Hey! This is my first Reylo fan fiction! I hope you all enjoy!
Their connection had been fried when the lightsaber was wrenched in two. Rey had come to first, staring down at an unconscious Ben Solo. Kylo Ren, she corrected herself with a sigh. It was incredible fighting alongside him.
They were beautiful.
They were flawless.
They were balanced.
When the chaos ended around them, a new tension grew between them. Rey was utterly devastated as she saw Ben Solo vanish beneath the crushing force of Kylo Ren. She'd begged, pathetically crying and wearing her emotions on her sleeve.
She was weak.
He knew it.
He'd asked softly, gently and with a bit of desperation, but Rey couldn't follow. In a moment of transparency, he'd shown his cards. He cared. For her. Still, she could not stay.
Now she traveled alone with only Chewy to help her pilot the Millennium Falcon. They were quiet most of the time. Rey suspected that he could feel her melancholy tainting every second of every minute of every day. For a fleeting moment she had belonged. For the first time in her life Rey felt her inner turmoil ebbing, settling down comfortably, and in a flash he'd snatched away her peace.
She saw him for a moment, kneeling before her as she helped load the last of the Resistance on the Falcon. Rey knew better than to speak. She knew better than to reach for him. You can't reach for someone who doesn't want to be found. They shared a long look.
I tried. The rest is up to you.
Rey lifted the ramp, closing him out.
They rejoiced on the Falcon – a narrow escape for the dregs of the Resistance – but Rey kept quiet. Han was gone. Luke was gone. Ben was…misplaced. Rey could see him still swimming in those dark eyes she'd grown to know so well. There was still Light in him. There would always be Light in him.
At night, in the darkness of the Falcon, Rey would listen to Chewy snore. She didn't get much sleep anymore. She was constantly on edge. Rey slept better when they were soaring through space. The hum of the engines never failed to soothe her. Rey sighed and closed her eyes, settling down for what she knew would be a restless night.
His identity was lost in a miasma of confusion. The people who served him called him the Supreme Leader. Hux called him Ren when he forgot Snoke was long gone.
No one called him Ben. Not anymore.
Kylo Ren was not eloquent – he never had been, even during his childhood. He was quiet and withdrawn, talking only when necessary. It would account for his botched offer after he'd slayed his Master.
His adrenaline has been coursing like fire through his veins, stunting his thoughts and curtailing his speech. He wanted to say so much to her, so many things in such a short time, that a mess spilled from him. Kylo saw her grief as he held his hand out to her. He didn't want to be alone anymore. Neither did she. He tried to explain, but nothing was making sense. Her broken countenance was driving him further into madness. He had to make her understand! But it was pointless – the damage was done.
Rey was gone.
He awoke alone. For a brief moment he felt nothing. He thought nothing. He tried to throw a barrier up to stop the memories from flooding in but he couldn't. Stumbling to his feet rage flared in his chest and into his throat. He hissed from between clenched teeth, dumping Snoke's murder on her doorstep. Kylo had been angry with everything. Nothing was going the way it should.
He'd threatened to kill her when fighting with Luke on Crait. It was spoken out of madness driven by rage and nothing more. Perhaps long ago, before Starkiller he could have killed her. Back then he hadn't understood the connection between them, hadn't craved it as he did now. He saw her as a threat to be neutralized.
The forest had changed everything.
He could feel the power surging through her – and she was completely unaware of how to wield it.
She was incredible.
She was awe-inspiring.
She'd dug her way beneath his meticulously constructed armor and now he couldn't dig her out.
He hadn't seen her since Crait. He hadn't wanted to, if he was honest with himself. How could he look at her after her rejection? After his humiliation.
She was still there. A few moments she would let her guard down and he could hear what she heard. As quick as these moments would occur, they'd vanish. The second the sounds around him faded, melding with sounds from her world, his head would snap up, eyes devouring his surrounding in an attempt to find her.
It would be months after Crait before he saw her again.
He'd been sitting quietly in the dark of his room, thinking of her, always of her. The quiet buzz from the electronics faded suddenly, like a blanket was wrapping around his body. For a moment he held himself immobile, afraid to break the connection. Lifting his eyes, he saw her, curled up in his bed, sound asleep. Logically he knew that she wasn't there in his bunk, but asleep he assumed, on the Falcon.
