Chapter Text
D’Acy calls for another adjournment after Rey tearfully finishes her testimony. Whether it’s because her words actually landed and could sway their decision, or simply because they chose to humor her, she isn’t sure. All she knows is lunch and dinner both taste like ash in her mouth, and she doesn’t even try to feign an excuse when Rose gently invites her to play Sabacc with the pilots in an effort to cheer her up. Rey just shakes her head, thanks Rose for trying, and then trudges off to the Falcon to fall into bed.
From the moment D’Acy dismissed the tribunal, Rey had been petitioning the Force to connect her to Ben through the bond again that night. She’s still doing it now as she drags her feet up the boarding ramp, hoping against hope that it will be receptive to her pleas. It has its own agenda most of the time, she’s learned, but after more than a year of begging to keep them apart, she’s hoping it’s merciful in her first attempt to bring them together. Perhaps embracing the bond instead of fighting it is the first step to controlling it.
Unless, of course, they decide to execute him. Rey has no idea what the bond will become then, and she dreads the mere thought. When he’d been in bacta, the lingering essence of him had been a soft, throbbing ache. It stayed with her even in her dreams, an elusive pain she could never heal.
After changing into her sleep clothes, she tucks herself into the edge of the bunk, pressing her back against the wall. If the Force decides to be merciful tonight, she wants to make sure Ben has enough room to lay comfortably beside her.
She stays up until her eyes burn, and even when they start to fall shut against her will, she shakes herself awake and looks around the room for him with wide, bloodshot eyes. Eventually, despite her best efforts to fight it, sleep wins out over her stubbornness.
Deep into the night, when she’s rolled over and drooling onto her pillow, a pair of strong arms wrap around her torso. She doesn’t immediately wake; her subconscious has convinced itself that the muscled chest at her back is simply a dream.
But then soft, warm lips press into the back of her neck, and her eyes flutter open. Her senses are suddenly invaded—the heat of his body against hers, the masculine scent that's familiar and intoxicating, the sound of his heavy breathing.
Almost involuntarily, Rey pushes herself further into him, wanting to be enveloped entirely in his warmth. Every inch of their bodies is touching, and it still isn’t enough. Ben’s arms tighten around her, and the strength of his inhale moves both of them as he breathes her in.
“Stay,” Rey whispers. She takes his hands in hers and cradles them against her chest, pressing her lips to his knuckles. “Stay with me.”
When he speaks, his voice is raspy and thick with sleep, but the words seize her heart and cause tears to bloom in her tired eyes. “For as long as I can.” He kisses the shell of her ear, lets his lips linger there. “Forever, if they let me.”
The morning sun beams through the viewport in the captain’s quarters, waking Rey with its brightness and heat. She doesn’t need to turn around to know that Ben is no longer with her; the cold air wrapped around her body in place of his warmth is evidence enough. It seems as good a time as any to further test her theory about the bond; he did come to her last night, after all.
In her mind, she envisions a door. It’s different from the one she pictured after Crait, which had been made of thick, impenetrable durasteel. This one is glass, foggy but not opaque, and she can almost make out a figure standing on the other side. Slightly nervous by the possibility, she asks, are you here?
The figure moves abruptly and then stills.
I’m here.
A shaky, relieved breath falls from Rey’s lips. Hi.
Hi.
She sits up in the bunk and rubs her eyes. Did you sleep okay?
Ben hums. The clarity of his voice goes in and out, as though he’s moving closer to and away from her all at once. I did. I think I joined your dream instead of the other way around, this time.
Rey’s brow furrows. I didn’t dream last night.
His responding tone is soft. Exactly.
She’s standing up and stretching when she hears a murmur on the other end of the bond, one that doesn’t sound like it’s coming from Ben. Without warning, the door, the figure, and Ben’s voice begin to fade. Rey tries to latch onto it all, but it slips through her fingers like smoke. Slightly panicked, her movements still.
Ben?
The responding silence is terrifying. She tries again, but her call is lost to an echoing void.
Please. Her eyes fall shut, her heart beginning to pound. Please, not yet.
Pacing the Falcon is the only thing she can do to keep herself occupied. The tribunal isn’t supposed to reconvene until after breakfast, but if they’ve already come to a decision, it’s possible they’ve already gone through with it, whatever the final consensus may be. She doesn’t think they’ve killed him; she has to believe she would feel that in her very soul, more than this numb darkness that greets her now when she taps at the bond.
But then she hears heavy footsteps walking up the boarding ramp, and her stomach sinks. Is someone coming to tell her he’s dead? Is this what the bond becomes when one half of it is snuffed out? Terrible, endless emptiness?
Her throat feels dry as the entrance door swooshes open and reveals Poe on the other side. He looks like he could sleep for the next forty-eight hours if given the chance, with dark circles under his eyes and his usually perfectly tousled hair an unkempt mess. His clothes look rumpled, too, and she wonders if he slept in them.
Rey swallows down her nerves as he approaches her and folds his arms over his chest. He looks her right in the eye, and she’s becoming more and more certain he’s about to say it’s already done, it’s what needed to happen—
“The council has decided against execution,” he says, and thank the Maker for the captain’s chair within arm’s reach, because without being able to grab onto it, Rey thinks her knees might’ve given out at his words.
“What?” is the only word she can muster. Disbelief and joy and confusion and a million other emotions rush through her, and it’s nearly impossible to contain the smile threatening to break out on her face.
“Don’t get too excited,” Poe counters, holding up a hand. “You won’t like what we went with instead.”
Rey blinks, the burgeoning smile vanishing as quickly as it appeared. “What is it?”
“He’s been tasked with sniffing out First Order and Imperial sympathizers. As many as he can until the council feels an adequate quota has been met. He can use the Force to question them and their intentions, and then neutralize any potential threats.”
It doesn’t sound terrible—in fact, it sounds quite reasonable, considering death by hanging or firing squad was the alternative. Rey’s nose scrunches up in confusion. “Why wouldn’t I like that? I could go with him, we could cover the entire gal—”
“No.”
Her mouth snaps shut. “No, what?”
“No, you can’t go with him. That’s part of the deal—he has to do it completely alone.” Poe walks toward the captain’s chair and falls into it with a thunk. “His ship will be equipped with a tracker, and should he veer from the assigned route at any point in time, he’ll be hunted and killed on sight. We’re offering him one shot. Nothing more.”
Rey is motionless as she processes his words. It isn’t the worst case scenario by any means, but it also doesn’t make her want to jump for joy. Yes, they have the bond, but it’s unpredictable and difficult to control. It could be months, years, until she sees him again in the flesh. “How long?” she asks, for herself, but also for him. She knows his loneliness, has felt it in her very bones. To subject him to something like this—her heart squeezes painfully at the thought.
Poe shrugs, his palms turning upward. “However long it takes.”
In other words, however long the Resistance leadership feels like keeping him banished. However long they deem appropriate to keep him away from her, and from any semblance of a normal life.
It occurs to her now that the voice she’d heard earlier through the bond, the one which sounded before the cutoff of contact, was Poe’s. She takes a deep breath and asks, “What—what did Ben say? When you told him.”
Poe chews on the inside of his cheek. “He accepted, obviously.” His eyes roam around the interior of the Falcon until they land on her, and Rey feels smaller under the weight of his gaze. “But he had one request. Ballsy of him to think we’d honor a single thing he asked for, but no one’s ever accused the guy of being meek, I guess.”
