Breaking Point

"You're so lonely...

so afraid to leave...

Don't be afraid. I feel it too."

This was an interesting turn of events. The scavenger girl was standing ten feet from him, across the glass. The looks of her caught his attention immediately. She was wearing Jedi clothes, the shades of white and brown mixing perfectly with the almond tones of her hair. And there was the blue Jedi lightsaber of his grandfather hanging from her waist. He couldn't help but stare. She seemed uncomfortable, it was easy to tell this task had caught her by surprise just as him. But it was the best surprise he had in weeks. The room had never been so immersed in silence before, even when he was alone, so he stands up and walks until the limit of his confinement, to better look at her.

"Afraid I might beat you this time?" He provokes. She looks away from him, annoyed.

"No, it was pretty easy before." Her defiant eyes back on. This was the look that had made him waver in the past when in confront with her, twice. He would not fall for it again. Without asking permission from her master, she walks to the entrance of his prison. He waits, anxious, he must admit it, for her to get in. When he sees her face sharing the same space with him, he doesn't attack right away, this was a different kind of fight - he would not physically hurt her as he did with Luke. Less then five seconds had passed, but she was already trying to enter his mind, her power with the force attacking him like lighting beams. She had grown stronger, he would give her that. But not enough. He walks towards her, but she doesn't draws back, her feet nailed to the ground, the shocks between their minds showing in their eyes, as they were getting closer and closer. He was three feet from her, the freckles in her nose and cheeks noticeable again, like the other time he had penetrated her mind. I will not go easy on you this time, scavenger. He speaks to her without real words, as drops of sweat appears on her face, her struggle showing. Come on, Rey! She thinks to herself. Her inner fight was starting to show on her body as her muscles were getting sore from the effort. He lifts his hand in her direction, his fingers inches from touching her face. Don't resist me, she hears his voice in her head. It's all right, it will be over soon...

He was in.

"No!" he heard a child's desperate voice. "No, come back!". "Quiet, girl!" Someone reprehended her. Her, the scavenger. He watched a starship disappear in the orange sky of Jakku, as the tears refused to leave the girl's face. He blinked, and the vision changed. She was now older, wearing the same worn clothes she was using when he first saw her. The girl was marking her days on the forsaken planet in a sand dirty wall. Memories of solitude crossed his eyes as he saw the girl staring lost at the horizon, her heart gasping for any hope of return of those who abandoned her. Her life was lonely, it was all she had ever knew, it was all she was ever going to know. The scene shifted again. This time he was staring at the interrogation room at the First Order's base, as the girl slowly gained consciousness. He saw himself knelt before her, almost at the same height of her eyes. The girl shivered at the view of his mask. And then he removed it, and she faltered. Don't be afraid, I feel it too... He spoke with almost a gentle tone, and a part of the girl, bigger than she would recognize, believed in him.

Luke stands by and watch as Kylo Ren keeps his eyes trapped on Rey's face, his fingers softly trembling over her forehead. With a light swing of his hair, he turns his look down to the floor, a heaviness growing on his heart.

The memory faded as a new one took place. He was in front of a lake, underneath the night sky, pine trees surrounding him. The girl from Jakku was sitting by the shore, with someone by her side. He couldn't quite identify whom, for the memory was not about the person, but about an enlightening epiphany the girl's soul had experienced. He knew this feeling. The warmth of the Light. The force was flowing through her body and her mind, her heart floating with happiness and hope, her body weightless all of a sudden. He had to grasp himself to avoid getting lost into the sensation. It was too good. It felt too good. The temptation of the light. Her light-hearted smile.

And it was gone.

The Darkness threw itself onto his body, sticking on his skin like dried mud. He tried to move, to gasp for air, to run away from the feeling of despair that spread along his body, knowing it was useless, but fighting it even so. This too was a familiar sensation.

"Very good, Rey."

He heard his words. His master. Snoke.

"I will not do such thing!"

The girl's voice. Rey's voice. Filled with fear, desperation, anger, hate. Doubt.

"Bring me Kylo Ren, and I will give you your parents..."

