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She wonders what she has done wrong in a past life to deserve this.
Not that Ava particularly believed in past lives.
Or that she of all people would have had one… But still.
She was stuck here. Watching, minding, supervising - the intergalactic disaster known as The Canary. A job that was more suited for one of her troopers or lieutenants not a General of the First Order.
It’s a pointless task.
Guarding this woman, because that’s all she was, a woman with a few good parlor tricks. Ava certainly didn’t believe in the Force, a mythical thing that tied the whole universe together. She had heard stories, rumors of Jedi that had lived long ago, a temple on a planet that no longer held its former majesty.
It was all nothing but nonsense.
If the Jedi were truly as magical and powerful as the stories claimed then they would still be around.
The Force would still be around.
More than in just a woman, one who apparently died to get that haunting yellow glow in her eyes, sitting with her legs propped on top of Ava’s neatly ordered desk, in that obnoxious, and not at all attractive, white leather get up with her cape draping off the edge of Ava’s chair.
“Don’t you have something better to be doing,” Ava asks, eyeing the other woman.
The Canary smiles like the cat that caught her namesake. “Rip said that I get free reign of this planet.”
Ah yes, as if Ava could forget.
The reason she was stuck with this woman.
The way Director Hunter had looked at her, like he was presenting the prize jewel of his collection, like there was a shared history between them that Ava was not and would never be privy to, before insisting that she stay on planet for the completion of Starkiller base as extra protection.
Protection from what Ava had been uncertain of.
It was not as if anyone knew where they were.
It was not as if the planet had any flaws.
Her plans were flawless.
Executed clearly.
Made for perfection.
Just as she was.
Just as the woman in front of her clearly was not.
Ava closes her eyes, blocking the Canary out for a moment, before she breathes in and out to the count of ten, a practice for relieving stress, a part of her training that she found herself turning too more and more often lately.
Once, and then once more.
“Very well then. Enjoy yourself.”
As she turns to leave she distantly registers, a reply of, “Oh I will.”
*
“So Aves-”
“It’s General Sharpe,” she says, voice tight, hands clasped behind her back, a picture of parade rest. Waiting for the Director’s call in the receiving chamber. “Ava if you must be colloquial, not-”
“Relax, it’s a nickname. Just being friendly.”
“We are not friends, Canary.”
For a moment, Ava could have sworn that she almost looked offended at that assessment, as though they would have had any reason to be friends . Before the expression is gone as quick as it came. A moment later she says, “You could call me Sara, if you’d like.”
“I’d rather not.”
*
Sometimes the Canary leaves on other missions.
Some infinite quest of hers to find the last of the Jedi and defeat them. Or something like that. Ava doesn’t pay much attention, enjoys the brief respite the moments without the Canary lurking around her ships or her planet.
It’s not worth bothering to investigate whatever it is that Director Hunter only seems to trust her with.
Though the rumors stir endlessly within her ranks.
From the troopers to her own lieutenants.
They speak of nonsense.
Of Jedi.
Of temples.
Of sisters.
Of a wreckage.
Of a planet that’s no more than an island.
Ava doesn’t ask, because she already knows what the answers would be. Director Bennett would tell her to focus on Starkiller Base, to focus on her project and not let herself get distracted by this. Director Hunter would avoid the topic, look away, say the right words to make her forget she ever asked.
So she doesn’t ask.
Instead she enjoys what small break she has, pours herself a drink, and tries not to feel as though the planet was empty without her usual distraction around.
*
The Canary is staring at her. A scrutinizing gaze that Ava wishes she could avoid. That she purposely looks away from. Her eyes have seemed more yellow since she last came back, more vicious, more hurtful.
Ava has noted the shifts in them, the colors and hues, has wondering what it meant too many times. Has never had it in her to ask, but this time, the word, “What,” falls off her lips without thinking.
It was, of course, exactly what she had wanted to hear.
The Canary’s voice is sickeningly sweet. “I think I saw a pamphlet about you once. What did it say? More human than human? One hundred percent housebroken?”
Ava squeezes her hands into tight fists, her nails biting into her palms. Not the best mode of relaxation, a voice like her trainer in the back of her head reminds her.
Her voice is measured when she finally speaks, “I didn’t know that you could read.”
*
“Spar with me.”
Ava’s eyes fall on the other woman.
