Keeping Your Promise

Wake-up Call

Summary: Who knew men's underwear could be so erotic?

Sleepy eyes peered around the mirror, examining the savaging which took new residence over your skin. All shapes and shades of dusk covered your prominences; one purpled puddle spanning your elbow, another three parallel over your side – one etching over your hip, another dripping over the curve of your rib cage, and the final fringing atop your deltoid in a russet starburst. A suggestion of a hand print fixed itself over your opposite shoulder, the bruise more vivid where your Commander's fingers had bitten into the muscle. The grisly sight continued below your waist, both your knees inked in injury, one blotch creeping upwards in memoriam of the joint's protrusions crashing against the floor. For once your neck remained free of the ghosted grip of Kylo Ren, the only evidence of him blending together in a patchy trail along your artery.

The tips of your fingers traced down the perforated contusions starting at the hinge of your jaw, drawing down the curve of your pulse, and ending at the proximal end of your clavicle; a violet twilight splayed beneath your touch, the memory of its fruition warming the tops of your cheeks. The reflection gave light to the faint lines which racked together over your wrists, the sight prompting the mindless rolling of the joint to test its range of motion. To any unsuspecting onlooker you appeared a survivor of a gruesome tale, one that indicated a battle with some ferocious creature; in a way, you thought, that wasn't completely false.

Every welt lingering over your skin, visible or not – the torment which your core had endured aching with each suggestion of movement – belonged completely to Kylo Ren. Last night he'd painted his own pain over your body, the ache of his anger obvious with even the slightest pressure over the affected areas. Though you knew this, knew that these marks were premeditated, you distantly regarded the comfort the echoed pain offered; while the night had been birthed in egregious wrath, its end offered a breath-stealing contrast.

In the full light of Kylo Ren's bathroom, you brought your hands together before you, the mirror falling out of focus as they turned over and brushed over each other's knuckles and tendons. The soft skin was painted with vestiges in the valleys between each knuckle, the sight reminding you of the intimacy which had created them, the irony of how a moment of such beauty could manifest in such an injurious manner lighting a spark at your spine. The frozen air of his quarters nipped at your bare skin, reminding you what had prompted you from the warm, yet vacated, covers: the search for clothing.

Waking up had been disorienting, jolting you past the haze of morning and into the acknowledgment of the unfamiliar environment. It felt hollow waking up alone, like you were on some separate plane of reality without Kylo's presence in his own bed. Out of habit, you'd gone to search for the time on your wrist, only remembering the timepiece's absence when its red-shining face didn't blind you in the shadows of early light, artificial in its existence, which framed the ceiling.

It had been too chaotic to get a good look at the Starkiller quarters last night, but as the frozen floor bit at your toes in your walk through the unfamiliar space, you noticed how mundane the provisions were. Everything lacked in comparison to the Finalizer, noting how the smaller rooms and shorter walls created a false sense of hominess; there was barely a kitchen, no dining table, and a hint at a sitting area – all of which blended together in various shades of similar blacks, greys, and whites. It felt uncomfortable to think that the Commander of the First Order lived in such normalcy and necessity when he wasn't killing innocents or training to do so.

A pile sat at the countertop's center, your uniform obvious at the top, the red embroidery prominent even in darkness. After a short search, you flicked on a light and padded towards it, crossing your arms as your breath shuddered through the cold air. It was a curious sight, your uniform folded into a frumpy square as your bra poked out from beneath the collar and your watch sat parallel above the red threading. Confused alarms sounded in your head, the fact that Kylo Ren had spent time collecting your belongings and compiling them into a neat pile making you doubt your consciousness, momentarily stopping to see if you had only been imagining the past few minutes.