Working at a coffee shop in Seattle was neither romantic nor fun, but at least some of the customers were easy on the eyes. When handsome Ben walks into her life, Rey is convinced that someone like him would never be interested in a barista like her. But after a particularly hard day at work, Rey’s car gets a flat and Ben is there for the rescue. On the drive back to the U-District, will Rey and Ben discover that they share more than a love of caffeine between them?
Dedicated to anyone who’s ever worked in a coffee shop before, or retail in general. Y'all are the real MVPs.
Chapter Summary: State Fairs, baby piggies, beer flavored funnel cake, funnel cake flavored beer, and upset stomachs.
Ben Solo hates Thanksgiving at his family's house. However, this year, his mother has invited a special guest - Rey Abrams, the girl he's been crushing on at work. When Ben consumes too much turkey, he falls asleep on the couch and has a rather vivid dream about Rey. Will he be able to hold his composure and finally ask her out?
___
“Ben! Come in, dear. I was just about to have your dad text to see if you were on your way.”
The wind picked up and rustled through his lengthening hair. “Yeah, I’m here.”
“And just in time to meet our special guest.”
Oh no. Not another set up. His mother was insistent on the idea that Ben needed to settle down. Despite his avid protests, she would force impromptu meetings with eligible women on him. It’s not that she had bad taste, it was just that he wasn’t interested. He preferred being alone most of the time, and there were only a handful of people whose company he actually enjoyed. “Who would that be?” he asked, feigning curiosity.
“Me!” A head full of chestnut waves popped around the corner of the kitchen.
Ben stopped in his tracks and had to readjust his grip on the heavy ice bag to keep it from crashing to the ground. Rey . Rey Abrams was the newest employee at the office. She’d been there several weeks, and Ben had been smitten since day one. She was definitely one of the handful.
“Rey doesn’t typically celebrate Thanksgiving, being from England and all, but when she told me she had no other plans for her time off, I insisted she come spend it with us.”
“That was n-nice of you, Mom,” Ben stammered as he set the rolls down on the counter and brought the ice to the freezer.
“It really was. Leia has been so welcoming. How are you, Ben?”
Better, now that you’re here. Really, Rey had few reasons to talk to him or even know his name. They worked in separate departments, and she was at the bottom of the totem pole whereas he was being groomed to take over in the event his mother ever decided to retire. He was surprised she even knew his name. “Fine,” was all he managed to say.
For the end of @reylomonsters week, I present: 8k of Mothlo <3
[Day 1 - Vampires | Day 2 - Werewolves | Day 3 - Angels/Demons | Day 4 - Mythological Creatures | Day 5 - Sea Creatures | Day 6 - Naga | Day 7 - Free Choice]
(read the whole thing on ao3)
Rating: E
Words: 8397
A/N: (For any insect phobics or sensitives out there, we're going with the "moth-like fae" kind of aesthetic here)
-
Rey steps through the dark forest, antennae twitching. Normally, she wouldn't dare venture so close to the First Order's territory, but their grasp expands year by year. Food is hard enough to find nowadays, with how the winters only get longer and the summers cooler, but where the dark reach of the First Order touches, trees shrivel and blacken, grass withers, and plants fail to bloom. Rey has watched as the life faded from her home and she's been forced to travel farther all the time to find something to eat. Not many travel through this part of the forest to start, but those that do move quickly, heads down and packs held tight. She hears the whispers, that the forest is possessed, that dark figures haunt the nights. No one stays after full dark, even in the short days of winter.
But she's also heard that all the growth that the Order steals from the land, they hoard for themselves. And she intends to take some of that back.
(continued under cut)
Nothing else stirs in the forest as she passes through. She prides herself on her lightness of foot, but never has she relied on it so much. The complete stillness around her feels unnatural. No birds flit through the branches above or small rodents through the stiff grass below. Her every step dodges dry leaves and fallen branches, with the trees above remaining bare. Their gnarled hands twine overhead, so overgrown and twisted that only a hint of the evening light peeks through, faded orange against the black.
Even that faint light slips away as she continues her journey, though it hardly matters when the trees grow so densely they the sky vanishes from sight. No stars to light her way. She feels the absence of the moon like a piece carved out of her chest. The woods remain as still as if carved from stone, and the only sound is the slight flutter of her wings behind her. The absence of anything but darkness and her own heartbeat makes the forest feel like it's closing in around her. The night becomes a tangible thing, creeping in, thick and heavy, like any moment it might seal closed, pinning her into its grasp.
