#reylo myths and legends

[olderthannetfic]

Something I need white people to stop doing in fandom: assuming anyone who is writing villain-centric fic is white. I'm black. I'm allowed to explore villains' backstories, psychology, etc. if I like. It doesn't render me white. I know, some people are just trying to shit on women so they throw "white" in front of the word women before they say "writing about villains is some white women shit". I know some people are just mad anyone writes about villains at all. For them, calling it a straight or white or straight and white woman thing is a way of not saying what they're actually thinking, which is that no one should do it.

But I would respect people a lot more if they just said what they meant. Just say you hate something. Don't assign a race or gender or orientation to what you hate. Say what you mean. Yeah, you'll get less fawning reblogs. You'll also be significantly less transparent and pathetic to actual black people reading your post.

This goes double for when someone is talking about a black villain. I can humanize him and give him a backstory instead of the ??? canon gave him. I can humanize him. And you know what? I like it when someone does that and they're white. If a white person humanizes a flat black character and sympathizes with them and treats them like a person, that's good, actually! Yes, even if it's the dreaded straight white woman of myth and legend doing it. Especially if it's her, even. I want to live in a world where a straight white woman pours her heart into writing a black man. I like that a lot. That means she's moved past the racist idea of scary black men and is viewing us as people.

Is it supposed to be woke or progressive to tell white women not to humanize others? Bc if so, my follow-up question is simple: how?

--

I always feel so bad for the black girls in fandom who are into... like... Reylo or Phantom/Christine or some bog standard problematic het like that. The amount of shit they get, man...

(It happens with lots of other things, obviously. I've just personally witnessed some truly reprehensible incidents involving shippers of those.)

[rappaccini]

do you ever think about how it's now a trend that every decade or so a fandom accidentally yields an incubator for writing talent.

like, how the 2010s were inundated with often-female ya authors who introduced book after book with magic systems based on the classical elements, got the ball rolling on popularizing non-western european fantasy settings for young people, creating a space for female-centric fantasy stories and tend to feature enemies-to-lovers storylines.... and author after author has cited atla and specifically the zutara ship as inspiration. and zutara was one of the first Big Ships to organize fanweeks, which are at their core, about encouraging a community to produce and support art for itself. that art is fun! it's a great way to bond with your friends! it's also practice.

or how the current 2020s wave of myth and classic lit retellings, romance, romantasy and fem gaze new adult fiction is being ridden by women who started out in the reylo fandom in 2015. like, thinking back to how the reylo fandom started as a bunch of nerdy women writing metas applying star wars to legends canon, folklore, fairy tales, and the heroine's journey model, they accidentally predicted the one consistent element of the sequel trilogy years before tlj and they wrote an everest-sized mountain of fanfic in between movies.... and ten years later a ton of them are now bestselling published authors. yup. sounds about right. they literally taught themselves about writing and storycraft through fanfic, they formed critique groups to help each other improve, and after about ten years of practice they're taking the training wheels off.

at this point i'm fully expecting another massively popular tv show or movie series to spawn another intensely literary female subfandom that essentially trains itself through fanfic and story analysis into another cohort of authors. this is gonna keep happening.

and it has to be a particular kind of fandom:

large and organized: the fandom must be of a property that's (usually sci-fi or fantasy, and) popular enough to draw the numbers to make an impact, and they should be close-knit enough to develop the communities necessary to create relationships to make and respond to their art and analysis

analytical: they have to be interested in interpreting the text as it is via metaanalysis, identifying tropes, and making comparisons to other canon and other works of fiction. the work is either deep enough to yield this analysis, or it gives the illusion of depth.

creative: they produce art, fanfiction, video edits, gifs...

transformative: they like the canon, but they do not worship it. they recognize that it can be improved or altered, and they want to do it. odds are, because it isn't giving them what they want or need.

fem-gaze oriented: related to the previous, the fandom's probably gonna be female-dominated. not only because transformative fandom tends to be where women hang out (and they tend to be kicked out of curative fandom)-- but also because the fandom itself is centered around a certain female character and a ship with her as one player in it. there's a mix of appreciation of the female character herself, of herself plus her relationship, and of tolerance of her as a stand-in for the audience in order to ship themselves with her love interest. regardless, it's about women and what they want: both the fictional female character, and/or the real female fans.

but not necessarily feminist or subversive: ... look, the favored character/relationship is always straight, she favors her male love interest over any female characters, and the preferred ending is pretty much always happily-heteromarried-with-biokids. the favored character/ship is usually monoracial white people, they tend to disregard poc love interests who are rivals to the Big Ship, or if poc are involved in the favored ship itself there's a questionable vibe to the fandom's perception of them and their dynamic. the fandom's hope for their fave is a story about how they don't really overcome their world's usually patriarchal structure so much as they become the exception to it or find a way to exist happily within it. usually through finding The One Man Who's Nice (and even then. is he, or is he just hot?). i didn't say this phenomenon isn't without its problems! maybe it'll change someday! but it can't change if the problem isn't acknowledged!)

motivated: and they're either disappointed about canon going a different direction and eager to reinvent it... or vengeful about their canon burning them. either way, they're gonna channel that into writing fix-it fic, and then their own stories. if they're satisfied with the canon, they won't want to build on it. so something can't measure up along the way.

so. who's next? my money's on the daemyra shippers. there was a zutara to reylo pipeline in 2015, there was a reylo to daemyra pipeline in 2022, people are still mad about the ending of game of thrones and have adopted rhaenyra as dany jr. and they're gonna get mad at house of the dragon when it goes a certain way. i bet in 2030 we're gonna be inundated with adult high fantasy stories about morally ambiguous dragon queens in questionable age gap romances with even more morally ambiguous men who are undyingly loyal to them and supportive of their interests in between committing war crimes.

or hey if fallout keeps growing, it might be the ghoulcys who take it. the reylo-to-ghoulcy pipeline is pumping, i see what's happening there. and fem gaze postapocalyptic scifi westerns with death-and-the-maiden romances? i'd be into that. guess we'll see!

regardless it seems like the trend took a while to grow up. ya at first, with a lot of usually-female ya authors being barred from making the jump to older readers. then new adult now that the category's starting to gain ground, and ya authors are finally being allowed to age their writing up. i'm thinking adult sf/f is next.

[pulpwriterx]

THE MOST DANGEROUS GAME

(PART 1)

It was the longest elevator ride of his life.

And Rey was right there, within the reach of his arms, talking to him, intently.

But he wasn't listening to the meaning of the words.

Just the sound of her voice, as the words passed her lips.

Kylo Ren began thinking about all the things she could do to him with those lips…

“BEN!”

The word from his Master was like a slap in his face.

“Stop thinking about the girl. Especially about lovemaking. You have to focus.”

I’m sorry, grandfather. But what I was thinking about? It does not distract me. Are you sure this is our moment?

Ben, this is your moment. You have the skill, and the strength, and the power. You are my sword. Your hand is my hammer. My strength is in your blood. You are Darth Vader. You are Anakin Skywalker. You are not a child in a mask. You are a man. A Skywalker. A breaker of empires. Strike the monster down.”

But why does she have to be here? I don’t want Rey to get hurt.

“Because she fights. And Rey is your light, Ben. You can’t win this battle if the Light and the Darkness are not balanced within you. She will help you achieve that balance. And keep it.”

“I am ready.”

Kylo Ren said that aloud.

Rey stopped talking all that Uncle Luke nerfshit he hadn’t been paying attention to.

“What?” she asked.

He grabbed her, pulled her tight and close against his body and kissed her, desperately.

When they parted, they were both panting and flushed.

She didn’t look unhappy about it, and Rey hadn’t let go of him.

“What was that for?” she asked.

“Luck.” Ben said.

“When you smirk like that, you remind me of your father.”

The elevator doors slid open.

“Right now? I have to be. Just like the Old Man.” Kylo Ren replied.

***

“You are nothing, but not to me. Join me. Please.”

Everything else had gone as Kylo expected.

But not this.

Rey wasn’t falling into his arms, after completely understanding everything he said, and wanting to join him in it.

That was what he expected.

And it wasn’t happening.

Instead, Rey was looking at him like he was as much a Sith madman as Snoke was.

Ben began to panic.

She’s not buying it.

Holy Mother Force, I blew it, and I can’t let her go. I can’t.

Then stop talking about the Galaxy, you idiot. She knows nothing about your plan, or your journey. You must sound like a megalomaniac.

Say something personal.

Bare your soul; tear out your heart and hand it to her.

Do it!

NOW!!!

“Rey, I’m not asking you to join the First Order. Or the Sith. I’m asking to you to join me. Take my hand, Rey. My hand. The hand of the man who loves you. Desperately. I love you. I need you. I want you. Without you, I can’t take one more step on my journey toward balance in the Force.”

The expression on Rey’s face changed.

“You want me? As a woman? You want me to join you so we can be together? So we can…make love?”

There was a little tremor in her voice.

A little crack in the armor of nerfshit that a few months of trauma and training with his unhinged Uncle had welded onto her soul.

Kylo Ren moved closer to Rey.

“Oh gods, yes, Rey! I want us to make love! I want to ravish your beautiful little body, right fucking now!” he admitted.

Ardently.

Truthfully?

Rey was a little bit afraid.

But there was something crawling in her belly that was stronger than fear.

I don’t have to stay with him, forever.

Just long enough.

“Take your glove off.”

He did it.

And Rey took Kylo Ren's hand.

He hesitated, only for a moment, and then he pulled her into his arms.

Close to his trembling body.

He pulled off his other glove, put his hands on both sides of her face, and kissed her.

Rey groaned into his mouth and kissed him back.

Sparks flew, and not just the ones that fell from the sky.

They parted.

“Ben. Kylo. Take me to a safe place, away from this dying and make love to me. I don’t want the Galaxy. I want you. Be my teacher. Be my lover.”

“You want me? Really? It’s not a trick?”

Rey touched his face, put her fingers to his lips.

Tell him the truth.

For yourself.

“Does my body trembling in your arms feel like it’s lying? Yes, Ben. I want you. You’re such a beautiful man. I love your face. Your unconventionally beautiful face, your dark, saturnine good looks. You’re a mean, moody, magnificent bastard. A big, bad, black raging-bull of a man. You’re handsome as Hell, and I want to kiss all of your freckles. I lie awake at night, and I think about what you could do to me with your gorgeous, luscious mouth.”

Ben kissed her, again, this time more intimately.

Carnally.

He slipped to his knees.

“Ben, please! The ship is exploding. Showers of sparks are falling all around us. We can’t…”

But even as she spoke, Rey put her arms around him, crushing his head against her breasts.

“No. We are exploding. Those sparks are falling from our bodies. I’ve never been this close to you. I’ve ached to be this close to you, since the day we met.”

Ben wasn’t so bold as to try and liberate her breasts from her clothes, but he did nuzzle against a nipple with the end of his nose.

Rey’s body started to tremble in his arms.

To tremble under his hands.

“Oh, Ben, we’re so close, already. What we did in this room, it brought us so close. Besides, I don’t think I’ve ever been ravished, before. It sounds wonderful.” Rey said.

“It will be. I promise.”

Ben pulled away from her, and he started undressing.

“No! Not here! It’s full of dead people in here, and the ship is exploding!”

“Then you'll go with me, to my ship?”

“Yes. But that doesn’t mean I am joining your side.”

Ben stood up.

He was angry again.

Gods, if he stays angry, I will take my clothes off, right here!

“Here we go, again! Rey, I don’t have a…kark it. I’ll show you. I’ll show you what I’m talking about!” Kylo shouted, angrily pointing his finger in Rey’s face.

He ducked flying sparks, kicked aside a body, and went over to Master Snoke’s radio.

“Hux, this is Supreme Leader Ren. Stop firing.”

“What?”

“Stop firing on the Resistance. They’re finished. We can afford to be generous. If we want these people to accept our authority as their government, we have to show them that we are not just butchers. They have one ship. Let the survivors go.”

“What happened to Supreme Leader Snoke?”

“He died. Old men often do. Stop the attack and start getting our people into…she never gives up, does she? Phasma, stop! Can she hear me? Is she leaving FN2187 alone?”

“No.”

“Nobody on this ship understands what I’m trying to accomplish!”

Kylo Ren closed his eyes and moved one of his hands, abruptly.

“Why did you just move Captain Phasma into an escape pod? You can’t just pick people up and throw them...”

“Stop yammering, or I’ll pick you up and throw you! There’s no time! The ship is…Damn it, hux, put me on the karking Intercom, and get yourself to the Throne Room!”

Rey heard a loud click.

“Now hear this. This is Supreme Leader Kylo Ren. I have good news. First? Old Man Snoke is dead. Also? We have defeated the Resistance. They crashed their last ship into ours. Which leads me to the bad news. The ship is compromised. Try not to panic. The more we panic, the more likely we all are to die. Everyone who would like to continue with me as Supreme Leader, abandon your posts and make your way to your escape pod or your vehicle. We will rendezvous on my Star Destroyer. Everyone who wants to remain loyal to Snoke is free to go down with this ship and die with him. Your choice. For those of you who are evacuating? Go now. Don’t go back to your quarters and pack. You don’t have time. And to General Pryde and my command crew? Execute Order Lucky Number 7. Over and out.”

Ben hung up the radio and made another communication.

“This is Supreme Leader Kylo Ren calling General Organa-Solo. Do you read me? Over.”

The response was immediate.

“Supreme Leader Kylo Ren? What happened to Supreme Leader Snoke?”

“What do you think happened? I killed him. Cut him in half with grandfather’s lightsaber. That’s as close to Darth Vader as he was ever going to get. I wish you could have seen the look on his face. He was so surprised. Like I’ll bet you are, right now. Can all your passengers hear me?”

“They can, now.”

“This is Supreme Leader Kylo Ren. Snoke is dead. His war on the Resistance is over. I will be turning my attention, and the attention of the First Order to our common enemy. The Sith. Contrary to what you all believe, I am not a Sith Lord. I do not follow the Jedi, or the Sith. Mine is a New Path. But, as long as one Sith lives, I can’t follow that path. And there will be no peace in this Galaxy. None for me, and for the planets of the First Order. And none for you, and what you call the Free Planets. I will not be undertaking any more operations of conquest outside what the First Order had already claimed. We will be fighting the enemy, within. I don’t expect a surrender. But it is my hope that you will regroup, and when you have, that we might both fight our common enemy. General Organa-Solo, I would like to have a meeting with you, in the near future.”

“I’ll think about it, Supreme Leader.”

