Chapter Text
“Extra mic cables?”
“Check!”
“Distortion pedal? With the right hookups?”
“Check, check!”
“Got your head on tight this time?” Finn asked, in the same tone of his checklist, but with a sly sideways glance at Rey, who sighed and clicked the case of her Fender Squier Stratocaster open.
“You’re one to talk, Mr. Stage fright,” she said, rolling her eyes as she hefted the once-sleek but now somewhat battle-worn ivory guitar up to her midsection, looping the strap around her shoulders.
Finn shrugged as he perched his snare drum onto its telescoping stand, perching himself on the drum throne and making sure everything was at the right height and angle. “I’m just trying to help, Peanut,” he said softly, “we’re all nervous.”
Nervous was putting it lightly, Rey thought as she plucked the strings of her guitar softly, unhooked to the amplifier, and careful to face away from the chattering crowd that had begun to mill about in front of the short stage. She had tuned it just that morning, but she continued to fiddle with it, less out of a sense of perfectionism than out of sheer nerves.
“I had no idea the Niima Outpost could hold so many drunk people!” Rose’s voice came drifting up behind them, as she climbed the step up to the stage holding her electric bass. It was covered in stickers from her favorite bands, including one she had been in with her older sister Paige.
Finn glanced at the crowd, his dark brown eyes widening and looking more wary by the second. Glancing between his bandmates, he said brightly, “Yeah...well, maybe a drunken crowd will be less likely to notice us slip up!”
“Or more prone to riot,” Rey added darkly. It wasn’t just her natural shyness at work. It was the very real and dismal possibility that this, as their first real live gig together, could very well make them the laughing stock of the whole garage/punk scene in the mid-size college town they called their home. Not that Niima Outpost was the most reputable venue around, but it was a solid dive that had borne many acts that had gone on to sign record deals with the coolest indie labels--like Yavin Records, Chandrilla Trade, and Ackbar Media. A far cry from the roughly dozen terrible house party shows and the back rooms of art galleries that they had played. And if that weren’t scary enough:
They were opening for STARKILLER, the biggest band to come out of the university in decades. ‘Big’ meaning signed. To a real label, First Order Records.
Rose’s round face gave Rey an appraising look as she chose not to respond to her grim commentary. Instead, she said, “We’re the most prepared band to take the stage at this lousy bar, I can guarantee that.” She adjusting the strap on her bass with an expert wrist flick as Finn busted out a few strong thumbs on his kick drum, testing the motion.
“Yeah,” Finn latched on to this stream of positive pep-talk, almost as much for Rey’s sake as for his. “We’re gonna own this,” he said, as if it were a calming mantra.
Rey couldn’t help but suppress an amused snort. “You two are starting to sound like Poe--”
“You rang?” A jovial voice sounded from stage left, and Poe swaggered on stage, hair coiffed, leather jacket on, despite the somewhat balmy temperatures indoors.
“Where have you been? We have sound check,” Finn asked immediately.
Yes, before the townsfolk get restless, Rey thought glancing at the crowd at the foot of the stage. The stage was only about a foot up, which made the stares of some of the beer-clutching pub-goers feel too close to comfort.
“Relax,” Poe said, with an upward jerk of his hand, producing several small pink stubs of paper. “I was getting our drink tickets and, you know,” he said as he handed them each a ticket, “schmoozing.” Poe winked to Finn at this. Finn leaned backward on the throne ever so slightly.
“You can’t wait until after we melt some faces to find a date?” Rose said sarcastically, bass guitar at the ready as she thrummed a few deep notes. Poe pointed an appraising forefinger at her, as if she’d made an intelligent but incorrect guess to a question.
“Not that kind of schmoozing. The big-wig from First Order Records is here. Well, at least a big-wig.”
Rey and Finn exchanged helpless glances, followed by nearly identical nervous and searching looks into the crowd.
“Hey,” Poe hissed in a stage whisper, “be cool! It’s fine. It’ll be fine, right Rose?”
“Uh-huh,” Rose backed him up, her eyes on her bass string as she settled into a good spot.
Poe, it seemed, had arrived earlier than all of them (as was his custom) and set up his guitar next to Rey’s up front by the two microphones they used for vocals. As he flung his sunburst hollow-body guitar over himself, shrugging it into place, he turned to each and every one of them and asked if they were okay. When he got a round of nods in varying degrees of impatience, they began their sound check; Poe and Rey flicking on various knobs, switches, and pedals that all came to life with an electric hum and brief whines of feedback. Moments later, a series of short strums from the lead guitar (Rey), rhythm guitar (Poe), and bass guitar (Rose) sounded in succession while a bearded sound guy off to the left of the dark dingy space made adjustments on the house sound system. Finn click-clacked his drumsticks on the snare and beaten up floor tom, kicking the bass drum—its beat echoing into the microphone set up next to it close to the ground.
