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Kylo came to her a week before, though why, Rey hardly understood.
There had been a short stalemate in the war games that surrounded both Kylo and Rey and tensions were mounting. Rey heard worrying news from her side. Somehow the Force bond opened once more, after Snoke was gone and a red-haired admiral had taken his place.
‘Meet me in the forest within a standard month,’ Rey said.
‘What forest?’ Kylo looked tired as he answered.
‘The one where it all began,’ Rey said with a slight grin, managing to hide her concern. She didn’t know if this would be enough.
‘Okay,’ Kylo responded after a moment, the slightest tug of his lip upwards. That was enough for Rey.
So they met on Takodana, outside the ruins of Maz’s castle which had since been abandoned.
They didn’t touch at first.
They had only ever done so as enemies. Rey was still wary but she had felt a pull in the Force and she would see it through. Without anyone to guide her, that was all she could do.
Rey approached first, one hand resting on her blaster. Kylo took off his cloak and put his lightsaber in her hands.
“Follow me,” Rey said, as she slowly entwined her fingers with Kylo’s.
They ended up in the Falcon. Kylo was wary of it. Rey wished she had another choice of vehicle to pull off her plan in. But this was all she could have done. Everything was set now.
“Why did you ask me to meet you here?” Kylo said, awkwardly standing in the main area of the ship, as if afraid his family’s memories would attack him.
“To see if you would come,” Rey responded, unable to hide the amusement in her answer. She was nervous about all this. But the plan would work. It had to.
“You know how dangerous it is for me to be here?” Kylo said with a huff.
“Of course,” Rey answered, her tone becoming serious, “The resistance has been talking about you. I couldn’t take hearing about it and doing nothing.”
That seemed to be enough for Kylo to at least sit down now, though he looked just as uncomfortable.
Rey somehow managed to avoid talking too in depth about the plan and get Kylo close enough to lean against her. They instead spoke of lonely and haunted pasts, isolation, pain, and longing.
Soon Rey had gotten Kylo into an uneasy sleep. With a deep sigh of relief she drew the needle from her pouch and slid it into Kylo’s neck.
Now the real work could begin.
Kylo came to her a week before, and Rey was certain it was the Force’s will. He would be safest with her.
The restraints were holding, and the device she made to administer various doses of drugs was functioning better than Rey had predicted.
Kylo was still angry with her, as to be expected. But his demands to be let go were already dwindling.
It was a start.
Rey sat in the small chair she dragged outside the makeshift cell in the cargo hold of the Falcon. Inside the lit barrier Kylo sat on the ground, chains attached to each limb, the links of metal curling around him.
“We could just run away together. I know of many places we could hide. Just let me go,” Kylo said, trying to sound reasonable but desperation was leaking into his voice.
“You’ll just go back to the First Order. I have seen your thoughts. The desire for power is still too strong.”
Kylo bit his lip, his fists curling up as he looked away from her.
“I won’t.” He sounded like a petulant child. In many ways, that’s all Kylo was.
“The darkness is an addiction. You have clung to it for so long. It would be unhealthy to let go quickly anyway.”
“You act as if you know,” Kylo spat back with venom.
“I know what I have seen. It will take time, that is what the Force told me.”
“Time for what?”
“To learn balance.”
Kylo shook his head and turned around so he wasn’t facing Rey anymore. It hurt Rey to see him like that. It hurt to feel his hate seep into her.
She had to believe it was for the greater good. That everything would be okay.
A standard month had passed. Rey had stopped on a small planet to refuel. She had gotten effective at making sure Kylo couldn’t give them away, even as a slightest precautionary measure. She always bought just enough to not be suspicious and get on her way with hacked credits from whatever side the planet happened to support.
Rey left her load of supplies in the main hold after settling on the new course and letting the Falcon pilot. The ship at least was happy with her.
She went back to the cargo hold and let herself inside. Low grunts could be heard from the bed as Kylo glared at her.
“Please don’t make me put you down again to do this,” Rey said as kindly as she could. She undid the makeshift gag and used one hand to tip his head up and held the canteen of sweetened water from the last planet. Kylo drank without fighting her.
That was at least one small improvement.
Rey ran her hands through Kylo’s hair. It was getting dirty again. Neither of them enjoyed the process of getting Kylo clean, but he had often been stubborn. He was most often calm in moments like this, when she was touching him. He kept his eyes closed and his expression almost looked pleasant in these smallest moments.
Rey undid the restraints that held Kylo to the bed frame. He didn’t move.
“How much longer?” came Kylo’s voice, quiet and rough.
“I don’t know. I’m listening for the Force’s guidance.” Kylo pulled himself away from Rey, the sound of the long chains clanking together.
“I can’t take this anymore, Rey. Please...let me go.”
Rey took in a deep breath.