“May we speak, privately, again?”

Rey heard another click.

“Yes, Kylo?”

“Go to Ahch-To and get your brother. He needs a bath, a hot meal, a change of clothes and a warm place to sleep. Once he gets used to that, figure out something to get him to stay.”

“That bad?”

“He’s lost his mind. He’s turned into this crazy old hermit. It’s very sad, and he needs help. And lots of it. Before you go back to your base, go get him.”

“What about Rey?”

“I think he traumatized her. Rey looked better when she was fresh from starving in the desert. I’m not going to keep her against her will. Like Snoke kept me. I’ll give her a choice. That’s fair.”

“It’s also all I’m going to get. You’re getting better at this, kid.”

“I’d better. Because things are only going to get worse from here on out. I have to go. The ship is exploding. Over and out.”

***

“What happened?” Hux insisted.

“Nothing! I don’t see where that’s any of your business!” the girl snapped.

“I’m not talking about that! I mean why is everybody dead?” Hux clarified.

“Haven’t you ever heard of a coup? This is our day, Hux. A day for warriors. A day of Blood and Iron. A day for our gods to take pride in our work. Today, I am their hammer. Look around you. The fire? The blood? The death of our enemies. It’s our own private Ragnarok. Get Snoke’s head, Hux. And his hand. I want to make a mug from his skull. Hurry it up, the ship is on fire!”

“All the sudden, Ren, you’re a religious man?” Hux quipped.

“I didn’t know you were a religious man.” Rey interjected.

“I’m an Arkanian warrior. My life’s work is undertaken in the service of my ancient gods.” Hux explained

Ben grabbed Rey's hand.

“Talk later! Run, now!” he suggested.

He was soon pulling her along through the collapsing hallways.

“What about the Resistance?” Hux asked.

“I took care of that. How about I explain everything to you, later, when we’re safe on my ship. Don’t waste your breath, Armi! ]Run faster!”

***

All three of them had to run through the dying ship to get to Kylo Ren's TIE Fighter.

Rey couldn’t keep up, with the two long-legged men, and Ben was practically dragging her along.

She kept stumbling.

“Ben! Kylo! I can’t keep up with you!” she cried.

Kylo Ren picked her up and carried her.

Oh well.

At least I am going to die in his arms.

That’s stupid, but romantic.

A First Order General wearing both First Order and Imperial insignia was waiting for them.

Quite calmly.

“Supreme Leader Ren, the ship is cleared of our people.”

Ben looked around

“All these fools standing calmly at their posts, they want to die with Snoke?”

“You can’t force people to listen to reason.”

“Yes I can. Hux? The head.”

Ben stood up on a console, unwrapped Snoke’s head from the bloody cloak, and held it aloft.

“You have nothing more to fear from Old Man Snoke! There’s still one transport left. Come with me if you want to live!”

About half of the troopers and officers left their posts and began running towards their new leader.

Some were calm, some were begging for help or mercy, and some were openly crying, and reaching to touch Kylo Ren.

“Calm yourselves, my people. We are free, now. We don’t have to beg any man for mercy. But we all need to escape. Captain Phasma! As long as you are out of your escape pod! Help General Pryde get these people onto the last transport.”

“Are you going to make him into a mug?”

“Yes.”

Ben got down from the table, and he and General Hux and the two other officers herded a stream of souls onto the last transport.

By the time Rey took a second look around, there were less than a quarter of those who had been there, before, willing to go down with the ship.

“Phasma, Enric, get on the transport. Tell TX-1456 to take off, immediately. Your ship is bigger. You need the advantage.”

“You’ll never make it, we must take off together!” the General insisted.

“Then three people will die instead of a thousand. Go. That’s an order.”

***

The part of the Star Destroyer that the last transport took off from collapsed behind it.

The three of them, Rey, Hux and Kylo Ren barely made it to his TIE Fighter, and as it was, Ben had to take off at a 90 degree angle.

“Damn you, Ren, we’re all going to die!”

“Shut up, Hux! Buckle the girl in, first!”

Rey felt heat, and looked behind her.

“Fireball! Fireball!” she sobbed, giddy with fear.

The whole ship was imploding; there was no deck beneath them; everything was fire and ruin.

Instinctively, Hux embraced her, cradling her head against his chest.

“Don’t look! Don’t look! It will be over, soon.”

He reached for something inside his tunic, and began to recite something, in another language.

Rey thought it was Arkanian.

She hoped it was a savage prayer, to his ancient gods.

Who else would listen, at a time like this

Then the TIE Fighter was rolling and fading, and jumping to lightspeed.

All at once.

Rey felt sick.

She clung to her enemy, and he tightened his arms around her.

But they were still alive.

With Han gone, Ben really was the greatest pilot in the Galaxy.

Hux loosed his grip.

“Don’t let go. I’m going to pass out.” Rey said.

But Hux had already passed out.

“How about that for flying? Are you OK, back there?” Ben asked.

“Not really.” Rey told him.

Darkness called, and she answered.

***

General Pryde was waiting in the hangar.

He looked calm.

They all walked together, through the hangar

There was room on Kylo Ren's flagship Star Destroyer

“May I be the first to congratulate you, Supreme Leader Kylo Ren?”

“Not yet, General Pryde. Was the Order successful?”

“Entirely, Lord Ren.”

“What about any casualties among my troops and officers and personnel?”

“Not one?”

“Did we lose any escape pods? Fighters? Transports?”

“Not one. All of our people are present and accounted for.”

“Excellent. In that case, you may congratulate me, General Pryde. And General Hux has decided to join us.”

“And the charming young lady?”

“My Apprentice. Rey Skywalker. No relation. She has no family. No name. So, I have given her my family name. She deserves it.”

“You are fortunate, Miss Skywalker. Young Lord Vader comes from a long line of Masters of great skill in the Force.” the General told Rey.

“Like his grandfather. Anakin Skywalker.” Rey said, a bit defiantly.

“Yes. He was a great man. May the Force be with young Skywalker, that he too becomes as great.” Pryde replied, evenly.

Ben had turned to his other General.

“General Hux? The story is that my predecessor died. Old men do. But before he passed, he named me his successor.”

“No one will believe that! You showed them his bloody severed head! Even a fledgling Stormtrooper will know you killed him and took power. There will be fear in the ranks.”

“Probably. But there will also be awe. I am their liberator. I have liberated myself, and I have liberated those loyal to me. They will understand that. Now, if you will excuse me? My Apprentice and I are exhausted and covered in blood and gore. I am going to retire to my quarters and show her to hers.”

Hux scowled.

General Pryde nodded, crisply.

He put his hand on Ben’s shoulder.

“This day, Kylo? Your grandfather, Lord Vader, is proud of you. As am I.”

“Thank you, Enric. I know that he is. He was with me, this day.”

“You saw him? You spoke to my Lord Vader?”

“Yes, Enric. Now that I am liberated? I am able to communicate with my grandfather.”

“Then my life’s work is complete.”

“Not yet, General. We have much to do.”

Rey took all this in, using the Force to remain serene.

But the way Ben had flown to get them out of danger, the smell of death that clung to her, and the revolting memories of the charnel house that had been Snoke’s throne room?

It was catching up to her.

“But your Apprentice looks unwell, Supreme Leader. Perhaps you should assist her.” General Pryde said.

“I feel sick.” Rey said.

Ben swept her up, and carried her down many long, brightly lit and silvery hallways.

Too many for her to make it, without being sick, and answering, once more, when darkness beckoned

LINK TO CHAPTER TWO

[allgirlsareprincesses]

"The detachment of the growing individual from the authority of the parents is one of the most necessary, but also one of the most painful achievements of evolution. It is absolutely necessary for this detachment to take place, and it may be assumed that all normal grown individuals have accomplished it to a certain extent. Social progress is essentially based upon this opposition between the two generations. On the other hand, there exists a class of neurotics whose condition indicates that they have failed to solve this very problem."

-Otto Rank in The Myth of the Birth of the Hero

[readingreylo]

Happy MerMay!

In honour of Mermay here are a few mermaid-centric fics that I love!

(Updated may 2022)

Out of Water by AquaWolfGirl | @aquawolfgirl | WIP: last updated 2021-08-04 | 33K | Explicit | Reylo | Modern AU | Ben POV | Mermaid!Rey | Retired rockstar!Kylo Ren | Enemies to Friends to lovers | Slow burn | Food Porn | no smut yet | "When ex-rocker Kylo Ren buys a lakehouse, he expected to relax near where he spent his summers as Ben Solo. He expected peace and quiet, with fresh fish and lazy days spent enjoying the sun. He most certainly didn't expect for a vicious mermaid to insist this part of the lake is hers, and to get the fuck out."

A delightful story by the immensely talented AquaWolfGirl (go read all her stuff!) This fic makes me wanna go dip my toes in a lake and then cook a gourmet meal. You'll get it once you read it ;) Great characterizations and dynamic between Rey and Ben. I'm always thrilled when this fic updates.

beyond the veil by Dachenabritta | @dachenabritta | Complete | 40k | Mature | Reylo | Modern AU | Rey POV | Ben POV | The Little Mermaid elements | Splash(1985) vibes | Finish folklore | slow burn | strangers to lovers | action/drama | Mermaid!Rey | Loney Businessman!Ben Solo | HEA | "Deep within the waters of the Oregon coast, a lone mermaid longs for the man she's watched for years. Her wish of joining him comes true but comes at a cost."

A beautiful and well written fic! So detailed and imaginative! With fantastic characterizations.

Sirens by SageMcMae | @sagemcmae | Complete | 21k | Explicit | Reylo | Modern AU | Mermaids AU | Strangers to lovers | Rey POV | Ben POV | Mermaid!Rey | Merman!Kylo | Clueless virgins | Mermaid smut | mating rituals | Devoted Reylo | Action/Drama | Pregnancy | HEA | "When her kind frequented the oceans, mermaids spent hours polishing their scales and knotting their tresses with beads and shells to attract a mate. Rey can't imagine such a tedious thing. She has no interest in a mate. Not that it matters since she is the last mermaid. One morning she wakes up to find a small offering left outside her home. She catches only a glimpse of alabaster and obsidian before the creature dives into the murky depths of the deep sea. On the edge of the drop-off, Rey is left with a choice: Stay in the light or follow into the dark."

A classic! Engaging prose tells an adorable and romantic story with a touch of drama and plenty of mermaid sex. Yeah, this fic was a gateway drug for me regarding a *ahem* certain type of smut...

Added in 2022:

Separate on the surface by quamquam20 | @quamquam20 | Explicit | 18k | Complete | Modern AU with magic | Siren!Rey | Monsterfucking | Humans are siren food | eco-terriorism | Drowning/rescue | Desert Island | Angst with a happy ending | Multi POV | "It’s probably not the first time the son of an environmental lawyer has ended up working on a storm-lashed offshore drilling platform.But he's definitely the first one Rey has ever pulled out of the water."

Treasures Untold by TheAlchemistsDaughter | Explicit | 20k | Complete | Mermaid AU | Magic/spells | Angst | Falling in love | Mermaid!Rey | Octopus!Kylo | Monsterfucking | Eggs/babies | HEA | Rey POV | "Rey is a mermaid determined to find her family. She seeks out Snoke, the Sea Witch, but finds his apprentice, Kylo Ren instead. He tells her all magic has a price, but Rey wants to pay it. To prevent her from going to Snoke, he agrees to perform the spell himself, binding her to him until the debt is paid. He doesn't expect to get more than he bargained for."

Heracleion by no_big_deal | Explicit | 6k | Oneshot | Historical AU | Ancient Greece/Ancient Egypt | Sailor!Ben | Mermaid/siren/goddess!Rey | Soulmates | Reincarnation | Curses/Magic | legends/myths | Monsterfucking | HEA | Ben POV | "Beniamín Solo is a Greek captain of a Nile River barge in the time of gods and monsters. When a mysterious old fortune-teller warns him that his soulmate--a cursed mermaid called Coraelia--is looking for him, he finds himself swept up in events that could bring him ultimate happiness, or result in the destruction of the greatest city of the age."

Across the Way by OptimisticBeth | @optimisticsprinkles | Teen | 7k | Oneshot | Modern AU | Magic Realism | Mermaid!Rey | Octopus!Kylo | Captivity | Angst/emotional hurt | Pining | BabyOC | Escape | Multi POV | Mermaid Rey and half-octopus Kylo are exhibits in an aquarium run by snoke, who looks to start a breeding program.

Man of Wind and Sea by Dinkerinos | Explicit | 5k | Oneshot | Modern AU | Lighthouse keeper!Ben | Mermaid(?)!Rey | Myth&folklore | Loneliness | Aggressive sex | Dark | implied charcter death | 404 HEA not found | Ben POV | "He finds her floating in the freezing October waters, just at the edge of the cliffs. A storm had passed the day before, leaving a great deal of things washing up on the cliffs of his lighthouse, but he could never have expected her."

Enjoy!

🌊🧜‍♀️🧜‍♂️💦

[southsidestory]

Your mermay Reylo is just... 😍😍😍 yes please! LOL!

cast off, verb: set a boat or ship free from its moorings.

cast-off, noun: something that is no longer wanted. 

.

.

She remembers a storm. A dark sky shadowing the sun, grey wind, a torrent of rain that stung her bare skin and drenched her clothes. Thunder strong enough to shake the sea to its sand-grit bottom, so loud that Rey could barely hear her family’s screams. The waves rose higher and higher, wrapped around their boat with black hands, and gave it over to the hungry ocean. 

The water swallowed her down, but Rey fought against its pull, swam until she found her mother, clinging to a great plank of wood. She reached out, and even now, she remembers the white fear emptying Mum’s eyes, the cold shiver of her clammy, sea-wrinkled fingers as she grasped Rey’s hand.

Then the plank wobbled, overbalanced by the fresh weight, and her mother cried out. She said I’m sorry, and let go.

—

Kylo knows the legends as well as anyone, the fish wives’ tales about selkies, sirens, and sea dragons. Maybe they’re even real, not that he’s ever seen any such creatures. Part of him would like to believe, and besides, it would be the height of hypocrisy to dismiss an incredible story, considering the blood that runs through his veins.

More than any other, he’s always been drawn to the myth of merfolk: children lost at sea, cast aside and left to drown, who survive the ocean by becoming a part of the ocean itself; half-fish, half-human, living half-lives. 

It’s a story that resonates, despite its absurdity. Kylo wasn’t thrown to the sea like so much trash, but he’s been adrift for most of his days. Fitting neither here nor there, and never wanted.