"No!" Her sharp scream pierced his ears as he was violently pushed back by her arms, his back hitting hard the wall behind him. He blinks a few times, his sight regaining focus. The girl was breathless, her face extremely red, tears falling shamelessly from her furious eyes. He was serious like stone, unresponsive, still overwhelmed by her memories, leaning against the wall.

"You!" She yells at him. "I should have let you die!" The last word pronounced with such hate. Holding herself not to cry further, she storms out of his cell and out of the room. Luke Skywalker lets out a heavy breath, turning around and leaving too.

~xXx~

"I'm so sorry, Master!" She sobbed, tears running free now. "I couldn't do it! He is too strong, I'm not-" She had to pause to regain breath, her blood pounding sorely inside her veins.

"Rey, calm down." He gently grasps her shoulders, keeping her from shaking. With a soft smile, he dries the tears from her face.

"This outcome was inevitable, it wasn't your fault." He finally says. Rey, almost stable again, lifts her eyes to face him.

"Wait... What?" She questions him, slowly putting his sentence together in her, yet disturbed, head. "You made me walk in there knowing I was going to fail?" She vociferated. "Why? Why would you sacrifice me like that?" her voice growing incredulous with every word.

"Rey, control your emotions. Think." He had now assumed his master position, with his hands grabbing each other inside the sleeves of his cloak. "He is the Master of the Knights of Ren, the leader of our enemy's finest warriors. We are going to face them on battle in a future not so distant from us. How do you expect to succeed against them without practice? You were lucky last time, Rey. Things might not happen in the same way again, you need to be prepared." He gives her a harsh look. She takes a steep back.

"What are you saying?"

"I'm saying this is your final trial, Rey." He can not be serious.

"No." She denies it immediately.

"You must. There is nothing more that I can teach you, some aspects of the Force we must learn it ourselves. You defeated him once, you can do it again."

"No, I can't." She hisses, the memory of him going through her head haunting her already, how defenseless she was.

"Have you never asked yourself the reason why you were able to thrive against him at the Starkiller? It is because you're strong with the force, Rey. Everything you need you already have. But you are scared, and you are afraid. And it is holding you back. You need to get pass it. This is the only way."

She realizes the implication of his words. He was telling her to practice her mind skills on Kylo Ren. Her lips flinch as she feels a deep cry stuck in her throat. He was right, as always. She was scared. She was terrified. The thought of Snoke's dark knight creeping through her mind, messing with her memories, it scares her in a deep part of her being. But she knows there is no other choice. This is her life now, and she must face it, or her destiny will be doom.

"Fine. Master." She manage to say, her eyes gazing the floor. Luke Skywalker gives her a compliant look.

"Go eat something. You are pale like these walls. In the afternoon we shall train your saber skills. For now you can go take a rest."

She nods positively, with a sniff from her nose. When the sound of her steps completely disappeared stairs down, Luke turns his back and walks to a room on the end of the hall.

"I take from your face it was that bad, then." Leia speaks when he opens the door only to stood in his place.

"She wasn't ready, I told you."

Leia sighs on her chair across the table. This wasn't any particular room, just an abandoned one with a view to the beginning of the forest. Leia liked to hang out there after her monologues with her son. It was a private place where she could moarn in peace, far from curious eyes.

"I can't just let my son rot in that cell, Luke. He won't talk to me, he won't talk to you, maybe he'll talk to her."

"And what makes you think that?" He questions her. She lifts her eyes like she was about to state the obvious to him.

"I know my son. He may have deserted me, but I never turned my back on him. I am still his mother, and there are things a mother knows. I have spent my time listening far more then I would have liked to Rey's reports on the Starkiller base, analyzing every move he had towards her. He could have killed her in that fight, you know it and I know it. But he held back. Why? He also didn't torture her like he did with Poe, like he did with many others from the Resistance." She pauses, about to conclude her argument. "He has forged some sort of connection to her, even if he doesn't know it yet."

Luke gives her a doubtful look.

"You said it yourself her training wasn't moving forward. Pressure made her thrive against him before, well, maybe pressure is just what she needs to improve now."

