Rey slipped into his unguarded mind and the Images, thoughts, and feelings of their history, from his point of view, began to unfold in exquisite detail.

Through the digital display of his helmet she could see herself in the forest on Takodona, a glimpse here, a glimpse there, through the trees. The colors of everything on the display were washed out and dimmed so that her false color heat signature stood out in stark relief against an almost flat background. She could see lines of scrolling data reporting her vital statistics in his peripheries- range, species, sex, approximate age, heart rate, blood pressure, body temperature, respiration, over all life expectancy based on the details of her report.

She could feel the shock that had rippled through him when he'd stepped into the stone crevise in front of her, switched his display to a real color image and gotten his first good up-close look at the girl he'd been tracking. Rey felt how astounded he had been to discover that in addition to what he considered to be an absolutely lovely face and form, she was possessed of a breathtaking amount of raw power that he could feel pulling him towards her like a magnet. She felt him instantly recover from his shock as a jolt of power crackled through him when she began to pepper him with blaster bolts and felt how he had very quickly come to admire what he considered to be her vicious killer instinct.

She felt his mind register a strong concern that one of them was going to get killed as he deflected bolt after bolt. She felt an intense surge of power zing through him, saw her gun hand fling backwards and felt his whole body spasm as her muscular system locked up.

She saw a different type of false color image replace her real color image on his display, saw him scan her from head to toe and knew that he was checking her for other weapons. When the display image flicked back to real color she felt how his intensely focused visual scan on the way back up from her toes was nowhere near as impersonal or analytical as the false color weapons check had been.

Rey actually felt the spark of his fascination ignite into a full blown wildfire as her raw power and strong will forced him to channel previously unfathomable amounts of energy to catch even a tiny glimpse inside of her mind. She felt a dizzying flash of relief flood through him when he caught a brief image of the map she had seen, and the thrill that shot up his spine at realizing that he had an excuse to take her prisoner. She saw her body begin to crumple and felt his queer enjoyment of holding her in his arms as he'd carried her limp form back to his shuttle.

Through his memory, she saw how his eyes had barely left her for a moment the entire time she had been unconcious. Some of the thoughts that had flitted through his mind as his eyes had freely roamed across her sleeping face and body made her insides flutter and her skin go hot and prickly.

She felt his desire to see the exact shade and patterning of her eyes, and his impatience for her to wake up as he bound her to the interrogation table on Star Killer base. She felt his curiousity grow into a living thing as he pondered how she might react to her predicament, would she beg and plead like so many others? He'd wondered. She felt intrigue flit through him as he thought of the raw power and fierce strength she had displayed in resisting his earlier mind probe and she felt his hope that she would still be fiery and fierce when she awakened.

She could feel his impatience with her prolonged unconciousness grow nearly unbearable before he finally felt her starting to wake up. She felt his desire to see every single detail of her face as it came back to life and saw the sight of her shift as he squatted down for a better view of her closed eyelids. His attention was lazer focused on her eyes as they fluttered open and she felt his insides actually flutter with them.

She could hear the sound of her own heartbeats through the unmuted audio input of his vitals scanner and she heard how her heart quivvered unnaturally when she became aware of his presence. She felt him sense the loathing that washed through her at the sight of him and felt a shaft of pain stab him in the chest.

She felt him sense that the fear he felt stealing through her stemmed from what he might have done to her friends and she felt his desire to reassure her that he hadn't harmed them. When she called him a 'creature in a mask,' she felt how her words had stung him and how much he couldn't bear to have her think of him that way.

That was when he'd taken off his helmet.

In his mind she felt him feel the shock that had ripped through her at the sight of his naked face and she felt how his heart had skipped a beat at that exact moment in reaction to seeing her with his own eyes, not as a real color image on the display in his helm, but in real living color for the first time.

She felt him feeling her insides jump around as he stepped nearer. She felt him feeling her confusion, and the tickle of fear that sent her heart skipping when she'd felt as if her soul was trying to leap into his body.

She felt his heart skipping, his soul tugging towards her, "Don't be afraid," He'd said then. "I feel it, too."

She hadn't understood what he'd meant then, but it made perfect sense now that she could feel it from his perspective.