—

She’s a scavenger. A bottom-feeder, as the less kind of her neighbors like to say. Rey is quick and nimble enough to catch the choicest fish, but it’s hard work. She finds it much easier to dig through the sand for crabs, lobsters, and clams, not that any of it is satisfying. Her stomach wasn’t made for seaweed and raw creatures alone. Some days, she remembers the warmth of a cooked meal and aches for it as much as she aches for dry land beneath the feet she no longer has. 

Rey avoids the sharks, who are too restless and single-minded for good conversation, and the dolphins, who are smart enough for petty cruelties and selfish violence—just like humans. The smaller fish are sweet, despite their short memories, and the seahorses are as energetic as they are stupid. It’s lonely here, underwater, and if not for the gentle companionship of blue whales, Rey thinks she might have lost herself to isolation years ago.

But today she has a new wreck to explore, and that makes things far more interesting. 

A selkie follows her to the sunken ship, saying, Humans are such careless creatures. All it takes is a little wind and rain to kill you.

Rey flinches, and for a moment the only thing she can hear is the raging of a thunderous storm all around her, all she can feel is the slick slipping of her hand through her mother’s fingers. She tries to breathe, but she swallows water, feels her gills ripple, and wishes she was at the surface, where she could fill her lungs with fresh air.

When she calms, Rey says, Don’t talk about them like I’m one of them. I’m not.

The selkie hums, a low not-quite-seal sound. But you used to be.

Rey ignores her and swims ahead. She’s faster, and maybe her unasked for companion will take the hint.

The wreck is so fresh that sand billows about it, fat brown clouds roiling around the splintered ship. It looks like this one was rammed in its side. Not a natural wreck then; there must be a battle above. 

It isn’t that she wants to see violence, although watching human bloodshed doesn’t stir her sympathies like it once did. Too many years apart from them have frozen any familiarity Rey once felt toward her former kind.

More than anything, it’s boredom that drives her to the surface. 

—

A storm saves his life. Kylo’s ship was surrounded, enemies on all sides, when the sky opened up and pelted them with rain, hail, and every other unholy fury of a sea goddess.

There are certain advantages, he’s found, to being Leia’s son—but it’s hard to remember them when he’s half-drowned, coughing up saltwater and bile, lost in a desert of rolling blue water. The sun beats down on his bare face, burning his cheeks while the rest of him freezes.

A fortuitous wind blew away the driftwood he’s holding fast to, steering it far from the fighting and the storm, but Kylo is still going to die here if his mother doesn’t drive a ship in his direction soon.

“A little help?” he shouts.

A wave rolls over him, rushing seawater down his throat, into his lungs. Once he finishes vomiting, Kylo keeps his mouth shut.

She won’t truly let him die, he knows that. Leia is a harsh-tempered goddess, but she loves him, in her own way. 

Even so, his confidence in her mercy is starting to wane, right when he sees a girl in the distance, swimming too gracefully and swiftly to be fully human. And there, he spots the glint of a pale green tail stippled with iridescent scales. As she draws closer, he sees that her skin is sun-browned, like she might spend as much time above water as below it, her hair shorn chin-length, ragged along the edges. Cut with a sharp rock or a scavenged sailor’s knife, he imagines. 

She stops before him, her hazel eyes bright against her tan, freckled face. A pretty creature, Kylo thinks, despite the gills below her jaw and the slick sheen of her skin. It looks like a cross between human flesh and the too-smooth hide of some sea mammals, giving her an ageless look. Unsettling and uncanny for how close to a woman she appears, and yet how far. 

The mermaid tilts her head to the side, looking him over with curious eyes, and says, “You’re not human either.”

“Half,” Kylo corrects. “Not unlike you.”

Her soft mouth hardens into a sharp line when she says, “I’m nothing like you.” 

Wonderful. I’ve offended my rescuer. 

“Did my mother send you?” he asks. 

She takes ahold of his driftwood, keeping it in her grasp without tugging it down. “I wouldn’t say sent. More like the waves brought me here, and warned to carry me to the ends of the world if I didn’t help you.” 

Kylo laughs. “She can be… aggressive, when seeking something she wants.”

The mermaid offers nothing more, so he asks, “What’s your name?”

She sighs, takes a firmer grip on his makeshift buoy, and begins to swim, dragging him along behind her. In the direction of the shore, he hopes. 

Before they’ve gone very far, she glances over her shoulder and says, “I’m Rey.��� 

.

.

A snippet just for you, sweet anon! :)

[thebigreylotheory]

The Start of A Resurrection

Doing some thinking...my lazy google research has only went as far as tvtropes as of today (recommend me some resurrection myths, legends, novels, etc, if you got them.)

See there Disney, you can do it! You’re so pro at this, you’re a trope!

Personally, I think my favorites tropes right now are:

Rescued, in which, perhaps, Rey goes on a quest to get Ben back. As a biased Reylo, I think she has enough personal reasons to go after him (true love) but for everyone else it would probably be a good idea to mix in some sort of threat or prophecy that specifically requires someone that fits Ben Solo.

Or, Refusing, in which, cause Ben loves Rey, and perhaps having deceased/spiritual/ForceGhost/Anicent Whill knowledge, Ben knows there’s still a threat and sacrifices something to return as human/mortal. Perhaps, either the possibility of ever being one with the Force/joining the Force again, his Force power, his memories, strength, etc.

I’ll eventually go through my library and see if any of my anthropology books contain anything interesting for a fanfic. But I’ve also got nesting and a baby due very soonish....so feel free to run with anything you see...

[misscrawfords]

The Rise of Skywalker: Part Two

Read Part One here.

One of the many things I’ve been grappling with over the 2 weeks since TROS came out is the validity and cause of my upset and anger. And it centres round the question: if Reylo had ended differently, if they’d had a happy ending, if Ben Solo had lived, would I still hate the film? Would I still be angry? Or would I forgive and overlook its other myriad flaws? And connected to those central questions is another that pressed upon me, namely: am I angry and upset because it is a bad film on multiple levels that insults its audience and breaks its own mythology in a way that is deeply distressing to female viewers and is fundamentally a poorly written film or do I only feel like that because I am a disappointed shipper? Am I only upset because I have got so attached to my HEA fluffy fanfic that I’ve lost sight of the story that canon is actually telling?

There’s a wider issue contained in these questions that I’ve been asking myself which is that there is a judgement implicit that responding to a film purely as a shipper is a bad thing, that it invalidates my criticism and my feelings if, in fact, I am simply an upset and disappointed shipper who wanted a happy ending. That’s an issue that is definitely worth pursuing but elsewhere.

It’s been two weeks. I’ve read multiple twitter threads, listened to bits of WTForce podcast (it’s very long... and was making me cry...), many reviews of the film, and today I finally started reading Valerie Estelle Frankel’s From Girl to Goddess: The Heroine’s Journey through Myth and Legend which is blowing my mind and giving me the confidence to say what I’ve known for a while:

My feeling that TROS is a terrible film on multiple levels - all of them actually - is valid. You may disagree and that’s fine. It’s only an opinion. But it’s my opinion and I stand by it. And, returning to the initial question that has been perplexing me - in fact I cannot separate the way the characters of Rey and Kylo/Ben were treated from the film’s other flaws. If Ben had lived, if Reylo had had a happy ending, if their relationship had played out differently, even if they had both died, yes, I would have been more inclined to forgive the film its many other flaws and misjudgements, but the fact is, if Reylo had been written in a satisfactory way then it would have been a very different film. Reylo is only one - one massive, egregious error - thing that contributes to the mess that this films. It is not the only thing that is enraging and upsetting but it is probably the biggest. I’ll talk about these other things in yet another post, but for now...

Let’s talk about Reylo.

tl;dr: Reylo is canon and the movie still sucked. Here’s a 5000+ word dissertation on why. Maybe don’t read if my opinions on this are going to make you sad/angry.

I’m going to break down my problems with Reylo in this film logically and honestly, I’m not sure I’m going to say anything that hasn’t already been said, but perhaps reading another perspective will help others who feel similarly? I’m guessing it’s going to help me if I write about it. We’ll see.

There are three problems. There’s the problem of the fate of Ben Solo. In a way, that’s the easiest and simplest one to deal with. Death was always on the cards as a possible ending for him. A tragic hero who commits terrible acts is redeemed in death by saving the world. The death of this character is... not a surprise and has always been an ending I worried about because I’m a shipper and I like happy endings over sad ones. And I’ve been very convinced by the meta and arguments of shippers who have argued passionately that Ben had to live. However, arguably the problem is not the death in itself but the circumstances and the context. So I’ll come back to that.

The second problem is that of Rey. Rey’s development (or lack of it) and especially her ending. Yep. This is a big problem. Far bigger IMO than the death of Ben which, while tragic, could have been beautiful and fitting.

Thirdly, is Ben and Rey together. Reylo. Their relationship and the way it plays out and the way, ultimately, all of this breaks the mythology being established in previous films.

So three very interlinked problems.

To summarise. In TROS Kylo regresses to being the Supreme Leader and trying to source dark power. This is not terribly surprising considering the ending of TLJ. Rey also regresses to someone who is training and who does not believe she is worthy of Luke’s lightsaber. This is surprising because Rey has already accepted her destiny and her role as a Jedi at the end of TLJ. There is no reason for her to feel insecure about it a year later in TROS.

Rey and Kylo connect through their Force Bond and fight. Their anger is understandable but these fights continuously rehash exactly the same material as what was covered in TLJ, leaving me feeling, well, not very much. Kylo is trying to tell Rey something about who she is (a question that was resolved in TLJ) and Rey is angry at him because of reasons. 

There are some good parts here. Unlike a lot of people, I really liked the fight at Pasaana. I felt it took something from TLJ and added something else. It was a rehash of the throne room fight over the lightsaber but while that conflict was entirely personal over an object that meant something to them but not the wider population (beyond what it could do as a weapon), the same conflict here was over a transport ship containing real people and Chewie (apparently), a character of importance to both. So what happened is that their inability to reconcile with each other and meet half way is manifested in a completely balanced conflict which has a living cost. Chewie dies! Rey kills someone dear to her - accidentally, sure - but she now has a body count showing how truly destructive her fight with Kylo is. It is a symbol of how necessary it is they work together and find balance. Daisy Ridley’s acting here was great and I felt genuinely shocked. Shocked that Rey plunged so immediately into a kind of darkness that put her on a level with Kylo and shocked that Chewie was killed off so casually without warning or build-up - a real casualty of war and the raised stakes in this film. I thought it was a great way to build on TLJ and extend it.

So you can imagine how I felt when Chewie’s death was retconned.

Pretty similar to how I felt when C-3PO got his memory back.

I will probably talk more about this in Part Three, which is my wider issues with the film, but it’s sort of unavoidable mentioning them here because of course the way the film invalidates serious emotion by showing in so many ways that Death Is Not The End and is consequently meaningless impacts on Reylo and the fact that Ben dies.

Another nice moment was the snatching of the beads through the Force Bond. I mean, Kylo literally stole some fertility-coded beads from Rey’s neck!? Uh, this subtext is rapidly becoming text, as they say. Pasaana was weird though, right? Rey talks to children, is at a festival of life, she is fulfilling her role of becoming a symbolic mother which she started in TLJ and which fits the child Jedi at the end of that film (who was never seen again but we’ll deal with that later) and Kylo receives a gift of a necklace (a feminine symbol) from her immediately afterwards... This is pretty hot and heavy symbolism. Of their union and a future involving children, real or metaphorical.

And Rey learns how to heal with the Force, trying it on a giant worm as practice. This fits with her heroine’s journey - she is not using the lightsaber (a symbol of masculine power) but is using her power to preserve and save, which is feminine power. So far so good. I mean, it’s a shame they are wasting all these Force Bond sessions backtracking on TLJ to the extent that instead of enjoying their interactions, I’m going “Yeah yeah yeah okay but we’ve already done this but better”. But there’s still development so it’s okay and sometimes it’s even kind of hot.

Rey Palpatine. 

Oh dear.

Look, it’s not the thing itself. The union of a Skywalker and a Palpatine, the balance coming from the union of two great families on either side of the Force, is honestly not a bad idea at all. Ben as the Skywalker with a bit of darkness in him balanced by Rey the Palpatine with a bit of light in her. BALANCE. It could be beautiful. 

Unfortunately it isn’t. Rey’s lineage was resolved really well in TLJ. Rey Nobody is a great idea for all the reasons everyone already says - opening up the Force to everyone instead of keeping it as a kind of aristocratic lineage etc. Retconning this is really unnecessary and also sends a terrible message to the audience, especially women, as everyone has already discussed to death. Rey is literally told her power comes from a creepy old man who won’t stay dead instead of something innate within her. Instead of letting the past die, we are digging it up like an overzealous and ignorant 19th century British aristocrat let loose in Egypt with a pick-axe and period-applicable racism. Rey is then told that her parents sold her and abandoned her… to protect her. Another great message. And apparently Luke, Han and Leia all knew this?????? Honestly, I was confused by all this when I was watching the film but from what I’ve read afterwards it seems this is the case and in which case not only does that not make literally any sense at all in terms of what happened in TFA and TLJ but also has pretty awful implications for the OT characters and how they related to Ben. 

As I mentioned, it is also unnecessary for the plot for Rey to be a Palpatine. If Palpatine has to come back (which he doesn’t but okay whatever) then surely it’s enough that Rey is extremely strong in the Force for him to either want to kill her or want to control her? Like, literally that’s what he did to Anakin. Why does she have to be related to him unless the film is making some very unfortunate conclusions about blood. Good blood, bad blood… yeeeaaaaaah, this isn’t great as a message. It could be but that’s not the story the first two films have told. Also does Palpatine want to kill her or control her? Like, I’m genuinely not clear on that. I’m not sure he is. I’m not sure the film is. What is actually going on? Also if Palpatine has been controlling Ben his entire life why the hell didn’t he control Rey? Surely it’s easier to invade and control the mind of his own flesh and blood than that of another random Force child he isn’t related to? Who is surrounded by other powerful Force users? When Rey is all alone? Like if Palpatine is able to build up an insanely massive army that nobody has noticed across the Galaxy while still being kind of dead, surely he can access the mind of Rey on Jakku? Also, how did he manage to impregnate a human woman while being sort of dead and old? On both a mythical level and on the level of a question of taste and plausibility, HOW??? 

