The air between them felt electric.

"And you….. you're afraid," she accused him, "You're afraid that you'll never be as strong as Darth Vader!"

Kylo Ren's hand snapped to his side and he stared at the girl, her eyes glistening with tears, but also with naked, unanticipated triumph. She was breathing hard from the effort, beads of sweat glistening on her forehead and her sternum, hair falling loose at the edges of her face and sticking to her cheeks, her temples, but she didn't break his gaze as he stood before her, rooted to the spot with indecision. What had just happened? He bent deliberately to pick up his helmet where it lay on the floor, his eyes never once leaving her.

She studied him carefully and struggled fitfully against her restraints, her momentary victory feeling less so like one with each silent, passing second. Who was this man that he could see into her mind? Moreover, who was she that she could suddenly see into his? And she had seen him before he'd arrived, in her terrible vision from touching the lightsaber, foreseen him giving chase in the moss and ferns on Takodana. When he'd finally caught her, he knew she'd seen the map in the droid's memory bank. But how?

He shook his hair back with a slight toss of his head and slowly slipped the helmet on, obscuring his angular, boyish face from her view. His breath purred through the voice modulator before he finally said, "We're not finished yet." He swept past her close enough that his cape brushed her bare shins and she shuddered at contact with any part of him.

Outside in the hallway, Hux hovered nervously across from the entry to the interrogation room. He did a poor job of pretending to be occupied with something else. He sprang to life and fell into lockstep with Kylo Ren as Ren swept down the corridor towards his own quarters.

"Well?" Hux's voice was clipped, anxious. "Did you retrieve the map?"

"This will require more time," Kylo replied, feeling irritation growing with every passing stride. Hux could not possibly know how much it irked him when Hux walked in stride next to Ren. The urge to shove Hux with the Force was nearly overwhelming. Actually, everything felt overwhelming at the moment. He felt like he was drowning in her signature, her memories, her unexpected strength in the Force. He could still feel her presence halfway down the kriffing hall.

"Really," Hux drew out the syllables in disbelief, "Well, there are certainly other methods we could use to extract-"

"No!" Ren stopped abruptly. Hux stumbled a stride further before stopping and turning back to face him. "Transfer the prisoner to a holding cell, and bring her something to eat. I won't have her... damaged, or we may never locate Skywalker." He closed the distance between them until he was standing slightly over Hux, who stood up straight with his fingers laced behind his back and looked him directly in his visor. "Do you understand?"

Hux may have looked like a pushover, an overgrown, asthmatic kid for whom nepotism had opened all the right doors, but he was not easily intimidated. "We don't have unlimited time to hang around this corner of the galaxy, Ren, and this is Knights' business more than the First Order's," he huffed. "Perhaps we should consult the Supreme Leader for advice."

"The Supreme Leader does not have time to trifle with a scavenger girl, and our business is one and the same," he struggled to keep his voice even, "I will deal with it myself. Send me the girl's cell coordinates and I will meet you in the detention block. Are we clear?"

Hux sniffed as though he did not agree, but nodded curtly. "As you say."

A few minutes passed and Rey was alone in the room, the first time she'd really had a look at it since regaining consciousness.

Not that it was much to look at: matte black durasteel walls, a shiny black tiled floor, a few panels glowing with all manners of buttons and blinking consoles. And of course, this infernal contraption she was strapped to. It was angled precariously in a way that was neither standing nor reclining, and while she refused to waste any more energy struggling, the restraints were biting into her wrists and shins in a most inconvenient and increasingly painful way. The light sweat that had broken out on her skin during the interrogation now felt clammy, and Rey was aware for perhaps the first time ever, here in this sterile black room, that her body had a perceptible odor.

She started as the Stormtroopers re-entered the room, braced herself for what was to come. To her surprise, they began undoing her leg restraints and she managed to give one a glancing blow in the side of its helm before a third came in to help hold her down. They undid her wrist restraints and wrestled her into a standard pair of wide, metal cuffs with her hands in front, and proceeded to jerk her unceremoniously in front of them with one leading the way, two behind her. She couldn't help but wonder what they looked like under their helmets. Finn had been human. Were they, too? If so, why were they doing this? Surely they see she was in distress. Where were they taking her?

After a five-minute march and three turns down hallways that looked identical to her, she had lost her bearings so thoroughly that she couldn't have gotten away if she'd even wanted to. But get away to what? Certainly not back to the wretched room where he'd… tortured her. Was that even the right word? His thinly-veiled threat of some kind of forcible seizure of her person had left her icy cold with dread, but he hadn't physically touched her. No, instead he had invaded her mind, until she had been able to fight him off with hers. Whatever it had been, it had not been pleasant.

They finally stopped in front of a door, and the lead Trooper entered an access code. The blast door retracted into the wall with a swoosh and the Troopers behind her gave her a light shove into a tiny, dim room.

"No, wait-" she exclaimed, holding out her hands in front of her, but their expressionless masks were cut off by the door hissing closed between them.

She was alone, and still shackled. Rey turned once, slowly, taking in the new quarters.

It was tiny, a narrow room with sloping walls that narrowed to an acute angle above her head. She could stand upright, but she knew she was not very tall. A skinny, unpadded bench ran along one side, and for lack of anything else to do, she gingerly sat down on the edge of it. The wall sloped behind her such that she couldn't sit up straight, but rather had to lean forward with her elbows on her knees.

Fuck, she thought. Just, fuck.

Inside his quarters, Kylo Ren stood staring at his grandfather's half-melted mask. The damaged mouth guard dripped down in what looked like a permanent sneer.

The girl had reached her cell, he could feel it. He could feel her growing dread, her sinking estimation of the possibility of escape, and the tinges of despair just edging into her mind. Good. He had never had a prisoner resist him like this, and he could hardly comprehend if it was somehow a deficiency in his technique or a strength he didn't know she had that had allowed it. She had gotten into his mind, thrown his fear back at him. She had not been wrong, how could she be - she had plucked the very thought from his own head.

He paced slowly in circles around the low table where Vader's mask lay, brushing his gloved fingertips over it as he passed, forcing himself to breathe deeply and evenly. He would not be undone with one trick by an untrained, nascent Force user. Hux's suggestion of turning so quickly to Snoke had nearly sent him over the edge, but he had no wish to revisit the inquiry board that had resulted from the last time he'd nearly choked Hux out over such a petty slight. Their authority over him was tenuous at best, but he had to play nice with Hux if they ever hoped to locate Skywalker.

No, he would deal with this in his own way. Clearly, stress seemed to be strengthening the girl's powers rather than weakening them, if the last four hours had taught him anything. The Force was strong on Takodana; he'd always felt it there himself, and it was no different today. He wondered what had happened at Kanata's place to make her run out into the jungle like that, where the very trees practically had their own Force signatures. He knew. He'd been there many times before, had felt them even as a child when he'd played amongst the vines and leaves while his father greased palms and traded intel over glasses of gav.

That was a separate concern altogether - that he had felt his father's presence again for the first time in many, many years. It wasn't just a trick of the trees, the memory of the forest. No, the girl had been with Solo, he'd clearly seen it in her recent memories. Her bright, inquisitive, obvious admiration for Solo rankled him. No matter.

Just then, his comm beeped softly near the door, and he crossed the room in two long strides. He picked it up and read the digital display.

GHux: Block 421, #1114.
GHux: You're welcome.

He raised his hand to tap out a reply, but immediately thought better of it, clenching his fist until the leather squeaked; Hux needed to learn his orders did not require pleasantries to be carried out.