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Ever since Armitage Hux can remember, he's loathed having to be privy to human interaction.
It isn't the interaction itself, per se, not the conversing and debating and acquiescing he's grown used to accommodating as a part of his day-to-day life, nor is it a worry of how others may perceive him; no, Hux has neither the care nor the time to allow for much focus on the mundane , and he's hardly the type to sit about and cry over whether or not a person hates him. After all, he should be hated-- should be despised, because the state of being despised simply means that he's doing his job properly. Subordinates did not like their commanding officers, nor were they supposed to; the relationship was meant to be one of respect, and intimidation when the typical order was plagued with stress, but it was never personal. Never close.
And Hux loathes fraternization, too. As well as compassion, tenderness, love and any of the similarly associated traits that are equally unnecessary and irrational. He has never seen much point in the indulgence of it all, the inanities that romance and friendship provoked. He prizes order. He prizes logic. He prizes shrewdness, competence, obedience, in others just as much as himself. Anything that does not conform to his constraints is abhorrent-- and undesirable. An error to be fixed, he might even say; machines can only run without fail when they are carefully maintained, and if Hux has to maintain the entirety of the galaxy, he would do so without fail, because he is capable, he is controlled, he is judicious, and he is certainly not prone to the same contemptible mistakes as the rest of the improper fools that he's been made to serve with.
Hux is, to put things simply, order itself.
And he refuses, absolutely refuses, to give himself over to his emotions in the manner that others apparently see fit to.
The emotive state of sentience is one which Hux has always preferred to sever himself from; empathy was more of a hindrance than an asset, and volatility was hardly useful, no matter what lesser minds such as Kylo Ren may have attempted to claim.
Hux furrows his brow; his fingers tremble, still clasped tightly about the pen he's been gripping to like a vice for the last seven hours and forty-three minutes as he's continued to file report, after report, after report. Edits. Assignments. Reviews. Clearances. Shipments. The organization helps. It is familiar. The repetitive task of signing and filing documents, the meticulous care with which he critiques the work of his underlings, the way his mind always seems to fall into a state of blissful numbness as he works, endlessly, without fail, until he decides he can work no longer. He is methodical, almost like a protocol droid, devoid of any consideration besides his concentration-- but...
His fingers clench tighter around the length of the pen; Hux bites his lip.
He will not function outside of his determined parameters for this evening.
He will not fail in completing each task he has been assigned, each task he is responsible for, lest he damn himself to the same pathetic state of being as those over-emotional, bleeding heart rebels that make up the Resistance.
His hand twitches.
Damn it all.
Hux prefers to keep certain sentiments caged, buried deep inside a vault that he keeps locked up tight, hidden behind numerous closed doors and entirely removed from his typical stream of thought.
These sentiments, these undesirable considerations, included his opinions-- his feelings-- about one Kylo Ren.
His co-commander, as it were.
How dare Snoke force him to cooperate with that barbarous man and his mystical nonsense. How dare he expect Hux to simply bend over backwards to accommodate Ren's whims, his tantrums, his requests. How dare he relegate to Hux the responsibility of keeping Ren happy, for the betterment of his asinine training, how dare Ren force Hux to clean up his messes, how could he dare to even exist here, how dare he be handed everything he so desired, everything he could have possibly wanted--
(Armitage.)
The acrid taste of blood swarms his mouth, seeping across his tongue and dribbling down the back of his throat from where he's torn open his own lip. Hux blinks at the sensation once he takes note of it, almost idly. He sets down his pen; peels off one glove with the utmost care and lays it out atop his desk before reaching up, tentative, pressing his thumb to the shallow, albeit sensitive, wound in the flesh.
He has missed the clarity that pain provides, has missed the certainty of it. Regardless of circumstance, pain would always exist in some capacity to ground him, to anchor him to reality and remind him of exactly what he's done to earn his place here.
(Nobody respects you.)