She felt him struggle to keep up an appearance of disinterest as he worked furiously to break into her mind and she could feel the incredible amount of power he'd had to channel in order to managed it.

She felt hunger tear through him, felt his mouth go dry at the earthy muskiness of sweat and forest with a faint trace of something warm and almost floral that was his first scent of her. She felt how desperately close he had come to completely losing his composure as he was struck with a sudden and very powerful urge to bury his face into the bare skin between her neck and shoulder to simply inhale her.

She felt his heart actually twinge painfully at the images and loneliness of her past few months living alone in her abandonded AT-AT out in the battle graveyard near Niima Outpost.

She felt how her desperation had made his insides churn as he watched her try, night after night, to distract herself from the burning pain of an empty stomache by envisioning the most beautiful place she could imagine…

She could feel an intense blast of jealousy tear through him as he saw her feelings for rogue Stormtrooper FN2187- Finn- began to evolve from seeing him as a nuissance to considering him her friend to feeling a vague, undefined, attraction to him and a swift yet lesser pang of it at her memories of Han Solo as he watched her quickly grow closer to his father than he possibly ever had been.

She felt the entirety of his being- heart, mind, body and soul- spasm as her mind had invaded his. For a few brief heartbeats they had existed in each other's mind as fully as they existed in their own, then she felt him recoil reflexively from her mind in shock. She felt his control slip and his fascination ratchet up as she'd described what she had discovered inside of him. She felt how rattled he'd been as he'd fled from her presence to try to get a grip on himself.

Next, she saw herself in the snowy forest on Star Killer base, standing next to Finn with a blaster pointed at him… again. A surge of anger burst through him dulling the screaming agony in his side where Chewbacca's bowcaster bolt had caught him in the abdomen a little below his left ribs.

She felt furious power snapping through him as he grabbed her in an invisible fist and threw her against a tree when he felt her finger begin to tighten on the trigger and she felt his horror at having thrown her so hard she'd been knocked out, then she felt his relief when he realized she wasn't dead or even seriously injured.

She felt him force himself to pay attention to the traitorous former stormtrooper and watched through his eyes as the rebel ignited what he instantly recognized to be Anakin Skywalker's light saber. She felt a nearly unhinged amount of anger flood through him accompanied by a spine-tingling amount of raw power that trivialized his pain temporarily with it's intensity.

She felt rage snarl through him as the man holding his grandfather's weapon put up way more of a fight that he'd expected- even managing to wound him in his upper right arm. She felt his satisfaction when he'd struck what should have been a killing blow just to the left of his opponent's spine from the small of his back to his shoulder blade.

She could feel his triumph as he reached for his prize and his astonished amazement when it flew past him and landed in her hand. She could feel the tingles that had nothing to do with the Force shoot throughout his entire body as he watched that blade erupt into life and illuminate her fiercely beautiful face. She became aware of how he'd thought, in that moment, that she was the most incredible person he'd ever met in his life.

She could feel the pain in his mind and body, but those sensations paled in comparison to the awesome rush of Force energy singing through him as she had attacked. She felt the restraint he'd used in fending off her assault while trying not to hurt her, and she felt his admiration tinged relief when he'd finally managed to tie up her blade with his.

She felt him feeling the Force throb through her body while her eyes had been closed and she felt his heart stop, while her own had done the same, when the throbbing reached a dizzying peak.

She felt his trickle of fear as she gained the upper hand in their duel despite his best efforts to defend against her relentless attack. She felt his momentary distraction when pain seared his right calf as her blade caught him there and then the so much more agonizing slice of her blade as it burned through his face, neck and shoulder.

She felt his fear and disappointment as he looked up at her from the ground and realized that he was about to die and she felt his stunned disbelief and awe as the ground opened up between them and whisked her away. She felt his certainty that she belonged with him as he lay there, bleeding, watching her float away to the other side of the chasm that he believed the Force had opened between them.

Next she felt the sharp jabs of pain in his right cheek as a suture droid knitted away at the healing scar on his face caused by her light saber. She could see herself in his mind's eye, lowering her weapon and panting as she drifted away. She was startled to realize he'd been thinking of how gorgeous she'd looked in that moment, like a savage angel, he'd thought.

