating the Empire. All of them had thought that Alora had died with the rest of her family, all of them being ripped apart to shreds like the shell of a planet still left floating in the galaxy.

But evidently that wasn't the case. Alora had moved on after Luke, having a child and raising her on a secluded planet in the Outer Rim- the perfect place to escape if you didn't want to be found. But the question now became one that Leia didn't want to face- most likely because she already knew the answer.

All signs pointed to Kyra being his daughter. Her age, that stupid smile that was plastered on her face when she bantered with Poe, and the fact that her mother was Alora all seemed to only support Leia's suspicions. It made Leia almost want to laugh. Han had told her that there was a surprise on board his ship, but she had expected it to be some sort of cargo or stupid gift, not- well- this.

This being Luke's daughter, of course.

"Alora?" Leia repeated the name, earning a nod from Kyra, tearing the young woman away from her  banter with Poe. She was still trying to wrap her head around all of the information that she had just been thrown while also trying to hide her shock behind a facade of tranquility.  "Your mother was Princess Alora Ceydea?" She asked Kyra, getting an unsure nod in response to her question.

"Why?" Kyra whispered, her mother's name sounding familiar, save for the princess title in front of it. "Did you know my mother?" She took a stab in the dark at the general, realizing that Leia would be around her mother's age if Alora was still, well, alive at the moment.

"We all did." Leia muttered, tapping her chin as she decided if she was going to tell the young woman everything that she had learned about her in that moment. She decided against it, figuring that with everything going on right now, the last thing that the young woman needed was to be overloaded with the fact that she was the descendant of the last Jedi. "During the days of the Rebellion, your mother's oldest brother called upon us to help their planet liberate themselves from the Empire after he became king. Your grandparents had been assassinated by the Empire, and we were assigned with making sure that your uncle did not have the same fate."

"And what happened?"

"We were able to help rid the planet of the Empire's influence, however as soon as we left, they struck the planet with a half-constructed Death Star. The weapon didn't work as required, and exploded only the planet's outer core. Everyone there died that day, and your mother was assumed to be one of those dead. Until today, I suppose." Leia explained the information slowly and carefully to both Poe and Kyra, making sure to carefully assess their reactions before continuing.

"Then how the hell did Ren find me?" Kyra demanded, more questions coming into her head than she had answered. All of this made no sense to her. How could Kylo Ren have found her that easily within a galaxy filled with countless different planets? How could he have been so lucky?

"When he trained the next generation of the Jedi, Luke told the stories about the Ceydea family and their destruction. There had always been rumors floating around in the galaxy of the survival of one of your family's line, and I suppose Kylo Ren tracked that trail down until he found your home planet of Sorgan. I'm sure he was expecting to kill the last of your family line, but instead he found you."

There was a moment of silence as Leia looked into the eyes of Kyra, who was assessing Leia's own look, trying to find the truth inside of it. There came a moment when Kyra's expression turned from one of desperation and confusion to understanding, the young woman giving a small nod to the general.

Looking between the two women, Poe cleared his throat. "While all of these new discoveries have been fun, I know you said that there were some more pressing matters at hand for you, Space Girl." He nudged Kyra in reminder of what they both had come to talk to the general about.

Kyra's expression turned to one of serious business quickly as she looked around the room for BB-8, the young woman spotting the droid rather quickly. "The BB unit that has the map to Skywalker, BB-8, has some important information that he's been holding onto for me, too. He has the names of all your Resistance informants that the First Order plans on targeting, along with the finalized plans of the weapon that destroyed the Hosnian System." She explained, seeing the general's face light up with realization.

"Now that we have the finalized plans-"

"We can destroy the First Order's new weapon before it can target any other systems." Kyra finished the general's sentence, nodding in agreement with her. "Which may turn the tide of this war in the Resistance's favor."

"If what you're saying is true, then we need to get you to the briefing room, Kyra, and fast." Poe agreed with the two women, watching them communicate to each other so quickly that it almost hurt his brain. "General Organa, I want to ask permission to allow Kyra to brief us on the Star Killer base's finalized plans."

"Granted." Leia didn't even hesitate with the approval, turning to Poe with a serious look. "Take care of her Dameron. She might be one of the best assets that the Resistance's got." She warned, her eyes telling Poe that if he screwed this up she would personally see to his punishment.

Kyra and Poe gave a quick glance to each other, the two of them turning their backs to the general. Poe was already starting to lead the way to the briefing room for Kyra to follow him when the two of them head the general's last words. "Oh, and Kyra?" She called out to the young woman, watching her turn around to look back at Leia. A weary smile formed on her face as she spoke, hope fluttering up inside the general as she muttered four words that would forever change Kyra's life.

"Welcome to the Resistance."

<~•~>

ahaha, okay I might be creating a schedule for when I update now y'all, every Monday and Thursday 😌

it'll just give me time to actually write and get ahead, also, this works out because next Monday is May 4th.

if you guys have any semblance of how important that day is, well, it's going to be important to this book as well.

one of the biggest and phatest ( yes fat with a ph ) is coming out on that day, and I'm also dropping a new Star Wars fic on that day ;)

okay anyways,,, this chapter was fun for a multitude of reasons, and I really hope that you enjoyed it! thanks so much for reading!