The Patron Saint of Lost Causes
Chapter 7
The ships scattered around the makeshift Resistance airfield glittered reflective and silver in the mid-morning sun.
Standing at the bottom of the Falcon's ramp, Rose looked up at Finn.
"You should come with us," he said. "This mission wouldn't be happening if it wasn't for you."
The assault on the First Order shipyards above Fondor.
Well, not for her and Hux.
It was a temping offer Finn was giving her. Hadn't she, not too long ago, been complaining about this very thing? That she'd been relegated to desk duty as the boys had all the fun? But then, she thought of Hux, alone in his cell, with nothing to do but stare at the wall. The alternative would be sitting together, working on mechanical components, talking tech and trading barbs.
The latter option curled something warm and pleasant inside her.
"I think I'll stay behind."
Finn's face screwed up in confusion. "Really? Are you sure?"
"Yeah. You guys be careful, though. Blow some stuff up for me."
Finn smiled with an excited nod, ducking back into the Falcon.
"Hey."
Rose turned to see Poe, munitions thrown over one shoulder, walking up the grass.
"Hey," she said with an easy smile, but it quickly fell when she saw the look on his face. "What is it?"
"Connix mentioned she saw you last night and thought you looked a little wrung out. Everything okay?"
She shrugged off an uneasy feeling, eyes roaming around so she wouldn't have to look at her friend. "What? Yeah, it was nothing. Just, you know… long hours."
With solemnity she rarely saw from him, Poe stood before her and put a hand on her shoulder, fingers curling slightly into her shirt. It wasn't a painful, angry kind of grab, but one in which he did so to make sure she was absolutely listening to him. He looked around for a moment, trying to get a hold of what he wanted to say, before holding her gaze.
"Be. Careful." He was firm, punctuating each word with a gentle flex of his hand.
She scoffed, eyebrow quirked. "Oh…kay? Yeah, I'll be careful. Here. While you're out dodging turret fire in space."
Pressing his lips together into a thin line, Poe shook his head. "No, I mean, be careful, okay? Just… think, before you do something you'll regret."
Rose felt a shiver run down her spin.
He was talking about something else.
She swallowed thickly.
"Yeah."
"Paige would be proud of how much you've done for the Resistance, you know that."
Her face pinched with emotion. Somehow, it felt like he was trying to hurt her with that. It was a compliment, but… why did it feel like such a low blow? Why did she suddenly want to rip his hand off?
Anger, from where she did not know, bubbled inside her.
"I got it," she said firmly.
Poe lightened instantly. "Good." He patted her shoulder. "Good. Hopefully the next time we see you, the First Order's shipyards will be down for the count. Then we can go after the big prize."
She nodded as he turned away, walking up the ramp to join Finn.
Roiling anger followed her back to the hanger, where she casted about aimlessly, feeling like she wanted to throw things and scream.
"Be careful."
She was careful! She made sure she was armed at all times! She's used the cuffs!
In her mind's eye, Poe shook his head again.
No. She wasn't stupid.
He meant her.
Rose slowed to a stop next to her workbench.
Because—
"Because. It matters."
"To whom?!"
"To me, okay?!"
Because she was getting too close. Too personally invested.
She cared now.
That was what Poe was worried about.
Rose pressed the heels of her palms to her eyes.
When did her life get so complicated?
"Do you even have a specialty? Or are you simply proficient in nearly everything mechanical?"
His compliments, so hard won; the look on his face when he was particularly impressed by her.
Why did she enjoy it so much?
Because Hux saw her. Not Paige Tico's sister. Not Finn's sidekick. Not his interrogator. Not Rebel scum. Her.
"The company is the only highlight of my day."
Rose's heart did a shiver-sweet gallop.
That evening, after being allowed use of the fresher's showers, Hux found himself back in his cell close to sunset. He could hear the sounds of camp start to swell as the light from his small window turned a purple hue. Excited chatter of people returning from work and the clatter of cutlery; it must have been supper time in the canteen.
