"Perhaps she has an unfair advantage over you. She has been studying your movements and fighting style for months. You have never seen her in action." Snoke sat in a chair very similar to his stone throne but inside of a spaceship hurtling towards some unknown destination. The girl, still nameless, stood ready to jump out the moment they arrived. Her fingers absentmindedly stroked the lightsaber hilt sitting on her left hip. Ben watched the child curiously. It had been three months since their first encounter and he hadn't gotten any closer to defeating the girl. Her attacks seemed disconnected, unrelated, until they piled up and you found yourself laying in the mud with a blaster between your eyes. Getting to watch her in action without fighting her could prove to be beneficial.
Finally, they landed on a very green planet with large trees. Just a few parasecs from their landing site was the beginning of a scattered village built into the upper layer of the trees. Large, hulking beings moved from building to building, carrying meat, firewood, weapons. It took a moment for Ben to recognize them in the sudden bright light: wookiees. Snoke had taken them to the wookiee home world. The girl stood quite still as the hangar door dropped open, conveying she had done this before.
"Combattez," Snoke ordered and she took off. It took longer than he cared to admit, for Ben's mind to process beyond the blurring image of a half-sized human decimating the village. Blood filled the air along with petrified screams. She blocked blasters with her lightsaber, shot into crowds, disappeared into buildings, used wookiees as shields against other wookiee attacks. She cut down men, women, and children with blinding speed, all without batting an eye.
"Tell her to stop," Ben muttered. "Tell her to stop!" he cried out, begging Snoke hopelessly while his mind filled with swirling images of Uncle Chewie.
"You're being seduced by the Light. Cut-ties with your past, Ben Solo. Worry not of the creatures; watch how she fights." He tried, honestly, he did. He focused on how she maneuvered, how each wall, each hole in her path became a stepping stone to victory. She was wholly aware of her surroundings in a way that he couldn't dream of yet…
"Please, please tell her to stop. They haven't done anything wrong!" Snoke ignored the teenager. Frantic, he ran out of the shuttle and across the village to where the massacre was taking place. Half the time, he could hardly bring her into focus she moved so quickly, changed directions so abruptly. "Stop!" he shouted. "You must stop." She ignored him as wookiees barreled towards them from either side. In a last second decision, desperate to end this killing-spree, he turned his lightsaber on and ran it straight through her.
Everything stopped. The wookiees backed away still crying out in anguish over their lost loved ones. How many were left? 60 or so? The girl furrowed her eyebrows, glancing down at green light sword, then back up at him. Her lightsaber and blaster clattering to the wood-plank floor as she stared at him with startled eyes. He turned off the saber and let her drop between her weapons. His pulse hammered in his ears and he dared to turn back and look at Snoke.
"Killer of Ren," Snoke hissed, the ship hovering closer. "She was the most promising knight in the Order. Your ignorance and weakness to the Light side has destroyed her. I will continue training you when you have severed yourself from your past sympathies."
"What about the girl?" he asked, glancing down at the child he had almost certainly slaughtered.
"Leave her. She is useless to me now." With that, the hangar door closed and the ship rose, taking off into space, abandoning Ben with the child and screaming wookiees. Several older men gathered around them, wanting the girl dead for her actions.
"She was just following orders. She's just a child," he spoke in her defense, attempting to save her despite that her outlook was already grim. It took a while, but finally the survivors of the massacre let her go. The dark haired teenager leaned down and scooped the child into his arms, placing her favorite weapons on her torso. She just watched him, not making a noise as he carried her across the village, towards a half-built home nobody was around. He climbed slowly toward the hut while speaking to the survivors, making sure they could safely reside there for the night. Her actions were… despicable, but he couldn't find it in him to hate her.
"Pourquoi vous m'avez poignardé? Je ne comprends pas." Her voice was soft, slightly puzzled but not upset. The boy placed her on a stack of wood and sighed, unzipping her jumpsuit so he could see the wound, ignoring her speech completely. "Vous ne parlez pas français?"
"I really don't understand a word you're saying," Ben groaned, examining the raw, red hole gaping open. He could see the back of her jumpsuit through it but the wound was not bleeding, completely cauterized by the heat of the lightsaber. He dared to press around it to ensure nothing inside was ready to fester out. She convulsed, grasping his hand but somehow keeping herself from removing it. He glanced up at her face, which had turned an ashen white, making her look more ghost than human. Hesitantly, he pressed again, having to assure himself that she wasn't going to suddenly bleed out if he went for water. A shocked cry escaped thin, pale lips and her nails dug into his wrists.
"Arrêtez-vous, s'il vous plaît." He could barely hear the words over ragged gasps for airs. Her eyes rolled back into her head and she began to shake all over. Luckily, the wound remained very much closed.
