Kylo
He marches through the once again abandoned military outpost, a legion of stormtroopers following in his wake. His fading rage pushing him forward towards the command center, He enters, and notices something on the floor, a shimmer of metal catching his eye. Kneeling down to pick it up, a wave of recognition hits him. Is that?
Rey.
He senses her before he can see her, the familiar warm presense of her conscious sinking into his with little warning. Even before he looks he knows what he'll see. It's as if she's standing mere feet from him, her image clear as day. Their eyes meet, and he begs for the rage to return, but all he finds is regret. It slices through him like ice, but he doesn't dare look away. Her eyes bare into him and he expects to see hate, but instead it's worse, and he begins to feel the full weight of his failure.
Fear.
Disappointment.
Sorrow.
And for the briefest moment he sees something else cross her face, a fleeting moment that's gone as soon as it began before her face hardens into steel resolve and then she's gone. And nothing but regret remains.
And he's alone.
He returns his attention to his discovery, the golden dice that his fath-
That Han Solo kept as a lucky charm. He feels a brief moment of sadness, of weakness, before they disappear from his grasp like ash in the wind.
He's alone.
And he has nothing.
He clenches his fists and basks in it, in his pain, but this time it gives him no reprieve. He gave her a choice and she chose them. The weak and dying that she calls friends. She could be so much more.
With Him.
Surely she must have sensed it? The sheer power that flowed through their bond when they fought the praetorian guard. It was unlike anything he had ever felt before, like they could do anything. Like they were unstoppable. She must have. And yet, she threw it away.
No.
He had been a fool. Finally someone understood him, understood what it felt like to have everyone you've ever cared about leave you behind, abandon you because you weren't what they wanted. It gave him something he hadn't had in a long time.
Hope.
Hope for a future where he wasn't alone, one he didn't deserve. He shouldn't have been surprised when she left him, she wasn't the first to do so.
It didn't stop the pain from cutting to the bone.
His hope left him vulnerable, left him weak. It was a mistake he wouldn't make twice. She had chosen to stand in his way rather than by his side, and he had no intentions of letting hope stand in the way of his destiny.
He stood, his sense of purpose renewed. He knew what he had to do, his resolve replenished. But there was something else, hidden deep in his thoughts, pushed away by his own denial.
Doubt.
Rey
She quickens her pace, helping everyone she can onto the Falcon, desperate to leave before the First Order catches up. Before He catches up. Everyone now aboard, she turns to close the ramp when she feels the cold ache of Kylo Ren's mind meld with her's once again. She glances down the ramp, and for the briefest of moments she's afraid.
It's as if he's knelt right in front of her, his form as solid as the rest of her surroundings. Their eyes meet and she expects rage, but his eyes are filled with anguish. Her fear melts away, replaced by deep sorrow.
She failed.
She thought she understood him. A man crushed under the weight of his own destiny, struggling to find his place within the shadow of his families' history. And when his inner conflict came bubbling to the surface, those he trusted the most abandoned him. They gave up on him.
And it tore him apart.
He was a tortured soul seeking belonging. And so was she. When they... connected on Ahch-to, she saw herself in him, carrying scars not unlike her own. It helped her begin to understand what it meant to be Kylo Ren, to be so haunted by the past that the only way out in sight was to destroy it completely.
Let the past die.
It gave her hope. Hope that she could show him he wasn't alone, that someone understood him, that she could show him a way out. She could save him. They could save each other.
She thought she understood him.
He was too far gone. What she thought she saw was already long dead and buried, discarded to the back of his mind to be forgotten forever. He'd killed Snoke, breaking the shackles that had bound him for so long, only to replace them with a set of his own creation.
Ben Solo is dead.
She almost believed it. When he killed Snoke it wasn't to save her, but to fully embrace the darkness. She was merely an opportunity for him to act upon, a tool to exploit.
She almost believed it.
But the look on his face told a different story.
Looking at him, she sees no anger or malice, not a hint of either. All she sees is a man utterly defeated, drowning in regret. Her hand wavers over the switch to the ramp, hesitating for a moment before she presses down with conviction.
His regret was muted by the volume of his actions.
She offered him a second chance but he pushed it away, choosing to fall further than he ever had before. She thought she only needed to give him a choice to bring him back to the light, that his conflict would ultimately save him. Instead, it turned his heart another shade darker.
He'll come for me.
Now that we're enemies again.
It surprised her, how much the realisation hurt. When she'd left him, he followed her to crait with every intention to wipe the resistance out, and by extension her.
And he'd come for them again.
He had no intention of letting the resistance get in the way of his rule, of that she was certain. And when that time came, she would do what she had to to protect her family.
Even if that meant destroying him.
She felt the truth in her words, but also something else, the reason she hesitated.
Doubt.