Any minute now some nameless Resistance member would walk in and throw what cold scraps had been spared from the night before through the slot on the floor. Sometimes they were human, and sometimes they were not, but all gave him a look that could only mean Rose had bribed them not to shoot him dead where he sat.
The door at the end of the hall slid open.
Like clockwork.
He looked up from the datapad he was perusing; an old reader-model with no holonet connectivity. Rose had found it for him, and even though the only uploaded texts were old starship repair manuals, he was thankful to have something nonetheless.
To his surprise and unadmitted delight, the very woman he'd been thinking of came into view, balancing two mis-matched and chipped-rimmed bowls in one hand and two cans in the other.
Hux grimaced in wry amusement. "What are you doing?"
"Well, someone let it slip that all they've been feeding you are leftovers, so I thought this might be better." The two bowls came down with weighty clunks onto the table set up in the hallway, steaming. Placing the drinks to the side, she pulled the strap of her bag off her shoulder and let it drop to the floor. Hux set the datapad to the side, rolling his eyes in exaggerated irritation, as if she'd interrupted something truly worth his time.
"And here I was, hoping for another plate of cold, unidentifiable vegetables."
Rose gave him an apologetic look. "Sorry." He stood, shrugging his shoulders up and giving a huff when he dropped them again. "This will be better," she added as he approached the durasteel bars, "I promise." She knelt to slide the bowl through where the trays usually went, but the rim caught on the metal. It was too tall.
They both stared at it.
She tilted the bowl and gave it a second try, but it got stuck again, the shape clearly not compatible with prison cells.
Rose gave a withering sigh as Hux bit the inside of his lip to keep from chuckling.
"Smells… decent," he conceded, the corner of his mouth twitching.
"Shut. Up." She stood, looking at the bowl in her hand and then back at the bars. She hadn't foreseen this particular problem.
"It's the thought that counts, I suppose." He mused.
Rose shot him a fierce glare, fishing the data chip out of her back pocked and pressing it against the command pad. The lock clicked open, and she swung the door back into the hall.
"You're in a mood," she huffed, thrusting the bowl in his direction.
His eyebrows shot up. "Me?"
She was flushed, either with embarrassment or anger he could not tell, but he took the bowl all the same, as it had stopped just a few inches before colliding with his chest.
He could really smell it then; bright, acidic, and with a distinctive tang. There were small starchy bits, roughly chopped vegetables, and dark, almost purple-black chunks of what he hoped was some kind of meat, mixed throughout an ocher-red sauce. He blinked in surprise as Rose went to hand him something else. It was a fork, with one of its tines missing.
Inwardly, he shook his head, taking the fork and studying how old and worn it was.
The Resistance. Really.
Rose extracted a once-bent, now re-straightened, spoon from her breast pocket, pulling the chair up into the cell doorway.
Hux motioned lazily to the still-open cell door with the pointy end of the fork. "Just going to leave that, are you?"
"Eat your damn food," she griped, "I'm too tired to argue." She sat heavily, bowl balanced in her lap as she reached behind her, snatching the two cans, one of which she kept. "Here." Rose made a mock throw so he was ready, and then tossed the can in his direction.
"More juice?" He sneered, catching it easily with one hand.
"It's beer, you ass. You got something from the Generals for helping the other day, and this is from me."
The can was dinged up and a bit scratched, like it had been carted halfway across the galaxy under the metal floorboards of some smuggler transport.
But…
He glanced up as Rose tugged errant strands of black hair out of her face, trying to smooth them into a bun that had most likely loosened over the course of the day.
Her thoughtfulness tugged at something in his chest. He found it not as unpleasant as he might think.
Hux used the toe of his boot to drag the small crate over to sit across from her. The back of his little room was darker now with oncoming night, the only illumination coming from the lights out in the hall. He took a seat just on the edge of light that seemed to radiate from above Rose's chair.
There was a telltale pop and hiss as she opened the tab of her drink.