“Test, test, test,” Rey said into her microphone, swearing she could hear someone in the crowd give a faint laugh. Her embarrassment was short-lived as Poe’s vocal test consisted a series of absurd whoops and tongue rolling trills. He’d be doing most of the vocals tonight, and Rey was grateful for it.
When everything seemed to be to their liking (a thumbs up from the bearded figure in the distance), Poe turned that roguish smile onto his bandmates, as he faced away from the crowd for a moment. On this small stage, they were practically in a circle formation--Rey didn’t have much room to move unless she wanted to back into Finn’s crash cymbal. They all knew what came next.
Poe held his hands out to the women on either side of him, guitar hanging from his shoulders, as Finn took Rey and Rose’s free hands in each of his, completing the circle.
“Dear God,” Poe said, followed by a snicker from Rose. He was the only one closing his eyes in mock sanctimony, a wry tribute to his strict Roman Catholic upbringing of which he’d never been the biggest fan. “Grant us the power to melt people’s faces off and show them the glory of rock. Ave Maria, Dominus santus, spiritus santus, leviticus, septimus--”
--what followed was a stream of words that were decidedly not latin nor holy, to his bandmates peals of laughter, and at the end--
“--oh, and pretty please get us a record deal, ‘k bye, Amen,” Poe added hastily, bowing his head theatrically to the center of the circle, jiggling Rose and Rey’s hands before letting go to perform a parody of a sign of the cross in front of his chest, with far too much finger wiggling. It was a ritual before every practice that they had laughed over and joked about endlessly.
“Whacko,” Finn said under his breath, though with a smile on his face as he picked his sticks back up. Poe turned to the microphone at last and took his guitar in hand.
“How’s it going out there? Everyone having a good time?” And just like that, showtime Poe Dameron was there at the mic, drawing in stragglers from the crowd, quieting the idle chatter with his piercing dark eyes and rakish looks. Rey felt relieved to have someone like him as their frontman--it was easy to hide behind ball of energy with perfect eyebrows.
“Ladies and gentlemen, we’re Rebel SCUM!” Their band name was barely out of his mouth before Finn’s sticks clacked together; 1, 2, 3, 4 and crash!--they all began to play in time, a raucous energy filling the room as their heavy sound pulled them straight down from the precipice with rhythm and purpose.
Rey concentrated on hitting all her notes, at first standing stiffly at the spot, and occasionally watching Finn’s movements for guidance. As her oldest friend, she found Finn’s presence comforted her more than anything in this godforsaken dive. Poe and Rose were really cool, and maybe the nicest band mates she could have ever asked for, but she’d only known each of them for less than a year--she’d only known Rose for about 4 or 5 months, when they first got serious about practicing and put out cross-campus ads looking for a bassist. She had begun this journey, however—of being in a rock band as well as college--with Finn, after becoming friends with him in her first year at uni. Or, Freshman year as the Americans liked to call it.
On her cue, Rey contributed her backup vocals to Poe’s, acting purely on muscle memory of the many, many times they had practiced this set. The crowd was too difficult to look at while concentrating on a riff, but she chanced a glance while at the mic, strumming an easy rhythm—and to her surprise more than a few people seemed to be enjoying themselves, bobbing their heads, beers in hand, faces alert. The revelation filled her with a renewed confidence—even if the crowd seemed to consist mostly of 20 year old college boys in ratty jeans and ironic t-shirts.
From then on, Rey allowed her movements to loosen up a bit. She bobbed and weaved with the music, hopping in time with Poe during a particularly fun bridge; allowing a small smile to creep on her lips.
****
Precisely 35 minutes later, the quartet traipsed off stage, having cheerily accepted a decent applause and some enthusiastic hoots (during which Poe called out to the crowd to remind them of their name, to thank Niima Outpost, and announcing STARKILLER as being up next). The house’s sound system resumed its regular bar music as they lugged all their instruments and particulars off stage, Rose stopping to help Finn disassemble his gear. Once all their belongings were hastily stashed away in the dingy back room of the dive (Rey had eyed the ancient boiler in the corner when they’d arrived), they all excitedly headed towards the bar, sweaty and exhausted but overall quite pleased at the reception they’d had.
