Warning: Violence, self-harm, murder fantasies, murder, assassination, implicit minor characters' deaths, implied child soldier, implied child abuse.
Author's note: This is weird. The weirdest I've written.
Assigned
When the assignment came, the face peering up at him on the small attached picture was nothing but an established requirement, a remembrance only matter for the kill.
A glimpse made quick work of the apparent details; any more had to be observed personally. But it would not be of much import - he just needed to make sure he got the right person.
The Order preferred his work. If not for his unorthodox combination of detachment and precision, then for at least he could get the job done. Kylo's performance was nearly unquestionable; the scene set for each mark was sophistication: The tragic slice of a grievous spouse; the careless splatter of choked, throaty blood; the pale lines of a bullet-ruined face. His subterfuge reeked of sorrows - the sorts that inflicted horrors brought by self-destruction only - maybe. It was nostalgic like poetry, but people were often wary of Kylo's rhythms.
Undeniably, Kylo remembered how he made each one.
Finn. It was the name of the mark. Dark and sturdy. But ordinary. A brisk, thorough search of his things (clothes, sentimental attachments, shoes, sentimental attachments, appliances) concluded in a simple taste, too practical, too little. Like a man packed light for constant moving, carrying along (could not bear to part with) precious, useless knick knacks (memories).
And when Kylo was done with Finn, he would leave Finn to rot amidst his meager home and travel-worn trifles. It must feel like mercy.
Except, once Kylo went in for Finn's end, Finn stared at death in the face and said, "Not yet, Kylo."
And Kylo slammed his fist against Finn's calm, mercy forgotten in lieu of emerging lethality. No one said Kylo's name and lived. No one had ever known a face inferred by such a name.
Finn dodged his ruthless strikes with efficiency belied by plain appearance, dangerous misperception that could cause great misfortunes. Kylo had been lied to, and he had thought he was the better liar of anyone.
A gun cocked, and Kylo was held frozen by the press of cold steel. A delicious promise of a small explosion. Kylo bent like a predator hunching on prey, smart enough to wait, but too bloodthirsty to stop. Finn seemed serene under his scrutiny. A barrel was a certain assurance anyway.
"I said not yet; have you been hearing?" Finn said, trigger-sure. "I will let you have me once I'm done. But as long as my job is unfinished, you have to content yourself with other marks, or whatever you call them on your to-do list. I'm not your boss, can't say what you can do, but a shattered brain may be bargain enough. But if you choose differently, I promise to at least keep the jaw."
Kylo gave him one and a half week. And a nasty punch to his temple.
Finn passed out, but lived.
He skimmed through the names, the faces that could all better be nameless and faceless. Kylo did not have the habit of making a collection; such trophies were easily evidences. No. Kylo was jealous of his achievements. No one got to see.
He put Finn in a nondescript room, its yellowed paint and pale sheets a fit for Finn's luggage and a clash for his other (sentimental) things. There was no way he would let a mark run unchecked, not least this one.
Finn woke and took to the room with the usual grace he did to anywhere he would not stay long in. He counted his belongings, and did not lash out as Kylo was thorough with his sweep. Kylo did not take hostages lightly.
"I figure I don't have to pay rent," Finn said, rifling through his possessions, "But I have to ignore any kind of curfews. Stuff to do, time limited. Though, I'll drop by once or twice - still remember our arrangements."
Finn got to his feet, touched the bruise on his temple, winced and made no comment. Kylo would not have cared less.
When Finn moved past him to the closed door, he looked at Kylo and thought out loud, "I'd like it if you plan my crime scene out. Always prefer a peaceful sleep. Not very terribly poetic or ingenious, but it's an idea. From the very muse himself."
Kylo idly wondered if it was just Finn, or snarking was the symptom of inevitable demise.
Finn disappeared for three days, and turned up on day fourth, cuts and bruises littering his body. Kylo calculated each one, and once sure they would not hinder the latter stage, concluded to let Finn lick his wounds without assistance.
Finn only got the worst of them treated to be deemed bearable. Kylo was curious as to why humans like to indulge their pains. Pleasure? Cruelty? Hatred?
