Darkness At Dawn • Kylo Ren [1]

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"Stars, hide your fires; Let not light see my black and deep desires."

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The only announcement of her arrival was a slight drop in the air temperature and the descent of absolute silence. Without turning Kylo knew she was there, pale in the shadows of the temple. She wasn't even near him yet but he knew she would find him soon, with the blood of her friends painted on his skin.

To come so close to pure love and lose it so violently is something no meditation or comfort could heal. In the half-light, Kylo looked like the shadow he had become as Elara entered the same room as him. It was impossible to even move her feet, she felt like her legs were heavy weights and every step she took felt like she had been impaled by glass.

"I'd like to assume you have an explanation." She spat dryly.

Kylo faced her, his mask on and his breathing metallic. "I told you to stay at the hotel."

"I chose not to listen." She stepped away from him when he took a step forward. "I felt a disturbance."

"I'm not surprised, listening isn't something you're good at." He took a long glide towards her, daring to touch her hand.

"How dare you even come near me." She screamed, tears running down her cheeks. "Spite you, you monster! You have the blood of your friends on your hands and you wear it like a medal!"

"Elara..." His eyes gleamed with pain though she couldn't see it. "I didn't want you to see this."

"I would of found out Ben!" She cried, her voice cracking.

"Don't call me that!" Kylo Ren yelled back, igniting his red lightsaber.

"Or what? You'll kill me?" Elara dared, testing herself.

Kylo's face fell and he turned away. "I couldn't even if you were to strike first."

Elara ignited her own purple lightsaber, her face messy with agony and sorrow. "Good because I will strike you down to avenge the lives you took from me, including my Ben Solo."

Kylo cringed, his shoulders slumping. "You cannot win."

Elara swung her lightsaber at Kylo, who immediately blocked himself by swinging his against it to protect himself from being cut.

"I loved you!" She screamed, kicking him in the stomach and pushing him away from her.

Kylo quickly got to his feet, darkness storming over him as he brought his hand to Elara and began to force choke her. "You don't think I knew? I was always in your mind Elara Jane, I saw everything and heard everything. Every time you had a memory of us, I saw it! I loathed it! I lusted it!"

Elara grabbed at her neck but it was no use, he was unstoppable. Her feet dangled in the air as she desperately tried to get out a word. "Y-you loved me back."

"I still do." He dropped her to the ground.

Elara slumped against the ground, heaving in all the air her lungs could take, but also sobbed out in crucial pain.

"I didn't want you to see me kill them, that's why I told you to stay behind. I didn't want you to know it was me." Kylo explained, pacing back and forth.

"You would've left me, thinking that I lost you to death." Elara scrambled to her feet. "But you are the killer!"

"Silence!" Kylo yelled.

"You killed Dez and Vega!" Elara pushed herself off the ground, smashing her lightsaber against his. "And Palace!" Another hit. "Dahlia, and Lennox!" She used the force violently, pushing him against the wall as she walked towards him. "You killed younglings Ben! They were just children, you are a mad man!"

Intrigued by her anger, he let her hurt him. "El..."

"You had countless nicknames for me!" She screamed. "How does a user of the dark side even have the heart to call me a nickname?"

Kylo brought his hands up to his mask, pulling it off so Elara could see his face. It was washed away with sweat and dark circles, his eyes a dark pair of brown beads, he looked insane. An accidental masterpiece. "Look at what I've become."

Elara dropped Kylo to the ground, looking at her hand as she stepped away from him. Darkness overwhelmed her light and she began to cry harder, screaming aggressively. "We did everything together!"

"We still could." Kylo attempted, pointing at her purple lightsaber. "You have that darkness inside of you."

"I will never betray the republic and your uncle!" She barked. "I'd rather die than become what you have."

On edge, Kylo began swinging his lightsaber towards her, only to be stopped by the blade of a blue lightsaber. Kentaro leapt in front of Elara, stopping his masters vengeance to kill. "Forgive me master but I can no longer be your apprentice."

"Kentaro!" Kylo yelled, thrashing his lightsaber as the three went back and forth, trying to harm one another. It only took a matter of minutes before someone went down and that was Kentaro, stabbed in the chest.

The scream that left Elara's lips echoed in Kylo's head and he knew that that sound would haunt him for the rest of his miserable life. He stepped back from the deathbed of his padawan and watched Elara hold the dying boy's head in her arms.

"I can't kill you." He confessed.

"I wish you would." Elara fell numb against the ground beside Kentaro. "You've taken everything I have learned to love."

Kylo looked around, waiting for some miracle to happen but the world was still. "Join me."

"Never."

"I love you Elara." He looked at her as he began to exit, leaving her traumatized. "I always will."

"If you don't leave now, I'll kill you." She divulged, swearing to herself that she would kill him one day.

Kylo took one final look at the young Elara Jane he fell in love with while Elara looked one final glance at the face of Ben Solo, the boy she fell in love with.