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Chapter Text

Rey jogs to keep pace with Ben’s swift trot down the stairs. She refuses to think of him by any name other than Ben Solo, even when his clenched fists and stiff back shout Kylo Ren.

Where is he headed? Given his stony reception and what happened the first time she delivered herself to him, she wouldn’t be shocked by immediate escort to confinement or even interrogation.

So much for her fantasy that Ben would take her in his arms and whisper how much he missed her. Leia did try to caution her, but would Rey listen? No. Foolish, foolish girl. Foolish misplaced hope.

Painful bands tighten around her chest and her shoulders slump forward. Maybe this was a mistake. But if Ben doesn’t want her, then why did he offer a truce?

The stairs lead into a chamber with a vaulted ceiling and illuminated floor. The odd angles are imposing, severe, and stark white. She gapes. Is this the Supreme Leader’s personal suite? A crumpled mask stares from atop its pedestal and mars the clean, bright lines. Hairs rise at her nape. Is it a Sith artifact or an idol?

They whip past before she can ask.

Gah. What’s the kriffing hurry? Why the mad dash from the packed hall on Coruscant and through the destroyer’s echoing passages? Whether she’s chosen wrong or not, Rey belongs to the First Order now. She’s not going anywhere. She forfeited by her free will.

Not that it was a difficult choice, even with her friends’ objections. They meant well. They believed they had her best interests at heart, but in truth, it was no choice at all. Given a second chance to be with Ben, there was only one possible answer: yes.

Through how many of Ajara’s luminous nights did she lie awake on her pallet, worrying over Ben, heart sore with longing for him? How many hours did she run the course through the Ajan Kloss rainforest, practicing the few Jedi skills that Leia could recall from her training a lifetime ago? And to what end? That she might someday kill Leia’s son in battle? As if she could. What a farce.

The separation and loneliness, even her formation as a would-be Jedi, were simply filling the days until Ben changed his mind. Rey had asked him in Snoke’s throne room to call off the Order’s attack on the Resistance—and that’s what he’s done. At last.

So why isn’t Ben happier? Why is he so cold and unfeeling?

If only she could read him through the Force.

Rey follows Ben into an adjacent room—probably for training, considering the heavy padding that lines every surface. Does he mean to spar? A good bout could relieve the tension. If he refuses to talk it out, maybe they can fight it out. She wouldn’t mind matching him with quarterstaffs. Her fingers twitch in anticipation.

Ben slaps his palm to a hidden panel. A mechanism whirs and a sleek door slides forward and up, revealing not a hidden cache of weapons as she expected but a concealed port.

“Get in,” Ben growls.

Rey stoops to inspect the tight space. She straightens and folds her arms. “This is an escape pod.”

“It is.” Ben taps in a code. “You need to go. Before the Steadfast enters hyperspace. You can disappear on Coruscant. The pod holds a month’s rations and enough credits to see you through a standard year—if you’re frugal.”

He’s not making sense. Less than an hour ago, he stroked elegant letters beside his mother’s sweeping signature and guaranteed cessation of all hostilities against the Resistance, contingent on Rey’s surrender. Well, she’s here, isn’t she? Then, why would she leave?

Ridges tighten her forehead. “I don’t understand.”

“It’s the only way”—his arms drop to his sides—“to keep you safe.”

Rey swallows a scoff. No way did he agree to a ceasefire solely for her safety. What’s his secret motive? Is he trying to be rid of her? Was Poe correct that this is a political tactic? Does Ben want her to flee so that he can invalidate the treaty and blame the Resistance? Finn warned her not to trust Kylo Ren.

Except she does trust him. She wouldn’t be here otherwise. Rey narrows her eyes.

Ben tilts his head to meet her gaze. It’s the first time he’s looked at her since she swept into the grand hall beside General Organa. He couldn’t keep his eyes from her then, his stare devouring her length with such raw desire that her arms prickled beneath her wraps. She had complained that her new Jedi costume was impractical, but in that moment, she was grateful for the pristine white tabards crisscrossing her chest like a shield and falling in a graceful flutter around her calves.

