When Commandant Hux was still a Lieutenant and assigned to field work, the platoon he was in surveyed an Outer Rim planet.
The planet was called Fora by the locals, and it was lush and warm, deemed a useful exporter of tropical fruits and spices, an asset to the Empire. The animals there held all the colors of light refracted through a prism, the leaves on the trees were dripping verdant green, and the sand upon long beaches was orange red, just like the sunset and clouds above.
And under the sunset, Lieutenant Hux met a girl with eyes that were verdant green, and hair the color of the sand and setting sun.
**
The animals held all the colors of light refracted through a prism. But these colors were not worn to be pleasing to human eyes. These colors were not paint to complete the beauty of paradise.
These were warning colors.
And it wasn’t until later that Lieutenant Hux realized the fair girl he’d taken as wife was a monster.
And it wasn’t until later that the girl realized the charming military man she’d married hid daggers behind his smiles.
The two monsters looked at each other, and thought, alright.
**
Other ladies laughed at Lady Hux behind her back. Barbarian. Outer Rim dweller. A tribal savage uplifted into high society, good for nothing but her looks.
They were no longer laughing when it was her father’s trading fleet, instead of Imperial transports, that had arrived before the New Republic forces on Arkanis, and took the best and brightest of the Academy to the Outer Rims.
**
Commandant Hux lay his weary head on his Lady’s lap as she stroked his greying hair.
Worry not love, I’ll stand by you, she had whispered. The Republic had done nothing for her world. And for good or ill, her people mated for life.
**
When Brendol Hux II was four, his world turned upside down.
His home was gone.
His father left with other grim faced and stiffly uniformed men. To restore the glory of the Empire, he had said.
His mother held him in her freckled arms, and took him into the trees of her childhood. There, she went onto all fours as a he, and bared his claws and fans. Together the Lord of the Forest and his cub (it was initially strange, being a girl, but Hux scions were adaptive and resilient) stalked through the woods, a pair of sleek tawny predators.
But hide your fangs love, just as your father hid his edges. It would do you good. It would do you good.
**
Unfortunate then, that with their resources stretched so thin, the years on the new Academy ships so harsh, and the blood of his mother so diluted, that Hux never managed to grow too big. And his mother’s beauty became weakness upon Hux’s boyish frame.
But Hux was vicious and sly. Groups of bullies who tried to corner him alone could never find him. Yet they would soon find themselves alone, and a skinny pale ginger with wild eyes upon them with a bloodied durasteel switchblade and sharp boney knees.
A barbarian just like his mother, the students whispered. Do you not see his icy eyes glow with hellfire in the dark?
The sudden growth in height in his early teens was quite pleasing to Hux. By then, the youth had his own little group as well, vultures and jackals trailing behind an apex predator, begging for scraps.
It was somewhat displeasing, that his other self never quite got that growth spurt.
**
Dopheld Mitaka was soft and weak. And he cried, hiding in a cubicle in the communal refresher on their floor.
Dopheld Mitaka was soft and weak, but he was also obedient, methodological, and meticulous with his work. And he was in Hux’s little pack. He belonged to Hux.
An Academy instructor failed to return during a field training trip. His rotting body was found through the communicator on his belt. Half of his cadaver was already consumed. The other half mutilated and torn beyond visual recognition. Strangely, his genitals were found thirty some meters away from the main trunk, the penis bent in half, the testicles crushed, and the local birds feasting upon the gruesome treat with gusto.
The man’s own fault, for his lack of caution regarding the dangerous local fauna.
Dopheld Mitaka heard the news and laughed.
Hux licked his chaps and picked at his nails. The man’s eyes were so soft and squishy. His throat so tender. His father must be slipping in his old age. Were Hux in charge, he would never let such a disgusting disgrace sully his ranks.
**
Hux took his little pack from the Academy ships to other postings. From mountainous terrains to slushy wetlands, from ocean worlds to lands of fire.
On one such world he met Phasma, a lioness crouched behind heavy armor.
Hux took his expanding pack from ship to ship to bigger ships, until the Supreme Leader himself assigned him to the Finalizer as General, a rank that his father never did manage to achieve.
**
Supreme Leader Snoke smelled of something long dead and rotting.
Hux had told his mother so, under the cover of the trees. She shushed him quickly, but her eyes were bright and shifty.
**
Lady Hux visited her husband after waving off her son.
The Lord of the Forest called on his elders and many brothers.
Slowly but steadily those of Brendol II’s pack who were not on the Finalizer were nudged to other key positions within the military and civilian branches of the First Order.
**
Rumor had it that General Hux could sense your weakness and smell your fear.
**
Rumor had it that General Hux had eyes and ears everywhere. Nothing got past the man.
**
He prowled his domain during day cycles with hair slicked back, uniform well-pressed, and great coat flapping around him. Officers and Stormtroopers alike paid him respect as he strolled down the hallways.
She prowled her domain during night cycles with fur well-groomed, eyes sharp, and ears sharper, her pale whiskers twitching before her. Officer and Stormtroopers alike rarely noticed her as she stalked through the vents and around dark corners.
**
Rumor had it that General Hux kept a cat.
Some say it was a gift from his mother, a small predator from her remote home world. Others say it was just a very large house cat, and was crabby and tabby and shed viciously.
Engineering and sanitation could confirm there indeed was a cat. It kept the ship clean of small pests stowed aboard with supplies and cargo, and left orange hairballs in its wake. The latter was much easier to clean than the former.
FN- 2187 had once managed to stroke its fluffy tail. He got a hiss and a swipe for his troubles, and was reprimanded for carelessly damaging his armor.
Dopheld Mitaka could confirm there indeed was a cat. Her name was Millicent, named after fortitude and industry, virtues of the First Order, and she was ever darling. But even when bribed with extra rations, the Lieutenant would not say if the cat was General Hux’s.
