Just Us

Chapter 1: The White Light

The floor was hard and ice cold but it did not compare to the hard, ice cold feeling in Rey's heart.

Ben was gone.

He had sacrificed everything, given his life to her. And now he was gone.

Rey sat on the floor in spot where Ben once lay, and cried.

She never thought she'd cry so much for someone.

She never thought she'd cry so much for him.

But here she was, sobbing over empty cloths, longing for the person who used to wear them.

Rey figured it was because she had hoped to see Ben for longer. After all they had been through, she'd been looking forward to getting to know who he really was.

When they first met, Rey did not know Ben even existed. All she knew was Kylo Ren. An evil, hostile, power hungry villain who would stop at nothing to achieve power over the galaxy.

He had taken her away from her friends, looked into her mind without permission, and kept her as a prisoner on StarKiller Base.

Rey hated him.

But, despite all her dislike towards him, Kylo had unintentionally showed her something when he had been in her mind that ultimately proved useful.

A strange line of power, one Rey had not felt or seen before.

It allowed her to see into his mind. His fears. His pain. It was in that moment that Rey had seen a glimpse of something that Kylo was desperately trying to hide. But what that was, she did not yet know.

Then they had fought in the woods. Kylo had killed his own father, pushed Rey into a tree, and wounded her new friend Finn.

He was a monster.

Rey reached deep into herself for that line of power he'd accidentally shown her and used it to fight back, best him, and take him down.

But she could not kill him.

Rey could have done it while he was lying weak and defeated in the snow before the ground split, but she hadn't. Something inside her had told her she just shouldn't do it.

So she left him.

Then, on Ahch-To, the Force connected them in a way Rey never knew was possible. They could see and talk to one another across lightyears. She was not happy to see Kylo at first, so their interactions started out hostile...but then they changed.

Rey saw something.

Something deep within Kylo Ren. A person. A broken, scared, lonely person.

A person full of light.

Ben Solo.

And then she understood.

Kylo Ren was just a husk, a cracked shell that Ben was hiding in and didn't know how to get out of.

He was a lot like her.

Desperate for family. Friendship. Love.

Maybe, Rey thought, I'm the one that could help give those things to him.

He's broken...like me. But maybe I can fix him. Maybe we can eventually be at home with one another.

So she made up her mind to go to Kylo and turn him back to the light.

She flew to him. Spoke to him.

He seemed to understand too.

In Snoke's throne room, he had had the chance to kill her but he hadn't taken it. He killed Snoke instead and they had faced the praetorian guards together.