“Your heart is still clouded. I can feel it.”
“I don’t know what you want me to do. I learned from both the light side and the dark,” Kylo started after Rey silently offered the canteen. He took a long swig of it.
“Yet you learned flawed lessons from both sides,” Rey said immediately.
“How could you possibly know?” Kylo said, arrogance seeping into his tone.
“No one I met has been able to understand. I am not subject to the laws you lived under. I merely have been listening to the Force itself.”
“I could help,” Kylo said stubbornly
“You can’t. I will figure it out. I will protect you, even if it is against yourself.” As soon as Rey finished Kylo threw the canteen against the wall.
Two standard months had passed.
No one seemed to be tracking them. It was a small miracle.
Kylo was improving little by little, Rey was sure of it. He was still struggling against the binds, but he also let Rey put bacta on the bruised and raw skin patches.
His wrists and ankles were always the worst, the heat and sweat of the metal against his skin caused constant streaks of bubbled crimson lines. His nails had started to crack and split from the nervous biting habit Kylo had picked up and his constant picking at the cuffs, as if that would be enough to do anything.
Kylo’s skin even started getting more delicate. Whenever Rey had gagged him for one of her market ventures his face and neck started bruising as well, his once luscious lips dried up into a series of bleeding cracks which no amount of liquid or healing cream would fix.
“I promise there is a place where you can go outside soon,” she kept promising. It was a hidden planet Rey found. The Falcon even seemed to like the location once she had picked it out.
Kylo managed to look bedraggled even when he was clean. His hair was growing, and Rey was taking care of any facial grooming, as best as she could anyway. Kylo was calm as he could be, for someone in his position. Rey made sure to reward him with a few hours of them lying together where Kylo could hold onto Rey, usually his head in her lap.
She had opened up enough to hear his stories about the Force, and Kylo had opened up to hearing her interpretations.
But Rey could see a darkness gripping onto Kylo’s heart. He wouldn’t let go of it.
“Please unbind me. I want to feel you,” Kylo asked in a tired voice.
Rey calmly got up and moved to leave. Anytime Kylo had made such a request Rey found it most effective to leave and let him be for a while.
This time Kylo stopped her. A hand clung to the fabric of her pants.
“I can’t take this anymore,” Kylo said in a whisper.
“You can endure this trial as you have all the others in your life. In it, we might be able to find balance.”
Rey left still, Kylo screaming till his voice gave, the clank of metal seeming to resound throughout the entire ship. She laid down in the main hold, hands pressed against her ears, curled under a blanket.
Rey wanted to scream too.
Had this all been for nothing?
Kylo was beginning to turn a sickly pale. He had stopped fighting, but instead started sleeping half of the time. He simply refused to talk to Rey at all. He moved away when she touched him and was eating almost nothing.
Rey was getting worried.
“Would you want to go outside?” she offered up one day.
“Fresh air. It’s so stale in here,” was all Kylo said warily.
Rey went about moving and adjusting all the air handlers after discussing it with the Falcon. The ship seemed utterly indifferent to the needs, but what would it know about an organic’s need for air anyway.
Even after all Rey’s hard work, Kylo was intent on ignoring her. It was so risky, but Rey had to make the offer again. It might break the silence.
“Do you want to go outside?”
“When did you start caring about my needs again? If it is your will, do it,” Kylo said tiredly.
Kylo had spent too long in the dark. Rey was failing. She would get him into the light, safely, and on her terms.
She already had been thinking about a few designs. She completed a repulsor chair within a few standard days, having been slowly gathering parts from the last few trips. It wasn’t enough though. Kylo was cunning when he wanted to be.
On the next planet Rey visited she saw an unusual item in one of the small markets, a thick jacket with long sleeves that buckled up the back. The seller told her it was one of the humane ways some slave traders moved their stock around. It took a small mind trick she had been practicing, but the seller gave her the jacket without ever remembering she had been there.
The thing was better in her hands than others. It would allow Kylo to go outside, if properly hidden in a remote area. It could lesson the terrible tension of their long journey to come.
Rey re-worked her designs, learning how to secure the jacket against the chair for the most comfort and security.
But the hardest part was yet to come. Kylo would have to willingly put on the jacket or be knocked out so Rey could put it on him. She would rather make this process as painless as it could be.
So Rey presented the jacket to Kylo first, knowing he could be skittish about such new things.
“What is that?” Kylo asked slowly backing away in the corner of the cell.
“Your way to go outside.”
After a few more moments of confused wariness, Rey continued.
“You should wear it. It’s more comfortable than the chains for sure.”
Kylo didn’t answer but shifted the heavy cuffs around his wrists as he often did when contemplating something.
No answer though. Rey expected that. She could be patient.
It would take a few more standard days for Kylo to say anything to her.