Hux was no fan of eating in front of other people, but Rose apparently held no such reservations. She carefully scooped a bit of each ingredient onto her spoon, scraping the convex bottom over the rim of the bowl to avoid spills, and popped the entire bite into her mouth. She was so thorough that the utensil came away clean; pressing her lips against the entirety of the spoon as she pulled it from her mouth. Eyes fluttering closed, she let out a quiet sound of contentment, slouching back in her chair.
Hux didn't realize he was staring, rapt, with his fork halfway to his bowl, until she opened her eyes to look at him.
"What?" She snapped, shifting nervously in her seat.
He shook his head, eyebrows jumping as he quickly busied himself with spearing a bit of the stew for himself. The back of his neck felt hot. If he shoved the food into his mouth as quickly as possible, he reasoned, then he wouldn't have to figure out what to say.
To his surprise, Rose let out a frustrated sigh. "Sorry," she muttered, stirring her bowl vigorously. "I'm just… there's this thing I've been trying to work on and it's been giving me a lot of grief. Plus, now I'm having to pick up the slack for some of the other engineers, like they can't be bothered to figure out how engines work for themselves. Then I found out they weren't giving you the proper food and—" she broke off, grumbling. She avoided the subject of Poe's warning. It would be too much. "It's been a day."
Hux frowned. She was doing an exorbitant amount of work. "Tell that idiot Dameron to balance assignments more evenly. Spread your subordinates too thin and everything begins falling apart." Such lack of formal training. Maybe he should start giving seminars.
"It's not his fault. If anything, it's mine. Sometimes I feel like if I'm not collapsing into my bunk at the end of the day then I'm just not contributing enough."
He snorted. "That's absurd."
"Huh?"
Hux felt himself get a bit warm. "From what I've seen, you're the only one around here worth a damn."
She gave him a strange look. "You think so?"
He hummed in careful accent, loading a fork full of food. "You did have the audacity to sneak aboard a Destroyer and bite me, if you recall." He… liked that about her; that fire. "And Dameron keeps questioning your methods. If anything, he underestimates you."
Rose blushed, grinning. "Now that's definitely a compliment."
"Yes, it was." Hux took a mouthful of food, chewing slowly. The stew was rich; full of a spice and flavor he couldn't quite put to name. Eventually, he swallowed, looking back down into the bowl with a note of quiet surprise.
It was… delicious.
"Not bad, huh?"
Hux looked up to see that Rose had been watching him, trying to hide a broad, pleased expression behind her hand and her spoon.
"It is… sufficient." He said with clinical loft.
"Oh shut up," she laughed, giggled really; giddy.
The corner of his mouth twitched up.
"It's quite good," he muttered in admission, stirring the corners so they kept warm. She was still staring at him; he could feel it. He must look a fool, he thought, sitting awkward and gangly on some little wooden box, dressed in whatever charity clothing the Resistance had deigned to give him, hair a mess, stripped of rank, laid so terribly low— "I'm going to assume it's much better fresh than it will be tomorrow evening." He leaned forward and used his free hand to pull back the tab on the beer.
Rose took a swig of her drink. "Did they have food like this in the Order?"
Hux let out a sharp, single-note laugh. "Most certainly not."
"Really? What the hell did you all eat?"
"Nutritive milk, mostly. It's more cost efficient and faster to consume," he added, at her look of horror. "Meals were available upon request, but to require them was viewed as weakness."
Rose shook her head. "That's awful. How terrible." She said it like it was another black mark on the Order's long list of atrocities. She paused, thinking, and then blurted, "Is that why you're so thin?"
Hux choked on his food, coughed, and reached for the beer in order to take a long, cleansing draught. It was mostly fizz and foam at the top, but he gulped it down, breaking off with a pant of fresh air.
"Thin as a slip of paper."
"Sorry," Rose winced.
She was trying to kill him!
Rose took a sip of her own drink, mumbling over the rim of the can with embarrassment, "Are you okay?"
"Fine," he was able to wheeze, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. He glared at her, his pride wincing. "I suppose I am rather slight of build," he said bitterly, "compared to— to—" he cast about for someone he could even bother to remember, "to the trait— FN— Finn! Or whatever the hell he calls himself." His heart was racing, ire piqued.