To be fair, she drank him in with corresponding eagerness, her dreams and memories falling far short of the reality. Every cell in her body came alive at being near him, at sensing his signature in the Force. She wondered if he felt the same.

Apparently not.

Hunger doesn’t fill his eyes now. If only their bond were active and she could read his intent, but that connection slammed shut with the Falcon’s ramp and has remained mute since Crait.

“Hux was hunting you. The Knights were hunting you. I was hunting you to stay ahead of them.” His pitch drops. “You are hard to find.”

Smugness flares and Rey tamps it down. He never did find them. She was only lured out by an irresistible summons: himself.

Ben rakes thick fingers through his hair. “Publicizing the treaty will force them to leave you and the Resistance alone—or at least it will make any subterfuge far riskier.”

“I still don’t see how my escape will help.” Not that she intends to comply.

“It won’t.” He shrugs. “But they prize the air in their lungs too highly to dare question the Supreme Leader.”

She ought to be horrified by his implied threat, but the self-deprecating little snort that accompanies his shrug almost makes her smile.

Force-persuasion pummels Rey’s mind like Ahch-To’s ocean batters its islands. She staggers and grits her teeth under the assault. Stars, she forgot Ben’s strength.

“Enough talk.” He lowers his hand and the pressure ceases. “Get in.”

“That won’t work on me.” She raises her chin. Leia’s training may have been limited, but at least Rey learned to resist. “Not anymore.”

Something glints in his pupils. Temptation to meet the challenge perhaps? But the moment passes and he relents.

“Why must you make this difficult?” His shoulders bunch and he spreads open palms. “Just accept. Stay low and hide somewhere.”

Kylo Ren doesn’t back down, not from a fight, not from a challenge, and not from temptation. She blinks. Epiphany bowls over her like BB-8 careening out of control: Ben does care. He cares about her. He wants to keep her safe, just as he said. He’s never lied to her. He’s willing to do this, even if it means jeopardizing his authority. No matter how he might posture or dismiss her concern, his decision to release her will be questioned and challenged.

That means Rey was correct from the start. When she first heard his holonet broadcast calling for her surrender, her heart leapt like the Falcon for hyperspace. Hope flooded her veins with the certainty that Ben had changed. If that’s the case, then—

“Come with me,” she entreats, her tone low and soft.

“Rey.” His voice cracks like gravel underfoot, and his eyebrows pinch.

“The pod’s large enough for two.” It isn’t, but they’d manage and she wouldn’t complain.

He wets his lips. “Don’t do this.”

Didn’t she say something similar when they faced this moment before? If she presses a little harder— “We could leave it all behind.”

“I can’t.”

“We’d be together.” Her heart patters at what it would mean to disappear, the two of them, and live free from conflict and duty.

“Don’t you see? I must stay to protect you. If I desert the Order, Pryde or Hux will annul the treaty and drive the galaxy straight to chaos. Only my presence will prevent that.”

She nods. She does see, maybe not in the way that he means, but the commitment to peace implied by his answer is no less striking. He has become both Kylo Ren and Ben Solo, authority driven by compassion, and darkness wielded by light.

“Then let me stay too.” She’s not above begging. “When you asked, I—I wanted to take your hand.”

“I know.” The tenderness in his gold-brown eyes will break her, but he doesn’t extend his hand again.

Tears wet twin paths down her cheeks. “I’d rather die by your side than leave.”

“Go. Now.” His chin trembles. “Before it’s too late.”

“All these months wondering if you’re alive and how you’re doing”—she sniffles and shakes her head—“about killed me. I can’t return to living like that.”

“I’ll find you. I promise. When everything is over, I’ll find you.”

If there’s ever an end. If he survives. If she does. If he still wants her. If they can even find each other in the wide, wide galaxy. She’s drowning in ifs.

“Wait for me, Rey.” His words spark and catch in the dry tinder of her soul.

“No.” Her nails bite into the meaty flesh at the base of her thumbs, the pain a distant grounding, and she looms into his space—or tries to, given their height difference. “I waited all my life for my parents to return. I counted each day and carved them into the Hellhound’s skin. I starved. I nearly died from waiting. Literally.” She enunciates each word in sharp staccato. He had better understand. “I will not do it again. I refuse. Don’t you dare ask.”

