Kylo had been young—not more than ten years old—when Snoke had first found him in the Force. At the onset, young Ben Solo had not even understood that the voice in his head was not himself speaking. Initially, he mistook is as a sort of conscience that functioned as personal cheerleader and an excuse to vent. The voice appeared sporadically. Sometimes daily, but sometimes not for weeks at a time. But always when he was upset. Use your aggressive feelings, boy. Unleash your emotions. It's not good to keep them bottled up.
If some people have a guardian angel, poor Ben Solo had been assigned a personal demon. His very own devil to whisper in his ear and goad him on. The voice was alternatively encouraging and cutting, often helpful but sometimes cruel. The voice never shouted like his parents. It was habitually calm, reasoned, and authoritative. And always subversive. Pay Skywalker no heed, boy. He is mistaken about a great many things.
The voice became a sort of friend, for young Ben Solo was a lonely kid. Shuffled around to too many schools by too many nannies. As a Senator's son and the young Prince of Alderaan, he had every advantage credits could buy. Except, unfortunately, the attention and understanding from those he needed most. The excuse was always duty. Duty to the Senate, duty to the people, duty to the Republic. And so, from a very tender age, Ben Solo learned to associate negative emotions with democracy. They don't want you, son. But I do. When the time is right, you will come to me. I look forward to completing your training.
As he grew older, he had issues with authority. The truth is that most young men are angry in some manner or other. It's a phase that is part of maturation. But Ben Solo's angry phase started long before puberty and quickly became extreme. It got him in fights with his peers and in arguments with his teachers. That just led to an escalating set of punishments that culminated in being sent away for Jedi training. It was the ultimate consequence for this already lonely, disaffected boy. And now, becoming a Jedi was more like a jail sentence than a calling in his life. The flip side of all of this rebelliousness was a strong need for guidance. But dependable male role models were in very short supply in his life. Luckily, young Ben Solo had the voice in his head. Don't be a pawn of the Jedi Order. Listen and learn but see through the lies of the Jedi.
The voice was there as he began his Jedi training. Pointing out alternative ways to do things. When young Ben Solo struggled to find peace in meditation, the voice suggested he focus on his frustrations instead. His uncle was preoccupied with twelve other students so his pedagogy was stretched thin. And since Luke Skywalker and his bad attitude nephew had no natural rapport, his uncle tended to look the other way a lot. So when the remedial student Ben Solo finally mastered a basic skill in the Force, Master Skywalker wasn't inclined to scrutinize how. Usually, Master Luke was relieved that it was time to move on. Once or twice, his uncle had taken Padawan Ben aside to confess how hard he was to teach. You have enormous raw power in the Force, his uncle had complained, so why can't you focus on skills other than combat? You have all that mighty Skywalker blood and yet you are my slowest student. He cannot teach you because he fears your power. In time, you will understand why.
Who are you? Ben Solo had asked the voice time and again. It was years of playing 'hard to get' before the voice would respond. I have had many names in many times, my son. Call me by my favorite nickname. Call me Master Snoke. Master? Are you a Jedi? No. Are you a Sith? Let us dispense with labels, shall we? How do you know the Force? I learned it long ago but I learn it still today. You must study the great mystery from all its angles. I'm rather enjoying learning now as a Jedi through you. The answers were always vague evasions. Ben Solo stopped asking after a while. It was pointless.
The voice was just a voice until that fateful night when young Ben Solo had awoken with his uncle's sword lit above his head. Things had degenerated fast from there. And now the voice in his head was back. Come to me now before they find you. Before they finally cast you out. They might not want you, but I do, my son. Come to me and I will complete your training. Come to me and fulfill your destiny.
He had still been a teenager at the time.
Before he knew it, young Ben Solo had been on his knees pledging himself to his new Master's training and committing his soul to Darkness for all time. Gooood. Good. He had a new name, a new sword, a new uniform, and a new cause. A new role model too in his recently discovered grandfather Darth Vader. Ben Solo was born anew as Kylo Ren and nothing was ever the same after that. It was years before Kylo would fully understand how stealthily and effectively he had been turned to the Dark Side. Corruption, he would learn, was Master Snoke's favorite pastime.
And while no one else might understand it, the murder of his Master on the Supremacy had been a second patricide. First, Kylo had killed his biological father Han Solo on the Starkiller. Then, Kylo had killed the father figure Snoke who had mentored him for decades. While he does not regret that act, it is still a defining moment in his life. For Snoke was the man who had sheltered the terrified runaway Padawan with blood on his hands and an angry Jedi on his heels. Snoke was the man who raised him from a boy to a man, giving equal parts carrot and stick as he slowly but surely steaped him in Darkness. Snoke was the first person to truly believe in him. Snoke gave Ben Solo the direction, the discipline, and the purpose he craved. You will be the son I never had, for he was taken from me. The Jedi stole my boy, Snoke had revealed once. And so, as revenge, I have stolen you from the Jedi.
