The Last Jedi

by Jason Fry

  Rey stepped back to study the tumbled landscape, then smiled.

  “Lifting rocks,” she said.

  Kylo and Luke regarded each other, their lightsabers humming between them. Each methodically adjusted his stance, eyes locked on the other. Around them drifted flakes of salt, light as ash.

  “I failed you, Ben,” Luke said. “I’m sorry.”

  “I’m sure you are,” Kylo replied. “The Resistance is dead. The war is over. And when I kill you, I’ll have killed the last Jedi.”

  He waited to see what his former Master would say, bracing to defend against a lightning-fast strike. But Luke simply raised an eyebrow.

  “Amazing,” he said. “Every word of what you just said was wrong. The Rebellion is reborn today. The war is just beginning. And I will not be the last Jedi.”

  * * *

  —

  It began with a quaver, and the slightest trickle of dust and bits of rock.

  Poe, hardly daring to believe it, gestured for the Resistance soldiers to step back from the rockfall sealing them inside the mine. But it was true—the stones were moving, first one by one and then several at a time. Finn watched, holding Rose’s hand, as daylight appeared at the top of the tumbled heap of rock. Leia smiled as boulder after boulder rose into the air, revealing a tunnel. C-3PO shuffled back and forth in distress as the Resistance soldiers hurried past him, rushing out into the crevasse revealed beyond.

  Finn emerged from the tunnel to discover Rey standing at its mouth, boulders floating in the air around her. Her eyes were closed and she was smiling slightly, her face serene.

  She opened her eyes and the boulders crashed down to the ground.

  As the other Resistance soldiers regarded Rey in astonishment, Finn rushed forward, calling her name. For a moment he was afraid that Rose had been right—that this Rey who could lift mountainsides would be utterly changed in other ways, too, with no trace left of the young woman he’d followed across the galaxy from Jakku.

  And she was different. But the old Rey wasn’t gone. And it was that Rey who fell into Finn’s arms, sobbing and laughing at the same time, and held him tight.

  * * *

  —

  “Rey,” Kylo said, speaking her name like it was poison. “Your chosen one. Chosen over me. She aligned herself with the old way that has to die. No more Masters. I will destroy her, you, and all of it. Know that.”

  Luke searched Kylo’s eyes, found them full of fury and hurt.

  Then he turned off his lightsaber. His face was calm, accepting.

  “No,” he said. “Strike me down in anger and I’ll always be with you. Just like your father.”

  Screaming, Kylo raised his lightsaber over his head and rushed at his defenseless uncle. He brought the blade down on Luke’s head and it passed through the Jedi Master, meeting no resistance.

  As if it had passed through a ghost.

  * * *

  —

  On Ahch-To, the suns were setting, bathing the peak of the mountain housing the Jedi temple in luminous orange.

  On the ledge overlooking the sea, Luke Skywalker floated a few centimeters above the stone. Pebbles hovered around him. His eyes were closed and his legs crossed. His face was strained, and beneath his gray beard the tendons of his neck stood out. Tears streamed down his face as he poured his strength, his very essence, into the Force.

  Behind him the peak shuddered, shedding dust and chunks of debris.

  * * *

  —

  Kylo staggered, but recovered his footing and aimed another vicious cut at Luke. Once again, his lightsaber blade met nothing but emptiness.

  Luke smiled at his nephew sadly.

  “See you around, kid,” he said.

  And then he disappeared, leaving Kylo alone on the shattered plain, flakes of salt falling around him like snow.

  Kylo’s blazing eyes leapt to the mine, and the stone door the First Order’s cannon had blasted open.

  “No!” he howled. “No!”

  * * *

  —

  Luke opened his eyes and fell onto the ledge, the pebbles plunking down around him. He lay on his back, his breathing ragged with exhaustion. The twin suns had touched the horizon and were sinking into the ocean.

