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The Resistance was weird.
Kylo should have known this, considering his mother had started it and people like Poe Dameron got promoted into positions of leadership. Nonetheless, he still hadn’t quite grasped just how weird it would be. Certainly in the First Order Kylo would never have had to deal with stormtrooper traitors coming up behind him and wrapping their arms around him, and not only because they would have known they’d get a lightsaber through the eye for their trouble.
“What are you doing?” Kylo said, flinching away.
“Nothing,” Finn said, but he wasn’t moving away.
Kylo considered moving him forcibly, but he realized that would be frowned upon and he was meant to be trying to improve himself. “Why are you touching me?” he tried asking instead.
Finn snorted in what Kylo thought must be amusement. “Just testing a theory. Wanna see if it’s true.”
“Theory?”
“Yeah.”
Kylo waited for Finn to explain but when he remained irritatingly silent, Kylo was forced to prompt, “And the theory is…?”
“If I told you,” Finn enunciated slowly and deliberately as though Kylo were a child, “it would invalidate the data.”
“Of course,” Kylo said, breathing deep like Uncle-- like Skywalker had taught him so many years ago, as a tool to moderate his temper. “But the theory involves inappropriate physical contact.”
“It’s called a hug. Just stand there and take it.”
Kylo closed his eyes and remembered that he was trying to improve himself.
Fuck the Resistance, truly.
-
Sometimes Kylo wondered what had possessed him to go with Rey, to choose her way when he could have chosen his own, to return with her to his mother when he could have claimed Snoke’s power for his own, could have been the Supreme Leader and smashed whoever he wanted.
He wondered it a lot, actually, particularly when Finn decided the moment was right to continue testing his theory. The fourth time Kylo found himself subjected to an unwanted hug, he informed Finn, “I think this is harassment. I should report you to my mother.”
“Your mother will side with me. She likes me better.”
Kylo scowled. “She always did favor pathetic lost causes. Just look at my father.”
“I mean, explains why she took you back, doesn’t it?” Finn asked as he stepped back, shrugging. “Pathetic lost cause? A face only a mother could love?” His smile was cheeky.
He was a son of a Hutt. This was the man Rey had fought so hard to protect on Starkiller?
”Lighten up, Kylo,” Finn said, squeezing Kylo’s shoulder. “Remember, you’re with the good guys now.”
As Finn walked away, Kylo muttered, “I’m with idiots now.”
He really should have called himself Supreme Leader.
-
There was far too much hugging in the Resistance. Poe hopped out of his cockpit and there was practically a line. Finn and Rey were separated for five minutes and they had to run to each other with arms open like it had been five years. It was ridiculous, honestly.
“Why don’t you hug someone who wants it?” Kylo asked Finn, several weeks into his torment. “Doesn’t seem to be a shortage.”
“Because that’s the point,” Finn said, like Kylo was stupid.
“That I don’t want to hug you?”
“Exactly.”
“So… harassment.”
“Testing a theory,” Finn insisted. “We’ve been over this.”
Kylo stepped away as soon as Finn released him, crossing his arms over his chest. “You mean you weren’t joking?”
Finn laughed. “Nah, I wasn’t joking.”
“How long were you planning on collecting data?”
“Until I prove my point.”
“To whom?”
“Guess you’ll see, won’t you?” Finn said with a sly little smile because he was a terrible traitor and the Resistance deserved him.
The problem, of course, was that someone in the galaxy seemed to think that meant that Kylo deserved him, and this.
He had walked into a nightmare when he stepped onto that ship with Rey.
-
Kylo would give Finn one thing. He had definitely contributed to Kylo orienting himself more quickly to the Resistance’s new headquarters than he might have otherwise. Kylo knew all the twists and turns, the ins and outs of the base.
The better he knew his way around, the better his chances of ducking out of sight when he saw Finn coming.
Not that it always worked. Unfortunately.
He thought he had succeeded this time, quickly scurrying – well, not scurrying, precisely, that made him sound like a rodent and Kylo liked to think he possessed more gravitas than that – around the corner to travel down the corridor towards the mess when he saw Finn. Only moments later, however, he realized that it had been in vain because Finn was calling after him and the only way now to avoid him would be to run and Kylo didn’t run away.
(Kylo thought about running.)
“Not avoiding me, are you?” Finn asked as he approached.
“What would I do that for?” Kylo didn’t like the way Finn was looking at him.
“Dunno. You tell me.”
“In a base filled with irritating people, you’re the most irritating.”
“Aw, man, thanks,” Finn said, with a theatrically pleased air. “And here I thought it was Poe.”
Kylo clenched his fist. “It’s a close call, but Dameron doesn’t periodically assault me.” He had tried to shoot him when Kylo first arrived, but that was different.
“Not yet,” Finn said, patting the side of Kylo’s elbow.
How… horrifying. What a genuinely horrifying thought. Finn was really a bastard, planting such an idea in Kylo’s head. This had to be some new form of torture, building on from the random hugging. Psychological torture. Maybe he’d picked it up from Hux before he turned traitor.
“We’re playing cards,” Finn said. “You should come.”
