4Inspired by a prompt from galacticidiots on twitter.
No one had ever been able to explain why, but Ben Solo had been born feeling as if a part of his heart was missing. Before he had learned how to communicate properly, it led to a lot of crying as a child, of complaining how much his chest hurt. It led to worried parents, late nights, and several confused specialists.
As far as anyone could find, he was a completely healthy, normal little boy without even the slightest trace of a birth defect. One day as they were passing by, an elderly lady sitting at a fortune table spoke up.
"A curious condition, your son has. Not every day that I see one so young missing half their soul."
Leaning against the railing of his yacht, staring out at the sea before him, Ben wondered if maybe she had been on to something. Most of him believed it to be rubbish, nothing but a scam like his father had claimed at the time; but he couldn't deny the small part of him that knew it to be true. He reached up, absently rubbing the ever-present sore spot on the center of his chest. It never did any good, but was a habit that he had picked up in childhood that he had never quite been able to shake.
As he got older, he got used to the pain; most days he was able to ignore it, sitting in the back of his mind as an ever-present dull throbbing. But other times, such as days like this when he was missing something so dearly and feeling so lonely that he almost couldn't breathe, it was impossible to ignore. It's the reason the habit formed in the first place; it never did any good but it felt better doing something then nothing at all.
It was why he had come out on the sea today; the insistent need to get away, to be anywhere but where he was. To be with someone, even if he didn't know who. He often came out like this when time allowed, going far enough out that land could no longer be seen; it was only like this did he feel some semblance of freedom, away from the constrictions and mistakes of his daily life.
Usually, he would place an alarm on his phone to go off so that he would make it back to shore in time to continue his work, but when it went off, he simply turned it off and continued letting the yacht's autopilot take him wherever it willed. He couldn't bring himself to go back today, not yet at least. It felt like something was pulling him, something he so direly needed. He didn't know how much time passed as he stood there, but he didn't really care. He would sail to the edge of the world if it finally meant that he would be free of the pain.
He frowned when he could see a land mass in the distance, finally starting to wonder just how far out he had gone. Ben had gone pretty far out before, but never had he encountered anything before. Where exactly had the autopilot taken him?
He was about to go back inside to take a look at the compass, when something caught his eye. Looking closer found that it was a girl, passed out and barely hanging onto a piece of wood. Without a second thought, he ran inside, flipping off the autopilot and navigating closer towards her.
There was a sense of panic growing within as he brought her on board, laying her down gently on a nearby bench. Her hair was a tangled mess of saltwater and seaweed; her skin both far too pale and yet still tinged red with sunburn. Worst of all – she was barely breathing; Ben knew that if nothing was done soon, she would stop altogether.
She's dying
It was as if a knife had been stabbed through his chest, the familiar throbbing pain growing almost unbearable at the thought. Frantically, he reached forward, setting his hands on her chest to keep her breathing, desperation rising in him to make sure that she lived. The moment he leaned forward to press his lips to hers in order to give her a breath -
They were in a snow-covered forest, the planet around them breaking and yet still they continued, angry red and blazing blue clashing. He had her on the defensive; soon he would have her beaten.
"You need a teacher!" He insisted, needing her understand, to know just how much there were alike. He had seen inside her mind; she was just as lonely as he was. "I can show you the ways of the force!" He just needed her to stop, to agree to come back with him. It was only then he was sure that could finally have someone that he could truly confide in.
She didn't answer, instead reaching inside and somehow managing to push back against him, putting him on the defensive instead. She had him soundly beat, leaving him on the ground with a gaping, searing gash across his face. The normal reaction to her standing above him, watching him like predator watches its prey would be offence; yet instead he only found intrigue in its place. Never before had anyone managed to best him at anything; and yet her she was, having resisted him multiple times in a day.
She could have killed him easily once he was down, but she didn't; he knew she felt the same as he. There was something more between them, waiting to be explored.
The ground broke between them as they watched each other, separating them. She glanced at him once more before turning and running off, leaving him lying in the snow and longing for more.
The scene changed as he watched her leave, morphing into somewhere completely different. He was sitting in his room, watching her as she sat across from him. He couldn't see her surroundings, but he knew she must be sitting inside a hut on whatever planet she had found Luke on. She was clutching a blanket around her, he hair still a bit damp from when she had fall into the cave.
