Chapter 5: An Unbreakable Connection

When Kylo Ren felt he was a reasonable distance away from that forsaken Sith place, he landed on the nearest planet he could find that wasn't occupied by the First Order.

To his dismay, it was also a rocky desert planet.

He was starting to really loathe the desert.

Kylo found himself under the shade of a twisted red cliff. Sand was everywhere in this blazing hot unbearable heat. So much sand. If he would die in this place, he wanted some witness to hear his last words. Sand is terrible.

He shed his tunic and his gloves and sat down in the endless sand. Sun was falling soon and there was no point in removing his cloak in case it got chilly at night.

For once he allowed himself to breathe.

Just breathe.

Kylo could feel the force everywhere and anywhere around him.

Life.

Light.

Dark.

Balance.

It wasn't as easy to allow himself to be consumed by this sensation, having resisted it for so long, but now that he was able to let the tension roll off his shoulders and just breathe, he was all but too impatient to connect to the force.

Both sides of the force.

Kylo Ren was utterly terrified of what this meant.

Silence.

He blinked and the sight before him was unsettling.

Rey's eyes were red-rimmed as if she was crying, and gazing upon him with white-hot anger. She looked like she had no sleep. Her skin was pale and thin; her breaths were heavy and ragged.

Kylo stood up, unsure how to begin now that the force had connected her to him once again. His words stalled in his dry throat.

The only thing he could muster up at that moment was her name. "Rey."

"Kylo Ren," she responded with such venom it was like a different person spoke.

His blood froze. She had called him Kylo Ren before, but that was because she was convinced he rejected his old name. This, this was different.

"Rey, what happened to you?" He spoke, ever gentle still with her. "Why did you disconnect yourself from the force?"

"Because Ben Solo is trapped," Rey hissed, sounding rather deranged now that Kylo thought about it. "And I will turn, free him."

He reached out with the force and was met with something that was terrifying. It was something dark and twisted. She was embracing the dark side. She was using it.

Kylo had seen visions of this moment, even dreamed of it, of Rey turning, but now… Now he was just unsettled by Rey ever turning to the dark side.

"Rey why?" he could only beg her, conflict rising inside him. The force responded in kind as he took one step closer to her. This wasn't how he expected everything. He expected her to still be working on that legacy lightsaber and looking at him with disappointment as per usual.

This woman wasn't Rey.

Wasn't his Rey. Compassionate. Understanding. Fiery. Unyielding.

No, he knew he would never be with her. He focused on the task at hand.

Darkness was coming off of her, trying to pull him in. His breath hitched in his throat.

It was the same evil that lingered in the air on Exegol, but that wasn't possible. She'd never been there at all, as far as he knew.

She glared at him, a tear slipping down her cheek. "I cut myself off…" Her voice wasn't as full of venom but still cut like a saber. "Because I wanted to take your hand. Ben's hand!"

That stopped him in his tracks. Did she just…

Of all the things and all the explanations he wanted, this was the last one he expected.

Something caught her attention, and she reached her hand out in the air and tightened her fingers in a very familiar grasp.

Time slowed down for Kylo Ren as he stared in horror as Rey was performing a feat only he had dared done many times. Bile rose in his throat as he took one giant step forward towards her.

Not in any universe would he ever stand to see Rey fall down the dark side so badly.

"Rey!" He yelled out to her, his hand reaching for hers to stop her horrific action.

And their fingers touched, shaking both of them to the core.

He could see her surroundings. A rich green jungle forest with leaves as tall as he and mist hanging low.

But he couldn't see other things, only hearing them.

Ben.

I will have killed the last Skywalker!

You're a fool, Kylo Ren!

Give it to me!

Please.

…Sweetheart.

And it hit him like lightning.

Sunshine. Rey in a beautiful grey dress, looking at him with love, on a beautiful balcony he had never seen before. The breeze fanned his face and her loose hair fell in waves on her shoulders.

"Ben," she whispered.

She rose on her tiptoes, her arms around his neck and inched up towards his face…

He was ripped out of his vision, their hands no longer touching. Rey looked at him, seeing something else no doubt.

"You…" she breathed. "You saw…"

Kylo's eyes widened. Had she seen what he had seen just now? No, that wasn't possible. He had seen something different from her when they first touched hands all those months ago. She must have just seen what he once saw.

"You're in the desert," she only answered back. "I will find you, Kylo Ren. Ben Solo will turn."

Oh no.

"Rey please!" He reached out to her again, agony shaking his voice as the connection ended.

He collapsed to his knees, burying his face in his hands. "Rey…"

Kylo's first logical conclusion was that bastard Vicrul got to her somehow. The second was a harder pill to swallow. Kylo himself somehow pushed her to the dark side. Her light was dimming, darkness taking over. It was tearing her apart, making her into a monster he didn't recognize.

This wasn't how it was supposed to go. The inner conflict of Rey's alluring light would tear her to shreds. She should still be with the light, a Jedi, a beacon of hope for the galaxy, and he was to play his part as the darkness, someone to be shunned and feared and reviled.

