A/N:

Thank you so much everyone for the comments, kudos and support! Please keep the feedback coming, I really appreciate them.

This is a Kylo-centred chapter, where we'll discover what he saw in Mustafar. (Also moving forward, would you like to see Ben Solo's calligraphy set make a cameo? Let me know!)

- Althea_Draxus

The first thing he saw when he came to was the rubble of black obsidian. His eyes widened in horror as he began to register what had happened.

"No... no!"

He immediately leapt up to his feet to rush towards the ruins, to at least retrieve what he could. But the words he then heard stopped him in his tracks:

"No, stop."

The voice was soft, but stern. Deep down, he felt as if he recognized it, even if it had first came to him in a different form. He cast a long glance at the castle ruins, which had begun to disintegrate even further where the rivers and streams of Mustafar permeated. Vader's sanctuary. His helmet. Traces of the man he revered. Everything that had signified Darth Vader was being consumed by the hot molten lava to be reduced to nothingness.

"Let it go, Ben. It is not what you need."

This time he turned to face the owner of the voice. It belonged to a young man, not too far off in terms of age from him. In fact, much of the man's appearance resembled him. His hair. A light scar running along his right temple. His eyes. The man wore a sorrowful expression, but it was hard to tell to whom or what it was directed.

This man was not the figure he was looking for. He was not the one he had been imploring to appear in front of him. But Kylo knew who he was looking at. He could feel it.

The man too clearly shared the same awareness. When he spoke, it carried a certain affection, "Ben."

"REN."

The forceful way his name was said snapped him out of his thoughts. He glanced up to see General Hux give him a withering look. Kylo said nothing, but signaled to his second-in-command to continue.

"As I was saying, our engineers have submitted a design proposal for a weapon -"

His weapon came to life, and Kylo pointed the crackling blade of his lightsaber at the man. There was no intent to strike, however, and the man knew this. He regarded Kylo with a half-smile.

Kylo wasn't as amused. "Why? This was where you were strongest. Why destroy them?"

"Because now I finally can. You brought my two sides together, and I have completed my choice. Ben, this is not your path to take."

"No, you are wrong," Kylo countered. "This is the path I must take. To succeed where you failed."

"That was what you were made to believe. But ask yourself - is it what you truly believe? Is it what you are truly struggling with? All this while you've asked for guidance, Ben. This is my answer to you."

The man held out the blue crystal shards towards the crackling red blade. Kylo watched on in confusion as his lightsaber's blade calmed down. The vents on either side of his cross guard dissipated. Instead, his lightsaber now glowed in a steady, singular beam of light, blue and red dancing within.

"Learn to forgive, Ben Solo. Not just those who have hurt you, but also yourself. That's the only way your conflict can end."

"-positive we can end the Resis..." Hux trailed off mid-sentence as it occurred to him that all his explanations for the past few minutes were for nothing. He cleared his throat as loudly as possible. "Supreme Leader. Supreme Leader."

That finally got Kylo's attention. But it was clear that his attention was elsewhere. In fact, it had never been in the meeting room from the start. Hux could barely conceal his annoyance. "Is the Supreme Leader not up to the task today?"

To his surprise, Kylo stood up and answered wearily, "General, we'll do this tomorrow, first thing in the morning. I am not to be disturbed for anything until then. Can I trust you to oversee things for today, General?"

Hux's eyebrows shot up at the word 'trust'. But maintaining a tone as stiff and impassionate as ever, he answered, "But of course, Supreme Leader."

Kylo didn't wait for him to finish his sentence before he strode out of the meeting room. Along the corridors, a couple of Stormtroopers greeted him. Those who were more courageous extended him a "Good evening, Supreme Leader". But the others were content to just salute him wordlessly. His relationship with them was largely indifferent. He knew that the ranks had their own factions. When Phasma was still around, many preferred to place their loyalty in her over Hux. Now with Peavey part of the triumvirate, it was more likely there already was a tussle between him and Hux for the troops' choice of preferred leader. Kylo knew eventually he would have to pay more attention to such developments, but for now he had other things to concern himself with.

Once he entered his chambers, the doors slid close behind him. Kylo tugged to remove his gloves as he walked over to his desk. His half-disassembled lightsaber and its components were laid out on the working surface. Whatever he had seen in Mustafar refused to leave his mind. Upon landing on the Finalizer, he intended to spend time merging his cracked Kyber with the blue crystal shards Caerra had presented to him. Unfortunately, he barely started when Hux interrupted him earlier for that pointless meeting. Kylo was determined to complete his project this time.

He picked up the crystal shards again. Everything that had happened on Mustafar was its doing. Casting him out of Vader's castle and then bringing it down to ruins before his eyes. Shattering his prized Vader relic. He was furious when it happened, but on hindsight, it was incredibly fascinating how the crystal reacted so strongly - no, Kylo corrected himself. How the crystal overpowered everything that had been emblematic of Vader and destroyed them. The phenomenon seemed to defy everything Kylo thought he knew about the way crystals worked.