Rey stands up a little straighter, anxiously rubbing her bicep as she shifts her weight from foot to foot. “What was it?”
Poe shakes his head, a mirthless smirk on his lips. “He asked for one day with you. One day for you two to spend together, and then he’d go without complaint and work for us for as long as we tell him to. For the rest of his life, he said, if we can grant him just one day.”
Hope swells in her heart, but she knows better than to bet on it. Hesitantly, she asks, “And what did you say?”
He pins her with a glare she knows is judgmental, but she doesn’t care. He will never understand her feelings for Ben, will never understand how she can forgive him for the things he’s done, and Rey is done trying to make him.
Maybe because of that, they will never be friends in any real sense. But that doesn’t seem to matter in this moment, because Poe exhales deeply through his nose and nods toward where he came in. “Go see for yourself.”
Her feet have never moved faster. She runs through the door and finds Ben standing at the foot of the boarding ramp. No cuffs. No chains. Only a soft smile, and eyes bright enough to power an entire city.
The giddy grin on her face is starting to hurt in the apples of her cheeks, but she can’t stop. Not when he’s here, right next to her. “Where do you want to go?” Rey asks, settling into the Captain’s chair.
Ben leans back into the headrest. He’s been staring at her since he boarded the Falcon, and it seems he can’t stop himself from smiling any more than she can. With a contented little sigh, he says, “I want to show you something.”
Rey cedes control of the Falcon to Ben about halfway to their destination, uncomfortable with her lack of familiarity beyond the Outer Rim. The further they go into Wild Space, the more it feels like they’ve flown to another galaxy entirely. Like they’ve jumped off of any known map and into strange, uncharted territory.
As they close in on Kesh, Ben briefly explains the history of the planet—it’s remote and nearly impossible to get to without the use of the Force due to the surrounding magnetic field, and once served as a base for a Sith Temple. Upon hearing this, Rey looks over at him, immediately concerned.
He offers a reassuring smirk. “That was centuries ago.”
Ben pilots the Falcon with confidence, navigating through the barrier of the atmosphere with ease. They push through it with little resistance on the other side, and as the surface of the planet comes into view, Rey gasps.
The closer they get, the more beautiful it becomes. Mountains tall enough to pierce the sky bordered by crystal blue rivers and verdant valleys, and treetops so thick the ground beneath is almost invisible.
“There are three continents,” Ben explains as he soars over the plains. “Keshtah, home of the Takara Mountains and Sessal Spire volcano, where Baron Remulus Dreypa hid Leviathan larvae during the Great Calamity.”
Rey tears her gaze from the viewport to look at Ben and finds him grinning. Nerd, she says through the bond, and he winks at her in response.
“Then Eshkrene. We definitely don’t want to go there.” He hisses with a slight grimace. “It’s extremely cold.”
Turning back to continue staring at the landscape, Rey chuckles and asks, “So where are we going?”
“To Alanciar,” Ben replies as the Falcon dips downward in a graceful swoop. “To the Eskellon Mountains and the Endless Sea.”
“Alanciar,” Rey repeats, sounding out the word slowly. It feels foreign and flowery on her tongue.
“Yes,” he says, lowering the ship closer to the ground.
They ride up the face of a hill, hovering just above the trees, and then something comes into view that has her eyes narrowing, trying to see more clearly. “What is that?”
“That…” Ben says, turning the Falcon until it’s zeroing in on what looks like a building, slightly rusted with overgrown vines spilling down the walls. “…is my sanctuary.”
There’s something hauntingly beautiful about the homestead, something bittersweet about its coziness. Rey surveys the area, leaving no stone unturned as she walks slowly through the small sitting room that gives way to the kitchen. Ben stands under the archway that separates the spaces, watching her.
The furniture is sparse and functional, nothing like what she’d expect him to have. In the past, when her errant thoughts had drifted to Ben Solo and where he might’ve lived before he joined the First Order, she pictured something more ornate than this. Something expensive and excessive, or at the very least, comfortable. The only thing comfortable about the sitting room is the cream-colored rug, plush and squishy under her boots.
Art is hung on the walls in an orderly fashion, but it’s all rudimentary—scribbles on blank canvases that could only be drawn by him. Mostly landscapes, but a face here and there, none immediately recognizable and yet, all of them familiar.
Leia’s regal mouth. Han’s stubborn eyes. Luke’s wrinkle-lined forehead.
“I can’t believe you built this place,” Rey says quietly, staring at his wall of portraits and paintings.
“I needed somewhere to go,” Ben replies, and Rey turns to find him leaning against the frame of the archway, arms folded over his chest. “Somewhere Snoke couldn’t reach me.”
Stepping toward him, she asks, “How did that work? I thought he was…” She holds his eyes as she searches for the right words. “Always there,” she finishes, pointing at her temple.
Ben shrugs one shoulder, his lips pursing. “For the most part, he was. But the magnetic field helped. He couldn’t penetrate it. I’d come here when things got too—heavy, I guess. Stay for a couple of days. When he’d ask me where I’d been, I’d tell him I was meditating or training somewhere and needed to shut him out to focus.”
Rey kinks an eyebrow, knowing that can’t be the end of it.
He seems to understand the look and offers a flat smile. “He didn’t like that very much. But it was worth it. This place—the quiet, the remoteness of it. It was worth every lashing that came after.”
His honesty hits her like a punch to the stomach. She steps forward, moving into his space without warning until they’re nearly toe-to-toe. Ben’s head rears back slightly, surprise parting his lips.
“Show me the rest,” Rey says resolutely, reaching out to take his hand.
After a beat, Ben nods, then weaves their fingers together and leads her down the hall.
“When was the last time you were here?”
They’re in his bedroom now, and Rey feels herself growing nervous as she pads softly around the space. The austere sitting room was one thing, but here, in his bedroom, everything is different. For one, it smells like him—that specific Ben scent she catches whiffs of every time they’re close. Spicy, sweet, and clean, so good that she can’t help but inhale a little deeper. Books are stacked in teetering towers near his bedside, and there’s a desk sitting below a large window. Rey notices an inkwell and a haphazard stack of paper, but doesn’t call attention to it.
“After Crait,” Ben says from where he sits at the corner of the bed.
She nods, then walks over and sits next to him, the mattress bouncing under her weight.
Ben smiles, leaning back onto one hand. “Are you hungry?”
With a giggle, Rey says, “One thing you should just learn about me now: I am literally always hungry.”
He huffs a laugh through his nose and nods, grunting a little as he pushes off the bed. “I think I can probably scrounge something up. Can’t guarantee it’ll taste very good.”
“Whatever it is, it’ll taste better than dehydrated portions. I promise you that.”
Ben stares at her for a long moment, his smile softening into something somber. He bends down, and Rey’s breath catches in her throat as he presses a kiss to her forehead. His lips linger for a brief moment, and then he leaves the room without another word.
Slightly shell shocked from his touch—the emotion it invoked—she takes a moment to collect herself before standing up to follow him, but notices the papers on his desk are covered in writing. And not just regular writing—loopy lines that swirl and curve in a precise but delicate way. It’s art in itself, the way he constructs each letter. And Rey’s never been more grateful she forced herself to learn to read around age fifteen, because not only is the writing itself beautiful, but the words—
She shuffles through the pages, reading all the beautiful snippets with her heart tightening in her chest.
