A/N Hi, lovelies, it's me and I hope you haven't forgotten me yet. I know updates are taking ages, but when you have a story which is close to 100k symbols it becomes rather difficult to sit and write. Nevertheless, the update is here and I hope you'll forgive me for the long wait.

Chapter 23. Letter from the past

"Are you ready? If you are not ready yet, it is not necessary to do it right now." Ben's voice sounded concerned.

They sat on the bed, legs crossed, and between them lay a holodisk. He had recovered rather quickly, and now only the bandage on his hand reminded her of the accident. Time flew fast, and she thought that they have already spent several weeks in the village. Despite the kind attitude of the residents, Rey felt trapped. The people of Kehoo really did not use any achievements of technology. No droids, no ships, no speeders. Probably, once upon a time all people lived like this somewhere in the cradle of humanity, before interplanetary travelling became possible. The lack of the ability to find a ship or even send a signal to the Resistance reduced their chances of leaving the planet to zero.

She peered into Ben's face for some time and thought about the new life that was developing in her womb. For all the time they spent on Kehoo, she never had the courage to tell him about the baby. The thought that they were to become parents frightened her to a shudder. What kind of parents could they be - the scavenger who never knew mother's love, and the man who killed his own father? She decided to drive the thoughts of child to the depths of her mind and to focus for a while on more pressing issues.

Rey reached out and pressed the disc button. A woman's figure appeared over the surface. Rey's heart began to beat faster when she saw that the woman's hair was collected into three buns, just like her own. The woman straightened up and looked somewhere through Rey's face. Rey felt shivers coming down her spine because the figure above the holodisc was almost an exact copy of herself. The similarity was almost frightening. Rey looked at the holoprojection in a strange stupor. Was that ... her mother? Alesa looked some years older than Rey was now, but she was still very young.

Finally, Alesa Bellax began to speak.

My little Rey,

I do not know if we'll ever see each other again. I just hope that when the time comes, you will see this message. I ask you to forgive me for everything.

I hope that my story will help you to understand who you are.

Alesa paused and coughed a few times, as if she collected her thoughts together, and continued.

My memories began when I opened my eyes in the strange place. It was a system of interconnected rooms, without windows and doors, without any connection to the outside world. Most of all it resembled some strange prison, if not for one circumstance - all rooms were filled with incubators. And each incubator contained a human baby.

Scraps of the memories I was left with did not give me any clue for the situation I found myself in. I will not dwell for a long time on how I tried to understand what happened. My only company was the voice from the loudspeaker on the wall, who began to give me instructions soon after my awakening, but seemed to pay no attention to my questions. I had no choice but to follow these instructions. And no choice but to start my life anew in this place.

At first, I did not understand why was I needed at all, because soon I discovered that there were three medical droids which were quite capable of taking care of the babies. After several days of work, I realized that all the children were clones. All girls. At a certain point in life, infants were injected with some substance. None of them survived the injection. Why they were obliged to die in such young age? I had no one to ask questions. All droids were disconnected from talking, so my world was filled with silence and loneliness. Clones were dying and replaced with new ones, who also died in turn. Over time, I began to feel that the world consisted only of incubators and clones and there was nothing but this silent place. At times, I had vivid dreams about my old life - at least I thought so, although I could not remember a single dream. But when I opened my eyes, the picture was always the same - incubators, clones and droids.

Now, when I am out of there, I know that this place was something like a drifting space station. But then I had no clue of my whereabouts. The walls of the station were smooth, like an egg shell. However, one day I found a door in the wall. It was locked. So over time, I forgot about it, drowning in the everyday routine.

But there came the day when my lonely days ended. One clone survived after the injection. And my life was filled with meaning from that moment.

I gave this clone a name.

Rey.

Alexa smiled to her memories and continued:

The voice from the loudspeaker was not stupid. Droids could maintain the incubators but could not raise up a human child. When it was finally clear that you survived the injection and would continue to develop normally, the strange door opened and I found a room full of necessary things for a child's growth. Time began to fly faster. I raised you as my own child, but we were still locked up. Nobody visited us, the new surviving clones did not appear any more. You grew up as a child who had never seen sunlight or green grass.

I swore that I would get us out of this strange place, where we were imprisoned for incomprehensible crimes. I started to watch the droids. They were not in the hatchery all the time - they appeared and disappeared. That meant that there was an exit from our prison.

I managed to change the program of one of the droids by directly connecting to its electrical circuit. It allowed us to follow it out of the hatchery. It turned out that it was part of a drifting station. There were no spaceships on it, but there were life-saving capsules. Why they were needed on a drifting station, populated by droids and babies remained unknown, but these capsules saved us.

