He didn't know how he did it or how it happened but whatever it was, Armitage Hux was grateful.
Another draining day, another wary evening; like everything was on repeat but why should this night be different to any of the others?
Perched on his bed with uniform neatly folded to the appropriate creases (a habit that would follow him into adulthood), Armitage sat and simply re-evaluated the day. An officer now and thriving, his responsibilities surpassed that of a cadet or even an officer candidate and somehow, he assumed his father was responsible for that; anything to keep him busy and focused. Focused on anything than a certain someone.
But Armitage played his father's game. Fulfilled his duties, obeyed his commands, ran the extra errands; did whatever to lure his father into placation that his plan was working. However, between the hours of 08.00 and 20.00, Armitage was paid. Maybe not exceptionally well but it was better than the miserly and grudging pocket money that his father sometimes "forgot" to transfer, the pocket money that was almost impossible to save. Needless to say, said pocket money had ceased since the wage started coming in and Armitage didn't miss it.
The gentle buzzing of his com (set to a quieter setting for his off-duty hours) disturbed him, though not immediately, as it reverberated on the bedside table. His eyes rested on his uniform, disdained at the idea of dressing and presenting himself to the usual standard for the sake of some stupid and menial request of a drunken superiour. Resigned to do what would keep him in favour and therefore continue to rise through the ranks, he readied himself to comply.
"Yes?"
"Hello. Am I speaking to a…. Armitage Hux?" Piqued and curious, he sat up fully in expectancy with his brow creased.
"Yes. Speaking?"
"Good evening, Mr Hux, my name is Nara Mentar; head of applications at the Merisee Grand Medical Facility. I hope I'm not intruding by comming you so late?"
"Uhh… No, not at all!" Confusion deepened but in the most wonderful way, Armitage scrambled from his sitting position in favour of pacing his restricted quarters in just his socks, vest and boxers.
"Mr Hux, we've reviewed an application you've made on behalf of a Greya Vardai…." Everything appeared to stop. Time suspended and the conversation seemed to pause while his mouth dried and his mind went into overdrive of the thousand different ways this com call could go: Good and bad. But Ms. Mentar continued regardless of if the young Hux was listening or not.
"We acknowledge that the application was made over a year ago and we appreciate your patience on the matter but we take the needs of our patients very seriously and so overcrowding is not an option for us." Armitage froze. To tell him such a thing and refuse the application would be cruel; to know such a facility (no matter how old it happened to be) was so well run and to turn them down would be a terrible blow. Particularly when the facility in question was the best case scenario, a dream come true.
"Of course….."
"With that in mind, Mr Hux, we would like to extend our warmest welcomes to Greya, should she still be interested in a place here at Merisee." His heart leapt and the butterflies in his stomach erupted. The Merisee Grand Medical Facility was a collection of several buildings located in the city of Caronath on the planet Merisee. Dedicated to the healing arts, its services were expensive but fast, highly reliable and so, extremely sought after.
The facility, an actual hospital, was staffed by the finest doctors, nurses, specialists, technicians, and medical droids from the Elrood sector. All these combined made it an ideal place for Greya, where she would be cared for with competence, compassion and gentility; the polar opposite of Jevelet and where Armitage would have preferred to place her from the beginning.
"Yes!" The redhead remembered his decorum and clenched his jaw though he doubted Ms. Mentar would have accosted him as his superiours (including his own father) would have for letting his demeanour slip. Clearing his throat, the woman on the other end of the com was patient. "Yes, we would. We absolutely would, thank you."
"Now, as I'm sure you'll understand, Mr Hux, we can only off you the most basic package of care with the figure you quoted us in your applicati-"
"That's fine!" Armitage jumped in, almost petrified that she would revoke the offer and they would lose the opening at Merisee. "That's fine, we'll take it! Anything to get her out of where she is!" It seemed Ms. Mentar was sympathetic.
"Excellent! And, as I was about to say, Mr Hux, there is the possibility of an advanced care improvement scheme. It's offered to some of our more trustworthy clients with the assurance of later payment-"
"We'll take it." Armitage cut in once again, the prospect of going into such substantial debt so young meant nothing if Greya's care was guaranteed; with a facility as prestigious as Merisee, that guarantee was as good as granted. Coiling his lips together to moisten them, these words would cement his beloved's future. "We'd like to accept the placement, please."
"Wonderful!" Nara Mentar genuinely sounded pleased and enthusiastic; another relief: humane staff. "We'll be in touch tomorrow to finalize details of Greya's transfer to Merisee. Would you like us to collect her from her current residence and bring her-"
"No." Hux had never been surer of anything, ever. Resolution echoed in those words and was reflected in those hardened features. He gripped the com firmer than was probably necessary but a sudden bout of fury provoked it. "No, I'll see to that myself. Thank you."
