Disclaimer: Star Wars belongs to Lucas Film and Disney. I'm just... well, messing about really.

This was initially written as part of the Reylo Fairytales/Myths anothology on Tumblr over a year ago. I accidentally deleted my blog so I figured I'd put it here, sans the nice editing. (Go download the PDF, the art is gorgeous.)

Anywho. This was written after Episode VII aired, but before Episode VIII. Enjoy.

Little Temptress

She woke up chained to a table. Again.

Rey closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Then she tried again. Nope. This wasn't a dream. And judging from the pounding in her head and the nausea at the back of her throat, she'd been captured before she'd so much as had a chance to fight.

Ignoring the voice inside her head, telling her that for a Jedi-in-training she sure got captured a lot, Rey surveyed her surroundings. Her table was in a small room, smaller than the one in the Starkiller base, where Kylo Ren had first interrogated her. She was either on a small ship, or in some kind of midway base. The air was rank. Like one too many people had been broken here and nobody had bothered to clean.

Once she exhausted her normal senses, Rey turned to the Force, reaching for it as Master Luke had been teaching her, trying to get a better feel for where she was and who she was with… and there was nothing.

Her headache grew, as she tried again, and again, and again. She took a slow breath, held it for four seconds, exhaled for eight. Nothing. She brought her heartbeat as down as she could, and still, there was no connection, not even a hint of it. It was as though the Force was gone completely.

No. No way. This isn't happening.

Rey hadn't been truly in touch with the Force for a long time, but she had felt it, in some degree or another, since she was a very little girl. To reach out to it and find nothing, it shook her to the core. It was like— it was like—

It was like being abandoned all over again.

Stop. She ordered herself, fighting against the panic. Stop right now. You can't afford to lose your head.

She did not survive on Jakku for over a decade only to die like this. The Force was in every living thing. It was the fabric of the universe itself. It didn't just get up and walk away. If she couldn't sense it, Rey thought, then it was because something was obstructing her access.

Closing her eyes, she expanded her awareness, probing the nothing for any gaps, any giveaways. If Kylo Ren had found a way to exploit their link, to make her weak, then he would surely have left some mark behind. But she still couldn't feel a thing, and her aches and pains were becoming more and more prominent. And she really, really needed the bathroom.

It was time for old school methods.

They'd taken her lightsaber, but she was still wearing the same clothes she had when she left the Resistance base… was it this morning? Or had a full day passed already? She added this to the list of things she would figure out later, and she tried angling herself on the table, tried to bring her hips closer to her right hand.

"Looking for these?" someone said, holding out her lock picks right in front of her eyes. Rey jumped. She hadn't heard them approach at all.

But it wasn't Kylo Ren she heard. This was someone else.

The man walked around, keeping himself in the shadows until he was right in front of her. His hair was slicked back and he was wearing the uniform of a First Order commander, but there was no weapon on his belt. Not even a standard issue laser.

"Let me go," Rey ordered, throwing as much of her will into the command as possible. "Now."

"No."

"Give me back my things, then."

"I don't think so," the man said, and then pulled a chair out of somewhere, plonked it down, and sat. "I wouldn't force the Jedi mind trick, if I were you. Too much effort for no gain. But if you insist…"

Rey focused on him as hard as she could. Unfortunately, the more she did, the more her headache grew, until she had spots dancing in front of her eyes, and her stomach cramped. Had she eaten anything, she probably would have thrown it all up.

"Yes," the man said. "You should listen to me more often. It'll make this a whole lot better."

"Who are you?" Rey asked. "What are you?"

He smiled. "It drives you mad, doesn't it? Not knowing. Having someone have the upper hand. You thought you left that all behind on Jakku, didn't you, Rey."

Her hands balled up into fists. Oh, if only he untied her, she would show him exactly what she could do! But that wouldn't happen - he'd planned this too well. He'd made sure he'd control the entire encounter, and the more she fought back, the more she played into his hands.

So instead, she thought. The Resistance had some data on most of the First Order high command, and pictures of those on top. Of course, Kylo Ren made the most appearances, since he often led strike teams, but they did have a shot of him with another man, of the same rank, arguing. "You're Hux," she said at length. Several more puzzle pieces fell together. "You're resistant to the Force."

"Did you just figure this out, or does your little organization know that already? Actually, it doesn't matter," he says, before she can respond. "They did a terrible job at training you to protect yourself, either way. We had you captured in no time, and you exhausted yourself trying to fight me there." He tsked. "Tell me, why does the Resistance's finest fly on her own without an escort, or even a decent stealth shield?"

She didn't respond. This was just heckling, an attempt to destabilize her.

Hux waited for another minute, before rising. "Perhaps you're too tired to chat right now. That's alright. I can come back in a bit."

"Wait," Rey said, and then wondered - what do I even want from this guy? "I need to use the bathroom."

"I'm sure you do. We have a lovely vent right above the toilets that leads straight to the docking bey," Hux said. "Unfortunately, you will have to make do with the facilities right here. Enjoy."

And then he left her, shutting the lights on his way out.

There was no way to tell the time, no way to know if hours or days or weeks had passed. Eventually, Rey's nausea and headache subsided, and she managed to calm herself down enough to rest. And think.

Unfortunately, her thoughts weren't very happy ones. Every time she tried to retrace her steps, she found something new to beat herself up about. Why hadn't she put her shields up? Why hadn't she chosen a better ship for her excursion? Better yet, why had she left on her own at all, without telling anybody? For the first time in an age, she had people who cared about her whereabouts and wellbeing, and she deliberately left them out of the loop. How could she be so stupid? So foolish?