THIS PLOT MAKES LITERALLY NO SENSE WHAT IS GOING ON AAAARGGGHHH 

And breathe. 

So anyway, Rey Palpatine. Rey and Kylo fight and Rey kills Kylo. It didn’t really work for me though I’d have to watch again to figure out precisely why. This epic, wet fight just… wasn’t quite as epic as I expected it to be. Maybe it was because Finn was randomly there. Maybe it was because it didn’t have the dialogue from the trailer. Maybe it was because I was just tired of watching them fight and not seeing their relationship progress during the film when it had already progressed beyond this in TLJ. And she kills him like it’s a calculated thing when his guard is down and this whole thing is a mess. Now, it’s coming back to me! The order of events don’t make sense. The characterisation doesn’t make sense. 

Kylo and Rey are fighting. Leia gives her life force to communicate something to her son and dies in the process. I don’t quite understand what she’s doing and why this means she has to die. She’s not force projecting like Luke did. How is this different from in TLJ when she says “Ben” then and he waivers about killing her? She was fine after that! I get that they’re working with what they could for Leia but nevertheless, if you’re going to include it in an actual film, it’s still got to have internal consistency. Not that this film cares. Anyway, Leia dies to make Kylo pause and then Rey kills him which seems very rushed and kind of mean but whatever. Then Rey immediately uses Chekov’s healing to bring him back to life and when she does he’s Ben without a scar. So this is all confusing to me. Did Leia redeam him by saying “Ben”? Did she do anything else that makes sense of her dying? Did Rey killing Kylo bring Ben back? Was it Han’s memory? A combination of all these factors?

But the order strikes me as off. The death of Kylo Ren to allow Ben Solo to live is good. Excellent content. But all that is needed to do this is for Kylo to die – meaningfully (which being randomly stabbed by his lover at the moment when he was changing does not quite feel to me) and be brought back to life – meaningfully. I’m not saying what Rey did wasn’t impressive but I don’t remember being overawed by the music and the cinematography here. This is in many ways, or should be, the turning point in the entire ST: the moment when Ben Solo is reborn. And the exact moment of it happening is uncertain. And does he need the moment with Han’s memory afterwards? I’m not saying it wasn’t very touching to see Han and to have their moment together but it nevertheless didn’t quite gell. Like so many things in this film, it’s a nice moment that is over too quickly and doesn’t quite hang together with coherent plotting and characterisation. The entire sequence is rushed with too much happening – fight, Leia, death, healing, Han, lightsaber, RANDOM FINN etc. etc. And in fact, this moment that should be climactic is then later overshadowed by later Ben healing Rey in the same way, a completely narratalogically meaningless act. But more on that later. 

And I realise that in my hurry to get to this fight, I’ve forgotten Dark!Rey. Dark!Rey, like Rey Palpatine, is an idea that could and should be amazing and, apart from the cool graphics and a moment of gasp for effect, isn’t and fundamentally doesn’t work. Rey is struggling with her inner darkness throughout this film, something that was suggested in both TFA and TLJ, so I’m very much on board with it, and I think it’s important to see women on screen be angry and especially angry in a wild, ugly way. I think Daisy Ridley did a great job with that. But TROS attributed this anger and darkness to Palpatine rather that all the myriad and understandable reasons that Rey had for being angry. Perhaps that could work in some contexts as a metaphorical way of showing her anger but Palpatine is too present physically for that to stick. Instead, her characterisation is given wholesale to her genes and a male influence. This is… not great.

Confronting the dark part of one’s self is vitally important in the heroine’s journey. Only when the heroine has reconciled the dark parts of her psyche can the heroine be whole. TROS has worked out that this important but then hasn’t really known how to execute it. The physical manifestation of Dark!Rey for Light!Rey to fight is hellishly unsubtle and is also over so quick you quickly forget that she’s there. (Again, momentary effect is prioritised over anything that actually makes sense in terms of storytelling.) As a manifestation of Rey’s inner anger, she’s completely pointless. Rey fights her quickly but fighting Dark!Rey doesn’t result in Rey unifiying her dark impulses with her heroic self. She still has dark impulses throughout the film! In fact, she never succeeds in fully reconciling them. If defeating Dark!Rey had been a striking and climactic moment then that would work, but it doesn’t. She continues to fight Kylo straight afterwards and Kylo himself is in some respects (certainly in TLJ) a physical manifestation of what Rey fears and needs in herself. It is Kylo who is truly Rey’s dark double in TFA and TLJ. He tells her what she knows and cannot admit, forcing her to confront that in herself. He attracts her yet repels her. According to what is set up in TFA and TLJ, until Rey can both kill Kylo and reconcile with him, she is not conquering and reconciling with that part of herself. After all, they are two halves of one protagonist. But in TROS Kylo no longer seems to take that role, or not coherently. For example, he delivers information (“Rey, yer a Palpatine lol”) that she doesn’t in fact know. So it doesn’t work. And yet it also doesn’t work that Rey fights Dark!Rey and then immediately goes off and fights Kylo! One of those fights is redundant, perhaps both. If Dark!Rey had been a real character who does stuff, who tempts Kylo, who replaces Rey (Odile/Odette-like) then this would be meaningful. But she doesn’t. I know that some people are arguing that Rey in the subsequent fights is possessed by Dark!Rey but honestly? I did not see that in the film and I just do not think the film is sufficiently coherent to be that subtle about something that is such a major plot point! So she continues to struggle with darkness even after supposedly defeating Dark!Rey which is just nonsense in terms of mythology. She struggles all the way up to her confrontation with Palpatine. 

So let’s get to that. Look, I’m going to be completely honest here: I have no idea what was going on. Palpatine was rigged up on a crane on creepy evil villain life support, there was a giant jam jar filled with pickled Snoke heads, Rey was there, Ben showed up having thrown away one lightsaber but then found another two lightsabers (there were a lot of lightsabers, I couldn’t keep track of which was which and why they were significant), the Knights of Ren were there to do a soundcheck for their upcoming gig IDEK, Finn wasn’t there which made a change and Palpatine wanted Rey to kill him so she would become super powerful until he didn’t want her to kill him. He was tempting her and used the standard threat of “I’m going to destroy the universe unless you take on these super dangerous powers to stop me but if you do then you’ll be evil yourself mwhahaha”. I’m not sure really how that benefits him. Was his end-game plan to build up a massive Sith Empire for his darling granddaughter to rule, ignore her for years in favour of corrupting Ben Solo via some dude called Snoke and then reappear from nowhere in order to die again so she could rule? Because that’s a really, really flawed plan. Like, my cullender is less holey than that plan. I may have got this wrong. But before anyone jumps in to “Well, actually” me, my point is valid: I’m an intelligent viewer who spends plenty of time thinking about SW. If I couldn’t follow the main reveal plan in the climactic film of the ST, then… that is a flaw in the writing and conception. It shouldn’t be that difficult!

 Anyway, back to Rey. She is being tempted yet again (which she shouldn’t be by this point in the film or trilogy) and, briefly (though I’ve mostly given up on hope for this film by this point) I am engaged by her quandery. I think it would be really interested if she takes the power offered and fully embraces her Palpatine heritage – she becomes a Sith in order to save the lives of her friends! Perhaps Dark!Rey was just a warm up to seeing the real Rey transform into Dark!Rey. Then Ben has to save her! As she has saved him from being Kylo Ren, he will save her from being Dark!Rey! Balance. So I think that could be interesting and it raises some interesting moral questions about whether doing something bad for good reasons is ever justifiable. But of course Rey resists! Rey is not allowed to actually do anything bad in this movie! It’s infuriating! Rey is completely good. I think the message the film thinks it’s giving out is that Rey is more than her ancestry – that she is good despite being a Palpatine, that everyone has the power to move beyond their background. Unfortunately, that message was already there when she was Rey Nobody! And the actual message is that Rey is a static, pure character who despite apparently containing darkness is never in any way truly tempted by it or gives into it. Any narrative tension over whether she will succumb or do something interesting is very rapidly dismissed. Just as Chewie’s death is retconned and C-3PO gets his memory back. 

Anyway Ben arrives and they somehow have two lightsabers (???? whatever) and stand and face Palpatine and I think at this point we need to talk about how this is just waaaaay less impressive on every level than them facing Snoke in TLJ. There was tension there and uncertainty and when they fought together it was genuinely breathtaking and surprising. There was no surprise about Ben and Rey facing Palpatine together, but there was a tired feeling of “Oh look, we’ve got to face off against another creepy old man who wants to hold onto power for evil after his time is well over. Oh well, I guess if we have to…” If nothing else, this sums up the Millenial experience very well! Ultimately, not only is Palpatine a confusing final villain, he’s also a boring one. The Chancellor in the PT was interesting on a political level, the Emperor was truly creepy as a foil to Darth Vader in the OT, but this fossil on life-support is neither scary nor original nor even particularly threatening.

That’s the thing with escalating the threats continuously – it becomes meaningless. Making the Boss bigger and badder and threatening the Universe instead of the Galaxy doesn’t make the drama more exciting, it just makes it less believable. It looks very impressive to have the entire sky filled with ships and the threat of Palpatine destroying everything but it’s also ultimately meaningless. A massive threat just means a massive reset button or deus ex force lightning. Superhero movies are very guilty of this terrible storytelling, so is Doctor Who. First London faces an alien threat, then England, then the planet, then the Galaxy, then the Universe… and where do you go from there? The audience doesn’t care about the world at large, they only care about our plucky little heroes and their lives. If Palpatine had said “I have Finn and Poe and if you don’t take on these Sith powers I’m going to murder them” the effect would have been the same, maybe even better because Rey’s dilemma would have been even more personal. Hey, another interesting idea: “I have Ben. Only way to save him is to adopt Sith powers!” Anyway.

So this confrontation is yet another less impressive copy of the throne room scene in TLJ. The lore also gets confusing here. Ben and Rey are tortured which makes no sense because doesn’t Palpatine want Rey alive? Not sure what he’s trying to achieve here except it makes our heroes look powerless. Then Rey takes on the force lightning and does some snazzy special effects to win the war very easily. So easily that you feel no emotion whatsoever at how easily this massive army of ships is instantly wiped out. (Side point, but I’m guessing there were lots of people on those ships and Rey’s just killed them all? And considering we’ve just got an admittedly half-baked but still a plot about the defection of storm troopers, isn’t this just a bit concerning? But Rey can do no wrong and it’s all for the greater good because this is the Light Side of the Force and she is All The Jedi so I guess we’ll just pass over this casual genocide on the part of our heroine.) This seems to kill Rey despite Palpatine telling her to do it to get more power a few minutes earlier. No seriously, isn’t this what happens? I’m so confused. At which point Ben force heals her as she force heals him and whereas she was fine and dandy after doing it, it kills him.

Which… okay. Is a thing that happens. It’s hella inconsistent. And makes no sense. But okay, I mean, okay. I wasn’t even sad. I was just like “…right.” And fortunately the film immediately moves on and completely fails to acknowledge Ben’s existence while triumphant music plays. So that’s a thing.

Remember how I said at the beginning of this meandering dissertation that I was always aware of Ben dying being a possible ending but it was the execution that failed here? Right! Well, the thing is that every time a death happens in the context of a hero’s journey, it’s got to mean something. In a world where people can be resurrected and, uh, SW is very much that world (or it is in TROS), then you can’t just die for no reason! And neither Rey nor Ben’s deaths made sense. Rey absolutely needs an underworld journey as part of her heroine’s journey but her death near the end of the film does not fulfil that criterion. An underworld journey is a way for a heroine to shed part of her behind, to learn something, and to confront herself. The cave scene was Rey’s journey to the underworld. Arguably, the scene on Pasaana where she learned force healing was another type of katabasis. Heck, you can argue that when she finds the lightsaber in TFA it’s a katabasis or when she ships herself to Ben in a coffin it’s another. Like. Rey has lots of metaphorical underworld journeys. But when she dies at the end of TROS she has already reunited with Ben, she has no darkness in her that needs to be purged because she never waivered from the light and when she is brought back she is the same person she was before. Unlike Ben who comes back from the dead literally a different person. So Rey’s death makes no sense either in terms of the magical world and powers in play but also for her heroine’s journey. Maybe she could have collapsed. Maybe the effort should have drained her and Ben of their Force powers – a sacrifice for using powers they shouldn’t have touched. That would have made sense and would have been entirely fitting. But death? Nope.

And Ben’s death consequently makes no sense. Force healing has been established within the very same movie to have no real consequences on the user (also similarly established in The Mandalorian) so Ben’s death makes less sense than anything else in the entire film. The internal logic of the film says that there are no consequences for force healing. And then it kills off someone who does it. Sadness is not the reaction to that; confusion is. And then on a mythological level, Ben shouldn’t die. Kylo has already died. And Ben has been reborn!  I know it’s a meme, but Ben has done nothing wrong. Kylo has been punished for his actions and what is left is Ben. This is very, very clearly spelled out within the film. This makes Ben’s death a senseless tragedy that makes no sense, a final death in a film that has continually shown that death is not real or an ending. Except for Ben Solo. Because… I don’t know? I’ve managed to go 4812 words without mentioning redemption but I guess I can’t avoid it now. I’m actually not a big fan of redemption because it gets all thorny and becomes about morality and specifically Christian morality and I’m just… I’m tired of that. I’m a classicist and stories of classical mythology and classical heroism have nothing to do with redemption and being good and evil and I really see the Skywalkers as a kind of Greek tragedy lineage rather than people who have to be redeemed. I know Vader died changing his mind and killing the Emperor for his son but I don’t see that as redemption. That was a man who had done many awful things making a choice out of love at the very end of his life. And again, Ben saved Rey – this was an act of personal love and had nothing to do with the Galaxy. Redemption seems to be an active, ongoing thing that is about more than the purely personal. Vader wasn’t redeemed and neither was Ben – because he didn’t have a chance. And it all gets confused because, as I keep saying, Kylo Ren died!!!! On a mythical level, that’s all that’s needed! Ben Solo, on a mythic level, has nothing to prove, nothing to atone for, nothing for which he requires redemption. On the level that SW is also a story of politics, if Ben had lived, he would have had to reconcile his past actions as Kylo Ren with his present experience as Ben Solo – and it would have been fair if he had to pay a penalty in the human world. But not the death penalty. Because he has already paid that. Ben succeeds in reconciling and facing off his inner darkness in the way that Rey does not in this film. But he is then punished again and dies needlessly and shockingly in order to save Rey, who also shouldn’t have died.

It’s very unsatisfactory. On a mythic level, it really doesn’t make sense.