To see her like this broke his heart.

He had to save her, but how?

Tears he didn't know he was holding back fell, staining the black of his pants and his hands.

Of all people in the universe to save Rey from the dark side, he was the least qualified out of all of them. Kylo Ren, a monster in the darkness. Who would have destroyed the Resistance if it wasn't for his own pain and humiliation at the hands of Luke Skywalker. Who would have killed his own mother if it wasn't for the conflict tearing him apart. Who would have pushed Rey into the dark side in the snowy forest if it wasn't for her light being so damn strong.

"Ah, a young Skywalker," a hoarse graining voice spoke next to him.

Kylo looked up slowly from his hands and slowly turned around to see a short green Jedi, glowing in blue light.

Confusion swirled around in Kylo's depressed brain. "Who are you?" he asked slowly. "Master Yoda?" He recognized him in the Jedi textbooks he would read as a padawan.

"Indeed."

Kylo sighed as he stood up. Great, one of Luke's masters. He sat down on an old rotting log by his campsite and created a fire. The sun had completely set and as he predicted, a chill settled in.

A chill to match his mood. A chill to match his view and realization of what Rey had become.

"Are you going to spout words of Jedi wisdom at me?" Kylo said, feeling bits and pieces of Ben Solo's inherited penchant for a snarky tongue coming back to him.

Yoda closed his eyes in thought. "I do not intend to, nor will I."

"Then why are you here?" Kylo questioned, feeling his patience run thin. "Why am I seeing Jedi ghosts?"

"Answer your question, only you can."

Well, that was certainly helpful. Kylo rolled his fingers over his temple in exasperation. The one time he could get aide or counsel from a force ghost and the vaguest one appears. Was the force just messing with him at this point?

The truth was a shaky one, something that Kylo Ren wasn't entirely comfortable admitting yet.

That lack of conflict within himself didn't come from nowhere. "Because I'm no longer aligned with the dark side," he said, still not sure if he believed it yet.

"Ah, changed you have. Wishes to cast away the past, the Jedi Killer."

His temper rose with each patronizing sentence Yoda said. Of course he wanted to cast the past away, kill it if he had to. But what would a Jedi Master like Yoda know? The Jedi clung to ancient ways which led to their downfall, strangling the force until it suffocated. Luke wouldn't even let those teachings go, not entirely.

"To save the Last Jedi, the Jedi Killer wants?" Yoda spoke again.

Kylo stared at the flickering flames, illuminating the chilled air with sparks of ember. A bitter sentence left his lips before he could stop himself. "Are you going to stop me, to tell me to let the force do as it must? That my fear of losing her is the wrong way? That it will lead me into anger and hatred and suffering?"

Yoda only smirked at him. Kylo stared in disbelief as the Jedi Master laughed for a moment and then looked at the lost man with sincerity.

"Stifling and preventing love, the greatest sin of the Jedi was. Was correct Skywalker, in saying the Jedi must end."

"Luke said that?"

"More than one Skywalker, there is."

Kylo felt dumb. "Me?"

Yoda faded away, a smile of contentment on his face.

Kylo Ren wasn't sure how to take that exchange with Jedi Master Yoda.

"A thousand generations lives in you now."

He stiffened up at the voice, a hint of anger rising. Crait left some sore memories in his mind. "Luke?" he answered back, voice hoarse, trying not to shake with rage.

To his left sat Luke Skywalker. "Hey, kid. We got a lot to talk about."

The last thing Kylo wanted was to talk more after being left more confused by Yoda's words, especially not with Luke Skywalker of all people.

"There is nothing to talk about," Kylo said, words biting.

"Oh, believe me, Ben, there's plenty."

Kylo turned to glare at Luke. "No, there isn't. You already know. I killed Han Solo, I killed Snoke, I killed you. I drove Rey away and I even said at some point that I would destroy her because she's right, I am a monster. I almost destroyed the Resistance. I almost killed my own mother! And now I lost control of the First Order, betrayed by my own Knights, and on top of that, I'm going to die alone because I pushed Rey into the dark side and I have nothing. There is nothing left to talk about."

An unusual silence followed. Luke took to considering Kylo's words carefully.

"I sense you're lost and regretful."

Kylo, for the first time in over seven years, rolled his eyes. "Tell me something I don't know," he said.

Luke couldn't fight the smile and a chuckle. "Ah, I missed that."

Shame washed over Kylo at what Luke was referring to.

"You regret your acts and blame yourself," Luke stated. "Why?"

Kylo ran his fingers through his hair, trying not to let more tears fall. "Because I didn't want this. I just wanted the pain to end. And I caused them pain. I caused her pain."

"Interesting," Luke mused. "Has the pain stopped?"

Kylo removed his hands from his hair. He didn't want to vocalize the answer. Yes.

The conflict within him was simply gone. The pull between light and dark didn't tear at him any longer. The pain had stopped and he didn't even know it. It must've been months since it ended.

A moment of silence passed and Luke looked up to the stars, allowing Kylo's revelation to settle in.