She forces herself to keep her pace steady and not lost her footing under mindless panic. The night belongs to her as much as it does any of the fae moths, more so than does who don't dare to take what it has to offer. She knows her path even without a goodnight light. Her attanae flick back and forth, tasting the air. Every one of her senses screams with the wrongness all around her, but she can't be deterred. All she has to do is follow that feeling to its source and take back what's been stolen from her.
Time fades to nothingness in the endless black reaches of the cursed forest. She could have fallen into a trap and wandered for years for all she knows. Everything centers on the simple repetition of one step after another.
From somewhere in the distance, the dull glow of muted lamps winds its way through the trees, barely strong enough to cast a shadow. She thinks at first that her eyes are finally failing her, taunting her with what she can't reach, but slowly the lights from clearer. Her heart begins to race as she approaches. The lights aren't the warm glow she's used to, globes of contained flame that do their best to bring sunlight into the night. These shine cold and sickly, spreading a grayish-purple night across the dark ground. She pauses just outside of its reach, shivering as she imagines it sliding over her and taking hold.
She strains her eyes to look beyond the line of haunted lights and into what must be the heart of the Order. Her attanae still detect nothing beyond the slithering wrongness that infects this place, but her instincts tell her that something waits on the other side of the lights. In the distance, she can barely make out the shapes of structures, and farther away something that might be firelight. A tribe like the First Order would certainly patrol their borders, and she keeps a careful look for the glint of eyes in the dark.
She stays in place for another small eternity, waiting for any hint of life she can latch on to in order to guide her way. If it weren't for the lights, she'd think this area as deserted as the rest of the forest. Sliding slowly, hardly even daring to breathe, she steps behind a tree on the edge of the light, intending to follow the line around to see where it leads.
As soon as she moves, a flutter of wings comes from behind her. She whirls around, ready to run, but she's too late. Another creature stands behind her, waiting.
From his wings, antennae, and the thick fur at his collar, hips, and ends of his legs and arms, it's clear he's a moth like her. But from his build, he could be an entirely separate species. She's always been long and lean, built for quick movement, and hunger has driven her smaller that usual. He, on the other hand, manages to be both broader and taller than her. With his size, it's a miracle his wings can get him off the ground. She wouldn't believe they could if he wasn't hovering in front of her, ready to pounce.
The differences don't end with their sizes. She's stayed sunkissed, a remnant of the time when she could bask in the late afternoon and watch it fade gently to night, before darkness took over the forest. Her fur reflects that too, golden oranges and yellows once bleached and now dirty. His colors have none of her gentle warmth. His chest shines like a beacon against the dark forest, reflecting the witch light behind her. From its deathly pallor, it couldn't be clearer that he's never ventured from under the protective hold of the woods. It stands out even more starkly against the inky black of his fur. The thick pelt jostles as he hovers, much richer than hers. She almost wants to reach out and touch it, see what it feels like to run her fingers through it. How soft would it be against her callused hands? Would the skin below be just as silken? The pale expanse stretches over thick muscle, showcasing the strength of a warrior. Her hands twitch but she clenches them at her sides.
She swallows as her gaze reaches his face. Dark eyes scowl at her from underneath his feathery black antennae, also reflecting the lamplight in unearthly ways. His strong features are fixed in suspicion, and her eyes flick down to his plush lips. She waits for him to do something, speak or attack or leave, anything, but he simply watches. His eyes make the same path over her as she did to him, and she tenses. The longer he stays still, the more ready she is to move. Keeping her chest steady, her eyes dart to either side of him.
He notices the flicker and growls, wings propelling him closer. He'd been within grabbing distance when he'd appeared; now she could flick her tongue out and lick him.
“What are you doing here?” he growls, leaning even closer. She nearly flinches back, but refuses to give him the satisfaction.
“I got lost,” she says, thrusting her face up to his. She takes a touch of pleasure in the way his head darts back for an instant.
“You got lost,” he repeats, tone incredulous.
“Yes,” she insists, still not giving him an inch.
“Through the entire length and breadth of these woods. You found your way to the very center. Because you were lost.” He draws back just enough so she sees the way his eyebrows quirk into a clear picture of disbelief.
“Yes,” she says again.
He snorts, landing on the ground. “You are a liar,” he says plainly. She opens her mouth to protest but he continues. “A bold one, but a liar nonetheless. I ask you again: why did you come here?”
She juts her chin at him. “I've told you.”
He shakes his head. “You have not. You've lied to me, which only tells me you have something to hide. What is it?” His tone turns curious, and he cocks his head as if trying to figure out a puzzle. Then just as quickly his scowl overtakes his features. “Is it the Resistance?”
She blinks. “The what?”
He leans in and breathes deeply, antennae twitching towards her, and she jumps back. “No. You don't smell like them.”
She snarls. She may be a loner without a tribe, but she has boundaries. No one scents a stranger like that.
