Disclaimer – I do not own Star Wars. Disney has not yet accepted my offer of four dollars.

A/N – I have my graduate school orientation today so I won't be able to post much, but I got up early to write! I'm not obsessed or anything… but I may write on the train there. Also! If you're writing and find you can't focus like me, use the Hans Zimmer station on Pandora. It's all incredible movie scores with absolutely no vocals to distract. Think Star Wars, Inception, and Pirates of the Caribbean level of epic.

Chapter 11

Neri opened her eyes the following morning with the distinct feeling that something was off. She stood slowly, her bones aching from the training a distant Kylo Ren had put her through the day before, and quieted her mind to feel where the disturbance was coming from. It wasn't her mind, but her feet that determined this.

They weren't moving; there was no familiar vibration beneath her soles. It felt strange, like being jerked out of a full run suddenly, and she looked around the room for anything else that was amiss. She did not see her teacher, could not feel him when she reached out with the Force. He hadn't been able to sneak about much without her noticing in the preceding few days and she wondered if he had kept her unconscious on purpose, if he was avoiding her presence.

Shrugging, telling herself not to care, Neri padded lightly to the bathroom and shut the door behind her. Her fingers traveled through her cropped hair, finally used to the lack of mass there, and then rubbed the sleep from her eyes drowsily. Her night had been fitful, filled with dreams of falling endlessly, no bottom to the black void of her subconscious.

She looked at herself in the mirror and was unsure that she knew who was looking back at her. She had the same bones, same eyes, but they were weary and her face slightly drawn from several nights of not resting easily. The bruises that marred her skin were all but gone, just yellow shadows on her cheekbones that reminded her that she could be treated much worse. Her fingers grazed the scabs on her head and she smiled. The cuts were nearly gone. She would have scars, but scars weren't fundamentally bad. Kylo's face was no less beautiful for his.

She froze, staring at herself in the mirror in horror. She could not think such things, could not let those thoughts come to the surface of her mind. She could not acknowledge the pull to him, could not let him realize that she was being torn apart by her fear of him and her need for him. He had noticed that her mind was fatigued, but he did not know that it was from keeping such thoughts at bay. He could never know.

Neri scrubbed her face with icy water, dispelling the warmth that rose in her at the thought of her teacher. She grumbled at Han Solo for making her think that his son could be good, that he could be human. She grumbled at Kylo for lying to her, for being anything other than the raging monster he had been two nights before. She knew that he was that man deep down and that anything else was a manipulation. She must not fall prey.

Her mind raced at the thought of what she was doing. He was teaching her to control her hold over the Force, yes, but at what cost? Would she meet the Supreme Leader and pledge her loyalty to him, to his twisted idea of justice? Would she too be the prey of the darkness, doing whatever it took for more power? Neri stared at herself, willing the light to stay within her. She was a good person, could not turn. She would learn all she needed and use it to escape. She would…leave him. That thought made her chest ache and she chided herself for foolishness.

Kylo Ren was nothing to her. There would be nothing to leave.

Neri cleaned herself quickly, dressing in her uniform with familiarity. She had worn the same thing, in two identical sets, since her training had begun. Her tunic and leggings felt like a second skin, her pair of boots an old friend. She inspected her body in the mirror now, admiring the way her limbs grew thicker from the novel muscle she was building. She knew she was not yet strong, at least not strong enough to approach success over her teacher, but she thought she could stand a chance defending herself. At least against someone small…someone distracted. She sighed. She had only just begun.

She stepped out of the bathroom and looked around, still seeing no sign of her teacher. Food had been left on the table by droids while she prepared herself for the day and she chewed absentmindedly, walking over to the window that Kylo Ren so loved. It was strange to see the inside of a hangar rather than the vastness of space, and she looked down at the activity below with fascination.

The First Order base moved much in the way the Resistance had. Pilots ran about with their mechanics fixing things; soldiers marched in formation drills. She noticed now, after being exposed to them for over a week, that the stormtroopers' uniforms were not as identical as she thought. Each soldier had something unique, something small that set him or her apart. She wondered if they had chosen to do this or if the First Order had. They were so very different from the images she had seen of the Empire's cloned foot soldiers.

Her eyes were drawn to a door at the far end of the hangar suddenly and she waited for it to open, knowing who would walk through. Her teacher, cloak billowing behind him, strode through the hangar confidently; at his side was Hux. As they approached the ship, Kylo looked up, sensing her gaze. He beckoned for her to come to him and she cowered, not wanting to be in the presence of the other man.

She could not disobey him. She had promised not to. Her legs were leaden as she walked out of the apartment and through the halls of the massive ship. It was only the second time she had been about without him, the only other instance being when she had frantically fled his rage. She surprised herself by not getting lost and eventually came to the departure ramp. Neri hesitated, not having stepped foot on solid ground for far too long, and then told herself to stop being stupid. She was a pilot. Solid ground was a luxury.