But then she gets to one page in particular, and tears begin to well in her eyes.
Torturous, brilliant, overflowing light—
Ever you beam, ever you taunt
Through self-inflicted cracks—
You bleed through
When I taught myself to hate you—
I knew it would be a lifelong pursuit
But when you wore a different face—
Sand streaked and golden and bewitching—
I fell to my knees in defeat
I knew you outside of time—
In my bones, my hands, my heart
In your eyes like the trees of Kashyyyk—
I am gracelessly, stubbornly reborn
How Ben manages to concoct a meal as delicious as this out of whatever nonperishable items he had lying around, Rey will never know. Nor does she care very much—her only priority right now is shoveling the food into her mouth as fast as humanly possible. It quite possibly may be the best thing she’s ever eaten. Maybe even the best thing she will ever eat. Part of her wishes she had the willpower to savor each bite, especially as the contents of her meal begin to dwindle. As the food disappears into her belly, she is equal parts elated and distressed that it’s gone.
That is until Ben is suddenly at her side, scraping what’s left of his food onto her plate. She doesn’t even try to pretend she doesn’t want it, doesn’t even stop chewing on her current bite to protest. She looks up to find him smiling at her with that same, ever-present softness she’s learning is just him.
It dawns on her then that he’s the first person to ever cook for her, and she’s suddenly and wholly overwhelmed with emotion. Without a second thought, she swallows her food and reaches for his hand before he can walk back to his side of the table. She holds it tightly, and holds his eyes as she rests her face against it.
Ben flips it over until he’s cupping her face in his palm, his thumb caressing her cheekbone.
No words are said, aloud or through the bond, but the touch alone says everything.
Around midday, they venture outside. Ben carries a makeshift knapsack over his shoulder as he leads her through the forest surrounding the homestead, stepping over thickets and holding her hand when they cross a narrow stretch of a river. She isn’t sure where they’re headed, but she doesn’t care much, either. The air is crisp and cool and smells rich and lush, not unlike the misty, warm winds of Endor.
At one point, when Rey is distracted by a particularly thick tree stump and isn’t looking ahead as she should be, she almost barrels into Ben when he stops suddenly on the path. She grunts, halting her steps and huffing out a surprised breath as he crouches down and starts to inspect something she can’t see.
“What is it?”
He says nothing, but eventually stands and turns around, holding up his palm. In it lay a vibrant, ruby red plant unlike anything she’s ever seen. Rey tilts her head, her eyes growing wide in amazement.
“Dalsa flower,” Ben says, lifting it to her nose.
Rey breathes in and sighs at the sweet scent, immediately inhaling again.
“They have thorns in them, but they’re easy to pick out,” he continues, smiling at her. Then, he reaches forward, tucks a lock of hair behind her ear, and sets the stem there carefully, his fingertips brushing her cheek as he pulls away. She can see the vibrant color in her peripheral vision, and thinks she must look a little silly. Like a child playing dress up.
Ben stares at her with that soft, lovely smile, shaking his head slowly, as in disbelief.
“Why are you staring at me?” Rey asks with a little pout.
A chuckle sounds from deep in his chest. “Because you’re beautiful.”
Half a mile further, they reach a gap in the trees. On the other side sits a clearing of lush, bright green grass, speckled with pink, orange, and lavender flowers. The beauty is almost too much to bear. When you grow up in a place as monochromatic as the Jakku desert, it’s easy to forget that the rest of the galaxy is bathed in color.
Rey’s breath catches in her throat, and a breathy “Oh” slips from her lips as they break through the forest and are enveloped in sunlight, lovely and warm against her skin.
Entranced by the environment, she doesn’t notice Ben digging around in his knapsack and grabbing a blanket that he lays out in front of them. Only when he clears his throat does she turn, blinking at him in surprise. He gestures for her to sit with a patient smile and then joins her on the blanket, close enough that their knees are touching.
After a comfortable, quiet moment, he sighs and lays back, folding his arms behind his head. Rey looks over her shoulder to find his eyes fluttering shut, face content as the sun beams gently across all of his strange, beautiful features. She takes advantage of the moment to simply stare at him, mentally cataloging the hundreds of freckles and beauty marks that span his cheeks, forehead, and temples.
It almost hurts to see him wholly unguarded and free, every wall he’d constructed to protect himself dismantled. She wishes this could be his every day, wishes that smile on his face could be there always.
With a little grunt, Rey lays back, too, her arms pressed awkwardly against her sides. She’s unnaturally still for a good twenty seconds before Ben huffs out a laugh and reaches for her, pulling toward him until her head rests comfortably on his chest. It’s odd, at first, being so close to him all of a sudden, but then—
Then she breathes him in, relishes in his scent mixed with the wildflowers, and it’s everything. Her eyes fall shut and she squeezes the material of his tunic covering his sternum, as if latching onto him as tightly as she can will keep him secured to her side forever.
They lay like that for an indeterminable amount of time, basking in the sun, and each other.
Never one to leave well enough alone, Rey eventually shatters the peace of the meadow when she can no longer refrain from asking questions. There are a million things she wants to know about him, about his life before and during the First Order. She doesn’t know how much they’ll be able to communicate while he’s away, so she packs two years worth of conversations into an hour. Ben is patient and generous with her the whole way through, answering every question in as much detail as she wants, never once getting angry or defensive when she pries even further.
“What was she like, as a mother?”
“Warm. Understanding. Physically affectionate. Preoccupied.”
“And him?”
“Cynical. Funny. Pedantic. Apprehensively kind. Never around.”
“Were you angry with them when they sent you away?”
“I was heartbroken and scared, at first. I didn’t understand why they were so afraid of me. But the longer I was gone, the more angry I became. I resented them because it was easier than missing them.”
“When did you stop loving them?”
“Never.”
“But you—how could you do what you did, if you loved them?”
“I wish I could blame the dark side, or Snoke, or anything but myself. But the truth is, I was in constant pain because I couldn’t stop loving them. Stupidly, I thought once I removed them from the picture, the pain would cease, or at least evolve into something I could use to enhance my power. Neither of those things happened.”
“Do you miss them?”
“More than I ever thought was possible.”
He denies her nothing, even when she can tell it pains him. With every piece of himself he shares, Rey holds him tighter.
“Why didn’t you come with me that night, after we killed Snoke?”
“I couldn’t be what you wanted me to be. Not then.”
“But you still wanted me to join you, to be by your side.”
“Yes.”
“It was more about power, then, wasn’t it?”
“It was.”
“And now?”
“Now, I see things differently. I understand that power is secondary.”
“To what?”
“Love. Trust. Devotion.”
His lips are pressed against her temple, and she’s struggling to keep her eyes open. Anger flushes her cheeks; she’s frustrated that sleep is threatening to steal her away from him.
She can’t go, not now.
Not when they have so little time.
“What did the bond feel like when you were in the pit? When I was…you know.”
“Like something had ripped a hole in me, and in the fabric of the universe. Like nothing would ever be okay again.”
She’s fading fast, dancing back and forth over the line between sleeping and waking. Ben strokes her hair, and the rhythm of his heartbeat—the strong, vibrant thrum of it—is the sweetest kind of lullaby.
I think I missed you before we even met.
I think I’m falling in love with you.