"What are you going to do about Rey?" Luke asked, nonchalant as if he was asking about the weather.

Kylo stared at his hands. "I don't know. I failed her. I am such an idiot. If I hadn't… Done so many things I could have prevented this."

He couldn't come up with a better descriptor than that. He was simply an idiot.

"No, Ben. You and Rey were failed."

Kylo snapped his head up, staring in disbelief at his former master.

Luke continued explaining. "Just as the Jedi failed Anakin. Just as the son of Vader failed his students, both of them."

Kylo looked away. "Both of them?"

Luke put a reassuring hand on Kylo's shoulder, even though it wasn't really there. "I couldn't be what you needed, Ben. And I couldn't be what Rey needed. But you two need each other. You can end this cycle of failure, Ben, with this."

"How do I even begin? Rey wouldn't even listen to me," Kylo said, looking back at Luke.

"There is someone who will though," Luke said. "You're her only hope now."

The ghost of Luke left Kylo Ren alone by the fire.

He would set out in the morning to the Resistance Base.

Maz felt something shake in the force again as she made way with haste to the Falcon. It was the same thing that occurred months prior, hours before the Resistance fled to Crait, or so what Leia told her of their near crushing defeat.

It was two halves of the force meeting together. There had to be something about this.

Maz rushed into the Falcon. Chewie was outside of it, weapon in hand blasting back troopers.

She went to Rey's bunk, a repaired but fractured lightsaber on her small bed. Reaching underneath it she pulled the drawer open. Books from the Jedi still rested within. A few weren't touched in a long while, but the ones on lightsabers were. Maz brushed her fingers past the lightsaber texts and onto the books written in a most ancient language.

Lifting a couple of tomes out of the bunk drawers, Maz opened up to one of them. The language she recognized well enough even though it had been so long since she read it.

She flipped through the pages, looking for something on balance, and then it caught her eye. A word that she couldn't easily decipher or recognize as well as she would have liked. Squinting, Maz studied the word and the words around it for context until she finally figured it out.

Dyad.

Rey had no idea what to expect when Kylo's hand touched hers through the bond.

For a moment she saw a desert. Kylo Ren was on a blazing hot planet somewhere. There were many out there, but this one was more red and rocky than the endless dunes of Jakku.

Then all the things she could hear loud and clear in her head.

Only the Sith can save him.

Be with me.

The Resistance is dead!

Rid the galaxy of the Jedi Killer!

The First Order is over.

I'll…

And there she was, on a dark desert planet, the golden pyramid in her palm. Power surged in her veins as she clashed lightsabers against Kylo Ren's, but she couldn't see the color of his weapon. Voices swirled around her over and over.

You shall have what you want.

"You're not alone," Kylo said. "Join me."

I'll destroy her.

Kylo sat upon a dark throne, Rey with him, kissing along his jaw.

You're still holding on! Let go!

She ripped her hand away from his, her breaths shaking and chest heaving. A strange numbing pain poured through her entire being.

"You…" she breathed. "You saw…"

Her mind raced as his fingers twitched, aching to hold out his hand to her again.

She saw what he had originally seen when they touched hands on Ach-To. Her at his side on a throne, ruling together. On the dark side.

It was sorely tempting to her now. So very much. As long as she wasn't alone in this potential future, she would chase it. It had to lead eventually to Ben Solo's salvation; the voice in the vision told her so.

He shall be saved in this future.

"You're in the desert," she said. "I will find you, Kylo Ren. Ben Solo will turn."

He reached out to her and the connection closed.

She turned her dark glare over to Ap'lek on the jungle floor, still gasping for air as her hands still lingered on her throat.

Rey lifted her up using the force. "You will lead me to Kylo Ren," Rey said, voice monotone.

"I will lead you to Kylo Ren…" Ap'lek's voice cracked and rasped for air. "But we don't know where he is."

"He is on a desert planet with red rock. Find it and lead me to your master."

She let the Knight of Ren collapse to the ground in a tangle of limbs. "Get up now," Rey ordered. "Take me to your ship."

Ap'lek struggled to get up, but she did as she was told, too exhausted to fight back the command on her mind.

Rey followed her through the woods and to a First Order TIE-Fighter. With an order, she told Ap'lek to remain there for a few minutes while she went back to the Falcon. Grabbing her small bag full of provisions and an old Jedi textbook on the Sith; she didn't even care to look at the old lightsaber or her simple staff. She didn't need them anymore.

Her resolve was set in stone. It was unsettling to hear the angry, vengeful voice of Kylo Ren in her visions, only to see him turn around and be different to her in their bond.

Lightsaber and the golden pyramid in her hands, Rey boarded the ship and left Ajan Kloss. Ap'lek Ren told the division to pull out and abandon the skirmish.

A/N: Aqua's lines in Birth By Sleep inspired the title.

I'm always nervous to post a new chapter because Dark Rey is such a challenge to get right haha. Also whoever thought of Yoda's speech patterns hates fanfic writers.

Guest: Thank you for your review! There's going to be more POVs next chapter but of course we'll still be sticking primarily to Kylo/Ben's :D