She woke with a start.

The restraints were looser than she remembered them being before she had passed out from screaming and fighting to break free. The sweat that had drenched her body was now dried, leaving chills wracking her small frame.

"Are you refreshed now?" The booming voice seemed to enter her skull - her stomach dropped. As the creature in the mask approached her, she began to struggle again, her screams giving way to guttural growls. "Let me go! Why won't you let me go?" Her chest was heaving, her breath accelerating - a sick sense of entrapment washed over her as the creature put out a hand as if to strike her. Searing pain filled her head.

… she was screaming, her tears flooding her face so quickly she felt she might drown. She wanted to drown. "Come back! Come back! Mum, dad!" But the starship was gone. She collapsed in a heap on the sand, her tears mixing with the earth. If only she could bury herself and die but a hand roughly grabbed her leg and began to drag her ...

… towards her home in the abandoned AT-AT. She watched the sun dip into the west, and felt the golden rays caress her …

… as she watched the droid project a map into the starship's interior -

Her head snapped back onto the restraint so quickly she felt it might split open. The creature growled. "You've seen it! Tell me where it leads!"

Defeat flooded her. "How am I supposed to talk to a creature in a mask?" she spat out. The creature pulled back. A hiss, then a thud.

She stared, astonished.

He was so young. And so frightened. He was trying to project an aura of steely resolve, but somehow she could sense his fear and unease. A new power surged through her. There were his emotions. She pushed further - there were his memories - and suddenly she was in his soul. A boy looking up at a shrine, a schoolteacher raining blows down on his back, a mother crying - and anger. So much anger. She reached deeper, but was thrust back. His hands were pressing her into the metal, her head was again searing. "Stop!" His dark eyes were frightened.

"You have no regard for my soul! Why should I have regard for yours?"

"It hurts me too, you know." His voice without the mask was deep but trembling. "Tell me where it leads!"

"I would rather die," she spat.

"That can be arranged," he said, a sneer spreading across his face as he plunged into her head once again, invading all that she knew. She couldn't breathe. The memories were racing through her mind, and she felt him observing and scoffing and … sympathizing? Could that truly be a sympathetic thought? She took hold of the weakness and pushed him back out.

Frustration dripped from his frame as he took a sharp breath. "Give it to me," she said. Was he imploring? "Give it to me and the pain will stop." The pain. Our pain. He was begging her. She felt a wall come down as he stretched out his hand once again. It was gone.

He was wiping away her tears now, his hand softly gliding over her face. She felt emotion growing inside her chest - a warm glow beginning to blossom. She looked up at him and saw the anger vanished. He looked puzzled, swept up into his own world - a world revolving around only her. As his fingers followed the line of her jaw, an electric bolt seemed to overtake her. The emotion she couldn't name, that felt like a match to his, began to unfold slowly in her chest. His hands found her lips. What was this feeling? All she knew was that it was beginning to be too much to bear ...

As his hand traced her lips, she seemed to wake anew.

Revulsion filled her stomach at what had overcome her. As his fingers began their journey again, she thrust her head forward and bit down. Her mouth filled with blood as he leapt back and cursed, then lunged for her neck. The anger cascaded through her bones and she felt herself begin to die. She was slipping into unconsciousness when he suddenly let go. She was already enmeshed into a swirling blackness as the door slammed shut.