Saga Red Five (Luke/OC) Updated 20 September

Thanks gal! A lot of little Rey is inspired by my niece who loves the "where is your" game and showing off her tummy.

I know you're busy gal, thanks for taking the time to read, you always know how much I appreciate your thoughts!


Tags: @mattman8907, @EGKenobi, Jedi_Perigrine


19 ABY, Settlement Colony, Yavin 4

“Rey, come back!” Luke ran after his daughter as she sprinted from the ship as fast as her four year old legs could take her. She laughed in glee as she bounded down the gravel path which lead through the jungle towards the settlement colony.

“You’ll have to catch me!” she called over her shoulder as her dark hair whipped across her face. Luke quickly outpaced his daughter, storming up behind her and scooping her up in his arms, spinning her around above his head and she laughed uproariously. .

“Got you!” he growled, drawing her down and nuzzling her cheek. Rey laughed again and wiggled in Luke’s arms, accidently kicking him in the stomach. “Oof. Careful, Rey-bey, you’re getting too big to carry around.”

“Yep,” Rey gave him a toothy grin. “So I can walk by myself.”

“Not if you’re going to run off,” Luke said more seriously, hoisting her up slightly so he could look into her face. “You don’t want to leave Mommy behind, do you?”

Rey’s face fell immediately, and she looked back to where Valara was walking cautiously, trying to discern her surroundings through the Force.

“I forgot,” Rey said, her lip quivering, distraught she may have upset her mother.

“It’s okay,” Luke soothed her, smoothing down her flyaway hair. Rey wiggled again and he set her down so she could dash back to Valara’s side and take her mother’s hand. Luke followed, taking up position on Valara’s other side and tucking her hand in the crook of his arm.

“Honestly,” Valara huffed. “I don’t need help.”

“I just wanted to hold your hand,” Luke said smoothly as they walked towards the settlement.

“Hmph.” But the corner of Valara’s mouth lifted and she didn’t pull her hands away. “There’s Shara.”

At the entrance to the settlement stood Shara Bey, as proud and striking as Luke remembered her from the days after Endor. At her side stood a young man who shared her colouring and warm smile.

“Shara,” Luke greeted her. “It’s good to see you again.”

“Luke.” Her smile widened. “And Valara, it’s been a long time. My son, Poe,” Shara said, ruffling his hair affectionately. “Home for a few days at least.”

“Mother.” Poe waved her off, but his charming smile remained. “Master Skywalker, it’s such an honour to meet you.” He nodded and clasped his hands behind him, standing to attention. “And you, Commander Valara.”

Valara looked surprised. “It’s a long time since anyone called me that.”

“I’ve read all your mission reports,” Poe continued with a flirtatious grin. “Every word was illuminating - you’re a great pilot, ma’am.”

“I was,” Valara corrected him, and Luke squeezed her hand lightly.

“Poe’s just been accepted into New Republic Starfleet,” Shara said proudly.

“Oh really?” Luke was intrigued. “Who’s your commander?” Before Poe could answer Luke felt a tug on his trouser leg, and looked down to see Rey pouting up at him. To her credit, she’d been waiting patiently but clearly felt it had been long enough.

“Sorry, we can get into that later. This is our daughter, Rey,” Luke said, prompting her forward to greet them as she’d practiced. It was executed perfectly, and Shara bent down to Rey’s eye level.

“Nice to meet you, Rey,” she said. “Welcome to Yavin 4. Did you know that this is where your parents met?”

Rey shook her head, wide-eyed. Valara patted her head lightly and gave Shara an admonishing look.

“I don’t think she’s old enough to hear that story,” she said as Shara smirked. Luke wasn’t sure his daughter would ever be old enough to hear details of how he and Valara met.

“Why don’t you show us around,” Luke suggested, eager to move on from the subject. Shara led them into the settlement, quite clearly proud of the small community they’d built. Poe caught Valara’s ear almost immediately, oozing charm as he spoke about the present state of the Republic fleet and asking her opinion on various military matters. It made Luke smile - his wife loved talking specs and she had a captive audience in the young man who was all affability and confidence. When she mentioned her project to rebuild her old X-Wing he was intrigued and offered to show her his own ship to compare notes, leaving Luke to catch up with Shara alone.

At the heart of the settlement was the Force tree he’d given her, and although it was not quite so large as the one at the Temple, Luke was pleased to see it was thriving. Rey gleefully bounded over to it, climbing the trunk and swinging on the branches with delight.

“She’s beautiful, Luke,” Shara commented as they took a seat at the outdoor picnic table beneath the shade of the Force tree’s branches.

“Thank you,” Luke couldn’t contain his smile as his daughter giggled happily, climbing higher into the tree. “She’s the light of my life.”

“You know when we first met I was quite in awe of you,” Shara said, folding her hands on the table. “You could do these incredible things - things I’d never seen before, things I never even thought were possible. But there was a sadness in you as well.”

“It hadn’t been the best year of my life,” Luke admitted.