And I haven’t even mentioned the whole thing about if they are dyad (lol I keep reading this as dryad and getting a very weird set of mental images) or two halves of a protagonist or soulmates or whatever you want to call it where if one dies the bond just remains as a wound. This is a scenario where Rey and Ben have been very clearly set up as a pair animus/anima hero/heroine who belong together whether that is in life or death. I’ve just been reading about Brunnhild and Siegfried from the Nibelung Ring Saga – they both die at the end when they’ve finally been reunited but they are united in death. It’s sad but their death is inevitable after what’s happened to them and it’s sort of uplifting because they are together. This could definitely have worked for Rey and Ben. And considering death doesn’t stop you appearing multiple times and even doing cool stuff like lifting ships out of the sea, it wouldn’t even have been very sad. The mystical hero/heroine who cannot remain in society once their journey is complete is not uncommon. Look at Frodo going off with the Elves in a metaphor for death at the end of LotR where the more down-to-earth Sam is able to stay and rebuild. It would make total sense for Ben and Rey to be unable to integrate with society at the end of TROS whether that means simply exile or death. So long as they are together.

Anyway, they’re not together which makes the whole thing horribly unbalanced and unnervingly wrong on a profound level. The myth is broken! It simply does. not. work.

But if the ending for Ben and Reylo as a whole was disturbing, false, internally inconsistent and emotionally empty, that’s nothing to the ending Rey gets. Lots of people have already written about this so I’ll try to be brief. Rey has no connection to Tatooine. Rey is not allowed to grieve. Rey regresses to a childhood state, her very definite, spelled out future as a symbolic mother being absolutely aborted. Rey takes as a family name one that she has no personal connection. Rey is left with absent friends and nobody but the ghosts of Luke (who she didn’t like) and Leia to talk to in the role of weirdly incestuous sterile parents. So I guess this is a win for the Luke/Leia shippers?

Okay, I just need to rant a moment. (Yes, this is 5556 words of ranting but you’ve got this far – indulge me?) I’ve seen several takes from people I follow who aren’t Reylos saying that this is a great ending for Rey because she has a family and I’m just like ARE YOU EFFING SERIOUS?????? Are you ACTUALLY trying to tell me that living alone on a barren, desert planet reminiscent of where she lived as a child before she heard the call to adventure, where she was symbolically asleep with nobody but the GHOSTS OF SIBLINGS for company and ABSENT FRIENDS is FINDING A FAMILY???????????? JUST KILL HER ALREADY – she’s ALREADY DEAD!!!!! You want to make me feel Rey at the end even if Ben is dead? Show her surrounded by her found family in the Resistance and show her WORKING WITH CHILDREN?????????????? IT. WOULD. NOT. BE. HARD. TO. DO. THAT. AND. MAKE. IT. UPLIFTING. But this -this is just painful, truly painful and insulting. And don’t give me this crap that she’s not living there, she’s just there temporarily to bury the lightsabers and leave and go back to her friends. WHAT ABSOLUTE BULLSHIT. This is the ENDING of a NINE MOVIE SAGA. The ending matters???? And the ending is of Rey alone with the droid she rescued two movies back staring at some binary suns that only matter to the audience and not to her. THE FILM DOES NOT TELL US THAT SHE IS GOING TO LEAVE AND MEET HER FRIENDS. THE FILM DOES NOT TELL US THAT. IT DOES NOT IMPLY THAT. So this is a bloody stupid argument.

Yeah, I cracked. I don’t regret it. This is so infuriating I actually have literally nothing to say about “Rey Skywalker”. Like, whatever. The film’s already done its worse. Just… whatever. Who cares at this point? It’s meaningless. I laughed in despair at the cinema screen and was glad it was over.

 The fact is, according to the heroine’s journey, this isn’t the end of the story. It makes sense that within 24 hours of the film premiering, AO3 was filling up with “fix-it fics” where Rey goes to the World Between Worlds to get Ben back. Because that’s what heroines do. They save their loved ones. They do it patiently and through endurance. And they always succeed. And unlike heroes who go to the underworld to save their wives (cf Orpheus), heroines who go to get their man succeed. This story needs Rey, like Psyche, to go save Ben. She hasn’t finished her heroine’s journey. In fact, she is in many ways back where she started. Her attempts to integrate and confront her darkness have been confused and ultimately meaningless. She has not unified permanently with her lover yet. She has not become either a literal or symbolic mother. There is a stage in the heroine’s journey where she retreats to where she comes from for reflection and growth. That is acceptable. But that is not the ending!!!

And to place this ending of the film, with Rey smiling and saying “Rey Skywalker” as if this means something and some triumphant music over the top alongside what so many viewers feel instinctively, namely that the myth is incomplete and broken, leaves the audience – or at least it left me – feeling cheated and empty and bemused about why it feels so wrong. Ultimately Ben dead and Rey pregnant would make more narrative sense than the sterile and barren and infantilised ending we were given. And that was just about the worst case scenario of bad writing that we ever thought could happen. 

The myth is broken. Good night.

(Tune in soon to the much shorter Part Three where I discuss everything else that isn’t Reylo related that is wrong with this movie.)

[weirdconnections]

On Finn, Poe and Rey(lo) - TROS aftermath

I’m writing this post because I’m a Reylo shipper and I’m tired of receiving hate from the Stormpilot/Finnrey shippers who say Reylos don’t care about Poe and Finn.

I’m gonna be 100% honest and tell you that I didn’t even ship reylo until after TLJ. My first ship for this new trilogy was Stormpilot and I was completely sold on it from The Force Awakens. And I also believed prior to watching TFA that Finn would be the new generation Jedi of this trilogy and the protagonist of this story.

I was not disappointed to learn that Rey was the new Jedi because I loved the idea of finally exploring a female Jedi, but I was kinda disappointed to learn that Finn had no apparent connections to the force.

This being said, the one thing I love about TROS is that they made Finn force sensitive canon, which is something TFA clearly set up and in The Last Jedi we didn’t get a chance to explore it much.

With that in mind, TLJ surprised me a lot, and even though Reylo was the surprise I loved the most, I hated how they made Rose Finn’s love interest as a way o putting Stormpilot on a grave once and for all. In spite of this, TLJ helped establish some great character arcs for Finn and Poe which defined their objectives and goals for the next movie.

Going into TROS I was totally sold on Reylo but I was still longing for Stormpilot. Even though I knew that Disney would not make it canon or even hint at a romantic relationship between the two,  I still had hopes that this would be a satisfying movie in terms of exploring the trio’s relationship, and that it would be interesting to see their dynamic now that Finn had a concrete purpose on the narrative which diverged totally from what we thought he had before. He was no longer in the game to either help Poe or Rey, he was in it for himself and he truly believed the rebellion’s cause.

I was excited to see the trio’s relationship grow and to see how profound their bond was now that over a year had passed after the events of TLJ. This was something that disappointed me a lot in TROS.  The first scene between the three of them is very good example on how this movie failed completely at making us invested in their friendship. Rey cannot stand Poe’s imperative and impulsive decisions and Finn is simply stuck in the middle because he had nowhere else to be.

Finn doesn’t have any agency in this movie, his sole purpose is to go along with everything Poe and Rey say. The scene where Poe makes him general is great but also makes me angry that Finn is only promoted when Poe has no one else to turn to. And here’s where I think JJ failed the most with these characters:

The Last Jedi established that Poe could be a great leader If he only put his mind into strategy instead of impulsiveness and if he allowed others to share their ideas for a better solution instead of following his own gut and blowing stuff up just because.

Finn on the other hand learned that war is a double edged sword and you can’t fight something without the purpose of saving what you love because then you are not better than the bad guys and you are simply participating in a system designed to exploit and inflict suffering on others, justified by whatever side you’re on.

Both of these characters had massive potential in becoming great heroes, alongside Rey, who finally becomes a powerful Jedi and who is now ready to fight for the Resistance. Finn should have been Poe’s voice of reason, advising him on battles and thinking of ways to enlist rebel Stormtroopers such as him to improve the Resistance’s numbers in the process. 

Honestly, I loved Jannah but I felt that she should have appeared much earlier in the story and that Finn should have been the one to introduce her and the other Stormtrooper defectors. A whole year passed and what had Finn been up to? Oh yeah, he was stuck in the middle of Poe and Rey’s childish spats.

As for Poe I believe this character was simply badly written and he could have filled the same purpose on TROS without treating Rey like rebellious child who wants to play with magic instead of picking up a gun. Not to mention and they could have had a great friendship, since Poe was basically Leia’s second in command and I do not believe for a second she wouldn’t have explained to him how important was Rey’s training and how they could have strategized the Resistance moves way better with that in mind.

The scene where Rey tells them she knows how to find Exegol could have been 10x better if Poe had given us an indication of having had previous conversations with Rey about the Jedi and how they always helped in saving the f*cking Galaxy from evil. So he would throw in a “May the force be with us” line and you would know that these characters not only grew closer during the year that passed but that they also understand and respect each other. And the scene where Poe wants to leave Rey behind would not have existed at all because both Poe and Finn would have been shouting her name, worried for their friend’s safety going up against Kylo Ren, and the only reason he’d wanna leave would be because Finn (as the voice of reason) would have told him reluctantly that they had no other choice but to trust she would be able to handle herself, so they could go back to base. It would have given the scene a lot more emotional weight. And it would have prevented Finn from seeming like a lost puppy by shouting Rey’s name whenever he had the chance to. 

So yeah I ship both Reylo and Stormpilot. I respect Finnrey. 

I think TROS was very dissatisfying in terms of how they handled Finn and Poe’s characters. 

Finn deserved so much better as a character that was set up to be one of the main protagonists. He simply was not written this way at all. It feels like they simply didn’t care enough to give him a relevant plot within the movie which is infuriating because it would have been goddamn easy to link him with Jannah. And if they were going to rub in our faces that Stormpilot could never ever happen might as well have given him a love subplot with her, and I would have been fine with it because at least it would have given his character more depth. Not to mention the great stormtrooper desertor’s cause that he could have been the leader of.

As for Poe, I would have loved to see him care more about Rey and to have more understanding of how the Jedi always influenced the previous and current wars. Leia was sister to Luke Skywalker, the myth, the legend. You cannot tell me Poe would not have been interested in knowing more about the force with blatant evidence to confirm that the Dark Side always represented the oppressive regime the Resistance/Light Side fought against.   It would have been great to see this as a part of their strategy not only because Rey was the one with the secret Jedi texts that led them to Exegol but because he also had faith in the force and learned to trust in it and much as in his X-wing canons. This would have made Leia so proud because it was exactly was she was trying to teach him in the previous movie.

That’s my take on the trio and TROS, guys.

 Let me know your own thoughts!

[eirenare]

Got tagged by @sassy-solo-shrug ! Thank you for sending these tag games, they’re lovely and it makes me happy to get tagged in them (even though I take like an eternity to reply for X or Y omg, thank you so much for your patience)! ♥♥  I’ve cheated a bit and added some movie series mentions rather than just a movie though, but choosing is just so hard at times haha

TOP 7 COMFORT MOVIES (you don’t have to tell why they are your comfort movies or talk about them, I’m just doing it because I feel like doing it lol)

“Star Wars: The Last Jedi” (my fave SW movie, a masterpiece in all levels and it has my favorite ship of all times, the goosebumps are strong with this one but so are the feels and the smiles at some points)

“Star Wars: The Force Awakens” (my 1st SW movie which means it has a very very soft spot in my heart, hard not to smile watching certain parts of it)

“How to train your Dragon” (any of the movie series will do, but I have the softest spot for the 1st one and pride for how Hiccup and Toothless changed it all)

“Harry Potter” (they’re my childhood and I specially love the first 3 ones)

“The Lion King 2″ (... is it really a surprise, seeing that I’m a big Reylo lover? Or rather, is it a surprise that a Reylo loved first Kiara and Kovu? These two lions aside though, the OST is amazing and this lion-like adaptation of Romeo and Juliet with all these themes is beautiful AND with a happy ending—still waiting for Disney to give us another TLK series or movie with Kovu and Kiara and their cub(s) though *cough*)

“Pirates of the Caribbean” (one of the best movie series, it has a little bit of everything, I love how they mixed pirates with legends and myths, and what can I say except it’s lots of fun)

“Lilo and Stitch” (give me all and every one of them and the series included but specially the 1st movie, Lilo and Stitch’s friendship is so precious)

TAGGING: @desfraisespartout​ , and whoever wants to do this tag game just do it! ♥ :D

[writing-with-dragons]

So, I wrote a thing?

I have not written anything in YEARS so this will probably be dreadful and have an unforgivable amount of grammar and style errors. Oh, well. 

So how do I explain this...? This is a kind-of Frozen inspired fix-it / re-imagining / alternative universe Reylo fanfiction?? I’m really just using the some of the SONGS from Frozen and not much of the story itself as inspiration. Frozen 2 and TROS are both available to watch at home now and I’ve been kind of bored during self-isolation and well, this is the result? 

In this AU, Ben and Rey are only 5 years apart. Their storylines and the major events in their lives are even more closely linked together than they are in the original story.  This is just the first part. I’m posting this now, as a sort of test I guess. If anyone actually likes it I might polish it up a bit and continue it? Here it is kiddos:

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The day Rey is born, on the other side of the galaxy and many planets away, 5 year-old Ben Solo feels a shift in the force. It was as though a wave was crashing over him. Overwhelming and drowning him in its intensity while also completely wrapping him in its welcoming warmth. Being only a child he is unable to put his feelings into words. He is both uncomfortable and fascinated by these new ripples in the usually still water-like presence of the force. His confusion leads to unprecedented tantrums and outbursts of the force from the usually sweet-tempered child, leaving his family concerned and starting to fear the worst. This disturbance in the force becomes the new normal for young Ben as he continues to grow, he subconsciously begins to accept and even expect this other presence in his mind. 

Every time he mentions or tries to explain this foreign feeling to any of his family he can sense the fear and even grief it brings, so he begins to keep both the presence and his own feelings to himself. As he grows Ben discovers that as it turns out, his abilities in the force are even more rare and unusual than he had originally thought. They frighten and confuse his teachers, they alienate his classmates. His mother skirts around the issue, finding increasingly subtle ways of advising him to conceal his abilities as much as possible. Being a very astute little boy, Ben quickly realizes that his abilities are very much tied to his emotions and so the solution becomes quite obvious. In order to conceal his abilities he must first keep a firm hold on his emotions. It was simple, really: conceal, don’t feel. Don’t let it show. Very quickly, the young Solo becomes quite skilled at pretending and hiding behind a mask of self-control. A skill he would later learn was more of a family trait.

