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Kylo stormed through the doors to his chambers. Enjoying the sound as they snapped shut in Hux’s face. The wretched cur was nipping at him about something or another, probing, pushing, trying to put him at a disadvantage. He was exhausted and the last shreds of his, already tenuous, grasp on his temper disappeared when Hux approached.
Catching a glimpse of himself in the window’s reflection the thought crossed his mind that he needed to trim his hair soon. It had become a liability during his during training session this morning dripping sweat into his eyes and obscuring his vision at an inopportune moment. At the time he’d allowed a long-buried childhood memory to guide his hands through the ritual of plaiting the top half into Alderaanian battle braids.
He strode angrily to his wardrobe, dropping his mask, gloves, and clothing in a trail behind him. He jerkily pulled on a butter soft under shirt and some loose comfortable sleeping pants, irritated with his momentary lapse into sentimentality, but still somehow reluctantly unwilling to take the plaits out.
He snatched up the decanter of Corellian brandy and a glass as he walked by the side table in his sitting area and proceeded to drop bonelessly into a padded chair that was almost large enough to be a couch. He filled the glass nearly to the brim with the potent spirit. Sleep pulled at him from behind tired eyes as he propped his feet up on the matching ottoman, but he knew it was not to be, he hasn’t slept more than an hour at a time since Crait.
He’s always had problems sleeping, even as a baby he would have constant nightmares any time he closed his eyes. With Snoke gone, the normal nightmares no longer happened, which just reinforced his suspicion that they’d been pushed into his brain, but new images had taken their place.
He sipped at his brandy relishing in the burn as it slid down his throat. The initial pain, rage, and grief from that moment had settled into a numbness he couldn’t escape, the burn of the alcohol let him pretend that he could have those feelings again if he wanted, rather than this lifeless existence.
He relished the idea of sitting here and getting drunk, but in reality, it was a spectacularly stupid idea. The results of alcohol on force abilities were unpredictable, and he was already too on edge to add another incendiary piece to the churned-up minefield of his recent behavior.
He thinks back to before it all went numb, the burn of anger in his chest built on a foundation of miserable grief from the events on Crait. “Grief is weak, YOU are weak” a memory of Snokes voice whispers in his head.
Once again, he’d been rejected.
Staring up at her from his kneeling position on the floor of the office in the resistance base was like a stab in the guts. Filled with an all too familiar feeling of miserable longing, which he was positive was echoed in his face, while he watched her close the door to the Falcon. Echoing all the times he watched Han close the Falcons door leaving him behind as a child.
He momentarily tortures himself, thinking that the small hesitation he saw in her as she’d stared back had meaning. Nevertheless, she firmed those beautiful lips and closed him out, leaving him to go play politics with Leia.
Politics had always been more important than her son, the bitter and familiar sting of that thought brought him a strange comfort.
He refilled his now empty brandy glass and used the force, floating the decanter back to where it belonged.
The warmth from the alcohol spread through him, temporarily lifting the numb blanket from his emotions.
His head is so quiet now, with his voice being the only one inside it. Memories overtake him intertwined with scraps of old songs that dance through his brain, echoing loudly in the empty amphitheater of his mind.
“No time for rest, no pillow for my head, nowhere to run from this, no way to forget..” He’s hopeful the Brandy can help him into a state of empty sleep and keep the new nightmares at bay…or worse, the dreams filled with fantasies of her delicate bare skin and breathy moans.
“Tired soldiers in this war, remember what we’re fighting for…” Brief flashes of the times they’d come together in battle: that night in the forest, how she fought back against his probing interrogation and in turn unearthed his own fears, how she had the astonishing reflexes to take a shot at him the first time the force bond connected them. Had they been in the same physical space he might not have survived. He felt equal parts proud of her for her reflexes and appalled at his lack.
“Meet me on the battlefield, even on the darkest night, I will be your sword & shield, your camouflage, and you will be mine” The long look between them after the decisive stroke which cleaved Snoke in two. The quicksilver and nearly wordless information being passed between them through their force bond, as she stood up holding his grandfather’s lightsaber. Turning as one, solid in their connection, to face the oncoming Praetorian Guard together as a team, partners in a deadly dance. Such a partner she was! He savored the memory of it, the flow of battle, furious and strong, the feel of her body as she laid along his back, her hand brushing his thigh as she grabbed his hip bracing herself to deliver a brutal kick to their opponents. Truly he had felt as if they were extensions of each other as they battled.
“Our tainted history, is playing on repeat” He shivers remembering the moments with her in the elevator leading up to the fight in the throne room. He was staring down at her face, her turned up gaze filled with hopeful conviction. Her lips looked so soft, he wonders what they would taste like…he remembers her whispered offer “It’s not too late Ben, I’ll help you” the memory of his old name falling from her lips sends shivers down his spine. He hates it when people use that name, Snoke had even created a standing order that no one was to ever use it again, oddly he doesn’t mind when she says it. He recalls again how delicious and soft her lips looked. He should have kissed her then like he had been oh so tempted to do.
These thoughts were pushing his mind into dangerous territory, the nightmares were infinitely preferable to the other dreams.
Dreams of silky skin, loose hair on his pillow, and a feeling of completeness. Waking up from those dreams to cold reality hurt more than any nightmare his mind might conjure.