“No tribe,” he muses, eyes bright in the face of her anger. “So what are you doing here, Sunshine? Come to join us?”
“I'd rather let the spirits take me,” she spits. He glares.
“That can be arranged,” he growls.
She grins savagely. “You'll have to catch me first, dark sider.” She spins around, slapping her wings access his face as she takes off.
She pushed the door open and released the stream of children, watching as each made it to their respective parents and guardians, waving back to a few of the parents with whom she had grown friendly over the year she had been teaching their children. Annie and May she kept hold of, one holding each of her hands. She spotted Kylo skulking at the back of the playground, waiting for the girls. ‘He’s here. I see him.’ May told her, looking up at Rey with big brown eyes. Rey smiled and crouched down so she was at eye level with the girls, who she brought round to stand in front of her.
‘Listen, I need to talk to Kylo, ok? Nobody’s in trouble, I just like to know who everyone goes home to.’ She kept her voice cheery but she felt her stomach turn as the surprisingly big man made his way across to her.
Aka Rey is a teacher and Kylo is the guardian of two children in her class. She quickly notices something is not quite right and arranges a meeting.
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Belatedly catching up on @reylomonsters week today, starting with Day 1
This was inspired by @rad-braybury‘s tags on this post. It was too perfect to ignore XD
[Day 1 - Vampires | Day 2 - Werewolves | Day 3 - Angels/Demons | Day 4 - Mythological Creatures | Day 5 - Sea Creatures | Day 6 - Naga | Day 7 - Free Choice]
ALSO ON AO3
Rating: T
Words: 3283
-
“BeeBee!” Rey called out into the night. She squinted across the dark yard and crossed her arms over her chest, shivering. She was used to the close quarters of the city, and no matter how many times she’d visited Poe, Finn, and Rose since they’d moved out here, she couldn’t shake off the feeling of something watching from the trees.
She was on day three of cat-sitting since they’d gone off on their vacation. They’d invited her too, of course, but she’d had more than her share of fourth-wheeling. And a couple days in their house on her own wasn’t a bad deal.
“BeeBee!” she yelled again. “Here, kitty-kitty!” She loved the cat, but getting her in for the night was never easy, and standing on the back porch calling into the woods reminded her of the worst kind of horror films.
She was about to go back in for the bag of treats to see if that would get Poe’s darling pet to listen to her, but something stirred out in the edges of the shadows. She held her breath, and then a round, orange-spotted cat emerged into the light. Rey sighed and pulled open the door.
“Come on, you,” she said, beckoning BeeBee in. As she got closer, Rey heard her muffled meows and frowned. She noticed something dark and twitching hanging out of BeeBee’s mouth just as the cat broke into a run. Rey let go of the back door, letting it fall closed.
“Hey, wait!” She was too late. BeeBee dashed into the house, prize caught in her teeth. Rey watched the door close behind her. She debated for a moment staying outside and letting BeeBee have her fun without her, but she couldn’t reasonably stay out for the rest of the week. With a sigh, she pulled the door open again.
(continued under the cut)
BeeBee waited for her in the middle of the kitchen, sitting proudly on her haunches. When she caught sight of Rey, she bent and carefully placed her prize on the floor, then straightened, clearly expecting to be praised. Wincing, Rey walked in and leaned down to get a better look at the black lump. Her first thought, that BeeBee had caught some kind of rat, was quickly disproven by the wing splayed to one side of it. The other looked to be crumpled beneath the fuzzy black body about the size of her hand.
“Oh,” she sighed. She reached out to touch it, then remembered something about bats carrying diseases and pulled back. She stood, grabbed a dish towel from the sink, and returned.
With the towel, she turned the small animal onto its back, trying to see what the damage was. Small, dark marks dotted its chest where BeeBee’s teeth must have held it, but that looked to be the least of its injuries. Dark red blood matted the fur on the top of its small head and a deep gash, still sluggishly bleeding, cut across the middle of it. When she gently extended it, the folded wing turned out to have a long cut all the way up to the top.
Strangely enough, the injuries didn’t look like they’d come from the cat. She’d gotten on the wrong side of BeeBee before, and the matched sets of lines from her claws were distinctive. This looked more like a cat she’d seen after a group of older children had been tormenting it. Isolated, defined cuts. She sighed again, feeling inexplicably sad for the small animal. It was just a little thing; she’d never have noticed its loss. But watching it struggle in front of her tugged at her heart. Carefully, she wrapped it up in the towel, trying not to jostle it too badly. It squeaked and she winced.
