adarkergray | Kenoma

Kenoma

Previously:
Escape From Starkiller Base
At the Monuments of Madness
A Living Weapon

To Jacob's surprise, they made it to Ahch-To's system without incident - but then, it was clear now that the Force was on their side. As per his calculations, they'd dropped out of hyperspace a few hundred thousand kilometers away, just beyond its outermost moon's orbit, and as they headed toward the planet at sublight speeds, he tried to ignore the way his protective instincts were going into overdrive.

However, the closer they got to the planet, the more he couldn't help being aware that everyone there, everyone they were going to see, was someone who'd hurt Kylo terribly, and Force, how could Jacob even begin to justify taking him down there? To put him in that level of danger, in the kind of condition he was in--

He made himself take a deep breath, though the fingers of his free hand were clamped tightly around the hilt of one of his lightsabers. The urge was incredibly strong to tell Kylo that he couldn't in good conscience do this, that there had to be another, better way to defeat Snoke, and they would find it - but, deep down, he knew that if there was, the Force would have shown it to Kylo instead. He had to have faith in his master, and in the Force.

Instead, right now, he had more sympathy than ever for why Snoke wanted to destroy the Force's will - not that he had any sympathy for Snoke himself. That thought was enough to settle his nerves slightly by reminding what they were here for, why it was important, why they could all work together just this once.

Snoke had to die. That was the one thing they all could agree on.

Finally, he calmed his mind enough to push his senses outward through the Force, to see whose presence he could detect. Even this close in, he still couldn't pick up Skywalker, but he could sort out Rey and General Organa from the background energy of the planet. He turned to Kylo. "...Your mom's still here. Do you want me to ask her to leave?"

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It took a moment, but when she felt the energy nudge against her mind. Rey understood. “Together. We do the technique together.”

She closed her eyes and opened her mind. She didn’t have to worry about drawing it in. Jacob was teaching out across the island itself, stirring the sediment and making waves. All she needed to do was float here. She was merely a conduit. Just as before. Feel the Force, and find the pain.

She could do this.

Jacob had expected to find himself beset by uncertainties that would only hamper the process, but instead, none materialized. There was nothing, no room for anything, in his mind except executing the technique. "Right - together." When he felt Rey center herself on the pain in the sample, he focused on connecting her to the energy he'd gathered, providing her what she needed to carry out the healing. It was superficially similar, in a way, to the wound transfer technique; it required that same level of awareness of the boundaries of the pain, and the energy surrounding it. Completely absent, however, was the violence of that technique, and rather than tearing out the injury and the damaged energy surrounding it before filling its place with something better, it was a balancing process, an evening out, with the damage leaching away and being absorbed by the much greater energies of the Force, where it could dissipate without harm.

When they were done, the sample felt... clean, on a level that even the others didn't. Jacob drew them slowly back out of the trance. "I... think that was the key to it, right there." He got up to re-package the sample. "Once I get back to the ship, I'll analyze these, and tomorrow I'll give you a full report on the results and any variations between them that we might not have expected." Right now, however, he did need to get straight back to the ship - they were close to the three hours he'd promised Kylo, but he could definitely tell that the results were more than worth it.

"I'll see you later." Under different circumstances, he would've asked if Rey wanted to join them for dinner - but he figured he'd have to break it to Kylo sooner rather than later the degree to which Leia had been involved in the latest breakthrough, and he didn't want Rey to be in the path of the fallout from that when she wasn't the one who was to blame here. Jacob was the one who had known all along that this would most likely feel like a betrayal to him, no matter how logical they both tried to be about the necessity of it.

Kylo was still asleep when Jacob arrived back at the ship, but it wasn't a restful repose. The not-so-subtle twitches were punctuated with grunts and groans. Muffled pleas of 'No... don't... don't fire it again...' mixed with soulless mutterings of 'Yes, Supreme Leader... I just need your guidance.' He was sweating, panting. The nightmare felt real enough that even his Force wound was reacting to the stress.