Ben stands motionless, save for his perceptive eyes, which scan between hers. If only their bond were open that he might know the intensity bordering on desperation within her soul.

Rey lowers to her heels, unlocks her fists, and steps back. A red square on the control pad pulses like a beacon. Her fingers brush across to cancel the launch protocol. The door whirs closed and nestles back into the wall, appearing as no more than another padded panel. That knowledge might come in handy later.

“I’m staying,” she announces. “Besides, the Resistance expects me to stay. The First Order expects me to stay. Thanks to your holonet stunt in the treaty hall, the entire karking galaxy expects me to stay.”

He grunts. “I won’t go back on my word, if that’s what you fear. I won’t hunt the Resistance, even if you leave.”

“Is that what you think?” She plants her hands at her hips. “That I surrendered to save the Resistance?”

His nostrils flare. “Didn’t you?”

“The Resistance tried to dissuade me. They said you were up to no good and feared what you would do. They’d rather lose a war of attrition than hand over their ‘last Jedi.’ They might have stopped me forcibly if they thought they could. Your”—better not antagonize with the ‘mother’ label—“General Organa only conceded as signatory because I informed her in no uncertain terms—”

“That must have gone over well,” he mumbles.

“I informed her that I would surrender to you with or without her permission or support.” She arches her eyebrows in punctuation.

The black-clad planes of his chest surge with his breathing. If she rests her palm over his heart, will she find it beats as fast as hers? She ignores the urge.

“Ben.” She studies his expression, the long angles of his countenance rigid with some emotion. “Let me—” Help you teeters on her tongue, but she stops.

She offered that in the Supremacy’s lift the first time she came to him, but help was tangled with turning him back to the light. That was before. Before she tasted what it was to fight beside him, to revel in the rush of light and dark Force pulsing through their bond like an artery. Before she was compelled to live long months without him. Before the darkness in her soul confronted her with her own naivety. Before she spent fruitless hours meditating and pleading with the Jedi to be with her. Their silence revealed the truth: the only Force-user she truly desires is Ben.

“Let me be with you.” She reaches toward his face. “I want to be with you.”

Her palm hovers, cupping the camber to his jaw and asking wordless consent.

He leans into her hand, his cheek warm and stubbled. His eyelashes lower and an exhale drags from his lungs. Oh, the wonder of touching him! Her thumb traces the corner of his mouth, each pass drawing an inarticulate sound from his depths. A thrill tingles along her limbs.

Her other hand sinks into the dense locks at his nape, and she massages the back of his head. He sags a little, as if his knees have turned boneless, but not enough to lower him to her height. Bracketed as he his between her hands, if she tugs him down and stands on tiptoe, she could kiss him. She wants to kiss him. He needs the certainty that she’s here for him and him alone.

But Ben collapses backward against the training room’s cushioned wall. Maybe it’s all too much?

He slides toward the floor, long legs folding and then stretching before him. Rey straddles his thighs and follows, unwilling to let go. She drops onto her knees, pulls him forward, and tucks his head beneath her chin.

His arms close around her back, and he yields to her embrace. How long has it been since someone held or touched him with gentleness or anything approaching kindness, let alone love? The thought prompts fresh tears.

“I’m here. I’ve got you,” she croons. “You’re not alone.”

His shoulders, broad and thick though they are, shudder beneath her arm.

Her fingertips stroke along his scalp and her lips press into his crown, already damp with her quiet weeping. Rey inhales, closes her eyes, and nuzzles deeper. His scent is all Ben, her heart, her hope, her home. At last.

Happiness purer than anything she’s known radiates through her being. She revels.

Until their mute connection in the Force demands her attention like the discomfort of a limb that has gone numb. She frowns against Ben’s black mane. Even if their bond is hobbled, at least they’re together. She’ll be grateful for that much.

It has to be enough.

It has to.