At around the age of eight, Ben was playing outside by himself as his mother kept a loose watch over him. Normally, he would make his toy ships fly around the garden using the force. He would stage what he believed to be elaborate battles, using small rocks as asteroids and his mother’s rose bushes as canyons and mountains to maneuver through as his nursery droid kept a detailed score of battles won and lost. But not today, not with his mother around. The young Solo knew that his frequent use of the force was unsettling even to his parents. He didn’t want to give her a reason to leave, not when this was one of the few times she decided to work at home rather than at her senate office. So he pretended to make repairs on his ships, like he had seen his uncle Chewie do on his father’s old ship so many times before. He muttered to himself about compressors, leaks and motivators while his mother worked on the seemingly endless documents she always had to prioritize. 

Out of the corner of his eye, Ben saw his mother suddenly stiffen and turn completely towards him. The rare gesture caught Ben’s full attention as he pretended not to notice the sudden shift of atmosphere in the quiet garden. He kept up the air of nonchalance as he heard his mother approach him and tried not to flinch as he felt her hand stroke his hair. 

Slowly, he put down his toy x-wing as he turned to face his mother, trying to keep all apprehension from his face and maybe even smile at the touch. Turning to look at his mother, he could tell he was not the only one forcing nonchalance. His mother looked at him the way one looked at a wild animal they were being careful not to startle, fearing what might come from its agitation. 

Her hand moved down to his cheek and stroked it as her eyes searched his and her mouth parted slightly. She was weighing her words, he realized. She was being careful around him, trying not to spook him. They always seemed to be walking circles around him as of late, it no longer surprised him. Finally she spoke, her voice saccharine, completely unlike her normal tone. “Sweetheart…” she said softly. Trepidation hiding behind her smile. “Do you remember a long time ago, you said you felt a presence? In your mind?”

Ben nodded, keeping his face as still as possible.

His mother nodded along with him before pausing and stroking his cheek with her thumb once again.

“Do you… do you still feel that presence?”

Yes. Everyday. That presence felt like a part of him now. Sometimes he felt it more strongly than others, but it was always there in the back of his mind. Like an imprint on his very soul. He wanted to tell her; he wanted to be honest, to be able to share all of his secrets with his mother. His fears of this presence and even how sometimes, the presence comforted him and eased him into sleep at night. 

But he saw the fear in his mother’s eyes, felt it in her touch. He wanted her to tell him that whatever it was, they would figure it out together and that nothing would change. He wanted her to see his entire self and accept him, regardless.That wouldn’t happen, of course. His mother feared the presence more than he did, so did his father and his uncles. But they would never tell him that. And more importantly, they would never tell him why. 

So he lied.

Forcing a smile, he shook his head. 

“No. No, I don’t.”

The change was instantaneous. His mother’s shoulders relaxed and her smile seemed to finally reach her eyes as words left her lips in breathy sighs. “Good, that's good.” She said, leaving a kiss on his temple as she rose, turning her back to him and walking back towards her work. 

Ben kept his eyes on her back for as long as he could before being caught and turning back to his toys. He traced the design on the x-wing with his finger as he finally felt his own tension leaving his shoulders.

He had done the right thing, he thought to himself. The truth would have only upset his mother, it would have made her turn away from him. People always fear what they cannot understand, and she wouldn’t understand. She couldn’t understand. Neither could his father, or uncle Chewie. Least of all uncle Luke.

 No, he would keep the presence to himself for now. He scratched the paint on the miniature x-wing with his nail as he continued to ease his nerves. He had painted it to look just like his Uncle Luke’s old ship, or at least as close as he could make it. His uncle had long since turned in his flight helmet for jedi robes and all that remained of the young rebel pilot were the stories he would pry out of his father and a few blurry holos. 

It was then that a sudden realization struck the young Solo. Just because he couldn’t share his secret with his uncle, it didn’t mean the legendary jedi couldn’t help him understand the mysterious presence. 

The presence, he knew, was tied to the force. And so, in order to understand it, he had to first understand the force. He had always been fascinated by the myth of the jedi, the legend and the hope they embodied. And taking into account his heritage and family legacy, it wouldn’t come as a surprise to his parents if he suddenly showed an interest in learning more about the force and the jedi.  He decided then and there that he would become one of his uncle’s apprentices, he would learn the way of the jedi and on the way he would learn the truth of this other presence in his mind. 

*************************************************

Ben waited about a month after his encounter with his mother to mention his desire to learn the ways of the jedi to his parents. It was one of the very rare occasions in which his entire family was sitting down, sharing a meal together. His father and uncle Chewie had already had a few drinks, they were cracking jokes and challenging each other to not-so friendly games of Dejarik. His mother and uncle Luke, ever the more solemn members of the group, looked on with pleasant smiles on their faces as they quietly reminded the ex-smugglers just how badly their last Dejarik competition had turned out. 

This was good, they were all enjoying themselves. This was the right time, they were happy and relaxed, there was no way they would say no!

Ben reached out his small hand and grabbed a hold of his uncle Luke’s sleeve, both he and his mother, who sat close to him as usual, turned to face him with comforting smiles. Yes, this couldn’t go wrong!

“What is it, Ben?” uncle Luke asked. His face was open and welcoming and it filled Ben with confidence.

“Um, I was thinking…,” his excitement was growing, he could feel the smile on his cheeks as he spoke and he met his uncle’s eyes with his own.

“I want to train to be a jedi! Just like you, Uncle!”

Ben regretted his words only seconds after they left his lips. There was another shift in the force, but this time the source was not unknown. It was more than obvious as the glass in his mother’s hand shattered, and the banter coming from his father and uncle screeched to a halt. 

Ben let go of his uncle’s sleeve as though the fabric might burn him, clapped his hands together and placed them firmly on his lap. He stared at them as his mind raced, trying to figure out how to undo his mistake.

“I- I’m sorry… I didn’t mean. I just… I thought-”

Panic enveloped him, words stuck in his throat forming a lump that made it hard for him to breathe. 

“I’m sorry”, his face was hot and his vision was getting blurry… was he crying?

A heavy hand was placed firmly on his shoulder, he willed himself to look up to his uncle Luke, his expression once open was now serious and questioning.

“Ben, are you feeling the pull of the force?” his uncle’s voice betrayed no emotion.

He wanted to be honest, he wanted to tell him the truth. But he could feel it, he could see it; their fear, their rejection just lurking on the horizon ready to tear him down. Ben’s eyes darted across his uncle's face, looking for any clue as to what the right answer might be but the jedi offered him no life line. 

His mother’s voice broke through the thickening silence. “Is it…,” she swallowed heavily as she pushed the words out of her throat and Ben thought he saw her eyes watering. But no, it must have been a trick of the light. His mother was the mighty General Organa, she wouldn’t let her emotions overpower her. 

“Is it the presence? Are you feeling that presence again? In your head?”

All eyes were on him, he could feel himself shrinking under the weight of their stares.

Ben started to speak, “I -”

His words died on his tongue as his father shot out of his chair, the shriek of wood over tile stunning the boy into silence.

“Absolutely not.” Han spoke out harshly, he was looking directly at his uncle Luke. Ben had never seen his father turn so serious. Han’s hand was twitching over the spot where his blaster used to reside and immediately Ben felt as though he was no longer part of the conversation but rather, just a spectator. 

His mother’s hand was resting on her forehead now, shadowing the rest of her face. She looked so prematurely tired, as if she knew the conversation that followed would use whatever strength she had left. 

“Han... “ she started, already sounding out of breath. “Please.”

His father bristled, and turned his attention towards her as uncle Luke kept his eyes firmly on the ex-smuggler. Uncle Chewie stood slowly and silently behind his friend, placing a paw on his shoulder, clearly trying to act as a calming force during the increasingly tense situation. His father’s temper and volume of his voice only seemed to rise. “No. No, we talked about this Leia! We agreed! A long time ago, when he first started…” His eyes flickered quickly towards his son, never actually looking at him as he struggled to find the right words. 

“When he first started showing signs…” he said, his tone now more resentful than enraged. 

Showing signs. He spoke of his abilities as though they were a disease, something he should be cured of, expunged from his body like a plague. Ben knew his father was not intuned with the force like his mother and uncle Luke; he generally avoided talking about the subject all together. They bonded over different things, like flying and ships even games and stories. It had never occurred to him, until that moment, that his father might have actually hated his force abilities; that his father could actually hate a part of him. Ben felt completely stupefied by this realization, the conversation being carried out in front of him started going in and out of focus. 

Ben registered Luke’s voice in the distance, “Showing signs? Showing promise is more like it.”

Han’s lip twitched as he consciously tried to ignore him, refusing to acknowledge his words and keeping his stare directed at Leia. Han’s voice picked up once more, “We agreed we would try to give him as normal a life as possible. Away from all this... “ he waved his hands wildly in the direction of Luke, “mystical force mumbo jumbo!”

His mother’s head snapped up as her hand slammed down on the table. She rose from her chair, her voice now matching her husband’s.

“Well clearly, that HASN’T WORKED!” she screamed, while aimed a well-manicured finger towards Ben; pointing but not looking.

Han walked towards her, towering over her smaller stature, “You cannot be seriously considering this.”

“What other choice do we have, Han? He’s not…” her voice grew quieter for a moment. “He’s not like other children, Han. He needs guidance, a kind of guidance that neither one of us can give him.”

Ben watched as his father raked his fingers through his greying hair. Slowly, Han looked up to Luke, giving him an expectant stare. Luke simply raised an eyebrow in response. An exasperated sigh escaped his father as he scratched his stubbled chin. “Well?” he questioned. “Can you do it? Can you promise me Luke -”

The jedi master interrupted him, “I would not have made the offer all those years ago if I wasn’t sure.” Luke stood up slowly, “I can train him, put him on the right path.”

His uncle’s words started to sink in, all those years ago, he could have started his training years ago but his parents had forbidden it! He could have been closer to understanding the presence, he could have been feeling less alone, like less of an absolute freak all this time but his parents had kept him from others like him. And what’s worse, they had done it on purpose. Ben knew his uncle Luke had other students but he had always assumed they were much older, that he would have to wait a couple more years to even be considered a proper apprentice. But no, his uncle had offered to take him under his wing years ago! A cold resentment started to wash over him as he looked up to adults surrounding him. Ben had never felt smaller than he did at that moment with those four towering figures casting shadows over him, deciding his fate without giving him any say, as though he wasn’t even in the room. He felt angry and powerless, and in a moment of desperation he reached out to the mysterious presence, hoping to find some semblance of comfort.

He closed his eyes and the loud voices around him began to fade away. He knew they were still arguing with each other, he could hear their screaming but he was no longer listening to their words. He barely registered his uncle Luke smugly stating, “If anyone can help him, it’s me. And you know it.” Then, it all faded and he was sucked into what seemed to him like a whole other realm. He felt the presence all around him, it covered every part of him. For the first time in his young life, Ben Solo felt truly safe and comforted. For the first time, he did not feel alone.

 And then he heard it, a voice. Sweet and innocent, like a child’s. 

“Aah, aaah…” 

[flamingjets]

Reylo fanfic

He was unarmed and unmask. She was looking at Ben solo not the persona kylo ren that Ben used with everyone else around him and the first order. But not her, with her he showed his vulnerable side and how he was just as lost as she was. She didn’t feel like she belonged with the resistance as where every time she was with him force bond or physically in the same room, he was her belonging and she was his even though they still tried to deny it.

In the ruin of the throne room they were physically in the same space and she was once again ready to attack with her lightsaber ready to slice through him. Yet not matter how angry, upset or disappointed she was in him she couldn’t bring herself to hurt him or attack him unless he was armed. She wasn’t happy he was standing there unarmed and unmasked. She wanted to hate him and let all her angry out yet she couldn’t move to attack him as he spoke to her about wanting to help and about an evil they had both only heard in stories made out to be a legend or a myth. Palpatine was alive and wanted both of them but he wanted her especially because of her power. She could hear the voice in her head telling her to explore the dark side and explore the Death Star to find her true purpose and that he could help her. It wasn’t Ben’s voice in her head but someone else’s and it scared her. But the more she heard the voice the more it angered her and then seeing Ben it angered her even more as he tried to talk to her. Finally her anger exploded and she ran toward Ben and attacked him. He never raised his saber he just dodged her attacks as he avoided her saber barely as she swiped at him over and over again.

He could feel her anger radiating off her and through the bond they shared as he dodged her attacks trying to reach through the bond to read what her next move would be but her mind was all over the place and she was unpredictable. He knew palpatine was manipulating them both but now he was getting into her head and was making her more reckless. He wouldn’t be able to keep this up for long so Ben took a reckless possibly deadly chance in order to stop her. He dodged her next attack and spun blinding her with his cape as he gripped her wrist of the hand holding the saber as he forced it out of her hands sending it spinning to the corner of the throne room as he tried to spin her around and grab her other wrist. But Rey broke free of him and tried to force grab her saber but he forced it away at same time. She turned to him and started to punch and kick him as she growled at him. He blocked her punched and once again grabbed her wrist and spun her around grabbed her other arm and pulled her toward his chest and anchored to him as he wrapped his arms around her. She tried to flip him over her back but he held fast and locked his one leg around hers to keep her still. She tried to get away as he leaned his head toward hers to prevent her from head butting him breaking his nose.

Finally she grew tried and started to cry as her knees buckled as they both sank to the ground with his arms around her and her head falling back and resting on his shoulder as his face buried between her shoulder and her neck. His arms loosened from around her and she spun around wrapping her arms around his neck as she cried and he wrapped his arms around her holding her close.

“You are not alone. I’m right here Rey and I’m not going to leave. I’m going to help you. Together we ar going to end it once and for all.” Ben whispered in her ear as her crying stopped. She pulled away from him and looked him th eye with tears in hers. “Together. We are going to end it once and for all. Avenge your family and your grandfather. Stronger together.” As she spoke those words she pulled him in and kissed him hard in the lips with desperation, passion and everything and else she hasn’t said as he threw the same passion into kissing her. Rising together they both escaped the throne room and departed the planet in ben’s tie silencer as Finn screamed her name as she left with Ben knowing the only way to save everyone was for Ben and her to join together and take down the emperor who has for decades terrorized the galaxy. Ben and Rey were their only hope.