Looking around the kitchen, she found a half-empty fruit carton and emptied the rest of the clementines onto the counter. She lay the swaddled bat inside and washed her hands off in the sink. BeeBee wound around her feet, purring. She glanced into the carton. The small chest still moved, just barely, though she couldn’t say what was normal for it. BeeBee stretched, reaching her paws up onto the cabinets towards the bat.
“No,” Rey told her. BeeBee blinked and tried again, reaching further.
Rey picked the carton up and took it down the hallway to her guest room, BeeBee trotting after her. She set the bat down on the night table, and BeeBee hopped up on the bed to look.
“No,” Rey repeated. She picked up the cat and took her out of the room, closing the door behind her.
Rey kept thinking about the bat as she showered and got ready for bed. Maybe it would have been better if she had left it outside, but all she could think about was something larger coming along to snap it up. At least this way it would be warm and mostly safe. She could find a vet to call in the morning, if it made it that long. Washed and with a towel wrapped around her, she went back to her room, nudging BeeBee out of the way again.
“Not tonight,” she said, much to the cat’s displeasure. She slipped inside, quickly closing the door before BeeBee could push her way through.
She looked in on the bat before lying down. It might have been her imagination, but she thought it had moved a little. She turned off the light, resolving to call someone as soon as she woke up.
It usually took her a while to fall asleep out here, where the darkness fell much more completely and the noises of wildlife outside didn’t match up to the sounds of the city she was used to. Tonight, she drifted off to sleep before she realized it, her dreams taking her in.
She sat in a dark forest, laying against a tree. Darkness had settled here too, and when she opened her eyes, only vague shadows greeted her. No sounds came from the trees; everything sat too still, too silent.
Uneasy, she got to her feet, looking around her. Nothing new revealed itself, but somewhere in the distance, she heard the sound of a footstep. Or was it a wing fluttering? She stepped forward, and whatever she’d heard did the same. Another step, another noise. She started walking, and the other creature kept pace. Never growing closer, too far for her to identify. Her heart pounded, and before she could think better of it, she broke into a run. After a beat, so did the thing behind her.
She pushed herself faster, breath coming in sharp pants. The noises grew louder now, and she heard both the pounding of feet on the ground and the beat of wings through the air with every step. Her side began to ache, but she couldn’t stop. She didn’t know what followed her, and every instinct screamed that she couldn’t let herself see. Trees flew past her as she ran, blurry in the night. Her foot landed wrong, snagging on a root, and she crashed to the ground.
Every breath hurt as she lay there, trying to pull herself together. The creature drew closer, louder and louder until it stopped, nearly on top of her. She squeezed her eyes shut, not ready to see it. She felt it watching her, its gaze as tangible as fingers dragging over her skin.
Her eyes flew open and she sat up in bed, breath heaving. Her eyes took a second to adjust to the darkness of the room. No trees or mysterious woods, just thin rays of moonlight falling over the dresser and closet. Her fingers clutched the sheets as she caught her breath.
“Just a dream,” she muttered. Still, she couldn’t shake off the feeling of being watched. Trying to force herself to relax, she turned on her side and lay down again. Her gaze passed over the nightstand and she sat up again and screamed.
A man sat on the nightstand, skin as pale as the moonlight with hair like the shadows. He wore dark clothes, torn in several places, and watched her, unblinking. She felt around in the bed for anything she could use as a weapon and came up only with pillows. From the looks of him, he had several inches and quite a few pounds on her if he decided to attack. She’d fought worse odds, but after tonight, she was sleeping with a knife under the pillow.
“Who the fuck are you? How’d you get in here?” she demanded. Her voice sounded unnaturally loud in the dark room. The man shifted, and the moonlight made his eyes gleam red.
Two knives, and a baseball bat by the headboard.
“You cat dragged me in,” he spat in a deep voice. Sharp white fangs flashed as he spoke.
She blinked. “What?”
“Though technically, you’re the one who brought me in here,” he added, then frowned and looked her over. “If I remember correctly. The scent is the same, but the visual is hard to match between forms.”
She stared at him. There was no way. She glanced down at the nightstand and saw the remains of the carton underneath him. Her gaze travelled slowly back up, taking in the bloody slash across his stomach that matched the one she’d seen on the bat. The gash on the head was the same too.
“Let me see your arm,” she said sharply. His frown bled into a smirk as he extended his right arm, where she’d seen the cut on the bat’s wing. On his upper arm, his coat and the shirt underneath hung away in tatters, soaked in blood. He turned his arm to show where the flesh parted. She couldn’t see much, but she’d bet that the cut went deep. She exhaled shakily.
“How?” she asked.
He cocked his head, still staring at her unnervingly. “How do you think?” he taunted.
She scowled. “I think you should leave now.”
