Hux shivered discretely, shifting his weight from one feet to the other.
The laboratory was cold even for him, perfectly used to the low temperatures typical of all the starships, and he was starting to wonder when Kylo Ren would decide to move from his position and finally let both of them go back to the main bridge.
He didn't spoke, though. If he felt a sort of reverential fear from the sight in front of him, he could only imagine what kind of emotions the latter elicited from the Knight.
Instead, his eyes were intent on following around the lab staff; out of over twenty members of the original team, only three were still remaining, more than enough to keep an eye on the last steps of their ambitious project, and all of them now fussing around with datapads and big words, obviously trying to impress their guests.
They were chosen on the basis of more than their scientific curiosity: main required points had been extremely high technical abilities -of course, a conspicuous lack of the moral issues normal people is plagued with, and a ridiculously high disinterest for the world outside of their laboratory.
All the other people they started with, instead, had been... Removed from duty with an simple and efficient shot in their head.
It's not like they could have left them go around with that kind of insights - he mused,
"Status report?"
It was one of the scientist, a young woman with frizzy hairs and a crooked nose to answer, getting closer, together with the droid she was dictating notes to.
"Everything is proceeding as it should, sir. The perfluorocarbon oxygen regeneration is constant and no anomalies have been discovered in the subject during the accelerated growth process. Cleaning the genetic pool has been a difficult process, but this time we are 97% sure to be correct." She informed them, keeping her eyes fixed on the large axolotlian tank in front of them "It's a thing of beauty, isn't it?"
"She," Ren corrected her, and not even his helmet could completely conceal how breathless he sounded.
"I'm sorry?" She looked surprised and more than a little scared by the interruption, while the droid beeped questioningly.
"It's a she," He repeated, turning the head towards his interlocutor.
Kylo Ren's shoulders we re hunched forward and it was difficult to decide if he felt somehow defeated or he was just ready to propel himself towards his victim. The harsh light coming from the machinery was using the man to paint a frightful shadow on the white, sterile floor, and each and every movement of the Knight was multiplied on it.
If there was something that Hux had learn in the few years spent with this particular force-wielder, was when to step in to avoid a potential catastrophe.
"We are both extremely impressed by your work," The general started, his lips curling into a not totally pleasant smile "It was time, after all, for success. I'm sure Lord Ren is tired to take care of the failures."
A praise and a censure, for subordinates should never forget that there's a fist inside the glove, he considered silently.
The woman correctly interpreted his words as a dismissal, and rushed away after a small bow, probably aware of having just barely escaped some incomprehensible rage outburst.
Ren's voice was icy when, a few seconds later, he finally started to move towards the door. "That was unnecessary, general. You should remember that I'm not under your command, and I do not take kindly when people overstep their boundaries with me."
Hux followed him, forced to lengthen his stride to keep up with the other man, his nostrils flared with disdain at the offensive words of his companion, to the point that even his voice was more petulant than usual.
"And you should remember that this whole project is under my responsibility. I don't like your meddling with the staff. It usually ends up disastrously."
If the knight actually caught his taunting he couldn't say, for the masked man didn't deigned to answer and just kept leading the way towards the bridge.
He knew he had sounded petty, and pettiness doesn't suit high officials - or kids above fifteen - but for sure he couldn't let the knight's impulsiveness put his plan on risk, especially when so close to the end.
It had been a First Order squadron to sift trough the ruins on planet Kamino, retrieving what possible. His men had worked night and day, for months, to rebuilt from scratch such an advanced technology without external aid, and no one was authorized to fuck up at this point, no matter how important their contribution might have been.
"Your staff is incompetent."
The automatic door in front of them opened up at that precise moment, allowing plain view of the control room, where busy officers in neat uniforms were even more neatly performing their business. It was a sight that made the general's heart swell with pride and he couldn't realistically let Ren's words unanswered.
"Lord Ren, my men are perfectly trained for their job. If you hadn't been so insistent upon secrecy, we could have just asked another factory to perform this task in half the time it required us to. I'm sure that under proper control, and given the right amount of money..."