Gingerly he climbed to his feet, eyes locked on her, afraid she would vanish before his eyes. He knew that the bond had connected them not because Rey wished it, but because she'd relaxed enough in sleep to let her guard down.
He moved to her, stealthily yet buzzing with energy.
Dropping to his knees, Kylo reached out and let his fingers brush against her cheek. He'd wanted to wipe her tears away in the hut when she told him about her vision, her lack of answers, her burning questions about her parents. Rey had let herself go. She'd let him witness her suffering.
Her skin was warm. Even in the dark room he could see her freckles, earned beneath the unforgiving sun of Jakku, now jumping off her face that had paled beneath her sleepless nights.
"Rey."
Rey.
Rey jerked awake, sitting up in bed.
The room was empty, but she could still sense his lingering presence.
Rey could feel the whisper of his fingers along her cheek.
A week later Kylo was startled awake by a sob. He didn't think much of it – how many times had he cried himself awake in the dead of night?
It wasn't until he heard another muffled sniffle that he became aware that the sound hadn't come from him after all. For a moment he closed his eyes, breathing in deeply. He was conscious of the weight beside him and the small amount of warmth that was originating from another source. Kylo was nearly trembling with relief. They hadn't been completely separated after all. It was debilitating knowing that he wasn't alone – not anymore.
At first he turned his head slowly towards the wall of his room, afraid that if he made a sudden movement she'd scurry away and the connection would shatter.
Her hair was down, spread wildly across her pillow. His pillow. He wasn't quite sure anymore. Regardless, the tangled mess indicated that she'd been seeking sleep unsuccessfully for hours. She had a pile of blankets atop her, burrowing down deep. Space was cold and she'd lived her entire life in heat that most people would find unbearable. Her thin form shook with her stifled sobs. He knew that wherever she was sleeping for the night, someone was near. If she was alone, she wouldn't try to quiet herself. Kylo would have left her alone and tried to disengage from her, but he recognized the desperation in her cries. It was the same desperation he felt after fleeing from Luke. It was loneliness. It was the type of loneliness that yawned before a person like a chasm of darkness, surging up to swallow them whole. He'd been there. He was there.
Carefully he reached across his body, taking soft shallow breaths, until his hand brushed along her arm. Even if she shoved him away she would know that she wasn't alone in this moment. He tried to send his own feeling through the bond. He tried to tell her that he was experiencing the same sense of loss that she was.
"Sh," he breathed into the darkness. "I'm here."
Rey's crying abruptly halted and Kylo felt her tense beneath his hand. He held his breath, waiting. This was the moment. Either she'd accept that their connection was back or she'd thrust him unceremoniously out and into his cold room. A soft croak reached his ears.
"Ben?"
He squeezed her arm gently in affirmation. Again she was crying, a single sob of relief. Without a word he turned toward her, curling his arms around her and drawing her form back against his. Rey was boneless. He could feel her quaking with barely contained stress. Her fingers hurried along his arms, searching until they found his. He held her hand in the dark, warming her icy digits. They remained awake long into the night. Not a word was exchanged in the dark. Instead, they both savored the warmth that chased the desolation away.
The next morning Ben was slowly pulled awake by a feather-light touch dancing across his face. Opening his eyes barely enough to see, he found Rey had turned towards him during the night. Now she was sleepily watching her own finger trace the scar she'd left during their first battle. The medical droids had done well stitching him up once he was healed enough. He recalled that as the moment he first connected with her - the moment when his life had altered completely.
Rey lifted her gaze to meet his.
He could tell that her torture had abated during the night. Between them existed balance and peace where before there was anger and hurt. They would always be wary around one another, until they reached the necessary crossroads that would either join their paths or divide them forever. Until then, they could be confident that neither was alone any longer.
Rey smiled languidly at him, her thumb tracing along his cheekbone. He sighed deeply, content.
Even when she vanished a moment later he could feel the warmth on his cheek and sense her swimming in the back of his mind, where she would remain for as long as he lived.