“It would be my pleasure,” he said, and made to stand. As soon as his weight shifted to his feet, he swayed, nearly falling. On instinct, she jumped from the bed to catch him. She grunted under his heft, arms coming up to support him.
“My apologies,” he said hoarsely. He swayed again, this time towards the bed, and she let him fall. He landed mostly on the mattress, long limbs sprawling. She looked at him, then noticed the uncomfortable wet sensation of her night clothes clinging to her. She glanced down and saw that his blood had soaked through her arm and side where she’d caught him. That much blood loss couldn’t be healthy, even for… whatever he was.
He groaned and turned over on the bed, doing his best to face her. He tried to stand but collapsed again.
“I may require a minute,” he told her.
She raised her eyebrows. “You think?” He grimaced and she sighed. “I’ll see if there’s any gauze or something.”
Rey left the room for the bathroom. BeeBee waited outside the door, green eyes bright in the dark. Rey didn’t bother closing the door behind her and BeeBee slunk in. She figured the full-grown man on her bed wasn’t in danger from the cat. No sounds of fighting followed her at least.
A quick raid of the bathroom turned up a moderately-sized first aid kit, with enough gauze and bandages to take care of any size of scrape, but nothing that would cover the massive wounds cut into her intruder. She carried it back to the guest room anyway. The man still lay on the bed, and BeeBee had set herself in his former spot, the remains of the crate of the nightstand. Man and cat watched each other warily. BeeBee’s tail whipped back and forth, and if the man had still had fur, it would have been on end. Rey stepped between them and set the kit down on the bed.
“Can you get your shirt off?” she asked brusquely.
He struggled a bit, but it quickly became clear that his injured arm was useless. Bracing herself, she helped him to pull the jacket off, keeping her gaze away from his face. With the jacket removed, the wounds became much clearer. Blood soaked his shirt. It stained her fingers as she helped him pull the remains of the shirt up over his head. He collapsed back to the bed, panting, blood spreading across the blanket beneath him. His eyes looked unfocused, like he wasn’t really seeing her.
“Who are you?” he muttered. His gaze shifted from her to the cat.
“Rey,” she said, and his eyes snapped back to her. “And that’s BeeBee. You should probably thank her. You’d be bleeding out in the woods if she hadn’t brought you in.”
He didn’t answer, but his full lips twitched in the hint of a smile. Moonlight shone across his pale chest and it rose and fell shallowly with his breath. Blood pooled on his stomach. His wound looked as if it had started to congeal, and she briefly wondered if he had abilities beyond what she’d seen so far. She shoved the thought aside. It wasn’t the time to try to figure that out; she was confused enough by him already. She held the wet scraps of his shirt and discarded the idea that it could be used to bind the wound at all.
Making a note to apologize to her friends when they got back, she went and retrieved a spare sheet from the closet. She took the small scissors from the first aid kit to try to cut a strip off, ripping it when they failed. She started to lay the end of the strip across his stomach, then remembered the dried blood caking him. With a sigh, she left again and got a large glass of water from the kitchen. He watched her as she returned, eyes only half open.
“Sorry,” she whispered, then splashed the water over his wound. He jerked and cried out briefly, then lay still again. She figured that was as good as it was going to get and retrieved the strip again. “Bend up a little?” she asked when she got to the edge of his stomach. He did his best, arching to give her just enough room to pass the strip under his back and then over again. When she finished, she gave the same treatment to his arm, then cleaned out the gash on his head, which also didn’t look as deep as she remembered.
She looked over her bandaged patient. It wasn’t anything that would get approval from any nurse, but it was better than she’d done on her own for herself before.
His eyes fluttered open, and she felt the full weight of their dark stare once more. His throat worked. “Thank you,” he said eventually. She nodded mutely. His hands went to his sides to push himself up, and she took an involuntary step forward to support him. “I’ll just --” He attempted to stand again, landing on his feet for a brief second. His wide eyes met hers. “Fuck,” he said, and then fell back to the bed.
She moved over him, looking down into his face. His eyes were closed and his breath came in the barest pants. “Hey,” she whispered, then louder. “Hey.”
He didn’t react. She tried poking him with the same result.
Her shoulders slumped. She’d started out the night with an injured bat she didn’t know how to take care of, and now she had an injured man she knew even less about. At least as a bat she could pick him up. She wasn’t going to have the same success for the tall and bulky man. Was he even a man? She rubbed her forehead. She hadn’t gotten nearly enough sleep to figure that one out.
Whatever he was, she didn’t want to leave him alone in the house. “Watch him,” she told BeeBee, who kept her vigil on the nightstand, and quickly went back to the kitchen for a knife. With it in hand, she settled herself on the other half of the bed, sitting up against the headboard.
