A/N: Heavily inspired by Seether's 'Save Today'.

Canonverse / Post TLJ / Angsty Force Bond Trash

It's been seven months, twenty-three days, twelve hours and eleven minutes.

Should it be shocking to anyone that she remembers their parting in such stark clarity? That final weighted look in his doleful dark eyes. The slumped posture of his shoulders and his mouth drawn low at the edges, the frown he wore bringing acid to the back of her throat.

Why? Why did he choose this way?

She glances up at her reflection in the small mirror beside her bunk. It's late. Again. The bruised circles cradling her eyes have not abated for weeks, but no one questions them, nor the redness in her gaze. Her plucky smile and jovial laugh can fool most, but the truth can't stay buried forever.

Sleep would come easier without the dreams, the voices. The failures.

He hates her for her betrayal, but he betrayed her, too. She rubs irritably a her face, pressing her palms cruelly into her eye-sockets. Colors bloom and swirl behind her eyelids, grim, sickly shades of green and violet. Supernovas, screaming faces, gaping mouths.

She shouldn't have been surprised when word reached them that a bounty had been put on her head. She killed Snoke? Of course he lied. He's a survivor in a world of monsters. She'd have done the same. In the chaos of cheers, Leia found her gaze from across the room and the the older woman's eyes cut right through Rey's stonewall defenses to the truth. They never spoke, but Rey felt it. Leia knew. Somehow, she knew. And there it was, hope, as blinding and brilliant as a star in the darkness.

The tender ghost of a smile never left Leia's lips that night.

Still, he clings to his darkness like a shield. Why can't he see beyond it?

She pulls at her hair, a frustrated growl tearing from her throat and filling the empty room. The bond has been silent, as undisturbed and peaceful as death. Is he close to finding them? Does he think of her? Does he hate the silence more than she does? She opens her eyes, finding her attention drawn back to the mirror.

In the quiet moments on Jakku, she wondered who'd given her her eyes. Her mother, or her father? Unwanted tears sting with their greeting, obnoxious and unwelcome. She viciously smears them away. None of it matters now, she bites her tongue disdainfully. He'd forced her to admit the truth and it still hurts. The lie was easier, safer. She'd done it to survive, to continue on... hoping.

For so many years silence never grieved her. The marks on the wall, the dull scrape tallying another day as she waited for them. This had been her melody, a song dedicated to ghosts who didn't give a damn about her. Then, fate swept her away into a never-ending abyss, a war too big for her small world, and his sound filled her existence. She yearns to hate him for it, but that is impossible now. Perhaps, it always was.

So quiet.

She never expected that after... everything - the absence of his sound. She's sure her efforts to block him out had worked, but she never anticipated his equally deliberate silence. It burdens her mind as if a millstone round her neck dragging her down into murky depths, dangerous and festered with hungry things. They feast upon her thoughts, poisoning her mind with despair, with doubt.

The others had noted her abnormal quietness, Finn especially, but no one commented on it. Hiding away from the First Order and its new supreme leader dominates the center of everyone's attention these days. Rose, who Rey has come to appreciate beyond measure, has thankfully never asked her many questions about her past. With Finn, their lack of conversation never lacks in comfort and, though sometimes forced, Finn's tender smile is a welcome sight.

She sighs and falls back onto her pillow, chewing fretfully at her nails. It hasn't always been quiet. No...

It started a month ago, one night when she and Finn had dozed off in the Falcon cockpit, a deafening roar, the shout practically vibrating her skull and jarring her from her sleep. She'd immediately felt him prowling in his quarters, muttering to himself aloud, though howling like a madman in his mind. His rage was liquid fire, melting through her barriers and settling into her chest, burning all else away.

Then, she saw him, clear and sharp in the cold light. He turned abruptly, fists shaking in a wild frenzy, and he moved on her in two strides, towering above her as a shadow blocking out the world. She looked up at him, unwilling to avert her eyes or to fight him.