The Knight interrupted him with a brusque hand gesture.
"Do you even realize the full impact of what we are doing here, general?" the voice, muffled and distorted by the helmet's modulator, was icy. Ren stepped closer, invading the other man's personal space with his imposing figure, and lowering his tone to a deadly murmur "There is always a leakage of information when so many people are working together. It happened to Vader with the Dead Star, it happened to you with the Starkiller. Do you never learn from the past?"
The ginger man swallowed anxiously when a gloved hand brushed his jaw on the way to his throat. He was pretty sure the masked monster in front of him wouldn't dare to hurt him physically - especially in front of his troops, but the trips to the scientific bay never failed to unsettle the already volatile temper of Lord Ren.
With regrettable consequences for somebody, usually.
Hux collected his wits, frowning, and working hard to keep is voice firm. "Remove yourself from my person, Kylo Ren."
That simple phrase seemed to have the desired effect, for the Knight stepped back immediately. Now, if he could only see what kind of emotion were showing under that dreadful mask it would be even easier to know how to deal with the situation...
Dammit.
"I personally think that you overdid your job then, Ren. Still no one has come here to try stop us. What if they didn't found out the small clues you left them?" Hux retaliated. "What if they are unable to find us, here? I'm starting to wonder if you haven't just overrated our adversaries. Or maybe that's what you really want, deep down?" The general smiled knowingly. "It would be understandable, it's genetic. Not even you can completely escape all the bindings that tie the calf to the cow."
It was like pushing on a switch: Ren went completely still for a second, before storming out of the room with a growl of outrage.
Hux was still smiling, even if completely aware that his words were going to cost him some ridiculously expensive piece of the ship. But underlining who was the highest authority on the ship was always worth. Equilibrium had been re-established.
Kylo Ren, on his part, was scurrying along the corridor at the maximum speed allowed by dignity, glad for his infamous temper since it translated into a trip with no interruption from the base personnel.
Once in his chambers, he pounded in the locking code for the door and headed directly towards the bed, where the mask fell off with a muffled thud.
Breath in, breath out.
He felt like his lungs were on fire, his heart beating wildly against the ribcage while he paced around, trying to calm down.
That bastard. That stupid, blind, and overconfident bastard; how dare he speak like that in front of him?
He new that Hux's words were just the tip of the iceberg, the real problem well hidden under those black, bottomless waters. From the moment he had laid eyes on the body floating inside the tank in the lab, he had to suppress the urge of retching.
It was perfect, like a personification of his nightmares.
He had felt both terror and relief knowing that, at least this time, there would be no need to push the button meant to inject a lethal dose of potassium chloride in the slowly forming clone, ending up with a wet , too familiar, corpse he was supposed to deal with by himself.
Shell. Not a corpse -he tried to himself: just a void, emotionless shell with no kind of self-knowledge.
When he headed to the adjoining bathroom to wash his sweat-covered face, the scarred man staring back to him from the mirror looked haunted, hair stuck on his forehead and dark circles around his eyes.
Shell. Only that.
It was a thought which never failed to bring him some measure of comfort, and his breathing eased, slowly, to a normal pace. He still had a few weeks before ordering the medical staff to start the awakening procedure and voluntarily throw himself down the hell hole that the plan was.
He freed himself from the majority of his constricting clothes, leaving them on the floor before padding and laying down on the light, sterile-white duvet that covered his bed. The fabric was soft on his skin, and he barely had time to roll beneath the blanket before starting to drift off to sleep, fiscally and mentally exhausted.
Shell. The well-trained mental reflexes were already starting to work, pushing away the horror that the word now evoked in him, and substituting it with a safer image - a shameful skill from a long forgotten past, one that he would never use when fully conscious, but still useful for the moments in which the sleep eluded him and self-preservation kicked in.
Shell. Well, shells is even better, his mind provided him.
Many of them, all mother of pearl, in all the colours of the rainbow - his thoughts were getting foggier while his mind slowly slipped on the higher levels of the existence, were the universe was filled with entire galaxies made of countless fragments of light. Not suns, no, not even if some of them were just as shining: somebody, once, had told him that it was a pretty common way of seeing other people's mind but he had never cared for the technicality: he had been struck by the sight that first time, by the sense of connection it had felt towards the entire world in those few precious first moments.