She felt the tingle in his spine and the leap of fearful joy he'd felt when she appeared in front of him a moment after he'd waved away the suture droid. Fear that if she was here, he'd have no choice but to inform Snoke, joy because he was just plain thrilled to see her.

She felt his visceral reaction to her phantom blaster bolt which caught him painlessly in the gut. She felt his panic when he looked back up and she was gone. She felt his desperation to find her, to prove to himself that she'd been there, yes, but also because he needed to see her again.

She felt his heart leap when he caught sight of her in the corridor outside medbay.

She felt his chagrine at realizing that she wasn't really there when his attempt at mind control not only failed, but found no mind to even latch onto.

She felt the realization enter his mind that whatever was happening was being orchestrated by something far bigger than either of them.

She felt the hunger growing and shifting inside him with each new encounter, each new image, each memory as they flashed through his mind, and she felt as it morphed from a hunger to possess her into a desire to deserve her as the memory of their last connection before they'd met again flittered through his mind.

She was astounded to learn that the precious intimacy of that moment had meant every bit as much to him as it had to her, possibly more… not only was she actually talking to him as if she didn't hate him, but for the first time since the cross galaxy connection had opened up he could actually feel what she was feeling, how vulnerable and fragile and utterly alone she had felt in those moments just before she had reached out to him… the memory ended abruptly just before their fingertips touched.

Another image of her swirled into his mind, she was looking up at him from the flat of her back in the pod that had jetisoned from the Millenium Falcon moments before.

She felt his momentary instant of horror at seeing her there, onboard the Supremacy, within Snoke's reach and she felt him tamp it down until he was so tightly in control of his emotions that she couldn't feel a thing as he watched her be put into binders then lead her into the elevator that would take them directly to Snoke's crimson throne room.

She felt his control slip as she said his name and felt him lose it entirely as she stepped nearer, looking up at him with wide, trusting eyes and speaking to him in that soft, intimate voice about having seen his future when their hands had touched.

He had wanted nothing more than to declare his intentions to her then and there but he knew that if he did, Snoke would kill them both.

She felt his conviction as he'd told her that it would be she who would turn and stand by his side. She felt the promise that he'd made to himself when he told her that he saw her parents. He had promised himself that he would show and tell her everything once his business with Snoke was concluded.

His memory of the event stopped there and instead of the detailed moment by moment version he had been showing her he sent several short moments flashing through his mind: Her screaming as Snoke tortured her, she could feel the way it had seared his soul to watch every second of her mistreatment. Her on her knees in front of him, she felt the way his heart had shattered to hear her say his name so pathetically when she thought he was going to kill her. She felt a sense of having been relieved of a massive burden flood through him when he'd activated her light saber and his fleeting moment of doubt as she'd scrambled to her feet with her weapon at the ready. She felt the question in his mind of whether she intended to fight with him or against him dissolve into a sense of giddy relief as he felt her make her choice.

His recollection of turning to face the red armored Praetorian Guards was exactly as she had remembered it. Their minds had fused together in the very instant that she'd decided to fight with him and had stayed connected in the background as each had been forced to concentrate on simply staying alive as nearly a dozen heavily armored and armed guards had attacked in a rush.

She felt his distraction as searing pain lanced through her arm at being stabbed and she felt him recenter himself and turn his attention back to the trio of guards he was fighting.

She now understood that He'd known that she knew what he'd been thinking as he'd stood, letting the last guard's body hit the floor with zero thought of anything but getting to her… She felt him feel her feeling his breathlessly intense desire to kiss her even as she'd fled from his mind.

She felt frustration snarl to life inside of him as she choose to stubbornly ignore that desire. She felt it grow intense as she started to lobby on behalf of the rebels when what he desperately needed to know was whether she was with him or not, and she felt it boil over as he yelled at her to let go of the past.

She felt his disdain for the couple he called filthy junk traders and thats when his memory of the event changed drastically from reality. Instead of saying, as he had in reality, "You have no place in this story. You come from nothing, you're nothing… but not to me. Join me." he said the words from the dream. "You have a place in this story. You're my everything, always were… everything to me. Trust me."