Out of her leathers for the first time since she’d shown up on Starkiller base, wearing a thin tank top and workout shorts instead. Ava resists the urge to let her eyes roam over the woman in front of her.
Everyone knew that the Canary was beautiful. It was half the reason her so called Jedi mind tricks worked, because nobody felt much like turning her down when faced with that smile, even if they knew that there was darkness underneath the surface.
It wasn’t magic.
It wasn’t the Force.
It was that smile.
And those eyes that seemed more blue than golden today.
“This is the officer’s training room, Canary, I don’t believe you’re an officer of the First Order.”
“Free reign,” she replies, before adding, “Honestly, Aves, you don’t expect me to train among your troopers, do you?”
She’s not certain what she expected, but her eyes fall to the lightsaber, the heavy look of it in her hand. This much Ava does believe in, a sword powered by a light crystal, able to cut through even the strongest of metals.
The one reason she even considered the Canary to be a threat.
“Can you really fight without your precious toy?”
When she meets the Canary’s gaze, there is a mischievous look in the other woman’s eyes before she tosses her lightsaber aside.
“Wouldn’t you like to find out?”
*
“Did they not put you together right when you died, or have you always been this incompetent?”
The Canary grins at her, lips red with her own blood.
Not seeming to care in the slightest that she was bleeding on the floor of Ava’s control room.
“It’s part of my charm.”
*
She could have guessed that having the Canary here was a recipe for disaster. That it was never going to end well, that one of her little quests would jeopardize everything that Ava had worked so hard for.
She just hadn’t imagined that it would go this poorly.
One of her own breaking rank, the loyal ZR-1308, turning against her careful programming. Known rebel commander Amaya Jiwe having escaped from custody with the knowledge of the location of Starkiller Base.
And all of this over what -
“A droid?”
“A very important droid,” the Canary corrects.
She’s not sure what to make of this woman in front of her.
For a second, she looks like a monster.
For a second, she looks more human than she ever has.
For a second, Ava falters.
It’s just enough. Enough to be significant, though she hardly realizes it at the time. Hardly realizes what this moment means when she stares too long into those eyes, listening to the alarms that blare loud and uncomfortable around them.
She breaks the moment soon enough, tearing her gaze away, letting the frustration and annoyance and anxiety return. These emotions are so much easier to handle.
“What exactly is this Gideon ?”
The look she gets in return is back to that mischievous one, the one that Ava can handle, “That’s above your clearance level, Aves.”
*
She takes a deep breath in and out.
In and out.
In and out.
Tries to steady herself.
As if that will make the control panel that has clearly been destroyed by a lightsaber easier to deal with.
“Lieutenant Green see that someone cleans this mess up.”
*
She finds the Canary in her office.
Sitting as she always is, in a chair that doesn’t belong to her, feet propped up on the desk, already broken into Ava’s liquor stash. The good stuff. The type of drinks that one could only get on planets with prohibition laws, the underground bars always serving something stronger than any legal drink.
Ava doesn’t even ask what she’s doing here. A part of her already knows.
Instead she just pours herself a glass and leans against the other side of the desk, watching the Canary with careful eyes.
“You know, I used to be part of the Resistance,” she says, her words slurring a little.
Enough to make Ava wonder how long she’s been in here.
“I didn’t,” Ava says.
She didn’t know much about the Canary.
Just that she apparently had the Force. Just that she died, more than once before. Just that some might say that she had fallen. Just the way she looked cheeks red and chest heaving pinned underneath Ava. Just -
“I wanted to be an X-Wing pilot,” she continues. “Save the day. Be the hero.”
“We would have been enemies,” Ava points out.
As if that makes any difference.
As if they weren’t now.
No, she supposed not. Maybe not enemies, but something else… Or at least, they were supposed to be. At some point something had changed. Ava’s still not certain how that had happened.
“Canary-”
“Sara,” she corrects.
Ava isn’t sure why she gives in, maybe it’s the taste so sweet it could almost be wine on her lips, “Sara.”
“What did you want to be when you were little? You can’t always have planned for this?”
Ava downs her drink instead of answering right away. Savoring the burn. A proof that she can feel things unique and her own. “You forget that I was made for this.”