  Around him the island was wild and alive, a riot of currents and ripples in the Force. Its energies were fed by the birds and insects of the air, the fish and scuttling creatures beneath the waves, and the grass and moss that clung to the ground. All were generators of the Force, yet none were its containers. Its energy escaped the fragile, temporary boundaries of their bodies and spread until it surrounded and permeated everything.

  Luke heard the wail of the wind and the cries of the birds. He heard his own faltering breaths as he struggled to get up, and the rhythmic thumping of his heart in his chest.

  And he heard a familiar voice. Maybe it was real, or perhaps it was just in his memory.

  Let go, Luke.

  He did and his body faded away, leaving the ledge empty. In the spot where he had been, the Force rippled and shivered. But a moment later this disturbance was lost amid countless other currents of an autumn evening on the island, and the Force continued as it always had, luminous and vast and eternal.

  * * *

  —

  Rey’s hands shook and she sank to her knees, her eyes staring into nothing. The weary Resistance soldiers hurrying up the Millennium Falcon’s ramp stopped, staring at the woman who had saved them.

  But General Organa was at her side immediately, reaching for her hand. Rey took it as if she were blind, her mouth hanging open. Then the general pulled her back to her feet.

  “We need to go,” Leia told her, her eyes sad but warm.

  * * *

  —

  Kylo stormed through the rent in the massive stone door, stormtroopers hurrying behind him with their rifles ready, hunting for enemies.

  But there was no one to meet them—just empty transports and a jumble of discarded equipment.

  Kylo, his face a mask of fury, swept into the control center. It was empty, too—deserted. He stalked around it, teeth bared, and the stormtroopers quickly found a reason they needed to be elsewhere.

  Something on the floor caught Kylo’s eye. He knelt, his gloved fingers closing on a pair of golden dice linked by a short chain.

  As Kylo stared at them he sensed something else—a tremor in the Force, the prelude to a familiar connection.

  He stared at Rey. She stared back at him, her gaze level and unafraid. There was no hatred in her eyes, as there once had been. But there was no compassion, either.

  A moment later Rey severed the connection, leaving Kylo alone in the gloom with his father’s dice resting in the palm of his upraised hand. A moment later, they faded and vanished.

  * * *

  —

  The Falcon rose on its repulsors, engine whining, then spun gracefully and vanished into the skies of Crait, the shock wave of its passing rippling the fur of several foxes watching from a rocky outcrop.

  A few minutes later the battered freighter emerged from the planet’s envelope of atmosphere. Before anyone aboard the First Order’s Star Destroyers could issue an order, it had disappeared into hyperspace.

  Inside, Leia was puzzled to discover the decrepit freighter was infested with chubby, big-eyed avians. They seemed to be everywhere: nesting in tangles of wiring, peering out of access hatches, and even squawking in territorial pique at the Resistance soldiers who dared to sit around the gaming table.

  “Shoo,” she said, sidestepping yet another one as she entered the cockpit. “When did this old rattletrap become a birdcage?”

  Chewbacca sat in the co-pilot’s seat, his hairy hands drifting over the controls with a grace that belied his size. The Wookiee chuffed in amusement, then indicated she should take th
e pilot’s seat.

  Han’s seat.

  Leia’s steps carried her to just behind the chair, but no farther. She stopped with her hand on the seat’s back.

  “Chewie…,” she said, then stopped, needing a moment to control her emotions. “Luke…gave his life for us. To buy us time. To save us.”

  Chewbacca’s hands slowed on the controls, then stopped. The Wookiee whined, a small sound almost lost deep in his throat. His hands fell into his lap and he slumped in his seat.

  Leia’s hand settled on his shoulder as she gazed out through the viewports, remembering.

  Chewie had been in that same seat the first time she’d entered the Falcon’s cockpit. She remembered the chaos, being pressed into service as an extra pair of eyes and ears during their frantic flight from the Death Star. With the last of the Imperial sentry ships destroyed she’d flung herself into the startled Wookiee’s arms, elated by their unlikely escape.

  They’d sat side by side during many long watches on the agonizingly slow journey from Hoth to Bespin, unsure if the Rebel Alliance had survived. And once again when they’d doubled back to Cloud City to rescue Luke.

