albinomilksnake | STAR WARS: possible spoiler warning

That's a dangerous road to go down. [There's a certain dry mildness to it this time, meeting his stare rather than watching the branded gash shift across Kylo Ren's features as he talks.]

At least in the eyes of the First Order, anyway.

[Because they're not alike-- they can't be alike-- not after everything he's done (how cruelly he cut down Han Solo, how he took Rey-- how he hurt her) but Finn knows hypocrisy when he sees it: if he hadn't, he'd still be FN-2187, dutifully serving under the First Order's flag. Ren had a name, he had a life, and it came with the freedom to walk out the front door whenever he wanted to. No one Finn grew up beside could say the same.

It wasn't right.]

For a stormtrooper ... yes. [The words are simple. Ren believes in the organization of the First Order. He believes that everyone beneath him should be willing to align with certain goals. But he knows he's outside the typical jurisdiction. He knows he only answers to the Supreme Leader, and nothing will change that.]

But I have a different goal. To finish what someone else started. [The words are crisp, like he's said them before.

(He has.)]

Tell me, what do the trainee histories contain about the feats of Darth Vader? [If they're going to be here for a time, they might as well talk. Plus, he wants to shake this traitor's resolve.

He believes he can.]

Edited 2016-01-10 20:02 (UTC)

[He could ignore him. The thought digs in as he lies there, eyes shut - just turn away from the hierarchy of the First Order that always listens to Kylo Ren, show him that he can't always get what he wants just by shoving through anything-- or anyone-- in his way.

But if that were true, he realizes, he wouldn't be here.]

A lot. [It wasn't his favorite collection of vids or files to page through, but a lot of the other troopers were into it - legendary stuff. Stories that touched on some greater universal power, a bigger purpose worth serving instead of just piling into gear and shuffling along in rank and file. For Finn, though, it just always felt out of touch compared to everyone around him. That was real, and Vader? Even if he was everything they said, he's dead. Gone.

But then he puts two and two together, and his eyes open, realization more than evident in his expression:] --you're supposed to be him, aren't you?

[Not directly, and he knows that, but it's unmistakable once the line's been drawn: whatever Vader was to the people who sympathized with the Empire, having that nearby again in Kylo Ren was the smartest move to make. A warrior tied to both the Force and their cause, a faceless, terrifying presence - it'd make them feel like they never lost him in the first place.]

[There is a moment where Ren's features soften. It's brief, fleeting, with his features looking wounded—because he isn't him. He isn't nearly as powerful as Darth Vader. Though Vader had been held back by sentiment, he had proved to be stronger for years upon years. Even when Palpatine challenged his role as his apprentice, Vader still rose above that and proved that he deserved that place in the Empire.

Unlike Vader, Ren doesn't know that he would ever accomplish the same thing. He defeated that sentiment, cutting down his father. And he had naively believed that that moment would lead to some new strength within him, some new ruthlessness that he had never tapped into before.

But it unleashed something else: emotions, love, compassion. Things he meant to cut away. Things he's trying to cut away even now.

But that expression, that wounded look, is brief, and it looks misplaced on his scarred face. He replaces it with something unreadable, but that's him schooling his face that way. It's obviously meant to hide something else, and anyone good at reading people would be able to see that he isn't very good at passing between emotional states casually. That's because he's always emotional, always out of control, always dealing with that.]

Symbols carry a lot of power. If someone on the dark side represents that power and succeeds, it would guarantee the return of a power as great as the Empire had been. [There's a pause.]

But there is a legacy, too. One that only I can carry. That others have failed to carry. They wouldn't chance ruining his legacy. [Vader's.] But he was a Skywalker. One of the very first, and as far as I'm concerned, the last. [His uncle didn't deserve to have the power of the Force, too caught up in idealism and a need to bring back the Jedi order without acknowledging that true balance could only be achieved through callousness and ruthlessness.

(Or so Ren believes. It's an idea that doesn't carry all the weight that he'd like it to carry.)]

[Sharp as Finn is-- as quick as he's always been to scope out the truth with his own eyes-- he doesn't miss the way Ren's expression flickers, even in dim, that stagnant light. What to make of it's a different story: he already knew the First Order's monster was human (he knew it the second he checked his arm back on Starkiller, watching him reel in aggravated pain) but looking deeper than that and understanding why is strange. Miserable.