She stands up and walks to her brother, giving him a small squeeze on his hand, her head resting on his shoulder.

"Why do I always let you convince me into doing something you want?" He looks down on her eyes. She half-smiles. Life had mistreated her too much for her to smile in its fullness.

"Because I am often right." She kisses his cheek.

"This could turn out real bad for us, Leia." He holds her hand tightly.

"I know." There was undisguised concern in her voice. "But it could also be good."

The rest of the day worn her out. Rey looked for Poe right after leaving Kylo Ren's prison, but he was stuck in a private matter of the Resistance and wasn't available. Overly frustrated, she compensated her stress on the lightsaber practice, until reaching exhaustion in every cell of her body. She wasn't sure what to think about training mind reading on Kylo Ren, especially since it wasn't so much on him as it was on her. But one thing Master Luke spoke had caught her attention. She did defeated him before, so why was she feeling so weak now? Hasn't she spent the last three weeks on intensive training with the Last Jedi? The great Luke Skywalker, destroyer of the Death Star and redeemer of Darth Vader? Shouldn't she trust his judgement?

She decided it was the best thing to do, but she could not calm this euphoria inside of her heart. It was a bad feeling she was carrying ever since Snoke reached her mind. She had never thought she would miss the quietude of her old life.

She groans to herself, externalising her thoughts. A girl on the bed by her side shushes her. Great. She thinks. She gazes at the ceiling while lying on her back, the sound of fourteen other girls sleeping peacefully filling her ears. Her brain was too agitated to turn off. But eventually the fatigue takes hold of her body and she slowly fades into unconsciousness.

After some minutes, she was already dreaming.

"Shush, Rey! Your daddy will be home soon, don't worry!" A woman tried to calm down a crying baby. The child had big brown eyes and thin brown hair. Rey stood perplex at the scene. She knew, even though she had no memories of her parents, she knew this was her mother holding her in her arms. She was the most beautiful woman Rey has ever seen. Long, copper hair running through her shoulder onto baby Rey's face, making the baby cease from crying and start to play with them instead. The woman began to sing a lullaby softly, her nose tickling the baby's nose. There were tears in Rey's eyes, as she felt the warmth of her mother's love, how adored she was. Why did you leave me? She couldn't help from thinking, the sound of her own pleading screams to a flying ship in Jakku haunting her ears.

"Do you really wish to know?" A dark, sinister voice talks to her. "I can give you the answers... I can give you your mother..."

She wakes in a heartbeat. She looks around momentarily desperate by fear, but she was still on her dorm room at the Resistance. Tears form in her eyes, as she realizes she wasn't free of him at all. Snoke. He would never leave her alone until he drives her to the breaking point. She drowns her face into the sheets and screams as hard as she can. Breaking point was pretty close. She could still fell the texture of her mother's hair on her face as a baby. That was an actual memory, it was not something made up, she knows it, she feels deeply in her heart. And that is what is tearing her apart, because her mother is out there, alive, maybe even her father. She obliges herself to calm down before Master Luke could take notice of her state. This was her battle to fight, there was nothing he could do for her.

Without really thinking about what she was doing, she gets off the bed and walks to the commode by its side. Careful not to wake anybody, she picks whatever clothes her hand touches first and dresses it. Without a sound, she walks out of the building.

~xXx~

So Snoke had reached out to the girl, how Kylo suspected he eventually would. The apex of the war was getting close, he could feel it. Their role in the game to be defined sooner then he had thought. With his eyes closed in the darkness of his cell, he revisits the girl's memories in his mind, the image of her weightless smile by the lake lasting longer then the others. He covers his eyes with his arm. This certainly concerned him. The reason, he was not entirely sure why.

A light knock on the door distracts him from his thoughts.

"Are you awake?" The Scavenger girl. The corners of his lips curved into an unavoidable smirk. He was a prisoner, and she was knocking on the door like he had the right to refuse her. This only improved his concerns that this wasn't the place for her. This or anywhere else he knew. She was different in an entirely new way.

