Finn had nearly finished a low-level intel operation on Takodana when he heard the news.

Well, he was told the news, via the efficient channel of Maz popping up on his communicator and yelling, "They've got him!"

"Maz! I could have been in the middle of something!" Finn said, though he hadn't been; he was sitting in his room in the back of a treetop bar, making sure he had the datachips that would prove Senator Jilani's involvement with First Order weapons manufacturers before he headed off-planet. Maz likely knew his itinerary, though of course he hadn't shared it with anyone.

"You know you can't fool me," Maz said. "But they've got the boy. Kylo Ren. Netted him leaving Pamarth. He's on his way back to the Resistance base now."

Finn thought of General Organa, the rage and grief she'd been trying to control before Finn had left on assignment. "He'll be kept there?"

"Oh, I'm sure." Maz's voice went sly; she was concealing information she probably shouldn't have. "You'd better get a move on, then, bucko."

"All right, all right," Finn said. "Keep me updated if our, uh, friend, finds out what I've copied."

Maz blinked at him once in solemn assent, and his communicator went dark.

It honestly felt like the universe should have known, somehow. Maybe the sun should have gone dark, or his transport ship should have fallen out of hyperspace. Ren had been an extraordinarily powerful inconvenience for the First Order. Stormtroopers had calmly looked the other way while he destroyed equipment and, occasionally, soldiers; they'd also done their best to avoid him when he might be in a murdering mood. Finn had never been particularly aware of him, but feeling his power during that awful raid on Jakku had felt like doing generator duty: inches from a fiery ship's core, sweating, yelled at, losing his sense of self. In Poe's words, it had been fucking terrifying.

And now Ren would be on the same planet as Finn, almost all the time. Great, that was fine. Nothing to worry about there.

But Yavin 4 felt normal when he stepped out of the Resistance transporter. He went directly to the command center and gave his datachips to the spymaster's #1 aide, as instructed. Then - because he wasn't a citizen quite yet - he went to his barracks, and sat there.

It shouldn't have bothered him. Or - no. He thought of General Organa's face when they'd been informed he didn't have "complete trust" from the Senate just yet, two months after he'd been injured by Ren. She'd been furious, and had told him after the meeting that he ought to be furious too. So, okay, it should bother him. But he couldn't do anything about it; he had to wait. He just had to be patient with the questions, and the sidelong glances - the implications that maybe stormtroopers weren't quite people enough to defect for a cause.

"I have parents just like them," Finn had said one night, after too much of the wine Poe had sworn wouldn't get him all that drunk. "I - they - I almost died!" He still had the scars, too, twisted and tender under his shirt.

Poe had patted his back and said, "I know, buddy." Then he'd filed supporting petitions to match every single one of General Organa's. Finn would be fine.

"Two people are at the door, Finn," his room computer said. "Please provide information on preferred response." His holoscreen lit up to show -

"Let them in!" Finn said, leaping to his feet. He didn't know who the old guy behind Rey was, but that didn't matter. For the first time in almost six months, Rey was home.

"Finn!" As soon as the door slid open, Rey was in his arms, squeezing him so tightly he almost lost his breath. "You're here!"

"You're back!" Finn said, his words stumbling over hers. She broke away from him, grinning widely. She'd barely changed; her hair was longer, and she had a small scar on her shoulder, but she was still just Rey, one of his first friends.

"Oh!" Rey said, spinning around. "Finn, this is Luke. Luke, this is Finn, my friend."

"Nice to meet you," Finn said, shaking the man's hand. Then his brain caught up to his ears and he couldn't stop himself from blurting out, "Wait, Luke Skywalker?"

Rey's smile just barely faltered. "I did write you," she said. "Saying I'd found him."

"I know." It was one of the few 'mails he'd actually received on his holopad. "I just -" Luke Skywalker in his barracks. It just didn't seem possible.

But the older man in front of him did look a little like the General, and he smiled gently as Finn spluttered his way to silence.

"It's wonderful to meet you, Finn. I've heard so much about you."

Right. Legendary Rebellion general and Jedi Luke Skywalker knew all about him. "It's great to meet you too. Rey, something's happened."

Rey's expression went grim. "You've heard, then? I wasn't sure how quickly news would travel."

"About Kylo Ren, pretty quick." Finn shook his head. "You're okay?"

"I should be asking you the same question. We're still not sure how far his influence will extend, what he can do in proximity to others."

For a moment, a chill kissed the back of Finn's neck, and he remembered - too vividly - Ren snarling, Traitor! But he wasn't back on Starkiller Base; he had Republic citizenship to gain, work to do. He forced himself to smile. "I've just got a few scars, that's all."

Rey didn't look particularly fooled; she'd changed, Finn saw, during her months of training. Of course, he himself had probably changed too. Poe had told him, before his first mission with the Resistance, "This whole thing will turn you inside out. You can't go back to where you were before." Finn respected Poe too much to remind him that as a stormtrooper, he didn't have much to go back to.

"Of course," Rey said. She forced a smile. "I'll find you later? I have so much to tell you!"

Finn nodded. He made the mistake of making eye contact with Skywalker, then, and had to say, "Goodbye, uh, sir."

"Call me Luke," he said, still very gently.

Finn would rather die first, probably. "Uh huh. Uh huh. Okay, bye," he said, and retreated into his barracks as the door slid shut behind them.

The warning about being able to feel Ren put him on edge. He had work to do - paperwork to fill out, a deposition about the information he'd gotten to give, and even an interview with one of the Resistance's many Defection Intake officers. No one had really been able to explain to Finn what they normally did with recruits, and why Finn was different. They'd been happy enough to take his information when Starkiller Base needed to be destroyed, but now there were other considerations. "Politics," Leia had said with the grim weariness of a well-meaning politician.

Maybe it was Ren being nearby, a constant reminder of Finn's past, supposedly undetectable but invading the back of Finn's mind anyway. Maybe it was knowing they weren't anywhere close to shutting down the First Order for good. Whatever it was, Finn felt ready to bolt when the protocol droid arrived at his room, shortly before sundown.

"What did I do?" he said when he saw the General waiting for him in the command room. "Is it another mission? Or -"

"Finn." The General held up a hand. She was smiling, Finn realized, and didn't look angry at all. Maybe a little tired. "I've got some good news, and some bad news. Which do you want first?"

"Bad news, I guess."

Her smile didn't even falter. "Your new assignment for the next month will be to monitor Kylo Ren in captivity here on Yavin 4."

Ouch. "I hope the good news is really, really good."

"You could say that. The Council has approved your petition. Welcome, again, to the Resistance, Sergeant Finn."

Finn blinked. Then: "Sergeant? Seriously?"

"The Senate insists on the bureaucracy of citizenship applications for First Order non-nationals," the General said. Fancy speak for stormtroopers, not-quite-people despite the humanity of everyone Finn had grown up with. He knew that part already. "But we pushed for your immediate promotion to a rank reflecting your experience and skills."

He'd have been given a captaincy sooner rather than later, with the First Order. It was how they kept you close, made sure you were committed. His heart beat too quickly; the General looked at him with perfect calm, not expecting anything special.

She had no idea how different that was from where he'd come. "Thank you," he finally managed to say.

