Chapter Text
Red light strobed behind his eyelids.
Black. Red. Black. Red.
Oddly, it was comforting. Hux wondered briefly if it might be the last thing he might see before he passed into eternal darkness.
Memories swam through him. Each one passed by too quickly. They were snatched away by the currents of pain which streamed through his limbs, down his back, and gathered like a lake in his chest and stomach. Deep wells of sharp agony. He tried to reach for the memories to distract himself but they slipped away through his fingers.
His heart was on fire.
“Surrender or we’ll open fire!” A voice stammered. Familiar. Panicked.
“Belay that order. I want him alive.” It snarls, “I said bel-”
He could remember the tone of the second speaker. He remembered how his own lip had curled to hear it. He could see his reflection in the cockpit glass; dishevelled hair, eyes wild and feral like a dog giving chase to prey, or fleeing from something worse.
He could remember the outraged roar over the comm. He watched as an illicit beam of energy lanced towards his ship from a turret, before he even had a chance to respond.
He remembered he would have responded snidely.
Then… floating?
Red light bled around him, so very bright and searing. He had seen that colour somewhere before. It was a colour he felt he owned.
There was pain. He screamed, and screamed, and screamed.
Black. Red. Black. Red.
Suddenly, his chest was flooded with cold. There was something thick and hard slithering down his throat and forcing his chest to expand, shrink, expand. He fought it. Coughed. Choked. He heard someone shout something authoritative. A sharp pain in his arm. Needle?
He remembered medical jargon and the instruction to hold him still.
“If you do not save him, Doctor, every staff member in this infirmary will follow him. Do you understand?”
He remembered a hand. Large. Gloved. A thumb stroking slowly beneath his eye, along his cheekbone. His eyelids flickered open briefly as the hand stroked his cheek. A pale face. A harsh scar.
He remembered his vision swimming, a harness around his body, a blue tank behind a hulking monster all dressed in shadow. The monster with the large hands, the dark eyes. He remembered feeling like he lost something vital.
He lost a war.
The darkness would have been better than this.
Then his eyes slipped shut and he remembered nothing at all.
---
Hux gasped. His lungs hurt. His back hurt. His hips, his thighs, his shoulders, his knuckles, even the skin behind his eyelids and inside his mouth hurt.
He sat bolt upright. He immediately regretted it. His hand drifted up to grasp at his hair. It was loose and soft, washed and free of his usual pomade. He gripped it hard to feel the sting along his scalp. It helped to ground his ragged breathing. There was something wrong with him. His eyelids fluttered and he swallowed. His throat felt bruised, dry and raw. His hand dropped from his hair to his throat and he tested the skin there tenderly. It felt familiar, that pain, though he did not know why.
Hux quickly took stock. His panic could wait until he knew he was safe to panic. He needed to assess the salutation and plan.
He sat on a thin cot in a small, cold room. The walls were a dark durasteel grey with no windows. Four solid walls with only a few steps between them. There was one door with no windows and no door handle. His eyes flicked to each corner of the ceiling automatically and he spotted a camera pointed at his bed. He stared at it and wondered who was watching. He glanced down at himself and saw threadbare grey leggings and a grey t-shirt hugging his thin body. He frowned. The clothes hung off of him as if they were meant for bigger men and they did not leave much to the imagination. He wasn’t wearing underwear. He wore no shoes or socks. The clothing dimly registered as the clothing they gave prisoners.
He was a prisoner then? A criminal?
Hux drew in a slow breath, “My name is Armitage Hux. I am… I am…“
There was nothing there. He swallowed, thickly, the pain in his throat grounded him again. He looked down at his hands and flexed them. He counted his fingers. His fingers were long, pale, and his nails were broken and torn as if he had fought something or someone recently with his entire being. They were clean but he felt the phantom itch of blood and skin beneath them. He had a small scar on the inside of his wrist and he couldn’t remember where it came from.
Yet, he knew some facts. This was a First Order ship. He knew of the First Order, and its workings, apparently, and when he sat and mulled it over he found he knew a great deal about administration, geography, order history, security and data. He had... worked for them? He could remember budgets and rotas. The spreadsheets pulled forward in his mind as if he was sat in front of a terminal.
