Chapter 20

"And we're in hyperspace," Teva said as the stars streaked past them. He leaned back in the pilot's seat and folded his hands in his lap and blew out a breath. "So are you going to tell me what happened back there or do I have to wait until Banto shares the official report?"

He heard Rypo's groan and smiled. He knew taking joy was not appropriate for a Knight of Ren, but he didn't care. He was never one for philosophy. He had joined the knights because he had been bored and preferred the military-based First Order to the overly-political New Republic. It seemed a logical choice given his force-aided fighting specialization.

"You don't want to know," Rypo responded in a disgusted voice.

"I asked for a reason. Come on. I've never seen you quit an interrogation so quickly," Teva replied. It was true. He had worked alongside Rypo on missions for years. Normally Rypo would spend so long inside a person's head that Teva felt that he would die of boredom. For Rypo to jump out so quickly, especially for such a high-profile target, was very unusual.

He heard Rypo's chair swivel around, and he turned to face her. They had agreed some years ago to take their helmets off in-flight when it was just the two of them so they could breathe more comfortably and hear each other more clearly. Well, that's the reason Teva claimed, but he enjoyed seeing Rypo's face. She was solid and dark-skinned, with black, curly hair. She was beautiful, and Teva considered himself lucky to be the knight most often partnered with her.

Right now, Rypo's lovely face was contorted with revulsion. "The girl lusted for him," Rypo spat.

Teva raised an eyebrow, wondering what the big deal was. He lusted for Rypo all the time, not that Rypo knew. The first lesson Master Kylo Ren had given each of them was learning to shield their emotions and thoughts. Only Supreme Leader Snoke had been allowed unfettered access to their minds. "That's good, right?" Teva had not been paying close attention to the meeting Banto held following Master Kylo Ren's departure, but he recalled something about a plan for Master Kylo to seduce the jedi.

Rypo frowned at him, took a calming breath, and sighed. "I forget you're you." Teva raised both eyebrows now. "Lust inspires so many other feelings that most of us have sworn to celibacy in both body and spirit to avoid the conflict it introduces."

Teva narrowed his eyes in thought. "No, I don't get it. Don't you see emotions all the time when you're reading minds? That Bothan was scared out of his wits when you dug into his thoughts last week."

Rypo shrugged at him. "Fear is fear. It's simple. It's easy to dismiss. Lust is different. With her lust, that girl felt hope, desire, fear, affection, disgust and so much more… It's like being alone in an open field and suddenly you have ten attackers on you at once. It's confusing and unsettling. It's different. It's dangerous."

"If you say so," Teva said. He thought about the irony of this conversation given his own desire, but shrugged. He knew better than to pursue that direction. "That oath to celibacy… was Master Kylo one of the ones who swore it?"

Rypo tapped her lips thoughtfully and leaned back. "It's a private thing. I don't know, but I admit I'm still concerned. The knowledge that she can be swayed is substantial, but it still is not evidence of Master Kylo's motivations. Banto fears that Master Kylo has become unstable since the death of Supreme Leader Snoke."

Teva repressed a snort at that. He had always thought the grandson of Darth Vader seemed unstable. Still, it was no shock. The man had such a mixed heritage of powerful force users and had been under Snoke's thumb since Teva had joined up. Teva did not envy his master.

Rypo cursed suddenly, disturbing Teva's contemplation. "What is it?" Rypo asked.

"I didn't even think to check for the girl's memories of that battle. I was so shocked by what I found that I forgot entirely… How did she do it? She didn't do anything to save her friend past stand there with Master Kylo's lightsaber until he put her into a force sleep. How is it that she could be so powerful as to kill Supreme Leader Snoke and the guard and knock Master Kylo unconscious, but she couldn't even do anything for her friend against us? She didn't even defend herself when Master Kylo used force sleep on her."

Teva shrugged. "Obviously, she trusted him. She left herself completely open to him."

Rypo's black eyes flashed at him. "Why does she trust him? I saw lust in her thoughts, not trust. When I scanned the mind of her friend, I saw their afternoon and visions of him with some weird bird thing and eating dinner together and other boring details. The only things the girl showed me were images of Master Kylo without his shirt on and images of his lips and her fascination with each. It was almost like she was broadcasting those thoughts to hide…"

Teva cocked his head to one side. "Hide?"

Rypo hissed, baring her teeth. "She tricked me. She must have somehow known that I wouldn't look closely past those images."