Jacob had just finished re-racking the samples into the treatment rig and setting it to run a scan on them when he sensed the fluctuations in Kylo's Force wound. "...Shit," he muttered. He could sense how bad the nightmare was, and that rushing up to the ship's cabin to wake him would only have cataclysmic results.

Instead, Jacob settled himself in a corner of the cargo bay, and forced himself to sleep. Within moments, he was there with Kylo, inside his dream.

They were back in the power chamber of the Finalizer's superweapon, only the dimensions of it were so skewed from what Jacob had seen when he rescued Kylo that for a moment he almost took it to be a dream-composite of multiple locations. Then, he realized that this would have to be how the chamber would look to someone much smaller than his master - and immediately, he sensed the presence of another outside influence on the nightmare, besides Jacob, one working to shape and distort it.

The mechanised dreamscape didn’t just look bigger. Kylo looked smaller. He could have passed for one of the children if it hadn’t been for the identifying scars he’d gained over the years and a literal representation of the Force wound sinking into his chest like a three dimensional tattoo. Clearly the association was there - and the malevolent force acting on this dream wanted Kylo to make it.

Petrified and in pain, his limbs pulled tight in all directions. His body was wrapped in wires and tubes. Electric pulses riddled his body with Force enegy. A familiar and terrifying voice echoed in the weapons array.

“You serve me so well, Kylo Ren. How grateful you must be... I always knew you were something truly special. Just as you always knew that you would never... never...be free of me!”

Lightning ricocheted off the floor. In the dream, and in real life, Kylo screamed.

"He doesn't belong to you anymore. Never again!" Jacob snarled, wrapping his arms around Kylo as he pushed back against the dark presence in his master's dreams. Slowly, bit by bit, the tubes and wires binding Kylo tight began to unravel. Every time they tried to gain a new hold, Jacob pushed them back again, shielding Kylo with his body.

"You are free, Kylo," Jacob murmured softly in his ear. "We're both out of his clutches, and before long, he'll be dead and never able to hurt you or me or our children or anyone ever again. You'll be whole again and you'll regain your strength and our victory will be complete, because Rey found us the secret of undoing everything he's done to you. All he has is this stupid extinction burst, and even that-- isn't enough!" With that, he began dragging Kylo back into wakefulness.

"Lies..." the voice countered. A face that was far too young for its pained expression pleaded silently with Jacob. "It's all lies!"

Wishful thinking turned into believing, though, when Kylo remembered Rey's part in all of this. They'd made solid and measurable progress. He could feel it in Jacob's mind, even though he kept most of it safely tucked away.

It was enough to crack the nightmare apart.

The mechanical prison started to break. Tubes and wires slithered away like scared snakes. Snoke hissed at them both.

He was gasping for air. His heart hammered in his chest. Excitement mixed with terror, and both of them felt everything all at once. The real Kylo Ren opened his eyes in shock before they fluttered shut again. An even more terrifying thought tore through Jacob's mind before everything fell deathly silent.

It's happening... Need to go... Now...

Jacob startled awake as well, with a gasp as he realized exactly what he sensed. Snoke had finally figured out how to link his mind to those of the children to amplify his power - similarly to how Kylo and Jacob did with each other, albeit much less efficiently - and he'd used that to reach across space with a strength even he wouldn't normally have been able to manage, and punch right through Kylo's mental defenses.

They were out of time. Snoke had found his way to them, and they had no more opportunities to prepare against him. If they didn't strike soon, he'd be the one finding a way to prepare against them, and he had more power, more minds, to backstop himself with, if he figured out how to bring them all into line with each other and himself.

Jacob was by Kylo's side in a matter of moments. "Right now..." He tried to catch his breath, still not fully believing the reality of the situation. "We're really going to kill him now?"

Kylo's eyes were closed, conserving his strength as much as he was hardening his resolve. They both knew that was no normal nightmare. "...or die trying."