She looked confused. "Well, yeah," like it was obvious. "He went through the Stormtrooper program."
"That was my program!"
A dark emotion passed over Rose's face. "I know," she said tonelessly. The sudden ice in her voice stalled his words; made him fall silent. She jabbed at a piece of meat in her bowl with a distinct air of anger.
Hux blinked down at his food and took a breath. What had he been trying to do with that little outburst? Prove her to her that he'd gone through the same basic training that Finn had? He felt hot; aggravated. Why was he trying to justify this to her? Because he didn't like the idea of her thinking poorly of him? "Well," he said, dismissing his own thoughts, "it doesn't matter."
"It mattered to all those kids you stole."
"We provided those children a good life," the words flowed out of him as easily as one of his weekly addresses.
Rose gaped at him.
"Famines on Ibaar and Adarlon!" He didn't even have to think; it was a justification long since ingrained within him. "Alien advancements rampant and unchecked in the Outer Rim! The liberation of the Iktotch labor camp! The Republic's deplorable—"
"Armitage."
The warning in her voice cut through his diatribe, and Hux realized that he'd started to lean forward where he sat. He glanced at the fork clutched in his white-knuckled grasp, and forced himself to relax his hand.
Ah yes, he thought. Hays Minor.
"I knew some of those kids," she said with precise and dangerous emotion. "And I can tell you without a doubt that each and every one of them would have rather been starving and destitute and still living with their families rather than be ripped away from everyone and everything they ever knew."
She was trying to stay calm.
"We had to deal with that. We had to fight for every single one we could. And when Paige and I left," she shook her head in disbelief at his callousness, "we had to hear the news about our planet, our parents, our friends, being bombed to death because the First Order decided to test a few of their new canons."
Her calm was collapsing, breaking away one jagged piece at a time. "What it's like to be taken from everything you've ever known. Ripped away from the ones who love you. Never to see them again. You can't even—"
"We left my mother on Arkanis."
His words hit her like a blow; he could see the impact.
"Your— your father… abandoned his own wife?"
"Yes, well… while he did abandon his wife, his wife was not my mother." He smiled, but it was a spiteful and self-inflicting, and broke into a pained expression. His brows drew together before allowing, "I'm a bastard."
Rose's eyes widened.
"Looking back…" He hoped she didn't notice his hand trembling as he raked it over his face. He remembered that he did not cry when his father loaded him aboard their escaping ship, but he did remember the fear. A swift-moving terror that threatened to drown him; made him want to run back toward the ruined Academy's living quarters despite the blanket of bombs. "Perhaps the taking by force, at such a young age, was, admittedly, a step too far." The admission was a twist in his gut. It would only make her hate him more, surely.
"It was… a mistake," he said, and when he did, there was a small ease to that terrible weight inside him.
Conscripting them so young… it had been the best way to ensure the Order's propaganda was taken to heart, but that didn't mean those children hadn't felt that same wild terror that he'd experienced when leaving Arkanis. He could see that. They could have actively recruited, but they'd chosen the easier route. To his surprise, it felt good to have acknowledged it.
Rose's voice was soft, but determined. "Those kids. They became stormtroopers. And your father created the stormtrooper program."
Hux nodded slowly, a little unsure where she was going.
"Do you ever think that maybe… the reason Finn bothers you so much is because… he was able to escape? And you weren't?"
His lips parted in surprise; the air in his chest felt like it had been forced out in one, heavy blow.
Of course. Now she saw him weaker than Finn not only in physical strength, but in fortitude as well. He hadn't been strong enough to save himself. Not himself. Not Millicent. Not her.
The knowledge of her burned into his chest like a brand.
Honey-red hair.
A woman whose name he did not know.
Green eyes, like his.
A name he'd been too young to remember.
The slap of a hand across her face.
A name which his father had banished from existence, killing her all over again.
Gone.
His mother.
All gone.