Hux rubbed at his throat and eyed the blinking light on the camera. He delved deeper. He knew he was from Arkanis. He knew that it always rained there. He knew he… had no family. He trained in an academy but he could remember none of it except the skills. He knew how to take apart a sniper rifle and put it back together. He knew how to take a life. He could not remember experiencing it. He knew how many decks there were on this ship. He knew it was called The Steadfast. He could not remember why he cared for it.
Hux took a deep breath in, a longer breath out. His eyes followed the walls. No vents. No access panels. A single dim light flickered overhead.
He traced the bed linens beneath his pale fingers. He noticed his wrists were bruised. The sheets beneath him were thin and scratchy. He strained his mind and forced himself to dig deeper. He could remember… Tie fighter designs. Starkiller base. The plans. He remembered how to build it. He knew his plans for a second, a third. He remembered how to make a monomolecular blade.
He touched the scar on the inside of his wrist gently.
But when he closed his eyes and drew in a slow and pained breath into his aching lungs, he knew was missing significant gaps. He couldn’t remember people. He couldn't remember events. He couldn’t remember his own history. Who was he? Just a name, “Armitage Hux” and a collection of facts and skills.
At least, he supposed, as he rose gingerly from the cot, he remembered how to walk, piss and breathe. Whatever had happened, this could be much worse.
His eyes snapped open. He needed to move.
The room smelt clinical, as if it had been wiped down with industrial bleach and then left empty and stagnant for months. He groaned as he shoved himself off of the cot and dragged himself to the door. He ran his hands over the cold steel and checked for any sign of a way out. There was no internal panel. He was delighted to find he could remember how he might splice one to let him out but this room was not generous with its treasures and he could see no way to escape. Whoever had put him here knew his abilities. That worried him.
Why did he want to escape? Dread weighed down on his ribcage. A heavy need to run and to run far kept gnawing at him. He frowned at himself. He had no memory to rely on so he could not assume his gut feeling was accurate. Then again, he only had gut feelings to rely on and something in his hindbrain was telling him this situation was wrong.
Very wrong.
He did not have much time to contemplate it though. He heard boots trudging outside the door and they were getting louder. Hux glanced quickly around the room but there was nowhere to hide and nothing to use as a weapon.
He stepped back out of the way of the door nearer to the far wall and fell into a military stance. It took him a moment, as his back went ramrod straight, for him to realise it was as instinctive for him as blinking.
The door slid open to reveal what he identified as stormtroopers. There were two, solemnly masked and carrying rifles. They parted and a greying man in a grey military uniform stepped into the room. His lip twisted into a sneer and his eyes dragged from Hux bare feet all the way up his body to his dishevelled hair. Hux had never felt a look crawl over him the way this man’s gaze had before. Possibly. Hux set his jaw and met his eyes. He refused to be intimidated by some nameless officer. Hux did not know why but he decided that his gut must be right about this one because he loathed this man.
“You are finally awake then.” The man adjusted his glove, his fingers curled slowly so the leather creaked. “Why the Supreme Leader decided to keep you alive, I have no idea.”
The mystery officer’s gaze swept over him again and lingered on his face, “Although perhaps I can see why now you are dressed down and finally in a position worthy of your… breeding.”
Hux lips thinned.
There were a thousand ways to play this. He could feign memory but then he would be caught out quickly if asked anything specific and that ruse rarely worked well when it came to long term subterfuge. The man had a blaster strapped to his belt, and a knife in his boot, cleverly concealed but easy to spot if one was trained. The two troopers outside the door were well armed and they were competent in hand to hand. Hux weighed up his options, fast. He could disarm the man and shoot him, and take out the troopers. To do so would be of great risk and although he knew the layout of the Steadfast (how and why was a mystery but he could compartmentalise that for later), he did not know where they were. An escape pod would be shot out of the sky - Red, Black, Red, Black.
Hux blinked away stars. Escape through careless violence was not viable. He needed more information. Lying about his memory required more data to be effective. Unfortunately, the truth was his best bet. The risk that they were keeping him alive for his memory alone weighed on him. If so, revealing that he remembered nothing meant he was useless and then he was dead. It was a risk he would have to take.