The bright cerulean sky has bled into a dark purple expanse, speckled with pale, twinkling stars. Rey’s eyes flutter open to find day has given way to night, and she instantly picks her head up from where it lay comfortably on Ben’s chest. She finds him awake; his pale skin looks almost violet in this light, his amber eyes shifted into a sea of black. He’s rubbing soothing semicircles across her shoulder blades, and if she wasn’t irritated with herself for falling asleep, she’d be melting into his touch.
“How long was I asleep?” she asks, pouting.
“Couple hours,” Ben says, his hand drifting upward, toward the back of her neck. He cradles her there with the softest touch, his thumb stroking the edge of her hairline.
Rey’s eyes widen. “Why didn’t you wake me?”
“I thought about it,” he muses, pursing his lips.
She blinks at him, waiting for further explanation.
Ben grins. “You looked so peaceful. And your little snores were so cute.”
Rey’s mouth drops open and she moves before her brain has time to process it, swinging a leg over his hips and straddling him in an effort to trap him so she can pinch his sides in retribution.
The laugh that erupts from his chest is like the strangest kind of music—there’s no grace in it; he laughs with his entire body, as though it’s rising from the depths of his very soul. It’s loud, brash, and lovely.
Eventually, he locks her hands in place with his own, panting as he halts her tickling fingers. Rey leans forward, their noses only inches apart. “I do not snore,” she bites out, nose scrunched dramatically.
“You actually do. You also drool,” he replies, looking down at his shirt.
Rey’s eyes follow the movement to find a wet patch near his sternum and her cheeks instantly flush. She pushes against his hands, wanting to go for his armpits this time—that oughta teach him to poke fun at her—but Ben doesn’t budge. She’s grunting with the effort, and then yelps when he yanks her hands swiftly away from his sides and pulls them above his head, lacing their fingers together. The movement brings their faces close enough that their noses actually touch this time. Their panting breaths meld together as they stare at each other in the twilight, and when Ben’s eyes flicker down to her mouth, she decides they don’t have time to dance around this. Not when she’s wanted so badly to kiss him since they landed on Kesh.
She presses their lips together in a hard, unpracticed way, more of a smoosh than a kiss. Ben lets out a little grunt, his hands leaving hers to gently cup her face. The smack that sounds when their lips part is loud and almost comedic, and Rey lifts her head slightly to find Ben grinning, his thumbs brushing over her cheekbones.
Then, with a little tug, he pulls her lips back to his own, and kissing is redefined for Rey forever.
Because Ben doesn’t just smash their mouths together; he brushes his lips gently over hers, letting her feel the texture, the softness, the warmth. He kisses the corners of her mouth, her chin, the line of her jaw. He slides his hands into her hair and pulls her head down slowly to kiss her eyebrows, her forehead, the tip of her nose. Rey sighs as he maps every inch of her face, and when he finally kisses her properly again, it’s as if the entire galaxy ceases to exist outside of this moment, this planet, this meadow. This complicated, beautiful man.
Rey moans into Ben’s mouth as he trails his tongue across her bottom lip, sweetly requesting access she didn’t realize she could give. Their tongues touch and it’s a maelstrom of sensation—wetness and warmth and sparks flying deep in her belly, sending aching pangs of something deliciously unfamiliar between her legs.
This is everything, he says through the bond.
I know, she responds. I know.
She follows his lead as they explore each other; she has no experience in this area, but when he bites her bottom lip, her hips rock into his body and it feels as natural as breathing.
Ben moans into her mouth, his hand moving from her waist to cup her bottom, and Rey feels something beginning to harden beneath her. It’s pure instinct when she swivels her hips, rubbing her crotch over the growing bulge, and the sound that echoes from his mouth to hers is completely animalistic.
He breaks away from her then, his chest heaving as he presses their foreheads together. Rey chases his mouth but he leans back, smiling as he shakes his head. “We have to stop.”
Her voice is rough and foreign-sounding when she asks, “Why?”
Ben hums as he pushes himself off the blanket and into a sitting position, Rey still firmly secured in his lap. He presses a kiss between her eyebrows, then to the apples of her cheeks. “Because I want you,” he whispers, leaning down to kiss her neck, “but we can’t do this here.”
Rey’s eyes fall shut, her head falling back to give him better access. Breathily, she asks again, “Why?”
His lips move upward, and when the hot tip of his tongue traces the shell of her ear, Rey whimpers. Ben’s hold on her tightens, his hand pressing into her tailbone to bring them even closer. “It’s not safe out here at night. Some of the native species are unpredictable.” Fingertips trail up her spine until his hand cups the back of her neck. “And there are bugs.”
She wants to tell him she doesn’t care, they can take care of themselves, they can face anything together if it means they can stay right here and he’ll keep touching her.
Ben chuckles, and she realizes she’s let her thoughts drift freely through the bond. He bites her earlobe and her mouth falls open, her hands moving to his hair. When she sinks her fingers in and scrapes his scalp lightly with her nails, Ben moans.
He sends a thought, and even through the bond, his voice is raspy and strained. Rey shivers at his words.
Let’s go back. I want you in a bed.
Unlike Jakku, Kesh becomes abnormally warm in the evenings. A stickiness settles into the air, bringing with it a host of flying insects that hover around Rey’s head as they make the three mile trek back to the homestead. Every few steps, she finds herself smacking a different part of her exposed skin when something lands on it, buzzing and irritating. After one particularly painful slap to the neck, Rey huffs in frustration. Over her shoulder she grumbles to Ben, “Do these things bite?”
“Sometimes. I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine,” Rey replies—lies— and whether the creeping itchiness on her arms and neck is psychosomatic or real, she can’t say. But she’s starting to scratch, and once she starts, it quickly becomes harder and harder to stop.
She’s scraping her nails over a particularly rough bite when she feels a hand land softly atop her own. Ben’s keeping pace with her now, angling his arm out to stop her motions. “You’ll only make them worse,” he says, giving her hand a little squeeze. “I have a balm for it at the house. It’ll help the itchiness.”
Rey lets her hand fall back to her side, but it’s a difficult feat. Ben gives her a reassuring smile as his hand slides down her arm until he takes the one now closest to him and weaves their fingers together.
The walk feels exponentially longer than it did in the cool afternoon, and by the time they make it back, Rey is dripping in sweat and practically begging for this mysterious elixir Ben has that will save her from this itchy hell.
“I’ll grab it,” he says as they push through the front door. “Go jump in the fresher. The sweat isn’t helping, and the ointment will adhere to your skin better if it’s clean and dry.” He points toward the back of the homestead and Rey follows his direction, already beginning to disrobe. The faster she gets these clothes off, the better—they’re nearly soaked through and sticking to her skin, causing an unpleasant chafing in more than one area.
Part of her wants to give Ben a hard time for keeping them out until dark despite knowing the environment would become annoyingly hostile. Yes, she is the one who fell asleep, but he could’ve woken her—could’ve had them making the miles-long hike back in the daylight when the forest was kind and the air was crisp and dry. Yes, she thinks she will say something about it—
But then the spray of the fresher hits her skin, and all complaints cease to matter.
Ben must’ve gone through quite a bit of trouble to secure a fresher like this. It’s unlike any she’s seen—not that she’s seen a great many, but it’s definitely a massive step up from the tiny booths at the Resistance outpost, where the pressure is weak and the water is always lukewarm. This is a technological marvel, as far as Rey’s concerned.