It was crucial that they act now. First, because if Snoke was capable of reaching him, he may be able to reach the others. No one on the island was safe. Second, if he truly mastered this technique, everything they had been preparing would be for naught. The time they'd bought themselves was borrowed and spent. Third, and most importantly, Snoke had forged a path through space that Kylo could take as well. He wasn't sure how he knew this, but the feeling ran as deep as the planet's core.

"I can feel this urge to let go... to follow it..." he whispered. "The Force will take me to him. How quickly... can we get into the caves?"

"...Faster if I carry you." Jacob disconnected the IV line, then stepped back away from him. "I'll be right back - once I've packed up everything I need to keep you from dying of hypothermia while we're down there, we'll go."

Just like last time, the fastest way in - taking the tide into account - would be through the entrance shared by the mirror cave. He just hoped that Rey would be able to handle and adjust to it much more quickly this time than last. Jacob pulled a waterproof pack out of the ship's entryway and hurriedly stuffed it with a waterproof blanket, heating pad, pitons and ropes and harnesses in the outer compartments, and - upon returning to his quarters - a change of clothes for Kylo.

As they made their way out of the ship, he reached out mentally to Rey. I hate to have to do this to you again - but we're out of time. Snoke has found his way to us, and if we don't kill him now, while he's still in that transitional phase of figuring out how to bring his full power to bear, we will be helpless against him. Meet us down in the caves, right away.

“Do it.”

There was no hesitation. There couldn’t be.

Kylo might have been impressed at the speed with which his apprentice readied their supplies (using the Force to enhance it even more), but his mind was focused on other things entirely. He was actively resisting the urge, as he described it, to simply let go. It was the time, but it wasn’t yet the place; he had no choice but to hold on until it was.

Rey was having a meal with Leia when she heard Jacob’s voice echo in her mind. The shock alone was enough to make her accidentally spit her soup. If it hadn’t, the message alone might have.

Leia looked up, visibly concerned.

“What is...”

Rey interrupted her before she could finish. “I have to go.”

Leia attempted to interject again as she ran out of the hut as well. “What is it? What’s going on?”

“We’re going to kill Snoke!” She shouted back, stopping only long enough to shout, “Make sure Luke doesn’t interfere.”

She didn’t have the same animosity toward him that Kylo did, but she still didn’t trust him. He’d started to show a little remorse for his role in how this all turned out, but it wasn’t enough. And if what Jacob said was true, that Snoke had found a way to reach them, then a mentally tormented Jedi master was a perfect target - and a perfect tool. Rey couldn’t let that happen.

She ran to the shore as fast as her legs would carry her.

[ooc: sorry for the delay. Been busy. And... I just passed my 7th degree black belt test!!]

((Congratulations!! And no worries about the delay, I'm not always speedy myself x_x))

Jacob had gotten them down there in record time, the Force enhancing his every movement, and he had just started anchoring their belay lines to the same rock as last time when Rey arrived. "Here - get this on." He snagged a climbing harness out of the bag and tossed it to her. "Then, start focusing on meditation techniques to get your heart rate and respiration down. I want to be able to head into the caves as soon as possible. We have to get this done, while we can still minimize the damage, because I don't know what he's told them or done to them to get them to this point."

Their mental connection filled in the gaps - Snoke had gotten to them by drawing on the children's strength, and on their minds. To do that, he'd needed to break their natural mental barriers down in ways that he'd previously been unable to, and that boded ill for how this was going to go as a rescue mission.

The three of them were down into the cave within moments, where Jacob insisted on a moment to regroup, and calm their minds - if only for the moment - so they could be sure they'd make it through the caves. It was low tide, and he could sense there were pockets of air in the labyrinth that had been entirely underwater when they negotiated it the last time, but they were still too far apart for them to make it through without careful control of their heart rates and respiration.

Rey caught the harness and immediately began putting it on. Any trepidation she had about making the trek through those underwater caves again was immediately shoved aside when she saw Jacob assisting Kylo with his gear.

