A/N: This is a rewrite of an past fic. I did not like how I set up the POV so this might be a bit easier to digest.

I remember coming upon him, weary and hesitant, watching as he sagged under the weight of his demons. The face of the wall in front of him was slashed and hacked with angry red scars from the repeated blows of his saber. Moments before, I had watched as he had ripped into the unfeeling barrier with frustrated screams, trying to channel his energy into something. Now, as his bent form huffed dejectedly in front of the dying embers of the damage, I came to tower over him by his side, my courage blooming.

Despite being so force-sensitive, in his rage he hadn't noticed my approach, and was taken aback when it was me that met his gaze. Through the metal encased void of his helmet, I knew his eyes were there looking up at me, vulnerable, weak, and afraid.

Afraid because he knew that, with each passing day, the pull Snoke had on him was growing weaker, and the call from the Light was growing stronger. The spell was wearing off, the exploitations were beginning to grow frail given time and distance, and the puppet strings were gradually snapping away.

Except, the prospect of change was terrifying, especially when coupled with a newfound, blazing sense of conscience. But, such is typical in those that are abused and manipulated from a young age – change, even for the better, is petrifying.

But, no more hiding. No more delays. This show of weakness was a sign that he already knew he were too far-gone now.

"Take off that mask. You don't need it anymore." I said to him, stepping closer.

He didn't move, frozen before me.

I reached towards his neck, not feeling any fear now, conscious that everything had abruptly changed – I could feel it within the signature of the atmosphere's energy. Sweeping my fingertips along the edges of the clasp, I pressed upwards to release the airlock on his helmet, never taking my eyes off of where I knew his met mine. A hiss evacuated out into the air when the front mouth panel thrust forward, signaling the voice modulator had unlatched from his jaw, freeing him of the contraption.

I knelt then, to mirror his stance, to intimately observe his final moments in that infernal mask. Having spent so long as a prisoner within its confines, the moment of his liberation was one that I was proud to witness.

My palms met the underside of the helmet and lifted up, causing my fingertips to curl past strands of his hair while he was being unchained.

Even though I had seen his face on past occasions, the sight this time caused my breath to drawback. The severely marked difference in his eyes, as if finally coming out of a deep trance, told me that his evolution was complete.

No longer was he Kylo Ren.

Ben Solo looked back at me now.

The narrow, freckled face surrounded by masses of black hair belonged to a man who was in no way absolved from his sins, but was now finally on his way to proving himself worthy of redemption. The man – the son – whose mother and father knew would one day come back home.

A burden in my hand, I discarded the mask, now a dirty shackle, and made him and the beating energy currently flaring in my chest my principal focus. He was entranced, immobile when I inched near him, acting on a bizarre impulse as one of my hands came to hold the side of his neck. Fingertips brushed past wisps of hair at his nape while my thumb rubbed up to skim the beginnings of his earlobe, earning me a slight widening on his pupils.

Slowly, in case he began to object, I slid forward, bracing my weight on his shoulder with my other hand. Without expression, he neither rejected nor accepted me, simply watching my movements, just as unsure as I was. I could not explain why I was acting upon the yearning, but the pull was undeniable – I knew he felt it too, he always had.

We both had, but for obvious reasons, had ignored it.

When the tension became too high, after our foreheads had met, his composure broke with a vengeance. I recall leather wrapped hands rising to roughly grasp my jaw from behind my ears, dragging me forward onto his lips. The shiver, akin to an electric current, first hit my collarbones and ran into my toes while I tried to process how I felt about what was transpiring. Sensitive flesh against his was enough to lock my arms round his neck, but the frenzy of energy in our Force awareness's was satisfying on an incomprehensible level. Suddenly a moan I hadn't realized I was keeping prisoner broke free in a muffle, provoking a snarl from him. His hands shifted, reaching to twist around my neck, and the other going to hug me tightly around the middle, crushing me against him.

It was a desperate kiss, one that was poorly thought out, compulsive, and needy. However, in it, we sealed and acknowledged an underlying connection between us that we had been denying – one that ran deep and powerful.