And yet, at the same time, it was like the perfect series of events had lined up, leading her here, to this moment, this ship, this table. Moping won't save you, she reminded herself. There was nothing she could do with what she had at present, so she had to wait and gather information and use it to her advantage.

She discovered fairly quickly that, while her holding cell was sub-par, her captors had taken precautions specifically designed to keep her from escaping. Hux was the only one who visited her, and whatever powers he had about resisting the Force, he had managed to extend them to the entire room, cutting her completely off. Hux was also the only one who tended to her, even if, as a commander, such a job was below him. He inserted an IV line into her arm to keep her from becoming dehydrated and hosed her down when she soiled herself, but other than complain about how annoying the task was, he didn't speak to her, let alone attempt an interrogation.

Throughout all this, she wondered where Kylo Ren was. Surely the man wouldn't resist coming to gloat over her, or at least try to convert her to the Dark Side again.

Don't let your guard down, she thought. Be patient.

If only she'd been patient before. Maybe she wouldn't be in this mess.

Three times Hux changed her IV bag. Three times he worked in near-silence. The fourth, she asked him where his friend was. "I would have thought he'd enjoy seeing you play nurse," she said.

Hux laughed. "You know him well, then, little temptress. He would get a real joy out of this, and he doesn't have much of that. Unfortunately, we would have to deprive him of the pleasure."

"What do you mean?" Rey asked, narrowing her eyes. "What is this all about?"

He made to leave, and then, seemingly changing his mind, pulled up his chair again and sat opposite her. "Are you ready to listen?" he asked softly.

Rey gave him a weary look. "I don't have much of a choice, do I?" she asked.

"On the contrary. You can fight me. From what I'm told, you're not half-bad at a verbal spar. Ah—" he smiled "—but you're tired. A diet of saline liquid and no sleep will do that to a person. Apologies."

She waited.

"You're not very well versed in interrogation techniques, are you?" Hux asked. "This is usually the part where most prisoners get chattier."

"We don't torture people for information in the Resistance," Rey said.

"Neither does the First Order. Well, when I'm in charge, anyway. Kylo Ren gets his results faster by plucking them straight out of people's heads, but I must admit, I find his technique lacks finesse."

"Finesse or not, I'm strapped to a table, without food or a chance to stretch my legs," Rey said. "I don't see how the two of you are any different."

"You're wrong there, little temptress." Hux leaned forward in his chair. "The restraints are a simple security measure for a not-so-simple captive. I would dispense with them, but I would like to be heard out, and I don't think you're amiable to do that.

"But I'm getting ahead of myself. Yes, Kylo Ren has his own way of doing interrogations, but I find I get better results by just talking to you. Explaining your situation, figuring out what you want. Maybe we can reach a compromise. In your case, however, I'm pretty sure we won't need to negotiate."

Slowly, she started to understand. "You want to make a deal with me?"

"Why, I think she gets it."

"You're a moron," Rey said. "I'll never betray the Resistance. You'd be better off killing me right now and saving yourself the trouble."

"So hasty," Hux said. "I'm not particularly interested in your information about the Resistance. From what I can gather, they keep you out of the loop as much as any third-rate pilot in their fleet. No, little temptress, you have more valuable talents than as an informant."

"Enough. Why are you calling me that?" Rey snapped.

"Isn't that what they called you? Or has it been so long that you forgot?"

She felt the blood rush into her head, the fury betraying her. But it had been a long time. She'd had new nightmares now, nightmares that were far worse than her years on Jakku. She hadn't gone back to those memories in years, and now there was Hux, throwing it all in her face.

"Cheeks the color of sunset. No wonder he finds you so irresistible."

"How did you find that out?"

"What? Your past?" Hux snorted. "Sorry to disappoint you, but there are living people on Jakku who still know you. A few greased palms here and there, and hey presto, you get all the information you need. See, this is why I don't appreciate Kylo Ren's approach to interrogations. He doesn't give a toss about what people think, so long as they're afraid. I find making friends to be much more profitable."

"You sure like to compare yourself favorably to him."

"I'm stating a fact. I'm very good with information, which is why you will want to help me.

"You see, I know you and he have a connection. Some sort of shared bond. I'd like to bring you with me to the First Order base, so that you can use it and weaken him."

Rey waited. Then, when he didn't continue, she burst out laughing.

"Does that surprise you?" he asked.

"Why," she said, "would I ever want to do that? I might just as easily escape and burn your entire order down to the ground."

"But you won't, will you?" Hux said. "You won't, because you hate Kylo Ren, and you would relish the opportunity to take him down. Admit it, Rey. You would have been happy to go back to Jakku, back to that sham of a life you lived, if he hadn't given you something to hate. You train to become a Jedi so that you can take him down.

"But you're not strong enough yet. And that drives you up the wall, because while you're learning the basics, he's out there, ruining more lives."

"Even if that were true," Rey said, "why would I agree to help you?"

"Well, for one thing, because I'll let you live afterward," Hux said. "Mind you, I could just as easily let you starve to death here and then bring your body to Snoke, and get favor that way. You know I'm a patient man. But I think we can work better together. I can give you information that you will find useful."

"More information about my childhood?" Rey laughed. "I can remember Jakku well enough on my own."

"But can you remember the time before?" Hux asked. And that cut her laughter short. He stood. "Have a think about it, Rey. There's always a choice."