Title: Long Live the Supreme Leader
Characters: Kylo Ren, Finn, Rey, Poe Dameron, Armitage Hux, Phasma, unnamed stormtroopers and officers
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Evidence of torture and mistreatment of prisoners.
Setting: A month or so beyond TLJ – Kylo Ren left the Order to join Rey. The Resistance required him to prove that he'd turned by assisting them in infiltrating the First Order and helping stage a civil war, mainly led by Finn among the stormtroopers. The troopers turned against their officers. The Resistance won. This story is set as the gang moves to where the leadership of the First Order has been assembled for them to dispense with.
Summary: Kylo Ren takes a stand against what he knows is wrong.
They strode into the hangar bay, secure in their victory. Finn was in the lead, his armor marred by blaster shots but himself unscathed. Rey flanked him to one side. Kylo Ren on the other. It was a strange honor guard, but this was what it had come to. General Poe Dameron, the leader of the Resistance, followed. If his blaster pointed more often at Kylo's back than at anything else, no one saw fit to mention it.
Yet they would have never made it here without Ren's help. He was the one who had led them to the stormtrooper training camps, who had cut through defenses, who knew the codes, procedures, and protocols. He and Rey took the worst fire – blaster bolts deflected or even stopped in the air, people thrown back, critical information pulled from the minds of their foes. Rey had learned most of Ren's tricks and was a match for him in power, but she couldn't have done that if he hadn't joined them to start with. Even if she had, she would have never known the Order inside and out as he did.
Before them were the assembled ring leaders of the First Order, defeated and laid low. There were a few dozen of them, mostly pathetic old men trying to look tough in their starched uniforms. It was difficult to do when on one's knees, nursing one or another injury. Few of them had gone down without a fight and even then … well, their captors often had good reason to vent long-simmering frustrations on their former leadership.
A ring of stormtroopers stood around them, blasters pointed inward at their prisoners. There were two prisoners of more status and the subject of more hate than the rest. They had been singled out at the front, separated from the others. One was Phasma, hardly recognizable with half her armor gone and helmet missing. Her face sported two blacked eyes and a broken nose which had stopped bleeding some time ago. She was as upright as she could manage on her knees and had been hit more than once for her insolence.
The other was Hux. His orange hair was matted with blood from a scalp wound. It continued to drip, having created a pool in front of him. He leaned forward slightly in some pitiful attempt to keep the blood from running down his body. He looked dazed. The fingers of his right hand had been broken – all of them, in a systematic and intentional way.
Finn marched to a stop in front of them. "I gotta do this," he said with a smirk, and moved in front of Hux. Finn waited until the man cocked his head slightly, looking up at Finn with a hateful look. Finn slapped him. It was harder than Hux had hit him back when their positions had been reversed, or perhaps Hux just didn't have it in him to stay upright like Finn had that day. Hux fell to the side. Unable to catch himself with his right hand, he went to his elbow, then struggled back to his knees as quickly as he could.
Finn laughed at him. "What happened to his hand?"
The stormtrooper next to the man said, "He wouldn't let go of the blaster. So we broke two fingers getting it away from him. Then he came up with a knife from somewhere. So we took the rest of his hand."
"Huh." Finn chuckled again. "You always were a mean bastard." At that, Hux spat on Finn's boot, which earned him said boot to the midsection. Hux went down once more, righting himself not nearly as quickly. "You wanna do that again, you nasty piece of work?" Finn challenged him.
"Forever," Hux coughed out. The blood-soaked lock of hair at the front of his face was dripping faster now. He leaned forward slightly, tilting his head down as though managing his appearance was more important than anything else.
Finn moved away before Hux worked up more spittle. He looked down on Phasma. "I think I've already said everything I need to say to you." He looked at the stormtrooper next to her. "But I remember something she said once: blasters are too good for them. I think it ought to hurt."
Two of their subverted troopers came forward with glowing vibroblades. Finn stepped back so he could watch this properly, remembering his terror and that of Rose Tico when this had happened to them. Kylo Ren stepped forward, in front of the two prisoners, then he turned his back on them with a sharp pivot, facing Finn, Rey, Poe, and the rest of their guard who had come along behind them. Kylo swallowed and took a deep breath, giving Rey a long look that was wild around the edges.
"Ben?" she said.
"Yeah, no," Finn said. "I'm sure he has some scores to settle, too. Do you want to kill them instead? You can do that. Maybe make up for something. A lightsaber's about the same as a vibroblade."
"No more killing," Kylo said. The words seemed hard won.
"What?" Finn said.
"The battle … is over."
"Yeah, I know. And you know how I know?" Finn asked. "Because they're done. They're on their knees. They're powerless. Now we end this so it never happens again!"
Behind Kylo, Hux slowly lowered himself forward onto his elbows. He reached out with his left hand and touched Kylo's ankle. Kylo glanced back at him. Hux looked up. "Long live the supreme leader," he whispered, then turned his face down in complete and genuine genuflection. Kylo looked over his other shoulder at Phasma. She had a shocked expression on her face, but one glance between Hux and Finn and up at Kylo Ren had her dropping to the same pose.
Every other member of the First Order High Command, gathered on the floor behind them, followed suit.
"No way!" Finn snarled. "No fucking way! He's turned! Kill him!"
"No!" Rey yelled.
The two troopers with the vibroblades stepped forward anyway. Kylo's hands flew out to either side and both were thrown back harmlessly by the Force. But the rest of the troopers backed up, raising their blasters and leveling them – some at Kylo Ren, some at their prisoners. Kylo crouched slightly, a fighting stance.