He wrenched his thoughts to a darker path, a new song now threading through his thoughts.
”She told me that I’m not enough” He remembers begging her to join him, the trembling “Please” he whispered as he reached out his hand. Her hesitant hand coming up, a flare of hope in his chest, which dies savagely at her betrayal, as she tries to call the lightsaber to her hand instead.
“She left me with a broken heart. Fooled me twice and it’s all my fault” The remembered pain as he kneels abandoned in the resistance office alone after she has left him, yet again.
“She cut too deep and she left me scarred” He reaches up and gently strokes the scar that bisects his cheek and trails down onto his chest. The image of her standing over him, a gorgeous look of righteous rage on her face, as his own face and shoulder burned where she had sliced him open, struggling with herself against delivering a fatal blow.
“Now there’s too many thoughts going through my brain” He vividly recalls all the force bond visits between them, and the words she spoke “Monster!” “Murderous snake!” the feeling of disappointment that she too sees the monster he has forced himself to become. Unfortunately, he also recalls the other parts of those visits, her disquiet at seeing his bare chest during the visit that interrupted his morning routine. She was lucky that his chest was the only bare skin showing, had the force connected them 5 minutes prior she would have gotten a much more shocking eyeful. That final visit before she came to him, “I’d never felt so alone”, the feel of her fingers brushing his across time and space as the firelight cast golden light onto her bare shoulders.
“I can’t let go. Feeling like I sold my soul” He remembers his struggle in the throne room, to remain impassive as Snoke rung screams of pain from her, floating above where he was kneeling. His conviction that her torture made Snoke his true enemy. He remembers the dart of pain he felt when he was standing over her, unlit lightsaber in his hand, those tear-filled beautiful eyes staring into his own. He could see the despair and pain cross her face as she truly starts to believe he will strike her down.
“Taking these shots like it’s Novocain” She’d LEFT HIM, just like all the others. He curses violently and throws the last of the brandy down his throat. While it didn’t completely sooth the sting from the memory of her rejection, it helped smooth it over, like a bacta patch for his tortured soul.
His fist tightened around the glass, and he tensed his muscles preparing to throw it violently at the wall, desperate to get some sort of relief from the pain through its destruction, but he stopped. Destroying the glass would only result in a mess to clean up later. He removed it from temptation by floating it over to the decanter.
He still felt whispered shadows of her through their connection on occasion. Neither of them had any control over the force bond connecting them, but so far it had scaled itself down to the feeling of occasional touches of fingers on his skin, gentle whispered words just out of hearing range, and the ever present FEEL of her in his brain through their bond. He wondered what, if anything, she got on her end.
Did she feel it when he drank until his head spun to try and sleep?
Can she tell when he’s longing for her to whisper his name again in that intimate way she had?
Does she feel the other things that he sometimes does in the dark of night to try and find some relief from her memory, and push him over the edge into sleep?
Can she feel his hand now brushing on her own skin as he slides it down into his pants, or hear his voice as it moans her name in guttural tones when he comes in his fist like an adolescent boy with his first crush?
His eyes slip closed as his whole body relaxes from the combination of alcohol and climax. This time his body doesn’t bother to fight the tide of sleep as it rolls over him.
His last thought was that he wished she were here with him, so he could pull her down to sit sideways across his lap, wrap his arms around her, and tuck her head under his chin. She would fit so perfectly against his chest, and he’s positive that he would be able to sleep peacefully and deeply with her in his arms, safe and warm.
Though his mind is too far gone into slumber to feel the warm weight of her settle into his lap, or the phantom fingers gently stroke his scalp along the braids, his body reacts to the scent and feel of her, relaxing tense muscles and letting out a contented sigh. “Rey”
Rey padded quietly into her room, hair still wet down her back from her shower. She was in a comfortable pair of sleep shorts and a soft undershirt, as the shared fresher was in the mail base building and her room was in the hanger, not a walk she wanted to make naked save for a towel.
She was concentrating so hard on her plans to stretch, meditate, and collapse into bed that she almost didn't notice the throb and burp of silence that heralded a force bond visit.
Though, even if she had missed that sign, the fact that her bed was now completely filled by a large male frame would have clued her in. He was just on the verge of falling asleep, and hadn't seemed to notice the change in atmosphere, perhaps the smell of Corellian brandy had something to do with that. As he seemingly wasn't aware the force had connected them, he was loudly broadcasting his thoughts while he slipped under into unconsciousness.
Rey caught her breath, he was thinking of her. Specifically, he was thinking about how the nightmares had kept him from sleeping for the past few days and wished she were there to hold him, figuring that would keep the monsters in his head away.
Her heart hitched a bit at that, and she couldn't find it in her to shake him awake and make him move. She pondered his body, mostly reclined against the pillows at the head of her bed, which took up all the usable real estate and finally shrugged mentally. She needed to sleep as much as he did, and as long as he stayed asleep this wouldn't be an issue.
She crossed the room and tentatively arranged herself across his lap, head pillowed against his shoulder like she'd seen in his mental image. He was a warm comfortable mattress in lieu of her own, and she let her eyes close and dropped into sleep as she felt his arms come around her tucking her safe under his chin.
The last thing she heard before she slipped under was her name whispered on his lips.