Sara’s face flashes momentarily with guilt - “Shit, Aves-”
“I want to be more than this,” Ava cuts her off. She doesn’t need her pity. She doesn’t need anyone's pity. “I’ve been working on things. Designs really, weapons, this very planet. I may not have been born for greatness, or with magic inside of my veins, but I’m going to leave my mark. I’m going to live on in the Galaxy’s history books.”
She’s going to be more than just another clone.
She’s sure of it.
That belief is what has gotten her this far.
When Starkiller Base goes off, it will be official.
But now, she feels as if she isn’t so certain of that. Because the look of pity on Sara’s face has turned into something else. Sadness almost like disappointment, and Ava doesn’t understand it.
Sara opens her mouth, about to tell her something, explain that look, but she never gets the chance, a knock at the door, a flustered lieutenant’s call of “General Sharpe?” ends the conversation before it truly begins.
*
“It is time,” the hologram of Director Bennett says, “The moment you’ve been waiting for General Sharpe.”
“Yes, sir,” she says, though the words no longer seem to fit right on her tongue.
*
“Today is the end of the Republic! The end of a regime that acquiesces to disorder!”
She stares out at the crowd as she speaks. The gathered mass of First Order soldiers and Stormtroopers. Those loyal to her. Those who have been there for the creation of Starkiller.
Those loyal, to her first and foremost.
“At this very moment in a system far from here, the New Republic lies to the galaxy while secretly supporting the treachery of the loathsome Resistance!”
Her eyes move away from the crowd, to the woman that stands just a few feet away from her. Still unable to manage a parade rest. Her white dress a stark contrast to the black of the officers uniforms around her..
Were here speech not so well practiced, repeated over and over again until she knew it better than she knew herself. So well rehearsed that this too might have been programmed into her. She might have faltered at the way Sara’s eyes were on her.
That gaze that had such little yellow in it that Ava did not know how to process it.
“This fierce machine which you have built, upon which we stand, will bring an end to the Senate, to their cherished fleet!”
She’s supposed to feel happy about this.
This moment.
The one that she has spent her whole life working towards, but something feels off.
“All remaining systems will bow to the First Order! And will remember this as the last day of the Republic!”
*
“The rebels are attacking the base,” Ava says, “And whose fault is that?”
There’s an accusation in her tone. One that she cannot stop.
It feels most like betrayal, standing here watching Sara put on her familiar getup, a costume really. Nothing more. Nothing real.
“I need you with me when it falls apart,” Sara says, stopping for the second, before sliding that gaudy white cape over her shoulders.
“My orders are to stay on my battleship and prepare for rebel brigades.”
“Fuck your orders, I need you.”
*
Director Hunter turns traitor.
She wishes that she was surprised by this. That she could stand there with the same shock that her officers are feeling. As if they did not truly expect this all too happen.
But Ava knows better.
She remembers not days before a taste like wine on her lips and a woman that had told her of a dream to be an X-Wing pilot. She had been too foolish then to realize the truth. That the woman before her had not fallen from grace, but rather purposely acted as though she had.
A spy in their own ranks.
No wonder the Resistance had found them so easily.
It suddenly all made too much sense.
“It is likely that Sa - That the Canary has as well,” Ava tells the hologram of Director Bennett.
She feels like a fool.
She feels like a mistake.
She feels like a woman with a broken heart.
And isn’t that the worst of it all?
*
“The planet is going to blow.”
She’s aware of that, more than aware. Everything she’s worked for, everything that she’s ever believed herself capable falling to ruin right before her eyes. She did not need Lieutenant Green to tell her that she had failed.
She could feel the failure within her bones.
But then, he says something that changes everything, “The Canary is still down there.”
*
She’ll be branded a traitor herself. She knows that. Knows that there is no other alternative. That there will be no going back to the First Order after this.
Then again, there never really was.
She’s not certain what will happen next. There is no way she will be accepted among Sara’s precious Resistance, not when she had just been the one to press the button that destroyed a whole planet.
Not when she still can’t find it in her to completely regret that.
But not doing this…
That she would have regretted.
“You came back,” Sara says. Shock on her face, mixed with the blood and snow.
As if she thought she would be left behind.
As if this failure could not be forgiven.
As if Ava did not love her enough to risk everything that she had ever wanted.
As if this was anything other than inevitable.
Ava notes for the first time that the haunting yellow is truly gone from her eyes - “You needed me.”