The bug bites scattered over her skin are an afterthought as she lets herself get drenched, hot streams cascading down her face and body like she’s under the most glorious waterfall. She uses Ben’s various products—of course he’d have more than one type of conditioner—and scrubs herself clean, relishing in the added sensation of running a sudsy towel over her bite-ridden skin. Only when she notices her fingers beginning to wrinkle does she decide to rinse off one last time, shutting off the water with a woeful pout.
Grabbing for one of the large, plush towels from a hook on the door, Rey pats herself dry. She presses it to the ends of her hair and squeezes out the excess moisture, then sets it down atop the sink and stares regretfully at the crumpled pile of clothes on the floor.
The last thing she wants to do right now is put the sticky, sweaty garments back on. Not when she’s never felt quite as clean as she does now. It would be a shame to soil her skin with the grime that’s caked into the fabric of her tunic and leggings.
Just as well, she thinks. It’s not like she was planning to be clothed much longer, anyway.
Ben’s standing at the kitchen sink with his back to the sitting room, fiddling with something Rey can’t see. If he hears her approach, he doesn’t acknowledge it at all, so she observes him for a few breaths before deciding she’s done—done not being looked at by him. Done waiting to be touched.
I’m here, she says patiently through the bond.
“One second. I’m getting the balm ready,” he replies over the noise of the faucet. “It’s more effective when it’s warm.”
Ben. She shifts her weight from foot to foot, chewing on her bottom lip. The longer she stands here, the more likely she is to lose her nerve. After all, it’s not like she’s done this before. In the meadow, she went by what she felt, but she isn’t naive enough to think that was all sex entails. Sex is something done naked. There’s…inserting involved. Heat blooms on her cheeks at the thought.
Ben still hasn’t turned around, nor does he even look over his shoulder as he responds, “Yeah?”
Look at me.
Finally, he turns. “It’s not quite there—”
The words die on his tongue, and the shallow canister in his palm falls into the sink.
She’s leaning against the arch that borders the kitchen and the sitting room, legs crossed and head resting against the smooth wood. It’s the most alluring pose she could manage; she’d tried more than one, feeling a bit too much like an awkward pretzel for all the grace she exuded with her spindly limbs.
But whatever she looks like now must work for Ben, because his lips are slightly parted and his eyelids have suddenly gone heavy, and when he swallows, the action is obvious in his throat. His gaze trails up and down her body, drinking her in. A deep inhale through flared nostrils lifts his chest and shoulders, and then he seems to tire of being so far away from her. He steps closer, and Rey is licking her lips, ready to push off the wall and press herself against him when he stops, shaking his head quickly, his eyes fluttering shut. “Wait.”
It takes every semblance of decency and patience Rey has not to outright whine, and the frustration must echo through the bond because Ben opens his eyes and gives her that characteristically soft smile before turning back to the sink. He reaches in and grabs the canister, then renews his journey toward her with purpose. “Let me do this first. If I don’t—if we get carried away and forget—you’ll be scratching all night.”
“I don’t care,” Rey says breathily.
You will, he replies through the bond, approaching her slowly. Come.
He reaches out for her hand and leads her to the sitting room, then to the arm of the wide lounge chair. She leans against it, feeling more exposed by the second. If she’d known he wasn’t going to immediately pounce on her, she probably would’ve considered at least putting on her undergarments. As it stands, she’s wholly naked, bare ass rubbing against the stark white material of the couch.
Ben stands in front of her for a beat, eyes still roaming over every inch of her skin. When they make their way back up to her face, his breathing has grown slightly shallow, and any embarrassment Rey’s feeling dissipates almost immediately when she notices the bulge growing beneath his belt.
With long, deep breaths through his nose, his eyes roam over the top half of her body. Rey notices the way they seem to dart from her arms to her neck, as if he’s mentally blocking himself from looking at her breasts. He clears his throat, then places two fingers at the bottom of her chin and begins tilting her head slowly back and forth, cataloging all the places where the insects have marked her. When he’s seemingly satisfied, he unscrews the lid of the canister and dips his fingers into the thick, opaque substance inside.
He starts with her arms, and the relief is instant. The urge to scratch dulls more with each bite he soothes, gently and methodically rubbing the ointment over her biceps, forearms, and elbows.
When he’s mapped her sufficiently there, he moves to her neck. With an exhale, he scoops more of the balm onto his fingers and begins with the base, then carefully makes his way upward to her jaw. One spot in particular near her ear, he dedicates himself to for longer than the others. She wonders if perhaps it is more swollen or red and therefore needs more care—whatever the case may be, it feels indescribably good, especially when he leans down and begins to blow on her skin. Rey has to bite down roughly on her bottom lip to keep from moaning as her head lolls back.
He presses a quick kiss to a spot just south of the bite before he pulls himself away. Then, without warning, he sinks down to his knees. Rey’s breath hitches at the sight, and when he lifts his chin to meet her eyes, there’s a wildness in his gaze. He looks like a man unmade, expression full of reverence and hunger.
With the way he’s looking at her, it’s a wonder that he manages to refocus on his task, but he perseveres somehow, lifting Rey’s ankle until her foot rises from the floor. He sets it against the top of his thigh and begins rubbing ointment onto the reddened bumps on her calf, where the bugs had taken full advantage of the patch of exposed skin between her boots and leggings.
He gives the same care to her other leg, and when he’s done, he lifts his chin and stares at her through long, dark lashes. Eyes locked with hers, he bends forward and presses a kiss to an unmarred part of her shin. Rey exhales loudly at the feeling, her attention rapt as he begins a journey of warm, wet kisses—from her calf to her knee to the overly sensitive skin of her inner thigh.
Already, the onslaught of sensation is overwhelming. Feelings too deep to articulate—physical and emotional—take flight as Ben gently scrapes his teeth against thick muscle, alternating between one leg and the other, never neglecting either for long. The exhales he looses from his flared nostrils hits her exposed center and Rey’s knees almost buckle, might’ve completely if Ben weren’t holding her secure in his grip. His lips inch closer to the apex, hovering deliciously and enticingly around the border as his eyes bore into hers.
May I? He asks through the bond, sounding rather winded.
Rey gulps. I’ve never done that before—er—no one’s done that to me. I’ve never done it—any of this. Even mentally, she can’t help but stutter and stumble over her words. Nerves intensify under her skin as he processes her confession; she doesn’t know if he’s practiced in the art of sex, if he’s taken lovers, touched or been touched. A selfish part of her wishes his inexperience matches her own, if only because he’ll have nothing to compare this to. If she’s lacking in any way, disappointing in her naiveté, he won’t know any better.
His next words are earnest, as gentle as his expression. Do you trust me?
Struck by just how much, Rey can only nod.
Can I make you feel good?
Another nod as she chews on the inside of her cheek in anticipation.
Ben holds her gaze, unblinking and unrelenting. Then, without ceremony, he dives in.
In her life before, pleasure was never a priority. When your sole daily task is to survive, the idea of doing anything outside of what is absolutely necessary feels self indulgent and absurd. In a peripheral sense, she’s understood for a good while that procreation and mating is part of living, but the concept of pleasure for pleasure’s sake, she has yet to grasp.
Or, at least, she hadn’t grasped. Until now.
