Rey stormed onto the quarter deck outside of Ren's cabin, firmly pulling the door shut behind her. Ever since she fell into the company of those onboard the Supremacy and the Silencer, she had fought to keep all of her prejudiced views regarding pirates at bay. But now, those thoughts had boiled over.

First and foremost, her encounters with the crews increased her loathing of pirates tenfold. Save for Finn, of course. And maybe Poe.

Secondly, she absolutely hated Kylo Ren.

Hated the incredible sex-appeal that his voice carried; hated those dark eyes that appeared to have somehow seen right through her. As if he had known something about her that she didn't. And nothing - oh, nothing - would make her happier than slapping one of those self-righteous smirks from the captain's face should the opportunity ever present itself again.

Bastard.

Reflecting on that smirk he had earlier as Ren declared their conversation over made her molars grind. It made her equally determined to get her compass back too. And one way or another, she swore she would. If she could just figure out where the captain was hiding it...

"Rey, wait up!"

Peering over a shoulder, she saw Poe hustling toward her. Bee-Bee in tow, on his master's shoulder.

"I've had enough of you bloody pirates for one day!" she snapped. Sadly, though, she had nowhere else to go but further below deck.

"What happened?"

"Your captain is a perfidious bastard, that's what," she snarled, her quickening pace exhibiting no signs of slowing as the pirate hurried alongside her.

"Alright, calm down," assured Poe, the hand he put on her shoulder forcing her to stop and turn before reaching the stairwell. "C'mon, talk to me."

Begrudgingly, glaring daggers, she flexed her jaw. "There's nothing to talk about," she huffed, slinging a hand toward the captain's cabin. "He's a liar and an asshole. And—."

"Whoa whoa! Okay, hold up for a second." Brows furrowed, Poe canted his head back like it was he she had just insulted. "The latter I can attest to there. But...a liar? Ren?"

"So, what? You're defending him now?" she accused, planting her hands on her hips while gauging him through narrow eyes.

"No, I'm not defending him," he affirmed. "Ren is a great deal of many things. Granted, he's brutally honest to a fault and a dick sometimes, yes."

"Honestly, even if you said he was Poseidon or Prince Charming underneath that garb, I wouldn't care." She sighed exasperatedly and crossed her arms. "I just want to go home!"

They stared at one another in silence for a beat. Rey, gathering her wits, turned and ambled towards the banister, overlooking the tranquil Caribbean Sea; which dazzled like a thousand diamonds in a rock quarry under the blazing sun.

"I'm sorry." Rey sighed as her arms settled over the railing, a note of reserve underlining her tone. Joining her, arms drawn and folded over his chest, Poe kept quiet as she continued to speak softly. "I just want my family, and I can't find them without the compass."

Poe wet his lips. "Did you try asking for his help?"

"Yes," she replied dryly.

"And?"

Rey snorted at that. "He didn't give me a direct answer." She slid a look of resignation in Poe's direction, shrugging. "He just mocked me and insisted I didn't know where the hell I was going. That I was going the wrong way. So then I asked for the compass to prove him wrong and he refused to give it back."

Poe chewed on his bottom lip. "Well, I mean...He wasn't wrong."

Rey wrinkled her nose. "About?"

He took a sharp breath and began to explain, carefully. "When we found you last night, you were going roughly 500 miles out of your way. America is Northwest from here, Rey. Not East."

Blinking, she gave him a suspicious look. Noting the genuineness in his gaze, the apparent frown creasing her forehead deepened. Not because what he had said was starting to sink in, but because she realized what Kylo had told her was the truth after all. Her head started spinning with questions and she shook it in dismay.

If the compass wasn't leading her to America, then where was it taking her? It had to be wrong.

"Look, I don't know your whole story," sighed Poe. "And you don't have to tell me, your business isn't mine. But maybe what you're looking for isn't exactly what you were meant to find."

"It makes zero sense, though," she scoffed. "I—I don't understand."

"You don't have to take my word for it," he professed. "I'm not a philosopher or an expert in shit like that. But the universe has a way of playing things out for us. Sometimes we gotta zig-zag to get to where destiny wants us to be."

She quirked a small smile and lifted an eyebrow at him. "Not bad advice for a pirate."