"Familiarity," Finn said, even though Kylo never questioned. "People got addicted to certain kinds of pains." And Kylo pressed a finger to one of Finn's many wounds, and listened to him hiss at the sudden, crude contact. But Finn never leant out of the infliction of Kylo's hand.
A lack of corpse had alerted the Order. But Kylo knew insidious internal conflicts when he saw them. He did not doubt the urgency over one man's death, nor did he rebuff such exclaim of alarm.
The Order wanted accomplishment. Kylo wanted a masterpiece. Both had to wait.
"I'd looked you up," His on-and-off prisoner confessed, words slurred on pain meds and the split fleshes stitched together running from hip to mid-abdomen. "And by dumb luck, along with a bit of clever maneuvers, I got to match a face with the name."
Counting out the exact dosage that would put Finn into deep unconsciousness, Kylo counted out the exact number of people that he had to wipe before such dumb luck made his identity too 'public' for his liking.
"I think I see you for more than a face, though," Finn continued, "Even more than the name."
Kylo halted and tilted a look at him, whatever expression on Kylo's features making Finn blink, a bleary motion that could have well been a widening of brown eyes. Kylo watched Finn pull himself into something hardly together, "I, I've thought I know you. A part of you. The tiny little weebee bit that makes me think I can strike up a deal. I'd like to get to know you. Because I'll be dead, eventually, either way. Can I get to know you?"
Pills were swallowed before Finn could further make no sense of himself.
Reputation needed intelligent weavings in order to hold. A whisper veered right; appropriate audiences to spread a certain kind of rumors; firmness where intimidations were due. The underworld curled under the hovering name of Kylo, the bogeyman of even monsters, ambiguous as a mutter - but sure as a fatal downfall. Kylo was either one man or an assembly of a group - no one was certain, everyone speculating.
Certainly, Kylo worked for nobody, but there were talks the Order might have a leash on such a figure. Kylo knew the Order generated fear from it. One would think twice before crossing into the unknown. And ghosts Kylo remained, unseen and haunting, casted hidden in the brutal, looming shadows of the Order. Two beasts tolerated each other for the sake of beneficial surviving.
So when Hux hooked up in his connection without much of a permit, Kylo almost crashed the Order's system just for spite. But since he knew why the man was there and ignored him would simply raise too many flags, Kylo did not destroy anything essential.
"The FN assignment has not been confirmed," Hux greeted in usual Hux' way of forgoing any type of meaningless pleasantries. "Snoke has expressed himself to be rather agitated."
The Snoke Card would have worked back on the days the Order had first tried to contact him. Snoke was the voice that malevolently guided and persuaded, a logic that seemed fit and ambitiously understanding. Power originated from a cause. Snoke demanded, and that got Kylo to think Snoke might be larger after all.
But Kylo was relentless for his work, can be vicious and sophisticated amidst his unravelings. And he tore one of Snoke's men apart for interrupting his making, and watched something shaped like caution in Snoke's lines twisting with the static. Nobody could play too close to the fire.
So Kylo paid nonchalance through his invisibility, and Hux had the intuitive sense not to apply much pressure to a bend that might harmfully snap. But business was business. "We're willing to guarantee a week more. After that, if the assignment is not sufficed, we must send our own agent. But we do believe in your ability." Then, Hux cut off the connection without further exchange.
Finn was becoming restless, as if waiting for planned disasters. Kylo knew he was not afraid of Kylo's hands or methods, carrying his proposed end with such care - no matter how unconventional. The room Kylo dug up for him had never been able to quite contain Finn, one who tended to fly apart, but too determined and gentle to burst. Now, Finn looked more like a caged animal than ever, not demolishing, but still rattling up the bars. Kylo did not lean, yet his height towered contemplative over at the door, and Finn startled as though being hawked.
"It's almost done," Finn grimaced, stuttering a little with nerves, "I hope it will be done."
Having said that, Finn averted his gazes like he were too anxious to even show Kylo his anxiety. Kylo could not sympathize, for he watched emotions and molded them to suit his pieces. And Finn would be marvelous with his dark skin gleaming in sweats, his brown eyes liquid boiled, and his teeth glimpsed-white shaped around a whimper. The thought burned Kylo fingers tingling.
