An outer rim skirmish between the First Order and the Resistance takes an unexpected turn when Trandoshan hunters find themselves with two highly prized captives from both sides. Rey and Kylo discover they must work together to escape the hunting ground…

Inspired by The Clone Wars, Season 3, Ep 21.

Prologue

The two captives are an unexpected windfall for the Trandoshan scouts. Even if they can't quite be sure of what they have bound and sedated in their cargo hold.

The woman is clearly a Jedi, insists one. He brandishes the weapon retrieved from her belt and nearly decapitates his closest comrade when he ignites the saber's thrumming blade and slices it through the air.

The other must also be a Jedi, declares another, holding the black hilt of a second saber with more trepidation than his crewmate. Or perhaps a Sith. Were they not the wearers of black robes?

There are no Jedi anymore, argues a third. And no Sith. These people, they're just –

Important. Interrupts a fourth and final Trandoshan. He stares at the bleeps on a display. There's a lot of noise on the grid, he warns. Whoever they are, they've got the First Order looking for them. And the Resistance. The sooner we drop them on Wasskah, the better.

I've never hunted a Jedi, says the first one in awe as he drives the blue blade with experimental caution through the back of an empty seat and thrills at the molten hole it leaves in the transparisteel frame. But I know it was a Jedi who murdered my great-Uncle. I'll enjoy avenging his death.

III II I III I

Chapter One

"Scavenger."

The word sluices through the inky black depths of Rey's consciousness. Wrenching her awareness towards the surface with a violent snap.

It's a cheap shot. To slander her when she's down. She opens her mouth to say as much. Or tries to. The words sit thick upon her tongue then slide away. Submerging into the darkness. The effort is too much.

The ink swirls and stills. Her mind slips back into the deep.

"Desert rat."

Barely an insult. Barely worth the twitch of an eyelid.

"Get. Up."

Something nudges her ribs. Hard. That does the trick. She winces. Tries to lift an arm to bat away the offending… Whatever it is. The limb hangs useless in the air before slamming down again. Surely this appendage isn't her own, she thinks groggily. It's too heavy. Breathing is too heavy. Everything is too heavy.

"Well. Some Jedi you've turned out to be."

Now, these are words that cause her head to jerk.

No, that's still not it. It's actual movement jerking her head. The sudden, stomach-churning whirl of momentum as her body is hefted up and an involuntary gasp of air drags into her bruised and aching lungs before her stomach slams into something hard and angular - thumping it out again.

A shoulder, her brain offers sluggishly.

A shoulder, she agrees with herself as the firm press of fingers tighten against the back of her knees.

Each footstep sends a jolt of discomfort through her body. She thinks, perhaps, she might be sick. Where the hell even is she?

Forcing her eyes to open, she wills them to focus. Then abruptly slams them shut once they do. The ass end of a billowing black cape is not what she was hoping to see.

She definitely thinks she's going to be sick.

It's just as well the inky darkness reclaims her first.

Light as the girl may be, it soon becomes an effort to carry her. Bad enough that his head feels cleaved in two. Bad enough his body aches and shudders with bone-deep fatigue. That each limb feels cast in lead. That the air is thick and humid and his lungs feel squeezed to half-capacity. All of these things are bad enough.

But having to pick his way over tangles of thick ancient tree roots and push through damp grasping foliage with an additional 110lb slung over his shoulder? That's a new level of self-flagellation.

So why not leave her, he asks himself as he settles his unconscious burden into the hollowed curve of a fallen tree. Why not let her be picked off by whatever wild creatures live on this sodden world, he wonders; settling himself upon a sunken bough nearby.

Weary beyond measure of his internal monologue, Kylo Ren ignores his own conscience and takes stock of his surroundings. It's just as well he has no one left to answer to, right now, but himself.

"Wake up. This is just ridiculous now."

This time, when that scathing voice punctures the ink, Rey's eyes open with a snap. Overhead, huge trees loom; their great boughs twisting and reaching like long grasping fingers. Their trunks even wider than the great Uneti tree of Ahch-To. She blinks hard, searching the thick canopy for scraps of sky as she attempts to make sense of her surroundings.

"Finally."

There is a certain unmistakable timbre to the voice that causes a distinct shiver to chase itself down the length of Rey's spine. Tumbling from her resting spot, she tries to roll into a defensive crouch, only to find herself wracking forward and swallowing hard against a surge of nausea that hits her from the effort.

"You." Squeezing her eyes shut, she inhales deep through her nose; her senses instantly assaulted by the heady aroma of rotting leaves and sweet pungent soil. Her stomach heaves, and she silently wills herself not to vomit over her hands.

Get up, get on your damn feet, she silently commands herself. Any moment, she thinks, the crackle of the Supreme Leader's saber is going to flare to life. Any moment, he's going to run it through flesh and bone. And the sharp tang of bile in her throat will be the last of her worries.

The thought is enough to unfurl her from the forest floor.

