Chapter 3: Combustion

Growing up on Jakku taught Rey everything she knew about the pangs of hunger and the desperation of thirst. But kissing Kylo was like nothing she had ever felt before. His mouth was the last drop of water under a blazing sky, the northern wind singing in the belly of a broken starship, the cool touch of nightfall on her sunburnt skin. Rey opened her lips to him and he devoured her with tongue and teeth. Her mind shattered at the need in it and she let herself sink into the meeting of their minds. Their connection burst open and Rey drank in his desire for her.

When they finally pulled apart, breaths shallow and hearts racing, Kylo Ren looked at her like she was the brightest gleam of starlight in the entire galaxy.

She heard Ben coughing and the brisk footsteps of a nurse.

"Where am I?" His voice was low and hoarse.

"Med bay, on a Resistance ship. We're about to land at the base. What's your name, sweetie?"

"Ben. Ben Solo. Are my parents here?"

There was a pause. "You're Ben Solo. The General's son?"

Rey saw the expression on Finn's face and she tugged at him urgently, shaking her head. He looked questioningly at her but kept his silence. They both strained to listen to the conversation on the other side of the curtain.

"Ben, what's the last thing you remember?"

He coughed again. "Uh, I had just left the Academy after seeing Uncle Luke. I had a mission to Dantooine. There was—I think someone was in pain. I saw a bright light and then—a face, I think. My head doesn't feel so great."

"Here, take this with some water." Rey heard him gulp it down. "We're going to have the doctor examine you and let the General know you're here. Get some rest in the meantime. We'll be moving you shortly." There was a rustle of bedsheets before the nurse left. In the distance, Rey heard the buzz of a comlink. "Doctor? We have an incoming patient with possible head trauma from Operation Daybreak. Human male, late 20s or early 30s. No visible physical injuries, but—he says he's Ben Solo."

It didn't take long for her to kiss him again, slower this time and gentler. When Kylo sucked lightly at her bottom lip, Rey let a moan escape from the corner of her mouth. He hitched her up against him and her legs automatically wrapped themselves around his waist. She felt him carry her in the direction of his shuttle, his stride long and sure. With a whoosh of climate-controlled air, they were inside and Rey absently realized why he always spent the night there.

Kylo tried to lower her gently onto his bed, but she refused to let go and pulled him down with her. He growled as he angled himself against her inner thigh and she gasped at the trail of hot kisses down her neck.

"Show me," he said, and she stripped off her clothes for him piece by piece. Every inch of skin uncovered was worshipped by his mouth until she came flying apart around his fingers, beneath his tongue.

For a minute they just gazed at each other wearing matching grins, stroking hair and caressing skin. Finally, Rey reached for him, pushed the trousers off his hips, grasped him shyly with her hand, and watched the awe on his face as she took him in for the first time. There was a flash of pain but then she was so full with him, as if that was exactly where he'd always belonged. Kylo rested his forehead on hers and she thought she could see the constellations in his eyes. Then he started moving and Rey completely lost her head.

Neither of them could last very long, their bond overwhelming them with sensations until Rey couldn't tell where she ended and he began. Foreign sounds filled the air, slaps and whimpers and the bed creaking beneath them, and when she said his name it was in a breathy whisper that neither of them had ever heard before. They finished together with a quiet sob and a strangled cry, clutching each other as the waves of climax crashed over them. Rey never felt so complete.

She teased him afterward for letting her sleep in a miserable swamp for all those weeks and he looked so abashed that she was compelled to kiss him breathless, her fingers ghosting over the scars that she had left on him in a snowy forest so far away. They slept tangled together in his bed that night and for every night they had left on Dagobah, minds and bodies brushing in their dreams.

The remaining weeks were a blissful blur of fighting and fucking. They trained every morning and spent the hot midday exploring each other in the comfortable sanctuary of Kylo's shuttle. In the afternoons and evenings, they trained again and bathed together and bickered about the future as if it would all still exist. In the darkest recesses of her heart, Rey thought it was too good to last, a star burning too brightly, but she felt so lucky to be experiencing it at all, to be feeling so alive even if the end was coming for her.

On the final evening, Kylo and Rey took it slowly. For hours, they touched and teased and savored and blocked out all the burdens of tomorrow. When he came inside of her, Rey hummed her happiness into his throat.

During the tender moments after, Rey measured time with the slowing of his heartbeat as he held her, made a wish with every rising of his chest, and told him all her secrets without speaking. That night, their dreams were serene, a golden sunset and the dance of vivid colors against an endless black sky.

Early the next morning, Rey woke to the fearsome sight of a fully armored Kylo Ren, his gloves in his hands and his grandfather's lightsaber at his side.

"Were you watching me sleep, Dark Lord?" She batted her eyelashes and he caught her bare ankle to tickle the sole of her feet until tears of mirth streamed down her cheeks. But his guard was up; Rey felt it, the rage and sadness roiling again inside him. They prepared for battle without another spoken word, exchanging instead happy snippets of the past and wisps of warm feelings through their shared bond.

At last, Kylo plugged in the coordinates to Carrivar. Rey felt the now-familiar pull of hyperspace, her heart heavy. As he maneuvered the ship, she memorized the elegant flow of his robes and the reflection of dashboard lights on a mask that she had once so despised. Before opening the shuttle door, Kylo revealed his true face to her again, drawing her to him for a kiss that made Rey's soul sing. She didn't want the moment to ever end.

She felt Ben slip under again, no doubt from the sedative that the nurse had given him, and a part of her was relieved. Finn bent down to her ear, his breath hot on the side of her face.

"Rey, what is going on?"

"It's a long story, Finn." She was incredibly tired all of sudden and Finn seemed to sense it. "But you have to know that he isn't dangerous. Not anymore. Promise me you won't say anything." After one last glance between the drawn curtain and her best friend's trusting face, Rey let herself slide into sleep.