[starwarshyperdrive]

The Rise of Skywalker - adding my very important opinion to the internet.

Opinions are like **holes, everyone has one. Just that this isn’t true. People rarely substitute theirs with someoelse’s **hole. 

Looking back at some of my predictions I was wrong about some major plot points. I always said that the Bendemption and Reylo would make me walk out of the cinema. I thought it would be the two things that would ruin Star Wars for me and quite arrogantly assumed it’s ‘too stupid for Star Wars’. 

Now.. I stand corrected. To be honest, after the premiere I didn’t know what to think. Like everyone else I had this idea what the movie should be in my head. All the puzzle pieces I put together to a picture I liked. All the clues that lead my to my own personal conclusion. And like everyone else I saw the movie through this filter. 

I have to divert a bit to explain what I mean.

A Zen master was asked about Zen by a critical guest. Instead of answering he filled the guest’s teacup but did not stop pouring when the cup was full and the tea spilled out and ran over the table. 

"Stop! The cup is full!" said the guest.

"Exactly," said the Zen Master. "You are like this cup; you are full of ideas. You come and ask for teaching, but your cup is full; I can't put anything in. Before I can teach you, you'll have to empty your cup."

Letting go of our expectations is hard. Very hard. There is comfort in the familiar. There is stubbornness in wanting to be right. The unknown is scary and we want to be in control of our own narrative. So I watched the movie again and saw it for what it is. I’m gonna be honest. I am a ‘true believer’ and apologist. I will find goodness in every bit. If you want to find mistakes you will find them. Psychologically we mostly make up our minds whether or not we’ll like the movie before we see it subconsciously. Then we just look for proof we’re right. I didn’t really want to see Joker. I expected it to be a pretentious attempt to make a Scorsese 70ies movie while lacking substance. And that’s exactly what I’ve got. Knowing what to expect in the 2nd viewing I was able to appreciate it more. There is so much depth and love for Star Wars in it that’s not apparent if you walk out of the 1st screening snubbed about what you don’t understand. I sound like a broken record when I say Star Wars is not a Comic Book movie, not everything has to be explained or tie into everything perfectly. Just look at the Original Trilogy. Nothing is 100% clear. Obi Wan is twisting the truth and nothing aligns perfectly. Star Wars is like a Greek myth. WHY did Thetis dip Achilles in the river Styx? What was her motivation? How could she forget to dip his heel? That’s stupid. That’s RUINING Greek mythology.   

I liked the movie, very much. I’m not even sure if it might not be my favorite sequel. Before I go into my thoughts here is what I didn’t like.

I liked it, yes, but that doesn’t keep me from agreeing that it seemed like a mash-up of fan-service. And with fan service I mean the kind of parents who have no idea would give their kids. ‘You like your Nintendos, right? The man at the shop said this is as good.’ It somehow felt like a panicked corporate decision to undo the backlash after The Last Jedi (a movie I have seen 13 times in the cinema and now consider to be the weakest installment since Attack of the Clones), so they mistook the loudest voices on the internet to be the most representative for all fans. So they had to include Bendemption and Reylo because ..fanfiction.. ?! And people have long asked for ‘bring back Legends’ so throw in a bit of that. And then we need Han Solo and the Emperor to save this trilogy after we made the mistake of not overseeing what these film makers actually do and have an overall idea for the trilogy and Rian Johnson wrote the story into a corner. The Last Jedi felt more like the 3rd movie of a trilogy, so what are we gonna do? Rey has to be SOMEONE, right? How about the emperor is suddenly interested in his bloodline for some reason despite the Sith never having cared about that (what is her midi-chlorian count?). 

But I can live with all of that and I have my explanations for everything. Palpatines son who must’ve been born after his face got all f**ked up. So was he a clone? Some sort of attempt to create life like Anakin? An artificially created baby like the Nazis did to get a super soldier, just to be able to possess his body and when he ran off and fled he was more interested in his ‘granddaughter’ because her body was even younger? Did the force skip a generation like some diseases.  Not everything has to be answered, but it’s fun to think about these things. I find this to be more Star Wars than the thought he had a wife all the time, which is absolutely not in character. 

The one thing I didn’t like was the super cringy, cheap jump-scare with monster teeth during the Dark Rey scene. We have seen this too often. It’s not ‘worthy of Star Wars’. It didn’t even look good in IT or any other movie. 

And the kiss? Would I have cut it out if I’d have something to say. YES DEFINITELY. Do I think it’s romantic and actually hints to romantic feelings? HELL NO! In my opinion their bond is different. Calling it romantic undermines their connection and ridicules something that could be very deep. Kylo/Ben even says it, they are a Dyad. Whatever that means, it surely doesn’t mean something straight-out of Twilight. I see the kiss as relief, burst of emotion. Not unlike a kiss a mother would give a child that has been missing or rescued from peril. Affection yes, romance no (aka ‘no tongue’). The beauty of it is that it’s ambiguous. If you want them to be in love, then you can think that for yourself, probably wondering why she is not really grieving.

I said I’d hate Bendemption and many people have stated that Ben should’ve survived. No offense but this is completely missing the point. The way his redemption is portrayed is absolutely beautiful. The shame and regret in Ben that leads him to the realization what he needs to do is what makes his who he is. He says it himself. He can’t go back to his mother. She sacrificed herself for him. He killed his father. Everything is lost for him. He made so many mistakes. But he can do the right thing for once by saving Rey. And this is why he disappears. This is why he became one with the force. If it he’d have survived there wouldn’t have been a redemption. Ben Solo was ‘weak and foolish’ which led him to the dark side. Ben Solo is flawed, the good in him understood that to kill the looming darkness he has to sacrifice himself. Like the Terminator at the end of Judgement day. This is what made the scene so powerful and mirrored Vader. Ironically you could say he finally became like Vader in the last moments of his life.

As for the emperor being alive. Why not. If you’re that sort of badass and considering that Maul and Vader both survived major injuries with the aid of the dark side of the force it’s not that unlikely. And here is something some people seem to miss. He is desperately looking for a new vessel to transfer his spirit into because he is a corpse. He is a corpse on life support. As hinted at in the movie and as explained in the visual dictionary he is being kept ‘alive’ by a mixture of medical aids and Sith alchemy. One might argue that ‘we never heard about Sith cultists and all that’ but that’s not entirely true. Even outside of the books, comics and what not there are things you can easily retcon to fit the narrative. Just look at the emperors advisors in Return of the Jedi. At the time of The Force Awakens there have been theories that Snoke is nothing but a puppet. I have used the Wizard of Oz comparison before. When we got to see him ‘in the flesh’ in The Last Jedi we were nothing the wiser. So that somehow adds up.

Chewie got a medal now? Well that just serves to show what I always say: no one in the cinematic universe cares a great deal about books and comics. A lot of fans are always so eager to see stuff from canon in the movies and get upset when there are contradictions (also see S-foil from Lukes X-wing being used as door) but I think it’s best to consider whatever is not in the movies as ‘soft canon’ and take it with a grain of salt. This might change in the future now that Star Wars is free of the shackles of the Skywalker saga and it;’s very likely they learned from the lack of consistency, but it also opens it up to mediocracy and weird stuff like the world between worlds and space whales.

If you only watched the movie once there are many things that might have slipped by you. Which is a shame. I think some f the outspoken critics will change their minds about the movie over time. A lot of the emotional backbone of the movie was in these tiny moments, such as the scene in which Rey feels that she won’t see Leia again and has to say good bye. It is in the open whether or not Leia feels it too and just taunts her by saying ‘tell me when you're back’.

Let me just say that Rose is absolutely cool in this. I always maintained the position that the backlash against her character was mostly based on the weak costume design that made her more like like a cosplayer. Now that she looked the part she was fantastic. It’s not about quantity. Her screen time was impactful. The argument that JJ cut her screen time in favor of his buddies is ridiculous and uninformed. Everyone had their specific parts to serve the story. According to the visual dictionary Dominic Monaghans character was a former teacher and served as the ‘Sith’ expert to explain why the Resistance wasn’t collectively going ‘umm wut?’ when they heard about Palpatine being back and all that. Greg Grunberg was the link to the fleet and Rose was at the heart of operations. I can't understand how this isn’t obvious. 

And in conclusion let’s talk about the impossible task to end a 9 part saga, with the additional challenge of having lost Carrie Fisher. Can you even imagine being in that predicament? How did JJ Abrams say yes to this? Well knowing that he’d get shit from all sides. RESPECT! It is a miracle the movie turned out the way it did. I liked it and if we look at the numbers of things I didn’t like in the other movies despite liking them it might become my favorite or close 2nd of the sequel trilogy over time. Only this blade tells.

[raven-m-3]

Reylo and the Hades and Persephone myth in TFA

Thanks to @ohtze’s seminal meta back in January 2016, pretty much every Reylo is aware of the Death and the Maiden trope in TFA. 

It’s very well-established at this point, and the fandom has broadened its focus to discuss many other tropes post-TLJ. 

However, a recent post by @corseque made me realize that some of the evidence for Death and the Maiden in TFA- particularly in the form of the Hades and Persephone myth- has been hiding in plain sight (at least for me personally).

@corseque’s fascinating post describes how the vegetation (or lack thereof) in Ben’s scenes thus far in the ST are consistent with the Hades and Persephone myth. Specifically, we’ve only seen Ben on the “living world” when he comes to Takodona to capture Rey. After he obtains his “bride,” Ben directly absconds to “the Underworld” with her. This is also true for Hades with Persephone. 

This meta is simply a quick compilation of evidence for Hades and Persephone symbolism and themes in TFA. It was inspired by @corseque​’s excellent insights and some brilliant commentary by @theporgsnest​. I'm including examples reported by other Reylos, and am also adding a few insights of my own. 

The fruit of the Underworld

In the myth of Hades and Persephone, the fruit of the Underworld (in the form of a pomegranate) plays a critical role. The act of eating the fruit seals Persephone’s place at Hades’ side, making her belong irrevocably to the Underworld. In some versions, Hades tricks Persephone into eating the pomegranate. In other versions, it is the gardener of the Underworld, and Persephone is unable to resist her hunger, although she knows she should.  

Guys... Rey eats a strange fruit in Maz’s castle that looks suspiciously like a pomegranate (or at least a space version of one).

I’ve rewatched this scene many times now, and Rey is the only one shown eating in this scene. She is shown biting into or holding the fruit four separate times, whereas not one bite of food passes Han’s, Finn’s, or even Maz’s lips. 

I mean.. could this shot be any more heavy-handed? Right by the fruit basket? 

@theporgsnest first brought this to my attention (bless her!), and I was able to find a reference to this by @ashesforfoxes all the way back in 2016. 

A chariot drawn by four black horses

Full credit to the brilliant @theporgsnest for pointing this out. According to the legend, Hades kidnaps Persephone in his personal chariot, which is drawn by four black horses. Kylo’s shuttle trails behind four tie fighters while he is fleeing Takodona with Rey onboard. (Other tie fighters follow at a clear distance). 

Persephone’s despondent companions

In most versions of the myth, Persephone is alone playing in a meadow of flowers when Hades captures her. In other versions, she is accompanied by several terrified friends, including the nymph Cyane, who desperately tries to prevent the abduction. The artwork below depicts Cyane at the far left. 

Hmm…devoted companions who try but fail to save Persephone, and watch Hades carry her away?  Sounds familiar… 

The seasons

The myth of Hades and Persephone was developed to explain the seasons. 

Demeter (Persephone’s mother; goddess of the harvest) was distraught when Persephone was abducted. She demanded that Zeus use his influence to return her from the Underworld. Zeus refused, arguing that Hades was a suitable husband for Persephone. 

A heartbroken Demeter stopped nurturing the earth, allowing crops and plants to wither and die. After some time, humans were on the brink of starvation, and Zeus had to intervene.

Demeter was adamant that the crops would never grow again unless her daughter was returned to her. However, since Persephone had eaten the fruit of the underworld, Hades insisted that she could not return to the world of the living. Zeus came up with a compromise to appease them both.

Since Persephone had eaten 6 pomegranate seeds, she had to remain in the underworld with Hades for 6 months out of the year. When Persephone was in the underworld, Demeter refused to let any plants grow, and crops and vegetation shriveled up and died. Hence the season of fall and winter.

Hmm.. when Persephone Rey is in the Underworld on Starkiller Base, she is surrounded by snow and dead vegetation. 

For the remaining 6 months, Persephone was allowed to live with her mother on Earth. Every time she was returned, a joyful Demeter allowed crops and plants to burst into bloom. Hence the seasons of spring and summer.

Remember the Leia-Rey scene in TFA that puzzled many fans because no one could figure out why they shared such an intimate hug? I always interpreted it as presaging “family mourning”- the surrogate mother (in-law) comforting her surrogate daughter (in-law) over their mutual loss. I think that explanation still has merit, but there are clear Demeter-Persephone undertones here as well. Persephone has returned to her mother in the world of the living.

Note the vegetation surrounding them. 

That’s all I’ve got, but if there’s something I missed, please tell me!!! We see you, JJ. 😏

[Disclaimer to be safe: although the Reylo dynamic and its visual storytelling in TFA contains inspiration from this myth, of course it does NOT perfectly emulate it. There are many tropes and themes in Reylo, and countless examples of how this trope is subverted or altered in TFA.]

[Look for a reblog with sources]

[marybeatriceofmodena]

Magnum Opus

@reylomonsters My contribution for Day 1 of Reylo Monster Week! I might continue this, later on, since this was a lot of fun to write. Long story short, this is the American Horror Story: Coven & Dark Shadows mashup literally no one asked for, because I hate myself. Tell me what you think! 

Read on AO3 here. 

*

It was like the beginning of a terrible old horror film: the rain falling hard, but since there wasn’t enough of a budget for convincing enough lightening, they’d have to do without that. Rey’s umbrella was barely enough to keep her from getting wet, but it was still something. Whatever manuscripts or books she’d find in her quest were too precious for her to spoil them with rainwater.

The wind was however merciless, and Rey’s all-black raincoat, dress and boots weren’t enough to protect her against the weather while she held onto her hat. The only thing that seemed to hold on was her backpack, and she could hear Beebee-Ate meowing in distress. Thankfully for her familiar, the long-abandoned manor’s silhouette finally drew itself on the horizon, and Rey sighed in relief.

“We’re almost there, Beebee-Ate, don’t worry,” said Rey as to encourage him, although the sole response he gave her was the cat equivalent of an exasperated groan. Rey hurried, not wanting to have him wait any longer.