Kylo sits nearby, his posture like a lightning rod as he watches her. His gloved fingers dig into the lichen-covered bough he sits upon. She blinks hard. Unsure of why his body is set in such rigid tension. As if he's waiting for her to make a strike.

"What…" her tongue works over the roof of her mouth, searching for moisture. "What are you doing?"

"What. Am I doing." He repeats tightly. "Isn't it obvious? I'm taking you on a date."

His sarcasm slides over her as she squints against the press of twisted trees that surround them. Panic slams into her as a volley of disjointed images penetrate the blanks of her mind and she remembers where she should be.

"Where the hell am I?" The words tear like fire from her throat. She makes it to her knees before a wave of vertigo hits. "Where's my squadron? What have you done?"

"I don't know. I don't care. I've done nothing." His tone is carefully controlled, but the weariness seeps through. "In that order."

It's the slow dull edge to his voice that catches her attention and momentarily stills her. Her gaze snaps to the darksider; taking in the mottled bruising on his face. The drying blood caked at his brow. He's injured and exhausted. She can read it plain as day in the deep hollows beneath his eyes. The way his breath hitches a little with each intake - and the wince he tries to hide as it does so.

All the easier to take him down, she thinks.

Mouth pressed in a determined line, Rey pushes herself to her feet and reaches for Han's blaster at her belt. Cold panic surges up her spine as her fingers grab at nothing. She steps towards the Supreme Leader, stumbling as her brain takes several seconds longer than it should to register the movement.

"Before you ask," Kylo holds up a hand in supplication, "it wasn't me."

"How," she begins fiercely, "do you expect me to believe it could be anyone else?"

"We were attacked!" he snaps, the hand now curling into a fist and thumping the gnarled bough he sits upon. "The First Order, the Resistance… Someone blindsided us both, took our weapons, dumped us on this asswipe of a planet… And I've been sitting here for what feels like hours now trying to work out how."

"Wow," Rey says finally, arching a brow in disbelief, "your interrogation tactics have certainly grown more elaborate. Whatever happened to just strapping me in a chair and rifling through my brain?"

"No. Listen." Kylo leaves his seat and steps in closer. There's a raw intensity to the darksider's expression that has Rey reaching again for a weapon that's not at her side.

"You didn't just launch an escape pod and wind up on this planet, marooned and weaponless, any more than I did. We're the two most powerful Force-users in the galaxy. How is this," he throws out an arm, gesturing to the dense forest surrounding them, "even possible?"

"I get what you're reaching for here," Rey says slowly, forcing herself to hold her ground against his intensity, "but I'd prefer you reach for it back in your own comfort zone. Assuming you have one," she adds with a mutter.

He blinks, looking through her for a moment before understanding dawns and he moves back to the bough. He favours his left arm, she notices. And holds his head as though it pains him to move his neck.

It gives her a small degree of comfort to know she can probably outrun him. Though where to, she has no idea.

Moving to lean against a knotted tree trunk, she slides to the ground and draws her knees up to her chest. There's too much to process. She can't make sense of what Kylo's saying or why there's a disturbing amount of emptiness in her mind where short-term memories should be.

But there's one thing that stands out clearly.

"It was your Destroyer that intercepted us en route to Kashyyyk. I remember that much. This attack… you must have been a part of it. Why else would you be there?" Rey's focus drifts as she reaches again to fill in the blanks of what came next. "How can I not remember anything after that?"

"Contrary to what you might want to believe, we weren't there for you," Kylo sneers, "the Resistance is made up of, what? A handful of X-wings held together with glue and tape and the scrap heap remains of a smuggler's freighter? You're hardly a blip on our..."

"Okay then," she interrupts, "let's try this. If you weren't in the Kashyyyk system for us, why were you there? The Mytaraor sector is a long way from Bacrana, which is where you've been of late, isn't it?"

"How did you -"

"Your ship isn't exactly difficult to keep tabs on."

Kylo gives her a long, considering look. Despite her show of confidence, Rey feels a trickle of nervous sweat slip down her back to pool at the base of her spine. It's been three months since Crait. Three months since she rejected his hand. Three months since he further embraced the Darkside and made the extermination of the Resistance his personal vendetta. And while she's grown stronger in her Force abilities, she's yet to match herself against Kylo Ren.

She wonders if he's reaching the same conclusion.

"How about I take a guess then," he says unexpectedly, relaxing the hand that has curled and flexed at his side. "You were accompanying Chewbacca to Kashyyk to investigate a certain piece of intel you received. About slavers. Capturing the younglings of a wookie village and selling them to Trandoshan hunters for sport."

"How could you know all that?" Rey's heart lurches suddenly.

"I was there for the same reason." Kylo says after a beat. "But to offer the slavers a better deal than the Trandoshans. For the Wookies."

Anger flushes through her. "Taking wookie younglings as slaves to build your new empire?" And take out the Resistance coming to their aid at the same time, she finishes inside her head.

"It's what Hux had in mind, yes."

"Of course." She swallows tightly, wishing she'd never been fool enough to expect anything better from this man. "Well, that's enough lighthearted conversation for one day."

