Confronting Fear

Reconciliation

So, take this night.
Wrap it around me like a sheet.
I know I'm not forgiven,
But I need a place to sleep.

This Night - Black Lab

Five hours after Ren's outburst, Rey found herself on a shuttle to Mustafar. She was wearing her normal clothes but had packed a gray cloak from the wardrobe. She had also traded in her ankle boots for the black knee high ones. Mustafar was hot and she would likely be grateful for the protection from the heat they would offer. Aside from the cloak her bag held a change of clothes from the wardrobe, a multi-tool that hadn't been confiscated when she came aboard the Steadfast, an electric torch, and a few various odds and ends. She had assumed, correctly, that there would be food and a medkit onboard.

An hour earlier Kylo had buzzed her and wordlessly led her to the hangar where they had boarded the shuttle. It was small and built for speed, of which she approved. The cockpit had two seats which led to a small lounge area with two bunks, one on either side and compartments for stowing gear. A door led to a tiny fresher. They had been in space for half an hour and were in lightspeed with the ship was on autopilot. Ren was still in the pilot's seat and neither had yet spoken.

I suppose since I technically caused this I should be the one to try and make peace. She still wasn't completely sure what had happened, it was all sort of a blur. One minute Kylo had been comforting her, then he was kissing her, and she was kissing him back. That was twice now he had comforted her in a time of crisis, though the kissing scared her. Not because she didn't like it, but because she did...

She had felt his rage and jealousy surface in the Force like a tsunami. She had tried to breach his mind but he had shut her out completely. He must have seen that she was thinking about Poe.

The young Jedi gathered her resolve and sat in the copilot's seat. "This mission isn't going to go very well if we don't speak to each other the entire time."

She was met with stony silence, both physically and mentally. She sighed and stood to go back to the lounge area when his gloved hand silently latched on to her wrist like a viper. "Why him?" he asked flatly.

"Kylo, it's not like that..."

Kylo stood abruptly, towering over her, occupying much of the cockpit. "Then what is it like? I kissed you and you thought of him. There's not many things that could be." He accused, his voice low but his body visibly shaking with fury as his grip on her wrist tightened.

"Kylo, you're hurting me! Please let me explain."

He relaxed his grip on her wrist, but did not let go. "It's true that Poe and me have gotten closer over the past year.... please let me finish." She admonished as he started to interrupt her. "It was never as serious as you seem to think it was. A few kisses is all. I like him, but not in that way, at least I don't think. I thought of Poe because I felt guilty for liking you kissing me more than I liked it when he did it. These feelings are so new and complicated."

Kylo dropped her wrist, feeling completely empty. "I'll make it simpler. This ordeal will be over soon and you can get back to him."

Rey rounded on him. "Oh, and you're going to try and tell me you haven't ever been with anyone else, Supreme Leader. What I have been doing this last year and who I have been doing it with is none of your business, or have you forgotten that we've been fighting on opposite sides of a war?"

Kylo chewed his lower lip. He wouldn't deny his past and the women that checkered it. While Snoke had forbidden most worldly pleasures, physical relationships were one of the few he did allow in the eventual interest of siring progeny, though romantic love was forbidden. After all, many of the teachings of the Dark Side were driven by passion. A few female officers had thought that sleeping with him would hasten their promotions, he thought it amusing to let them try.

That had all changed the second he saw Rey. She had occupied his thoughts so completely since they met that he hadn't taken notice of any other woman. "I haven't been with anyone in any way since I saw you on Takodana." He said through gritted teeth. He decided it would be easier to show her. He projected a series of images into her mind.

He showed her the way the sunlight touched her face on Takodana, how fierce she looked standing over him with her saber, and the way the light from the fire on Ach-To reflected in her dark eyes.

He told her how he ached to kiss her in the lift to the throne room.

He relived the betrayal he felt when she rebuked him after the battle and how he had mentally pleaded for her to come back before she shut the entrance ramp in his face on Crait.

When he opened his eyes he saw tears glistening in her's, her head hung low. "I didn't know you felt that way. As I said, all of this is new and confusing and terrifying to me. I have had more revelations thrust upon me in the last three days than the rest of my life combined, which is saying something. I've experienced emotions that I can't identify and feelings in combinations I never thought possible. Everything is jumbled together, I need time to sort it all out."

Kylo gently wiped the tears from her cheek with his gloved thumb as he used two fingers under her chin to gently lift her face forcing her downcast hazel eyes to meet his brown ones. He slowly leaned forward and pressed a single kiss to her forehead, allowing his lips to rest there. He silently vowed to himself that he would do whatever it took to make her choose him.

Deep within his soul, the Son of Darkness felt the tiny spark of light he had tried so desperately to extinguish fan into a flickering flame.