She felt him feel her reaction to the altered memory and she heard his voice whisper through her mind, a plea that was half a sob, 'Please.'

Kylo dropped the last of his defenses and let her feel what he was feeling now.

Rey was able to identify many of Ren's tumultuous emotions as they washed over her like the waves battering the stone on Ach-to when he had agreed that he was a monster. Kylo's inner pain filled the air between them, his heart, mind and soul a roadmap of raw emotional wounds and scars that outnumbered his physical scars many times over.

His fear washed over Rey with all the burning intensity of a sand storm on a hot summer day near Niima Outpost. The first time she'd been this deep in his mind the only powerful fear she had found had been that he couldn't live up to the legacy of Darth Vader- A legend that still permeated through all levels of society from one end of the galaxy to the other. She felt no trace of that fear in him now, it had been replaced by other fears that were so intense she could only think of them as terrors.

She could feel every bit of his abject terror of the possibility that she may have never felt anything for him that was in any way similar to what he still felt for her - that she might have only come to the Supremacy that day to save the rebels and not at all because of him. That thought had his whole body so tightly coiled that hers started to vibrate from the tension.

She could feel the crushing weight from his overwhelming terror that he truly hadn't misjudged her at all but had -in his inability to properly express himself in that moment- permanantly destroyed any and all hope that this might end well. The thought of that had his chest so heavily compressed that Rey could hardly breathe.

She could also feel the seering agony of his soul deep terror that she might never see him again as she had before he had messed everything up between them, the thought of that had his heart pounding so hard and fast that hers felt like it was about to give out.

She felt his disgust in himself for not making his feelings abundantly clear before asking her to take his hand, for failing to tell her that the galaxy meant nothing to him without her, for not realizing sooner that the Resistance didn't need to die on those shuttles or in that mine or at all, for not telling her that he only wanted to stop the galaxy from bleeding and then spend the rest of his life loving her.

She could feel his doubts, he was doubting the wisdom of letting her read him this way, doubting the outcome of inviting her inside his mind, heart and soul, doubting whether any of the things he had shown her would make a bit of difference.

She felt the bright intensity of his hope that she'd turn away from the dark side, that she would accept him now that he'd made his feelings for her perfectly clear, that it wasn't too late for her to love him back, that she could feel as strongly about him as he always had and always would about her, that they could have a future together that included a home and family somewhere blissfully far away from galactic politics.

She backed out of his mind, trembling, panting and covered in sweat, and not just from the exertion of maintaining the mind probe so deeply for so long. She blinked at him, her mind a jumble of reactions to the things she'd seen, felt, and known from being inside of his mind.

The suspicion had never crossed her mind that he might be thinking or feeling any of the things that he had just shown her. From her perspective, he'd always seemed so stiff and cold, specifically toward her, that she'd never even fathomed the possibility that he'd been falling head over heels in love with her since the moment they'd met.

All she could do was stare into his maddeningly calm face and intense, unblinking gaze as her mind fought to reconcile what she had thought he'd been feeling all along -a desire to recruit her as a student of the Dark side- with what he'd actually been feeling.

He reached inside his shirt and pulled out a piece of paper roughly the size of his hand and offered it to her as the bindings holding her to the table fell away.

She took the creamy page and saw that it was an exquisitely detailed ink drawing of her. In the drawing her face wore an expression of intense longing framed by a beautifully rendered tangle of sleep touseled hair, the folds of her nightgown draped over her body like a lover's caress, and her soft, heavy-lidded eyes gazed back from the page startling her with the intensity of the hunger within them. She recognized it as the image of her that he had glimpsed just three nights ago, while she'd been speaking of the man she'd once considered him to be.

The page swam before her eyes and two fat tears spilled down her cheeks as she looked up to see the same expression on his face that was on hers in the drawing. He raised his hand, and in it he held his lightsaber which he offered to her.

"Take it." He whispered and waited while she took the weapon from his hand.

"If you can't forgive me… If you still hate me... If you don't want me..." He said raggedly. "Kill me." He dropped to one knee and looked up at her. "I don't want to live if I have to live without you."