He shouldn't feel sorry for the man that nearly killed him and Rey without a second thought, that took Han from them and acted like it was nothing. He shouldn't but-- he does.

It's possible Kylo Ren was just as much a victim of the First Order's hateful agenda as he was.]

Luke is still out there. You know that.

[He hunted them down for that - all of them.]

And what legacy does he carry? He only brings imbalance to the Force. He led his father astray from what truly mattered. He made him believe in some false ... sentiment, as if it was the thing that truly mattered. [This is practiced. He's spoken similar things to his grandfather's mask while alone. He's asked him why sentiment, why love, can cut through the darkness. Why did he feel weak to it, as well? How could they find a way to defy it? Over and over, he's asked, and he's never truly found a place inside of himself to hate his family. He knows hatred is what matters. Not indifference—indifference does not fuel him in the same way—and he could never muster it inside of himself.

He still can't.]

A name is just a name. A legacy is something different.

[Or so he tells himself. Luke did not follow in his father's footsteps, and Kylo Ren's version of Darth Vader is a man disappointed with his son the same way that Ren is disappointed in his father.

It's tidy and poetic.

And false.]

I don't get it.

[He's aiming for something more than just the baseline, that much is obvious. But by how much or what it's meant to mean? That's the part that has Finn struggling to catch up-- if he even should be in the first place. Some part of him has to keep reminding himself exactly who he's talking to in that too-small space. That letting his guard down could be just as stupid as it might somehow help them both.]

What's a legacy supposed to be if it's not-- I don't know, some part of the person that started it?

And what did Luke Skywalker start? All I see are false starts. [Because of him, the Jedi Killer. He had decimated the Force-sensitive youths that he had lived with day in and day out, believing that their return to the galaxy would only taint what had been established by his grandfather and the Emperor.]

Do you really think it's a coincidence that he hasn't brought hope to the galaxy? For years, it was Vader who succeeded there. He brought everything into its rightful place.

You did that to him. [He snaps it out without thinking, lips going entirely flat just a moment later as if he's already chastising himself for aggravating an already terrible scenario, but-- no, he's done biting his tongue out of fear, and he's done letting Kylo Ren intimidate him.]

You ruined everything he was doing to fix-- [Hope? The Light? His mind races over every conversation with Maz, every memory left burned into his mind from when Han was alive with his hand on his shoulder and a tired, affectionate voice, trying to pinpoint an answer that makes sense.] the Force. The universe.

All of it got screwed up because of you.

And now he's a man who runs from everything.

[To Ren, it's a clear question of resolve. He doesn't deny that he's the one who destroyed everything, ensuring that he could follow in the path of Vader. He doesn't deny any of that, but he also knows that Luke Skywalker fled.]

Tell me. Do you think he'll return? Or will he give up even with the girl?

[The girl, the mysterious girl with so much power from the Force. The girl, who was even more powerful than him. He's certain that Snoke recognizes it, and that makes him worry.]

[ Because he had to is what Finn thinks. Wrongly, maybe, but he knows what it's like, having nothing, needing an out when the whole world is hunting you down. If someone like Luke Skywalker fled, Finn likes to think it was for the same reason.] No.

Whatever he went out there to do, he's doing it. That's what I believe.

[And Rey-- Rey's better than anyone at shedding light in dark places. She'll bring him back. She'll be okay.]

[Ren laughs, and the sound he makes is cold, cutting, and certain, as if he doubts that Luke Skywalker (doubts that his uncle) had gone anywhere to do anything. In his training, he had heard of the different Jedi Temples spread throughout the galaxy, but Snoke assured him that his uncle would become no stronger while immersing himself in those settings.]

He's been gone for fifteen years. What takes fifteen years to accomplish? In that time, the Supreme Leader has only grown stronger. He's abandoned your people. He doesn't even stand by your foolish ideals. [In fact, he may not even know about the Resistance at all.

There's an irony in that, one that he appreciates. He knows that Luke is strong with the Force, though, so there's a certain twisted idealism in him wanting these words to be true.]

STAR WARS: possible spoiler warning

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