"I guess," he chuckled, propping his forearms on the railing alongside Rey's. Bee-Bee leapt down from his perch onto the empty space between the pair, parking its rear haunches there with his long, mangy tail dangling over. The creature looked from its master to Rey, centering its round primate eyes on her. God, he really was a strange-looking thing, that Bee-Bee. She found it hard to believe that underneath the leaves and hairless hide, was supposedly a monkey who had also fallen victim to the curse.

"How did you get here?" asked Rey, raising her narrowed eyes to Poe. "You're not like him - the captain, or the others." Compared to them he was so—normal. And kind.

Poe didn't answer right away. Lips thinly pressed, he spent a solid minute or two scrutinizing waves, lost in a painful, distant memory. "I had a choice to make," he grimaced. "And I chose to follow my best friend to this Hell."

Waves lapping against the hull punctuated a stone silence that fell afterward. Realizing who it was that Poe had referred to, Rey's initial reply was a blink in disbelief. "You-You're actually serious?"

Poe nodded. "I shit you not."

"But he's..."

"Ren wasn't always a monster." The explicit hurt in his voice made it clear that Poe and Kylo Ren were indeed friends, and withheld more history together than she could ever presume. "Be-Kylo." Wincing, he cleared his throat so to hide the accidental blip before continuing. "Kylo would have given you the shirt off his back had you asked for it. Hell, you wouldn't have needed to even ask; he would have just done it."

Learning this spurred on an entirely new line of questions for her about the captain. Pieces to an enormous puzzle that Rey had yet to comprehend. Why Poe had been so quick to avoid stating the captain's former name. Why Kylo Ren had become so fierce when he had clearly once been a decent man.

Why why why?

"Let me talk to him," he said before Rey was able to express either query out loud. "About the compass. About you."

Again, the pirate had her stumped for words. "I...No." She snorted wryly. "I've put you through enough trouble with him this morning already."

However, Poe was keenly undeterred by Rey's objection. Whether she wanted him to confront Kylo Ren on the issue or not, she was left with no other option but to accept. She spared him the tiniest of grins and whispered a heartfelt thanks.

Poe clapped her lightly on the shoulder with his hand. "In the meantime, just make yourself at home." With his chin, he gestured to his leafy compadre who was still seated on the banister rail while the pirate took a step back. "Bee-Bee here can keep you company. But as for everyone else, I can guarantee they won't bother you. Otherwise, Ren will have himself a skeleton crew."

Rey wasn't quite sure what to make of that. "Should I be worried or flattered?"

He pondered the notion briefly then cracked a knowing smirk. "Let's put it this way, nobody has ever mouthed off to Kylo Ren and survived. But for you, he made an exception."

**

Inside the captain's chamber, seated on the bench at his grand organ, Kylo Ren was facing his own dilemma concerning Rey. Not a single note was played since her dismissal minutes earlier. A rarity of its own as music had been his sole means of comfort during most trying days onboard the Silencer.

It wasn't a secret that the compass would one day lead him to the cure for breaking his curse; he just hadn't expected her to be the one. Discovering both the compass and the cure the same night on his ship was something he never expected would happen. Although it wasn't until he made the connection earlier that morning when he thought it was all too good to be true.

He didn't deserve to have it so easily - didn't deserve her. He didn't deserve to be shown such mercy by whichever god or goddess had granted it to him then. Some of the things he had done in the past were unspeakable. Unforgivable. Who could have possibly found him worthy of forgiveness and sent this girl to him?

To be frank, his reaction had been close to Rey's. It had to be a mistake.

He'd been on the forecastle deck shortly after dawn, a longer front tentacle holding the compass up before him to see. Where its needle had immediately settled on North the previous night, it was instead erratic. Not one direction favored.

Then, it froze the second North emerged below, on the top deck, frazzled by the crew.

North was a woman with auburn hair and freckles peppering suntanned, rosey cheeks, and the most beautiful hazel eyes Ren had ever seen. The girl named Rey had an English accent he could have listened to for hours when she spoke to him. And she looked at him in a way that nobody else had, without repugnance or fear. He hadn't deserved that either.

But damn it, if it didn't make him want her even more!