But, ultimately, the time had come for Kylo Ren to outgrow his role as apprentice and to leave his Master behind. When the moment came to choose Rey or Snoke, to choose the future or the past, to choose leadership or subservience, Kylo Ren had known what to do. He did not hesitate. He showed no mercy. He did what needed to be done. He does not regret his decision in the least. But he is still managing the consequences now. And the biggest consequence is Rey.
Kylo has never been much into girls. Power is his turn on more than sex. That's not to say that he doesn't appreciate the way a woman can fill out a uniform, especially walking behind one. But he has never acted on that sort of thing. Kylo Ren has long been content to look but not touch. But then Rey had shown up and she had been something completely different altogether. He found her in the woods, a skinny thing dressed in rags with slashing brows and high cheekbones. She had his father's second best blaster in her hand and a determined look on her face. She had even seen the map to Skywalker. Yes, whoever this girl was, she was special.
Rey's interrogation had not gone well. Kylo remembers being rocked on his heels by her resistance and thoroughly intimidated by her unexpected power. After that, he had a humiliating interview with Snoke to confess his failure as Hux gloated and looked on. Angry at the untrained scavenger girl who had so unsettled him but intrigued him too, Kylo had returned to find her cell empty. He had been thwarted yet again. Yes, this girl was special indeed. And now, the hunt was on.
Then, in the woods Rey had called him a monster. Name calling is nothing new to him, but for some reason this time it had hurt. Kylo doesn't think of himself as a monster. Yes, he is a Force user and that makes him an aberration of sorts. A freak of nature. But so is she. And yes, he has lofty political goals but monster . . . really? He had killed Han Solo who was sabotaging the oscillator for the enemy. That was a defensible act while at war. So . . . monster? Really?
The moment that had clinched it was when Rey had stolen his grandfather's lightsaber from him with the Force. He remembers gaping at her. Kylo was more than intrigued now, he was impressed. And angry still, yes. But he's an angry guy. Suddenly, unmistakably, Kylo realized that he had met his match. In the Force, in the war, maybe even in life. That magic moment in the woods had felt like destiny. He was dazzled enough to offer to teach her. He's been chasing Rey ever since.
She's nothing like the girl he thought he would fall for. Kylo always thought he liked softer women. Women with lower voices and easy smiles and accommodating personalities. Women who were the furthest thing from his demanding, high maintenance, and bellicose mother. Kylo always figured he would end up with a hearth and home sort girl he could dump on Mustafar to raise his kids. The sort of girl who wouldn't make too many demands and wouldn't challenge him. But, instead, he finds his head turned by a girl who shoots first and shoots often. She's skinny and mostly muscle, she smells of engine oil instead of perfume, and she is embarrassingly uneducated at that. Rey is completely unsuitable in all the conventional ways. Except . . . she has so much Force. All that raw power attracts this Dark Side warrior in a way that normal sex appeal never could. Quite honestly, Rey of Jakku just slays him. He'd kiss her forever in the hangar bay if he could.
But, of course, there are complications. Nothing is ever easy for him. He finds a girl he's crazy about and she's on the opposite side of his war. He's planning the future but she clings to the romance of an Old Republic past that never was. Of the ideal of a heroic Jedi Order that never lived up to its hype. Rey thinks she is fighting the good fight and carrying on a tradition grounded in hope and justice. But it is an illusion. Ben Solo had seen that from a young age. And in old age, Luke Skywalker had come to realize it too. But gullible Rey of Jakku, desperate for belonging, thirsty for knowledge, and under the influence of his mother, has latched on tight and won't let go. She's stubborn like that, he sees.
He's got girl trouble with Rey, he's got work trouble with Hux, and he's got a war that keeps dragging on. Today, it's all got him down. So Kylo goes where he always goes when he feels lost and confused. To his grandfather's mask. He sits down in his meditation room in his quarters to genuflect on the man who started it all. It's calming just to be here, he thinks, as Kylo reaches out in the Force. Will Darth Vader send him wisdom in a vision, he wonders. Yes, his fearsome Sith grandfather does not disappoint. In Kylo's mind's eye, images and feeling suddenly to take shape as his current surroundings fade away.
The slave woman has a weather beaten face and eyes with squint lines from admiring her world's twin suns. Her hard life has aged her well beyond her years. Still, she is undeniably pretty in an ordinary sort of way. This is a woman who does not chafe under her lot in life. She long since let that anger go. She is happy now for the first time and excited for the future too. The woman smiles as she strokes her round and swollen belly. There is no father, she has told everyone. Of course, they don't believe her. But it's the truth and she can't explain it. This baby is the greatest—maybe the only—blessing of her life. He is the best surprise ever.
"For unto you, a child is given" said the tender voice to the slave woman in the night. And thus was conceived the first Skywalker. The slave boy bought and freed by a Jedi Master and wooed by a Sith. His choices became others' destiny. For that is what it means to be the Chosen One.