He trembled with anger, a wave of rage bubbling up inside of him so hot and tight it nearly blinded him.
Rose's voice broke through, full of righteous anger… on his behalf. "You didn't abandon your mother on Arkanis, Hux, he took you from her."
The wave of fury broke against the unyielding compassion in her eyes, the absolution offered in her voice, washing back down into the dark within him, extinguished, leaving him utterly bereft.
He was breathing hard.
"Hux?"
"I'm fine," he said quickly.
"But…"
He couldn't see her clearly; she seemed to swim before his eyes, and it confused him. He blinked, trying to keep her in focus, and felt a strange sensation.
Slowly, Hux reached up, pressing his free hand to the side of his face. His fingers pulled away wet, glistening with tears. He stared, dragging his gaze up to stare at Rose in quiet horror, as if she'd done this to him.
Setting her bowl to the side, Rose stood, and took a determined step toward him.
He shook his head, extending his arm to stop her.
"Don't."
At the tone of his voice, she did as he'd said, standing there, half-way to him.
Hux wiped his hand furiously over his face. "Pathetic," he muttered, trying to smother the shame and the hurt and the loss under the familiar, cold emptiness.
"You're not pathetic," her tone was soft, welling all that emotion back up into his throat again. "I don't think you are."
He yearned for that warmth in her voice; the embrace of her arms. How close he came to giving in was frightening. It was all too much.
"Leave," he whispered, hoarse.
"But—"
"No."
"Hux—"
"Please, Rose."
Her lip trembled, but she backed away in silence, gathering her things to make a swift exit. She looked back at Hux one last time before she closed the cell door. He was bent forward where he sat, covering his eyes with a hand, still as stone.
Outside, Rose took deep, shuttering breaths of evening air, willing her legs to carry her back to the barracks before she completely lost it.
As soon as the door to her room closed with a click behind her, she burst into noisy tears, holding her face in her hands as she sank down heavily onto her bunk
Later, after dragging herself back from the fresher, Rose tried in vain to fall asleep. She kept staring at the ceiling and seeing Hux's face in her head. His face being angry, his face being contemplative, his face in shock as tears gathered and ran down his pale cheeks.
Rose didn't have to know every detail about his childhood to know it had been a cruel one. Every bit of evidence Hux let slip only reaffirmed her suspicions that someone in his life, and she had a pretty good idea who, had been one evil son of a bitch.
Brendol Hux had just… left both his wife and mistress in the middle of a warzone. From there, it wasn't too far of a stretch to assume the back of the man's hand had met his son's face once in a while. Or worse.
It certainly would explain a lot.
Rose felt a deep, twisting stab of pity.
She wasn't going to be able to sleep with such thoughts in her head.
Turning over, she screwed her eyes shut, trying to block out the image of Hux's expression when she'd messed up their entire evening together.
"Is that why you're so thin?"
Sometimes she really hated that big mouth of hers. Obviously he was sensitive about his appearance; probably had even been bullied about it.
Rose groaned, shoving her face into her pillow to muffle her mortification.
She really messed up, hadn't she? She'd have to apologize to Hux tomorrow.
What if… what if he never wanted to talk to her again?
The thought was painful, like a physical blow.
No, she had to be optimistic. She couldn't give in to despair.
Rose would just have to say sorry; let him know that she wasn't trying to be hurtful.
When she did finally fall asleep, she dreamt she was walking through the forest just outside the base. Something—someone— was up ahead, but she couldn't quite make them out. Every time she sped up, they seemed to do the same.
Crashing through the underbrush, Rose thought she saw the back of her sister's flight jacket whipping around a tree up head.
"Paige!?" Her voice came out strangled, and she started running faster, dodging around large ferns and snarling tree roots. Low hanging branches lashed at her face.
But still her sister avoided capture, gliding along the forest floor at an increasingly uncatchable pace.
A laugh, her sister's laugh; echoing.
"Paige!"
Terror ignited every nerve as Rose pushed forward, desperate, until the greenery began to thin and she saw someone there on the other side of the trees.