“You will have to forgive me but I do not know who you are.” His eyes flicked to the pips on the man’s collar, “Allegiant General…?”
Surprise flickered across the man’s face before his eyes narrowed, “Don’t act dumb. I am not a fool.”
Several acerbic responses flooded his mouth. He swallowed them all down, “Given I don’t remember you, Sir, I cannot comment on your intelligence, or lack thereof.”
The backhand that came was unsurprising. The force of it made him realise how frail his body was, still recovering from his forgotten incident, and it took him down to his knees. Pain rattled up his thighs to his hips where his knees had slammed hard against the steel floor. That was more painful than the sting that burned his cheek. He refused to lift his hand to it. He kept them on his thighs, curled tight into fists, and he steadied his breath lest he give in to the animal desire to rip the Allegiant’s blaster away from his hip and shoot him in the crotch. The pleasure of a bloody revenge was too short lived to give up his long term survival.
“There we go.” The Officer smiled mirthlessly down at him, his lip curled and teeth too white, “That’s a better position for you, I think. Now, are you really going to play amnesiac with me, Armitage?”
Hux took a moment to lick the inside of his mouth. No blood. He met the Officer’s eyes, “I am not playing. I don’t know who you are.”
The man drew back his hand again and Hux prepared himself for another strike, as if that would be enough to get Hux to drop his ‘charade’, as if Hux hadn't had worse from others. How did he know that? He couldn’t remember it, but he could feel it. He knew. This was child’s play and this man could beat him into the floor and it wouldn’t compare to real torture.
“Allegiant General Pryde, Sir?” Another officer, small and mousy and trembling, stood in the doorway, “S-Supreme Leader requested Hux be brought to him immediately, Sir, and unharm-”
The look the Allegiant Gener- Pryde shot the quivering Officer was wilting.
“I am aware, Lieutenant. I trust you can confirm he was unharmed when the Supreme Leader asks?” His tone suggested that she consider her answer wisely.
“Yes, Sir.” She shot Hux an apologetic look over his shoulder when he turned back. Her eyes wide and concerned.
Hux wondered vaguely, as Pryde gestured for the Stormtroopers to enter the room and cuff him, why she might be concerned for him. He was a prisoner, apparently, and she was a Lieutenant. Did he know her before his incarceration? Hux shut that part of his questioning away. If he spent too long asking questions of everyone and everything he might lose sight of a way to escape or increase his security. He needed one of two things; guaranteed freedom, or guaranteed safety, and Allegiant General Pryde was going to give him neither of those things.
Embarrassingly, he was marched from the room in magcuffs and given no shoes. He held his head high as he walked and refused to let the humiliation of being seen barely clothed, barefoot and wounded bite into him. He would get Pryde back, somehow, someway.
The air on the ship was cold and it left him shivering.
Hux got the impression he was being deliberately displayed. The walk was long and winding and as he passed officers and troopers the reactions he got were mixed. A great many, he felt with a strange pride, hid their concern and horror well, they had been properly trained. Some were openly gloating, and he noted their faces to ensure he knew who to shoot when he was in a more favourable position, and some were openly worried. Those, he thought, would be useful though they really needed to learn that baring their emotions so openly was a weakness.
Hux stopped abruptly opposite two large durasteel doors at the same time as Pryde and his Officer, who he now knew to be called Lieutenant Ryx. A heavy dread bloomed up within him as the two doors slid open on Pryde’s command to reveal an expansive circular room. Hux realised that he could remember the original purpose of the room and it had clearly been refitted for alternative use. The room used to be a grand conference hall; used to house a great number of officers, or diplomatic gatherings. The bar, seats and chairs had all been stripped out, along with the stage, and instead placed within the centre of the room was a throne.
A dais had been crafted in a way that hurt Hux to consider because it did not make any sense. Charred metal had been twisted and flattened, as if by some great power, and almost entirely flat. Nothing was welded and yet it was melded together as if it had been. A myriad of different pieces of black metal had been flattened, twisted and crushed together to create the raised platform.