Pushing to a stand as gracefully as she can with inertia spinning through her head at the movement, Rey slides a hand around a gnarled tree trunk and presses a cheek to the rough bark as she wills the world to stop shifting.

"Where do you think you're going?"

Kylo's voice draws closer as everything in Rey's line of vision swims away. "Away from you." She manages between clenched teeth.

"You know if you just wait it out, the side-effects will wear off."

She freezes. "Side effects of what? "

"Doaki spice, Purple Lotus…" Kylo takes another step closer, "something potent enough to take out two Force-users. Why else do you think you're half-dead on your feet?"

"Concussion?" Rey supplies hopefully. "Blunt force trauma?"

"No."

In a whirl of movement he's directly behind her. Looming in the peripheral of her half-turned head. "Right here. Do you feel it?"

She recoils at the shock of contact as a gloved finger sweeps the back of her neck.

"If..." she swallows back a grimace, "if uncomfortable is what I'm supposed to be feeling, then yes. Yes, I do."

"The track mark. Where they injected you," he steps around her then, drawing back his own tangle of locks and crouching so she can see his nape, "I have one too."

She's not sure what she's supposed to be looking at, at first. She only knows that the man who has become one of the biggest threats to her existence is almost kneeling before her, and there's a ridiculously tiny chance that she might actually be able to wrap her hands around his throat and at least half choke him before he body-slams her into a tree.

The odds are worth it, she figures.

Then a small red lump on the back of his neck captures her attention, and she finds herself gingerly gathering away a few stray ebony strands to expose the single puncture wound within it.

"See?" his voice is terse as he flinches from the trace of her fingers, "we're both in this."

"Or, you're trying to trap me," she snaps, releasing the locks and stepping back to the edge of the small clearing.

"Into what?" spinning to face her, Kylo throws out his arms in exasperation. "A game of hide and seek? Do I look that desperate for friends?"

A snort escapes her, "yes?"

She likes the way his cheeks dimple suddenly. Fleetingly. Before he has a chance to catch himself. The tension between them dissipates a little, before reforming itself anew.

"Rey…" Kylo pauses, working his mouth as if her name has left a trace upon his tongue, "someone's playing a game with us. I think if we work toge-"

The pitched shriek of a startled creature punctures the air, cutting off Kylo's words as the reverberating cry sets a frantic flurry of sound and movement throughout the canopy overhead.

"Come on," he glances up into the trees, "maybe whoever left us here has come back. Better we find them first."

"We?"

Kylo steps towards her until he's a few feet away. The edge of her comfort zone. Despite the confidence he tries to exude, there's a tension to his stance.

Just run, a small insistent voice whispers at the back of Rey's head. Turn around, pick a direction, and run.

"I'm not asking you to rule the galaxy at my side, Rey," he says with a note of exasperation, "I'm just asking for a temporary ceasefire so we can get off this damn planet."

"We're not going to leave this planet as anything less than enemies." She says bluntly. To herself as much to him.

"No. We're not." He agrees, as if it goes without saying. "But like it or not, we're in this together. Seems to me we stand a better chance of getting out of here if we can focus on picking off a mutual enemy, rather than each other."

"If you think you can kill me when my back is turned, I'll rip off your -"

"To be honest, I've already considered that at least seven times since I started lugging your unconscious body through this forest." He arches a brow. "You're not dead yet."

It's a good point, she has to admit. Still, she stands on a precipice of indecision; every fibre of her being poised to run. Run. Except for her legs. The muscles of which are still as jittery as a Hutt's belly, she discovers as she flexes them experimentally.

Swallowing hard, Rey shoots Kylo a sidelong glance. He's standing rigidly still. Fists curled slightly at his sides. The crease at his brow showing a trace of worry in a face otherwise carefully schooled of expression.

Steeling herself, she meets his eyes - and that's where she finds all those kriffin' emotions he's carefully stashed away. Hope, expectancy, trepidation… It's like facing him in Snoke's throne room again. All that's missing is the outstretched hand.

"Fine." The word escapes her in a rush of breath before she can change her mind.

His shoulders visibly relax as the tightness around his eyes falls away.

Something spears her then. Right through the heart.

She falters, reminding herself of that moment he chose to let her friends and the last of his family die. "Betray me and I'll kill you." The words hiss through her lips, fuelled by sudden anger.

He nods, slowly exhaling a long-held breath. "I wouldn't expect anything less."

II III I II

Chapter notes:

So many thanks to the amazing theoriginalsuki (read her amazing fics on AO3!) for her incredible encouragement and for beta'ing this trainwreck. :)

This story has been my baby for a year or so now. Initially, my plan was to complete it entirely before posting, but now that I have 5 chapters finished and a further 3 nearly wrapped up, I feel that if I start posting weekly now, I should be able to keep on top of new chapters before they're due for posting.

I hope you've enjoyed this so far. I might change my posting schedule to twice-weekly if I get far ahead enough in writing the rest. Otherwise... See you next Sunday (eh, that's Sunday for me in New Zealand), I hope! :)