Chapter Text

Kylo stares at the ceiling above his sleeper, a palm pillowed behind his head. He loves how Rey’s lips shape his real name. Sometimes fierce, sometimes soft, but always purposeful. What a contrast to Snoke, who forbade speaking it aloud. He never ceased to be Ben Solo, not in his heart of hearts, no matter how many times he denied it. He sees that now. In the same way, Kylo Ren never became his full identity and only represented one facet to his nature.

Someday he’ll go by Ben Solo again but not yet, at least not outside the privacy of their quarters or the sanctity of their bond and not while his authority remains tenuous in the First Order.

He crosses then uncrosses his ankles. He can’t sleep. Maybe it’s the usual insomnia. More likely it’s due to Rey’s presence in his sleeper. She insisted a mattress this large was meant to be shared and wouldn’t hear of him returning to the lounger in his receiving room. He only argued long enough to verify she was sincere.

His head lolls to take in her form mounded beside him. She’s near enough to cast body heat without touching, much to his disappointment. What did he expect? Snuggling wasn’t likely, given they’ve both slept alone and alert all their lives.

Except Ben craves more. The way she held him when he fell apart in the training room? He was mortified, yes, and heat scorched his ears. But he wants that again. He wants her lips, her hands, her heart. He wants it all. Greedy man.

She pried the cover from his soul, only to expose the void within. He’s a bottomless pit, yawning with need. He’ll swallow her whole. In sending her away, he meant to ensure her safety and protect her, yet here she is sharing a sleeper with her greatest threat. Him. He sighs.

The linens have slipped, revealing her delicate collarbones bordered by his black thermal. Would tracing his fingertips along the neckline wake her? What if he leaned over and kissed each freckle? Ben has always viewed possessions with indifference—it’s the Sith way and the Jedi before that—but on Rey, his sweater is a treasure he’ll cherish forever. Who knew it would stir him to see her wearing his clothes?

He ought to have requisitioned a proper wardrobe, but he never planned for her to stay. He never dreamed she might, thinking only that she would secure her beloved Resistance and then leap at the first chance to leave. At this point, Rey was to be far, far away from the Order, safe from Pryde, Hux and the Knights and hidden from the mysterious Force-presence lurking in the Unknown Regions.

But he wasn’t strong enough.

Weak, echoes in his mind. Bested by a girl who had never held a lightsaber.

Ben turns onto his side, tugs the coverlet over his shoulder, and pulls it tight against his chest. The voice is only a memory. A bad one, but a memory nonetheless. Snoke can’t torment him any longer.

You failed. There’s too much of your father in you.

Switch off! Ben screams in his mind and squeezes his eyelids shut. He won’t think about Han Solo. He’s won’t. Recalling that betrayal only sends him spiraling into darkness. He curls around his clutched fists, but it doesn’t stifle the agony.

Let go of the past. Kill it if you have to, he said once. What irony. He tried, but his past casts long shadows, and he can’t kill a shadow. Is he destined to be haunted forever?

His taut muscles shake the sleeper. He’s going to wake Rey.

He slows his breathing and forces his fingers to unclench. No matter how much Ben might wish otherwise, he can’t change his past. He can’t bring his father back. But at least Snoke is dead, his signature dissolved from the Force just as his body dissolved from existence. Even if the voice in his head sounds real, it can’t be Snoke.

Yet if Ben is honest, he can’t deny the judgment rings true. He has failed. He’s failed Rey—failed them both. He should have prevailed. If he couldn’t persuade her, then he should have loaded her into the pod against her will. That would have been better. She’s too good, too innocent, too hopeful. She can’t know what she’s chosen—whom she’s chosen.

But, oh—

To have her near, in his life, in his suite, in his sleeper? Did he ever have a choice? Confronted with her presence, with beauty as radiant in person as in the Force, how could he send her away? He’s deceiving himself to believe he could.

Call him a coward, call him selfish, but he never wishes to be parted from her again. Even the lounger a room apart is too far, despite assuring her that he’s slept in worse conditions—which he has—but never with the other side of his soul beckoning like a siren.

