"You need a teacher. I can show you the ways of the Force!"
She could feel her pulse in her temples, between the whooshes of her heartbeat their breathing— hers and Kylo Ren's. If she listened very closely, she might swear she heard his pulse as well.
Everything else was eerily silent. The universe had narrowed to the lightsaber in her hand and the face of the man who killed her hero, and the screaming, aching fatigue of every battered muscle in her body. She leaned in to the hilt, her face contorted in pain.
"Why?" she said.
Kylo Ren's face twisted with the effort of fending off her attack, his eyes locked with hers. He leaned into his blade with all his weight and strength, and her light frame was no match. She felt snow creep up the back of her leg as she slid backward. Her back knee began to buckle.
"NO!"
She felt a powerful red energy crackle from the base of her spine and press forward through her, strengthening her attack with the power of the Dark Side. Kylo Ren's eyes widened, and he took a step back to absorb the strength of her redoubled effort.
It was an opening. She reared back and kicked him in the belly, as hard as she could. He screamed as she hit him in his gut wound. Blood spattered up Rey's leg as he fell backward in the snow. The faint sound of his pulse went silent, and knew instantly he had passed out. She reached out her hand and pulled his lightsaber to her. It came to her without resistance.
She approached him slowly, both blue and red lightsabers reflecting off the snow, both pointed toward his heart. As he came to, he clutched his side and dug his heels into the snow, kicking, pushing himself away from her. He was hurt, and badly. He could die, she realized. A wave of nausea passed over her as his pain screamed through the Force.
"Answer me!" She bared her teeth at him.
"I— I can teach you—"
"ANSWER ME." She circled around to approach him from his side, like a predator looking for the final place to strike. He rolled on his side toward her and clutched his stomach. Blood darkened the snow beneath him.
"We all have to die, Rey. All living things. You and I, and even my worm of a father were destined to die for— for a purpose."
She jerked his own lightsaber up and pointed it so close to his face its light reflected off his skin and onto the snow. He drew his head back away from its heat.
"Don't you dare insult him to me! I could kill you. I could leave you to die!" she said.
"Killing me will set you farther on your path, but you cannot walk it alone. Not even you can be alone through this. You don't have to be anymore."
She drew her head back as if recoiling from a slap. He looked up at her and nodded. His tongue pressed against his bottom lip. He'd cut it on his teeth when he fell, and blood and spit flowed across his lips and down his chin in a thick, obscene sheet.
"You know." he said. "You know. You feel it. If you go to Skywalker with this anger, if you kill me now, he will refuse to help you the way he refused me. He can't help you with your rage. I can teach you to conquer this feeling and anything else you desire. I can walk with you for a time. If you want to conquer me now, then kill me and my Master will help you. You will not be alone."
By the dim light of the dying star, she searched his face and found something like compassion.
Just then, the world beneath them began to move and shudder. Behind her she heard a sickening crack, and by impulse she turned to see the ground open like the mouth of a terrible creature. At almost the same moment, she felt her arm pulled sharply. She heard her shoulder pop out of its socket a fraction of a second before she felt it. Luke's lightsaber flew into Kylo Ren's outstretched hand as she screamed and fell to one knee. Her fingertips had been seared. She nearly dropped the other saber as she recovered herself.
He slowly rolled onto his knees and pulled himself back into a fighting stance, holding Luke's blade.
"I won't tell you to be grateful." he said. "If I'd taken mine back, it would have taken your hand off."
Rey looked over her shoulder at the widening gap and knew that she needed to run and jump then, before it was too late.
Without Luke's sword.
She looked back at Ren's bloody face. She felt the ground move again, and waited for the quake to end so her voice would not be drowned out by its din. She waited, also, because she was afraid she would run if she had the choice. She looked behind her once more, and thought, for a moment, she could see her own back as the ghost of another choice ran from that place.
It was too late; the crack had widened too far to make the jump.
"I just," she said as tears welled up in her eyes as exhaustion caught up with her, "I just want to know why this had to happen."
He nodded. "I'll teach you. I promise. But now, we have to run."
She took a breath, then pressed her thumb over the saber switch. The red blade flickered and dimmed. Kylo Ren's eyes flicked between his blade in her hands and her eyes before also switching off Luke's blade. They watched one another warily as they each stowed their hilts. They faced one another, palms visible and empty.
"How can I trust you?" she said.
"Don't." he said. His voice cracked. She knew absolutely he was too injured to escape by himself, and from the expression on his face he knew it as well. He held out his hand to her.
She took it.