Ben’s tongue lay flat against her labia, stroking with long, broad, sensuous swipes. There’s one particular spot he keeps hitting that sends sparks of euphoria throughout her entire body; she keeps nearly doubling over with the weight of how good it feels. Her hands itch to grab onto his hair and direct him back there, but instead, she grips the arm of the couch for dear life.
The sounds she’s making are impolite, bordering on animalistic, but she’s never been touched like this before—with this kind of singular focus and determination. Ben’s eyes are screwed tight, and every few seconds she hears him moan, as though he’s enjoying this as much as she is. She watches him in awe as her hips begin to rock into his mouth.
You taste— he cuts himself off with a groan, his hands sliding up the backs of her thighs to cup her bottom. He squeezes, hard, and Rey gasps, her legs stretching open wider, her pelvis arching further into him.
“Tell me,” Rey gasps.
Like honey, cyar’ika, he says, pressing his tongue deep inside. So sweet and warm.
She doesn’t understand the word he called her; it sounds similar to a language she’s heard once or twice at Niima Outpost, spoken by men covered in shiny, impenetrable looking armor. The rhythm of it is familiar in that way, but she isn’t sure—
It’s Mando’a, he tells her, pulling back slightly. His mouth is glistening with her wetness as he breathes heavily through his nose, staring up at her with bald adoration. “For beloved.” With the pads of his index and middle finger, he presses against that little button that makes stars burst in her eyes, all the while keeping his gaze locked on her face. “Because that’s what you are,” he breathes, fingers trailing down to the place she’s most wet, most empty. When the tip of one breaches her slowly, a stuttered moan escapes her lips. Her eyelids flutter as she tries to process the feeling. Ben’s stare grows more heated; his pupils are jet black and wide as saucers as he says, “My beloved.”
He pushes upward to the first knuckle, and it’s odd—it stings a little, but not enough that she wants him to stop. And then he leans his head back down and focuses his tongue on that spot, that wonderful, throbbing spot, and the stinging fades into something else entirely.
“Oh,” Rey gasps as he starts to push and pull, the movement working in tandem with his mouth. He keeps her upright with his free hand, still cupping—and occasionally squeezing—her butt cheek. Something foreign begins to course through her, from the depths of her abdomen to her sex, all the way down to the tips of her toes. She isn’t sure what it is, but she wants to chase it. Her eyes screw shut, her hips starting to fully thrust against his mouth. “Oh, Ben, I—”
Do you feel it, sweetheart?
Rey nods, biting down hard on her bottom lip.
Without warning, he adds another finger, and she doesn’t even try to stop her hands as they reach for his head. They sink into his hair and hold him in place as she moves against him, scratching lightly against his scalp. Ben lets loose a guttural moan, and the vibration of the sound has Rey throwing her head back, her mouth falling open wide.
“Please.”
I know, he says, breathless. I’ll get you there.
She doesn’t know where he means, but she’d follow him to the far edges of the galaxy if it meant she could continue to feel this good. Maneuvering one of her legs until it’s draped over his shoulder, Ben grunts as his fingers sink even deeper inside.
Then endless, aching waves of pleasure suddenly radiate from him through the bond, and Rey is done for. How turned on he is—how hard—purely from serving her, it undoes her completely.
The moan that falls from her lips is long and loud as the orgasm crashes through her entire body. A sea of euphoria pulls her under and willingly, she sinks. Her vision goes completely white as it pulses through her, each crest more intense than the last. She grips his hair tightly to keep herself from falling over, and he squeezes her thigh, not stopping even as she moans and pants and gasps for air.
Feel it, baby, he coos. Feel it all.
Rey is helpless but to obey. She feels everything. Every atom she’s made of is vibrating. Every inch of her soul is alight.
When he rises from his knees and kisses her, she tastes herself on his tongue. There’s something heady about it, licking her own wetness off of his mouth. Ben’s chest heaves as he pushes his hands through her hair, his tongue sliding against hers with delicious friction. The echoes of the orgasm he just gave her still linger, and as the kiss grows deeper, longer, she feels herself growing wet again.
An emptiness unlike any she’s ever experienced aches between her legs; she understands what her body is yearning for, but the practicality of it is somewhat intimidating. Ben’s length, a distinctly massive bulge in his pants, presses into her belly, and Rey pulls her mouth from his and stares down at it.
Big, she thinks, and Ben huffs a laugh through his nose.
Rey blinks up at him. “I don’t know what I’m doing. I’ve never…done that.”
His eyes, blazing and dark with hunger, soften at her words. He lifts her head, his thumbs caressing her cheekbones, and bends forward to press a feather-light kiss to the tip of her nose. “Me either,” he whispers.
Rey’s brow furrows, unconvinced given what he just did, and Ben grins. “The bond helped. When something felt good to you, I could feel it. But I—” His eyes drop momentarily from hers and he rubs his lips together. “I’ve never been with anyone like that. Kissed a girl once at the Jedi academy during spin the saber, but I was like twelve.”
The image of Ben as a child among other Force-sensitives at Luke’s academy evokes unexpected emotion from Rey; she can picture him so vividly, sitting with his legs criss-crossed, his ears going bright red when the saber spins around the circle and lands on him. She can almost feel the way their teeth bumped together, and his shock and slight aversion when she tried to stick her tongue in his mouth. There’s a sourness to her breath that Rey catches whiffs of, recoiling.
The vision fades into sepia tones and then disappears entirely, and when Rey returns fully to the present, Ben’s eyes are searching her own, his lips slightly parted. “It’s that easy now, isn’t it?” he asks, awed. “I didn’t even have to try to share that with you. You saw it; you felt it. You smelled Brealla’s breath.”
Rey smirks. “I can see why that would turn you off of kissing for a while.”
Ben laughs, his smile lighting up his entire face. Then he’s bending down, gripping the backs of her thighs and lifting her up until her legs wrap around his waist. Rey yelps, flailing a little until she circles her arms around his neck, steadying herself. His erection is rubbing against a new, more sensitive part of her now, and both of their smiles begin to fade into something more intense when they realize it.
He leans forward and kisses her, tracing her bottom lip with his tongue. Rey moans, letting him in instantly, hands curling into his hair. They make out for a long, lovely moment before Ben breaks away, breathing hard. “We can take it slow,” he pants, nuzzling her cheek with his nose. “Figure it out together.”
Rey nods, rubbing her face against his like a needy lothcat. He starts to move, walking them down the hall with heavy, purposeful steps. When they reach his room, he lays her down gently atop his bed and stands before her, staring unabashedly at her sprawled out over his sheets. Hungry eyes continue to roam as he toes off his boots and sheds his tunic and pants, leaving everything in a haphazard pile on the floor. Fully naked now, Rey surveys him without shame. Every hard ridge and soft peak of him, his pale body painted with moles and freckles, but unmarked by scars. She swallows thickly, futilely trying to bring moisture back into her mouth, which has suddenly gone bone dry.
She’s always thought handsome isn’t the most sufficient word to describe him—it’s too simple, too commonplace for a man with a face like that. Beautiful is more apt, but that was before she’d seen him fully bared, every muscle and ripple and angle on display. And his cock—she thinks that’s the best word to describe the appendage, it’s less anatomical than penis, has a bit more flare—is unlike anything she’s ever seen. Thick and long and jutting toward his belly button, flushed with the same redness that spreads across his cheeks.