“That—was—amazing!!!” Finn exclaimed, making a jubilant punching motion with each word. As soon as they’d left the stage, a couple of well-wishers had stopped him and Poe to tell them how much they’d ruled. “We were in top shape!” he added, as Poe clapped him on the back as the four of them leaned against the grimy wooden rail of the bar. Rose had rather speedily flagged down a bartender, leaning over the edge of the bar to shout her order of four pale ales.
“Yeah it’s almost like we’d been practicing twice a week for months!” Rey replied, having to yell slightly over the general din of the bar.
“I apologize for nothing; it was totally worth it--” Poe said decisively as he accepted a beer from Rose, who was handing them out to her bandmates.
“—to crushing it!” Poe added, and they all clinked their beers together triumphantly.
Being in a band, Rey thought, was a lot like having a family, or—to use an example she was truthfully more familiar with—being in a gang. And while this gang involved a lot less petty criminal activity and a lot more practicing in a musty garage behind a strip mall, Rey got the sense her bandmates would always have her back, and she’d have theirs. Through their common passion and shared art, they celebrated each other’s success and lamented their failures collectively. It was a comforting thought, and one she and Finn had discussed at length during late nights sitting on the roof outside their small apartment in a two-story wooden house, sharing a box of cold pop tarts.
Perhaps she was putting too much stock in it, but performing publicly with her band felt like some great emotional milestone they’d all achieved together—and she knew now that, regardless if a record deal ever came along, whether they went their separate ways eventually, shelving their idle college dreams of pseudo-indie garage rock success, they’d still be lifelong compatriots.
“Hey,” Finn said suddenly, nudging Rey on the forearm and pulling her out of her reverie. “Is that the guy from STARKILLER?” he asked, raising his voice slightly to break off Poe and Rose’s chatter.
Poe peered at the stage. “Oh—yeah, well, one of them. That’s Hux, the bassist.” Rey followed his gaze across the large room, and spotted a thin pale man dressed all in black with a shock of red hair unspooling a guitar cable and busying himself with an amplifier.
“Not that Kylo Ren guy you were telling us about?” Finn asked, his voice taking a darker tone. They’d all heard Poe tell them all about Kylo Ren, the frontman of STARKILLER and his former college roommate, and Rey reflexively felt a hitch in her chest. None of Poe’s reminiscences had put him in a particularly pleasant light.
Still, she had listened to their latest record in preparation for this night and she couldn’t help but like it (despite Poe’s scoffs about it being too pretentiously noise rock for him). Having grown up loving punk rock and metal more than anything else, Rey appreciated a healthy dose of fast, angry fuzz in her music even though all the songs she’d written for their band were on the decidedly more pop end of garage rock.
She was looking forward to watching their performance, and she realized that other people in the bar must be too.
As Poe turned away to talk to the manager of Niima Outpost to discuss their payment (one of the main reasons Poe had agreed to open for STARKILLER despite his feelings towards Kylo Ren), Rey started to take notice of the room really beginning to fill out and become positively packed. She couldn’t even really see the stage anymore, her view blocked by a crowd of mostly taller men. STARKILLER’s crowd, she noted, seemed to wear a lot more black that theirs had. Eccentric artsy haircuts abounded almost as much as the untamed facial hair.
The familiar screech of feedback and intermittent guitar notes marked their brief sound check, and in what seemed like no time, the crowd was cheering and hollering around them. Finn stood on his tiptoes in an effort to see, to no avail.
And then, as the cheering died down slightly, a voice boomed across the sound system. It was distorted, deep, and slightly muffled in an electronic sort of way.
“We’re STARKILLER,” it said, with an eerie echo. “Blood Visions.”
Right away, the music began, with an intense and fast paced drum beat and a loud, fast guitar riff, drowning out more cheers from the crowd.
“Should we get up front?” Rose yelled to her companions over the din, and Rey and Finn nod, not really having heard her as much as gathered her meaning from her gesture towards the stage.
Finn led the way, squeezing through the mass of excitable bodies, Rey and Rose making sure to keep close behind as to not lose him in the crowd.
They stopped just short of the stage by 3 or 4 rows of increasingly excited show-goers; many of them rocking about and churning, but thankfully leaving enough space between them so that Rey could finally see the stage.
The redheaded man she’d seen earlier, Hux, was off to the side of the stage twanging a bass with his exposed pale arms dramatically, and to the other side was an extremely tall and strong-looking woman with short cropped blond hair and an icy gaze. And between them, over a drum kit set up more towards the front of the stage than is usual, a large, hulking man was beating away at the set, his legs tapping in quick rhythms, striking a booming bass drum beat eerily reminiscent of a desperate heartbeat.
Rey had seen this man before.
