Chapter 12

I forgive you, son…

The phantom voice echoed in Kylo's head as he slowly came to. He blinked several times, confused at first why everything was dark. Feeling hands holding both of his, he tried to move his head, to sit up, hissing when a shooting pain accompanied the movement.

Before he could shake away the confusion, he felt the now familiar tug on the connection between him and Rey and the world blossomed into view. His eyes immediately went to Rey's and he found them red-rimmed, tear tracks running down her face. He felt a strange comfort in the fact that she had been crying for him as he watched her inhale shakily, before a single sob choked its way out of her.

At the sound he saw movement on his right and looked over, finding his mother holding his other hand, staring at him in both fear and wonder.

Swallowing, he choked down his guilt and uncertainty. "Mother." His voice came out raspy.

Leia loosed a breath, bringing a hand up to cup his cheek. She paused just before she touched him, uncertainty in her face. Kylo closed his eyes as waves of emotion hit him. Feelings he had long buried under bitterness and anger resurfaced. He recalled a small boy, desperately wanting the affection of his parents, feeling the abandonment of being left alone with nothing more than droids to watch him. He also recalled the face of his father as Kylo had driven the lightsaber through his chest and pulled his hand from his mother's grasp, turning his face away.

"Ben," Leia whispered, "please don't shut me out."

Kylo swallow thickly, trying and failing to stop the barrage of emotions coursing through him.

"It's too late," he rasped, hearing the echo of those same words spoken once before.

"No." Kylo opened his eyes as Leia shook her head, leaning closer. "It's not too late. There's good in you. You're not a part of the dark side."

Kylo looked at her, hope blossoming in his chest despite his best efforts. Shaking his head he replied, "I killed Han-" his voice choked off as emotion began to overwhelm him. Pressing his lips together in his attempt to reign in his emotions, he shook his head again.

Leia swallowed, her eyes filling with tears. "I forgive you. Please come back to me. Whatever you've done, you're still my son."

"I can't go back to the boy you knew," he said in response, shocked by her easy forgiveness of an unforgivable crime. "I'm not a sith, but neither am I a jedi. I don't use the light side of the force and I don't want to."

"You don't have to," Rey said then. Kylo flicked his eyes to her, having momentarily forgotten she was even present.

"The force isn't meant to be divided into light and dark," she said, echoing her earlier words in his cell. "It's about a balance between the two."

Kylo was saved from having to respond when a door opened and Poe entered.

"Leia," he said, "The team has assembled to decide what to do with Kylo."

Kylo swallowed, looking between his mother and Rey, torn between bitterness and hope. Leia rose, looking down at him, a war of emotions flickering in her eyes before she leaned down and kissed him on the forehead. Before she turned she looked down at him again, and what he saw both confused him and gave him hope. He saw an emotion he had once craved from his mother filling her expression. Love.

Leia patted his cheek, turned, and walked towards the door.

"Ben."

All eyes turned towards Kylo as the word was ripped from his mouth, a decision he hadn't consciously made forcing the word from his lips without his permission.

Breathing deeply, Kylo looked first at his mother before turning to Poe, who had a questioning look on his face.

"My name is Ben, not Kylo."

His mother's mouth fell open and Poe's eyebrows flew upwards. He felt a squeeze on his hand and looked over at Rey, hope and happiness making her eyes shine. When he looked back at the pair by the door, Poe merely nodded at him and then walked out. Leia gave him a long, searching look, her lips pressed together, her eyes shining with emotion, before she too nodded and walked out the door.

When they were alone, Ben turned his face again to Rey, who was rubbing her thumb along the inside of his wrist.

A stabbing feeling in his chest reminded him why he was there, causing him to hiss in pain. Rey sucked in a breath.

"Are you ok? Do you need me to get someone? I can have the med droid come." Her words came quickly, colored with panic.

Ben shook his head. "I'm fine." Looking around, he asked, "What happened?"

Rey took a deep breath, the corners of her mouth turning up. "We did it. We won."

Ben frowned in confusion. "We won? How?" Last he had seen, the battle was still raging and Hux was nowhere to be found.

"When Naboo joined us, the queen sent out a distress call to all her allies. Once they heard that the Resistance had enough soldiers to have a fighting chance, more people joined us. Hux was aboard his ship when the allies arrived and blew it up. With Hux gone and you and your Knights of Ren on our side, the rest of the First Order surrendered. There have been endless meetings about what to do with those that are left."

Ben digested this information and frowned as he recalled Poe's words. "Poe said they were holding a meeting about what to do with me." He looked at Rey's face. "What happened to my Knights?"

Rey swallowed. "They're being held in cells while they await the republic's decision."

"The republic?" Ben's frown intensified. "How long have I been asleep?"

Darkness entered Rey's expression and Ben felt her fear and anxiety.

"Well over a week," she replied softly.

"A week?"

Rey swallowed. "We weren't sure you would survive. The med droid wanted to give up on you, but…" Rey took a shuddering breath. "Leia wouldn't let it."

Ben's eyebrows rose in shock. "My mother…wouldn't let it?"

Rey shook her head. "She fought for you, Ben. She threatened to sell the droid for scrap if it gave up."

Ben's breathing increased as feelings threatened to overwhelm him. His mother had fought for him?

"She's fighting for you right now," Rey said, likely sensing his thoughts.

Ben's eyes flicked to hers. "What do you mean?"

Rey considered him a moment, her gaze flicking back and forth between his eyes. It was then that he realized how close they were. Rey was leaning towards him, less than a foot away.

"Leia is fighting to make sure that you live. She's trying to convince the republic that it was in part your defection from the First Order that saved the republic. She's asking for clemency." By the time Rey finished speaking her voice was a whisper.