Pyrde saluted along with the others as they approached the throne, “Supreme Leader.”
The throne itself was huge, and it was composed entirely of twisted metal. Hux eyes widened as he skimmed over the different pieces and realised they were the remnants of ships and armour; blackened and burned pieces of hull, the casings of blasters, the remnants of masks, part of a tie fighter, and a rebellion ship. It was all jet black, as if each piece had been scorched before they were summarily crushed together into planes of twisted metal that sat flush and sleek. It made no sense. It hurt to look at. There was something incomprehensible and dramatic about the whole thing. It made Hux's teeth itch with the desire to bite out a scathing review. He felt anger bubble up like he wanted to snarl and criticize the lack of subtlety. He wanted to find fault with the rage that seemed to spill off of it as if the throne was sentient and spilling its feelings out into the space around it. He wanted to call it childish, like some hulking toddler had smashed together its trophies and decided to sit on them after.
He wanted to crawl up there, sit in his rightful place, and look down on everyone. The throne was beautiful, loud, magnificent and terrifying. Impractical. He wanted it.
He hated it.
Then his gaze fell on the man sat upon the throne and that hatred fizzled down to a low hum. It stuck in the back of his mind, like it was important he felt that way, but he didn’t know why. But other feelings crowded forward, too many to give names too, until he was swimming in a fog of his own confusion.
The man considered him with his head tilted like a curious animal. Hux eyes met the man’s and he forgot to breathe.
The Supreme Leader held Hux hostage with only a look. Hux didn’t need the Stormtroopers, their weapons or the cuffs around his wrists to feel caught. The Supreme Leader’s eyes were darker than the blackened metal he sat upon. His face was unnatural and captivating; pale, and beautiful, oddly boyish and aged, asymmetrical and spattered with moles like a constellation. Hux could feel the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end, and a shiver went through him as the gaze between them seemed to last aeons. There was a sick nausea building in his throat; fear, so much fear, like this man truly frightened him but not in a way that felt tangible or logical. He was swamped with rage, unbridled rage, like he could wrap his hands around this man's throat and strangle him for reasons he couldn’t name. He felt jealous, protective, sad, lust, and want, and… love? He could feel that horrendous emotion, buried inside him like a parasite letting out toxins. It was so strong. So strange. His steps almost faltered.
He was in love with this man and he couldn’t remember his name. He loved him, and he ached for him, and he was hurt. It made him feel sick. He wanted to claw it out of him and send it reeling into space. He refused to collapse but his legs shook.
“Armitage Hux, Supreme Leader, as requested. He has finally woken up.” Pryde turned to sneer at Hux. “He has “conveniently” forgotten me, My Lord. I think he is playing games with us.”
“I don’t think he is.” The man’s voice was deep, and thoughtful, intrigued.
Hux broke eye contact first. It was too much. He wanted to peel off his skin.
“Supreme Leader, with all due respect. This is a man who is known to lie and manipulate and he could easily be taking you in.” Pryde countered, his voice overly ingratiating.
Hux felt something slithering through his hair like fingers brushing him, and a coolness in his mind that was entirely alien. As soon as it had begun, it disappeared, and Hux was left blinking at the viewport. He glanced upwards but there were no vents above him. The ceiling was too high.
Hux pursed his lips.
“Have you forgotten me, Hux?” The man on the throne asked. His voice was soft.
Hux nodded, a jerk of his head. He didn’t trust himself to speak.
When he returned his gaze back to the Supreme Leader, the man’s eyes glittered. He frowned, his hands gripping the arms of his throne until his knuckles went white, and his head tilted to the side in contemplation. His gaze raked over Hux, but it did not feel like the crawl of Pryde’s, but something far more intimate and familiar.
“I don’t think I have ever heard you so quiet, Hux.” The Supreme Leader rose from the throne. The rage that had been swarming it early had petered out to something muted. Hux wondered what that was. He stiffened, back straight and chin up as the Supreme Leader closed the distance between them. His heart hammered in his chest. The Stormtroopers instinctively moved aside for him.