He looked like he was on the verge of losing the fight before it even began. Compared to the Force wound, his own energy was like a star on the edge of a black hole - slowly being pulled into the void and he was holding on by sheer will. His spirit was going to leave them, one way or another.

Which meant Rey could not fail. She had to get down in that cave. There would be no second chances.

Fortunately, Kylo’s state was a convenient model. Even as she climbed, she could feel her heartrate start to slow down and her breaths growing more infrequent. It wasn’t anywhere as controlled as Jacob’s, but it would have to do. After a moment or two to calm her mind, she gave him a nod. Her thoughts still bargained, Don’t let me die. And I won’t let him die., but she went under all the same.

As long as you trust me, you won't die. He reached into her mind and body, deeper than he ever had before, to help her adjust her heart rate and respiration into line with his own and Kylo's. As he'd mentioned, if she trusted him, this would be sustainable for just long enough to get them through the tunnels. If she fought, though... keeping any of them alive would be a struggle.

Fortunately, they were all absolutely united in their sense of purpose, almost to the point where Rey didn't find anything abnormal about the degree of Jacob's influence on all of them. Even when she started to question it almost against her own will, all he had to do was press the thought that it's necessary into the back of her mind to get them all back on the same wavelength.

Finally, they reached the meditation chamber, and Jacob released his grip on their autonomic nervous systems, knowing they would need to bring their minds back into alignment in an entirely different way for this to succeed. In the meantime, while they each sorted out all the detritus within their own heads that might prevent that alignment, he got Kylo's wet clothes off, toweled him off, and this time, actually had a heating pad to tuck inside his dry robes in an attempt keep his body temperature at something approaching normal through all of this.

He'd brought a much smaller ground cover and pad this time, knowing what they were all in for, and got Kylo situated as comfortably as possible before beckoning Rey in to join them again. As they sat down, back to back, he let Kylo draw them all into alignment with the Force.

This time, their attempt at projection was met with only a void, at first - the three of them, still hanging in the eddy currents of the Force energy surrounding the planet. Snoke had done everything he could to camouflage the origins of his attack on them, and while Jacob knew that soon, it wouldn't be enough - the contact he'd made, to push himself into Kylo's nightmares, had left traces in the Force, no matter how well disguised, that led back to their origin - alarm bells were going off in his head as to why Snoke had bothered with the delay tactic at all.

Rey didn't resist. She let herself be pulled under until her head poked through the surface of the pool. It was a surreal, out-of-body experience, even as she hoisted herself out of the water. The feeling of the Force resonating through the chamber centered her, and brought her back from the brink.

She glanced at Kylo, expecting to see him struggle. Instead, his expression was serene. His eyes were closed. His breathing was shallow, but regular. Jacob was tending to him in a way that felt all too intimate.

Rey averted her eyes, and focused on the Force.

Kylo's outward expression was a stark contrast to the turmoil that was spinning to life inside of him. The Force wound was active, already clawing at the energy of this place. The planet's very essence was his to command. Were he anything like Darth Nihlus, he would have been already lost.

As they settled at his back, Kylo became a beacon in the Force.

Take what you need. his mind whispered in theirs. Drain me dry if you have to. Today, I am a conduit... in the hope that tomorrow... we won't be one with the Force...

Sobering words as he felt himself starting to finally lose his grip on consciousness, but not on Snoke. Maybe they were being pulled into a trap. But that was a chance they would have to take.

Jacob was already familiar enough with Kylo's incredible strength in the Force to be able to channel and guide it effectively; he'd done it before, after all. And while their opponent this time was an entirely different creature than Thuban... he had to believe that the outcome would be the same. Finally, he found the last, fading trace of Snoke's incursion, like a crack in space, and pulled it open into a rift wide enough for him to draw himself through.

And there he was, not on the bridge of the Finalizer, but in Snoke's throne room aboard the Supremacy. All at once, Jacob could feel things shift in their favor, sense that the Force was truly with them.