Teva shrugged, feeling amusement beneath his carefully blank face as he realized what happened. "Master Kylo said he was opening her mind to you."

"You're right! He must have selected what I had access to, or warned her somehow… They tricked me!" Rypo said, slamming the wall next to her.

Teva revealed a lazy smile at the sight of Rypo so very unraveled. He didn't care if Master Kylo was conflicted or not. He didn't care if Banto usurped Master Kylo, though he saw clearly that Banto was organizing them against Master Kylo for that purpose. As long as he got to work in the First Order alongside Rypo and catch these rare glimpses of her heart, he was content.

"So they're working together. What do you plan to do?" Teva asked, leaning forward on his knees.

Rypo bit her thumb as she thought. Teva's thoughts went to dangerous places at the sight, and he bit his own lips in response.

"I don't know. If the girl were all jedi, I would report this to Banto in the concern that Master Kylo might be converted to a jedi, but that's not the case. I don't know what's going on, but I don't like it. If this girl and Master Kylo have been working together, then the story about what happened to Supreme Leader Snoke might..." She glanced at Teva in sudden fear.

Teva laughed, knowing from experience where her thoughts were going. "You seriously think I would report you for treason? As if we're not already investigating our new Supreme Leader to treasonous levels."

Rypo bristled at that. "We're following orders," she corrected.

Teva smiled and felt a thrill run through him at the idea of pushing her loyalties. "Yet we speak of the possibility that our current Supreme Leader participated in the destruction of Supreme Leader Snoke. I have a theory for you to consider, while we're discussing such dangerous thoughts."

Rypo glared at Teva, but did not try to stop him from speaking. His smile broadened. He had been evaluating his theory since he heard of the plan for the supposed seduction of the jedi girl, and the more he learned of the girl, the more he suspected his theory was true.

"Perhaps, just perhaps, Master Kylo met this not-jedi girl and felt something for her, and this not-jedi girl felt something for him. Maybe this is nothing more than a case of two very different people falling for each other in a situation where they must disguise it to have any hope of being together."

Rypo scoffed. "That's preposterous."

"Is it?" Teva asked. "You knew our Supreme Leader Snoke. Would he have tolerated Master Kylo having an attachment for another person? He kept Master Kylo isolated from everyone-even us-as much as possible. He would not have tolerated the girl's existence if he discovered an attachment-not to mention she's supposedly a jedi."

Rypo's eyes widened. "That's not… but…" She furrowed her brow with her jaw dropped slightly. "You mean to say Master Kylo killed Supreme Leader Snoke to protect the girl?"

"Can you imagine any other scenario where Master Kylo would have turned on Supreme Leader Snoke? He was as loyal as they come. He lived for Snoke's approval, but if he had fallen for someone..."

Teva could practically see the gears and cogs of Rypo's mind turning as she processed this possibility. "I suppose it is possible. That… how does that change things?"

Teva shrugged. "Well, where are your loyalties? The First Order? The deceased Snoke? Banto? Master Kylo?"

"The First Order," Rypo said firmly.

"Then you should decide which future provides the most stability for the First Order and go with that," Teva said. He had already considered this, and he suspected Master Kylo would be the best option so long as he did not turn the entire First Order over to the Resistance. Banto was too greedy to not cause more chaos in the end. Furthermore, if Master Kylo set a precedent for allowed relationships between force users… Still, he would support Rypo's judgment, whatever she decided. He cared more for her than anything.

"I'll have to think on everything. Teva, where did you even get this sort of crazy idea?" Rypo asked.

"The idea that a man might throw away everything for the girl he loves? No idea," Teva said as he gazed at Rypo.

Sorry about the wait. My oldest son and I both got really sick, and then I had to catch up on my dissertation stuff before I was free to write fun things. Hopefully I'll be free to write/post regularly again now. Crossing my fingers hard and knocking on wood here. February is always the worst month for staying healthy in my family. If you're ever anxiously waiting and want to know if I died or quit writing or am just plain sick again, feel free to send me a PM.

Also, original character chapter! I originally started this chapter to cover Rey's perspective, then switched it to Kylo's... what I wrote for Kylo's perspective will become Ch 21, most likely. Anyway, I realized I needed to put in some villain perspective to foreshadow properly, so these two got a chapter so we can see what's going on there before we run into them again with the main characters.

Hope it worked with the flow. Please review!