The woman is undeniably beautiful. Her face needs no adornment but she is meticulously made up. This is a woman whose life is chronicled in Senate newsfeeds, so she is always camera ready and long accustomed to being on display. But here at home in private, her habitual bland smile is gone. She is tearful as over the horizon she watches flames pour out of the temple. The woman strokes her round and swollen belly as she worries desperately for her missing husband. Ani, where are you? Are you okay? The father's identity is a secret she cannot explain without consequences. In truth, these unexpected twin children are a very great complication in her life. They were a surprise that has taken some getting used to.
"For unto you a child is given." The voice in this woman's dream is the same voice that gives her husband the persistent visions of her death. This is the next generation of Skywalkers. They are first kept a secret from the Jedi and then kept a secret from the Sith. Until the time is right and destiny intervenes. For you may try, but you cannot hide a Chosen One.
The woman is on edge as she stands in the Rebellion headquarters listening to the chatter of the battle being fought lightyears away. She herself would be fighting if she could, but her pregnancy has forced her to sit out this final, climactic confrontation on Jakku. She chafes a bit under this concession to impending motherhood. For she is determined that her new obligations will not keep her from fulfilling all of her dreams. As she strokes her round and swollen belly, the woman wonders about the child's father in the thick of battle. Come back to me, she whispers. Han, I need your help. This baby is no surprise—like everything else in her life, this child was planned. But he will be one more thing to do and she's already overscheduled as is. Han, come back to me. I'm scared and I can't do this on my own.
"For unto you a child is given." This time, the words go unsaid. The voice never bothers with an annunciation to this strong-willed mother. Instead, it waits to creep into the mind of her impressionable young son. You are a Skywalker, the voice whispers, a son of Darkness, the heir to Lord Vader, born to rule it all. Come to me and fulfill your destiny. You are a Chosen One.
The woman is tired, dead-eyed, and isolated. She scrapes by scavenging in the desert, but it becomes harder with each passing day. Once the baby comes, she has no idea what she will do. The woman is taking things day by day again, just like she used to. For now, she strokes her round and swollen belly as she waits in a long line to trade scrap. There is a man who claims to be the child's father, but the woman rejects his claim. You are a child of the Force, the woman tells her unborn baby. Made from the magic that binds the universe together. For despite all that has happened, this baby is still wanted. Now she will make another set of marks on the wall. A family is all this wretched orphan has ever longed for. Her dream finally came true even if it turned out to be a surprise nightmare in the end.
"For unto you a child is given." The voice is known to this mother and she screams out in protest as she hears the words. She has met the voice in the flesh and unwittingly impressed him with her fire and spunk. That's how she finds herself in this predicament. Powerful Darkness met powerful Light, and now a new Chosen One will be born.
"NO!" Kylo's mind retreats from the vision and for a moment all he can do is breathe, so incensed and terrified is he. "NO! NO!" He refuses to let this premonition come true. "Thank you . . . thank you, Grandfather," he pants out his gratitude to the silent mask. For now, he understands Rey's dreams. He understands Snoke's final words in the throne room. He understands everything. But is he already too late?
Kylo grabs for his mask and careens into the hallway, hollering into his comlink for an underling to ready his ship. Then, he mentally gropes for Rey in the Force. He's been able to initiate their bond twice before but he's having trouble now. He's unbalanced and unfocused, as his Master would say. Completely off kilter. "Rey, I am coming for you now . . . Rey, I'm coming . . ." He unconsciously says the words aloud and in the Force, so rattled is he.
When Kylo reaches the hangar bay, his command shuttle is still being prepped. And rather than cooling his heels feeling powerless, Kylo lights his sword and starts to destroy the nearest TIE. Again and again, he pounds the fighter with his sword, hacking through steel and wiring until it is a molten, smoking mess. Kylo keeps going and going until his overwhelming anger feels more manageable. Until it feels like he can concentrate again. Kylo is panting with the effort, and that physical release is helpful too. Satisfied at last, he deactivates his sword and steps back to survey the damage. A very wary lackey now approaches to salute and inform him that his shuttle is ready to go.
As he boards his ship and dismisses the offer of a pilot, Kylo tries again to reach Rey in the Force. "Rey, I am coming for you." The message never reaches her. But it reaches someone else. It's the voice in his head from his childhood. The voice he knows as Snoke.
Still a child in a mask, I see. Breaking your toys in anger. Foolish boy. Did you think I would let a second apprentice rule the Sith Empire I rebuilt? You're no Darth Sidious, Kylo Ren.
"Fuck!" Kylo hollers aloud his frustration as he punches the ship's controls and the shuttle lifts off. Echoing through his mind now is the sound of his dead Master's derisive laugh.
I cannot be betrayed. I cannot be beaten. I saw your mind. I saw your every intent. Congratulations, my Apprentice. You have completed your training at last.
This can't be happening. And yet, it's still happening. "You're dead!" Kylo accuses. "You're dead!" He says it a second time hopefully.
Not dead. Not yet. Not ever. Haven't you figured out who I am? No one is every really gone. Least of all me.
"You're dead!" This is just a manifestation of Snoke's spirit. Something like a Dark Side Force ghost, Kylo thinks. He's grasping at straws.
Not dead. Not ever. Long live the Skywalkers, Kylo Ren.