Even with the strings he pulled, the favours he called in, the promises he made; he still didn't see how it amounted to the force he stormed Jevelet with. As if everyone he approached had their mind in an invisible grasp, they agreed instantly to aid him in his quest to release Greya from her prison. His superiours commissioned squadrons, hundreds of Stormtroopers at a time. The head medic dispatched a team of doctors, nurses, droids and equipment. And the commanding officer of transport gifted him one of the finest, most spacious and best suited carriers for the run from Jevelet to Merisee.
And all without a servile, pleading mumble to his father.
The guards scattered like cockroaches; trained for such an eventuality but had grown lazy and complacent that such a thing would never occur. Armitage lead the medical team in his pristine officer's uniform and groomed appearance, the small group flanked and proceeded by innumerable armed and ready Stormtroopers.
The obscene howling of prisoners dinned around them but Armitage, trained on one target, didn't hear it. The icy flagstones underfoot hadn't changed in the year he'd been there, nor had the bars on the cells or the walls a foot thick. Even the smell of stale piss still hung insistently in the air. Prisoners had come and gone; some had died and more had been admitted to take their place, he doubted any had been released.
With his march impeccable, Armitage remembered his way, all the way to the cellblock where inmate 1983 unknowingly awaited resc-transfer. Each checkpoint they arrived at throughout the prison galvanized the cowardice among the guards who simply over-rode the system at blaster-point to let the invading force through; much to the future General's disgust. He commanded like one; a General, that is. He lead like one, paraded like one, decided like one; no doubt his charisma and professionalism were observed and would be reported back.
They met no resistance until they arrived where the bellowed conversation between the guards had happened on his last visit to Jevelet. There, he noticed something else had not changed; one particular guard, emerging from Greya's wing.
"OI!" The holler earned little more than a casual glance upwards and a slowing in the pace of the party but stopping was not an option. That guard, the same brash and cruel guard who had treated his darling Greya like a prisoner who had deserved such treatment. "WHERE D'YOU THINK YOU'RE GOING?!" The guard thundered the stairs, fixated on the redhead and trying to place where he knew him from until…. "YOU!" Even now, the guard held a significant height difference but Armitage saw no threat. "I KNOW YOU!"
"Yes, I remember you too." Oozing nonchalance, it took a single, minute gesture of his head and a series of micromovements to have the guard subdued. Standard procedure of the butt of a blaster rifle between the shoulder blades and a connecting of a front of a knee to the back sufficed to have the guard forced downwards and arms restrained behind his back; subjugated to the young officer.
"Take this." Armitage plucked the I.D badge from the guard's person and handed it to the tech to his right, one of his own team. "Go to the cell third on the left, do not enter the cell. But tell me if that I.D has been used on that door in the last thirty minutes. Thank you." While the tech skittered off, Armitage maintained an unnervingly calm and triumphant watch on the bleeding face of the unnamed guard; smug even, despite what could have (and probably did) potentially happen.
"Thirteen minutes, sir!" The tech called over the side of the railing after he'd worked his magic; Armitage allowed the ghost of a smirk to pull at those pallid lips as his eyes locked with those of the guard. He didn't bother to struggle but the brazen stare strengthened Hux's resolve, as if wasn't concrete already.
"Silly man." Two words. Two simple words; of all the hundreds of thousands in the Galactic Basic language, those two words were the last to ever enter that guard's eardrums. Or, arguably, the last sound. For the three direct shots to his uniformed chest came from a silenced blaster in the gloved hand of a young, redheaded officer.
The shell tumbled to the side with an unbecoming thump, nothing more now than a useless sack of meat; the thunderous approval of nearby inmates, naturally. Callous and unrepentant for his deed, Armitage made a point of stepping over the corpse to continue on his way while his flock opted to go around it.
"She will need to be sedated." The brief outside the cell would be just that: brief. "Men do not sit well with her so I would prefer this to be a female only operation where possible." The two female medics (who were the most accomplished on their respective vessels, as he understood) nodded not only their agreement but their comprehension of just how delicate this particular case was. The team of nurses did the same before he continued with the strength and poise leadership required.
"While she is out, I would like her examined before we move her. Anything that requires treatment will be done so on the carrier, in a more sterile environment; unless urgency dictates, of course." Hux averted his gaze while the tranquilizer blaster was being loaded by a medic. "Anything untoward is to be reported to me." With nothing else to say and the team ready, Hux stepped aside before giving the final, approving nod. "At your discretion, Doctors."