Only in a magazine, of course. At the top of the music review, he’d been wearing the same nightmare-ish mask he was wearing now: patched fabirc covering almost his entire face with the exception of some irregular holes near his eyes and forehead; a protrusion where his mouth should be that Rey had guessed could only be his microphone built in, a cord extending from it and tucked into the neckline of his frayed dark gray t-shirt. Patches and strips of fabric crossed the dome of his head irregularly, revealing protruding ears and locks of black hair.
This man had to be Kylo Ren.
A fierce black eye could be visible past this terrifying visage, staring out to the crowd as he screamed “blood visions!” intermittently as part of the chorus. Rey glanced at Finn, who was clutching his empty beer bottle with a stupefied expression on his face. He met her eyes and there was an unspoken exchange of being deeply impressed.
Finn, Rey knew, was an exceptionally talented drummer. But this guy was a beast.
It had taken Rey the better part of a year to really figure out how to sing competently while playing lead guitar, and from conversations with other drummers including Finn, she knew the effort was doubly as hard when you were trying to keep time.
The song ended as quickly as it began, and before anyone in the crowd had a chance to cheer, Kylo Ren said “My Shadow,” with a distorted echo, and busted straight into the next song.
As much as she hated to admit it to herself, she couldn’t help being impressed (and perhaps a little jealous). Kylo Ren may have thrown a lamp at Poe’s head in their time living together as college roommates, but he sure knew how to command an energetic performance. What’s more, the crowd couldn’t seem to get enough. Rey felt like she, Finn and Rose were statues compared to the increasingly jostling crowd around them. She felt certain that, given time, the people in front of them would form into a churning mosh pit.
The show raged on, and Rey begrudgingly discovered she didn’t just like STARKILLER’s music. She positively loved it.
****
“We have to go talk to him,” Finn said, almost grimly. After STARKILLER’s set, the blonde guitarist merely said “Goodnight!” to a chorus of screams and cheers, as Kylo Ren unceremoniously stood from his perch and left the stage, unhooking his mic cable and carrying his snare drum above his head in one hand as if the motion were as natural as any.
Rey bit her lip nervously. She knew that, like her, Finn had been deeply impressed to the point of having some new found respect for the man that had made Poe’s first three years at college a living hell. But that had been over five years ago by now--and surely it would be water under the bridge, right?
“Yeah, let’s do it,” Rey nodded. Rose had gone to the bar to grab some more beers, and she wasn’t sure where Poe was anyway, so she and Finn made their way to the back room, where the other band would surely be packing away their gear before loading out.
There were a few other well-wishers there, clustering around the hallway, excitedly trying to get the attention of someone in STARKILLER. Rey spotted Poe a few feet into the storage room, talking to Hux as he busied himself moving his own gear out of their way. And near the back, Rey spotted him: an exceptionally tall, broad figure toweling the sweat off from his mop of dripping black hair. The mask he’d been wearing had been shoved into an open cross body bag in front of him.
Moving more bravely than Rey felt, Finn cleared his throat and waved a hand to one side, trying to catch Kylo’s eye. The man froze and lowered his hands and towel from his head, slowly turned around to look at them.
If he hadn’t been nearly a head taller than Rey and twice as broad-shouldered, she might have let out a short laugh.
The man underneath the mask, whose eyes had been so dark and piecing, now glared at them out from under messy curtains of wavy damp black hair; his crooked mouth beginning to form a sneer under his large and unusually long nose. His whole face was actually quite long and finished in what Rey imagined to be a weak and narrow jaw. But more memorable than anything, she thought, with the exception of his eyes, were his comically large ears, made all the more noticeable through his wet hair.
“Hi,” Finn swallowed nervously, “I’m Finn; I’m in the band that opened for you?” He gestured to Rey, who stood behind his shoulder, “This is Rey. We just wanted to tell you how great your set was, man. Really fantastic stuff…”
Kylo’s eyes darted between the two of them, his expression unchanged. Finn’s compliment trailed off weakly as Kylo turned his head to Poe on the other side of the room.
“Hey, Dameron. Where’d you find such pathetic band mates this time around?”
Something icy dropped to the pit of Rey’s stomach. Poe had looked up from his conversation with Hux and his normally bright expression hardened into one of a familiar hatred. Hux had swivelled around on to spot--a look of menacing glee on his pale face as he let out a “ha!” to Kylo’s words.
“Leave them alone,” Poe said, pushing past Hux. The blonde woman had stopped what she was doing to watch the exchange, an amused smirk on her face. Rey noticed she was about as tall as Kylo Ren was.