“If I wear that thing, you promise I can go out?” he said in almost a whisper.
“I promise,” Rey said quickly, relieved.
Rey brought the jacket back into the room as well as her med kit. The cuffs would have to come off for this. She pulled out the serum she had been using for repressing Kylo’s Force powers, which she normally administered when he was sleeping. But today the mix was a little different.
Rey approached Kylo with the needle in hand. Kylo went stiff but didn’t move, only silently asking her ‘why’. Rey didn’t need to answer. She lifted his arm and administered the dose, then put the needle back into her kit. She brought the jacket over to the bed and went to gently touch Kylo’s arm again. He didn’t move away at least.
She slid her hand down to entwine with his. Kylo’s hand remained limp in hers, but he stayed.
With a little effort, and with the help of the concoction’s effects to make Kylo slightly more compliant, Rey started putting the jacket on him. It fit him well considering his size, his arms sliding comfortably into the sleeves, and the straps that hung off the front easily able to go between Kylo’s leg and buckle to the back. There were a lot of buckles in the back of the jacket, but it fit Kylo’s muscular form well, even as she pulled his arms through the loops on the front and side to fasten around his back.
Then it was time to get the chair. Even with the drug’s effect, Kylo groaned at the sight of it.
“I am not even allowed to walk?” he complained quietly.
Rey was able to secure him into it easily enough at least. The arms of the jacket had fasteners that attached to the back of the chair and Rey was able to simply attach the cuffs around Kylo’s ankles to the base of the chair.
It was finally time to finally go. Rey landed the ship in the middle of a forest on a small moon. The population was sparse and the Falcon was able to find a quiet spot to land in, seeming quite happy for the reprieve from all the flying it had been doing.
Rey guided the chair smoothly down the ramp and out into the clearing. Kylo’s face immediately turned upwards towards the sun’s light, tears shimmering in the corners of his eyes. His body shifted to stand but his restraints pulled him back.
Kylo gave a low whine of frustration, but refused to say a word. Rey ran her fingers through his hair hoping to help calm him.
“You know I would have stayed with you willingly. All you had to do was ask, Rey,” Kylo spoke after a while of sitting and basking in the light.
“I can’t know that.”
“You are so blind,“ Kylo said, his voice choking up. Rey turned so she could see Kylo’s face. He was biting his lip. He had tilted his face down so it was covered by hair, away from where Rey was trying to peer down at him.
“I can’t say it. Not like this,” Kylo whispered, half to himself.
“Can’t say what,” Rey demanded, taking hold of Kylo’s chin and tilting his face up towards her. Tears were starting to move down Kylo’s cheeks.
“I loved you. When I came to you...I loved you then.” Kylo spat out, jerking away from Rey’s touch again.
Rey stood back, feeling dizzy.
“I would have left with you if you asked me,” Kylo continued.
Another blow to Rey’s shell.
“You have hurt me, Rey, in ways worse than anyone.”
Rey stepped back further, watching Kylo shift within his bonds.
“I understand why you hate me, why I can never be forgiven. Who could ever love a monster anyway?” Kylo said in between heavy breaths as he tried to control himself.
Rey couldn’t answer him. She couldn’t speak, feeling the shock of his words hit her.
But it wasn’t true. This had all been to help Kylo, to make him understand.
Rey didn’t know what else to do. She moved forward until her hands rested on the edges of Kylo’s jaw. She gently pulled his face up and moved closer. And closer.
Their lips met and pressed up against each other furiously. Kylo’s lips tasted like cracks and blood, but softened quickly enough.When they finally needed to breathe, Rey pulled back and kissed Kylo’s cheek. She could feel his blood on her tongue.
Kylo’s chest was moving quickly. He licked his lips and tried to shift his arms which were tightly pulled around his chest.
“Let me feel you, just for a little bit. I am tired of being the caged beast.”
Rey silenced Kylo with another kiss.
He just wanted to escape. It was all the cunning darkness. She knew better.
No matter what they felt for each other, Rey had a higher purpose to attend to.
“We have to go back inside,” was all Rey said.
Kylo shuddered.
“Please.”
He was regressing.
“I relented too much,” Rey admitted. She shouldn’t have kissed him.
“Rey, please...please,” Kylo said, his tone imploring.
Rey said nothing and silently started Kylo in the chair back onto the Falcon. As they approached the ramp, Kylo started thrashing back and forth.
“Don’t make me go back in that room. I want to stay just a little bit longer. It’s so dark in there.”
It was just the dark’s cunning, trying to trick Rey.
As soon as they got back onto the ship, Rey gagged Kylo again, as he started to plead with her without end.
She didn’t want to sedate him, especially not wanting to mix things with the drugs she gave Kylo before.
It hurt so much to see him like this.
Rey had to believe in patience and that the Force would give her an answer. She knew it would.