Not because she was the answer to ending a decade of suffering, her kindness had reminded him there was good in humanity. That perhaps he did have a soul worth saving. Cause in that split second when she looked at him that way, she had made him feel things Ren shouldn't have felt with the emptiness inside him. Things that normally would have made his heart go pitter-patter and flutter inside his rib cage; he was almost certain he had felt the illusion of a heartbeat skipping once or twice.

However, wooing her without Ben Solo's heart and charm - his charm more than anything - was him performing the impossible. He had to work with what Kylo Ren was capable of achieving, which, to no avail, had also pissed her off. He'd ordered her around as he did members of his crew than treating her as his potential lover. As his equal than his subordinate.

Christ, he was doomed...

Knuckles rapping abruptly at his cabin door pulled Ren from his reverie. For a moment, his hopes had him thinking it was Rey returning to scold him again. Was that such a bad thing to wish for, so long as it meant she wasn't completely ignoring him?

God damn it, this girl was making him pathetic without her even knowing it!

His expression sobered when it was his first mate who revealed himself as Ren's visitor. That budding heat of desire to see her again, if only for a second, dissipated to a hard mass of bitter disappointment. "What is it, Dameron?" he sneered.

Wordless as his boots scuffled across the wood floorboards, Poe didn't utter a word till he was next to a floor sconce supporting a lit candle, a few paces from where the captain was seated. Within candlelight, the vibrant reds and oranges on his starfish sparkled as embers would of a freshly kindled flame in the stark shadows. "It's about Rey," rasped Poe.

"There's nothing to discuss," Ren retorted icily.

"Not according to her," Poe quipped, unphased by the captain's foul mood. "Why didn't you let her have the compass?"

"Bold of you to assume that I need to explain what happened between myself and the girl."

"Last I remember my best friend told me everything before he was captain of this hell ship."

Ren had no immediate comeback for Poe. True, they had been best friends on Jakku. They'd experienced just about everything a boy typically underwent during adolescence together, including the ups and downs of courting women plus some. Brothers of different parentage, they'd called themselves.

And then, such as the way of all good things in life, all of it had changed throughout their decade of service on the Silencer, as corruption began corroding the space where Ren's heart had been. Before he became cold and detached himself from anything and everything he'd ever cared about.

Then, along came Rey, and his world was irrevocably turned right-side-up after years of dangling upside down.

"Why does it matter?" Ren murmured coolly. "She'll never find who she's looking for. Best not give her hope when there is none."

Poe grunted. "Don't you think it's only fair you let her discover the truth herself? Rather than - say - holding her hostage?"

Ren sneered at him and rose from the organ bench. "I told her she was free to leave, she's under no obligation to stay here." In actuality, it was complete and utter horseshit and a total power play on Ren's behalf when he'd said that to Rey. Had his claw ground any harder as his fist tightly balled, its exterior shell would have cracked. "If she believes she's a prisoner here, then that's of her own doing."

Tenacious in his task, Poe followed him closely as Ren stomped away. "You're doing this on purpose, aren't you?" he scolded. "You think by withholding the compass she'll have no choice but to stay here with you."

Ren spun in his tracks, causing a near collision with Poe. "Ten years," he hissed. "I've waited ten years to find this girl and you're foolish to think I should encourage her to pursue hopeless aspirations on land? There's a significant chance that she may never come back after she sets foot on that soil and both of us are fully aware that I can't follow her."

Poe softened his approach. "The compass brought her to you," he reasoned, not once buckling under the captain's intense scrutiny. "She'll figure that out eventually. But in the meantime, you have 500-miles to prove why Ben Solo is worth her staying at sea. And the Ben I know would never back down from a challenge."

Ren scowled. "Ben Solo was killed when I ripped his heart out."

"And yet you still feel something for her, don't you? All you accomplished after removing your heart was lessening the impact that emotions have over you. But that light - it's always been in you. It's never gone away, and so long it's there you still have hope."

Ren curled his upper lip and snarled at Poe. His first mate was right and the irritant was wholly aware that Ren knew it. Of all the petty reasons why the captain hated him through the years, nothing made him seeth more than accepting his first mate had his conscience securely fastened by the balls.

And he hated Poe for actually wanting to listen to what he had to say next. "Fine. What do you suggest I should do then?"

Poe grinned at him slyly. "What you'd normally do when you wish to win a fair lady's heart. You ask her to dinner."