“It is difficult to make conversation when you don’t remember anyone, or why you’re in cuffs.” Hux replied, dryly, and arched an eyebrow. He refused, despite his racing heart and the cold sweat that had broken out along his spine, to look down or away. He tilted his chin up, “Would you rather I monologue for my release?”
“No.” The Supreme Leader stared at him with singular focus and lifted his hand up, splayed. Hux frowned at the gesture. “I have ways of telling.”
Pain exploded through him. Hux, for a second time that day, found himself on his knees and a scream tore its way through his gritted teeth. He clenched them so hard together he thought he might shatter them. A pushing, squirming thickness squirmed its way through his head, deeper, and deeper until he felt like pain had become manifest as some kind of corkscrew and it was drilling its way, ripping its way through mind. Brief flashes came to him. Plunging a blade deep into the jugular of an old, wizened officer who had commented that he would look stuffed with- being forced to kneel and lick glass and alcohol from the floor, tears stream- A woman in gleaming silver armour laying her hand on his shoul - a wry smile over the holocom, a man hazy and blue, in a pilot’s jacket telling him he won’t be pardoned but he would be saf- breathing in slow and holding his breath as he pulled the trigger of his rifle and felt the adrenaline high of the bullet hitting an ey-
He woke, lying flat on the cold floor with his cheek pressed to the steel. A hand carded gently through his hair. The pain ebbed, his brain felt like it had been scratched and rubbed raw with chemicals. He tasted iron at the back of his throat.
“Wh-What…?” He coughed.
“You had a seizure.” The Supreme Leader replied, gravely. His hand was gentle, and his eyes sharp. “You have had a few, I believe, since your accident.”
“Wonderful.” Hux pushed himself up, shame curling through him at having clearly had an episode in front of his… captors? “Get your hand out of my hair. I’m not a whimpering infant.”
The Lieutenant sucked in a fearful gasp at Hux blatant disrespect towards their leader. Hux ignored her. He was aching, sore, suffering memory loss, confused and pissed off. The Supreme Leader could do with some humbling. If they were going to shoot him for a snide mouth he wouldn’t last another ten minutes. This display the Supreme Leader had Hux taking part in for the Stormtroopers, Ryx and Pryde was humiliating.
Still, the Supreme Leader helped Hux up with a gentleness he hadn’t been expecting though he took much longer to obey Hux’s order to remove his hand from his hair. Hux cheeks heated.
“You're the same.” The Supreme Leader sighed, his eyes shone. Hux wasn’t sure if it was with amusement, cold fury or relief. He was hard to read. “You’re the same, despite missing…”
“Missing every memory?” Hux narrowed his eyes. He felt weak after the fainting episode, unsteady on his feet. “I was hoping you would know something about that, Supreme Leader. Perhaps explain why I am half dressed, having fits, and apparently here as a prisoner.”
The man’s lip twitched at the way Hux sneered his title as if he was pleased by it. That infuriated Hux. Clearly he was insane. Hux could not help himself though. Too many emotions clamoured within him to have their turn and there was something about this man that made him feel equally crazy. His survival instincts flared up only to quickly turn offline in favour of wanting to see a reaction. Any reaction.
“Not a prisoner.” The Supreme Leader affirmed, and Pryde made a confused sound behind him.
The Supreme Leader lifted his hand to press a gloved finger against Hux temple. Hux started, caught again in the dark pool of his eyes, and a frisson of heat went through him, then revulsion, fear, and the desire to pull away and lean in close. His eyes drifted to plush lips. He licked his own. The Supreme Leader’s mouth twisted into a smirk having seen something he was clearly looking for.
Hux shook his head to dislodge his hand, “Are you going to explain who I am to you and what I am doing here?”
The Supreme Leader’s hand hung momentarily in the air before his glove returned with shocking tenderness to Hux's cheek. He felt a blush creep up his neck. They were in public! Not to mention, he did not remember him. He flushed further that that had been his secondary concern rather than his first.
“It was necessary. The cell. The cuffs.” The Supreme Leader murmured cryptically, “But no longer, I believe.”
