coolhandluke | In a calm sea every man is a pilot [for gotyourselfapilot]

Sometimes, the easiest was to let someone else decide.

Especially when you had failed, and all the decisions you'd made in your life had seemed to lead up to one catastrophic moment. Luke had tried to atone. He'd tried to reach out. He'd tried, in his way, to be there for those he thought needed him most. And they... hadn't. They had let him drift away, shut him out, and he had let them. He'd grown up never hoping to know his family. The family he'd found had been a gift, a blessing, and when he had destroyed that, a light had just gone out for him.

But he was not his father. There was no impulse in him to go the other way, no rage to fuel a different sort of power, no reason for him to attempt to wrest control back. Instead, he'd gone dark by just disappearing, waiting for a sign he could return, until enough time had passed that he simply stopped waiting.

The map, though. The map he'd left when he was still hopeful that someone would call out, that someone would need him again. That he no longer believed himself to be useful or wanted to be called was a matter of self-preservation at this point. And it would take a lot for him to invite that sort of pain back into his being. Now he drifted, neither truly alive or able to die. Waiting. Not, any more, for a chance to be useful. But a chance to give up, for good.

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There must have been a confusion or a mix up or at least he had thought as much. It was strange to send a pilot and not someone who clearly showed signs of something more in the Force. Poe had heard the stories running through the base at least. General Organa said herself that Rey could turn out to be a Jedi if she learned and trained. He's confused by the confusion, yet, he was willing to still go when asked. He was still willing to continue a mission to find Luke Skywalker not just a map, but a man. Maybe this would be a better way to get Luke to come back with him. Leia seemed hopeful of the decision even if it may not be the right one. He could hope that Luke would come. They all could hope. Luke made a map, he would have wanted to be found. That's what it meant right?

Poe lets out a breath to steady his nerves and thoughts as he stood at the bottom of the stone steps. He came to Ahch-To in Black One, BB-8 would stay with the starfighter for now as he went up the stairs. The island's scenery is beautiful yet everything almost looks the same. He would pause pointing in one direction before another mumbling to himself along the way up. Which way was the right one to go in? He followed his instincts navigating through the different paths. How far up had he really gone up? The breeze would come by as he was circling around on a tight path that was mostly mountain on the way down. He stayed on course not afraid of the terrain.

The map could have at least left some kind of instructions. Anything really. Poe only felt himself moving higher up along the mountain looking back to see a giant ocean. It felt peaceful, he glances back up feeling that he had been going in the right direction. Once he made it up the path on a long slope up, he sees a man at the edge of a cliffside, it has to be Luke. Unless it's someone else altogether. He walks cautiously up to him. He's curious and unsure, it shows on his face with his eyebrow knitting toward the center when he finally speaks it's within his voice. A question, a name. "Luke Skywalker?"

If the kid doesn't have the Force, he's honed a sense of direction over his years as a pilot. But Luke does not initially recognize him. He sees the x-wing come in, and knows the moment has come--he has been found, and he cannot run.

That doesn't mean he's going to make it easy.

He no longer believes that being found means hope. He no longer thinks that this is the sign he needs to come back. He's long since let go of the notion that there is anything he can do that will help anyone he loves.

He's let go of the idea that he is loved, because he cannot love himself.

But he waits, at the side of that cliff, for the man to approach. He does not reach for the Force. He does not speak first. He just waits, as he's waited for years. And raises an eyebrow at the question, wondering if the name even belongs to him anymore.

"Who's asking?"

He doesn't have the Force but he could get lucky with the directional sense. Poe would at least keep going and not give up. There had been many obstacles set in place to get to the man that had information on Luke Skywalker. If he could manage all of that this shouldn't be that much of a problem to handle.

A family reunion would happen with Leia and Luke if he could manage to find the Master Jedi. Poe kept hearing how much Luke would be their hope. It was a hope that he would keep clinging to.

At the question, Poe eyebrows lift since he wasn't at least rejected. The man didn't even reply with a confirmation either. All he had seen were porgs and caretakers on random paths. It almost felt as if they were the only other people on the island.

"I'm Poe Dameron from the Resistance. Leia asked me to come here."

"Leia," Luke breaths softly, expression falling almost as if the sigh hurts him. In truth, the pain is almost physical, the memory of her anger, his disapproval, still vivid. It why it takes him a moment to register the boy's name, and when he does, the older man's brow furrows. Any other pilot, he could have simply ignored, anonymous and part of some past life he was no longer connected to.

But this one? Luke squints to try to make out the toddler in the man before him.

"Impossible," he says gruffly. "Poe Dameron would be, what. Ten? Fifteen?"

Poe waited for something an outburst, anything from the older man. Nothing really came besides for the soft sigh. He noticed the squinting, which makes him frown a bit. This could turn for the worst or something else. But, the pilot wasn't really a good liar.

There's a small shake of his head with eyebrows rising at the impossible of age difference. What? Poe moves his arms out wide at his sides.

"Does time really escape you that much?" How long was Luke on this island? Had he really not know how long it's truly been? Poe knew that the man disappeared when he was in his adolescence years. "That's about seventeen years ago."

Seventeen years. Of course. Time is muddy, a mess of regrets and memories hazy with rejection because he doesn't like the bad ones and the good ones just remind him of what he's lost. Poe has grown up, become a pilot it seems, and if Leia's sent him it's either because he's good at it or he's bad and she can spare him. Either way, she trusts him, as Luke is inclined to do despite himself. But he pushes the feeling of nostalgia away. He's not a young man, blithely letting a kid sit in the cockpit of his X-wing--the same ship that's now at the bottom of the sea, just off the coast. He's someone else, and so is this boy.

So after a moment, Luke shrugs, and begins to walk away.

"He's not here," he calls over his shoulder. "Luke Skywalker. He died a long time ago."

It was a long time. Poe knew that Luke had gone off during his teenage years, looking for artifacts. Leia did trust him to do certain things and even though he felt confused to be the one sent here. He would try to complete his mission, he wouldn't give up. He would have to convince Luke to come along. Poe slowly studies the older man in front of him. There's a pull at his gut when he begins to walk away. Had he been wrong? He couldn't have been.

Poe's eyebrows creased to the middle in confusion of the words. He slowly went after the older man.

"He would be here. Lor San Tekka wouldn't have been wrong, couldn't have been wrong. He gave me the map that would help us find Luke Skywalker. That map lead to this island. Certainly far away and no where someone would look. A place that's unfindable. Why he would come here? I don't know, but the scenery is at least peaceful. If he had died, surely his sister would have felt that. I doubt she would have asked me from the beginning to try to find him otherwise." There's a growing doubt that this could be all for nothing. Poe would be persistent though making sure to not lose sight of the older man.

In a calm sea every man is a pilot [for gotyourselfapilot]

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So sorry about the delay--busy time!

No problem and no worries

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