His jaw tightened. His lower lip trembled. He wanted to say the words, but he couldn't, so lost in his own treacherous sea of emotions that when she whispered his name, the moment shattered, snapping into a thousand fatal edges, and him along with it. She'd jerked around, searching for him, but he was gone, the phantom of his presence like the dim warmth of the sun on her shoulders.

He came again days later, screaming into her silence like a deepening thunder, leveling against her walls and collapsing. Then, he was gone again.

Could she reach for him now? Should she? The possibility of speaking with him thrills a part of her... and terrifies another. Why did he choose this path? "Ben?" she murmurs shyly. "Ben?"

Seconds drag by, but the room remains empty.

Disheartened but determined, she extends her thoughts. She runs a great risk doing this. She could betray their location. It's impossible to know the extent of the bond, what it can disclose to him. He destroyed the Resistance—the Rebellion now. How much farther is he willing to go?

How far will you go? her mind questions her.

I'm protecting the ones I care for. This is different, she snaps back.

Is it?

The longer the moments stretch, the more convinced she becomes that he will no answer. It's impossible to know if she could deliberately contact him, anyway. The connection comes and goes as the wind. Still, she pushes, persisting into the shadows beyond the dim light overhead.

Ben...

Something crawls up from the cavernous hollow of her gut. Guilt. Profound guilt. She covers her face with her hands, emitting a tired sigh. Dammit Ben! Why?

"I could ask you the same question."

She bolts upright, startled, to find him very real and very angry staring at her from across the room, face heavy with exhaustion and hair mussed from restless hands. She blinks. He isn't sleeping, either. Good, a vengeful voice in her growls. His stare sharpens every so slightly and she looks away.

"What do you want? You summoned me here." Impatience grates his words, making them clumsy and serrated.

She opens her mouth, but no words come out.

He tilts his head, eyebrow hiking to his hairline, generous lips pressing into a thin line. "How typical. You once again have nothing to offer. You meddle in a world you don't belong and have no explanation for the aftermath. You understand nothing. You never have."

She jumps up, anger suddenly livening her veins. "How dare you! I understand! I understand more than you wish I did!" Tears sting her eyes again. "I might have come from nothing, but that doesn't mean I don't belong! I do!"

His face softens, but it's a mockery. "Oh that's right. You do understand. That's why you keep repeating the same mistakes as those before you, those who never cared for you the way you wished them to."

Her feet move without her volition, stomping over to him in righteous ire. "Are you talking about me, Ben, or you? Because from where I'm standing, you path doesn't look much different."

The tendons of his jaw betray him. "Is this why you called me here? To waste my time with your ignorance?"

Her hand itches, the fury in her burning at her throat. It's overwhelming and, before she can stop herself, her hand shoots out, connecting with his cheek in a vicious slap. His head jerks and sound explodes from the contact, reverberating around them, filling every corner of the room, tainting every hour she'd ever spent staring into the void with her knees to her chest and her hands encircling her legs. It brands the very walls, fusing them with ugly, base emotions.

He glares at her, a scant sliver of blood trickling from his mouth. "Satisfied?"

"No." she admits, her breath hitching as she looks away shamefully.

A pause. "Me neither."

Why does it have to be this way? Why can't things be different? Tears flow freely now, glistening down her cheeks despite her attempts to swallow them back, to hide them from his gaze.

"What do you want from me, Rey?"

She looks up. His voice is raw, tinged with desperation and longing, but it's his eyes that shock her. The darkened windows into his soul; they are frayed and cauterized, a map of his mistakes, his victories. Her stare drifts to his scar. Her mark. Her victory. She is selfish, isn't she? Something she's never wanted to admit to herself, but the evidence is clear.

Her eyes widen at the realization and she glances up at him, unyielding. "I already have it."

His brows furrow, his lips part and she feels the smooth coolness of gloved fingers at her cheek. She closes her eyes and leans into his palm, reaching up for his hand, but he is already gone.

PLEASE DON'T FORGET TO REVIEW! I LOVE HEARING FEEDBACK!

THANKS FOR READING!