Before she could reach them, her foot caught, sprawling her forward. She fell out onto her hands and knees, breathing heavy. All she could see were a pair of shoes, right in front of her. No, not shoes. Boots.
"The Otomok system? That brings back memories."
Rose looked up just in time for Hux, back in his First Order finest, to bend down and loop the cord of her pendant around her neck, just like on the Finalizer. He was supposed to say something smarmy, and then she'd bite him, but in this vague amalgamation of the past and her subconscious, he didn't. Instead, he pulled. The necklace bit into the back of her neck, compelling Rose to stand as he hauled her closer with it. And then she was pulling him into her arms, wrapping him in a hug, just like in the base's fresher.
"Your friends would think less of you."
Rose shivered, his voice ghosting over the shell of her ear.
"I'm a bastard," he said. "Pathetic."
She shook her head in response, burying her face in his shirt.
"Troublemaker," he muttered, voice fond. Or had she just imagined it that way? Imagined the look on his face when he said it?
Warm. It smelled like soap and like him
She held him tighter
"You've never flown anything this fast." A new voice made her heart squeeze; made her pull back and look up. There was Paige, in her uniform, standing there and smiling down at her.
The morning alarm chimed loud from the desk, jerking Rose awake. She groaned, pulling her pillow up over her head and mashing it down around her ears. How was it morning already? It felt like she'd only just fallen asleep!
"Ugh," she grumbled, momentarily confused as to why waking came with a tight knot of worry in her stomach, but then she remembered the end of the previous night, coupled with her strange and vivid dream.
Oh, that's right, she thought, sitting up and rubbing her eyes. She had a giant ginger problem.
"Please, Rose."
A cold wave of regret welled up inside her. She'd done as he'd requested, left him when he'd asked, but she could have stayed. She could have refused to abandon him in his grief. Instead she ran away, and kept him locked in his cage.
No, that wasn't going to happen again.
As she walked her way to the stockade later that morning, Rose could only imagine the look Poe would be giving her if he knew what decision she'd come to. It was probably exactly the thing he'd warned her against; he wouldn't be amused.
Well, Poe just didn't understand the rapport she'd been able to build with Hux. He'd bared his soul to her, weather he'd wanted to or not. He was a ruthless killer, but he was a piteously lonely, angry, and misguided man as well. But he was getting better, she knew it.
He'd responded to her offers of brief companionship, of co-workmanship. Even if he did so begrudgingly, he still did so. That was progress. That was trust.
Why couldn't they show him the same in kind?
"Good morning." Entering the stockade, she tried to balance her voice between cheerful and polite reservation. She wasn't sure how he was going to react to seeing her after their conversation the night before.
Hux was already sitting up on his pallet, back ridged against the wall; blankets tucked and crisp. He looked terrible. She wondered if he'd even slept at all. He didn't seem surprised to see her.
"Sorry about last night," she said. He frowned. Rose rubbed her arm with the opposite hand. "I know what it's like to lay awake, thinking about all the bad stuff… so, I'm sorry I brought it up. I wasn't trying to imply that you're… you're not…" How was she supposed to say this? "You're not weak, Hux."
He scrutinized her, searching, before he relented, like he could allow himself to be cross with her but couldn't bother to be furious. He ran a hand over his face, running his fingers into his hair. "Last night, we… we rather meandered into that whole conversation, if I recall. I was being… insensitive."
"Doesn't mean you deserve to have me prying into every last painful memory."
"You're an incessant busybody. I can hardly fault you for adhering to your base nature."
"Oh, ha-ha," Rose said flatly, catching the playful note in his jab. He was always just like a cat, playing with his prey, wasn't he? Still, his willingness to engage in banter soothed her worry like a balm.
He frowned as she unlocked the cell door. "Another expedition?"
"Sort of. Actually, I've decided I'm moving you into the barracks." She'd already made up her mind, so that was that. She bent to pick up the empty bowl, beer, and fork on the ground inside the cell's door.
"I—" His surprise turned suspicious whip-quick. "Are you sure?"
