5. Brick by Brick

His helmet clattered to the floor as he turned away from her (before he did anything rash), marching stoically into the center of the room. "Come, Rey," he ordered briskly. "Stand here with me."

He felt her presence behind him before he turned his head to the left to look down at her. She was waiting, looking up at him with a raised eyebrow. "What are we doing?" She asked.

For a time he paused, for the light radiating from her stopped his tongue. How could he kill such a good, beautiful creature? How could he snuff out the light of the only person he had ever known who had been abandoned in the same way he had? Neither of them had parents. Not anymore.

So Kylo paused and he looked down at Rey, whose very name represented the goodness, the light, in her heart. But there was something else inside of her. He could feel it--a sort of inky blackness that could, at any time, make her lose her footing and fall down the path of the dark. The path he had walked down.

"Close your eyes," Kylo said. "I want you to learn to handle the Force. It's a delicate thing, and a powerful weapon, and I need you to know how to wield it.

"Close your eyes," he repeated, and she obeyed. "Breathe in. Breathe out. Feel the Force. You the Force. It moves through you. You are one."

A pause. "What now?" Rey asked, her voice little more than a whisper.

Kylo stood in front of her now. "I am going to try to look inside your mind now." He paused, waiting for her to object, but she merely pressed her lips together and nodded. Waiting. "I want you to resist me."

"Like I did before?"

"Yes. Like you did before. But this time, I want you to control your power. You used too much last time, which is why you were able to search my head. This time I want you to concentrate on forming just enough power to counter my search."

Kylo leaned closer. "Imagine a wall you are building, brick by brick by brick. . ." He trailed off then, his voice fading away. Because over her shoulder, he saw the helmet he had never taken off for anyone else willingly forlorn on the floor.

She hasn't asked, not directly anyway, either time for him to remove it. But she had hated him with the mask on, both times, and somehow this girl hating him was enough to make him want to get rid of the protection the helmet offered.

"Brick by brick. . ." Rey repeated quietly, almost whispering, trailing off slowly as he had done.

"Yes. Are you ready?" Kylo managed to shake his head and focus on the task at hand. He put away those thoughts for later.

Rey nodded, breathing in and out.

"Let's begin," he said, and somehow in that moment, looking down at Rey, he could not raise his voice to the deepness, the gruffness, of what it usually was.

And so Kylo closed his eyes and pushed deeper and deeper into her mind. Images swirled around him, blurry and painful and he tried to reach out and take one. Just grab one memory. A simple one. One Rey could resist. He was not supposed to torture her, after all.

He leaned closer and grabbed the one nearest to him.

And then he was standing in the middle of the desert. An onlooker on the scene in front of him. Lying half buried in the sand was an old AT-AT, Rey's home. Rey appeared from behind him, walking through him to get inside.

The sun hung low in the sky, mirroring Rey's head, which also hung low. She was utterly forlorn. She felt completely alone. But this Rey was different. Younger. A lot younger. In this memory, she couldn't have been more than eleven.

Kylo followed her into her makeshift home, treading tentatively. He was invading, somehow, and it wasn't the best feeling. He watched as Rey sighed, shrugging off the thin jacket she had been wearing. He watched as she pulled off her boots, slowly, achingly slowly.

Tears welled in Rey's eyes as she collapsed on the cot. "They'll come back," she told herself as she switched off the light, laying alone in her home and crying into the darkness. Sobs choked her, racking her body until at last they died down.

Rey hiccuped. Grabbed the small doll she had made out of an old flight suit. "They'll always come back. They promised."

And then the light switched on. Rey turned and looked straight at him. Blinked hard and her tears disappeared. "You will see no more."

And then, with a loud hiccup on the part of young Rey, and the building of an imaginary brick wall on the part of real Rey, Kylo was kicked out of the memory. He stepped back. And again.

And when he looked at Rey, the he couldn't help but see her with different eyes. Because with that memory, he had seen her grief and her pain, her loneliness and her aching for parents who were For parents who kept their promises and did not abandon their children.

Rey glared harshly at him, her eyes alight with fury. "Do you torment your other students in this way?" And even then, with her hands clenched and the fury emitting from her, Kylo noticed the beginning of tears forming in her eyes.

"I reached out, Rey," Kylo replied, forcing himself to step closer. "I took the memory closest to me, and I viewed it. I did not have to search far."

Rey stood up taller, meeting his eyes. "What are you saying? Are you saying that's the memory on my mind most often?" She forced a cold laugh. "I can tell you it's not."

"Maybe not. But it was the memory closest to me. It was the one you wanted me to see." Kylo told her, searching her face for a reaction. He waited in silence for a full three seconds.

Three. Two. One. "That's ridiculous." Rey raised her voice. "And how is it fair that you can see inside my head, but I'm not allowed to see inside yours?" She was grasping at straws, trying to change the subject.

He paused for a beat. Just one second, and then, something in his core was choosing the words for him. "I never said you weren't allowed to, Rey." He spoke slowly, lowering his voice and matching the stillness that filled the sound proof room they stood in.

"I don't want to interrogate you," Rey spat.

"You won't be. Think of this as today's second lesson." Kylo should not have done that. He knew it as soon as the words tumbled from his mouth. He should not allow this girl to enter his mind.

He could not allow this. . . Rey (of light) to journey inside his mind. Kylo wasn't ready to show anyone else the pain, the misery. Not fully. He had already taken off the mask for her--twice. He did not need to also show her why he wore it.

But Kylo knew what he could do. What he must do, it truly he wanted to He corrected himself. What he must do, if truly he wanted to And as a sort of goodbye to this Rey--because surely she could change after seeing this--he stepped closer.