She decided to wait for the man to wake up again. She’d gone for longer without sleep. But it had been a stressful night, and watching him wasn’t exactly the most riveting entertainment. She amused herself for a while imagining what exactly he could be. The word “vampire” kept circling her mind, despite her rational side’s insistence that it was impossible. She kept watching him, but he didn’t stir.
In a fit of curiosity, she leaned over and pulled his upper lip back from his mouth. His front teeth came to sharp points, looking like the best Halloween props she’d ever seen. These didn’t come off though. She pulled her hand back, taking in a shaky breath. Maybe not her imagination.
She wrapped her arms around her legs, knife within easy reach next to her. At some point, her half-formed imaginings faded into dreams, her eyes slipping closed as her head slumped to rest on her shoulders. Her dreams weren’t any different from her reality at first; she felt cold and uncomfortable, tense as she waited for something. As the night passed, they eased. She fell deeper into sleep and a slow warmth overtook the chill, like a warm blanket wrapping around her.
When she woke the next morning, her only companion was BeeBee purring on her chest. She pushed the cat off and was treated to a tail in her face as the affronted animal whirled and left the bed. She stared for a moment at the empty blankets next to her, brain still muddled with sleep, wondering if could all have been a dream. The blood on the top blanket and the smashed carton on the nightstand suggested otherwise. The blinking clock on the stand drew her gaze and she sat bolt upright.
“Shit,” she swore and scrambled off the bed. She threw on her clothes for work and ran out the door before she could think straight.
She spent the entire day in a daze, feeling like she’d never really woken up. Maybe when she went home, the last of the evidence would be gone, torn sheets and bloody blankets disappeared, and it would turn out that she really had dreamt it. And if she hadn’t, what then? If there were vampires out in the world, what did that mean? What was she supposed to do, knowing that?
She somehow managed to get herself back to the house in the evening. Her heart pounded as she approached the door, anticipating and dreading what she’d find inside.
What she wasn’t expecting was a package waiting on the doorstep. She frowned and bent to pick it up.
Dark paper wrapped around a vaguely conical shape, and she pulled it back to reveal several cat toys on sticks. Bemused, she removed the rest of the paper. A red ribbon tied together the toys at the bottom like a strange sort of bouquet, also holding a pouch of cat treats in place, with a note on thick paper taped to it. In flowing calligraphy, it read:
“To BB and Rey,
A token of my appreciation for your assistance. I am grateful.
-Kylo Ren”
Rey grinned and opened the door. BeeBee ran towards her in a blur of orange, telling her loudly how alone she’d been all day. Still smiling, Rey tore open the treats and tipped a couple onto the floor for her. She had the feeling she’d be seeing Kylo Ren again.
“Good kitty,” she crooned, scratching behind her ears. BeeBee purred.
-
A/N: Rey is setting a bad example here, handling injured wildlife is best left to people who know what they’re doing. IRL, bats have a very minuscule chance of turning out to be handsome vampires, sorry.
(ch 1: worm moon | ch 2: worm moon II | ch 3: waning gibbous | ch 4: third quarter | ch 5: third quarter II | ch 6: waning crescent | ch 7: waning crescent II | ch 9: waning crescent III)
Rating: T (M later)
Words: 24,789 / 40k
Tags: Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Finn, Rose Tico, Unkar Plutt, Leia Organa, Snoke, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Fairy Tale Elements, Moon, Scavenger Rey, Reylo Fanfiction Anthology, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Rating May Change, Spoilers, Tags Contain Spoilers, Stop reading these tags if you don’t want to be spoiled, Selkies, Selkie Ben, The Force, Magic
Summary: Rey has a busy schedule: between her part time jobs, trying to get a degree, and breaking into certain people’s homes to steal items she can pawn off to Unkar Plutt, she doesn’t have time for anything mysterious or unusual. And she’s not exactly in the habit of returning lost property.
However, something gets her to make an exception. Which somehow mixes her up with Ben Solo, and that turns out to be a hard bond to break.
Notes: Thank you again to everyone who was part of the @reylofanfictionanthology and who helped make this happen. <3
@persimonne , incredible human that she is, made a beautiful piece of art for this fic, right here! Spoilers for the fic, but it’s one of my favorite things ever.
-
The weekend brought a rough day at the garage, with Teedo somehow even more irritable than usual. She kept her head down and finished her work as quickly as she could. Even then, he tried to keep her from leaving, claiming she was cheating him on her hours, but she finally escaped. She only had a couple hours before she had to be at the bar, and she found herself actually eager to spend time with Ben. She’d tried sensing the Force on her own, but she didn’t know how to use it like he did, and any research she’d tried only ended in conspiracy theories and fairy tales.