After several days of drifting free in outer space, we were picked up by a commercial cruiser. We pretended to be refugees from some distant world, destroyed by war, so they dropped us on the nearest neutral planet, called Jakku.

Alesa smiled, but her tone became bitter.

I was a fool, thinking that nobody will find us. I underestimated the force, which stood behind the organisation of the clone factory.

We could not live on the planet without a minimal registration, so I had to register us at the local office, which looked more like a stable. And a week after, they came for us. I saw two people whose faces were hidden under the hoods, showing my holoprojection in a tavern near the market. All that I managed to do after that was to hand you over to Unkar Plutt and try to distract their attention. Near Niima, some smugglers' ship landed due to the fuel shortage. I hijacked it and another ship took off from the planet surface and followed me. They thought that I was taking you away and that saved your life. You remained just one of the dirty hungry children hanging around near Niima market.

Alesa's projection turned away for a moment, as if she was examining the monitors on the control panel. When she turned back her face looked concerned.

I hoped that I'd managed to leave them behind, but they've tracked me even through hyperspace. My computer says that there is an asteroid belt nearby, so I'll try to switch off all my electronics and hide there.

She looked back nervously again, then continued.

I am recording this message in case everything goes wrong and we don't see each other again. Unkar Plutt knows nothing, he just thinks that they are after my head for some crime and he is too stupid to realize that they want you, not me.

The image faltered and Alesa swayed as if the earth was dropping out from under her feet.

I must go now, my shields won't last long against their cannons. Goodbye, little Rey.

I hope we will see each other soon.

The message ended abruptly.

"And she didn't make it. She died, trying to protect me from the ones chasing me, and I didn't even remember her." Rey's voice sounded hollow.

"Don't blame yourself, you were a child when all this happened." Ben's tone was soothing, but it was not enough for her. Rey stood up and quickly left the room. It seemed to her that suddenly there was not enough air in the house.

It was early morning and Rey shivered from the cold. The landscape of the village was still calm and peaceful yet she suddenly wanted to scream. To scream because of the injustice of the universe, because of the pain of old wounds awakened by a message from a long-ago past, because of the fear of the future. She clenched her fists painfully and closed her eyes, breathing loudly.

A survived clone, the fruit of someone's evil genius. Life created without love, only by calculation. Back on Jakku, when she was especially lonely and hungry, she used to curl up in her little bed inside the old war machine and dream that she was a lost princess of some distant country and soon her parents would come for her and take her to a place where she would be important. Those thoughts gave her strength and even now, being an adult, she secretly hoped that her life was valuable and that there was a reason for all her sufferings. But now she was a clone, one of thousands, simply lucky to survive some medical invasion. She raised her hand and bit her knuckles to hold back the tears.

She heard a rustle from behind and a large hand was laid cautiously on her shoulder. Ben rarely left the house, being still weak, but now he was too concerned to leave her alone. He remained silent and she was grateful for it, because no words could help her at the moment. She had to relive the loss of the person who once replaced her mother, and reconcile herself with her origins.

You know that you ARE valuable for me.

His soft whisper through the bond made her smile bitterly. He tried to be sweet. She turned towards him and rested her head against his broad chest, her eyes closed. Suddenly, the burden of secrets she kept within became unbearable.

"Ben, we are going to have a baby."

The hands that were stroking her shoulders, stopped. He gasped, as if somebody had hit him in the stomach. She stood, face buried in his chest, afraid to raise her eyes and see his face. Was he angry? Disappointed? Confused?

"... Are you sure?" he asked hoarsely.

Rey nodded, still unable to look into his eyes. She haven't had her usual periods for a quite long time. Maa's flower was not mistaken.

Ben groaned and muttered, "I am such a fool. My contraception implant… They must have extracted it when I needed major medical assistance after being wounded on Starkiller and they did not put a new one." His tone sounded embarrassed, but not angry.

"What should we do about it?" whispered Rey. Finally, she raised her eyes, seeking answers and approval on his face. He seemed shocked and confused by her confession, but his hands still were on her shoulders and he seemed to have no intent to back off. Ben paused for a moment and then coughed for a few times, collecting his thoughts together. "Honestly, my love, I never thought of becoming a father."

"You don't want this child." Rey tried to sound calm, but her heart sank from the thought. Ben stroked her arms reassuringly, gradually overcoming the first shock and gaining control over himself: "It is not a question for me, Rey. Do you want to have a child, whose father is a murderer, a sinner, that I am? You know everything about me. You know that the Resistance and the First Order will hunt me forever, and if we are ever able to leave Kehoo, our child will be obliged to live a vagabond life. Besides that, I never meant to tie you to myself..."