Maybe minutes pass. Maybe hours. What is time in her presence? Ben doesn’t check the chrono. The ache in his hip demands a change in position, but he won’t look away. Who needs sleep? Sleep is overrated. He could lie here and watch her forever.

The low light brushes her cheeks with dusky color. Her eyelashes flutter open. “Ben?”

Kriff, all his sighing and tossing must have woken her.

“You okay?”

He isn’t, but he won’t admit it. He grunts. “I didn’t mean to disturb you.”

She presses her palms together and pillows her cheek on the back of her hand. “Can’t sleep?”

“Something like that.” His lips quirk, though not quite into a smile. How long has it been since he smiled? The impulse is foreign. Even in the wake of dark thoughts, she makes him happy. “I’m glad you stayed.”

“I am too.” She doesn’t suffer his restraint and grins wide, her teeth bright in the dim chamber. “How about that ‘midnight repast’ you mentioned?”

Never mind that midnight is long past. Since they departed late in Coruscant’s afternoon, she’s devoured an astonishing quantity of food, no less than two meals, three desserts, and one bedtime snack. Humor bubbles in his throat. “How can you be hungry?”

Her lips draw into a pout. “But you have so much.”

“You’re right,” he says. He’s being insensitive to the food insecurity she was vulnerable enough to confess over dinner. He did promise she could eat anytime she wanted, even the middle of the night cycle. “What would you like? I’ll bring something to the sleeper. Ever tried Chandrilan steamed milk? It’s helpful when you can’t sleep.”

“You’re the one who can’t sleep.” Her fingers worm beneath the covers and collide with his forearm. “I’m not hungry. Not really.”

He knows what she wants, even without her saying it, even without their bond to tell him. He rolls onto his back, withdraws from her touch, and folds both arms across his stomach. “I can’t, Rey.”

She wants their bond restored. She wants the wall broken down. She wants the current of thought, sensation, and emotion that they shared until they cut it off in a moment of mutual crisis.

He’ll never forget. The last time their bond opened, he was kneeling inside Crait’s fortress, humiliated by Luke’s Force-projection and incensed at Rey. His mother’s Force-signature lingered with her scent of candlewick blooms while he cradled his father’s golden dice, still dented from his teething.

Rey stared, her tumult of emotion bleeding through their bond: compassion, sorrow, determination, pity. He couldn’t bear it, especially not her pity. He channeled the pain and anger into his grip on the Force and choked their link the same way he’d like to choke Hux’s pasty neck. Severing the connection might be impossible, but the Force ceased to flow between them.

Then the dice vanished, evaporated like every good in his life—including Rey, who had refused him and left him unconscious aboard the foundering Supremacy. He should be inured to betrayal by now.  

If he lets go, she’ll see it all: the darkness, the brokenness, the weakness, every way he’s failed and fears to fail still. He’ll be exposed before her, more naked than if he removed his clothes. Not that he would object to the latter.

And that’s not even considering she might be sucked in and consumed by the “too much” that defines his life. Too much anger for his parents. Too much darkness for Luke. Too much light for Snoke. The bond was unavoidable when their souls were joined against their wills, when they fought the connection for all but a few moments reaching across the galaxy and battling Snoke’s Praetorian guard. But to enter into soul-deep intimacy by choice?

“Don’t you see?” Weariness makes her voice sharper than usual. “We’re together now. There’s no reason to hold back any longer. Aren’t you exhausted?”

He is, but his lips thin to a line. He was weak in indulging their mutual desire for her to stay. He must be strong to resist reopening their bond.

“I’m sorry, Rey,” he says, and he means it.

“If our bond survived Snoke’s death and it has, then he must have lied about creating it.” She tucks a loose tendril behind her ear. “If the Force did it, then maybe our souls are meant to unite. Maybe that’s how we’re supposed to live. Maybe that’s the reason we’ve been drawn to each other all along.”

He snorts. “Or maybe that’s wishful thinking.”

Although, it’s partly true. Because he was drawn to her in the forest on Takodana. She fascinated him, thrilled him, excited him. He longed to explore her mind—for the map to Skywalker at first—and then for the loneliness he recognized as his own, for her strength in the Force, and for the brilliance with which she shines. Yes, she draws him—with the inescapable gravity of a celestial body.

