In her sleep, she calls out to him. Subconsciously, but still she reaches. He's like a bad habit, something hard to kick though she knows how he pulls her away from all she loves in her waking hours.
His terrible, burning eyes search for her in every room, seek her across every galaxy. They find her sometimes, too. Those nights are the most confusing, though her path lay clear as day before her. She knows, deep in her heart, that she will not kill him. She can not.
She thinks, perhaps, that this is as close to love as she will ever feel.
And so, she seeks him. Always.
He feels her when she yearns, this accursed pathway. He'll forever curse whatever powers bound them together, and yet he cannot find it within himself to seek an answer. He cannot force himself to tell Hux, nor any of his trusted advisers. But he'll not allow himself honesty when he asks himself why.
He's afraid they'll find a way to break it.
That he'll never again feel the piercing agony of her hate, and that undercurrent of something sweeter, something…well, not quite hate. He can't put a name to it. But it's more precious to him than any drug.
Though, of course, he does loathe her. The way she clings to the light. It isn't in her nature, but will she listen? Of course not. She clings, like a child to a doll, to the idea, not that she is inherently good in her soul, because of course that is true, but that the Rebel alliance is anything more than the worst in the galaxy taking advantage of her brightness. They'll hunt down everything in her that is truly good and just, and replace it with an apathy that would see the galaxy burn before a ruler take control.
He hates her, truly. And he will never be rid of her, not of his own free will.
One day at mess, Rey is more reserved, quieter than usual. More focused on something her companions cannot see. She picks at her food, and ignores one too many questions until Finn knocks her hand from beneath her chin and she nearly topples into her rations.
"What gives?" he asks, "You've been a million light-years away today."
She offers a small smile but pushes her lunch away. "I think I'm going to go train, got too much on my mind today to do much else."
Finn hops up across the table with a grin. "I'll join you!"
Rey forces a grimace from her face and shakes her head. "Finn, I'm too out of it today. Maybe tomorrow? Just let me spar with a droid today, okay?"
He rolls his eyes but nods anyway. "Sure thing, Rey. Get whatever's going on out of you."
She heads off towards the armory, intent on wearing herself out. A night's sleep will do her good, she thinks.
Kylo reclines in the throne, considering whether or not he can sneak away from his advisers and Hux. He'd give nearly anything for an afternoon alone in his TIE fighter—he's not been flying for ages.
As he lounges, sullen, the familiar creeping sensation fills the space behind his eyes and it's all he can do not to let them roll back. What had once felt like a budding headache now fills him with a pleasure, a peace he craves.
Today, though, it's not peace that she brings him; it's war.
Her presence is fury today, all storms and hatred. It's almost more than he can stand, though of course he'll try. He wonders if she can feel him too, today, or if he can probe deeper. Shall he risk it?
He thinks he will.
He tries to let his mind wander into hers, slowly, without any plans or designs. Along the way, he sees flashes of her surroundings, what looks to be a sparring floor. He hopes she isn't fighting anything that can feel pain, for even he can feel the intensity of her blows as they land.
He pushes against one of the stronger feelings, he thinks it might be anger, though it's tinged with something else. He thinks she's confused.
He finally gets a look at the droid she's fighting as it lands a blast on her upper thigh. She howls with a rage that rattles his bones and he fights the urge to sink deeper into that feeling.
Her pride wounded more than her body, she whirls in on herself and takes a breath to steady herself. It does little for her emotions but her hands cease to shake.
Kylo pushes further, needing to understand.
Almost without his realizing, and certainly against his conscious will, his mind asks hers a question and his physical self flinches, knowing that this is the end of this voyeuristic venture. Usually, he would pull into himself again, rather than receive the full brunt of her rage, but today, he decides to chance a conversation, if she can be tricked into making one.
What are you fighting for? he asks as gently as he's able.
He feels her emotions swirl around him in an incomprehensible storm of hate and rage and sadness, and he knows that if she could reach him now her intent would be murder.
Some small part of him wants to let her try—he's never felt more alive than when she tried to kill him.
Her mind finally settles enough for her to see straight and though for a moment the room swirls around her, she stays on her feet, squeezing her eyes shut against the torrent of the worst feelings in her body all rushing towards her at the same time. She feels as if she may drown under the weight of them.
Finally, through the storms, she can pinpoint her focus on a monster with yellow eyes who seems almost too real to be in her mind. He looks shocked for an instant, shock giving way to some kind of smug interest and for a split second, she can't help herself. All of her training melts away and she lunges towards him, her one and only goal to put her hands around his horrid throat.
She'd give anything to kill him.
Kylo's smirk upon seeing the recognition in her eyes vanishes in a flash when her very real corporeal form springs at him out of the ether and slashes across his face with a very real hand.
When her hand makes contact with his flesh, Rey's breath leaves her lungs in a single gust, and she falls to the ground with his skin under her nails and his howl in her ears.