"We owe you thanks." She said it a little too sharply, in an imperial tone that, for a second, reminded him of Phasma. "Not the other way around. I'm sorry it took this long."

Finn nodded, not trusting himself to actually say anything. After that, he was free to wander around. He kept accidentally circling the part of the base that he knew was used to hold prisoners, like maybe if he got close enough he could, what, inoculate himself to Ren's bullshit? Not likely. The higher-ups in the Resistance must not have realized what kind of stuff Ren would be able to say to him. Not just calling him a traitor, but all the leverage of years and years of knowledge about stormtroopers, access to Finn's file specifically - he probably even knew about Slip. Finn walked a little faster, realized he was walking in the direction of the holding cells again, and circled back around.

He couldn't let Ren get in his head. Easier said than done, sure, but he'd managed it when he had the lightsaber, when he was trying to save his and Rey's lives. It was a chance to prove himself, to move forward in the Resistance. It would be fine.

It had to be fine.

-

He remembered Ren as an imposing, but also somehow ridiculous, guy. He wasn't nice, or funny, or interesting. He'd stomped around and choked people and that was pretty much it: he ruled by fear, and he seemed to like it. Finn expected basically the same Ren in captivity; maybe he'd be angrier, though that didn't seem possible when he thought about it.

His expectations crashed against the reality that was Kylo Ren in a guarded cell and absolutely disintegrated.

"Wow," he said before he could think better of it.

Ren glared at him through bloodshot eyes and pushed a lank piece of hair away from his face. "Here to gloat, traitor?"

Finn looked around. He'd made his way through three layers of guards already; this room had been specifically constructed to neutralize Force-users' abilities. Ren himself wasn't restrained, but his cell was only three meters square, the clear walls anchored by thick, ugly durasteel at each seam. Ren sat in the corner farthest from the door, glaring at anyone who might enter. Glaring at Finn.

"I asked you a question!" Ren snapped.

His voice wavered a bit. Finn had been staring, and it disconcerted him. Well, good. He could have a taste of what it'd been like, growing up as a stormtrooper. "I'm here to guard you, actually," Finn said. "It's weird, they think you might try something if you're in here alone all day."

"Alone. What a joke. You think I don't see the monitors? Feel them?"

"I get it, you're powerful." Finn inched over to the desk situated in front of the cell. "It's just an assignment, it doesn't mean anything. I'm sure we can both deal with it like, you know, adults."

Ren snorted. "Stormtroopers can't deal with anything. Brainless -"

"Hey!"

"Brainwashed," Ren said with delighted cruelty. "We were going to order another reconditioning on you, you know."

Finn kept his mind very carefully blank. "Good thing I got away, then."

For a moment, he thought Ren had gotten into his mind. He looked a little sharper, a little more like a dangerous enemy. But the edge faded even as Finn noticed it, and then he was looking at the greasy disgrace to General Organa again.

"Fine, whatever. I don't care." Ren looked, very pointedly, at the wall behind Finn's head.

Finn sighed and pulled out his holopad. He might've preferred sanitation, at this point. At least the stuff he was shoveling down there was a little less unpleasant.

"What did they give you to get you here?"

Finn counted his breaths. One, two, three. When he was sure he could speak without shouting, he said, "I'm sorry?"

"To come here. To be...a member of the resistance." Ren didn't so much as twitch, but he looked sharper, suddenly. He was using the Force, or maybe he was just good at projecting an air of authority. His mother definitely was, though Finn didn't think Ren had inherited that much from her. "Explain."

Explain. Ha. What was there to explain? First he'd panicked, because killing people turned out to be really different from even the most realistic simulations. Then he'd done nothing, because it was easier to do nothing than openly rebel. Then he'd openly rebelled, because he knew - he could sense - somehow, he knew they planned to send him in for reconditioning.

And now he was in the Resistance, but in a really minor capacity. Freed from having to make decisions like exactly who to rebel against, and when, and why. "It was a series of events," he said. "That's all."

"A series of events." Even without the mask - which had been less intimidating than Finn thought Ren wanted - Ren managed to sound mocking in a very specific, creepy way. "Which had nothing to do with your own thoughts, or actions."

"I thought they taught you guys stormtroopers don't have those things."

"We call them deviations. Signs of a - spark."

We. Charming. "That's just how I am, how we are," Finn said. "I needed a pilot, so I ran. If you were subject to stormtrooper conditioning, you'd do the same thing." He remembered stories of the unimaginable cruelty. He remembered being strapped in a chair and...his memory faded then. But it was all horrifying enough. He knew he'd done the right thing.

It was just, looking at Ren now, he couldn't help but feel a little of the old vulnerability, the old pain. Ren dug up weaknesses in him that he was still denying existed at all.

Ren must have sensed a shift in his mood. He didn't say anything else, and after a tense moment of watching him, Finn returned to his holopad. He was on shifts, of course, so eventually another member of the Intel Corps relieved him. Finn nodded at the guy with military camaraderie - hey, I don't know you, we're all in this shit together. Especially when the shit was Kylo Ren.

He didn't remember his dreams, and no wonder; his sleep didn't last long. He woke up three hours into his sleep shift, and only lay awake for ten minutes or so before giving up and wandering the barracks.

The schedule on Yavin 4 wasn't diurnal. It was bustling as it had been during Finn's work shift; a few people noticed him and gave him the old "you shouldn't be here" eyebrow-raise, but no one said anything. He rambled to the outskirts of the base, staring at the forest, then went back to his room. Eventually, he managed to grab a few more hours of restless sleep.

It wasn't enough to deal with Ren greeting him by saying, "Hello, traitor."

He didn't say anything. It was on the tip of his tongue - it was so tempting - but he was, in theory, better than a snappy comeback. So he sat down and read the news again.

The Republic disavowed knowledge of the Resistance. The Republic was also funding the Resistance. The First Order had seized a planet in the Inner Rim. It was all messy; Finn wanted to get out there and do something.

What could you possibly do? a voice in his head whispered. It sounded a creepy amount like Ren; Finn did his best to ignore it.

He spent a week like that, reading in silence every day, and it didn't occur to him that his new lifestyle might be a little dysfunctional until he described it to Rey and she scowled in dismay.

"It seems awfully unfair to make you watch him. Babysit him! Like he hasn't done enough to be condemned -"

"He's the General's son, one of her only living relatives -"

"She would never attempt to subvert justice in such a manner!" Rey glared at him in pure fury and, okay, Finn agreed. But -

"He's valuable, though, with the whole - bloodline, the Force. His intelligence."

"Are they even questioning him?"

The golden goose of intel. "I don't know," Finn admitted. "I guess they must be, but I haven't heard - he doesn't say. And they don't do when I'm there."

"Well, they wouldn't. I imagine their tactics are unpleasant."

Finn had heard the Force could pry information from the most seasoned soldiers. He'd never given Ren, or any of the less powerful users, reason to experiment on him. "Yeah. I guess they wouldn't."

They lapsed into silence for a moment, and then Rey said, "I'm sorry. I really think you're being wasted there, on guard duty."

"Well, he's a really valuable prisoner, I guess."

Rey shook her head. "You wielded Master Luke's saber. Your potential -"

Finn forced a laugh he didn't remotely feel. "You know, Poe Dameron asked me about that."