He’d shown up after her shift at the bar each night that week, never coming in, just waiting for her to come out. There wasn’t enough time in the walk back for them to practice much, but they talked, and she slowly learned more about the world she’d inadvertently stepped into. Ben was eager to tell her about the history of the Force and to teach her about the different creatures influenced by it. When it came to the First Order and his own past, he was more reluctant, but his unshakeable idea that he needed to protect her usually overcame his guilt.
(cont. under cut)
His new apartment was several blocks away from his old one, in a different direction from her apartment, but not any further. She walked over as soon as she got free of Teedo and found herself outside an apartment building that looked to be mostly rented by students. She climbed the stairs to the apartment number he’d given her and knocked on the door. This building looked more rundown than his last one, with more scuffs and dents along the hallway, but at the same time more welcoming. A rug sat outside the door, and she stared at it until the door swung open in front of her.
It wasn’t Ben. The man who stood in the doorway was several inches shorter and much slimmer. She blinked. “I think I have the wrong apartment -” she started, but then the sound of heavy footsteps came from inside the apartment and Ben appeared behind the other man.
“Oh, Ben, is this - ?” the stranger started, but Ben pulled the door open further around him, moving him out of the way.
“Yes, thank you, Mitaka,” Ben said, irritation and dismissal clear in his voice. “Rey, come on.” She walked into the apartment, smiling awkwardly at the other man as she passed.
“Hello-” he tried again, but Ben kept walking, and Rey followed him. He led her down a short hall and into a small bedroom at the end, cramped with a bed and a cheap desk.
“You have a roommate?” she blurted out as soon as he’d closed the door behind them.
Ben scowled. “As it turns out, it’s difficult to find a cheap apartment on short notice around here. Mitaka had a roommate drop out at the beginning of the semester, and he was desperate enough to take me.”
“You didn’t have anything to do with his roommate dropping, did you?” she asked, only half-joking.
He rolled his eyes. “No. If I was going to go that far, I could have found a better place.”
She glanced around the room and had to admit he had a point. The space wasn’t worth getting rid of someone else for. “So why move here at all then?”
(ch 1: worm moon | ch 2: worm moon II | ch 3: waning gibbous | ch 4: third quarter)
Rating: T (M later)
Words: 13602 / 40k
Tags: Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Finn, Rose Tico, Unkar Plutt, Leia Organa, Snoke, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Fairy Tale Elements, Moon, Scavenger Rey, Reylo Fanfiction Anthology, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Rating May Change
Summary: Rey has a busy schedule: between her part time jobs, trying to get a degree, and breaking into certain people’s homes to steal items she can pawn off to Unkar Plutt, she doesn’t have time for anything mysterious or unusual. And she’s not exactly in the habit of returning lost property.
However, something gets her to make an exception. Which somehow mixes her up with Ben Solo, and that turns out to be a hard bond to break.
Notes: Thank you again to everyone who was part of the @reylofanfictionanthology and who helped make this happen. <3
@persimonne , incredible human that she is, made a beautiful piece of art for this fic, right here! Spoilers for the fic, but it’s one of my favorite things ever.
-
Rey’s heart stopped. “What?” Her voice went up several octaves.
Ben, on the other hand, looked remarkably calm, except for the way his knee bounced under the table, and he went back to playing with his drink. “It’s tradition,” he said simply.
Rey struggled with several responses to that before settling on, “How?”
(cont. under cut)
“You returned my coat to me. That’s been a marriage rite among selkies for as long as we’ve had our skins.” His eyes watched as he stabbed ice cubes with his straw, but then they flicked up to meet hers, watching her intently.
“I’m not a selkie,” Rey said, a little desperately.
Ben shook his head. “Doesn’t matter. It used to be a huge thing, humans stealing selkies’ skins to marry them. In our traditions, the marriage is only valid if the coat is returned, and the selkie is given their freedom. These days, it’s usually more symbolic, couples trusting each other with their coats, but the traditional route still applies. Everyone knew when I lost my coat what it would mean when it was returned.”
She stared at him in disbelief. “And you’re okay with that? You were ready to be married to whatever random person picked your coat up and gave it back to you?”
He shrugged. “If they gave it back, they knew what they were doing. Better than the alternative.”
“The alternative? And how the fuck would anyone know about that? I only got it back to you through blind luck!” Whatever hold Rey had thought she’d had on this conversation was swiftly disintegrating. Magic was one thing; this was another one completely.
“The alternative would be them destroying it, or using it to threaten me,” Ben said quietly, glancing away for a moment. Rey suddenly remembered exactly where she had found his coat, and in whose house, and her blood ran cold, even as she struggled to keep up with the rest of the conversation. “And anyone who knew about my coat would know what it meant. You didn’t stumble on it on accident, Rey.”