Pryde, clearly impatient, cleared his throat pointedly and said, “Nonsense, Sir. Armitage Hux, you are-”
“My consort.” The Supreme Leader interrupted, and Hux saw Pryde’s jaw snap shut like he himself had been slapped. “You are my consort, and…” He tilts his head, “You are our chief engineer… weaponry and design, primarily. You were in an accident. Do you remember it?”
What?
Black. Red. Black. Red. He remembered the beam. There was something else. Voices? A comm? A command? Pain.
“I remember… red. Pain.” Hux squeezed his eyes shut. He regretted a pained sound that slipped past his teeth. The pain felt close to the surface. It reminded him his body was still fragile and he had collapsed twice already.
The Supreme Leader frowned and closed the distance between them considerably. One hand went to Hux hip to steady him as if he might fall again.. Hux inhaled the scent of leather, blood and salt. Hux tasted it on the back of his tongue. He realised that he knew his scent and his taste intimately. The title of consort sounded wrong, ludicrous even, but it must fit if he knew how the man tastes.
The seizure, the confusion, the march through the halls, and every revelation from the cell to the throne room knocked the energy out of him. The Supreme Leader’s hands felt warm and anchoring.
The love he felt earlier; thrashing around in him like something alien he had never considered before, could not be there if he was lying. Being the Supreme Leader’s consort would explain why he felt… love. He was hesitant to analyse that too closely. He didn’t know the man. But the rage? The hate? The sadness?
Hux lifted his cuffed hands to his forehead and groaned. A headache welled up thicker inside him, crashing through him like a wave. He needed rest.
“What happened to me?” Hux bit out. His eyes darted to the others in the room who watched the pair raptly. Hux couldn’t get a read on them. Everything was swimming. The panic he had been keeping under lock and key writhed away and squatted in his throat, desperate to break free.
“It’s all right, Hux. It might take some time to remember. It’s okay. I have you.” The Supreme Leader soothed him, and then his eyes narrowed down on Hux’s cheek. The darkness in his eyes turned sharp. .
Hux felt the phantom pain of Pryde’s hand where the Supreme Leader’s gloves fingers lay, gentle, almost ghosting him as if touching Hux too firmly might cause him to disappear.
“Supreme Leader, this is-.” Pryde choked out, and the Supreme Leader raised his free hand from Hux's hip. There was a gurgle and Pryde slammed a hand over his mouth, his face pale, like he had swallowed his own tongue.
Hux snapped his eyes to him. Was Pryde so frightened of the Supreme Leader he lost the nerve to speak?
Nothing added up for Hux, the more he questioned, “Consort… Engineer… then why am I in a convict’s clothing and locked up like this? Why was I paraded? Why did he-” He jerked his chin at Pryde, “Strike me like a common criminal?”
Pryde choked. The Supreme Leader’s hand twitched against Hux's cheek.
“Did you strike my consort, Allegiant General?” The Supreme Leader’s voice sounded airy, light. Everyone in the room froze.. Even Hux felt his muscles lock, as if some large creature had swiftly uncoiled itself from the shadows and was eyeing them all with a lazy hunger.
“No, Supreme Leader.” Pryde gasped out. Had he been unable to speak before and suddenly granted permission? A niggling thought surfaced for Hux and he felt old understanding push its way forward. A loose and hazy knowledge hidden under the layers of lost memory. The Force. Force Users. The previous Supreme Leader, whoever he was, had been a Force User and this man. The man he felt… strongly for, for whatever reason, whatever history they had. He was the same. Powerful.
Dangerous.
“Lieutenant?” The Supreme Leader flicked his eyes over to the woman nearby. She met his eyes as calmly as she could and then threw the Allegiant General under the foot of the AT-AT. Hux watched with a fair amount of glee, as much as he could feel that through his headache, at Pryde’s disbelief as she quietly recounted their meeting in the cell. It seemed Lieutenant Ryx wasn’t so simpering after all and clearly had the intelligence to recognise the biggest threat in the room. That was definitely not Pryde.
“It grieves me to confess this regarding the treatment towards…”She swallows, “Your consort, My lord.”