Ben swallowed as something in the air changed between them. His heart felt lighter with the news that his mother was fighting for him, that she had fought to save him when she could easily have let him die. He deserved death for the things he had done…

"No." Rey's response was a fiercely spoken whisper. "Never say that."

"Rey…"

Ben didn't get a chance to respond when Rey suddenly leaned forward, pressing her lips to his. In his shock he inhaled sharply. Rey started to pull away and he could feel her embarrassment through the bond. Shaking his head, he quickly placed his hands on either side of her face and pulled her back down, ignoring the stab of pain the effort cost him. He tilted his head to one side, then the other, pressing his lips to hers over and over again as she leaned forward so that she was almost half laying on him. He couldn't remember ever feeling as happy as he did at this moment and he cursed his injuries for keeping him from doing more than kissing.

"I'm not sure that's the best way to recover from a chest injury."

They broke apart quickly, both turning towards the voice, finding Luke looking at them with his eyebrows raised.

Ben huffed, exasperated, as Rey straightened up, a blush blooming on her cheeks.

"What do you want?" he asked.

Luke clasped his hands behind his back and walked towards them. "Can't an uncle stop by to say hello to his ailing nephew?"

Ben narrowed his eyes, feeling anger and bitterness rise up, suffocating his earlier happiness. "Why do you care?"

Luke stopped a few feet from the bed, peering down at Ben. Luke's expression confused him until, with a start, he realized it was worry that colored his uncle's expression.

Ben huffed a laugh of disbelief. "Unbelievable."

"Ben-" Rey started to say. Ben pulled his hand away from her so he didn't have to look at his uncle but when the rest of the world went dark, Rey and Luke remained in his vision.

Ben looked over at Rey. "You want me to forgive the man who so easily thought to kill his own nephew?" His eyes snapped back to Luke. "My parents were scared of me. Did you know I knew that? I heard them talking about me, about how they would get rid of their problem by sending me to you. Does my mother even know what you tried to do? The great hero of the galaxy, the man who tried to save Darth Vader, Luke Skywalker, tried to kill his own nephew. I wonder what people would think of you if they knew the truth."

When Ben finished speaking he was breathing heavily, as if he had been running instead of speaking. It was only then that he realized Luke had been taking his tirade with a calm, albeit sad, expression.

"Tell them," Luke said.

Ben recoiled in shock. "What?"

Luke took another step towards them. "Tell them what I did. If it brings you peace then it doesn't matter what people think of a dead man."

There was silence between them as Ben stared at his uncle, trying to figure out if he was being sincere or if this was another trick.

"It's not a trick." Luke sighed. "I told you on Crait that I failed you and was sorry. I meant it. That's why I denied you the pleasure of killing me. Why do you think I went into hiding in the first place? Fear?" He shook his head as Ben continued to gasp, his emotions roiling. "It wasn't fear. It was shame. How could I face Han and Leia knowing I had driven their son right into the hands of Snoke, that I had tried to murder their only son? How could I face the galaxy when I had given the First Order their strongest weapon? It was my failure. My failure in thinking I knew how to help you, how to teach you to harness the darkness, in not seeing that you were being manipulated by someone. Everything that happened from the moment I agreed to teach you was due to my failure."

A long moment of silence passed between them as Ben tried to figure out what he was feeling. The bitterness that had long been his companion was starting to break apart at his uncle's admission. In its place was a hollowness, a void Ben didn't know how to go about filling.

Luke finally looked away from Ben towards Rey. "You did good, kid." He glanced back at Ben. "You both did good." After a beat he continued speaking to Rey. "You were also right."

Rey raised her eyebrows as she grabbed Ben's hand again, causing the room to snap into view. "About what?"

"Turning Ben to our side saved the galaxy."

Ben's head snapped towards Rey. She had said that?

Rey smiled and squeezed Ben's hand, straightening up as she spoke. "I'm going to continue translating the texts. We can't let the Jedi order leave the galaxy entirely. There must be others who are sensitive to the force."

Ben looked at her. "The texts from Ach-to?"

Rey nodded. "They're the original texts of the Jedi Order. They're all that remains. But the language they were written in isn't one I speak, so it has been hard to translate them. I thought about using C3PO but I didn't want to take him away from Leia."

"I can read them," Ben replied.

Rey's eyebrows rose. "How do you know that?"

Before Ben could respond there was a chuckle. They both looked at Luke. "My nephew enjoyed ancient languages. He even had a calligraphy set he used to play around with."

Ben rolled his eyes. "I wasn't playing around." Embarrassment made his face feel hot as he looked at Rey. "I didn't like the idea that old things should pass away. I even designed my lightsaber based on an ancient design."

Rey pressed her lips together, the corners of her mouth turning up. "So did I."

Ben's eyes dropped to Rey's lips and the energy changed between them.

Luke cleared his throat, raising his eyebrows in warning when they both jumped and turned back to him.

"Why are you still here?" Ben asked, annoyed.

Ignoring Ben, Luke looked at Rey. "I think you have the makings of a wonderful teacher."

Rey smiled, squeezing Ben's hand as she looked at him, saying. "We both do."

Ben stared at her in surprise as Rey looked at him with uncertainty in her expression. Taking a deep breath, knowing what Rey was asking of him, he nodded.

Feeling a change in the force, they looked towards Luke, finding him gone.

A/N: Good Grief. As short as this chapter is, you'd think I'd have had it written sooner. Writers block hit for some reason and it was like pulling teeth. Anyway, thanks so much for reading! All we have left is the epilogue and this fic will be completed. *tear* I'm actually hoping I can get the epilogue written and posted by tomorrow. *fingers crossed* Let me know what you think of the chapter! :)