The old manor had been abandoned for two centuries now – ever since the Skywalker clan had faced a blight so terrible no witch or warlock dared to speak of it back in its time: nowadays, it was a forgotten legend, almost a story you’d tell children to scare them into obedience. There were whispers of forbidden blood magic, lurid details about human sacrifices, with blood too copious and scarlet in every single tale, and silhouettes of the undead creeping behind your back, sending a chill down your spine.

Rey was afraid as she pushed the door to the old Skywalker manor, but bravery, she mused, was all about doing the brave thing and hoping bravery would follow. Closing her umbrella and leaving it near the door, she quickly put her backpack on the ground, unzipping it to let Beebee-Ate spring out of it and proceed to groom himself right away. Rey, on the other hand, had no time for such trivial matters: she needed to be back by dawn, before the coven would notice her absence.

She lit up a flashlight she had brought with her and, with Beebee-Ate in toll, she made her way through the manor. The floor creaked beneath her steps, and the cobwebs and dust made the whole setting truly look like a haunted house. What Rey needed to look for was anything that appeared to hide some secrets: Luke Skywalker would have never left his findings in a place where anyone could steal them forever.

As she walked into the long-abandoned study, with quills, ink and a few sheets of paper still on the desk, the sight of the many shelves full of dusty books made Rey sigh at the sight of the work awaiting her: for all she knew, perhaps clues for her quest were lying somewhere in them. It probably meant she’d have to come many more nights in the creepy old manor: the pain was worth it, but she could only hope no one would notice her nocturnal escapades: it was the last thing she needed right now, among all her troubles.

As she walked towards the back of the study, Beebee-Ate head towards the carpet between the desk and the shelves, meowing with eagerness.

It didn’t take much for Rey to understand what her familiar was trying to tell her: kneeling, she swiftly removed the carpet from its spot on the floor, a large cloud of dust going up at the same time and making her cough. But it was worth it: a trap door was encased in the wooden floor.

It was too good of a discovery for Rey to leave it there unexplored. When she pulled it up, it seemed so much lighter than she expected it to be. Grabbing her flashlight and gathering what little courage she still had in her, she made her way down into the deeps of the manor.

The stone walls and arcs surrounding her reminded Rey of an old, abandoned church, imprisoning prayers and pleas uttered long ago, but which hadn’t reached the ears of their Maker yet as they were trapped underground. Sensing her nervousness, Beebee-Ate strutted ahead of her, as if he was ready to face whatever demon would be awaiting them at the end of the corridor.

There was, thankfully, no monster awaiting them: the corridor led to what appeared to be a crypt, with what seemed to be a large, rectangular wooden chest in the middle. Coming closer, Beebee-Ate hissed and headed back towards the end of the crypt, frightened, urging Rey to follow him. In another situation, Rey would have probably trusted her familiar’s always reliable instincts, but this time… this time was different.

A soft melody, never heard and yet so familiar, played gently in her mind. It was an old lullaby she remembered singing to herself, back in those days where she was alone, to make up for the oppressing silence: Mirrorbright, she remembered with a smile, and, as if she couldn’t control her legs anymore, she slowly made her way towards the large chest…

… which appeared to be, in fact, shaped like a coffin rather than rectangular.

In a trance, Rey didn’t hear Beebee-Ate mewling behind her, begging her to come back. Putting her flashlight on the ground, she pushed the lid open, and she gasped in surprise as she saw what – or rather who was inside.

It was a young man, but in his peaceful slumber, he almost looked like a boy.  

He was dressed all in black save for his white tie, in a similar fashion as the men from the period dramas Rose and Paige loved so much. He wouldn’t have been considered handsome by many, but there was something, something about his large nose, angular face and lips perused in a childish pout. His eyelashes were long, and for a split second, Rey wondered how his eyes looked like when they were open, how his voice sounded when he spoke…

The lullaby somehow became louder, and more seductive, and in a near trance, Rey found herself lowering her head towards the young man’s and, unable to control herself, she kissed him, oblivious to how ice cold his lips felt against hers.

The cold contact brought her back to her senses. She quickly got up, taking a few steps back, her cheeks red and her ears burning in embarrassment, trying to make sense of what had just happened despite the daze. As she looked down at the young man again, she noticed his eyes had opened, and he was staring right at her.

Fuck, Rey thought, but this wasn’t the last of her troubles that night.

His half-opened mouth as he stared at her, still aghast, let her see two white canines way too long for the average human: it didn’t take long for Rey and her quick reflexes to associate the fangs with the ice cold lips she had kissed earlier, the near trance she had been before, to remember those myths she had heard about in the coven.

Vampire, Rey whispered to herself, and she knew it was a matter of seconds before the monster would lunge towards her, draining her of her blood, and either kill her or enslave her. Neither alternative was appealing, and Rey needed to get out of the crypt – now.

Without thinking for even a second, a fireball materialized in Rey’s hand, which she threw at her opponent. The vampire deflected it just in time, letting out a muffled cry. Rey, meanwhile, had already started running out of the crypt, and back upstairs, a panicked Beebee-Ate in toll.

They rushed out of the study, heading for the entrance. Rey could only hope the vampire had been frightened enough by the fire not to not bother following his almost prey.

As she came in front of the doors in the main hall, they closed in front of her, and despite pushing them as hard as she could, her efforts were useless: she was imprisoned.

She turned around in a panic, seeing the vampire only a few feet away from her, his gaze neither threatening nor reveling in her fright. There was—curiosity. And perhaps a hint of amusement, but nothing menacing about it.

There was no time, however, for her to figure out if it was genuine or just a facade. With a feral scream as an attempt to appear a tad more intimidating, Rey threw yet another fireball at him. This time, he didn’t escape it – rather, with a wave of his hand, the ball of fire became ice, crashing on the ground into a million pieces.

So the vampire was probably a warlock before being turned. Things were just getting better and better.

“For an intruder, you certainly act like you’re the mistress of this house,” he said, his voice deep, almost warm. But Beebee-Ate’s aggressive hissing stopped Rey from being distracted.

“I’ll fight my way out if it’s necessary,” she replied, defiant.

“I have no doubt you would, but I’m not particularly keen on the idea of you burning the manor down with those fireballs of yours,” the vampire dryly said. “But I suppose I have a right to ask why a young lady such as yourself would come here alone at night.”

“None of your business,” Rey hissed.

“All right, then,” he replied, raising his eyebrows. “I’ll ask the questions. If you persist to remain silent, I will get the answers from you regardless. And while it seems like you want me to suffer your trespassing, I do wish to spare you the pain of me intruding in your memories.”

Rey crossed her arms, scowling at the vampire. “Fine. But you let me go after I answer your stupid questions, Dracula. Deal?”

“You have my word as a gentleman,” agreed the vampire, curtsying. “First, who’s Dracula?”

For a moment, Rey started at him in disbelief. How long had that guy been sleeping? Judging by his clothes, he probably last walked around in the 19th century. Perhaps he had been in that coffin even before Bram Stoker was born.

It was a miracle he wasn’t so bloodthirsty after sleeping for so long… unless he was toying with her.

No. No, don’t panic. This is not the right time to panic. You need to figure out a way to get out. Don’t do anything stupid.

“Cultural reference,” Rey finally replied, praying whatever gods out there for strength. “It’d be too long to explain.”

“Fair enough. What year are we?”

“2018… I mean, how long have you been in there if you don’t even know who Dracula is?”

The vampire didn’t reply: instead, he stared at nothing, his lower lip slightly trembling as if he was holding back tears. He gulped, clenching his fists.

“I’ve been asleep since 1821,” he muttered. “And during all this time… who knows what happened?”

So many questions pressed themselves in Rey’s mind: the matter of how his place of rest was the old Skywalker manor, and, on a broader scale, what was his life before being frozen in time? Those were all mysteries that would have to remain unsolved – that is, if she wanted to get out of the manor alive.

“What happened to the people who lived here?” he asked. “Do you know?”

Rey hesitated. “Nothing much. There have been so many stories over the years… Luke Skywalker disappeared all of a sudden. No one knows what happened to him. All I know is that something... bad happened. I don't know what it was.”

“He had a family, didn’t he?” he insisted. “A sister? His sister had a family as well.”

“Yes. I—I know Leia Organa was Supreme for a time. But—no one dares to talk about her. I know she and her husband died, and their child, too—but I don’t know how. The circumstances didn’t seem too pleasant at least.”

“You don’t know how? What do you mean, you don’t know how?” For a moment, his eyes were flaming, and his fangs became a tad too visible to Rey’s liking. He made a visible yet difficult attempt to calm down.

“And you?” he asked. “What’s your name?”

“Rey.”

“Rey. Rey who? Of what clan?”

“None of your business.”

“It becomes my business when you enter my manor like a thief,” he growled. “I suppose you came here because of Luke Skywalker’s quest, am I wrong?”

Rey didn’t reply, biting her lips and staring at the ground.

“Of course you did. You’re not the first trespasser to come here, you know. I’ve had thieves come here over the years, waking me up. I could never get a word out of them because I was too thirsty to care. That was my curse. Waking up with an insatiable bloodlust every time a trespasser came by and going immediately back to sleep after feeding. Only someone with magic could save me. And you came. But why?”

He started pacing around her, but Rey forced herself to not look at him, afraid of letting him see any weakness of hers. Beebee-Ate hissed again, but Rey shushed him softly. Now was not the time to attack - at least, not yet. “So what was Luke Skywalker’s quest all about? ‘I don’t know’ won’t do, by the way.”

“The One Ring.”

“Oh please. I have no idea what this One Ring is, and I know the correct answer. Playing smart won’t help you.”

Rey sighed in frustration. “Fine. The Philosopher’s Stone. He was trying to figure out the secrets to immortal life.”

“Ah. Finally reasonable. And why the Philosopher’s Stone? How can one be so foolish to still search for it, unless—”

Rey’s head shot up, her gaze pleading. She didn’t need to hear the word, especially not from him.

“—unless you have to prove yourself,” he continued, nonetheless. “Unless you’re clanless.”

She had heard that word so many times, sometimes mocking, sometimes pitiful, sometimes disdainful. This time, somehow, it was the worst of them all. Not because of anger, nor shame: but she felt… naked, as if she was left without any kind of protection against the rest of the world.

A slight cough brought her back to reality: looking up, the vampire was handing one of those old-fashioned handkerchiefs everyone had a long time ago. She huffed in embarrassment, shaking her head, straightening up in a poor attempt to toughen up.

“I’m not crying,” she muttered, her throat tightening anyway despite herself.

He rolled his eyes. “I was just trying to be helpful.”

Rey sighed, crossing her arms. “So what are you going to do now? Do I become lunch, or do I become a scantily-dressed bloodsucker?”

He stared at her for a moment, probably holding back a biting reply – biting as in “snarky”, of course. Or perhaps not. As Rey was getting tense again, he sighed.

“I’m not especially keen on your familiar attacking me,” he replied.

“You’re scared of Beebee-Ate?” asked Rey, mocking.

“No,” he said, rolling his eyes. “If you think I’d ever come to hurt your familiar, you’re wrong. I know what it is to lose your own.”

“So you were a warlock before?”

“No questions,” he snapped, tense enough to have Rey not want to insist. “But I do owe you a favor. You broke the curse.”

“So you’ll let me go?”

“Better,” he replied, with what almost looked like a smile, something a bit rusty due to how seldom it was used. “I know you’ll trespass here again. And since I can’t stand trespassers, I suggest you be my guest instead.”

Rey narrowed her eyes. “I don’t trust you.”

“I don’t expect you to,” he said bluntly, taking Rey by surprise. “But your research will be a lot easier if I help you.”

“How?”

“I know which books will be useful for you. I also know where Skywalker’s writings are, and I know how to translate them. He used a mix of Ancient Greek, Hebrew and Latin that can be quite hard to decipher. Unless you know all three languages thoroughly, of course.”

His help was almost too good to be true – Rey almost wanted to ask him how “thorough” the research would be if he selected whatever information she’d come across. Translating Luke Skywalker’s journals, if they really were the way he described, would be an impossible task for her. Rey had learned Latin, like every witch or warlock, but the other languages were all mysteries for her. And of course, she couldn’t allow anyone else to know what she was up to.

The vampire really was her best chance, whether she liked it or not. And in any case, if she noticed over time he was hiding knowledge from her, she’d investigate by herself, all the while hoping he wouldn’t find out.

There was another matter, though.

“Why are you doing this?” she asked. “And how do you know all this?”

His features darkened. “Those are two questions I will not answer. And it’ll be my sole condition. Do we have a deal?”

Rey held back a sigh of frustration. There was something up, perhaps even more intriguing than Luke Skywalker and his mysterious quest for the Philosopher’s Stone. But all those secrets would unveil to her in due time, no matter what obstacles would come.

“Deal. But I’d like to know your name.”

He had another of his almost smiles. “Kylo Ren,” he said with a bow, and Rey had to refrain from giggling. It probably wasn’t the only old-fashioned quirk he had…

From that moment, against all logic, it seemed to Rey all of this might just work. Or perhaps it was just her curiosity boiling within, whispering to her that there was more to Kylo Ren and the manor, and that if he remained obstinate in his silence… she’d find out soon enough.

[tookishfool]

Chapters: 2/30 Fandom: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy, Star Wars, Star Wars - All Media Types Rating: Mature Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Ben Solo/Rey, Reylo Characters: Armitage Hux, Finn (Star Wars), Poe Dameron, Unkar Plutt, Leia Organa, Snoke, Rey, Kylo Ren, Ben Solo, Phasma, The Knights of Ren - Character, Chewbacca, BB-8, Han Solo Additional Tags: it's the pirate's au we've all been waiting for lmao, reylo au, Piracy, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, the knights of ren are great and deserve everything ok, jUST IMAGINE, Kylo Ren Needs a Hug, ships... so many ships, Smut, boat sex... it'll be big, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, alternative universe, Pirates, Rey is a Kenobi, (not because that would make her important but i like that theory and it works with my story lol) Summary:

Trapped aboard the ship of Captain Kylo Ren, a mysterious figure that inspires fear in the hearts of sailors and land-dwellers alike, Rey is truly wading through dangerous waters. During their time together, Rey is forced to befriend Kylo Ren in order to ensure her survival as they sail the high seas. Yet, as Rey spends more and more time with him, she realizes that the man under the myth and legend may be more complicated and far more dear to her than she could have ever realized.

A pirates!au for reylo, filled with swashbuckling adventures, murder, piracy, and love and betrayal.