Rey eyed him warily. "And?"

"I told him I'd never call some Jedi 'Master' anything."

Rey laughed. "Captain, perhaps?"

"I don't think of them as mentors." His mind flashed back to Phasma. "Obstacles, maybe?"

"Finn!" But Rey was laughing, happy. She had more power now; she didn't flaunt it, but there were rumors. Levitation, impossible sword-work. For all he knew, she could do the same stuff Ren could. They were totally different people in every way, though. For starters, Finn actually wanted to talk to Rey.

"It's not so bad," he said. "With Ren, I mean. Someone has to do it; it might as well be me."

"If you say so." Rey didn't look even a little convinced, but she let it drop. Still, her objection stuck with him, wiggling its way into his dreams.

Or, his nightmares. He didn't think of them that way, but he guessed they were. That night, he was back in one of his earliest classrooms, being taught basic quantum math by a droid. Their setup was bare-bones: a holopad for calculations, a metal one-piece desk fitted with the little shockers that would reinforce the need for correct calculations, and wan lighting overhead. He was with ten other recruits - they always called them that, in the early days, and Finn didn't understand why. It wasn't like the conditioning had made anyone forget the conscription. It hadn't made him forget.

"This is so depressing," said the kid - stormtrooper - next to him.

He turned to look, somehow unsurprised to see Kylo Ren. "Go away. I have enough to deal with here."

"This is a dream." Dream-Ren rolled his eyes. "You could change it any time you wanted."

The one thing worse than his brain deciding to present him with Kylo Ren had to be his brain deciding he really wanted to hear Kylo Ren's opinions on his coping skills. "Go away," he hissed, and returned to focusing on his math.

For a minute he thought it worked. The room went silent. But then the world around him faded, and he couldn't see - it was only white, white all around, white so bright it was blinding, white so featureless he wasn't even sure he had eyes anymore -

And he woke up screaming. Of course.

"Vital sign alert," his room droid said. "Heart rate elevated."

"I'm fine," Finn said. "I just had a bad dream."

"Should I make you an appointment with a mental health specialist?"

What a question. It helped a bit, he guessed, that the droid sounded completely disinterested in the answer. "Not right now," he said.

Not ever. He didn't trust anyone in the Resistance to really get what stormtroopers had gone through. Maybe when they retook more of the core planets, maybe when the First Order was destroyed. If the First Order was destroyed.

Until then, he did what he'd always done: bundled up the nightmares, tucked them away in the dark recesses of his mind, and lay back down, trying to force himself to go back to sleep.

It didn't work. An hour later, he let himself out of his room - past the protestations of his droid, which had a great understanding of the sleep Humans needed, and basically no understanding of insomnia - and started wandering the base. It would've been nice and appropriate-feeling if it was emptied out, but ships came in at all hours of the night. He was alone, mostly as he wandered from place to place, but there was always someone just down the hallway, or across the yard.

He was so used to seeing people out of the corner of his eye, in fact, that at first he didn't notice anything was wrong. The figure in the black cloak could've been one of a dozen intelligence officers, mechanics, or even a Senator. Except even as Finn watched, they darted behind a wall to hide from approaching patrol droids.

Right, then. Finn took a deep breath and began to follow.

Town the line of fighter ships, into the cargo bay. Here the Resistance kept its transport ships, its captured First Order passenger ships. It was to one of those that the person walked. He fiddled with the door release, and for a moment Finn thought he saw a glint of light -

And then the figure whirled around, its eyes fixed on Finn, and hissed, "Get back, traitor."

Finn knew him then, with a feeling like a boulder suddenly dropped in his stomach. Of course it had to be him. "Kylo Ren. You shouldn't be here."

"Neither should you."

It was on the tip of Finn's tongue to point out that he had every business being on the Resistance base when he realized Ren was desperately trying to distract him. He never went anywhere without a blaster after Jakku. Now, he pulled and fired in the time it took Ren to come up with his next attempt at manipulation.

He didn't actually shoot him, of course. But it was enough to make him duck, enough to set off an alarm. In minutes, a patrol droid had Ren pinned, and Finn was giving an incident report to his boss's boss, Captain Shen.

"Am I still on the beat, sir?"

"Guarding Ren?" Shen shrugged. "Possibly not, but I'd guess so. You did a good job here. He's escaped from powerful people before."

It had been luck, Finn wanted to say. He knew Ren's power. He still remembered that moment on Jakku when Ren had stopped Poe's blaster bolt, the roiling fury and hatred that had seemed to fill the air. "Thank you, sir."

"Get some sleep, Sergeant."

Right. He had a rank. And a name. And still, apparently, a job.

He used his newfound place in the world really stupidly the next morning. He didn't even mean to. He let himself into the outer holding cell and saw Ren sitting in the corner, looking for all the world like he hadn't moved from the previous day. Finn thought of General Organa's despair, of Rey's longing for a family, of his own sometimes-overwhelming loneliness, and he said, "Your mom doesn't deserve this, you know."

The rage that lashed out from Ren made Finn stumble backwards. He looked around wildly for a weapon - Ren was supposed to be damped in there. How -

"Don't worry, traitor," Ren said. "I can't actually do anything."

"But you -" You're so angry, Finn didn't say.

Ren raised his eyebrows. "How did you hide it?"

"Hide what?" Then Finn recognized the ploy. "Wait, no, hang on, we're not talking about me. We're talking about you. And I stand by what I said."

Ren sneered at him. "Do you know what makes a stormtrooper command material?"

"I get the feeling I'm about to find out, since I can't gag you."

"Mediocrity. You can't be too smart, or too skilled. Certainly not too sensitive to the Force. The commanders of the stormtroopers have to be a bit dim, or it's too much work for the citizens of the First Order to keep track of them all."

Every single word was calibrated to make him angry. Finn stared at the wall and didn't respond. For a guy who thought he knew how to push a former stormtrooper's buttons, he seriously underestimated how much they'd been trained to ignore people talking, to withstand almost-unending abuse.

"You've heard all that before." Half guess, half realization. How did he do that? How could Finn keep him out? "I'm saying you're sensitive to the Force, FN-2187."

"Don't call me that," Finn snapped.

"Why not? It's your designation."

He knew arguing with Ren was stupid. Somehow, he couldn't stop himself from doing it. "It's not my name."

"You really think you can just give yourself a name?"

It was given to him, but Finn wanted to keep that bit to himself. He needed to hold something away from Ren. The danger was clear now; he understood exactly how bad this could get, if he didn't watch himself. "Shut up, or I'll get someone to come make you."

Ren laughed softly, cruelly. "The First Order trained you well."

Finn focused on the wall, on breathing, and didn't answer.

He spent the next week doing the same thing, guarding Ren and occasionally yelling at him to shut up, grabbing dinner with Rey or Poe or the pilots as a group, enjoying his new status as a citizen but not really having anything to do yet. Oh, guarding Ren was technically a high-level job; it required clearance that his buddies down in maintenance didn't have. But in a way, that made it harder. It meant he couldn't complain without thinking about what he might reveal, or do anything normal like tell everyone he met exactly how terrible Leia Organa's son had turned out.

After two weeks of guard-the-brat duty, General Organa called him into her office.