The same vulnerability exploited by the malware that the master codebreaker was writing, wasn't only present in Resurgent-class star destroyers, but in the Supremacy itself - and an attack on it would be far more crippling. Instead of an hour, the ship might be inoperable for as long as a day. He could've laughed, if it wasn't for the sight that greeted him. The sight that made it seem as though the feeling that was still with him, of the Force's absolute support, was somehow nothing more than a carefully crafted lie.

Snoke sat in his throne, surrounded by his Praetorian Guards - their weapons pointed inward, rather than outward, at the small forms kneeling between them and Snoke. Jacob drew a sharp breath when he counted twelve of them, and at the realization - not far behind - of what, exactly, had seemed off about them at first.

A chill ran down Jacob's spine when he realized he was looking at six sets of identical twins.

Eight of the children were male, and the other four were female, and all appeared to be between the ages of four and six - and he was so distracted by observing them, hoping that this wouldn't be the last time he laid eyes on any of them, that he barely noticed when Snoke had begun talking. Perhaps Snoke realized he hadn't been paying attention, since he'd only begun with, "I don't know what you said to Luke Skywalker, but it seems that he has picked an especially inconvenient time to develop a spine. No matter; I have no true need of him."

Snoke narrowed his crooked eyes. "Just as I no longer have any need of Ben Solo." He spat the name like a vile, disgusting thing, the words a total renunciation of their bond as master and apprentice.

A total renunciation of the one thing that could've held Kylo and Jacob back from his throat, once they figured out how to get to him.

In the cave, Rey felt Kylo’s body slump lifelessly against her back. She nearly jumped at first, but wheh Jacob didn’t even move, when she could barely feel his mind at all, she knew this was what they brought her to do.

She pulled Kylo into her lap and closed her eyes. Even though his spirit seemed to be far away, his body was still an active conduit. She could feel the Force wound drawing energy from the planet and she could feel it going somewhere.

They were out there... she reasoned. They were fighting Snoke.

She placed her hands over his heart.

Keep beating... she thought to herself. Keep beating...

Meanwhile, Kylo was standing aboard the Supremacy, staring down the man he once called master. The guards couldn’t hurt them. Nothing could. They were there, but they were not physically there. Mentally, however...

The children were there, kneeling like Kylo always did - subservient under threat of punishment. Only now, though, did he see it for what it was. Snoke spoke as though he was still in control, but Kylo did not rise to his bait.

No... He was the bridge. He was the conduit. Unlike Snoke, he trusted his apprentice.

Now.

One word echoed through time and space. Everything moved in perfect synchronisity. His eyes closed. His chin dropped. He clenched his fists as his arms snapped in an X across his chest. Frozen like a Sith statue, he poured everything he had into the Force and it surged within him in return.

His power was Jacob’s to wield.

Jacob smirked mirthlessly at Snoke's words. "Pathetic that you think my master is still what you made him, or that anything of him is yours to take away. He's grown far beyond what you tried to turn him into, and beyond your control." Jacob's projected form dimmed slightly, growing a little less distinct, and a dark mist began to fill the room - though Snoke and his Guards didn't seem to notice it, for now - as Jacob reached out through the Force to determine exactly what he was up against. "But then, you already know that. Otherwise, you wouldn't need to resort to cowardly tactics like trying to use Skywalker as a sleeper agent to get to our physical bodies, or using our children as human shields."

Snoke had enclosed himself, the children, and the guards within a Force shield similar to the one Jacob had only recently figured out how to use - and while, on the surface, it seemed much stronger and more sophisticated than anything Jacob could ever summon, a little probing revealed he was drawing most of the power for it from the children, and he wasn't regulating it well. There were little ripples and eddies where a well-timed attack backed by sufficient power could punch through, and most crucially, it didn't deaden Jacob's ability to sense anything that was on the other side of it, any more than it did his ability to see it - he couldn't touch it, but that didn't change the fact that he knew exactly what he was aiming for.

