IN MY DREAMS [A POE DAMERON X READER STORY] [BOOKS 1-3]

chapter ten

"How many times have I tried to tell you. Again and again. You were found with nothing and nobody. I am all that you have and all that you need and all that you are."

He shoved you harshly into the cell. You dropped to your knees with a grunt and turned your head, only to witness the flash of red as he ignited his lightsaber and swung it an inch away from your face. You gasped and fell to the ground, covering your face with your arm.

"Kylo, please," you begged, feeling his fingers dig into your shoulder blade. He forced you back onto your feet and he shoved you against the plastron. Gasps burst out of you as the restraints snapped down on your arms and legs. You lashed out against them, horror filling you as you realized that you were about to be tortured like a prisoner. "Stop this! You can't do this to me---"

He stepped in front of you, black cloak moving over you as he stepped to the side and began to circle you slowly. "As long as the pilot remains on this Star Destroyer, you will remain here."

"I'm not a prisoner," you said breathlessly.

"You're so right. And yet you act as if you wish to be treated like one."

You tried to break through the restraints. When it was clear that your physical strength couldn't help you anymore, you focused on the Force. As you lifted your chest up and pushed with all of the strength you could muster, he raised a hand and pushed you back. You were forced against the plastron, left to gasp for air that didn't seem to reach your lungs correctly. You had always believed that you were a perfect match of Kylo Ren, but now it was clear that he had been holding back on you during training. He was much stronger than you.

The only way you could get out of this was to convince him that you weren't who he thought you were. "You... you said no one remembered me. But he... he remembered my name."

"And maybe he did," he said. "But maybe, who does remember you, are not worth remembering. I am protecting you."

"From what?" you whispered. "I just want the truth."

"No, you don't. I tell you the truth and you don't believe me." He stopped in front of you. 

"I believe you," you said, "but I know there's more to the truth that you tell me! You say you're the only one that knows me but you aren't and I know that you're not. I can see it in their eyes that they know me and you know that they know me too. That's why you're afraid. You think I'll betray you if I know where I came from."

He clenched his hands into fists. "What are you hoping for? What do you keep holding onto this pathetic dream for?"

"I'm hoping for a family! Just a sense of where I come from. Of who I am! Even if I found who my family was --- even if they aren't alive, I want to know. I don't want to leave the First Order. I don't want to go to the Resistance. I just want to know---"

"There is nothing worth knowing." He raised his hand in front of your head.

"What are you doing?" you asked, swallowing your fear.

"I'm showing you something," he said. "And out of it, I will get the truth."

"I'm telling you the truth," you whispered. "I wouldn't lie to you---"

"Yet you have lied to me." It was at that moment that you felt your mind break into pieces. Every memory you had was his. What was he looking for? Every memory you had was him.

But at least he could see it. How you loved him and looked up to him. How you trusted him and believed in him. You saw him as your greatest friend, your only friend. No amount of hoping for a family could change that.

He also saw the change in your perception of him in the last year. He had broken your trust and hurt you so deeply that you would never see him the same way.

And it hurt, but at least he could see all of it. He left you exhausted in your chair for a moment, with fast pants coming out of your mouth. And you cried, because you couldn't believe that he was willing to hurt you like that again and again.

"Let's go visit that pilot you've thought about so much," he said, as if none of the rest that he saw in your mind mattered. As if nothing mattered except his hatred for what you longed for.