Star Wars x Reader

From the Ashes (Kylo Ren x Reader)

The ash riddled air burned your lungs.

It was eerily silent around the temple. The only sound came from the roaring fires that were consuming the temple one fragment at a time. You had been in the surrounding area doing your daily morning routine of walking and meditation when you had heard the screams. You ran as hard as you could, until your muscles felt like snapping and your chest burned from your labored breathing. But you had been too late.

You were met only with fire and ash.

You had tried to find a way inside but it was impossible. Every entrance and exit was barred by a wall of flame. You knew it would not have mattered even if you had been able to enter the building. You had felt an emptiness around the building. The usual pulses and flexes that radiated from the other jedi students had disappeared. There was no one living left within the building.

You had hastily searched the area for any sign of an intrusion, a source to the tragedy that had taken place. But there were no traces of an outside party. No noise of any invading ships and the grassy fields showed no signs of an encroaching army. It had been an inside job.

You wandered to the mountain side and looked out over the grassy hills. You felt an emptiness within you, a void of feeling you had never before experienced. You should have wept, screamed at the skies, cursed those that had committed this crime...but you did nothing. You stared out over the tranquil scene before you, silenced and emotionless.

"It had to be done."

The deep voice broke you from you your trance and you turned to see a familiar tall figure.

"What do you mean it had to be done?" you asked. Your eyes widened as realization set in. "Ben you didn't-"

"I did," he stated. "I did and I would do it again if necessary." You shook your head in disbelief.

"How could you?" Your throat was tight and the words came out strained. "Why? Why would you do such a thing?"

"Because I was ordered too."

"Ordered to? By who?"

"By someone strong. Important." He closed the distance between you and took your hands in his. "Someone who has offered to teach us, to guide us in the ways of the dark. Someone that could make us more powerful than we could have ever thought possible." He looked into your eyes and you could see a dark excitement within them.

"No amount of power could be worth this." You broke away from him and gestured toward the inferno that was still raging in the distance. "Can't you see what you've done? You've destroyed everything! You destroyed our sanctuary. Our home. Our friends. Everything that Master Skywalker worked so hard to restore after it had been wiped out so many years before."

"It was nothing of importance. It was only a testament to the weakness that thrives throughout the galaxy," he stated. You strode back to him and gripped his arms.

"What have they shown you?" you asked in a heated whisper. "What could they have possibly shown you that justified this act? What could have instilled these vices within you?"

"They showed me what could be! What I could accomplish! What we could accomplish under their teachings. Limitless possibilities!" he said excitedly. "We could have whatever we want, do whatever we felt necessary if we deemed it as such. They showed me that everything I had grown to believe was true. That the darkness is superior in every way. It is validation in its purest form!"

"So all those times you spouted that nonsense, all your rantings and ravings to me about the dark side, you were serious?"

"Completely. And don't look at me like that! I know you believed it too even though you tried to convince yourself you didn't. I know you always felt it. The calling. That irresistible whisper beckoning to you." You looked at the ground and shook your head.

"No. No I didn't." He cupped your face in his hands and drew your eyes upward to his.

"You don't have to lie anymore," he said soothingly. "Not to yourself, not to me. You can speak freely now and take pride in the fact that you were right. That the dark is right, that it is the answer."

"It is not the answer I seek."

"It is the answer to the revenge you so desperately want."

You shook your head again. "Jedis do not feel things such as revenge."

"But you are no Jedi! Deep down you know this. You can feel the burning anger inside you. That hatred for the slavers that stole you from your home and killed your family. That hot need to make them pay for what they've done."

"No," you denied. "I have moved past that. I have learned to let go of those feelings and to look ahead. The past does not weigh me down."

"We both know that's not true," he argued. "You are not past it anymore that the day it happened. And you don't have to be ashamed of that. The dark welcomes those passions, as does our new master. He would aid you in the search of those that wronged you, not tell you to forgive them as we have been taught here."

You knew he was right. All the time you had spent here you had been trying to leave the past behind. You did everything you could to try and move past what had happened, you told yourself every day that it no longer affected you. But he was right. In the recesses of your mind you could always hear that voice calling you, telling you to seek them out once you were trained and capable of making them pay.

"I can see you considering it," he told you. "If you came with me you could rectify the wrong those slavers dealt you. You would never have to fear any slaver again."

"You mean I could exterminate them?" you asked. "Wipe out slavery in its entirety?"

"Better," he smiled, taking you by the shoulders. "You could control it."

"Control it?" you asked in confusion.

"Yes," he laughed. "You could turn the slavers into slaves themselves." He saw your eyes spark with interest and knew if he spoke carefully he would have you convinced within his next few sentences. "You could have them shackled and sold. Taken to the farthest outreaches only to work day in and day out. You could force them to endure the pain, the exhaustion, the unending suffering. What better punishment than that which they delivered upon others so easily?"

"Its possible?" you asked wide eyed. He smiled. You'd been persuaded.

"Yes. And so much more, you need just come with me." You looked at him and he could see a glimpse of that internal conflict tugging at you. He took your hands in his again and looked down at you. "You once told me that you'd follow me anywhere. That no matter where the universe took me, you'd be there by my side no matter what. You said we were destined for each other and that we would always be inseparable. Did you mean that?"

"Of course I did," you said, offended that he would question it.

"Then let's go. Our future awaits us." You let him lead you away by the hand towards a transport ship you could see in the distance. You looked back over your shoulder at your home for one last time. The flames were grasping at the sky, growing taller still. Even at this distance you felt the radiating heat. You realized now the fire was cleansing, burning away at everything that had been holding you back in order for you to rise from the ashes. You spoke, the words low and soft.

"My future awaits."

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I wrote this and Aftermath when The Force Awakens came out but there are like actually some similarities with some stuff that happened in the Last Jedi? No? Is it just me? It could just be me but whatever I think so lol