“But we’d won,” Shara pressed. “Han had been rescued, the Death Star had been destroyed, Vader and the Emperor defeated. And yet you seemed like a man with the weight of the galaxy still on his shoulders.”

Luke smiled ruefully - he couldn’t tell Shara that his sadness had been primarily over the loss of his father, but he saw her point. Their meeting had been a bit dramatic, Luke still favoring black robes and his determination to rescue the Force trees from the Empire bordering on obsession.

“I only mention it because that’s all gone now,” Shara said. “Those troubles seem to have been stripped away.”

“Well not completely,” Luke chuckled, and then glanced over at where Rey was swinging happily on a low branch, kicking her legs up in the air. “Just replaced with new troubles.”

Shara laughed. “I know what you mean. My Poe is practically a man now, but I still worry about him every day. Perhaps even more than I did when he was young. Sometimes I regret missing those early years, when we were fighting with the Rebellion.” She sighed wistfully and looked up at the sky. “They’re memories I’ll never have, even though I know we were fighting for his future. Cherish this time, Luke, it will go by so quickly.”

Rey bounded back over to them, out of breath. “Did you see me, Daddy? I climbed right to the top!”

“I did, my darling,” Luke said, picking a loose leaf from Rey’s hair. “But be careful, okay?”

Rey rolled her eyes, but climbed up into Luke’s lap, mimicking his posture by putting her hands flat on the table next to his.

“You’re a born adventurer, are you Rey?” Shara asked.

“Yep.” Rey nodded. “Mum and me go out into the jungle all the time at home, it’s real good.”

“Where’s Kes?” Luke asked, noting his absence.

“He’s on patrol with civilian defence,” Shara said, still smiling indulgently at Rey. “He’ll be back for evening meal, we have a bit of a feast planned.”

“I’m looking forward to it.” Luke said. “Afterwards I thought we might head over to the old base. I wanted to see if the database was still active.”

“Would you like to leave Rey with us?” Shara asked. “We’d be happy to look after her and let you and Valara explore.”

“Would you like that Rey?” Luke asked.

Rey peered at Shara and pursed her lips. “Do you know any good stories?”

“Sure,” Shara smiled. “I have a great one about the mission I went on with your Aunt Leia.”

“What about dessert?”

“I’m sorry?”

“Can I have dessert?” Rey asked.

Shara laughed, and winked at the child. “Of course.”

___________________________________________________________

Jedi Temple grounds, Devaron

Ben sat cross-legged on the ground, the holounit placed carefully before him. The spot in the jungle he’d chosen was thick, although he was still within the protective perimeter of the Temple grounds, his mind on constant alert to anyone who may venture too close.

“My boy, have they left you alone again?” The voice from the holounit was smooth and deep, and had become rather familiar. Snoke, he’d said to call him - Lord Snoke.

“I train better alone anyway,” Ben lied, squashing his hurt that once again Luke had taken his aunt and cousin offworld and left him behind. He’d begged to go along, but his uncle had refused, although he had arranged for his mother and father to visit. But of course some crisis or another had come up and his mother had commed apologetically, promising that they would come soon.

“I don’t think you train there at all,” Snoke said. “At least not at anything that will be of use.”

“And what would you teach me?” Ben challenged him. He wasn’t a fool, he knew Snoke had been trying to turn him to the dark side ever since he’d first begun speaking to him. But he also knew that in trying to court him, Snoke would reveal things, tell him secrets of the Force Ben wanted to know.

“Everything that your Uncle won’t,” Snoke promised. “The Jedi and the Sith were both too narrow in their thinking, obsessed with defeating the other and unwilling to embrace the fullness of the Force. But I come from a time before either of them, I was there when the prophecy was written.”

“The Balance to the Force?” Ben asked, leaning closer to the holounit.

“They thought it was your grandfather,” Snoke continued, and Ben found himself being drawn in by the rhythm of his voice. “Anakin Skywalker, the great Jedi hope.”

“He died in the Jedi Purge,” Ben said, and at the back of his mind he heard that voice again, urging him to question.

“Did he?” Snoke chuckled lightly to himself. “The Skywalker bloodline was born of the Force,” he added. “Not just of the light side, but of the dark as well. That is why you are unlike any other Jedi or Sith who had ever lived - you are beyond Jedi or Sith. Do you think your grandfather could have been killed by mere stormtroopers?”

Ben frowned, confused by what Snoke was saying. “But what else could have happened?”

Snoke chuckled again. “Why don’t you ask your Uncle?”

___________________________________________________________

Massassi Temple, Yavin 4

The old Rebel base was much as Luke remembered it, although the hallways were deserted and many of the walls had been taken over by creeping vines. Echoes from twenty years in the past lingered on the periphery, when Luke was a newly minted Rebel hero with no idea of the trials that awaited him.

He’d been told then that the extinct Massassi had built the vast structure thousands of years earlier, but he hadn’t known that they’d also been slaves to the Sith. Unfortunately the databanks hadn’t yielded much in the way of information, most of the records damaged or purged.

“Found anything?” Valara slipped her light hands over his shoulders and massaged them lightly.

“Not much,” Luke admitted. “You?”