"Enough!.." Rey felt burning rage, developing inside her chest. She jerked her shoulders, throwing off his hands. "Ben Solo, don't try to to start talking about the fact that someday I will want to leave you. I saw you whole and I'm not afraid of your past. Tell me directly, will you love this child? You know that this is the only thing that is important. If you're not ready, if you want to run away - say it bluntly, like a man!" She felt that she was talking hormones rather than reason, but rage eclipsed everything.

Ben winced, as if she had hit him. A familiar flicker of anger flashed in his eyes, but he suppressed it. When he began to speak his voice contained unexpected tenderness, "Of course I will love our child. Nothing will make me happier than having your baby. I will protect you both till the last drop of my blood, if it is needed. I just don't want you to feel under pressure."

"Your love is enough both for me and our child." said Rey. She felt ashamed for her outburst, so she stretched out her arms to him, "Hold me for a while." He wrapped his long arms around her from the back and she closed her eyes, listening to their Force bond. He felt truly happy. It was a cautious, secret happiness that he tried to hide far away in the depths of his soul, but she felt how it was warming him from the inside. She sensed that he was even a bit afraid of this happiness, understanding its fragility.

They stood in silence for a while, watching the morning sun rising above the trees. Ben held her tighter, as if by accident putting a hand on her belly. "Do you feel bad about Alesa's message?" he asked.

"Yes… And no at the same time. I am who I am. Being a survived clone is better than not existing at all." Rey tried to sound careless.

"We still don't know who stood behind the clone factory and what was the substance, injected to all clones, which made them die." Ben pointed out. Rey shrugged her shoulders, "I think we'll never know it. And even if we could, what for? Alesa is dead, my father never existed - it is time to live beyond that." She turned her head and looked up at him. "Maybe the fact that we landed on Kehoo is not so bad. At least, it is a better place to have a baby than the chambers of the First Order or a Resistance base."

Ben kissed her temple and stated, "So, we need at least to find a job here. We've used enough of the local people's hospitality."

Rey looked him over from head to foot and giggled, "My-my, look at Lord Ren, scary and menacing, intending to work as a local farmer."

He snorted, slightly offended by her mockery, "Despite your opinion of me, I have never been afraid to work with my hands. I can become a local smith or carpenter. I do not think it's more difficult than repairing a ship."

"Just imagine, we are going to have a real family." Rey's voice trembled from emotion.

"Yes, sweetheart, we will. And now go inside, or our child will suppose that you are intending to freeze her." Now Ben was mocking.

"Her? Why do you think it's a girl?"

He smiled and answered nothing.

-x-

They began to live a quiet life in the village. Soon, when Ben recovered, they moved to a free house In the neighborhood with Grandma Shi. He found a job as a blacksmith and it fit him. He forbid Rey to come to his forge, referring to the fact that she might feel sick from the heat, but sometimes when he was immersed into his job, she peeked throgth the hole between the logs of which the forge was built. He usually worked bare chested and there was something darkside in the movement of muscles beneath his skin soiled with soot when he was pulling out a piece of red-hot metal from the crucible with forceps and threw it into the cold water with loud hiss. The forge was his personal battlefield. He beat and bent metal, turning it into absolutely peaceful things - plows and axes, shovels and fences for kitchen gardens.

Rey began to help Grandma Shi with herbs and visiting the sick in the village, so her days were also full of meaning. The war was gradually becoming a distant memory and her thoughts less and less often returned to the Resistance and her friends. The villagers easily accepted them into their narrow circle. Nobody asked them about the past.

Their life was so normal, that it seemed a dream.

She kissed Ben hard and almost sobbed when one day he proudly brought home a self-made cradle for the baby.

-х-

Rey walked along the path through the thickets, cheerfully swinging a basket for berries. Her rounded belly had already become slightly visible under her loose shirt. She murmured to herself a song without words and kicked the small stones that came across her on the way.

Everything around was quiet.

Too quiet.

She daydreamed and did not notice how she didn't notice someone in her path until she crashed into him.

It must have been one of the villagers.

"I'm so sorry…" Rey raised her eyes and the words froze on her lips. The man held her by the shoulders tightly. Then he raised one of his hands and put the lock of hair behind her ear, almost gently. Rey felt a drop of sweat running down her back.

"Well, well, guess who we have got here. A scavenger."

The spark of triumph flashed in Hux's watery blue eyes .

Rey felt pain from the injection in the neck. The last thing that her eyes had saw before closing was the glare of the sun on the shiny white armor of dozens of stormtroopers.