The Supreme Leader brushed his thumb along the marks on his skin, red and raw, easily missed in the dim light of the throne room. It was calming. A shiver ran through him at the unfamiliar-yet-familiar gentleness of the caress. He was struck by the easy possessiveness behind the gesture as the Supreme Leader’s fingers came to rest against his jaw, digging in just enough to feel threatening. Hux wanted to run. Lean in. He liked it.
“Did it hurt, Hux?” The Supreme Leader asks, with a softness that didn’t seem to fit with the look in his eyes. Fury lurked there.
I must be his…consort.
“Yes.” He replied, curious to see how the Supreme Leader would react and furious with Pryde for slapping him in the first place. If he was truly the Supreme Leader’s consort then the act was traitorous.
“You are correct. It was.” The Supreme Leader smiled, crooked, as if he had read Hux mind. Hux startled, chilled, but the Supreme Leader continued smoothly. “Traitor’s should know their place. They should be punished or leashed. Don’t you think so, Hux?”
“Yes, Supreme Leader.” There was an alarm going on somewhere inside him. Black. Red. Black. Red. But the Supreme Leader swept his thumb along his jaw and the blare of it was dulled by the sensation of touch without contempt.
The Supreme Leader raised his hand towards Pryde. There was a sickening crack.
The Lieutenant nearby gasped, her hand pressed over her mouth in an attempt to muffle her shock. The stormtroopers shifted uneasily from one foot to the other and Hux noted that one gripped his rifle tighter, pulled close to his chest, like it might act as a shield. The Lieutenant would need to learn a better poker face if she wished to survive the First Order. Murder was not rare in the upper ranks, especially when it came to serving volatile leaders.
Pryde’s head twisted backwards, his eyes turned blank and vacant, his mouth hung open in shock. His body teetered, then toppled and fell hard against the charred metal of the dais with a loud thump.
Hux saw the body twitch out of the corner of his eye but, despite it, he could not look away from the Supreme Leader. The man didn’t even look in the direction of the officer he had murdered without moving from Hux. Hux's own eyes widened as he stared in shock at the Supreme Leader. He had just used ‘cosmic wizardry’ to slay the man who had laid hands on him. A man of not insignificant status. The Supreme Leader had decided in moments to snuff out a life because that man dared strike him. Salive flooded his mouth and heat prickled under his uncomfortable clothes.. He had the urge to pitch forward and bite his way into that plush mouth, and feel teeth on his skin in return. He wanted to celebrate the clear and violent display that Hux meant something great to this man with something carnal and equally violent, passionate. His breath hitched as The Supreme Leader dropped his dark eyes to look at Hux lips, and in that moment Hux thought the red light from the throne made them seem gold, before they returned to endless black.
The Supreme Leader reached for Hux's hands. Hux held them out for him. The mag cuffs fell free from his wrists and clattered loudly against the floor.
The troopers looked quickly away from them, at attention, attentive but clearly reading the room. The Lieutenant had a hand over her mouth, and stared at Pryde, her eyes wide and she clearly trembled as she waited for further instruction.
“You just killed a man for me.” Hux said, his voice felt raw in his throat, “And I don’t even remember your name.”
His headache swelled. The flash of black and red felt distant. A warning that was being pushed further and further away.
“Don’t worry, Hux. You will know me.” The Supreme Leader leaned in, their lips brushed gently, as if they had kissed every day for years. Something in Hux told him that they had. He felt a lancing ache deep within him but his lips part at the sweep of the Supreme Leader’s tongue and that ache is soothed. He was swallowed by sensation when the Supreme Leader licked his way hotly into his mouth. His hand tightened around his waist and Hux bent back against the relentless press of his lips. The Supreme Leader kept kissing him until Hux was flushed with embarrassment, gasping, drowned in heat and only saved when the Supreme Leader let him come back up for air.
He gasped; tired, and worn thin, the adrenaline crashed down within him. He slumped forward. His face pressed against the Supreme Leader’s shoulder and his eyes drifted to the corpse nearby. He was too tired to think.
“I’ll help you remember.” The Supreme Leader carded his hand through Hux's dishevelled hair, his arm tightened around his waist. He breathed hot against his ear. Hux eyes drifted closed. He shivered. “I’ll help you remember it all.”