Valara had been exploring the base while he worked, claiming that she’d rather find her way through the endless hallways than watch him tap on a keyboard for hours.

“It was very productive,” Valara said, leaning closer to him and propping her chin on his head. “Come on, I’ll show you.”

“In a minute,” Luke told her, copying some data onto a chip to take with him. “I found some more star charts.”

Valara laughed and straightened. “You and your charts. Do you really think you’re going to find the Temple?”

“I see it in my dreams, V.” Luke pocketed the data chip and turned to face her. “An island in a vast and churning sea - the birthplace of the Jedi.”

“But you don’t know the name of the planet or how to get there.”

“I will,” he assured her. “I know it’s important, I can feel it.”

“Well right now I’m feeling nostalgic.” Valara took his hand and tugged on it. “Come on.”

He followed her obediently through the winding stone corridors of the Temple. They all looked the same to him but Valara seemed to know exactly where she was going. Although she could not see, her perception was in a way greater than his, or at least on a different level.

“Here.” Valara stopped in front of a door that looked exactly like the hundreds of others they’d passed. “Look familiar?”

Luke touched the raised number on the door and smiled. “It’s my old quarters.” He punched the access code after only a second trying to recall it, and they slipped inside.

The room exactly how Luke had remembered it. They’d evacuated in a hurry, but his possessions had been so meagre it had taken all of twenty seconds to stuff them in a pack and leave. The bunk still had rumpled blankets but otherwise the room was empty.

“It’s not like you to get sentimental,” Luke commented as he crossed to the bed, checking the bunk for insects. Remarkably, it seemed quite clean and Luke straightened the blankets.

“I guess I’m getting soft,” she said wryly. “And since we’re child-free for the evening…”

Luke moved into her waiting arms, his hands sliding up her back. “You know I think of that night often.”

“So do I,” she said softly, reaching up to cup his face. “I’m so glad you came to visit me.”

“You almost chased me away,” Luke pointed out.

Valara laughed. “Yes, but I also dragged you back here when you were being frustratingly honorable.”

“Well I didn’t have the confidence of the Dameron boy,” Luke chuckled, running his hand down her spine. “I saw him flirting with you today.”

“With me?” Valara smiled slyly. “A courtesy perhaps. Or a deflection - I’m blind and I could see the way he was looking at you.”

Luke grinned. “Oh, so I still got it huh?”

She slapped him lightly on the rear. “You never lost it,” she said and kissed him lightly. “And I’ll maim anyone who says otherwise.”






________________________________________________

A/N: I know in canon that Shara died when Poe was six, but that's stupid, so she's alive in this universe.

 

Snoke!Here begins trouble for Ben. Love the relationship between Luke and Valara; the love, sense of fun, gentle teasing, caring--it's all there and you capture it beautifully with your writing.

 

finally caught up and i'm looking forward to the rest of this story.

 

Rey as a Skycrawler. Like.

 

JadeLotus -- been away for quite the few months now but your stuff was always in the back of my mind tugging like a gravity magnetic field So I had to wander in and yay read this delightful couple chapters. Rey is a darling and Luke and V. -- exquisite! Ominous rumblings and foreshadowings with Ben though.

 

Due to WarmNyota_SweetAyesha I found this story and I simply love what I have read in so far.

Your OC has a beautiful name even though her life was dark and ugly most of the time. Thanks for weaving the Inquisitor story in.

I liked her interaction with Maz & Lor.

But most of all you wrote a vivid love story with all the ups and downs a couple can have.

Your Rey is a real cutie and I could strangle Snoke without any (pedagogical) problem (as a kindergarten teacher). That would teach him to lure boys into the dark side of the Force.

 

Okay, I'm terribly late in reviewing this (even though I caught up on the latest few chapters a while ago) but I hope you'll be back to finish it someday!

There's a lot I could write about here -- super-duper cute baby Rey, for instance -- but since I got the benefit of reading a whole bunch of chapters in a single go, I'll go straight to the two items that I found most amazing.

First, Valara's growth -- from the wedding to teaching at the temple, to becoming a mom, to wanting to still be her own person and not only Luke's wife/Rey's mom. All of it is so in character for her. She has learned to let down her shields and allow other people in her life, she's able now to show her weaknesses to a select few, but she's still very much the Valara we met earlier, who is going to be carrying that ugly baggage for the rest of her life.

Second, I love your portrayal of Ben/future Kylo. He's such a creepy kid in his own right, but you also let us imagine that it might not really be him, that his mind was poisoned by Snoke far earlier than we originally thought. The whole step-by-step approach if the First Order types -- the encounter with Hux, the "voice" he hears, the reason Leia sends him to Devaron, his knowledge of the Chosen One prophecy when he talks to Valara, the comm unit that shows up just at the right time when Luke is talking about leaving the temple for a while... We don't get to see much of the FO perspective here, but you're giving us every reason to believe that there's a long-term scheme at work.

And now, he's about to find out who his grandfather really was (or maybe he did find out between the last two entries) and Luke, Valara and Rey are away from the temple... I have a baaaaad feeling about this.