“Please, Ben,” she whispers. “Try. For me.”

An invisible cord pulls taut and cuts into his heart. His rough swallow echoes in the quiet room. “I can’t.”

The light gutters in her eyes, and it stabs straight through his gut. Maker, please. Don’t let her hope die because of me.

How can Ben explain? How does he bare his soul enough to convince her?

“I wish we could. I wish it were that easy,” he begins. “But the scars in my flesh are nothing to the scars on my soul. That wound is like an all-consuming black hole. It takes and takes and never gives back.

“I’ve done terrible things. I live with their weight every day. It’s crushing. I don’t know what it would to take to heal. I don’t know if healing is possible. But I sure as hells know that I won’t burden you with it.”

“Maybe that’s the answer.” Her eyes brighten. “Maybe that’s the key to finding peace and healing in the Force. That we do it together.” She rolls onto an elbow and her chin adopts its stubborn jut. “I was abandoned by my parents. I raised myself. I’ll always be an outsider to the Resistance. They live by a set of rules I never learned. But with you? I don’t care how much Luke feared the dark side—”

Ben scoffs. “For good reason.”

“With you, I’m home. You’re my belonging, Ben. Dark? Light? I’m not afraid.”

“You should be.” He knows too well the dark’s power to corrupt and destroy—and what it’s cost him.

“They’re both the Force, and it’s what we do with the Force that matters. You said yourself that you must stay to protect the galaxy from your rogue commanders.” She stabs a finger into his chest hard enough to make him wince. “That’s because you care, Ben Solo. Because no matter how much you deny it, compassion beats in that big heart of yours.”

“Don’t make me into something I’m not.” How can she see good in him or find anything to value in his blighted soul? Yet he can’t deny her optimism buoys him and ignites a flicker of hope. He catches her hand before she pulls away, tugs her finger toward his mouth, and kisses the tip. “You’re amazing, you know that, right?”

She waggles her eyebrows. “You’re going to let me in, right?”

Then it hits him: he’s a fool to think he could keep her out, just like he was a fool to think he could accept her surrender and then send her away. Because this was never about her surrender at all; his capitulation was inevitable. Maybe he’ll regret this and it will be their undoing. Maybe she’s correct and this will transform them. But if he’s honest about his fears, then he should be honest about his desire—that he longs to reunite as much as she does, come what may.

“Yes,” he says.

She squeals and scrambles closer, tangling the linens around their legs, until she balances on one elbow and hovers half above him. The sparkle in her eyes is infectious. “Truly? What do we do?”

She’s so eager that he can’t resist a tease.

He grins. “Kiss me.”

Her eyebrows arch high. “What?”

He taps his lips.

Her nose crinkles, hopefully more in suspicion than distaste, but she hauls her body up his. He won’t be distracted by identifying which curves exactly are pressing into his ribs. He won’t. She leans over, and their lips meet.

He never knew what living was until this moment: all soft skin, hot breath, and the clash of teeth. His hand cups the back of her neck to angle her head just so—and yeah. This. Coherent thought evaporates. He could grow accustomed to this.

It doesn’t last long, and she pushes away. Crimson splotches ride high on her cheeks, every bit as rosy as her fresh-kissed mouth. She levers against his chest and her brow puckers. “Did that work? I still don’t sense you through the bond.”

He folds an elbow behind his head, the picture of ease, and battles the smirk vying to split his face. To hells with it. Who cares if he grins from ear to ear?

“Did you like it?”

“Kissing you? Of course I did, you nerfherder. But what about the bond?”

“That has nothing to do with the bond,” he says. “I just wanted to kiss you.”

She punches his shoulder. “Ben Solo, you—you—”

His mother used to take that tone with his father, and it sobers him at once. He sighs.

She taps his nose. “You know you don’t need an excuse to kiss me?”

He nods. “Fine. Reopening the bond should be something like removing a tourniquet so the blood can flow again.”

