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when we fall asleep
(where do we go?)

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Title Card: When we fall asleep, where do we go? Story by Violet Hour 666, Art by Rad Braybury
Rey, looking concerned, in a sea of black, gazing at something only she can see.
Rey turning to the viewer, still concerned. She asks: "Do we exist?"
"Ben. The black relents, fading into a view of purple and blue galaxies and nebulae. "Of course we do," he says. The look on his face is open, soft. "We're here now, aren't we?"
Space -- violet nebulae scudding across the black. Words imposed over the vista: "Are they?"
"Rey's eye, closed. "She can't see anything."
Rey's eye, open. "She can see everything."
The lacework bridges of the World Between Worlds spans across space. In the middle of a gently glowing crossroad, a small figure hesitates. His shirt has a hole in it. Caption: "She can only see Ben."
The small figure runs along one of the glowing bridges in the World Between Worlds. There's a Polaroid showing a boy with big ears and a girl, several years younger, grinning up at him; the caption reads "Ben + Rey, summer '97." Text: "She can see him small. Were they friends as children?"
Framed in a glowing doorway in the World Between Worlds: Ben and Rey as adults, each holding a child. Rey is visibly pregnant. Ben's hair is pulled back. Text: "Or were they family?"
Ben in the World Between Worlds peers through a doorway to see himself and Rey fighting for the legacy saber in the wreckage of Snoke's throne room. Text: "Or were they fighting?"
In the dark, Rey sleeps curled on her side. Above her are glowing tick marks tracking the days of her solitude. At her back but a galaxy away, Ben sleeps clutching his pillow. Above him glows the paneled wall of his chamber. Text reads: "Or maybe she never knew him at all."
Rey glances over at Ben, concern still etched on her face. "Where are we going?"
Ben says, "Home. Eventually."
Ben smiles at her as he pulls on a seatbelt. "We're taking the scenic route."
Interior of a right-hand drive vintage car. The windshield is the Millennium Falcon's. Han's dice dangle from the rearview mirror. Rey's feet propped on the dash. Ben's hand on the wheel. Above: a brilliant night sky with shooting stars. To the left, a black sea. To the right, distant mountains. Straight ahead: the road, limned with light, and a glowing circular gate from the World Between Worlds.
Closeup of the rearview mirror, which reflects a pastel sky. Han's dice swing from it. Rey's voice asks: "Is it always like this?" Ben answers: "Like what?"
Rey sitting alone in the middle of the backseat. She's hunched over, holding the broken halves of a lightsaber. Her eyes are haunted. The sky in the rear window is a wash of pastel. "Everything," she says
The view from the back seat: Ben and Rey's hands resting together on the gear shift. In the rearview mirror, Ben's eyes meet the viewer's. Rey's quiet voice: "Nothing."
Ben driving, smiling at Rey. "Most of the time," he says.
"Sometimes things get clear for a while."
Ben is driving. Ben is starting to fracture into a thousand butterflies. He tells her: "I sort of unbecome a lot of me."
The butterflies reform into his silhouette. "Some of me becomes sharper for a bit," he says. "But it always ends up like this in the end."
Rey glances over at Ben, her face hopeful. "Just like this?" she asks.
"You. Me. The road." Ben presses his lips to Rey's knuckles. Behind them, the World Between Worlds spans the stars.
the galaxy fades into a white mist. ben and rey stand together. He smiles down at her. He's wearing his good boy sweater and his face is unscarred. She has her hair back in three buns, and one hand on his chest. caption: "a thousand stories waiting to be told."
The sea churns. The stars churn. A violet ocean foregrounds violent storm clouds, and above it all, the stars shine.
caption: "she is six people, she is thirty six people." There are numerous versions of Ben and Rey -- as MIB agents, as Mulder and Scully, as Will Graham and Abigail Hobbs, as knight and his princess, as a Vulcan officer and a human cadet, as a scruffy wheelchair basketball player and his girlfriend....
"she is nineteen thousand and six of the same different people, waiting for the world to focus." Image of a crowd of silhouettes, out of focus against the night sky.
Rey. Ben. Silhouettes. Solemn-faced against the stars.
Everything. Ben's and Rey's hands reaching for each other.
The word "Nothing" on a black field. The text cursor blinks at the end, waiting for you to fill in the blank.