"You'd rather stay here?"
His mouth pressed thin as he thought. Eventually, he asked, "No cuffs?" His voice ticked up at the end of the question, rife with disbelief, eyebrows pulled up and together to wrinkle his forehead.
"No cuffs," she confirmed. "Come on, I need a cup of caff and I know we have tea in the canteen. Besides, I have to return your bowl."
He stared at her; expression unreadable.
"It's not a trick," she urged. When he didn't move, Rose sighed, posture sagging a bit. She tried a different tact. "You said you don't deserve my trust. That I'm delusional for thinking that you've earned a bit of it. Fine. Prove me a fool. Here's your chance."
He glared; not at her, but at the ground between them.
He didn't deserve what she was offering him.
"Just… try not to be so hard on yourself all the time."
An outstretched hand.
Hux pressed his lips together. "Tea, you say?"
Rose's mouth quirked upward into a small smile. He could see she was pleased, even if she tried to hide how pleased.
"Don't gloat," he said stiffly, almost like an order, picking up his datapad as he stood and walked toward her.
"I'm not," she snapped, barely containing how delighted she was, stepping out of his way.
He paused, for just a moment, on the threshold of his jail cell, before walking out into the hall. When he did so… nothing happened. The world was the same. Except, the cage was behind him, and he wouldn't be going back inside of it at the end of the day.
He almost grinned.
Rose was right there at his shoulder. "Come on," she said, clapping him on the back of the arm, but not steering him this time. It was a simple, friendly gesture.
He wrinkled his nose at her back, but followed after.
They wove their way across the common, laughter and various sounds of good-nature bubbling up from innumerable areas of the camp as people worked and joked together. It was a curious thing for Hux to behold. He was use to tight-button regulation. This was… rabble.
Not that, in the past, he hadn't had a good rapport with those who'd served under him, but there had always been a sense of order. Decorum. Everything about the Resistance's lax atmosphere added extra weight to the blow of the Order's defeat.
Thankfully, most were too focused on their tasks to notice just who was walking in their midst. At least for now, his luck was holding.
As they strolled into the cafeteria, Rose deposited the dirty bowl and fork into a grey bin sitting on one of the bench-like tables.
"Drink station is back here," she said over her shoulder, leading him towards the back of the large room, weaving through rows of empty seating. It was between meals, so there were only a few people milling about.
One of the tables in the back contained all the dishware; a hodgepodge of different sizes and color, materials and wear. It looked members of the Resistance had carried these items, their personal things, from whatever various planets and star systems they called home. In their escape or emigration, they'd taken something with them, a pair of bowls, a cup, and it had all ended up here.
Rose plucked a yellow mug from the group; slightly faded, and with cracks in the glazing. She moved to the tall caf dispenser, turning the knob on the front.
Hux surveyed his choices. It made him feel odd, like he was sifting through a box of people's memories.
He opted for a tall black tumbler; utilitarian an unassuming.
The tea choices were underwhelming; a mix of a variety of sachets all together in a single bowl. He plucked them out one at a time and gave each a fair bit of scrutiny before choosing. It was no gold-label brand of Tarine tea, but it smelled black and bitter enough.
To the side, hands wrapped around her warming mug, Rose watched him with a small smile.
Every movement he made was like he'd practiced it before. Each flick of his wrist was precise, long nimble fingers careful with the weight behind his movements. He was fascinating to watch, much more expressive than she'd remembered seeing him in the hanger on the Finalizer. On-duty versus off-duty, perhaps.
She enjoyed watching the emotions that flickered over his face as he chose his cup, then his tea, eyebrows quirking along with his thoughts.
It was rather endearing, she thought. Cute.
Rose leaned forward, pointing toward a large pitcher resting on a hotplate, Hux having cast his gaze about the table, looking a little lost.
He filled the mug with steaming water from the pitcher. "Do you have your chronometer?"
Rose blinked. "Uh, yeah."
"Timer. Three and a half minutes."