  And here they were again, so many years later. So many years, and so many losses.

  “It’s just us now,” Leia said. “But we’ll find a way.”

  She realized tears were pooling at the corners of her eyes and tried to stop them, irritated with herself. But it was no use. She stood, silent and still, as twin lines of tears ran down her cheeks.

  Chewbacca looked up at her, his blue eyes bright. He saw her face and rose from his seat, towering over her.

  She tried to tell him she was all right, but the words wouldn’t come. He reached for her and folded her against his chest.

  Leia buried her face in the Wookiee’s warm fur, clinging to him, and finally allowed herself to weep, to surrender to the grief that had filled her to overflowing. She wept for Luke, and for Han, and for Ben. For all those they had lost.

  Chewbacca made no sound but simply held her, his embrace surprisingly gentle. They stood like that, Leia’s chest heaving, until she was able to master herself and step away. She stared out into the infinity of hyperspace until her breathing was slow and regular again, and she knew she was ready to be what the people waiting in the Falcon’s hold needed her to be.

  They found the hold crowded with Resistance fighters and pilots. C-3PO was telling R2-D2 about the many indignities he’d endured since they’d separated on D’Qar, while BB-8 listened and clucked sympathetically. As Leia and Chewbacca arrived, Poe looked up from talking with Rey, smiling as the Wookiee reached out a long arm to pull the pilot close.

  On the other side of the hold Rose lay in the Falcon’s relief bunk, a diagnostic scanner monitoring her vital signs, while Finn rummaged in the compartments beneath the bunks. They were filled with junk, of course—as Leia and Rey watched, he shoved aside batteries, old tools, and a scattering of ancient books until he finally found what he was looking for, extracting a blanket and gently draping it over Rose’s sleeping form. Rey turned from watching Finn to show Leia what she’d been holding in her hands—the halves of Luke’s sundered lightsaber.

  “Luke Skywalker is gone,” Rey said. “I felt it. But it wasn’t sadness or pain. It was peace. And purpose.”

  Leia nodded. “I felt it, too.”

  Her brother had passed into the Force. As she would one day. As they all would. But the Force remained. It was everywhere around them, connecting them and lifting them up. And wherever the Force was, some part of Luke was, too.

  No one’s ever really gone.

  Rey looked from the broken halves of Luke’s lightsaber to the handful of injured, exhausted Resistance fighters.

  “Kylo is stronger than ever,” she said. “He has an army and an iron grip on the galaxy. How do we build a rebellion from this?”

  But Leia just put her hand on Rey’s and smiled.

  “We have everything we need.”

  * * *

  —

  Every day on Ahch-To, the Lanais cut back the moss and uneti shrubs that threatened to reclaim the sacred island’s stone stairs, swept the common area outside the huts, and performed repairs as needed. And if any Outsiders were in residence, the Lanais cooked their meals and cleaned their clothing, so they could devote their hours to contemplation.

  Alcida-Auka had supervised these tasks for many seasons, since the day her mother had passed the title of matron and its responsibilities down to her. As one day she would, in turn, pass the title to her own eldest daughter.

  If there was a pattern to the coming of the Outsiders, the Lanais had never discerned it. There had been long periods in which there were no Outsiders at all, and brief stretches in which a group of Outsiders dwelled on the island together. A few of the Outsiders had been kind, as devoted to the Lanais as they were to them. And a few had been mad—the Lanais’s secret songs recalled years of fire and ruin that had forced them from their homes until things resumed their proper course. But most had left no particular impression, keeping to themselves and their studies.

  The latest Outsider had been a curious one. He had arrived bearing artifacts, some of which the Lanais’s songs recalled as having been taken from the island long before. Rather than hold himself apart, he had learned the Lanais’s language and ways, appearing each month at the Festival of Return. And he had insisted on doing his own chores, gathering his own food, and performing repairs alongside them.

