Author's Note: I will be using first person point of view for Rey, whenever her scenes come up. Thanks for reading <3

REY  (Arkanis Sector, Geonosis_3)

"Rey, are you sure you're okay?" Finn asks. The question puts my stomach into knots. I might have opened up to him, maybe after the fifth time he asked, if Rose wasn't with us. I don't know her well enough and she seems to look up to me as a Jedi, like Luke, but I'm far from that.

"I'm fine," I say, with as much confidence as I can manage.

Finn cries out suddenly, taken by surprise as steam shoots up from a small hole in the hard surface of the planet we're now on. Rose pulls him back before his face gets steamed.

"Don't step on those, Finn," she says, walking him around the bump in the ground. "They'll melt your boots off."

"You've been here before?" I ask her, glad for the change of subject.

"My parents and my sister and I used to travel a lot with my Uncle, before I joined the Resistance," she says.

A twinge of jealousy hits me at hearing her mention her parents. I nod and keep walking.

"This place looks like a volcanic wasteland, but it's not," Rose continues. "There's a whole city underground. It's known for its mineral baths and age reducing spa treatments."

"So your family traveled for fun?" I groan inwardly, realizing how grumpy I sound. Why wouldn't a family want to travel for fun?

"My Uncle was a trader. He helped the Resistance get their X-Wing fighter planes."

"Really?" Finn says, seeming interested.

He continues talking planes with Rose as we maneuver around the many steam holes in the ground. They sit silent, threatening to erupt at the most unexpected times. My hand flies to Luke's light saber at my side every time one shoots up. Why am I so on edge?

By the time we make it down to the underground city, I'm hot and sweaty and irritable. The elevator ride down unsettled my stomach, too.

A cool breeze blows through the spacious area. I can't even see the walls or ceiling, since underground city is so large. The floors are shiny, made of some smooth rock. I look up, unable to tell if the light source is artificial or coming from an opening from the outside, too high to see.

Shops line the wide street leading to another area where the restaurants and the Inn's are. The market is filled with various species, most of which I don't recognize.

"Why are we staying here?" I ask Rose.

"General Organa is meeting Maz here. Something about acquiring recruits and a new ship for us. The Millennium Falcon is kind of crowded for all of us to sleep in."

"Agreed," I say, at the same time as Finn says 'No kidding!'

We smile at each other.

Rose pulls out a piece of paper from her pocket and studies it. "I guess they've all checked in to the Volcanetian," she says, doing a little spin to find her way. "There are some Resistance Ally's on this planet who have offered to help us while we regroup our forces."

A high beeping sound catches my attention and I turn to see BB-8 spinning his wheels on the smooth floors, trying to race to us. Behind her, I see Poe sitting at a table at the restaurant patio by himself, waving a napkin in our direction. He stands and calls out to us.

"Poe!" Finn rushes over and Rose hurries after him. Poe and Finn hug and I hang back a bit. I don't really know Poe well enough yet to give him a hug.

"Rey," he says, giving me a friendly salute. "How was Ahch-To?"

He sure cuts right to the chase. I wipe my sweaty palms on my shirt. How do I answer that? Other than almost making me want to give up and become a hermit, like Luke, Ahch-To was as always; cold, wet and cloudy.

"I'm dying for a bath," Rose says, changing the subject for me. I give her a grateful smile. "And a change of clothes, too," she continues. "The surface of the planet is like a hundred degrees! I wonder how they keep it cool down here."

"I'll show you the way to the rooms." Poe sets down his napkin and escorts Rose and Finn in the direction of the lodging district, where all the hotel signs are.

"Wait," I say. "Don't you have to pay for your meal?"

"They don't' use currency here," Poe says over his shoulder. I'm about to ask more, then decide it doesn't matter and I don't feel like talking anyhow.

BB-8 hangs back with me as we walk, and asks me the same question everyone else has been asking since we escaped Kylo Ren, 'are you okay?'

"I'm okay BB-8." I look down at her. "So you want to stay with me, in my room? We can catch up and you can tell me about being on the First Order's ship and how you guys escaped."

Before he can answer, Poe turns back and calls over his shoulder.

"Come on BB-8. Let's move."

The little droid zooms ahead and I try to quicken my pace as well.

You're searching for your parents, everywhere, in Han, now in Luke.

Kylo Ren was right, in a way, but also wrong. I thought it was my parents I was looking for too, and it was. But it's not specifically them. I'm looking for something that's missing, something that keeps me lonely at every moment of every day, except when I'm distracted by a fight, or the rare moments of celebration and reunion, like when I helped the last of the Resistance escape from their own base, through a back way, and I saw Finn after so long. At that moment, I didn't feel alone. But it was a fleeting moment.

I watch as Finn, Poe and Rose joke and laugh, walking ahead of me with BB-8 at their heels. Was Kylo Ren right? Is this loneliness and searching my biggest weakness? I almost said yes to him, because he's the only one who truly understands this deep loneliness. He feels it too. We're the same, different than the rest. Strong in the Force. There are no others left. Luke is gone and as for the General, she's Kylo's mother, not mine. And I can't shake the fear that if I search for a mother, in her, I will lose her too, like I did Han and Luke. Anyone I dare to love ends up dying.