It took her a moment to figure out what he was asking, but he waited for her, sachet of tea hovering over the mug, pinched delicately between his fingers. When she set the timer with a beep, he finally dropped it into the water.
"We may walk while it steeps," he informed her, in a clipped, formal tone.
Rose nodded with raised eyebrows. Apparently, tea was very serious business. "Yeah, it's just this way," she motioned to a connecting corridor, leading them down a utilitarian hallway.
It was quite narrow, the hallway, having been carved out of the rock around it. Hux was fairly certain two people, only a bit broader than he, would have a hard time passing each other without angling. The dull lighting above was a far cry from any Destroyer's.
"So," Rose continued, "I should tell you now that there's no real organization to dorm assignments."
Hux sniffed. "I'm shocked."
She rolled her eyes. "They're numbered, so you should be able to find your way regardless. Most people are bunked two to a room, but… I don't think that'll work very well in your particular situation."
"Because you fear for my safety," Hux supplied solemnly.
"Because you're probably a nightmare to live with."
He bristled. "I'll have you know that I'm quite meticulous about my living quarters."
"You know you're not helping your case when you say that, right?"
Hux was about to open his mouth in retort when they reached their destination, stopping in front of a door with the numbers 284 on the wall. Rose punched in the access code and the door slid open, revealing the room beyond.
"I went ahead and programmed in a sequence. One three one seven two five eight." A call-back to his spy code. "Thought it might be easy for you to remember," she said with a small smile.
"Indeed," he muttered, moving around her and into the room with genuine interest.
There were two bunks, the kind that hung out from the wall with an extra leg underneath for support, one on either side of the room. The bunk on the left was folded up, allowing for some extra space for the desk with its built-in light; the chair; the open and empty closet.
It was so… homely. So unlike his quarters aboard any of the ships he had resided on. There was brief, wistful longing for his ice-blue sofa, his first personal requisition when he'd been given private residence aboard the Absolution. He'd endeavored to keep his personal surroundings in refined order; stark and neat and rimmed in fine, smooth silver. A covetous part of his heart did enjoy beautiful things, elegant in their utilitarianism.
This room was not that.
It was low-lit, walls uncovered metal sheeting rather than smooth, formed panels. The bunks were more like cots, not a proper bed. Everything seemed dated and a little bit rusty.
Rose leaned against the inside of the door frame; arms crossed loosely over her chest. "Is it acceptable to your delicate sensibilities?" She watched Hux run a long, pale finger over the surface of the desk, pulling it up to look at the dust collected there. "You can clean later."
He glanced her way, eyebrows jumping. "Oh I can, can I?"
"Yeah," she said, feeling twitchy at his half-amused look. "We've got a job to do. Remember I said I was working on a thing?"
"Why of course," he said, with a note of thinly-wrought humor, turning back to her. "How could I forget The Thing."
His height, combined with everything else about him, caused the space to look entirely too small in Rose's opinion. Bright ginger hair, dark plain clothing, holding a steaming mug and standing there against a normally-familiar bedroom backdrop, staring at her so intensely— it made her feel a little funny.
The alarm on Rose's chronometer went off, making her jump. "Oh! That—that's three and a half minutes." She pressed one of the buttons, cutting off the sound.
Hux plucked the tea sachet out from his drink and dropped into the room's waste receptacle. When he took a sip, Rose noticed his brows pulling together over the rim of the tumbler in what must have been contentment.
Rose kind of wished he'd do it again. She cleared her throat. "Ah, so The Thing is quite the puzzle. I think you'll enjoy the challenge. Want a crack at it?"
She saw his posture straighten, some weight rolling forward onto the balls of his feet.
He was excited.
He took another sip of tea before muttering, "I could be convinced..."
If he was trying to feign disinterest, he wasn't doing a very good job of it. Or maybe she'd just been around him long enough now to recognize his little quirks. Rose smirked. "Well, let's swing by the command center and see if I can't persuade you."
A/n: A big thanks to everyone on the Gingerose discord (and twitter) for being an amazing, supportive group of people who inspire me every single day.