He'd slaughter the guards immediately, and hopefully all at once; Jacob disliked killing when it was wasteful or unnecessary, but he knew what had been done to Snoke's Praetorian Guards, and they were essentially already as good as dead. Snoke had gutted out their minds like a parasitic larva, replacing them with conditioning that robbed them of every scrap of autonomy beyond what was required to make them perfectly-honed killing machines. The only thing Jacob could do for them was make it as fast as possible.

His master's voice resonated through him, followed by that surge of power in the Force, and he used it to peel away the shield just far enough to hit Snoke with the ysalamir technique with the speed of a striking adder. It was only a moment before Snoke pushed it back, but that moment was long enough to collapse the shield entirely - and long enough for Jacob to drop every one of the Guards. Dissecting the full lengths of their aortas required only one quick strike, and the near-instantaneous, near-total depressurization of their circulatory systems meant they were unconscious before they even hit the ground, and the damage was so catastrophic that even Snoke couldn't seal it with the Force for just long enough to get one of them back on their feet and begin the slaughter he'd threatened.

Snoke managed to get the shield back up, more resilient this time since it was covering only him; meanwhile, Jacob realized he could sense the children's minds, and that they were far less perturbed at the death of the guards than he'd expected. He didn't even want to think about the kinds of things that might mean Snoke had already done to them. Knowing that if he could sense them, they could sense him as well, he tried to maintain a shell of calm around the outside of his thoughts, screening the hate and rage and desire for Snoke's blood from their view, even as he tried to crack through the Force shield - and, in between, scoured the outside of it with bursts of the ysalamir technique to try to keep Snoke from reestablishing a mental connection with the children that would allow him the power to fight back.

There was only so long both sides could keep this up for - but Jacob could feel Snoke's strength beginning to falter, and he wasn't the only one who recognized it. Snoke dug deep for one last surge of power, enough to knock Jacob off-balance only for a moment. But that moment was enough.

"Enough!" Snoke roared, getting to his feet - as did one of the children, one of the boys, in front of him. Before Jacob could even react, he heard the snap-hiss of a lightsaber igniting, and the sight of an orangish, dying-sun-colored lightsaber blade protruding from the boy's chest shattered Jacob so badly that he almost lost the projection, before he realized that there was no way Snoke could've taken one of his lightsabers to do this with, because he wasn't physically there. Once that fact reconnected in his mind, any significance to Snoke's lightsaber being the exact same hue as Jacob's vanished beneath a tide of grief and murderous rage.

One last snapshot of the moment etched itself into his mind before things began moving far too quickly again: the inhuman, wounded-animal shriek of pain and anger and fear that filled the room wasn't coming from the mortally wounded child, or any of his brothers or sisters. They all remained eerily calm, even the dying boy, a horrifyingly out-of-place look of fanatic devotion in their eyes; the sound had to be coming from Jacob, or Kylo, or maybe even both of them.

"Stand down," Snoke growled, fully expecting the realization of the lengths he was willing to go to, to preserve his own life, to have stunned Jacob and Kylo into inaction. "Or else--"

He had miscalculated for the last time.

The air shifted. Even the air in the cave shifted and Rey felt a chill run down her spine. She heard a scream through the Force that threatened to split her heart apart, even though she couldn’t place the source.

Kylo’s vitals were erratic and the Force wound constantly threatened to overpower them. He was channeling all of this energy - energy that she was essentially purifying and redirecting right back into him in Force-centric version of dialysis. If she could have split her focus long enough to worry, she would have wondered whether or not he could survive this. It was better for all of them that she couldn’t.

On the Supremacy, Kylo’s voice echoed. His rage made the entire ship rattle. It was never part of their plan for him to get involved in the fight - in fact, diverting even a fraction of his raw power from Jacob ran the risk of sabotaging their entire plan by wearing Kylo out that much faster. If Snoke couldn’t stun them into inaction, pushing one of them into action was an acceptable strategy.