She opened her mouth to correct him, then closed it again as she reassessed how much she needed to tell him. “I practically did,” she insisted. “It wasn’t like I was looking for it.”
His eyes met hers with an earnest intensity. “I know where this was being kept,” he said, pulling on the coat. “Don’t insult me by telling me that you didn’t have to put any effort into getting it.”
“I - That’s not what I meant,” she protested, but he shook his head and kept going.
“I know you still don’t understand everything that’s going on here, and that’s not saying anything about you,” he said, before she could interrupt him. “But you’ve just learned that all this even exists; you can’t get what it all means yet. But with what you do know about what this is and where you found it, do you think it would still have been there if it was so easy to retrieve?”
Rey struggled for words for a moment, before giving the only answer that made sense. “No.”
Ben sat back and nodded. “So. This was never going to be a conversation I had to have with some stranger who tripped over my skin in a ditch.” He half-smiled. “Though I have to say I didn’t expect this either.”
(ch 1: worm moon | ch 2: worm moon II | ch 3: waning gibbous | ch 4: third quarter | chapter 5: third quarter II)
Rating: T (M later)
Words: 13602 / 40k
Tags: Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Finn, Rose Tico, Unkar Plutt, Leia Organa, Snoke, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Fairy Tale Elements, Moon, Scavenger Rey, Reylo Fanfiction Anthology, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Rating May Change
Summary: Rey has a busy schedule: between her part time jobs, trying to get a degree, and breaking into certain people’s homes to steal items she can pawn off to Unkar Plutt, she doesn’t have time for anything mysterious or unusual. And she’s not exactly in the habit of returning lost property.
However, something gets her to make an exception. Which somehow mixes her up with Ben Solo, and that turns out to be a hard bond to break.
Notes: Thank you again to everyone who was part of the @reylofanfictionanthology and who helped make this happen. <3
@persimonne , incredible human that she is, made a beautiful piece of art for this fic, right here! Spoilers for the fic, but it’s one of my favorite things ever.
-
When she slid into her usual seat for her last class the next evening, the room was less than half full. An astronomy class at the end of the day turned out not to be a popular choice for most students, but it worked well for Rey as something that met one of her core class requirements, fit into her schedule, and she didn’t have to force herself into attending. She pulled out her homework from her last class to work on as other students trickled into the room.
A minute before class was due to start, Professor Tano strode into the room, scarf fluttering around her shoulders as she took the steps down to her lectern. Rey turned to put her work away and pull out her notes for the class when another student came down the side of the classroom and took the seat next to her. She looked up in surprise; the whole class generally took the same seats every lecture, spaced out across the room. Instead of another student, Ben Solo sat next to her with a slight smile under amused brown eyes.
“I thought we were meeting after,” she hissed, as the professor set up her presentation to begin class.
(continue reading under the cut)
He shrugged his broad shoulders. For the first time since she’d returned it to him, he wasn’t wearing his fur coat. Instead, a dark jacket stretched across his back with a matching t-shirt and dark pants. He could almost pass for a college student if it weren’t for the edge to him that instinctively told anyone who looked that he wasn’t someone to bother. “I was just going to wait nearby, but I thought this might be more interesting.”
She was about to retort, but Professor Tano cleared her throat, looking pointedly in their direction. Rey thought her glance lingered on Ben, but then she turned to the board and began the lecture, drawing a diagram of an elliptical orbit on the board.
To Rey’s shock, Ben didn’t bother her at all throughout the class. Instead, he paid more attention than most of the students in the room, listening eagerly as Professor Tano explained the basics of the factors affecting the orbits of planets and satellites. She thought he’d be taking notes if he could, and he had an expression as if he was intent on committing every detail of the lecture to memory. When the hour was up, he looked disappointed, slumping back in his chair as the professor reminded them of their upcoming assignments.
Rey packed up her notes, noticing that Professor Tano was looking over at them again. She quickly finished shoving her things away and hustled Ben out of the classroom before the professor could come over to ask questions about the new student not on the roster.
She relaxed as they walked through the hallways and out of the building, Ben looking distracted and far away. “So, you’re interested in space?” she asked curiously as they emerged into the evening.
He startled and looked down at her. “Used to be,” he said, eyes on the sidewalk. She waited for him to follow that up, but he apparently didn’t want to discuss it.
“Where are we going?” she tried again.
He cocked his head. “Doesn’t matter. We can walk around and find somewhere.”
Sh looked up at him askance. “Nowhere in particular? You don’t have a secret training lair or anything?”
He snorted. “No. Not anymore. That would be helpful though.”