"I'll be back with water. Don't move." He didn't know why he bothered to talk to her when she obviously didn't understand. Perhaps he did it for himself, as a way to feel slightly more in control of the whole situation. The trek to a water plant and back must have been a farther walk than he had thought because when he got back with a full water canister, the girl was curled up on her side convulsing. Sweat dripped down her face and coated her entire body. She had kicked off her jumpsuit, leaving her in nothing more than pair of skin-tight black shorts.
Ben froze, wondering if it was even possible to save her at this point. Infection was setting in quicker than he had expected and who knew if he had struck a vital organ. Shaking his head of uncertainty, he rolled her on her back and propped her up against him, holding the water canister to her lips. "Drink," he ordered. She shook her head, body trembling in his arms. "Drink," he repeated, forcing the opening of the canister into her mouth and tilting it up. She obeyed but coughed and sputtered when he pulled it away. He forced her to lay down on her back and examined the wound again, pouring cold water into it.
"S'il vous plaît," she moaned. "Arrêtez-vous, s'il vous plaît. Arrêtez-vous." Her hands tangled into her hair, nails digging into her scalp to keep her from attacking the dark-eyed teen who obviously thought he was helping somehow. Ben Solo leaned down and picked up the girl's tattered jumpsuit and started ripping it into strips. He doused a couple of them in water and then forced them into the gaping hole. The girl screamed, tears leaking out of her eyes.
"I'm trying to help you. Just relax." Taking the dry strips, he covered the wound and tied the strips together as tightly as possible. He didn't really know what it would do for her but hopefully she'd stop shaking so much. Then, he heard her mumbling under her breath. He put his ear to her lips to hear better.
"Kie-lo oh Ren… Kie-lo oh Ren…" The teen sighed, laying down beside her on top of the small rock outcropping.
"You're not going to die," he assured her, wiping the sweat from her brow. "I didn't kill you. You're fine. You're fine." He wasn't sure who he was trying to convince.
Sometime during the night, her fever broke and she began to breathe normally again. She woke sometime after day break and attempted to sit up. Before she managed to get her second hand underneath her, Ben shot up and laid her back down. "Kylo Ren?"
"No. No. My name's Ben." He pointed to his chest. "Ben." She nodded.
"Ren. Kylo Ren." His head slumped forward and he sighed.
"Fine. If I'm Kylo Ren, then you're Ren." White hair waved from side to side as she denied that.
"Je n'ai pas de nom."
"Right, right. You don't speak Basic. Here, drink some water. I also traded with the wookiees if you're up for a meal." She sipped out of the water canister warily and then watched him with empty eyes as he gathered up the bread he had gotten. "Eat?" he offered, handing her a chunk while his eyes focused on the swelling reaching its way out from under her bandages. It didn't look too bad. If the wound didn't get any more infected, she may just survive. Not to mention, the girl apparently had an extremely high toleration for pain. He could put two fingers straight through her; she had to be in agony.
Obsidian eyes glanced up when she didn't take the bread. "Come on, you have to eat." He gestured to his mouth.
"Oh! Mangez! Mangez du pain. Non, merci. Vous mangez du pain." The child waved the food away and propped herself up against the hut wall. Her fingers caressed the wood absentmindedly. Somehow, she seemed to be in a stable state of mind.
"Look, Ren, I'm not the best at communicating in Basic, but you need to eat. If you don't take this bread, I'm going to shove it down your throat. I traded my blaster for this. Take it."
"Je ne suis pas Ren. Je n'ai pas de nom et je n'ai pas faim. Vous mangez du pain." She took her chunk and pushed it back towards him. Simultaneously, they huffed at the other's lack of understanding. "I no has hoon-gare. Vous has hoon-gare. Vous mangez du pain." Her flat chest heaved up and down, ribs seeming to contract with every breath.
"You speak Basic?!" he shouted. "Why didn't you tell me you spoke Basic?!"
"I speak lee-tle. I no soup-ohs to. Je parle français."
"What do you mean you're not supposed to speak Basic? Why not?"
"Monsieur Snoke no… like…? … quand I speak bah-seek"
"Well, you're not very good at it." She didn't react, just watched him with light blue eyes. "Alright, no Basic around Snoke. Don't worry, I won't tell him you ever said a coherent word to me. But you need to eat, Ren, even if you're not hungry."
"Ren est no mon nom. I no has nom. Ren est un teet-la. Good feet-ter call Ren. You Ren now. Vous m'avez poignardé."
"Well, Kylo Ren isn't my name but that doesn't change that fact you need to eat." She dropped her shoulders and rather unwillingly bit into the bread. She chewed slowly, contemplatively.
"You call Kylo Ren now. I like."
"You do?" he muttered, watching her closely as he ate his own share. "Fine. Kylo Ren it is. I needed a new name anyway. But only if I get to call you Ren." Her eyes narrowed but she nodded.