Even after all that time and all the horror he had witnessed, he couldn't thing of any other word but wonderful.
Not many were able to reach that place voluntarily, but almost all the dreamers were there, floating around unable to remember the beauty of it, once awaken again.
Drowsily, in the material world, he let a hand stroke his naked chest, starting from his once wounded side and then up to the other arm, where the was hand resting beneath the pillow.
He could almost see someone else caress his skin, a feather-light touch and a soft cooing that spoke about being cared for, being held by another human being and many other secret desires he though he crushed a long, long time ago.
Now, his mind was providing him the equivalent of a slow walk through the void, strolling around the directionless space in search of something.
He inhaled deeply, letting tendrils of Force creep around and probe the void. If he was very lucky, maybe he would catch a certain dream in that blackness, : that dream -he knew- would have soft sand, wind, and an entire house built of seashells; it would be quiet and comforting, maybe capable of soothing even his restless mind.
In the end, the wind was actually in the dream, but it was bringing acrid smell of smoke and sulfur to maul his eyes and nostrils, while the low dunes of dust of the black desert were nothing if not an indication of impending nightmares.
Somehow, he thought that it was exactly what he deserved.
On a far away planet, Rey was still concentrated on her task well past bedtime, eyes glued on the screen of the holopad hastily mounted on a support, switching contacts on the testing bench with a logic that up to that moment still eluded everybody else.
Finn was the only one still awake other that her, perched on a stool and bored to death.
"How's that she has a name and not a number?" Rey asked abruptly.
Apparently, Finn didn't need any other information to understand his friend's question, for he yawned and answered.
"Non-commissioned officers are not as replaceable as troopers."
The young jedi looked quickly in the direction of Hana, asleep in a chair with her head supported by the back wall and her legs propped up on a table; with her short hair streaked blond by the sunlight, chipped lips and a cute set of freckles didn't fit with the image of a black dressed official in a sterile control room, ready to destroy some planet.
"Was she good?" She tried again, but her friend just shrugged.
The day before, the woman had officially throw in the towel with the decryption attempts, refusing any kind of bruteforcing methods and hurling a surprisingly creative series of abuses in perfect Mando'a.
"Give me weeks and I'll do it, but with the allowed time slot... I found two of the three keys, and look how much time it needed! I'm pretty sure that these bastards ain't even using the Basic alphabet, but some crazy 5000 plus characters' one, like the Ugnaughtian o something," She had lamented, smirking knowingly when asked about how she got that information. "That's what I would do."
The only option left was more physical and far more risky in terms of system damage: trying to bypass the control by short circuiting the correct contacts without burning everything down to a crisp.
Rey was chosen for the task, ideally for her sharp sense of intuition when facing new and strange machineries, practically because she was the only one safe enough from the creative punishments that the General was used to order when particularly pissed off.
At the last body count, of the three original communication chips plus nine others obtained by even more illicit ways, only two had survived the testing procedures and she was pretty sure that this one now under her supervision was rapidly approaching its end.
So, it was with a certain degree of surprise that she saw the output signal suddenly decrypted on screen, and she blinked a couple of time just to make sure she was actually awake.
"Ohi, you two! I think I did it!" Rey all but squealed, a huge smile splitting her face in half.
Finn was the quickest one, reaching her side in mere seconds, followed by a still drowsy Hana.
"Wha..? You did? Let me see!" The woman intervened, squashing herself in the small space left between the two friends. They all stayed there for a while, staring in awe at the perfectly clear series of sinusoids wavering on the monitor.
"We must call Leia." Finn decided, moving quickly towards the door.
"Finn," Hana intervened, stopping him mid-step "try to avoid too much public. It's better if first decide with the General what kind of action we'll proceed with." suggested.
The young man flashed a brilliant smile. "Don't worry, I've got it."
Author's note:
Question: who got a new job and no more free time?
Yes, yes it's me. You're too good at this game - sigh