Summary: "You still use the Dark Side."
"Were you expecting me to stop?"
Poe's new life with Kylo Ren would be perfect, if he could ignore the cracks in their glossy façade. It's all coming to a head during a mission, when he can no longer turn a blind eye to the darkness that lingers in Kylo. Sometimes Poe wonders if he's drowning in it, but life's got to go on.

Notes: So here is the second part of what I'm tentatively considering a trilogy, the sequel to The Art of Falling.
While "Falling" was an introspective piece, this one is a little bit more action-focused. We'll be exploring Poe and Kylo's relationship several months after they got back together in "Falling." You don't need to read the first part to understand this story.

Chapter 1: Happy Endings All Around and Still They Haunt Me

I'm drowning in you…

Sometimes it wasn't readily apparent, but Poe knew that Kylo Ren wasn't, as such, redeemed.

He answered to Ben Solo though he still preferred his chosen name – except from Poe, who he insisted call him only by his new name. He carried a green Jedi lightsaber and wore the robes of a Jedi Knight – he wore them well, Poe liked to rip them off.

To the world at large, the black sheep had returned home.

Poe knew better.

He could tell from the way Kylo would look at him sometimes with cold, hard eyes which showed possessiveness when he spoke words of love, or in his touch – always passionate, but sometimes his desperate passion left bruises in its wake, and Poe had come to understand that anger and violence still simmered within him, they just didn't have an outlet any longer. Poe tried not to picture the fallout when – when, not if – his self-control snapped.

There was more, more damning evidence, but Poe Dameron was nothing if not a good soldier; he knew how to turn a blind eye to things which were not allowed to exist. Nobody could fight a war for long without getting their hands dirty.

I love you passed Poe's lips easier with every day, and soon it didn't feel anymore like he was cheating on the good boy he had once loved with the man who killed this boy. He didn't flinch anymore when Kylo loomed over him, though he knew deep down that had more to do with the lack of black robes and mask than with newfound trust in his lover. He may love Kylo Ren, the Darksider who had returned to him, but he would never forget their ugly reunion. He would never forget what Kylo was capable of when he believed himself justified.

Sometimes when Kylo was at his most insecure or closest to falling apart, Poe had that claustrophobic feeling of not being alone in his own mind. He would tell himself it was nothing but phantom pain and scars. It never took Kylo long to kiss away his fears, and he was so sweet about it, not even getting mad when Poe accused him of reading his mind. He never denied it either.

And throughout it all, he marveled how quickly you could fall back into normalcy after six years. Mere days passed before they moved in together; it was a matter of course. All their ambition and hard work had been geared towards climbing so high they could ask to be stationed on the same planet, and finally live the life they'd wanted since they were boys holding hands on Yavin IV. To not go ahead with it now that they shared not only a planet but a base would have meant admitting that their new bliss was but a sham.

Over dinner Poe would be complaining about Iolo pulling up too slow or Testor hogging the comm with her chatter, or fondly reminisce about the days when he was a simple pilot with no responsibility but to make it out alive and ensure the other guy didn't. When Kylo mimicked Master Luke's speeches, he was more scathing in his mockery than Ben had once been, but he had the same complaints as ever about meditation being boring and the no-cheating rules in lightsaber training fostering false expectations of honorable opponents.

Poe still thought of Ben Solo and Kylo Ren as separate people, and sometimes he still found it hard not to think of Kylo Ren as some dark twisted parasite that possessed the body of the man he had once loved.

But despite all his faults and flaws, Poe Dameron loved the man he shared his life with.

Maybe they could have gone on living their lives in blissful denial if it wasn't for that damned mission.

The moon didn't have a name, though its hot, humid climate and rain forest vegetation reminded Poe of Yavin IV.

"So," he said once he hopped down from Black One, flashing Kylo a crooked grin, "it's just you and me now, lover." He stretched languidly. "Whatever are we going to do with ourselves?"

BB-8 bleeped its protest, reminding them there were three of them here.

"Exactly what we have been told to do, which is to hunt down the Stormtrooper garrison we share this moon with."

"Hm. You're no fun." Poe squashed his discomfort at Kylo's choice of words: hunt them down. That wasn't their objective. General Organa's orders were break into the research station, get the data and get out.