And for a moment, it seemed at least Kylo had taken the bait.

The former apprentice reached out with both hands, force field be damned, and Snoke braced himself for the impact that he had foreseen...

Except that it didn’t come. Instead of lashing out at Snoke, Kylo poured the sum total of his rage into Jacob’s next technique. This was it and Snoke didn’t even realize it. He spoke in two places at once - “Everything you just said... everything that you’ve ever said... is wrong.”

Jacob's Force projection didn't break; it just ceased to be visible, as all of his focus centered on channeling the raw and all-consuming surge of Kylo's power. His senses expanded through the Force, unbidden, and he could feel his mind brush against the edges of the children's, feel flickers of fear inside them. For just a moment, he reached out, gently. The greatest source of power in all the cosmos... is love. No matter what, I will protect you.

He could feel them shy away before the alienness of the emotion, but they didn't stop him from peeling Snoke's Force shield back like tinfoil - even though he was screaming at them to help. Jacob blocked Snoke's voice from their minds, and reached down to lift the dying boy in his arms. All of a sudden, Snoke realized where this was going, and tried to retreat, but Jacob immobilized him through the Force. He laid the dying boy's hand against the center of Snoke's chest, and carefully found his way into the boy's mind. Together, their thoughts surrounded the energy of the wound, drew it out...

And drove it straight through Snoke's chest.

The boy dropped to his knees, gasping for air, his hand pressed to his intact chest in disbelief, and Jacob's projection became visible again, his immaterial hand inside Snoke's head as he followed his mind down the spiral.

There was a flicker of recognition in Kylo’s mind as he felt the technique take shape. The wound transfer technique that Jacob had created and used on him so long ago had expanded beyond its original design.

No, the apprentice was no longer sacrificing his own strength, or taking pain and injury onto himself to heal his master. Now, he too was a condiit of the Force. He was in both bodies, and both minds, at once. What Snoke did to the boy would be returned in kind.

If only, the same could be done for Kylo... what sweet revenge that would be.

No, even if it were possible, it would be far too risky to allow Snoke access to the Force wound. He had to die here and now.

For the first time, Kylo’s Force projection moved aboard the Supremacy. It flickered from the exertion, but didn’t fade. All of the children were staring, especially the one that had just been brought back to life.

“It’s all right. I have you.”

The message was for the children, but also for Jacob. As he followed Snoke down into death, Kylo stood strong - an anchor with for his apprentice should Snoke try to take him down with him.

“I have you.”

Right now, Jacob was grateful for that anchor, because Snoke still hadn't stopped fighting him. And though Jacob had done this dozens of times before, getting inside Snoke's mind was proving to be far more challenging than he'd anticipated. It kept twisting out of his grasp, writhing and sinuous like a nest full of serpents, leaving him with only brief glimpses of what he needed; however, he refused to be defeated. It was time to try a new tactic.

I forgive you, Snoke. And though there will always be things I disagree with you on, there are parts of your vision that are worth saving, as well. Please, please trust me to carry them on for you.

Snoke was genuinely startled to find that he actually meant it - and that gave Jacob the vulnerability he needed to get in.

Jacob knew exactly what he was after; however, that didn't stop Snoke from trying to derail him, still. You should have trusted me, Icarus. There are dangers out there in the cosmos that are far greater than anything you've faced before, or anything you could comprehend. You aren't ready for them, and without me, you will be powerless against them.

But I won't be without you, will I? I'll still have your work, and my master's legacy. With a sharp twist, he was finally able to break through into the memories he'd been seeking.

The scope of what Jacob found was far beyond what he'd expected. Snoke was leaving behind five separate facilities, hidden away at the ends of the galaxy, to carry on his plans; there, Jacob's research was still being carried on and developed, along with that of others, some of whom Jacob knew, and some he'd never met before. Once the news of Snoke's death reached them, they'd scatter like cancerous cells into the body of the galaxy, each carrying vital pieces to the spread of the disease. But, for once, Jacob knew something Snoke didn't. He knew all the blind ends and snags and pitfalls inherent in the research, knew that it was years away from being able to accomplish anything more than what Snoke had already done. The disease could be halted. The Force's immune system would catch up with it before it had a chance to flourish.

