Ever since they met, Kylo has been wondering how could a bounty hunter as mere as Jamis could be able to wield such a power as blocking another Force-sensitive individual's ability to penetrate or read minds. Too prideful to even ask—rather, too shy to even bring it up casually—but too curious and eager to stop.
In the crevices of his mind, he has always wanted to think this out loud and finally he is about to.
"What is she hiding in that mind?"
Kylo watched her as he wondered about what happened to them back in the training room, he wanted to know what he saw could have meant. Did she manipulate everything? Not so likely, for someone who is not trained neither from the Jedi Arts nor the Sith and only know so little in the beginning, it would seem that it is a bit of a stretch to assume that she did everything by herself using the Force.
Was it an intervention of the Force? Possibly, but he wanted to think of it without sounding like a devotee. Being honest with himself, Kylo did not know what to make of it—he did not know whether it was a sign or something that the Force wanted him to interpret for himself; after all, the Force only guides a person to the answer but does not tell it straight.
Whatever the answer is—he cannot find it yet.
He decided to retire to his bedroom.
The door whirred open, as soon as he stepped in, he shed off his gloves, and then his shirt, he suddenyly winced, clutching his side gently and slowly rubbing it. He had been disobeying the medical droids again. They told him that he would only avoid the abdominal pains caused by the physical stress inflicted on the wound itself if he would just stop doing training.
Kylo slowly pulled away his hand from his abdomen, at the slightest rub between his two fingers he felt a moist, warm, and thick liquid on its tips, he was hesitant to look at it but he could not help it—blood.
He sighed, in defeat, he put on his robes again. He marched through the corridor, on his way to the clinic again; there was no disgruntled doctor seeing Kylo the third or so time this week, he was greeted only by a droid who buzzed and beeped droidspeak as it hovered around the medical clinic. Its eye bobbed up and down, looking at Kylo from head to toe, and then found the tearing on his wound—his strenuous movements have torn the soft, fragile tissues that were supposed to be sealing the injury. He sat down on the gurney, the main medical droid called for two assistants—two smaller versions of itself—and started the procedure of replacing the bandage.
It is trips like these that he has a time of thinking—because the droids do not speak much, let alone interact with him like an actual human doctor—and his mind wandered off to the thought of Jamis again.
Another thing that Kylo had his mind on was the way Jamis did not feel any sort of intimidation or threat from him—let alone, she did not feel scared like she used to (even though she was good at hiding it and keeping herself calm) and the way she looked at him earlier showed a whole new different emotion. Tenderness and warmth flowed out of her and then trickled into him, as if trying to comfort him when she sensed his apparent sadness.
"All too familiar…" he muttered to himself, the droids did not hear it despite being within earshot. Then, like a single drop of paint falling on a canvas of black and spread, rippled, and swirled across its slate, the familiarity of the feeling tendered his stone-cold, darkened heart.
His heart sank, he felt it weighing down on him, and then the tenderness has softened and overwhelmed him at the same time, but he put his focus back to where it should belong—Jamis's performance in the training earlier. He remembered that he had his end of the bargain to fulfill. It meant that he had to let her leave or he will forge a contract with her—serving the First Order or personally Kylo's requests while still being able to accept outside contracts as a bounty hunter.
Kylo may deny all he wants but a part of him does not want to let her get too far from his sights. He does not want to admit that, to some extent, Armitage had a point and he was right about it.
The medical droids have finished without him even noticing, he prepared himself to head to Jamis's bedchambers and tell her of her training's completion. As he strode through the metal walls, that seemed to hum as he walked, he felt his hands become clammy, he even felt the slightest tremble of his fingers, as well as the sudden dryness of his throat.
All feelings piled up, one on top of the other, and everything he was feeling was occurring all at once when he was standing in front of Jamis's door. He took slow, deep breaths before pressing the button until he was calm enough to face her.
The door opened and showed Jamis staring again at the giant window overlooking space, leaning her head against the glass, shoulders slumped but relaxed, and hands held together.
Is she meditating again?
He figured that he should not be interrupting her if that is the case, he was reluctant to leave but he felt that he had to do so out of courtesy, he was about to turn around until Jamis called out his name.
"Stop…" she firmly but gently said. "What did you see?"
He did not speak right away.
"Earlier, I know you saw something inside me—it's written all over your face: you look so surprised."
Kylo's lips felt dry, he swallowed a lump stuck on his throat, and attempted to answer her without compromising the truth of what he really appeared before his eyes.
"To be frank, it was difficult to comprehend, but to put it simply: it was a silhouette of you. We're connected, but not really. Do you understand?"
Jamis did not turn away, though he saw her reflection, he noticed that her eyebrows furrowed in puzzlement, he was right—he did disclaim that it was difficult to comprehend—and Jamis herself was picturing what Kylo said.
"So, we can see each other but we're separated by something?"
"Yes, if you would put it that way."
"What else?" she asked.
"Nothing more to tell." He simply said.
There was a short silence between them, that was the invisible wall standing between them—the one that is keeping Kylo from approaching her—but he sees himself reaching out for her. In him, there was a feeling of longing for warmth—her own brand of warmth and her own kind of comfort—as he misses the sensation after making himself isolated from such feelings, proving that he has not numbed from his own training.
I've been in a major slump for almost a quarter of the month due to things piling onto the other, hence, the little hiatus. I also got a bit off-focus, I didn't want to write with a muddled mind. We're just trying to get our life back to normal after a fucking storm and flood that devoured most of our stuff—well, a fair, chunky share of my stuff and then there's my sister's laptop. That fucking laptop which was previously mine before I got a new one for graduation from college. If any of you have ever heard the phrase "If it weren't for you, [insert the thing/person/event that should or should not have happened]!" and constantly hate hearing it because they put all the blame to poor, defenseless, faultless you when it should have been the inevitable, external force by the earth and climate change ravaging our home… yeah, I hate that too.