Let The Past Die (Kylo Ren x reader)

1. Bring Him Home

I felt the heat before I saw the flames. The younglings' screams did nothing to ease my rushing heartbeat. I couldn't fathom what had happened that caused such echos of pain and terror to bounce between the walls. My legs carried me through the short hall, down towards the main body of the temple as thunder roared above. I pushed open every door on the way, desperate to see everyone - anyone - out safely.

The sky was covered in a blanket of stars and galaxies, slowly overshadowed by a raging red storm. I spotted Tai outside the wide-open entrance, cloaked in the night, the dark grass lit aflame by lightning strikes. His eyes were crazed and his jaw clenched as he helped Voe carry Hennix away in the dark. The Quarren padawan hung limp in their arms.

"Get to the Verity!" I heard him shout.

Girsig Varik came running from the other end of the temple, as if shot from a blaster. Blood had stained her green Twi'lek skin. She grabbed my wrist and pulled me along with her in the other direction.

"There's rubble- I- You gotta help me, I can't get them out!" she cried.

"Show me!"

Bolting down the other hall I tried to still my mind in preparation. Now was not the time for trepidation; fear had to wait. I knew Girsig to be a skilled Jedi apprentice already, despite her young age, but seeing the look on her face as we arrived at the blocked door in question, I could not fault her failure. An enormous stone column had somehow cracked and sealed off one of the chambers in its fall. My racing heart made itself known again, pounding in my ears.

"We can't leave them" Girsig begged, her eyes wide.

"We won't." I shocked myself with how calm I appeared, my voice way too steady for how I was truly feeling on the inside.

I reached out a hand, keeping master Skywalker's voice in my head; I tried to call to him, alert him to our aid, but there was no response. In the corner of my eye I saw Girsig reach out her hand as well, taking deep breaths, tears rolling down her cheeks. Gravel rolled out from under the pillar and back past our feet, and the column itself began to shake where it was lying on the ground. I felt my muscles tense up from the continued straining, the Force taking its toll on my body, and I lost all sense of time. Finally the stone obstacle began to drift towards us, pulled by our combined invisible efforts. A spark of hope filled my chest. We could do this! Just a few inches more, and the younglings inside would be free.

More of the rocks in the foundation cracked around us. I heard it, felt it, as if the whole temple was crumbling around us, threatening to crush and trap every last one of us in here. Nothing made sense. This storm didn't make sense.

"Look out!"

A sudden, hard push flung me to the side and broke my Force connection. I landed on my hip on the unyielding floors, pain shooting through me. My bare arm scraped against the sharp stone pieces covering the ground as I was sliding across it, and I cried out involuntarily. Once my body came to a halt, I tried to lift myself up to a sitting position, but every time I tried to turn my hips, that intense bolt of pain restrained me. The whole inner ceiling above me was lit ablaze now, and glowing embers started falling all around me, scorching my skin.

"Girsig!" I looked towards where she had stood a mere few seconds ago. "No no no no no!" The ceiling had finally come down, leaving an almost too perfect circle up top. Girsig was pinned underneath it all, flames rising on top of her.

There was no holding back the panic any more. It consumed me from the inside as I felt my face turn wet. I reached out with my feelings towards her, and the air was immediately punched out of my lungs. I was too exhausted. I couldn't sense if she was alive or dead. The latter just couldn't be true, but she wasn't moving either.