He pulled as much information about the locations and people involved out of Snoke's mind as he could before, finally, the last traces of it slipped away. As Snoke became one with the Force, Jacob felt the same things he always had: acceptance, and understanding. At last, Snoke was at peace with the Force, and in that moment, Jacob knew he would've given him more of the information he sought, if there had been anything left to give. But he was already gone.

To Kylo, whose body and mind had been so intimately intwined with the Supreme Leader’s will for so long, felt the blow of his death like a shockwave. It took every ounce of control he had to hold onto Jacob’s mind as the Force thrust him out of the projection.

He tried to reach out toward the children - at the very least to imprint in their minds that this wasn’t the end, that they weren’t alone and that he would return. He wanted so desperately to give them that much, something that, at their age, he craved - but the connection was severed. They were gone. Or rather, he was gone. Half a galaxy stood between them again.

Back in the cave, Rey was shaking. Sweat dripped into blurry eyes. She lost focus long enough to wonder how long any of them, herself included, could keep this up.

Then came the same shockwave, ripplies spreading out across the galaxy. She saw Kylo’s eyes open as he gasped for air. She felt Jacob’s body move behind her. She heard herself shout, “You did it! I felt it!” before Kylo went completely limp in her lap.

“Oh no... no no no no...” she shook him, scramblling to pick up where she’d left off and losing the last of her focus to panic. “Breathe! Kriffing breathe!”

The projection broke so suddenly that it took Jacob a moment to realize exactly why it was that he abruptly found himself in an incredible amount of pain. Every fiber of his being burned with the exertion of channeling energies in the Force far beyond what it was meant to endure, for an extended period of time - when he and Kylo had fought Thuban, the true apex of the battle had been less than a minute, despite feeling like it took hours, and had allowed Jacob to escape relatively unscathed. The confrontation with Snoke, however, had been every bit as long as it felt, and Jacob fought desperately to cling onto consciousness.

The only thing that allowed him to marshal the last of his strength was the knowledge that his master needed him.

He collapsed next to Kylo, his hand on his master's chest as he focused what little energy he was still able to command into keeping Kylo's heart beating. "Rey," he croaked, "do you know how to give rescue breaths?"

Chewing away at the back of his mind was the knowledge of what they'd done, or rather, what they'd left undone - they'd left their children alone in a room full of corpses without making sure there was anyone on the ship who would see to their needs, make sure they were seen back to their quarters and fed and taken care of until the Supremacy arrived at Ahch-To, what Jacob knew to be its inevitable destination. However, he had no way to fix that now; the only thing he could do now was try to make sure they all survived this.

Had Kylo been stronger and healthier, he would have stayed longer. He would have spoken with the children and tried to reassure them of their safety. He would have seen the ship safely to Ahch-To. Most importantly, he would have eased them both out of the projection. But Kylo had completed what the Force willed. His spirit, and perhaps his body, had already overstayed their welcome.

Rey gasped in shock as Jacob basically collapsed beside her. "Res..rescue breaths? You mean, breathe for him?"

She'd never done it herself, but had seen others try. At the time, she remembered feeling resentful - why would anyone do such a thing? Another mouth to feed meant more competition for already scarce resources. Not that it mattered. The man died.

Kylo couldn't.

Rey nodded, "Yeah, I've seen it."

A few basic instructions - tilt the head back, pinch the nostrils closed, etc. - and Rey could handle the rest. Even though it seemed hopeless on the surface, she kept going. She could still feel the Force within him, just as she could feel the Force wound desperately preying on everything around it (including them). The Force did not cling to the dead. Therefore, somehow, he was still clinging to life.

"How long..." she hissed quickly between breaths. "...can we keep this up?"

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