Her steps onto the hangar floor were quiet, her strides small. She did not want to march brazenly to her teacher's side where she knew Hux stood as well. A shiver ran down her spine as she walked and she turned her head to look around her, feeling a gust of wind. She froze for a moment at the sight of the open hangar door, having never seen what laid beyond with her own two eyes.

The planet beyond the base was white, frozen and barren. She had never seen so much snow before, so little life. She was mesmerized by it for a moment and did not move. The cold air blew her hair about wildly, made her eyes tear and brighten.

"You will freeze if you stand still long enough," said a voice behind her and she jumped, turning.

Her teacher stood alone, towering over her imposingly. She looked around him, searching.

"Hux is gone," he stated simply. "He had a sudden need to check on Captain Phasma."

Neri bit her lip to stop a smile from forming. "Thank you sir, I did not want to be near him."

He nodded curtly and turned on his heel. Neri jogged to keep up.

"Do you hate the cold?" she asked him as they moved towards the door he had emerged from.

"Why do you say that?" he didn't turn to her as he spoke.

"You were…unhappy when you found out what base we were to go to."

The corners of his lips rose slightly but Neri did not see. She was trying to match her small strides to his. "I do not like the cold. I do not like the hot either. Weather must work hard to please me." They passed through the door and he slowed his stride, allowing her to walk more easily.

She didn't ask where they were going. She walked quietly beside him, content that he was speaking to her at all. She looked straight ahead, knowing that if she glanced over at him she would begin to admire his features, his expressions. She couldn't bear the mental exertion so early in the day.

Unbeknownst to her, Kylo Ren was having the same internal struggle, was fighting to ignore it. He knew Supreme Leader could listen into his thoughts any time and masked them against him, refusing to let him learn of his…distractions. He led her in silence to her room, which had been chosen not for its proximity to his (he was on an entirely different floor) but its proximity to the planet beyond. She was on the ground floor, just a hallway away from the outdoors. Snoke had informed Kylo that her loyalty to the cause could be tested, her will to stay in his training, by placing her so close to freedom. Kylo did not respond with what he was thinking, that he hoped she would choose him over freezing to death on a foreign planet.

They stopped at a door suddenly and Neri nearly ran into her teacher, catching herself an inch away. Kylo stiffened, feeling her closeness to him, and waved a hand before the keypad on the wall. He stepped inside as though the space was his and Neri followed, thinking it was.

"I will come for you later," he said, looking around at everything but the small woman in front of him. "Settle in. The droids will put your clothes in the closet once they are ready."

She was taken back for a moment. "Is this mine?" she asked, eyes wide. She had entirely forgotten that Kylo informed her of her own room upon arrival at the base. She had never had her own room. With her mother, they had shared a squat, one room hut; with Han she had had a bunk; as a slave she had had a patch of floor. The Resistance housed its pilots together, and there she was the least alone.

"Where did you think you would be staying?" Kylo asked, finally allowing himself to look at her. She was windswept, excited, a light in her eyes that had been absent for a few days. Her cheeks were pink from the cold and their quick departure to her rooms, and Kylo's fingers twitched to touch them.

"With you," she answered quietly, cheeks going from pink to red. She wanted to kick herself for letting those words slip from her mouth. She was an idiot.

He cleared his throat and hardened his voice. "Supreme Leader Snoke preferred you be here."

"Yes sir, it is a very beautiful room."

Kylo laughed then, looking around. If he were being generous, he would call it stark, cozy. If he were being realistic, he would call it empty and small. "Is it?" he asked.

"It's my first room." She sounded ashamed by her lifelong scarcity and Kylo found himself humbled for teasing her. "Are you far away?" she asked. He caught her eyes for a moment. "In case I have a problem or something." She wanted to chew off her own tongue.

"I will show you later. Rest, I'll return in a few hours. I have something I need to take care of." His tone was clipped, cool. He would remain professional, lest he lose his mind.

"Thank you Kylo."

He reveled in the way his name sounded coming from her mouth but would not dwell on it. With a curt nod, he turned and left.

Neri watched the closing door and then rotated on her heel, fascinated by her very own room. She had a bed, a real bed, which sat beside a large window (!), allowing her to lie on her side and gaze out at the sunlit expanse of the planet. She hadn't even seen natural light for a week and it warmed her while she spread out on the bed. It was a luxury she hadn't dreamed of. She also had a chair that looked suspiciously like the one she slept on in her teacher's room, a small table, a shelf, and two mirrors. Her bathroom was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen, from the small tub to the toilet that she wouldn't share with anyone to the mirrored cabinet that held a toothbrush and toiletries. She felt herself a princess and stifled the urge to scream. In the back of her mind, she could see the draw to the darkness, if it afforded such beauty.

Outside her door, her teacher still stood, his back against the wall. He could feel the joy radiating from her, the astonishment she had at such small things. He wondered when he had last been able to find happiness in simplicity, when he had been able to find happiness at all. Her emotions washed over him and he invited them, letting himself be warmed.

Peeling himself from the wall, he stepped away, off to see a droid about a dress.