"Sir," Finn said, saluting. "My weekly reports -"

"Don't worry, I got those. I apologize for calling you here, I know it's irregular. The Resistance's command structure is a little looser than you're used to, I imagine."

That was like saying a star was a little hotter than Hoth. "Yes, sir."

"Enough of the formalities. How's my son doing?"

Finn hesitated, because he wasn't sure how to say 'I honestly want to dump him in the nearest large body of water' in a way that wouldn't get him court-martialed.

But General Organa wasn't easy to fool. "You can be honest, Sergeant."

"He's a nightmare," Finn said, all in a rush. "I mean - I'm sorry, I know he's your - but he's frustrating. He's a jerk to everyone. I don't think he respects, um, that murder is bad? He's awful. I'm really sorry, but I don't know why we're still holding him."

General Organa's office was small considering her stature in the Resistance, which meant that when she stood up from her desk and walked to the far end of the room, it only took a few seconds. She looked out the window and took two long, deep breaths.

Finn, almost absently, felt his brain do the review stormtroopers were trained for: shoulders, both vulnerable. Chest. Neck. Gut. Knees, if he had to.

He had his blaster. He'd found it so hard to shoot on Jakku. No one would force him to do that again, not even General Organa. Not even her son.

"I love my son," the General said, still staring out the window. "But he is...deeply flawed."

"He's a murderer who's committed, like, a hundred war crimes," Finn said. "Uh. Sir."

General Organa snorted. "Yes, he has. I used to tell myself it was the Dark, getting to him before it should have."

"And now?"

"Now I think it's the Dark, and his piss-poor attitude." She glanced back, smiling apologetically. "My illusions that I can save my son might finally be dying, but unfortunately, you're still going to have to guard him: he has information we desperately need. Snoke is like nothing we've faced, and we're hopelessly outmatched when it comes to intel. If I can get him to talk, it would be invaluable to our effort."

Finn knew he should just say something like 'anything I can do to help, General', and leave it at that. He opened his mouth to say it, and -

"What if you can't, General? What if he never talks?" He winced. "Never mind, sorry, that's none of my business."

"On the contrary, it's a question I was hoping you'd ask. We don't have the death penalty in the New Republic, and so the Resistance doesn't, either. But he won't be let free. He is my son; that doesn't mean he can escape justice."

For a moment Finn tried to imagine what it must be like, to have your husband dead because your murderous, evil kid killed him, to have a brother you hadn't seen in years, to be fighting a war you'd thought you'd won twenty years ago. It must be miserable, but - well. He couldn't really imagine having family to lose. It was an awful future he didn't think he'd ever see. "I understand. I'll guard him as well as I can."

"Thank you. Dismissed."

He made it to the door before she added, half-jokingly, "I'm lobbying for you to receive hazard pay for this."

"Ha," Finn said weakly. "Thank you, sir."

It wasn't until he'd gotten almost all the way back to the holding cell, half a mile from the General's office, that he let himself breathe normally again. Her son might be evil, but General Organa herself had - practically a forcefield of her own, powerful and terrifying. It wasn't just Ren that had Vader's genes. He knew that, of course, but there was knowing it, and then there was knowing it.

A week later, his hazard pay deposited in his account. He bought the pilots a round of drinks with it and refused to discuss anything about guarding Ren.

-

The thing about Ren was that he was so boring that Finn let his mind wander often while babysitting him, and that generally led to Finn trying not to think about - certain things.

Things like how he'd been just old enough to remember it when Ren came to the First Order, eight maybe. They hadn't been kind to him, which Finn hadn't found unusual, since they weren't kind to anyone. It seemed, to Finn's memories, like he went from hostile and often-slapped to commanding First Order troops relatively quickly.

Finn didn't understand why a person would do it. He'd rarely thought about it back with the First Order. Conditioning ensured that asking a question like that would never occur to them, so Finn hadn't asked, had barely thought it. But now, seeing what Ren had chosen to leave - a loving family, a society that believed in free thought and action - he couldn't help but wonder why.

"Stop it," Ren snapped one day.

Finn very deliberately thought about the ginger snaps Testor had shared with him yesterday. "Stop what?"

"I can tell you're - thinking." Ren waved a hand. "The energy directed over here, it's distracting. So stop."

Well, that was persuasive. "I'm not going to stop thinking just because you're bored."

"It's distracting. And irritating."

"Well, someone has to be here to guard you. Maybe you should've thought of that before you ran off to join the First Order."

Ren circled his fingers in a crude gesture. "You think that's what it was? You think I ran off?"

Finn felt Ren's anger mounting before he saw anything. He put a hand on his blaster, getting ready to ward off an attack -

Darkness, crashing storms. Death, all around, worse than Jakku, like the first day's culling when recruits were brought back to the Order, death and terror and endless, endless sadness -

"Stop!" Finn fired his blaster into the darkness. Sparks leaped into his vision, and he watched as the bolt dissipated against Ren's shielded prison. Ren, breathing heavily, finally looked away from him. The furious pressure and horrible vision vanished as though neither had existed.

"What is wrong with you?" Finn said. "Seriously, what - why -"

"You don't actually want to know."

That was just close enough to the truth to be, well, almost true. Finn wanted to understand, but he didn't want to hear Ren's own explanation. The guy was selfish, ridiculous, didn't even realize all that he'd thrown away. No, Finn didn't want to hear from him.

"You could have been invaluable to the first Order," Ren added. "You threw it all away."

Finn looked over at him. His tone was - weird, off. He was staring at Finn like he had back on Jakku, like he knew something Finn hadn't yet realized.

"Maybe," Finn said finally. "But I don't care about your opinion: shut up."

Guarding an evil Force user just wasn't that interesting, though. After two more days, Finn felt like he was going stir crazy. He got up at regular intervals to pace, even though every time he did it, Ren made a snide comment. After Ren said, "You're acting like you're the one in prison," Finn finally snapped. "I'm going to get them to gag you!" he said, whirling on the prison.

But Ren only smirked. "I don't think you have that kind of pull. Or you'd have a real job, not boring guard duty."

"Oh, so you're admitting you're not that important? That's progress, at least."

Ren stood. Finn hadn't noticed he wasn't restrained. He walked to the edge of his cell, brushing a single finger over the particle shielding standing between him and Finn. "This is what's doing most of the work," he said as it sparked against his finger. It must've hurt, but Ren didn't so much as flinch. "This is what keeps him from talking to me."

I'm going to regret this, Finn thought, and said, "Who?"

Ren met his gaze. Something stirred in the depths of his expression - pain, anger. Finn couldn't tell. "My lord and master. Supreme Leader Snoke."

"Right." Finn had heard rumors. The Knights of Ren existed both at the center and on the edge of the First Order: central to its goals and firepower, but mysterious and half-rumored at best. Finn had no idea how many they were, or if this Ren was a founding member. He only knew the bits he'd heard about Ben Organa while with the Rebels, and his own, sometimes overwhelming fear of the First Order. "Well, that's good."

Ren's expression twisted. "For you."

"I like being alive. I like not being a stormtrooper. I like fighting for what's right, so, yeah." Finn forced himself to look away from Ren and let out a slow breath. The guy was a jackass, and Finn was never, ever going to convince him of how wrong he was.