To think he'd once been so foolish as to assume that Ren were a being capable of reasonable action; to think that Hux had previously considered, even if just for a second, that Ren wasn't equally as delusional as Snoke was, equally as drunk with power... just as spoiled, just as uncouth, just as worthless---
His thumb glistens with a soft red sheen, the white of his flesh saturated with rivulets of blood spilled by his momentary lapse in judgment. Hux has to keep himself from laughing at the sight of it. Despicable.
He eases himself from his seat; turns from his desk, precisely ninety degrees. Pushes his chair in, walks to the open fresher just off to the side of a neatly-kept corner of the room. He stands before the sink, flicks the faucet three times before turning it on.
The water that quells the hideous stains upon his skin is, as always, a comfort.
As Hux continues to wash his hands-- sleeves up to his elbows and hunched over with exhaustion before the metal washbasin-- he deigns, at long last, to glance up and level his reflection with a long, scalding glare.
His eyes are red at the corners, bloodshot and raw; the hollows of his face bloom with dark stains and stark, blue veins that stand out from his spectre-like pallor. He looks sickly--
(Weak-willed, useless.)
--practically dead. Short, red-gold lashes flutter in acknowledgment of the picture; it is an undeniable fate that he think of death, especially at the most inopportune of moments. There is work to be done, and here he is, washing his hands.
Still, he supposes there's no harm in indulging himself, even if for only a brief moment.
He wipes his hands on the towel, makes sure they are well and dry before setting it beside the washbasin, folding the cloth corner-to-corner horizontally, then vertically, until the lines form a near-perfect square.
Hux sighs.
He would look quite lovely dead, wouldn't he? Black hair and black eyes and skin the color of an Arkanisian sky before a heavy rain. Kylo had the most melancholic features; dark, angular, and yet lovely all the same. Not quite symmetrical, but his abstractness was something rather befitting, wasn't it?
Hux would have him clean; set him out on a bland, colorless bed like the ones kept in medbay throughout his youth and admire the contrast of his darkness, offset against the impersonal white sheets and white walls and white lights above them. He'd be stitched right up the front, wounds filled with cotton and formaldehyde so he didn't rot away too quickly. There was nothing quite like a pristinely-kept corpse, nothing so excellent as gazing into the deep, chaotic void of soulless eyes and understanding exactly how empty one actually was; nothing so perfect as caressing the cool flesh of a still cheek, slipping fingers into a pliant mouth and guiding it to speak, rearranging limbs and maneuvering them as one pleased to best configure an ideal companion.
(Deviant.)
(Deplorable.)
(Vile.)
Hux's hand catches itself just as it reaches the fabric of his jodhpurs, one finger bracing against the trim line of the belt secured about his waist. He inhales, sharply.
(Nonononono no.)
Possessing Kylo Ren would be a true victory, indeed; he was formidable, wasn't he? A rather exemplary trophy for anyone's collection. Hux wonders what he'd look like once he decomposed, after he began to bloat and combust, rot away in succession until he became a hulking skeleton with a gigantic skull to match his sizable ego. He'd fuck the sockets where his eyes once were and spend himself in the remains of Kylo's skin to celebrate the magnificence of his gain, of his superiority. And afterwards he'd clean up the bones and organize them on his shelf; structured. Efficient.
(Wrong.)
Hux turns back to the sink. Flicks the handle thrice and resumes the process of washing his hands. He will wash them until he's cleansed himself of his thoughts, of his chaos, of his subjectivity and the wrongness of his feelings. Then he will replace his gloves and return to his work. In approximately two hourly cycles he will wash his hands again prior to allowing himself to retire to his bed for a brief rest. Afterward, he will return to the bridge and proceed with his tasks in an adherent, productive manner. He will continue to do exactly as he always does; maintain his ship with order and dignity.
He will stifle any deviant thoughts, behaviors or actions with the firm hand of order that he'd been made to develop.
He will not, under any circumstances, give in to his uselessness or the demented urges that sustain his weakness. After all, it wouldn't do for him to make a mess of himself, of his work and his authority. Miscalculation is never to be tolerated.