"He has not turned!" Rey insisted.
"Fire!" Finn yelled anyway, heedless.
A few score bolts were expelled, where they froze, vibrating in the air, buzzing and hissing like trapped demons. Sweat stood out on Kylo Ren's face immediately. He panted, fingers curled, arms outstretched, holding every one of them at bay, although it was far more than he had ever tried to do with the Force.
"No!" Rey called and she wasn't yelling at Kylo. "Get them out of there!" she shouted at the stormtroopers, who were looking between her, Finn, and Kylo Ren in confusion. Then her voice changed timbre. "Get the prisoners to safety." As one, the troopers moved forward, grabbing prisoners and dragging them out of the apparent path of the bolts. Hux and Phasma moved themselves out of downrange, but the half dozen or so blasts arrowing towards Kylo Ren remained a menace floating above their heads.
"Rey," Finn said in outrage, "what the hell are you doing? Whose side are you on, anyway?"
"Get out," Rey said to Kylo Ren in agitation. For now, she ignored Finn. "Move!"
"I can't," Kylo said in a low, strained voice. Three bolts behind him zotted into the floor as he lost his grip on them, or perhaps released intentionally.
Finn kept talking, "He's changed sides! He was a murderer anyway! Let it go! Let him go! You've seen what he can do! He's a killer!"
Poe, who had been silent up until now, nudged Finn. "I think you need to stop."
While Finn and Poe argued, a handful more bolts slipped through Kylo's faltering grasp, finding their marks on the deck. It was only a matter of time until the ones he was keeping from himself hit home. Rey pulled her lightsaber and slashed at one of them, but it passed through without effect. Phasma ducked as though she'd expected Rey to continue the downward progress of her blade and end her, but Rey stopped well clear.
"What do I do?" Rey asked him. "Should I move you?"
"No. Take them."
Rey stood before him and shut her eyes, feeling through the Force for the grip he held on the ineffable energy of the blaster bolts. She'd never done something like this before – she'd stopped them herself; he'd taught her that – but she'd never taken over control of a captured energy field, much less six at once. It was a dangerous and delicate process. Kylo Ren didn't last for all of it. She held four when his control finally buckled. Two struck him – one in the back and the other in the side. He collapsed to the floor with a cry.
Rey checked to make sure the four she was just barely containing weren't going to hit anything important now that he was down, then released them. By that time, Hux had cradled Kylo Ren's head and was looking at him with grave concern. He twitched when Ren blinked up at him a moment later. "Well," Hux said, "that makes the third time I thought you were dead. You're tougher than you look."
Rey knelt next to him. "Are you … okay?"
"Not really," Kylo said, levering himself up with difficulty and a helping hand from Rey. He got to his feet. Rey stood next to him.
Finn turned to face them, a step ahead of Poe. The general's blaster was leveled at Finn's back, visible to everyone but the former stormtrooper. "What are you doing?" Finn yelled at the assembled stormtroopers who were standing next to the prisoners they'd dragged to safety on Rey's order. "He can't do it a second time! Kill them! Now!"
"No!" Kylo Ren snarled.
"No!" Rey echoed.
"No," Poe said from behind Finn.
Finn whirled and looked at him, finally realizing he was being held at gunpoint.
"I told you to stop," Poe said calmly.
"The killing," Kylo Ren said hoarsely, "has to stop." He was dripping blood, the drops mingling with Hux's already on the floor.
"It doesn't stop until they're dead!" Finn said, turning back to them. "If we let them live, this whole thing starts over again!"
"No," Poe said, "They're right. I think this is a good place to stop. There's been too much blood. Too many losses. I'd forgotten about that until he put himself in the way. We're done." Poe turned to the various troops. "Come on. Holster your weapons. Let's go hit up the nearest medbay and get everyone patched up." Slowly, the troops moved away from the prisoners and headed towards the exit, following Poe, who stopped next to the door and waved people through.
"Lock them up, then," Finn said, getting angrier as people (his people!) deserted him. "Throw away the key!"
"No," Kylo Ren said. "They get the same freedoms as your stormtroopers. They have surrendered."
"He's the Starkiller," Finn said in outrage, pointing at Hux, who was still crouched on the floor.
"And Kylo Ren was the Jedi Killer." This time it was from Rey. "No more."
With a heavy sigh, Finn finally gave up. This entire time, he'd had a blaster on his hip, but he'd never reached for it. Maybe it was because he knew it was no more useful than those of his men. Maybe it was because despite the passion he obviously felt, he wasn't willing to fight his friend Rey directly. But either way, he spun and stalked off.
Kylo waited until he was completely gone before staggering and falling to the floor. He held his side. Rey told him, "I'll go get a first aid kit," and sprinted off.
Kylo looked over at Hux, who managed a broken smile. Hux told him, "I never surrendered."
Kylo snorted, then groaned, clutching his side. "Do you accept that I am the supreme leader?"
"Yes," Hux answered immediately. "Yes sir," he amended respectfully.
Kylo grimaced. Rey came back from where she'd removed a kit from near the door. Rey knelt next to him, pulling out supplies. Kylo said to Hux, "Then I surrender on your behalf. There is to be no more war. No rebuilding." He turned and looked over the others, who had come closer to hear while this was going on. "No revenge. No Second Order. No more killing. Peace. That is my only and final order. Will you do this?"
There was a moment of silence, followed by assent.