"I like being alive, too."

He meant to imply that Snoke would kill him if their gross bond was broken. Finn got it. He understood how the First Order, the Sith, and all of that worked, and he wasn't even special for it: most stormtroopers did, had to, because if you got in between the wrong two Force-users, you could die, and you'd just be a deactivated column in some personnel database.

Some of that must have bled through. For a moment, a blink-and-you'll-miss-it moment, Ren looked almost sad. Fury replaced any other nuance almost right away, though. "You don't know anything. You have no idea."

"Neither do you," Finn said. He felt - not angry, exactly, it was more distant than that. Cold.

He felt like he was about to do something stupid, actually, so he stood and said, "You know what? Let's go on a walk."

"Did you just - not hear anything I just said?"

"Oh, I heard," Finn said grimly. A forcefield wouldn't stop him from shouting at Ren until someone found out how unprofessional he was being. He wasn't going to have that kind of red mark on his record, not with the Resistance.

And anyway, the Resistance was the humane organization. Finn could take Ren on walks if he wanted; it was in the file, complete with directions on how to ensure he couldn't use his powers. A valuable intelligence asset would be handled carefully.

"You were so obedient," Ren complained as Finn led him, blaster trained between Ren's shoulders, down a deserted walking path out near the boundaries of camp. "I reviewed your file. What happened?"

"Before or after Jakku?"

"It's not like flipping a switch." Now Ren sounded condescending, great.

"I meant when did you review my file."

A huff of irritated breath. Finn kind of wanted to see the expression on his face; Ren hadn't re-learned how to hide his emotions. He'd relied on the mask, apparently, a weakness Finn had trouble believing the First Order allowed in its commanders. Well, maybe the impossibly powerful ones. "After. When you were identified as a troublemaker."

"I escaped then."

"Yes, well done." Not a drop of sincerity. "You'd never been sent for reconditioning, your post-conditioning test showed no abnormalities, you were being groomed for command. You were so obedient," he said again, and he sounded really and truly bewildered now.

"I was a person. Idiot," Finn added for good measure. "I am a person, still, but - it's people under there, you know that, right?"

"Very well-conditioned people. Programmed."

"Oh, like you are?" That was a low blow, but Finn didn't care; this whole conversation felt like a low blow to him.

"I'm the leader of the Knights of Ren. It's a bit different."

"I don't know, one of us has a blaster and one of us spends most of his time in a cage, so -"

He saw the blow coming. He expected it, even. They were walking along the edge of the lake that supplied a lot of the camp's water; this far out, only droids did ground patrol, and they didn't pass by often. Ground cover was thick. Ren had no chance of escaping the camp's various security measures, so it was operationally safe, but if Finn had wanted to mete out a bit of violent revenge, this would be the perfect spot.

He dodged, so Ren's blow only glanced off his hip. But he was ready for another one, advancing rapidly on Finn, clearly intending to use his size and reach.

Finn had been trained past the point of breaking. He'd learned to fight during a year that saw one of every ten members of his cohort killed. He was equal to the challenge.

He wouldn't have been, maybe, if Ren used the Force - but it didn't seem to even occur to him. He was trying to grapple, kept grabbing at Finn even as Finn dodged. Ren finally had to move in himself, punching Finn in the shoulder, then aiming for and again missing his solar plexus.

Finn charged him and brought him down. His balance was off; he was clearly unaccustomed to fighting without his saber. His lack of balance made it easy to roll them, punching Ren hard in the side - once, twice - and then, when he was wheezing and shaking, to grab his arms and pin him, knees digging into the ground, thighs locked, inches from -

Inches from Ren's face, Finn realized, as his breathing slowed and he came back to himself. Ren's weirdly calm, unappealingly sweaty face.

"You've allowed me to assess your weaknesses," Ren said. "Very foolish of you."

"Oh, so this was a grand plan? Very sneaky of you. I was right to be afraid of you."

Another almost-obvious, half-buried flinch. Finn wanted to chase those expressions to their almost certainly disturbing conclusion. Maybe he should beg the General for another assignment: this one was really driving him to the edge.

"You can move now," Ren said. "Unless they have you suffocate your teammates like this."

Once, only once, Finn had struck one of the trainees with a multi-carbonite rod. She'd died instantly. "You absolute bucket of bantha vomit, you worthless, cowardly -" He smacked Kylo's shoulder, fury roiling through him, then went to get up. "Just - space yourself, why don't you."

"I would, if only you all would let me! It would certainly be less painful than being around all this disgusting disorder, all the time."

"Disorder, right. As opposed to throwing tantrums and breaking control panels on your own ship - that's how the organized people do it."

"Go kriff yourself," Ren snarled.

"Gladly, if it got me away from you. Come on. Back to your cell."

"I'd have preferred to stay in there to begin with," Ren hissed, and swooped past Finn, radiating indignation.

That night, Finn's dreams dropped him back in the middle of the fight.

He once again saw the movement coming, but its end goal didn't make sense, didn't even occur to Finn, until Ren's lips touched his, Ren's hands pulling Finn back down to straddle his hips.

It was just a dream, but it still felt disgusting, Ren's huge hands on his waist, his lips against Finn's. But somehow, maybe because of the dream logic, Finn found himself kissing back.

He felt ridiculous, even in the privacy of his own mind. But he still didn't even hug people often. Any kind of touch still felt a little like the first sweet drink of clean water had after Jakku, something he desperately needed and would question the origin of later.

So, desperate was a good word for how he felt just then. Dream-Ren tried to touch his cheek, and Finn knocked his hand away but then followed it down to the ground, pressing it against the dirt. He could feel Ren shaking under him, just a little, and it fed into Finn's own pounding heart, gave him that much more reason to kiss back, bite at Ren's lip, press against him and feel. Yes, yes, he almost said, more, harder.

Ren made a sound. It was just an almost-moan, so quiet Finn almost didn't hear it, but it functioned like a blaster butt to the side of his head. He leaped away, falling onto the ground and then springing upright, fumbling for his blaster. "This is a dream. A stupid dream. This just a dream, you should go, I'm - I need to wake up."

"You're repeating yourself." Ren looked calm but he wasn't calm, Finn knew that much. But he also wasn't real, Finn reminded himself. He was so hard he ached, and easily half his mind still thought going back to the dirt and finishing what the dream had started was a great idea, the best he'd ever had. Ren's fingers were so long, what would it feel like if -

"Stop," Ren said with a strangled voice.

"You stop! Get out of my head."

"I thought you said this wasn't real. Does it matter, then?"

Finn looked around. The forest disappeared after a few yards, smudging into nothingness. Even the dirt on his hands didn't manage to stay consistent. Ren, though, looked up at him with clear eyes, maddeningly cohesive.

He'd escaped from dreams before. He screwed his eyes shut and began counting until the world around him disappeared.

-

He knew, after that, that he'd gotten way too wrapped up in his guard mission. He saw Ren locked safely into his no-Force cell, then went to the canteen for some caf and a good, long brooding session.

But the canteen wasn't known for being quiet. He'd barely made a dent in his drink when Rey plopped down across from him and said, "I think it's awful, you know."