Beautiful is no longer appropriate. He is otherworldly. Nothing less than wholly magnificent.
The blush from his cheeks spreads to the tips of his ears, and his brows pull together as he stares at her. A shine forms over his eyes, and she understands then—he’s heard her. Her classification of him was too loud, too sincere to stay in only her mind.
“It’s the truth,” Rey says, because she can feel the way he doubts it, even now.
He shakes his head in disbelief as he lays himself over her, leaning his weight onto an elbow. He cups her cheek gently and slants his lips over hers, slipping his tongue into her mouth with a sigh. His kiss says all the things he can’t articulate. Whether he means to say the words to her, or if it’s simply his stream of consciousness, she doesn’t know, but Rey hears it all with startling clarity.
No one has ever looked at me the way you do.
No one has ever called me beautiful.
I look at myself through your eyes and it’s the only time I haven’t hated what I see.
How do you do that?
How do you erase a lifetime of doubt with one look?
Rey moans into his mouth in reply, sliding her fingers into his hair. Ben growls, tugging at her bottom lip with his teeth and she can’t help the way her hips arch into his, short-circuiting for a second when she feels his cock, hot and heavy, pressing against her bare skin.
“Fuck,” he says into her mouth. “Can I—”
“Please,” Rey gasps, nodding fervently.
He reaches down to take himself in hand, his chin tucked into his chest as he notches the blunt, smooth tip at her entrance. All that’s left to do is push in, and Rey sucks in a deep breath and braces for the inevitable pain of it, but Ben doesn’t move. He picks his head up and brushes the tips of their noses together, half-lidded eyes boring into hers.
“I’ll go slow,” he breathes, pressing a kiss to the corner of her mouth. “We can stop if it hurts.”
Rey reaches up to cradle his cheeks in her hands. She can feel his hesitation, his genuine fear that he’ll injure her, or that she won’t enjoy this. “I trust you,” Rey says honestly. And then again, for good measure, “I trust you.”
Ben presses his lips to hers. He kisses her softly, sensually, and she’s getting wetter just from that—enough that when he begins to push in, while it does feel a little bit like she’s being split open, it doesn’t hurt. An uncomfortable pinch, maybe, but not pain.
He inches himself inside slowly, his eyes screwed shut and sweat beginning to bead at his hairline. Rey can sense the amount of restraint he’s exercising right now; he wants to shove himself in to the hilt, wants to have her warmth wrapped around the entirety of his cock. But he doesn’t want to rush it—he will never forgive himself if he doesn’t make this good for her.
The invasiveness of it becomes less unpleasant by the second, and deep breaths in through her nose and out through her mouth help her to relax. Ben, whose mouth had ripped from hers, panting harsh breaths, redoubles his effort of kissing her, sliding his tongue against hers and groaning when Rey’s hips cant forward in response.
When he finally hilts himself inside of her, their movements still. They share breath through open mouths pressed lightly against each other, and their eyes are locked as they both process the feeling of being completely connected. Physically, mentally, emotionally.
I never knew, Ben says through the bond, reaching up to push an errant strand of hair out of her face. I never knew it was possible to feel like this.
Rey’s eyes flutter closed and she leans into his touch. I’ve never given it much thought, she replies, but I’m glad it’s you.
A breath leaves his body like he’s been punched, and he slowly extracts himself from her until only the tip remains. Then he pushes in, slowly, deliciously, and any lingering thoughts of pain or discomfort disappear completely.
“Ben,” Rey moans as he repeats the motion, never fully leaving her but stretching her out with each thrust. Ben.
“Sweetheart,” he sighs, his head falling to the crook of her neck.
That telltale feeling she’s learning means something exquisite is on the horizon begins to creep up her spine. Ben continues to roll his hips into hers, hitting a spot inside her that sends her hurtling toward the edge. It’s less potent than it had been before, more of a dull, aching pleasure than the urgent, impatient lust she’d experienced from his mouth, but it’s still overwhelming. It’s still turning her breaths into moans shaped like his name.
I’m not gonna last, he tells her with a hint of alarm. But I want to make you come.
He reaches between their bodies until he finds that spot again, the spot that is quickly becoming Rey’s favorite, and circles it with the thick, rough pads of his fingers. Eyes squeezing shut, Rey’s head presses into the mattress and her back arches as sparks of heat begin to fly. “Oh, oh, it’s—” she gurgles, writhing beneath him.
“Tell me,” he says against her neck, echoing her command from earlier.
Unsure she still has the capacity to speak, Rey uses the bond, and even then, her thoughts are jumbled, bordering on nonsensical. His name is the only word she doesn’t stutter.
So good. Ben, I’m so hot—it feels like I’m burning up. Ben. Ben, please, never stop. This is everything. Ben, how is it possible to feel this good?
Ben moans into the line of her jaw, his hand reaching up to encircle her neck. His thrusts become more fervent and less gentle, his strong, powerful body losing its ability to hold back. “Rey,” he groans. “My love.”
Love, Rey repeats immediately, drunk on his cock, on the barrage of pleasure. This is love.
A beat of quiet stretches between them, the connecting of their bodies the only sound in the room. Then, Ben’s voice is soft as he commands, “Look at me.”
Her eyes flutter open, squinting against the glow of the lamp, and she finds his face hovering inches above hers. Wet trails of tears shine on his cheeks, and the sight makes Rey’s throat feel instantly tight. She reaches up to wipe them away with her thumbs, even as her own eyes begin to well. A tiny sob escapes Ben’s lips as he leans down and presses their foreheads together. She keeps his cheeks cradled in her palms, and his cock twitches and throbs as his movements slow, his mouth dropping open wide.
Whatever walls remained between them—whatever had been holding back his pleasure from melting into hers—fall down. It hits her like the towering waves of the Kef Bir ocean; the euphoria he’s experiencing is immense and all-consuming. It combines with hers, doubling in size and weight and power, and sends them both into oblivion.
Rey practically screams as she squeezes around him like she’s trying to lock him in place forever, a vice grip that refuses to relent. Ben grunts, his entire body trembling as he begins to spill inside her, his cock pulsing hot spend and coating her insides, amplifying the already near-painful bliss. “Rey,” he gasps, his voice watery.
She nods, her eyes blinking open to find his wide and wet. I’m here, she says, caressing his face.
Ben’s nostrils flare as the last of his come spurts inside. He lets out a long, shaky breath, and the words he says next come through the bond. She knows, somehow, that he’d say it out loud if he could, but he’s too overwhelmed, too lost—in this feeling, in her eyes, in her heart.
I love you so much.
Rey’s breath catches. “I love you,” she says, her face beginning to crumble. “I love you, Ben.”
His nostrils flare, and he flexes his jaw. “Everything I am,” he says, voice trembling, “everything I will ever be, is yours.”
For the next couple of hours, they fall in and out of sleep. She wakes more than once to find him snoring beneath her, and takes the opportunity to trace his face with her fingertip. He looks so relaxed, unguarded in a way that makes her heart squeeze with affection.
Later, she comes to and finds him kissing her neck, her breasts, her stomach. He wrings another orgasm out of her with his mouth and fingers, then flips her body over and pushes into her with a sigh.
The new angle pulls him in even deeper, and they both moan as he drives into her from behind. The slap of his hips hitting her ass with every thrust is the lewdest, most wonderful sound.