Kylo slowly blinked. “Yeah, okay,” he found himself saying, and walked with Finn down the corridor.
Maybe this was all psychological torture, and Kylo was playing right into it.
-
This hug could almost – almost – be justified. You know, if Kylo weren’t Kylo Ren and if he weren’t a latecomer to the Resistance trying to atone for things like ordering the execution of villagers and killing his father and various other facts of life.
And if he weren’t diametrically opposed to hugs.
But leaving all that aside, he could almost see why, upon returning from a sojourn to a forested moon where he had helped Rey not meet an early end to the rest of the Knights of Ren (he wasn’t entirely convinced she had needed his help, but since he was there, he figured he should aid her in not dying), Finn had sought him out when all he really wanted was a long solitary stay in the ‘fresher to, yes, hug him.
“I think it’s working,” Finn said with his arms around Kylo while Kylo stood there and tried not to hit him.
“What’s working?”
“Nothing.”
Don’t do anything, Kylo told himself. They were on the same side now or something and Kylo was, you know, good now, he supposed. So he shouldn’t lose his temper or do something rash.
It would be so easy. Kylo’s mother had confiscated his lightsaber but he didn’t need his saber to be dangerous. A moment of concentration and he could have Finn on his knees, choking for breath. No one would know. It would look like an accident.
Except maybe Kylo didn’t want Finn on his knees for exactly that reason. Maybe a different reason.
Wait. What?
Kylo pushed Finn away from him. Finn stepped back and said, “Oh, we’re done? Okay.” He had a nice mouth. And had his shoulders always been that broad?
“I need a shower,” Kylo muttered and strode away.
He absolutely, one hundred percent was not into Finn. That was just ridiculous. Yes. Finn was a traitor. So what if Kylo was now, too? Finn was just an ex-stormtrooper with no concept of boundaries who thought too highly of Poe Dameron.
Kylo took his shower and didn’t think about Finn at all. Especially not Finn on his knees.
-
Kylo didn’t dream about Finn on his knees.
He dreamed about himself, on his knees in front of Finn.
He woke up and contemplated how angry his mother would be if he stole back his lightsaber so he could destroy some stuff.
-
Finn spent too much time with Rey and Dameron and the mechanic. Rose. What did he even see in them? Irritating do-gooders with moral superiority complexes. Kylo understood the necessity of working together with them for the Resistance and even, maybe, that it might help their success rate if they got along.
But Finn actually chose to eat meals with them whenever they were on base and even to devote his free time to them.
Kylo was clearly superior. Finn had terrible taste in companions. So what if Kylo had intentionally isolated himself and didn’t even really like the concept of eating while conversing or whatever else Finn did with his friends? That wasn’t the point. Kylo’s personal preferences hadn’t stopped Finn from bombarding him with hugs.
And yet he continued to seek out his lame friends. Kylo watched Finn sling an arm around Poe’s waist across the mess and stewed.
-
“I told you to run,” Kylo said, one arm around Finn’s shoulders to support him while he clenched a blaster in his other hand.
“And leave you? Yeah, right. We’re on the same side now and I don’t leave people behind.” Finn winced as he stumbled on the uneven ground, putting too much weight on his bad leg.
“I had it under control. Didn’t need your help.”
“Uh huh. You definitely didn’t need my help when I shot that trooper behind you.”
“I knew he was there.”
“Wouldn’t have stopped him blasting a hole through your stupid skull.”
“I can stop blaster bolts in mid-air. Just ask Dameron.”
Finn made a sound halfway between a wheeze and a chuckle. “Right, I forgot, you’re the mighty Kylo Ren. You’ve never gotten your ass kicked ever. Let me just remind Rey.”
Kylo took a breath like he was supposed to when he felt the rage threatening to spill over. “Just shut up and keep walking. The ship’s on the other side of that hill.”
“You could thank me, you know. For not leaving. Probably most everyone else would have.”
Kylo knew that very well. He wasn’t exactly popular. “I can’t thank you because I didn’t need your help. I’m not taking responsibility for you getting yourself shot in the leg.”
Finn sighed. “I’m glad turning good hasn’t made you any less of an asshole.”
“You’re welcome,” Kylo muttered, and felt Finn’s huffing laughter as he continued to drag him along.
-
A few days passed with Finn and Kylo both on base, but without any forced hugging. Kylo was on his guard, suspicious. He felt sure Finn must be up to something.
Unless he had concluded his… his research? Without telling Kylo?
That was fine. Kylo didn’t care anyway, and it wasn’t like he liked the hugging. Or Finn. He was glad Finn hadn’t gotten himself killed but that was it.
He certainly never found himself entertaining some vivid, er, imaginings, and he never woke from any explicit dreams. Not ever.
Kylo watched Finn enthusiastically hug Rose on the other side of the hangar and bit his tongue, turning around to go… somewhere. And do something. He was sure his mother would have some boring duty he could occupy himself with.
He almost tripped on R2-D2, who beeped accusingly at him.
“Well, you shouldn’t stand there, then,” Kylo told him. “You’re not exactly at my eye level.”