  Eventually Alcida-Auka had accepted that such activities were part of his devotions, and accommodated him. He had been little trouble after that—though the same couldn’t be said about his rude, destructive apprentice, the one he’d said was his niece.

  Both were gone now. The apprentice had left aboard her skyboat with her two companions, while the Master had simply vanished, his robes discovered on the ledge above the sea. Maybe he had leapt from the peak and given his body to the waves. Or perhaps he had surrendered himself and become shadow, dispersing into the light and darkness from which all had been created. The Lanais’s songs recalled that both of these paths had been chosen before.

  Whatever the truth, he was gone and no longer Alcida-Auka’s charge. But much work remained to be done. There was a hut to rebuild, a fallen lightning rod to restore to its roof—a strike had just destroyed the library in the ancient uneti stump, after all—and the other damage done by the careless niece. There were steps to mend and creeping moss to clear. And there were the routine tasks of the island. It would be winter soon, when the Lanais and any new visitors would be dependent on salted fish, dried kelp, and thala-siren milk gathered during the kindly days that were green and growing.

  Alcida-Auka verified that one of the daughters had cleaned the Outsider’s robes and put them away in the storage hut, along with his woolens, pack, and boots. She directed another daughter to take his weapon, his star compass, and his strange other gear to the repository, where it would join other items gathered over the generations.

  Alcida-Auka checked over the daughters’ work and found it had been done as it should be. She cinched her habit against the wind, which had turned cold, singing to her of snow. When the snow came, the Lanais would sweep it away from the huts and the stairs. Alcida-Auka didn’t know if the next Outsider would come during her time, or her daughter’s, or not until the tenure of a matron yet unborn.

  But another would come, and find all in order. Because the Lanais would do their duty.

  * * *

  —

  On a hot desert world, three children sat in a filthy supply room.

  Temiri wasn’t fond of Oniho—the older boy slacked off whenever Bargwill Tomder wasn’t around, forcing Temiri and the other children to work harder to keep up with the chores that had to be done. If they didn’t, Bargwill would yell and kick, and maybe go after someone with his whip.

  The
surly groom had been in a rancid mood ever since the fathier escape—and Temiri suspected Bargwill didn’t believe his story that it had been the intruders who set the beasts free and caused all the trouble.

  But Arashell Sar liked Oniho’s stories, and had asked Temiri to come with her and hear Oniho’s newest one. And Temiri would do almost anything if it meant a chance to sit next to Arashell.

  Fortunately, Oniho’s story was a good one, enacted with the dolls the children made from sweepings and discarded bits of wood and wire. He’d gone all-out, too—there were not just soldiers but also toy walkers and starships in this story.

  Temiri couldn’t quite follow all of the tale—it had a lot of twists and turns—but the climax was pretty good. It came down to one man with something Oniho called a lightsaber, and that one man was facing an entire army.

  Before Temiri could learn what had happened to Oniho’s hero—this Luke Skywalker, Jedi Master—the door exploded inward and Bargwill was screaming abuse in rapid-fire Cloddogran, showering them with spit from his cavelike mouth and mucus from his ingrown nasal tendrils.

  Oniho had already fled. Temiri tried to keep his body between Bargwill and Arashell, hoping she’d notice what he was doing for her, and almost got a fierce kick in the backside for his troubles. Arashell didn’t need his help anyway—she slipped nimbly past the stable keeper to safety.

  As Bargwill ranted and raved at no one in particular, Temiri grabbed up his broom and returned to sweeping out the fathier stables. The beasts were racing, but soon they’d be led back in and need to be washed and groomed. There’d be a lot to do before they could bed down for the night—and maybe Oniho would be too tired to finish the story and tell them what had happened to the Jedi Master who’d fought an entire army all by himself.

  The stable doors were open and the stars blazed in Cantonica’s night sky, above the racetrack. Temiri kept sweeping, but it felt like the stars were calling to him. The strokes of his broom slowed, then stopped. He looked down at the ring on his finger that the woman he’d helped had given him, the souvenir he’d managed to hide from Bargwill so far.