Kylo didn’t spare Rey or Finn another glance, instead turning his whole body to face Poe now. With a quirk on his awkwardly pillowy lips, he said, “I didn’t know you were trying to get a record deal out of pity.” His tone was low, dangerous, and pointed. Almost a hiss.
Rey felt her face flush out of mounting anger when she heard Finn interject, “Hey! Don’t you talk about Rey like that!” His jaw jutted out bravely as he took a step towards Kylo, though Rey could feel a definite quake in his voice.
“What are you, her sad little boyfriend?”
“Come on, Ren,” Poe cut in closer to Kylo. Hux muttered something like “come off it, Dameron,” but Poe ignored him.
“Why don’t you pick on someone your own size?” Poe said, his voice taking on a silk Rey had never heard before, his face mere inches from Kylo’s. “I’m sure there’s a Yeti out there with ears as big as yours.”
Everything happened so quickly the Rey could barely comprehend it in the days to come.
A massive fist fell upon Poe, a flash of angry red hair colliding with him, as Finn yelled, “HEY!” and lunged towards Kylo but was almost immediately sent reeling from another blow, a punch squarely to his nose that had sent him tumbling backwards, shoving Rey aside. But Kylo kept barreling forward, striking Finn again, and again—
Finn gained his footing and flew down the hallway, Kylo tearing after him with a loud roar like a wild animal; Rey giving chase behind him, abandoning the tussle behind her between Poe and Hux—the blonde guitarist had strode forward to try to break the two apart—
Rey wasn’t sure what she’d do to stop this monster from chasing her best friend, but she knew she wanted to tear his stupid ears off the first chance she got--
She stumbled out the rear door to the bar’s back parking lot and spotted Kylo Ren’s large form grabbing hold of Finn and swinging him towards the dumpster. Without a second thought, Rey grabbed a chunk of brick from the ground and hurled it from a few feet away—she’d aimed for his head but it hit him square in the back, causing him to yell “Fuck!” and spin around on the spot, releasing the front of Finn’s jacket.
Rey didn’t hesitate; she just reacted: with all the force she could muster, she threw her whole weight behind her fist that landing on the right side of his face, catching him off guard. It made a sickening crack, and Rey felt like her knuckles might explode from the pain of it—but she had sent Kylo stumbling back a couple of feet in sheer surprise.
Poe burst through the back door, followed closely by the blonde guitarist and Hux, who was sporting a bloody lip. The woman and the redhead made towards Kylo while Rey darted towards Finn and began to help him up, aided by Poe.
“STAY AWAY! Just—stay away!” Poe screamed towards Kylo, who—Rey noted with a savage glint of satisfaction—was sporting a cut over his right eyebrow, his eye sporting the tell-tale signs of a burgeoning black eye.
Kylo Ren was led away by the combined force of his bandmates, but the look of incredulity on his face was apparent as he glared at Rey.
****
Half an hour later, Rey sat on a curb in the dark parking lot next to Finn, who was holding a bloody towel up to his face. Rose had come running out earlier, saying that news of a brawl had spread to the bar, and she and Poe took it upon themselves to load all the gear out into Poe’s small 4-door Honda, with Rey waiting protectively next to Finn—ready to take on Kylo and his thugs despite the ache in her right hand.
Rose returned with a ziplock bag of ice she’d gotten from the bar. “Poe’s called the cab. He’s trying to get our payment,” she said with an edge of nervousness as she gently handed the ice to Finn. He had refused an ambulance, and he and Rey had flat out refused calling the cops.
They all exchanged nervous glances, wondering if they’d have their guaranteed minimum revoked from all the havoc they’d “caused.” Thankfully, however, when Poe returned a minute later he explained the Niima Outpost manager was no stranger to brawls, and had shrugged it off and paid in full.
They had all piled into the car—with some difficulty, as not all the gear fit in the trunk—Rose practically sitting on Rey’s lap in the back seat next to some stacked drums. Despite their protests, Poe insisted on dropping Finn home off first, Rey going with him. It was a melancholy ride. Normally after a successful practice they’d all laugh and share some pancakes at their favorite 24 hour diner. Rey was sure that’s how the night would have ended if it hadn’t been for Kylo Ren.
“What’s that guy’s fucking problem?” Rose said with an exasperated sigh, breaking the silence.
Poe shook his head, the exhaustion coming off of him in waves. “It’s a long story.”
No one spoke for the remainder of the drive.
Rey decided she’d been completely wrong about Kylo Ren. People, it turned out, didn’t change. And that night she knew she hated him more than anyone else.
He could have said all sorts of nasty things to her, but no one was allowed to hurt her friends. Especially not Finn.