Finn blinked to cover the panic running through him. Had someone seen? Overhead something? Had Ren told people? Oh no, Finn had fought a prisoner, that was so unethical, even if the prisoner could technically choke him to death, even if the prisoner had started that - fight - whatever it had been.

"Poe having to go back to Jakku," Rey said. "I know it's important, to help the survivors, but -"

Finn had heard a bit about the mission. It sounded mostly routine, cleaning up after the First Order's murder and torture. That meant it was horrifying, of course. "Yeah. It sucks."

"I'm sorry. I - I don't forget you defected, but I suppose sometimes I just..."

"Forget? Don't worry about it." He smiled at her, really meaning it, knowing she'd pick up his emotions. She was so good at that, almost scarily good, but Finn was happy for her. It helped her, he knew, after so many years in isolation. She could react to people better, know how to act or what they were thinking. She was trying so hard to learn what her childhood had lacked.

"You are, too," Rey said quietly.

He flinched.

She didn't apologize this time, only picked up his hand, running her fingers over the calluses and scars from years of stormtrooper work. "I was thinking, Luke and I have to go do a recon mission, but when I get back...would you want to take a few days' leave and go to the hot springs? We could get a group together, it might be nice. The General says the fighting is likely to ebb until the Republic Senate takes a recess."

Because fighting during a Senate session was inviting more legislation to fund the Resistance, of course. Finn thought about it: relaxing by the warm water, friends all around him, food and drink readily flowing for once. He couldn't quite picture it, but - "Maybe," he said. "If I'm not still stuck on babysitting duty."

Rey made a sympathetic face. "Is he that bad?"

All in one big, awful moment, Finn realized his mistake. Embarrassment raced through him, and he had to look away from Rey's sympathetic, too-perceptive gaze. Don't think about it, he told himself, and felt his palms get sweaty. "Um, well, you know. He's evil, and brainwashed, and whiny."

Rey made a face. "He offered me...lessons."

"They like to recruit by brainwashing." Finn thought about his own - a big room, he barely remembered it. Pain. "And General Organa says the Force can be used to corrupt people."

"Master Luke says that too." Rey's eyebrows wrinkled with her anxiety. "Do they really think they can cure him? He murdered his own father."

Finn would never forget that moment, the emptiness in Ren's expression, the sheer disbelief he felt when Han Solo, traitor to the Empire - hero to the Rebellion - a liar who'd given Finn the first honest advice he'd ever received - fell to his death. "I don't know," he said finally. He felt like his words came from far away, like he'd floated away from his body a little. "I don't want to think people are just - bad."

"Some are. The people who stole you -"

Finn shook his head. "Just people, like me and you. Different set of choices, different set of beliefs. Still people."

"You don't have to tell me! Master Luke likes to talk about how we could go dark side, any of us, any time. He says General Organa stopped learning the Force for whole months at a time because she felt the pull of the dark."

"It's hard for me to believe you'd ever go dark side, Rey."

"Flatterer." Rey's mouth quirked up in a half-smile. "But if Ren gets better...it might be good. For the General, and for Master Luke."

He saw what she was trying to do, because he felt similarly: they were both doing their best to learn to react to others, to avoid reflecting the privation they'd faced in this new, safer world. He returned her good wishes, and they hugged before going off to their separate duties.

Later, he'd wonder why he didn't notice that something was off. He knew the First Order's military strategies, had in fact shared them with General Organa. He should have noticed the unusual cloud cover, the darkened atmosphere. The sudden lack of noise in the treeline, the heightened electromagnetic activity that any trained stormtrooper could detect by his own pulse, sweat, the hair on his arms rising - he failed to notice all of that. He thought it was just an ordinary day, didn't think anything was off at all, until Ren lifted his head in his cell and said quietly, "They're here."

And then it all really went to hell.

The First Order favored brief volleys of aerial attacks, following up with massive deployment of stormtroopers. The first blasters landed on the prison building before Finn could ask Ren for an explanation. They had maybe five minutes until the stormtroopers landed, if this was a normal attack. A normal raid.

Sure, Finn thought, they only found the Resistance's top-secret base; it's definitely a normal raid, probably. "We need to move."

"This cell is protected -"

"Yeah, because you're the highest value prisoner we've ever had. They're here for you. Move."

Ren sneered. "How exactly do think you'll force me to do that? Maybe I like it here. I've gotten used to it."

Finn opened his mouth to - argue, beg, he wasn't sure. It didn't end up mattering, anyway. He reacted to the sound of a blaster charging outside the door just in time to dive to the floor as three stormtroopers, led by a commander Finn didn't recognize, entered the room.

"Kylo Ren," said the commander through the thick black mask. "You're coming with us."

"You have to get me out first."

"You there." Gloved hands clamped on Finn's arms, lifting him upright. He looked away from the commander, but it didn't help: he could tell by the intake in breath, by his captors' grips stiffening, that they recognized him. "FN-2187, what a surprise. I didn't think the Resistance would concentrate its valuable objects like this. Tactically sloppy, don't you think?"

He wasn't an object. He didn't respond.

"He's worthless," Ren said in that odd, colorless voice of his. "Get me out of here, and I'll go with you."

"Ah-ah, we have our orders," the commander said. "FN-2187 is a wanted fugitive."

"I thought I was an object," Finn said before his self control could catch up.

The commander slapped him. "Keep quiet."

Apparently the Resistance had trained him to do the dumb thing. Finn licked blood from his lower lip and opened his mouth to respond. Before he got a sound out, a low humming filled the air.

Finn looked over at the cell at the same time that the First Order flunkies did. While they gaped at the sight of Kylo Ren freeing himself, Finn kicked one of them in the shins, right at the joint of the armor where he knew it was weak.

"Thank you, master," Ren said, and raised his hands.

Power surged through the air, and the cell disappeared as though it had never existed. Ren began to advance. Finn took advantage of the moment to roll away, hitting the floor, his mind only on escape - until the moment one of the stormtroopers yelled, "Halt, traitor!" and shot him in the shoulder.

Ah, no. Not again. But yes, again, because burning pain rocketed through him, so strong and world-erasing that Finn didn't even realize he couldn't move until the stormtrooper raised their blaster again, aiming to kill.

Something whispered, Hello.

Ren screamed, "No!"

The stormtrooper who wasn't trying to kill Finn and their commander turned together to regard Ren with bemusement. The other stormtrooper fired, but the blaster bolt never reached Finn. It froze in midair, trembling, only a few feet away from Ren's outstretched hand.

Interesting, hissed the voice only Finn could hear. The hold on him disappeared as suddenly as it had appeared, but he held himself still, afraid.

"Get out," Ren snarled. "Now, Giata, before I'm forced to make you."

"By the order of Supreme Leader Snoke, I hereby apprehend you both!" The commander's - Giata's - voice shook. And he was slow, Finn realized, too slow for what Finn knew he had to do.

Moving against orders still felt like trying to climb up a cliff in 3x gravity. But he moved. He disarmed Giata and watched as Ren killed him and the two stormtroopers.

Then he threw up.

"You've seen death before," Ren said, still in that horrible distant voice.

Finn gritted his teeth. The impulse to answer was so deep in him, inexorable and always painful to ignore.

"Answer me."

"No."

Ren's lip curled. The power in the room crackled again, and Finn became very aware that Ren was free, and could probably kill him right now, and he wouldn't be able to do anything.