And when Finn crushed their mouths together, Kylo still envisaged Finn's body flayed out beautiful and morbid, the bruising touch of lips a distant sensation. "Please," Finn almost keened, and Kylo wanted to tear him asunder, to make him unforgettable by killing him. "You can have me later. Later you can do whatever you want. But please, please-"
Kylo's teeth bit at those pleas; it was hardly intimacy, just carnal devouring, and Finn was shuddering apart under Kylo's accessing. It did not go far from anyone's faces, but Finn firmly had Kylo's hands cradling his cheeks, Finn's mouth trembling from grinding and tugging. Kylo's stomach churned with animalistic anticipation, tongue heavied by hunger. Finn was strange, so strange; a promise of being good, satisfactory. Could be destructive, such a taste.
"...You can let go," Kylo watched Finn roll out the words without actually listening, and his eyes must be intense enough to make Finn swallow. Finn's dark fingertips dug into Kylo palms and held on, his expressive face a studied desperation. A breath left Finn's lips sounding like a prayer.
And Kylo realized there were ways to destroy Finn without even attempted murder.
The day the Order was in ruins found Kylo sharpening a knife, the edge of it thinly glinting, cutting even to the eyes. When Kylo pushed his way into Finn's room, Finn was pale, but was smiling, a hint of red below his gums. "You look like an epiphany," Finn said, gazing as if Kylo were an epiphany, realized with Kylo razor-edges cloaked in black and the little gleam of silver-bright knifepoint.
"Knife, classy," Finn managed through a cough, choking like there were blood up his throat. There might actually be. Kylo saw how Hux had struck through his fleshes, without finesse, the forceful slash of it pure contempt. Kylo might have Hux' fingers ruined for such poor craftsmanship, might have killed Hux for much less else.
"It's done; I'm ready," Finn said, curling into himself, but still far too open. Kylo could clearly glimpse the red wasted from Finn's body staining the bed sheet. "You knew about the Order, didn't you? Of course. You don't look surprised at all, while I've tried to appear mystic."
The bed creak softly as Kylo settled on it, but Finn still rambled on, "The Order didn't take well to traitors. Especially one that returned to steal. I had so big a stake fighting against them; no matter how much I hate the Order, they did give me someo-something to lose. And I've been tired of running. So tired. Till I saw you. Still think I know you." Finn smiled, bloodied, but as painless as he could be.
The knife pressed into skin. "I wish I can know you more."
Epilogue
"Rey! Haven't I told you not to play with sharp things? It's dangerous," The little girl looked from Finn's fretting indignant face to the small Swiss knife held neatly in her tiny hands, and pointed a finger at Kylo, hunching in his weapon cleaning.
"Kylo?" Finn directed, but Kylo was studiously indifferent to his scolding, and Rey was studiously determined in her accusation. Snatching the knife from Rey's clutching fingers and pocketing it (knowing she would just nick it right back from him later), Finn curled their palms together and led her to his side. Rey looked at his hand holding hers, studying the gesture and Finn's scars both.
She still seemed too fresh out of the Order's trainings, cautious, quiet and observatory. A cub not yet learned how to be a hunter, but already grown to fear the beating hands that pushed it down. Some days, she would just lie next to Finn and caress his scars, as though getting acquainted to his grief to understand her pains. Pressing up to the remained side, Kylo would guard over them two.
"You may sleep in your armory tonight, Kylo," Finn huffed, smoothing down Rey's hair and ignoring Kylo's snapping up from his desk, eyes dangerously narrowed. But Finn had first stared Kylo out of his assignment, had lived through Kylo's slicing him apart to put him back into a broken whole, and had blasted heads to have Rey safe. Finn was undeterred, as always, "We should get some fresh air, still haven't explored this area thoroughly. The woods look nice."
Rey perked up at the idea, and tugged Finn towards the entrance, thrilled of being out in the secret open. Finn let her guide their way, and smiled at the sound of feet following after.