She hums and nestles down into his side, her temple resting in the hollow at his shoulder. He moves his arm around her back to hold her. She fits against him like she’s always belonged, a piece that was missing, both comfortable and comforting. Does she feel the same? Hasn’t she already said as much?

She exhales, quiet and long, and sinks deeper into him. The shift in Force registers before she speaks. It’s like sunrise through a dark curtain, a subtle rise in temperature and a glimmering around the edges.

“I did it. I let go. I opened my side.” Her fingers pluck at his black sleeping tunic. “Your turn.”

Ben pulls his hand from behind his head, stills her fingers, and flattens her palm over his chest.

“Your heart is racing,” she says.

The darkness within him clamors to be free, like a chained beast slavering for prey just beyond reach. Without Snoke to stoke Ben’s rage, he achieved better control and is no longer prone to burst into destructive frenzy. But to loose his darkness into Rey’s hands? He trusts her, yes, but he doesn’t want to hurt her.

“Rey,” he says. The thunder continues unabated beneath their joined hands.

“You’re still holding on,” she quotes in gentlest reproof. “Just let go.”

Ben visualizes a tight band constricting the flow of Force between them. Apart from flashes of light and heat, he can’t see her side, but on his, darkness has built and pooled until it bulges like an aneurysm threatening to rupture.

He sucks a deep breath and snips the band. The pressure releases, and relief is instantaneous. That wasn’t so bad. Why was he afraid? He starts to exhale—

And light blinds him, so bright that he can’t breathe. Radiance blasts through him and sets fire to his veins. Every shadow flees. He’s burning from the inside. Oh, Force, what sweet agony! If he must die, this is the way to go. But what about Rey?

He clutches at her. Her fingers scrabble for purchase in his chest, and she clings to him.

When the burning and brilliance recede, she’s there, in his arms, his heart, and his soul. Her Force within him is soft, warm and bright. His Force within her is strong, cool and dusky. They’re balanced. Controlled. All struggle ended. Their souls are at rest.  

His heart slows with his respiration. Peace settles over him—over them. She feels the same.

Her light has joined with his light. His dark has merged with her dark. Both sides of the Force move unimpeded through their bond, coursing like lifeblood between them, circulating with strength and vitality, and uniting them in power and purpose.

This is no ordinary Force-bond. No, this is something he’s never seen or studied before. Maybe what they share is something new. They were granted a foretaste in Snoke’s throne room when they battled the guards, but even those heady moments can’t compare to their connection now.

This is how they were meant to be. They were made for this—formed for each other. Rey was right.

I usually am. Her tone burbles like a sunny brook within his mind.  

This is the future they both saw when their fingers met across the stars, the one they parried in the turbolift. She did turn. She left the Resistance and came to stand with him. He turned too, with her help, not to the light or to the Jedi, but to a balance that neither could foresee. Their only mistake was in assuming their visions conflicted. Here and now, in the union of their souls, they have stepped onto the path to wholeness and to fulfilling their true purpose, which will unfold, he is confident, in a glorious becoming.

Ben marvels, sweeps aside her messy locks tumbling over his shoulder, and traces a finger down her cheek. How beautiful she is. How blessed to hold her in his arms. Warmth blooms at her temples under his unspoken praise. She knows all that is within his heart as he knows hers—and she accepts him as he is: conflicted, wounded, battle-scarred. More than that, her love and desire perfectly mirror his.

“Ben,” she murmurs and tries to hide her blush in his sleep shirt.

“Shh, sweetheart.” He presses his lips to her forehead. There’s no need to be ashamed. This is only the beginning.

Whatever must be faced—Pryde, Hux, the First Order, the malevolence in the Unknown Regions, or even the healing that remains to be forged within their own souls—they will meet each challenge together.

Beyond that, bright hope stretches—filled with children, family, and every good thing—like the shimmering Chandrilan beach that fronts the Silver Sea and dissolves in the haze of distance.

“I love you.” He tugs Rey closer, as if their bodies could nest within the other as do their souls. “I will always choose you.”

Her cheek tightens against his chest as she smiles into their shared vision. “Was there ever any other choice?”