As a teenager, he was taught that Kyber crystals sing for their owner a melody only he or she could hear. When he first held his, he understood why it was said that they were sentient objects who attached themselves to the souls of their wielder. Nothing was more beautiful than when a crystal and its wielder worked in perfect harmony. When put in a lightsaber, movements become more fluid, lighter, more elegant.

When he grew a bit older, he discovered that crystals could bleed, and when they do, they cry in agony - a cry that would be seared into the wielder's very soul. Usually a bleeding crystal would surrender to the will of its owner and evolve to be a smooth red crystal. Certain crystals might put up greater resistance, especially if they sense an equally strong resistance in its wielder. They would eventually turn red, of course, but end up cracked. Such crystals were highly unstable. Always threatening to strike back at its wielder who had betrayed it. Kylo ended up having to build his lightsaber with a cross guard to protect himself against his.

What he was shown in Mustafar seemed to be something unheard of in lightsabers lore. He had heard of healed crystals, but not of merged ones. It didn't seem possible, to meld a bled crystal with an untainted one. Theoretically, they would reject each other. If not, they would reject its wielder.

But as he held the crystals in his palms, he could sense them being at synergy with one another. He had thought of using the Force to meld them together, but the crystals seemed to be telling him not to. Even as separate pieces, he could hear their song. How curious. Both the red and blue ones sang to him. He listened more attentively. They actually produced a new song.

Kylo had removed the cross guard from the first quarter section of his light saber. After he slotted the crystals in, he finished the assembly with an old hilt that he once used, when his crystal still emitted a steady blue light. If indeed what was shown to him in Mustafar was true, he needed to test a theory out.

He held out his adjusted lightsaber an arm's length away from him. He took a deep breath, and activated it. At that moment, it felt like everything about it had been renewed. The laser blade came to life with more exuberance, and it was no longer crackling. Instead it was a steady beam of marbled red and blue light. If it was entirely possible, Kylo felt as if his crystal's newfound harmony had made his lightsaber lighter in his hand.

Kylo swished it about in the air. He had had to adjust the way he wielded his lightsaber after he added on the cross guard. He had focused on strong, blunt strokes. He knew his style wasn't particularly elegant, but he also didn't really care. His fighting style needed to complement his lightsaber, not the other way round. But with this new blade and the absence of a cross guard, Kylo found that he could move more deftly, manouevre more easily... And cut down with more certainty.

"Beautiful," he murmured, still transfixed at the way his lightsaber was glowing.

As if in response, a voice belonging to a little girl floated into his ear. She was sobbing, "No. Don't go."

Kylo looked around his room. As spacious as it was, he was certain that no little girl would be hiding in it. In fact, if there was a little girl on board the First Order flagship, his Stormtroopers would have a lot of explaining to do.

He heard the voice again: "Where?"

But this time it sounded more older... And familiar. Too familiar. Kylo whirled around trying to look for the source of the voice. He would recognize it anywhere. It was the voice that had broken through his loneliness.

Was the Force acting like some sort of providence? Kylo had no idea. But it might as well be. Kylo remained where he stood as someone materialized into view. She must have fallen asleep while working on something, at a working station perhaps. But in his room, she appeared with her head resting on her arms at his desk.

Rey.

Tentatively, Kylo approached her. The words that he heard on Mustafar suddenly rang through his mind: Learn to forgive, Ben Solo. But as he gazed at her sleeping face, Kylo realized that despite everything that had happened, he never once felt that there was anything he needed to forgive her for. Not for defeating him on Starkiller Base, not for the scar on his face. Not even for turning him down and then turning against him on the Supremacy.

This wasn't the first time he observed her unconscious. Ironically, the first time too happened on board this ship, the Finalizer. Back then he carried her in from Takodana, and waited patiently until she woke up so he could extricate the map fragments from her. Maybe an hour passed. Or two. Did it matter? Just like that time, even now he admitted to himself: he liked looking at her. There was something charming about her features. She was so fiery when awake. But watching her sleep, at times he was envious how deeply she could do so.

It was then that he noticed she wasn't sleeping as peacefully as he supposed. Deep lines creased her forehead. Kylo frowned. Was she having a bad dream? Kylo inched closer. In the faint light of his room, he noticed that her cheeks were wet.

"No..." Rey mumbled, clearly distressed at whatever she was seeing in her dreams. "Don't go..."

Kylo stared at Rey who was still caught up in her dreams. For a brief second, he thought of touching her forehead to peer into what she was seeing, but decided against it. She would be furious if she found out. Kylo wasn't sure if he wanted to deal with that. He moved to leave.

Rey however was as adamant in her dreams; one of her hands reached out to clutch at the ends of his robes. "Don't go... Ben..."

Kylo froze. Was she dreaming... of him? He tried to step away, but Rey only tightened her grip. He glanced around and spotted another chair closer to his bed. A subtle flick of his wrist and it slid up nicely to him.

Careful not to make any sudden movements that might wake her up, Kylo sat down quietly beside her, and waited.