Ren raised his hands. He smirked, looking like - Finn didn't even know. Like someone was occupying him just now, like the Ren in front of him wasn't the one who'd wrestled him, who'd...

Don't think about it, Finn told himself, watching in numb disbelief as Ren backed into his own cell, raised the protections again, and sat there like nothing had happened.

Resistance officers found them soon after that. Finn gave a heavily edited version of events; they didn't ask Ren. They wouldn't trust him enough to take his report seriously, which was, Finn knew, wise.

Don't trust me, he wanted to say. Don't trust me when I don't know how to trust myself.

After they'd left, he looked over at Ren, who was staring at the far wall, face angled away from Finn. He had a crooked nose and bloodshot eyes and Finn wasn't at all certain he couldn't break out of his cage again, if he really wanted to.

"I have the power my master grants me," Ren said, like he could hear Finn's thoughts. "Which, right now, is limited."

"That's creepy," Finn said. "And my shift's up. Don't - don't do anything stupid."

He wasn't sure if it was a plea or good advice; he left before Ren could respond. He had thirteen hours, then, to eat, sleep, and decompress. The person who'd debriefed him - Lara? Lyra? Finn couldn't remember - had told him about the med droids who could provide psychiatric care. She'd implied he should get some sleep for his post-traumatic stress. Finn hadn't tried to explain how unlikely any of that was.

He tried to sleep but it didn't work. He'd lied about so much, and he felt kind of guilty, but if he'd told the truth, he knew what would happen next. Interrogation, debriefings, long lines of questioning by people who didn't quite believe that a former stormtrooper would tell the truth. He believed in General Organa; he didn't believe the Resistance, in general, wouldn't snatch back the citizenship they'd only just offered.

It wasn't until he fell asleep and woke barely an hour later, heart pounding, breath coming too quickly, that he realized what was going on. He'd gotten this back with the First Order, too, and there he'd had to lie in bed and wait for it to pass. The bad time, he'd thought of it as a kid. Now he knew it was some kind of stress, but he still couldn't think about it head-on, was a little worried about what might happen if he did.

As a kid he'd been able to volunteer for extra patrols. Now, he got up and wandered the edge of the camp.

There was where he'd gotten drunk with the pilots last festival. There was a tell-tale impression in some leaves that signaled a site of fighting earlier. There was a blown-out tree trunk. There was - augh. There was where he and Ren had fought, where Finn had dreamed about them kissing.

Kissing. It was appalling. Finn felt like he was losing it, really losing it the way everyone had been waiting for him to in his first few months with the Resistance.

He stopped a hundred yards down from where he'd hit Ren and stared at the sky. Yavin 4 had three moons and never got quite dark enough to see the stars. It was nothing like the blackness of space that he'd been mostly raised in, and also nothing like nighttime on Starkiller Base.

He was so far from where he'd been raised, and infinitely far from wherever home had been. A damp, overly warm breeze blew through his shirt, and he sighed and sat down on the ground.

The moment when he'd been frozen and Ren had stopped the blaster bolt kept replaying in his mind. Snoke had been there, or had been close enough to reach Ren. Had it been Snoke who held Finn still? It didn't seem possible, but Snoke's primary interest was in Ren, they'd established that. It followed logically that the psychic whatever that had happened would be related to him.

But the Force wasn't logical. None of this felt logical, actually. Ren had saved his life and gone back into captivity: why? He still felt drawn to Snoke, that much was obvious. Why didn't he just go with the First Order? Why didn't he let them kill Finn?

None of it made sense. Maybe it would've if Finn could let himself think about his own - whatever. Maybe, he forced himself to think, maybe it would have made sense if Finn was someone that people rebelled for. But he wasn't. The First Order was all-encompassing and terrifying. They had a nearly infinite supply of cannon fodder - ground troops - stormtroopers - and they controlled most of the Force-users in the galaxy. What hope did the Resistance have? None, he thought, staring at the moons above him.

None at all. And yet, here he was, and he knew he wouldn't go back.

"I wonder too, you know."

He didn't shout, but it was a close thing, especially when he realized that the person behind him wasn't just some random night officer, but instead was General Organa herself. She moved to join him at the forest's edge, smiling ruefully, like she knew what he was thinking. "Apologies. I thought you'd heard me approach."

"I was -" Panicking? "Thinking. Sorry."

"No apology necessary." She smoothed her shirt, looking at Finn speculatively. "I received your report."

"You read it?"

"It concerned my son, so yes."

Of course. Finn let a breath out, tried and failed to relax.

"It seemed, how should I say this? Edited."

Finn's mind slid away from the events of earlier. He thought of his report and the events that had precipitated it. It wasn't true, but it was true. In the part of his mind he thought others could see, on the surface, it was true. "I'm not sure what you mean."

General Organa narrowed her eyes as she examined him. Finn thought of lining up to get his breakfast with the First Order, being beaten by a baton, conditioned to not even tremble if pain was applied to him. Cells and nerve endings, he reminded himself, flesh and blood and bone, none of it mattered. The mission mattered.

The mission, right now, was reminding himself that his report was true, for as long as it took. He stood still and made his mind placid and didn't even breathe until General Organa looked away.

"Interesting," she said, but she didn't press. Finn relaxed bit by bit.

"He's very powerful."

"Ben?"

"Um. Ren."

"Kylo." General Organa snorted. "I suppose it's harder to join up with the dark side if your new Master calls you the same name your father did."

"I don't...understand," Finn said. "I'm sorry. But it seems like he had everything. I mean, you're famous. Why would he - how did he think it was a good idea?"

Why would he kill his father? he didn't say. Does he have any idea what he's trying to ruin? What will he do when you finally give up on him?

General Organa sighed. "Why did you join the First Order?"

Something in Finn creaked, near to snapping. "I didn't! They kidnapped me!"

"But you stayed."

"I was a baby!"

"Precisely," General Organa said. "That's when Snoke targeted Ben, too. I could feel it. I had hoped we could negate his influence...I hoped I was crazy, honestly. I told myself I was inventing it, borrowing trouble."

"And now?"

"Now, I just hope he's not lost." She pressed her lips together, looking up at the sky. "And I hope I don't have to stop him."

"Rey brought Luke Skywalker back, so -"

The General's laugh held no small amount of bitterness. "Oh, Finn. If anyone sends Ben back to the universe, it won't be Luke."

It struck Finn, suddenly, how weird the whole conversation was. He tried to imagine General Organa saying this stuff to a pilot, or a mess server, and his brain sort of blanked out instead. "Um."

She glanced at him. "My apologies. It's not really your place, is it?"

"Well," Finn said, because he didn't quite feel comfortable telling one of the Resistance's legends to stop talking to him.

"I think you're good for him, to be honest. That's what I came out here to tell you. That, and you should get some sleep."

Irritation sparked in him. "I know that!"

"And yet, here you are."

"It's hard. Impossible. I feel like - like I'm drowning." And oh no, Finn hadn't meant to say any of this at all, but once it started he couldn't stop it. "All I know is the First Order, and now that I'm free everyone expects me to be happy - and I am, but - my whole life! Every time I slept, woke up, everything I ate, all the education I got, I can't just throw it off. There's no, I don't know, second personality waiting for me to put it on. And people watch me, and I have to live up to my - clemency - and I just, I don't know. I wish he'd shot me. I don't know. I'm sorry."