"I thought I'd find answers here. I was wrong." She blinked, looking down and he could see the beginnings of tears starting to fill her eyes. "I'd never felt so alone."
"You're not alone." He had wanted to say it from the start; it was only now within the stillness did he finally find the means to say it. He watched her closely, desperately needing her to know that he meant it, that even a monster like him could be worth something.
"Neither are you." She spoke softly, yet full of conviction. "It isn't too late." She slowly reached out a hand to him, and he was sure that if he had less self-control, he would've broken down crying then and there. For as much as he needed her to know he was just as lonely, he hadn't expected her to tell him the same. It was as if in that simple act of offering her hand to him, she was letting him know that no matter what she had said to him, no matter what he had done before, she was willing to give him a chance.
He pulled off a glove, slowly reaching out for her hand while his eyes never left her face. Right as they touched, however, the scene changed again.
They were on the Supremacy, the corpses of the praetorian guard scattered around them. Rey was standing across from him with tears in her eyes as he held out his hand to her.
"Please." He pleaded with her. He wanted it to all end, wanted nothing more than to be with her and find a sense of home a sense of peace –
Once again, he proved that he was terrible with words, that he never gets his point across correctly when he was far too wound up. They separated again, only this time they were both left feeling heartbroken.
The scene shifted once more, and he had just managed to climb out of the pit on Exegol that he had been thrown into, and it was broken, the connection that had connected them so strongly before had snapped, leaving behind a searing, white hot wound in its place. It was a pain so deep, so sharp, piercing his soul as if run through with a lightsaber; he could no longer feel Rey's presence, her ever present light seemingly having been snuffed out.
He forced himself over the edge of the cliff, body screaming in more ways than one, expecting to find Rey when he looked up, holding out a hand to help him up the rest of the way, relived that he had survived.
Instead, he saw no one. She wasn't there waiting for him, and the pain in his chest grow even worse, dread settling into the pit of his stomach. Still he denied it; insistent that he would find her further in, exhausted but very, very much alive. He dragged himself forward, despite feeling that his body was about to break apart. He couldn't stop, had to keep going until he found her alive and breathing.
But it wasn't meant to be. Rey's form was spread out on the ground just before him, limp and unblinking, staring into nothing. He had been doing well ignoring the pain from inside up until this point, able to convince himself that there was nothing to be worried about since he hasn't seen any proof. But now, with her right in front of him, the pain returned in full force, feeling as if it might consume him entirely.
He collapsed next to her, pulling her tightly into his arms. He wasn't about to leave her, not now. They could capture him and try him for all of Kylo Ren's wrong doings, he didn't care. Nothing was worth it anymore. If he had just been a little faster, made it to the top sooner, maybe things would have been different, he could have saved her -
In that moment he knew what he had to do. He was about to do something that he'd never done before; fortunately, Rey had shown him how to give. Ben poured everything he had into her, finding hidden reservoirs that he didn't know were there before. She was his everything; it was only fair that he gave her his all.
Somehow, miraculously, he managed to do one thing right, and Rey came back to life. She was alive again and she smiled at him, the happiest he had ever seen her. To his surprise yet great joy, she leaned forward, kissing him. He paused, taking a moment to enjoy the sensation of her kiss, to memorize how sweet she tasted; his heart completely full.
But as they say, all good things must come to an end, and even as he felt himself at his highest, he started to feel a pull downwards at an alarming rate. Rey pulled away from him, concern etched onto her face. He smiled at her, giving her the biggest, stupidest grin that he could, even as he could feel his consciousness fading. He wanted her to know, wanted her to feel without a shadow of a doubt that he loved her, that she had always been his sole light in life.
He fell backwards, the world going black -
It was with a jarring sense that Ben was brought crashing back to the present, landing with him sitting heavily back on the floor of his yacht, his mind swimming with everything that he had just seen.
"Ben...?" The voice was soft and hoarse; yet completely unmistakable. He looked up, to see Rey awake, watching him. Dumbstruck he could only stare back, nodding slightly. "Ben!" Her smile broadened, and she launched herself at him, hugging him tightly around the neck and nearly bowling him over.
He wrapped his arms around her, pulling her as close as he could, unable to stop the smile that was spreading across his face. "I missed you too, sweetheart."
