Star Wars - dietplainlite

Ileenium isn’t visible in the night sky of Ahch-To, but she pretends it is.

**Author's Note:**

* For [imperatorkhaleesi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/imperatorkhaleesi/gifts).

> Sometimes I like to write in 100 word segments.

I.

Ileenium isn’t visible in the night sky of Ahch-To, but she pretends it is, and she chooses a star that shines brightest before dawn—at least when the clouds have parted--and sends her intentions toward it.

She doesn’t know if the Resistance base is even still on D’Qar, but she pretends it is.  She sees it, circling her favorite star and cradling those she holds most dear.

Whether Finn has awoken or not, she doesn’t know. But she pretends he has, and that maybe, he looks up in the night sky of D’Qar and chooses his own bright star.

II.

Finn’s star doesn’t shine brightest, but its path takes the longest to trace across the skylight above his bed.

He follows it, as he grapples with the meaning of being a person instead of a number, and of the value conferred on his life, when the First Order would have weighed the sunk cost of creating him against the cost of rebuilding him, down to a fraction of a credit, instead of deciding his life was worth saving just because it is a life.

Because Resistance is sometimes too big a concept, but she is not, he follows the star.

III.

One night, a dream transforms into a vision and she’s sitting on a knoll next to him as he watches Starfighters leave atmo, his thumbs twitching at imaginary controls.

“You’ve been using simulators!” she says.  He doesn’t answer, because this is her vision, but she drinks in the sight of him, sitting up strong, skin glowing, eyes determined.

“Someday,” she says. “We’ll fly away together.  When this is finished.”

He looks in her direction. “Rey?”

She reaches, even as the vision fades.

Her name echoes as she wakes, blending into the pounding of the surf and the calling of birds.

IV.

Finn debates telling Dr. Kalonia, despite instructions to let her know immediately of any cognitive disruptions. If it wasn’t real, if he didn’t feel her presence, like a key sliding into a lock, if he didn’t _see_ her, he doesn’t want to know.

His survival instinct, does want to know.