1. Crimson Finds Cyan

Red and blue, reflecting on their faces. Light and dark. He swings and she blocks. She swings and he ducks out of the way, turning quickly. Half-hidden behind a tree, he glares at her. This glare is not easy for him to create.

So he mirrors the one that has formed on her face, wrinkling her brow.

"You're a monster," she tells him, her voice little above a whisper. "A murderer!" She screams the word and he struggles not to flinch.

And he knows. . . He doesn't need to be told what he already recognizes. Somehow the word hurts him. But isn't that what he wants? To be just as as Darth Vader? He should be happy.

He has succeeded.

Kylo Ren has made a name for himself, and now that name can never be unwritten from time. The galaxy will know. His actions will be inscribed in paper, in computers--the data stashed away for other generations.

So the children of future generations can remember the face of Kylo Ren, and understand exactly what They will remember him, and they will cringe and curse his name, and their parents will not correct their language.

He doesn't find it in himself to swing. He stands, glaring half-heartedly, his tri-saber inches away from the cold snow. He almost drops the weapon. And he would have, if Rey had not swung her saber--Anakin Skywalker's saber--, calling him out from his own misery.

Rey cries out in a sort of war cry, and then comes flying forward faster and faster, dodging trees and branches and raising the blue saber higher and higher above herself. She swings and Kylo Ren returns the favor.

Fueled by anger and adrenaline, she ducks his blow easily, leaping out of the way quietly and letting his fiery weapon, forged of his own desperation, to strike one of the pines. The tree comes crashing down, and not a second after it has hit the forest floor, vibrating the very earth on which they stand, Rey has leapt forward once more.

They are evenly matched. And so somehow, as they struggle to gain the upper hand, Kylo finds the words tumbling from his mouth before he has time to catch his breath and recognize the danger of his request. "You need a teacher. Let me show you the way of the Force."

He doesn't ask to teach her the way of the Dark Side--the way of the First Order. He doesn't exactly recognize it until after the words have spilt from his quick-acting tongue. And somehow, the man. . . monster. . . . . . does not mind that with one substitution he is showing someone his humanity.

He stops--almost all the way--trying to win the battle. He loosens the pressure he is putting on her saber and inhales a large gulp of freezing air. As he loosens his pressure, he finds that Rey has almost stopped fighting as well.

The wrinkle in her brow undoes itself, and her glare softens. Pursing her lips, she searches his eyes, and Kylo Ren holds still to let her. "The Force?" She asks him quietly.

Red and blue reflect on their faces, shimmering and dancing and tempting them. Light and Dark. Good and evil. And somehow, after everything he's done, Kylo Ren finds himself unable to choose a side. He stands with one foot in the night and one foot in the day, and they both pull on him, tugging him and tormenting him and. . .

"You will teach me?" Rey asks, still searching his eyes, and still not letting go of her saber. But no longer does she scream out about his horridness. No longer does she call him the very thing he knows he has become.

"I'll teach you," he replies.

Her eyes dance once more around his face, and somehow she decides to trust him. She steps backwards and switches her saber off. Quickly, he mirrors her actions.

She nods. "I want to learn. But let me first get my friend home safely."

He had almost forgotten about the boy who had picked up the saber first, who lied underneath a tree in the snow. "I'll see to it that FN-2187. . . Finn. . . is returned."

She searches his face, and he holds his breath. Her hand grips her saber fiercely. Slowly, Rey nods. "If anything happens. . ." She trails off, letting the threat sit in the air.

He wants to tell her not to threaten him. That he can snap her neck without touching her. But he will not let that be their first lesson. "It won't," he says simply, gruffly.

And thus there was no more red and blue in that moment, strikingly pointing out the differences between them. There were only the two, walking toward an unconscious man. And for a time, the forest was silent.