When he comes inside her, he bites down onto her shoulder, and Rey gasps as he reaches around and swirls his fingers over her slit until he finds that little nub, bringing her to the brink seconds later.
She clenches around him and Ben grunts, his grip on her hips tightening almost to the point of pain.
“Fuck, Rey,” he groans, his cock still pulsing inside. “Nothing has ever felt as good as you.”
When they’re both spent, Rey sprawls out on top of him with a leg draped over his hip. He runs his fingers through her hair as they just breathe together, both in denial about the dwindling amount of time they have left.
A thought occurs to her—she picks up her head and rests her chin against his pec, the sparse hair on his chest scratchy against her skin. “We should practice with the bond. I think we could control it if we dedicate some time to learning how it works. What it’s capable of.”
Ben brushes a piece of hair out of her face, tucking it behind her ear. “Okay.”
He says nothing else, so Rey’s anxiety bubbles up and starts to fill the silence. “I just think—with how long you’ll be gone—it would be good if we could use it at will. And we didn’t know we could pass things through it until we actually did that, what else can we do? I want—” She trails off, her nostrils flaring at the sudden emotion. “I want us to be able to sleep together, wake up together. All the things… in between together. And that won’t be possible if we have no control over when it separates us.”
He nods, and a half-smile forms on his lips. “I want all of that, too. I think we spent a long time denying its existence. Now that we’re embracing it, there’s no telling how powerful it could become,” he says, that analytical brain rearing its head. His eyes turn slightly sad, and he caresses her cheek as he adds, “Or how far it may reach.”
Eventually, neither can fight it when sleep takes them. There isn’t a single part of them that isn’t touching, and when Rey falls deep enough into sleep that she begins to dream, she’s met with something astonishing.
Ben is there, with his soft smile and his big hands and his beautiful heart. He walks toward her on some unknowable planet, takes her face into his hands, and kisses her.
Good, he says through the bond, smiling against her lips. Now even sleep can’t separate us.
They make it back to Endor with minutes to spare. Poe looks supremely annoyed, waiting for them with his arms folded over his chest and a sour look on his face. “Hope you kids enjoyed yourselves,” he says flatly.
Ben and Rey walk hand-in-hand down the boarding ramp and share a quick, knowing look. Both of them fight the urge to smile.
Poe nods toward a rusted X-Wing that sits among many newer, more comfortable looking ships. “That’s your ride, Solo. You’ve got five minutes before they want you out of here.”
A boulder the size of a planet sinks in Rey’s gut. “Poe—”
“It’s okay,” Ben cuts in, squeezing her hand. “Five minutes. Got it.”
When their feet are flat against the mossy floor, Rey turns to face him. He doesn’t look upset, or slighted, or afraid that he’s about to embark on a journey with no end. He looks content. Satisfied. Happy.
We can do this, he tells her, and his tone brooks no argument. This isn’t an ending.
Rey nods as tears fall from her eyes, and then Ben pulls her into his chest and holds her tightly. He presses his lips to the top of her head, and Rey breathes him in as deeply as she can, trying to memorize the way he smells. Maybe— maybe the bond will allow her to do so at some point, but she can’t bank on that. She’s got to take in as much of him as she can right now, while he’s still right in front of her.
We’re just beginning, he says, and then he’s using two fingers to lift up her chin so he can slant his mouth over hers.
They kiss for the majority of the minutes they have left, and when they finally break apart, they’re both breathing heavily.
“I love you,” Rey says, leaning her cheek into his palm.
Ben smiles, his thumb softly stroking her skin. “Forever, Rey. This is forever.”
Days turn to weeks. Weeks turn to months. Months turn to years, and Ben is still gone. To strangers, it would appear that Rey is managing surprisingly well in his absence. She doesn’t mope; she doesn’t cry; she doesn’t shirk in her duties to the Resistance. She goes on missions without complaint, brings back shiploads of supplies and rations and intel. She cracks jokes at meals between bouts of stuffing her face, and in her spare time, she fixes various things around the outpost until doors are no longer creaky and sinks no longer spurt brown water. She watches holovids with Kaydel and Rose and plays Sabacc with the pilots even though she’s so good that she’s constantly robbing them of credits.
No one calls attention to it in front of her, but they question it when she isn’t around. Wasn’t she close with Ben? Wasn’t she distraught when they gave him the choice between death and an impossible, incompletable mission? Surely, she must be at least a little bit angry. Or sad. Or anything but this happy, helpful, friendly person that bounces around the outpost with a grin spread from ear to ear.
Surely, she must miss him.
Rey sprints up the boarding ramp of the Falcon after a long day of repairs to the mess hall kitchen. She’s sweaty, covered in grease, and she can smell how badly she needs to jump in the fresher. A pot full of expired Rootleaf stew had fallen on her earlier in the day, and though she’d changed clothes, the smell still lingers in her hair and under her nails.
But that can wait.
All done for the day, she says, buzzing with excitement. It’s been two days since Ben landed on Canto Bight and they agreed to only see each other at night, and only to sleep. The mission at hand was proving to be a complicated one and he needed to focus.
But now, it’s over. He’s gathered as much information as he can about the arms dealers who used to sell weapons to the First Order; the ones that were stupid enough not to go into hiding have been thoroughly vetted and all potential threats have been neutralized.
She runs toward the lounge, panting, and finds him sitting at the Dejarik table with a bright smile on his face. It's become effortless now, for them to project themselves to each other through the bond. They've mastered it wholly, and can be in each other's company when and if they please. It is, perhaps, the most lovely gift the Force has ever granted them.
Rey grins and skips over to him, immediately swinging one leg over both of his and straddling his lap. “I missed you,” she says, planting sloppy kisses over every inch of his face.
He chuckles, gripping her waist, and catches her mouth with his. They share a long, sensuous kiss, and then Ben breaks away with a wry smile on his lips. He opens one eye, kinking a brow.
“What?” Rey asks, annoyed they are no longer kissing.
“Don’t take this the wrong way,” he says, leaning back slightly, “but you kind of stink.”
Rey’s mouth drops open and she smacks his chest with the back of her hand. “Rude.”
He purses his lips, studying her for a beat before standing up with her in his arms. Rey yelps and tightens her legs around his waist as he starts to walk them toward the fresher. “Maybe so,” he replies, leaning forward to kiss her cheek. “But it’s true.”
Rey rears back and pouts, but it’s half hearted. She knows better than anyone that he’s right. Rootleaf stew isn’t the best smelling substance even at its freshest. “Guess you’ll have to clean me up, then.”
Ben smirks and squeezes her bottom. “Happily.”
She lays against his chest that night, drawing invisible lines between his moles and freckles.
Ben rubs a hand up and down her back as his soft, rumbling voice breaks through the quiet. “I have news.”
Rey picks up her head and looks at him. There’s a smile tugging at his lips, and her heart begins to race. “What is it?”
“I commed D’Acy when I left Canto Bight and told her about the kids,” he says, reaching up to stroke her hair. “I told her about the conditions they were living in. Told her that I sensed the Force in at least one. She wants me to bring them in.”
Hope burns in Rey’s chest, brighter than any sun in the galaxy. “So that means…”
He smiles, and Rey understands, suddenly: this is it. This is the first day of the rest of her life.
I’m coming back, Rey. I’m coming home to you.