Chapter Twenty-Three: Madman
Rey's hands shook as she pried off the plating on a repair panel in the corner of her room. It was set into the wall by her bed, and she analyzed its contents, looking for any ingress into vital ship systems.
Temperature and gravity controls, lighting, water recycling—all localized to this lone wing of quarters. Rey thumbed through neat rows of wires and servos, her touch frantic.
She had to get out of here. Kylo Ren was insane.
Her mind moved faster than her fingers, a whirl of panicked rebuke. She'd been playing a dangerous game since waking up aboard the shuttle—unaware how truly perilous it was—but was finally done being so cavalier with her life.
Why Kylo Ren had allowed her to argue, enduring her curt rebuttals instead of simply tearing apart her insides, she didn't know.
Their close call in the shipyard had illuminated how loaded his threats had truly been. His brief display in the med-bay where he'd choked her had been nothing. Nothing. The man was a murderer, one who didn't blink at inflicting drawn-out torment on non-sentient creatures.
Rey was lucky he hadn't ruptured one of her internal organs in a fit of temper, letting her bleed out for days while sepsis set in. It was only a matter of time before she did something that would leave her writhing and keening like those poor animals. Their cries were still ringing in her ears and almost drowned out the sharp knock that suddenly rapped at her door.
Rey rushed to replace the panel, fumbling awkwardly with its top two screws before straightening, blocking it with her body.
The door slid open, revealing Kylo, sans cape or helmet. "You're afraid of me," he stated matter-of-factly, wasting no time, crossing his arms as he stood at her room's threshold. "I can sense it throughout the ship – you've managed to saturate every surface. Why now, and not before?"
Rey was too nervous to be embarrassed at broadcasting such fear. "I-I just didn't know…," she trailed off, unsure what would cause upset or offense.
Kylo's gaze grew piercing as he searched her face. "How ruthless I really was?" He finished. "Ah. My display left quite an impression," the intensity of his stare burned. "Had I known you'd be so easily subdued, I would have procured a batch of lifeforms bent on eating us days ago."
Rey clamped her teeth together, fighting her natural inclination to refute his claim. She wasn't 'subdued', she just no longer had a death wish.
Kylo's scrutiny lingered on the planes of her cheeks and jaw, taking in their strained set. "You do realize I killed them to protect us, right?" He asked.
Rey couldn't help herself. "The torture wasn't necessary," she mumbled.
He shrugged. "So, I got carried away by your quaint, little measure of good and bad. Better that, than being dragged back to their saliva-spun nests."
The gorgodons' bloodied, broken bodies swam before her eyes, and Rey squeezed them shut, trying to blot out the memory. "It's not a measure I made up alone, Ren. Most of the galaxy adheres to it."
"Not me."
Rey nodded numbly, retreating back a step, bumping into the wall. "Which I fully see now," she murmured.