A/N: Christmas present for a friend, who has made me warm to Kylo greatly after seeing The Last Jedi, and also a spiritual successor to my previous fic Red.

Title from an instrumental piece by Lacuna Coil, Un Fantasma Tra Noi.

He shouldn't be here.

There's blaster fire ringing in her ears, flashing across her vision in the heart of the ground assault while Resistance ship engines roar to life to commence a tactical retreat. Their base has been found again. Repurposed cargo freighters and run down, ancient battleships are all they've managed to salvage these past few months, and it's not enough for them to hold their own.

Now is not a time she wishes to see Kylo Ren. Unless he's here in the flesh, either with his lightsaber drawn ready to fight or hands thrown up in surrender, she wants him out of her head.

She'd believed Snoke when he'd claimed responsibility for the strange connection between them. Then she'd seen the Supreme Leader's body topple from his throne in two parts, and that should have been the end of it.

Yet, here Ben is.

Ben. In her head, still Ben, when her compassion gets the better of her; Kylo when her anger overtakes it. Now, seeing him like this, the anger ebbs away to an uncomfortable, yet persistent concern.

He's unconscious. Where he is, she can't tell, his surroundings obscured to her, but the blood seeping across the ground beneath him is a vibrant crimson invading her awareness. Perhaps it was Resistance fire. Maybe, even, one of his own men instigated a mutiny, though in the moment, the implications of either scenario mean nothing to her. All she can think about is him.

A cold sense of dread trickles down her spine, an unexpected fear that maybe he's dead. Then she tells herself that if he were, she wouldn't be seeing him like this.

The sounds of the battle fade around her as she reaches out towards him and draws herself closer. She kneels beside him, studies his face, still bearing the scars she'd left behind, then looks lower to find the damage. There's a wetness staining his chest and abdomen, leaking out over his gloves where his hands clutch weakly at his torso. She can't see a weapon.

It occurs to her that this isn't the first time she's seen him like this. Last time, it hadn't come with such a sharp sense of regret. "Ben?"

He can't hear her. Or if he can, there's no way to tell.

Rey's hand extends, tentative yet determined, as she wonders if she can still touch. The way they had, once, then hadn't for a long, long time. Maybe like this, his guard down, defenses all but destroyed, she can finally reach him again.

Her fingers touch his chest, probe for the wound, yet it feels of almost nothing. Pinpointing anything by sight is near impossible when the idiot insists on wearing nothing but black.

Instead, her touch wanders higher, wondering if she could find a pulse. Fingers rest beneath his jaw, looking as solid as the ground beneath her yet feeling as faint as the elusive beats of a moth wing.

"Ben, please," she says. "Don't make me tell Leia you're dead."

Nothing.

For a moment, she's left wondering if he's truly gone, or if the time she spent closed off from him has left her simply unable to tell. Then she feels it: the surge of life beneath her hand, the thump of a pulse chasing hot blood through veins that stains her mind red. The red of anger. The red of his lightsaber. The red of the armor worn by Snoke's guards when they'd fought them side by side.

Ben's eyes fly open. They meet hers, frozen for heartbeat in time as they stare at each other, souls bared. Then the hot red of anger turns to cold fear. Ben turns away, recoils, and the connection slams shut.

She feels it like a physical jolt when he pulls away, leaving her gasping for air as she stares down at the empty space where he'd been. The sounds of the battle flare up around her again, though it feels less real to her than the certainty with which she'd felt Ben's heartbeat, heard it pounding like a battle cannon in her head.

Rey turns her fingers towards her. They're stained with blood.

She's still staring when a rough hand grabs her by the shoulder, Finn's voice yelling in her ear that they need to go. Maybe it's her imagination, or just the thunder of her own blood in her ears, but she swears she can still hear a distant thumping in her head long after she stumbles aboard the last ship waiting to leave and the boarding ramp rises to slam closed.