------

Once we've checked in, I settle into my room and have a much needed bath. The servants, who seem to understand me but I can't understand them, take my clothes to be washed, presumably, and I'm given a light dress for the warm climate, which I don't like at all. It is more like a sleeping gown than something I'd wear out in public. But hunger finally wins over and I head down to the restaurant, in the flowy dress. I pick the same restaurant where Poe was eating earlier, eager to escape the quiet and loneliness of the room and be around people again.

I sit alone at a table for two, barely able to taste the food I'm given. I'm doing it again, avoiding sleep at all costs, the way I used to back on Jakku. I don't want to dream of Ahch-To. It will only remind me of Luke. My chest tightens at the thought of him. He tried to train me, but I went straight down to the evil at the heart of the island when I was learning meditation, which scared him. Then I went to the looking glass beneath the temple, which is also evil, showing things one is not meant to know, yet I went without hesitation.

Say it.

Kylo's words hit me. I already knew the answer to who my parents are. I just didn't want to accept it. Unkar Plutt had told me the exact same thing Kylo said, that my parents traded me for drinking money and were dead on Jakku. But I remember them flying away, when I was little, and I tried to run after them, yelling for them to come back. They weren't drunkards who sold me. They left, but I don't know why. I was five years old then. Could I have imagined it all? Did I make it up in my mind and believed it to be true for so long?

Tears stream down my face and I quickly wipe them away.

Say it.

Kylo's voice rings in my ears. I cover them with both my hands.

"Shut up," I whisper.

You know the truth. You're nothing.

"Rey?" A touch on my shoulder brings me back to the present. "Is everything okay?"

It's General Leia. I draw back, as if burned. I don't want to become close to her, and have her die too.

"I'm just tired," I say.

"Did you find what you were looking for?" she asks. "On Ahch-To?"

I shake my head. "Maybe I'm just looking for the wrong things."

The General nods and sets her hand over mine. "Maybe what you're looking for is already with you." She gets up and walks away, still moving slowly since her recovery from being in the ship that was destroyed by the First Order.

I feel like I'm in recovery too, but not getting any better. I want to feel the spark of hope that Leia talks about. But I only feel a hollowness, from no longer looking for my parents.

'You're nothing,' Kylo had said. 'But not to me.'

I suddenly notice that Finn and Rose are also at the restaurant, sitting at a table for two not too far off. I watch as Finn pulls on Rose's hair, which curls out like wings on either side. She swats his hand away and he makes a joke, flapping his hands like wings.

"Cute couple."

I jump at the voice. Poe sits down opposite me, leaning forward, elbows on the table. "So how are you, Rey?"

"Why does everyone keep asking me that?"

Poe smiles. "If everyone's asking you that then maybe there's a reason."

"I'm just tired."

"Then wouldn't it be better if you were back in your room sleeping, rather than here?" Poe stops, as though realizing his words might have been a poor choice.

"It's not sleeping hours yet."

"But we're not in a battle. You can have a nap anytime." Poe eyes me curiously. "The First Order is out of weapons from the last battle. We took out their destroyer and Snoke's ship too. I'm sure you've got at least..." He seems to consider this for a moment. "Seventy or so hours before a next attack."

I chuckle, a half-hearted laugh, but it is more than I've laughed in a while. 

"The truth is.." I keep my gaze away from Poe, embarrassed to be telling him, yet I don't know him well enough to worry about sounding stupid around him. "I don't want to be alone."

When Poe doesn't respond I glance over to see his response. His brows are furrowed, as though he's deep in thought.

Rose laughs at another one of Finn's jokes, catching my attention. When I look back to Poe I realize he's watching me.

"Do you know why my best friend is a robot?" he asks. He doesn't wait for me to answer but continues. "Because robots don't die."

Hadn't I been thinking something similar earlier, about everyone I'd ever opened my heart up to, dying?

"You're right," I say, "Robots don't die."

Poe sighs. "Don't listen to my advice. I'm the worst for advice."

I smile.

"You never answered my question," he says. "How was Ahch-To?"

"Rainy."

Poe laughs.

"I hate that I'm always searching," I say. "All my life I'd been waiting for my parents to return. Searching for them in every face, in every person that visited Jakku to do trades." I keep my gaze on the marble tabletop. "I thought I would remember what they looked like, as soon as I saw them."

"You don't want to search anymore?" Poe asks.

I can't bring myself to tell him what Kylo Ren had told me, about my parents. "No, I don't."

"Why?"

"Because it's my greatest weakness."

"Sometimes your greatest weakness is also your greatest strength."

"How can this endless searching, be a strength?"

"You've kept hope alive for so long. Held onto it. You don't give up on things easily. I'd say that's a strength."

I frown.

"The way I see it," Poe continues. "If you're looking for something, then there's something you need." He sits back in his seat and looks around the restaurant. "When you're hungry you search for food because you need it. Whatever your searching for, it's likely important, so keep searching."

I nod. "I suppose."

"Don't hate your weaknesses or your needs. Or you'll end up hating yourself." Poe gets up from the table. "I gotta go find BB-8. We're heading to Canto Bight first thing after sleep hours."

I get up too. "Canto Bight?"

"Yes, there's a group of Rebels there, called the Freedomists, who answered our distress call when we were trapped at the base. We told them what has happened and they said they can help us get more fighter planes."

"I want to come too!"

Poe looks at me for a moment. "Alright. But you'd better get some sleep first."