"Yes." He makes himself audible to her. The lights turn on automatically when she steps in, closing the door at her back. He lifts his body from the mattress, sitting on the corner of the bed, his eyes staring at her. This is the first time he sees her hair untied on her shoulders, the way it frames her face, matching perfectly with the color of her eyes. They look at each other for a while.

"You saw him. In my memories." She finally speaks, standing before the glass, directly in front of him.

"Yes." He says again, stoic.

She shoots him a mortifying glance.

"Let me assure you I have no intention of breaking you out of here. Ever." She walks to the wall on her left and sits on the floor, her back leaning against it. She seemed very distressed, something else had happened, but he couldn't figure out what. Somehow this bothers him.

"Once Snoke calls, it's hard to refuse."

"Is that why you betrayed your family? Because you have no willpower?" Her sharp tongue always in defensive. She would never disappoint.

She drowns her head amidst her arms, not really expecting an answer. Her silky almond hair runs through her bare shoulders, all her body language telling him she was close to reaching her limit.

"I know you have felt it too, the pull of the Dark side."

She gives him a snort of disgust, obviously regretting her poor decision to visit him, starting to get up of her place.

"But you didn't come here in the middle of the night to tell me you're not going to help me."

He says fast enough, not wanting her to leave yet. Somehow the idea of her going stealthily to see him so late at night provokes a strange thrill along his skin. She stays put, leaning her back against the wall again.

"No? And why was it, please enlighten me."

He observes her expression. She had been crying, dark circles beneath her eyes. Her hands were shaking nervously, although she tries to hide it by holding each other. Her lips swollen, shivering.

"You came because you're lonely."

Her head immediately turns to him.

"I felt it when I was inside your mind. Snoke, the temptation to accept his offer. You do not feel comfortable to talk about this with your so called friends. You wish for a simpler life. You miss your home."

Her eyes blaze at him.

"You know nothing about me."

"I know you're afraid. And confused. You came to me because you know I have already been in your place."And he knows he is right. That is the reason why she has hold on to his words from the first time he penetrated her thoughts. Don't be afraid, I feel it too. "Because you know I won't judge you."

"There is nothing for you to judge, I've done nothing wrong!" She hisses.

"Then why do you feel so guilty?"

A heavy silence takes over the place. His expression at her didn't change once since she walked through the door, but hers had already gone from mad angry to sarcastic to regret.

"I shouldn't have come."

She stands up, her eyes showing how sorry she is for acting so impulsively. When she was reaching for the doorknob, he speaks.

"I'm not trying to talk you into anything. I'm just saying... I understand."

She freezes.

"Why are you talking to me at all?" She turns around to truly face him, her eyes looking for something inside his own. And he sensed again what he always feels when in contact with her. Recognition.

And so, he tells her the truth.

"Because I am tired of feeling alone. Aren't you?"

She keeps her mouth from saying it, but her eyes speak for themselves. Yes, she is.

She turns around and leaves.

A.N: thaaaank you for the awesome reviews! I'm loving to hear your thoughts on the story! Hope you enjoyed this chapter, it's a little bit shorter, but I finally reached the part where Kylo and Rey start to interact with one another, yay!

Pinky-chan2: This is why Rey was made to face him with so little time of training, Luke only meant for her to evolve her abilities faster! (And also Leia manipulated him)

TheKatieBugg: at first I wasn't going to make the Poe/Rey romance, but then I was writing and they just looked so good together in my head that I couldn't say no! I love them too! But yes, the energy between Kylo and Rey is something else!

Korena-Li: glad you liked it!

To fill you in a little bit on the impression I'm trying to pass about Kylo Ren: He is extremely sure of who he is and what is his purpose, so he will do anything to achieve his goals, even if that implies hurting himself in the process. However that does not stop him from having his own feelings towards Rey. In the moment he is overly intrigued by her role in all of this and the way she acts before the events that are presented to her (like suddenly becoming a Jedi, Snoke trying to recruit her and the curiosity of finding out who her parents are) because he recognizes himself in her, having passed by similar situations that drove him to where he is now.

That's it, thank you for reading!