"Life as a Dyad"

By EsmeAmelia

Chapter 7

"NO! NO! STOP!"

Ben's eyes shot open, his sleep-hazed mind only comprehending that it was dark and his wife was screaming.

"NO! PLEASE!"

His wife . . .

His wife was screaming! With that, he rolled over to face her, placing his hand on her tear-drenched cheek. "Rey?" he whispered. "Rey, it's me, wake up!"

"GET OUT OF MY HEAD!"

Those four words. Those four words that sent a freezing stab through Ben's body, sending him back to that day when he tortured the woman he now loved. Tortured her, violated her.

"Rey!" His voice came out in a desperate sob. "Please wake up!"

Finally her screams faded into gasps as she blinked rapidly at her husband.

"Rey?" Ben asked, trying to ignore the ramming of his heart. "Are you all right? Look at me, sweetheart."

Rey did look at him with wide, damp eyes, but in the moment on the edge between sleep and wakefulness, she didn't see a loving husband. With a sudden, jerky motion, she bolted to a sitting position, shifting backwards as if trying to get away from him. Her emotions shot at him like a knife, so hard and so sudden that he couldn't help seeing what was in her mind.

His face, younger and more sinister but still his face, glaring at her, determined to pry the map out of her mind, taunting her with her memories and loneliness . . .

"I'm sorry!" he exclaimed, scrambling out of bed, slightly tripping over the covers twisted around his legs. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I won't trigger you anymore, I'll sleep on the couch."

With that, he dashed out of the bedroom before his wife could say anything.

. . .

For several minutes, Rey sat.

She'd wrapped herself up in the blankets and now she just sat, staring into the darkness with tear-filled eyes, knowing she should go to her husband, wishing she could banish the nightmare - the memory - from her mind, but every blink brought Kylo Ren's face back into her vision.

"Why?" she found herself asking out loud through a near-sob. She hadn't dreamed of that damn memory for years - why did it come back now?

She should find Ben and tell him to come back to bed - she should - but she felt frozen in place, as if the dream had taken away her ability to move. "Why?" she sobbed again - to herself? To the Force? To the empty air? She couldn't tell.

Finally, with a deep, uneven breath, she forced herself out of bed, the blanket still draped over the shoulders, and made her way out of the bedroom, though the memory was still pulsing in her mind.

She found Ben in the living room, lying on the couch, head resting on his arm, no pillow, no blanket, eyes wide open and staring into the darkness. "Ben?" she asked in the gentlest voice she could muster.

No answer.

"Ben?" she persisted. "Aren't you cold?"

"I deserve to be cold," he muttered.

"Ben, come on . . ."

He scrambled to a sitting position, staring up at her with glistening eyes. "That dream returned because of me! Now that I'm no longer safely locked away, now that I'm with you in the flesh instead of just linked through the Force, your subconscious sees that as a threat."

With a swallow, Rey sat next to him, wrapping part of the blanket around his shoulders. "Maybe you're right, I don't know, but that doesn't change the fact that my conscious self loves you."

"I hurt you. You and so many others."

"And you also saved me. Not only did you heal me, but you gave me the strength to fight Palpatine instead of allowing him to possess my body. If it weren't for you, I might have plunged the whole galaxy into darkness."

Ben held up his hand. "Stop it - you and I both know that doesn't erase anything I did before! Nothing can erase that!" He ran his hand over his eyes. "That note . . . that note was right."

Rey wrapped her arm around her husband's shoulders, squeezing him gently. "Ben . . ."

"And you're trying to comfort me when you're the one who just had a nightmare about a traumatizing memory?" Ben exclaimed.

Rey bit her lip, wanting to tell her husband that she was fine, she didn't need comforting, it was just a dream . . . but how could she say she was fine when Kylo's face was still creeping around in her mind?

"I wish I could comfort you," Ben said in a shaky voice. "I know, long ago you said you'd need a minute after these dreams and I said I'd give you as long as you need, but I wish I could hug you and make you feel better like other spouses do, other spouses who didn't torture the one they love."

What could Rey say to that? She squeezed his shoulder, hoping to ease his pain at least a little bit, but still the dream was invading her mind like Kylo Ren had done so many years ago.

"Ben," she finally said, "come back to bed."

"And give you another nightmare?"

"You didn't give me the nightmare!"

"Do you really believe that when I caused the memory you dreamed about?" He stared into her eyes, the wrinkles in his face giving him a weary look, as if he were older than his fifty-two years. "Don't try to sugarcoat how I tortured you - that's not helping anything!"

Rey let out a long sigh. "Okay, you're right. You did cause that memory. You did horrible things, I'm not going to deny that, but you're not that person anymore. No, that doesn't make the things you did okay and it doesn't mean they no longer matter, but you also can't go back in time and change them." She squeezed his shoulder again. "Please, come back to bed."

But before he could answer, there came a sudden jolt in the Force - the same jolt they had felt the night before. Almost in unison, they both cautiously turned to face the door, that same unfamiliar Force-signature pulsing through Rey's senses.

In another moment came a torrent of violent pounding on the door, making the couple jump slightly, followed by a deep, loud male voice screaming.

"I KNOW YOU'RE IN THERE, KYLO REN!"