Sometime in the middle of his fractured speech, General Organa had turned to face him. When he clicked his teeth shut and looked at her, he expected censure, or punishment, maybe. Instead, she took his hands and said, "Finn. Whatever the New Republic tries to do, whatever the Resistance says. People like you are why we're fighting. We need you desperately, you, not an inspirational holodrama. Do you hear me?"

They were words he'd heard before, but coming from her, they felt - more, somehow. Different. He felt power here, now, kind of like when Ren had broken down his prison, but also totally different. He couldn't help but respond, his panic ebbing away. He nodded to indicate he'd heard, then said, "Are you - you're not a Jedi."

She dropped his hands and half-smiled. "No."

"But..."

Her expression sharpened. "You know, if you sense anything right now, I hear Luke's got the time to take on a second student."

Finn all but fled after that, making excuses that all added up to 'please, one terrifying thing at a time'. She'd been joking, anyway.

Well, he was pretty sure she'd been joking.

-

Their whole shared near-death experience did not make it any easier for Finn to guard Ren. If anything, it was harder now. He wanted to ask Ren all of the questions he'd bugged the General with, even though he knew the odds of Ren answering him helpfully, at all, were so low they didn't merit thinking about.

He's a jackass, Finn reminded himself, and you don't like him, and his own mom might have to kill him to keep him from hurting more people. There's nothing there.

But Finn still wanted to understand. He couldn't quite crush that part of himself, didn't quite want to. He didn't realize any of that attitude was obvious until Ren said, "You need a hobby."

"Excuse me?"

"I can feel your thoughts." Ren waved a hand. "It's irritating."

Finn looked over at him. He'd washed his hair more recently; it was no longer quite so dirty and gross. He still looked tired, and pathetic, and evil. "Why are you like this?"

"I'm following in my grandfather's footsteps, of course."

"Okay, well, that's really stupid. Your mother wants you to get better, you know."

Ren sneered. "General Organa wants her son to return to her. She doesn't understand that he's dead."

Finn stared at him. When he didn't slap his forehead and say, 'wow, I'm dumb', he said, "That's one of the craziest things I've ever heard."

"You didn't hear many of the speeches about Starkiller Base, then."

"No, I was busy working." Had Ren known they were crazy? They were worse than crazy, really: they were malicious, dangerous, awful. He couldn't believe anyone would look at footage from the destruction of Alderaan and think, "that, but bigger." But one of the drivers of that whole - everything - sat in front of him.

His curiosity drained away; for a terrible moment he just felt sick, of himself, of his curiosity, of the whole awful fight. "Keep quiet," he said. "Or I'll escalate, and whoever guards you after I'm gone won't be willing to talk at all."

"Promises, promises," Ren muttered. But he fell silent after that.

Finn knew he needed to get out of his own head. He had leave the next day, and instead of spending it drinking with the pilots or reading up on New Republic history in his room, he wandered the base instead, hoping to meet someone new, or pick up a new skill - or even deal with a sudden emergency, whatever. Anything that would distract him from the stress of being Ren's designated babysitter. He'd be done in a week, with the initial assignment, at least. He briefly entertained the idea of begging General Organa to reassign him. It couldn't possibly be healthy to daydream this much about returning to sanitation.

On his third circuit of the base, he came across a kid sitting on the ground. She must have been walking around, because she had a wagon full of random things - bits of droid, whittled wooden planks, local-looking sticks, even a few durasteel springs.

Her tiny face was held carefully blank, but Finn could tell she was distressed. Sensitive to the Force, said Ren's mocking voice in his head, but he ignored it in favor of kneeling in front of her. He didn't mind using - whatever it was - to comfort a kid. "Hi there. I'm Finn. What's your name?"

She stared at him with wide brown eyes and chewed her lip. "Miara."

"Is there anyone here to watch you, Miara?"

"School." She shrugged. She looked thin, even for a little kid, and kind of - sad. The base did have refugees, he knew, and kids whose parents spent more time in the field than planetside. "I don't like it."

"What's wrong with school?"

"Rules. Boring stuff. You don't look like a pilot." One little finger reached out to poke the designation on Finn's - Poe's - jacket.

"I'm not, actually. I'm a Sergeant with the ground corps."

"My daddy was a spy, but she might be gone now."

Two Outer Rim planets that Finn was aware of had matriarchal, three-woman-family households as a standard. One of them had long since been laid waste by the First Order; the other was heavily occupied, its inhabitants barely more free than the average stormtrooper. Miara's parent was probably in pretty bad trouble, even if they weren't dead. "Were you going to build something? I could help."

She gave him a Look then, a real gimlet-eyed 'I know you're changing the subject' kind of look. It didn't quite fit her face; he did his best to look honest in the moment, ready to listen and help.

They were in the middle of building a hover-platform when Finn felt too-familiar prickling at the back of his neck. He looked up to see Ren, under guard from two Resistance ground fighters that Finn didn't recognize. He might've introduced himself, asked their names, except Ren was staring at him, looking torn between anger and - something else. Finn wasn't going to guess about the inner lives of evil Force cult people.

"Ren," he said instead, hoping Ren would take the hint and be civil in front of Miara.

"What are you doing?" Ren said, harshly enough that Finn saw Miara flinch a little. She'd already gone through some rough stuff, was his guess; as soon as Ren spoke, she looked down at her project, didn't even say hi.

"Just building a hover-platform, nothing fancy," Finn said. "It's my day off."

"So I noticed."

Which, okay, there was a clear implication there that Ren cared about who was guarding him. Or was capable of telling the difference between two different people. Don't be ridiculous, Finn told himself, and forced a smile.

"This is Miara. She lives on-base."

Miara looked like she didn't trust Ren at all. Good instincts. Ren looked at her with wariness, like she might be hiding a blaster or deadly Force powers. "She's really just a kid," Finn added.

He meant it to be a subtle cue, don't treat the kid like an enemy combatant, but Miara and Ren both gave him weird looks then - and saw each other doing it. Finn expected Ren to stomp away, but instead Ren said, "It's - nice to meet - you," sounding like every word had been pried out of him.

"You look bad," Miara told him.

"I am bad."

"Well, fix it." And, apparently having decided Ren wasn't as interesting as a hyper-coil, she returned to her hovercraft project.

Finn almost laughed out loud at the look on Ren's face just then. Half the First Order avoiding Ren like he had Naboo plague was one thing; seeing a kid just outright dismiss him was even funnier.

"Ouch," he said when he was confident he could talk without breaking out in laughter. "Well, anyway. I'm getting a new assignment tomorrow, so you shouldn't go looking for me."

"I didn't," Ren snapped. "I'm walking. For health. They've got me on a system now. It rewards good behavior."

"I get stickers when I do my multiplication tables," Miara said without looking up.

"Oh, wonderful," Ren said, and stomped away.

Miara chewed on a stick thoughtfully. "He wasn't very nice."

"No," Finn said.

"Do you like him anyway?"

Of course not. "Oh, you know. He's fine. Let's see if we can make this propeller work, okay?"