R2 swore at him. Kylo remembered fondly that he had known how to swear in binary before he could in Basic.
Then R2 asked him if he was so angry and distracted because he was feeling jealous of Finn’s friends again.
“Jealous? Of Finn’s dumb friends?”
Because he was in love with him, apparently, or so R2-D2 clarified.
“I’m not in love with Finn!” Kylo burst out, probably too loudly, because a couple of mechanics looked his way. “Don’t be stupid,” Kylo hissed, lower.
R2 claimed that it was just like Kylo’s (Ben’s, actually, R2 refused to call him Kylo) parents and his uncle during the Rebellion. Just as irritating, too, the droid added. Organics were so frustrating.
That was far too much to unpack so Kylo ignored the implications. “What do you know about it? You’re just a droid.”
Even if Kylo hadn’t spent enough time around R2 growing up to learn binary, he could have inferred the droid was saying something rude from the tone alone. “I hope you don’t talk like that around the little droids.”
He couldn’t help but laugh at getting the binary equivalent of ‘fuck you’. He rapped the top of R2’s domed carapace. “Watch it. Don’t you have something better to do than make unwarranted accusations about my personal life?”
Kylo glanced across the hangar but Finn wasn’t there anymore. He wasn’t sure if that was good or not.
R2-D2 pointed out that it was his job to watch Skywalkers.
“Well, go watch another one, then.”
When the droid said Kylo was the Skywalker most in need of supervision, it was Kylo’s turn to say, “Fuck you,” and he walked out of the hangar.
R2-D2 followed him. Kylo ignored him.
-
“Why is this happening,” Kylo wondered aloud, not really expecting an answer. “What did I do to deserve this?”
“Fell to the Dark Side? Became a mass murderer?” Finn suggested.
Kylo acknowledged the point, but only in his head. He wouldn’t give Finn the satisfaction.
“Besides, what’s so bad about this? We’re not getting shot at, we’re not in immediate danger of being blown up. We might be chilly but hey, we’ve got double body heat.”
“That,” Kylo said. “That is exactly what’s bad.”
He thought he might have seen a holonovel with exactly this scenario lying around Uncle Lando’s rooms on Bespin. Huddling for warmth, he recalled the summary had said.
It was embarrassing. He was Kylo Ren. Defeated by a kriffing snowstorm.
An icicle was melting from the heat of the fire they had started deep within the cave and it kept dripping onto Kylo’s shoulder. He shifted, but that only brought him in closer contact with Finn, which was unacceptable.
Except for how it wasn’t. Kylo kept needing to force down images from his dreams.
Suddenly he was thinking about R2-D2. Damn it. That droid was psychotic and long overdue for a memory wipe. R2 didn’t know anything.
(What did his uncle have to do with his parents being stupid about being in love, anyway?)
“You didn’t have to help those people,” Finn said. “We would’ve made it off the planet before the storm hit if you hadn’t.”
“No, we wouldn’t have, because you would have stayed to help them.”
“You could’ve gone without me.”
“What’s your point?”
“My point,” Finn said very firmly, pressed somehow more surely against Kylo’s side, “is that the old Kylo Ren would absolutely not be stuck in this cave with me waiting for a snowstorm to pass.”
The icicle was still dripping. “The old Kylo Ren wasn’t so stupid.”
“He was pretty stupid,” Finn said, and then somehow he was kissing Kylo.
Wait. What the hell?
Finn’s lips were chapped and they were in an awkward position and… and Kylo pulled him closer, kissed him back until the breath turned sharp in his lungs and he needed to inhale. Finn smelled like sweat and he was far too close and this couldn’t be happening; it wasn’t happening.
“That was easier than I thought it would be,” Finn said. “I was half-expecting you’d Force choke me or something.”
“I still might,” Kylo said, but his voice sounded hoarse and he didn’t mean it. Why didn’t he mean it? He hated Finn, the lousy traitor. So what if he dreamed about burying himself in Finn’s thighs? Kylo was semi-reformed, not dead.
“Maybe I’d be okay with a little bit of Force choking. It might be fun.”
“Hell,” Kylo said, and vehemently didn’t think about it, or look at the gleam in Finn’s eye.
Instead, he… oh, damn it. R2 might have presumed too greatly but Kylo was maybe, possibly a little bit into Finn and so he took the opportunity to kiss him again. Wasn’t like they were going anywhere anytime soon. Might as well pass the time somehow.
He was much warmer now. So that was a plus, too.
They settled back again, their breathing a little quicker, a little heavier in the quiet cave. Kylo asked, “Are you going to tell me what all the hugging was for?”
Finn’s cheeky grin was still a little annoying. Maybe mostly because Kylo could admit now he thought it was hot. “My theory? Well, guess it’s proved now. Basically it comes down to redemption through the power of hugs. You know, like maybe you just needed a little love.”
Kylo stared at him. “Come on. Seriously. I was asking you seriously.”
“That was my serious answer.”
Kylo kept staring. Finn was still giving him that cheeky grin.
“Oh, fuck you,” Kylo said, and Finn laughed, his arm tight around Kylo’s waist.
End