It wasn't unusual for Poe to take on black ops missions besides his wing commander duties, and they were the obvious choice for someone with Kylo's talents. General Organa had probably paired them up as a favor. It was indeed the closest they would come to a romantic get-away, if you didn't mind your getting-back-together honeymoon sporting explosions, firefights and your boyfriend going on a lightsaber rampage.

Poe had no doubt there would be a lightsaber rampage. He just wished he didn't have to see it. It would be much harder to turn a blind eye if you were wading in blood.

"Don't worry, Poe, it won't be that bad," Kylo said, and as so often Poe had this dizzying sensation of wondering if Kylo was responding to his thoughts or his body language.

"Let's go. I'm sure we remained undetected, but I'd rather not risk it."

Thankfully, Kylo didn't argue.

They covered their X-Wings with camouflage nets and left the clearing they had landed in for the dense jungle. Progress would have been faster if Kylo could have cut them a path with his lightsaber, but that would have been far too suspicious in case a patrol stumbled upon their tracks.

"I'm feeling hot and sticky, and not in a fun way," Poe was soon complaining as he pulled his grey shirt away from his chest; it was already glued to his skin from sweat and humidity. Before they left the landing place he'd changed from his orange flightsuit into something that would blend in better on the compound.

Kylo's scowl was almost cute, Poe wanted to kiss his pinched lips, but that glare of his shot daggers. "No, really?"

Poe snickered. Kylo had left the outer robe behind, but he had to be melting anyway in his overtunic and undertunic, and heavy knee-high boots. "Look on the bright side, you would be even hotter if you still wore black."

"That's debatable."

"Well. If you still wore black I wouldn't be so keen on getting you out of these robes," Poe amended. He sighed heavily, and readjusted his grip on his blaster. His hands were sweaty, too. He'd lived half of his life in a climate like this, he felt kind of pathetic for whining about the heat now. "But mission first. I don't want to get captured while we're making out."

Kylo rolled his eyes and used telekinesis to forge them a safe path between bushes with finger-long, vicious thorns. "Call me high maintenance, but I don't want to get captured at all."

"Your wish is my command, princess."

The telekinetic shove was completely expected, and Poe laughed, rolling with it as he let himself fall onto the soft carpet of decaying foliage that covered the ground. He was welcomed by the rich, earthy smell of home. There were birds chirping in the trees, a whole army of insects chittering and somewhere far away, monkeys…

The blaster bolt left a big black burn on an ancient mammoth tree, and then there was a whole barrage of shots that followed the first.

"Sorry, princess, hold that thought!" Poe yelped as he scrambled to his feet, already firing back as he dashed for cover behind the giant tree's trunk. There was a number of electric blue bolts hovering in the air, the only evidence of Kylo's presence. He could make out five Stormtroopers, though there might be more.

There were flashes of brighter green amidst the greenery of the forest. The bolts released harmlessly.

Poe kept firing until the enemy fell silent.

Kylo's green blade was still ignited when he stepped back into Poe's line of view. There was a healthy flush to his pale cheeks.

"You know, I really wish you'd keep using the red saber. This one just isn't you," Poe remarked. The robes were one thing, but him holding a saber so much like Luke Skywalker and Rey's just looked wrong. Actually, Poe wished he hadn't changed the robes either. It had been hard to bear the sight, and at the time Poe had been relieved by the change, but this wasn't real change, it was just a masquerade.

Kylo eyed his green blade with furrowed brows. It didn't crackle and hiss like the red crossguard saber he had built by himself, this one had a smooth, perfect blade. It bore the elegant touch of being created under the guidance of Luke and the deceased Jedi Masters advising him. Faint distaste showed in Kylo's features. He deactivated his saber and hooked it back onto his belt. "We killed them all," he said, frown deepening, "now we won't learn if they reported intruders before they attacked."

"Does it matter?" Poe asked, shrugging, and hoped Kylo wouldn't read in his eyes how glad he was. It was important to know, but to watch Kylo tear into someone's mind… He would rather not. "There's no way to go but forward either way."

"I suppose it doesn't matter."

After this first skirmish, Kylo was calmer. He didn't complain about the heat anymore, but his eyes lingered ever so often on Poe. Poe wanted to think of it as him being focused, but when Kylo plucked a large orange flower and tucked it behind Poe's ear there was no denying that he was more content than he'd been in a good long while.

to be continued...

Thank you for reading!

Chapter 2 will be bringing you Adventuring and Moar BB-8!