The Properties of Redemption found here
is a Star Wars Sequel Trilogy fanfic taking place post-Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. It can best be described as a Continuation of the Sequel Trilogy as well as a fic featuring the not-common-but-not-unheard-of pairing between Kylo Ren and Poe Dameron.
After his death on Exegol, the redeemed Ben Solo is resurrected by the Force Ghost of Luke Skywalker. From there, he goes on to right the wrongs he’s committed, all while realizing he doesn’t have to be alone.
The Properties of Redemption contains examples of:
- Accidental Murder: Ren’s master is revealed to have had this happen to her, spurring Ren’s Survivor Guilt and subsequent fall.
- Adaptational Angst Upgrade: The fic goes into more detail as to how Poe’s interrogation (which is retconned to be Snoke forcing Kylo to do it) affected him.
- Adaptational Consent: Poe’s interrogation wasn’t consensual to begin with, obviously, but the fic adds an additional layer by having Snoke coerce Kylo into doing it and Mind Raping him as “incentive”. Anakin’s conception is also this.
- Adaptational Heroism: Ben. Also, to an extent, Luke, as he’s the one who resurrects Ben (and it’s shown that his near-murder moment in The Last Jedi wasn’t his choice).
- Adaptational Nice Guy: Downplayed with Ren. He’s still a monster, but he’s more of a Tragic Villain here.
- Adaptational Villainy: Palpatine, who’s revealed to have used the Force to impregnate Shmi Skywalker without her consent among other things, and Snoke, who’s revealed to have coerced Kylo into torturing Poe and mentally tortured Kylo if he didn’t comply.
- Affectionate Nickname: “Spice Runner” is Zorii’s for Poe.
- The Atoner: Ben.
- Back from the Dead: Basically the premise of the fic.
- Being Tortured Makes You Evil: Averted with Poe and Rey, but very much the case with Kylo; Snoke and Palpatine’s conditioning very much made him a monster.
- Beta Couple: Rose/Jannah and Zorii/Jess. Finn/Rey also looks like it’s on its way to becoming this.
- Cast Full of Gay: With the exception of Finn/Rey and Kaydel/Beaumont, the majority of the major ships focused on (especially the main couple) are same-sex ships.
- Child by Rape: Anakin Skywalker turns out to be this, albeit through Force manipulation, which is one of the reasons the Palpatine-Skywalker family tree is so messed up.
- Childhood Friend Romance: Poe and Ben, though it’s slightly...unusually done.
- Cold-Blooded Torture: Zia Rand, a First Order stormtrooper commander, does this to Ben in a fury.
- Deconstruction:
- A lot of it with Rey and Kylo’s relationship (while keeping them both sympathetic).
- The fic goes into the likely consent issues of Palpatine creating Anakin.
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Die for Our Ship: Averted with Rey and Zorii. While aspects of Rey and Kylo’s relationship in the Sequel Trilogy do get deconstructed, Rey is shown in a sympathetic light and Kylo takes some of the blame, to say nothing of them turning out to be related. As for Zorii, she’s paired off with Jessika Pava and she and Poe remain good friends. - Does This Remind You of Anything?: Lampshaded darkly in the fic with Kaydel Ko Connix saying that what happened on the Finalizer is something like Rape By Proxy.
- Dramatic Irony:
- Ben’s brought back via the same method that killed him in the first place — and by his uncle, who inadvertently spurred on his fall in the first place.
- One of Ben’s stops in his redemptive journey before Poe finds him? Jakku. Where he dabbles briefly in being a scavenger.
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Ren held his master, Ekari, in high esteem before her death and his fall. Poe also counts as this to Kylo in some of the flashbacks.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Even Hux is disgusted at the idea of making Resistance prisoners rape each other.
- Expy: Zia Rand, who tortures Ben, bears some resemblance to Atton Rand, albeit a genderflipped, villainous version.
- Fix Fic: One for The Rise of Skywalker.
- Freudian Excuse: Ben gets one, as does Ren.
- Heel Realization: A long one for Ben. Ren also has this in regards to just what a monster he’s been.
- Jerkass Realization: Poe realizes how badly he’s been treating people around him and vows to be better.
- Mind Rape: In addition to Kylo’s canon interrogations as well as Snoke and Palpatine’s interference with him as a child, it’s revealed that Snoke did this to Kylo as...incentive to keep torturing Poe.
- My God, What Have I Done?: Even before formally atoning, Kylo has these, such as when he feels remorse for bringing up Paige Tico to Poe.
- Rapeby Proxy: It’s mentioned in passing that First Order officers had other prisoners do this, which even Hux found disgusting. It also has shades of it in what happened to Poe on the Finalizer.
- Related in the Adaptation: Rey and Ben, in a pretty horrific way.
- Scars Are Forever: Ben has scars from being tortured by Zia.
- Second Love: Zorii to Jessika Pava, Jannah to Rose, Finn to Rey, and Poe to Ben. An unusual variant in the last one, as technically Poe was Ben’s first love although he didn’t act on those feelings.
- Tragic Villain: Ren.
- Trauma Button: Ben has one of these on Jakku.
- Troubled Abuser: Ben has shades of this; it’s revealed that a lot of the more abusive things he’s done were either coerced or him lashing out in pain.
- True Companions: The Resistance.
- We Used to Be Friends: Poe and Ben used to be childhood friends before Ben’s fall. Subverted in that their relationship is being mended and on the way to something more.
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