On some night cycles Mitaka would curl up in his tiny officer’s bunk with a data pad held in his hands, and Millicent’s heavy form draped over his lap, purring like a small engine. Sometimes he swore the cat was reading along with him.
**
Unamo was professional and never gave her a second look, trusting her in her duties as a cat aboard the Finalizer just as Hux trusted her as his chief petty officer.
Thanisson was still young, and made toys out of scarps for her when he thought no one was looking.
Mitaka’s lap was the best. She knew the man well, as he knew her well. He left her blue milk, knew exactly where to scratch behind her ears, and told her all the Officer gossips.
Phasma’s bunk was the second best. She respected the Captain, as the Captain tolerated her. Her bunk was nice and snug and warm. The buzzing of the many Stormtroopers so near and so easy to hear.
Crack? Fill: Industrious and Strong in Work I
**
When Commandant Hux was still a Lieutenant and assigned to field work, the platoon he was in surveyed an Outer Rim planet.
The planet was called Fora by the locals, and it was lush and warm, deemed a useful exporter of tropical fruits and spices, an asset to the Empire. The animals there held all the colors of light refracted through a prism, the leaves on the trees were dripping verdant green, and the sand upon long beaches was orange red, just like the sunset and clouds above.
And under the sunset, Lieutenant Hux met a girl with eyes that were verdant green, and hair the color of the sand and setting sun.
**
The animals held all the colors of light refracted through a prism. But these colors were not worn to be pleasing to human eyes. These colors were not paint to complete the beauty of paradise.
These were warning colors.
And it wasn’t until later that Lieutenant Hux realized the fair girl he’d taken as wife was a monster.
And it wasn’t until later that the girl realized the charming military man she’d married hid daggers behind his smiles.
The two monsters looked at each other, and thought, alright.
**
Other ladies laughed at Lady Hux behind her back. Barbarian. Outer Rim dweller. A tribal savage uplifted into high society, good for nothing but her looks.
They were no longer laughing when it was her father’s trading fleet, instead of Imperial transports, that had arrived before the New Republic forces on Arkanis, and took the best and brightest of the Academy to the Outer Rims.
**
Commandant Hux lay his weary head on his Lady’s lap as she stroked his greying hair.
Worry not love, I’ll stand by you, she had whispered. The Republic had done nothing for her world. And for good or ill, her people mated for life.
**
When Brendol Hux II was four, his world turned upside down.
His home was gone.
His father left with other grim faced and stiffly uniformed men. To restore the glory of the Empire, he had said.
His mother held him in her freckled arms, and took him into the trees of her childhood. There, she went onto all fours as a he, and bared his claws and fans. Together the Lord of the Forest and his cub (it was initially strange, being a girl, but Hux scions were adaptive and resilient) stalked through the woods, a pair of sleek tawny predators.
But hide your fangs love, just as your father hid his edges. It would do you good. It would do you good.
**
Unfortunate then, that with their resources stretched so thin, the years on the new Academy ships so harsh, and the blood of his mother so diluted, that Hux never managed to grow too big. And his mother’s beauty became weakness upon Hux’s boyish frame.
But Hux was vicious and sly. Groups of bullies who tried to corner him alone could never find him. Yet they would soon find themselves alone, and a skinny pale ginger with wild eyes upon them with a bloodied durasteel switchblade and sharp boney knees.
A barbarian just like his mother, the students whispered. Do you not see his icy eyes glow with hellfire in the dark?
The sudden growth in height in his early teens was quite pleasing to Hux. By then, the youth had his own little group as well, vultures and jackals trailing behind an apex predator, begging for scraps.
It was somewhat displeasing, that his other self never quite got that growth spurt.
**
Dopheld Mitaka was soft and weak. And he cried, hiding in a cubicle in the communal refresher on their floor.
Dopheld Mitaka was soft and weak, but he was also obedient, methodological, and meticulous with his work. And he was in Hux’s little pack. He belonged to Hux.
An Academy instructor failed to return during a field training trip. His rotting body was found through the communicator on his belt. Half of his cadaver was already consumed. The other half mutilated and torn beyond visual recognition. Strangely, his genitals were found thirty some meters away from the main trunk, the penis bent in half, the testicles crushed, and the local birds feasting upon the gruesome treat with gusto.
The man’s own fault, for his lack of caution regarding the dangerous local fauna.
Dopheld Mitaka heard the news and laughed.
Hux licked his chaps and picked at his nails. The man’s eyes were so soft and squishy. His throat so tender. His father must be slipping in his old age. Were Hux in charge, he would never let such a disgusting disgrace sully his ranks.
**
Hux took his little pack from the Academy ships to other postings. From mountainous terrains to slushy wetlands, from ocean worlds to lands of fire.
On one such world he met Phasma, a lioness crouched behind heavy armor.
Hux took his expanding pack from ship to ship to bigger ships, until the Supreme Leader himself assigned him to the Finalizer as General, a rank that his father never did manage to achieve.
**
Supreme Leader Snoke smelled of something long dead and rotting.
Hux had told his mother so, under the cover of the trees. She shushed him quickly, but her eyes were bright and shifty.
**
Lady Hux visited her husband after waving off her son.
The Lord of the Forest called on his elders and many brothers.
Slowly but steadily those of Brendol II’s pack who were not on the Finalizer were nudged to other key positions within the military and civilian branches of the First Order.
**
Rumor had it that General Hux could sense your weakness and smell your fear.
**
Rumor had it that General Hux had eyes and ears everywhere. Nothing got past the man.
**
He prowled his domain during day cycles with hair slicked back, uniform well-pressed, and great coat flapping around him. Officers and Stormtroopers alike paid him respect as he strolled down the hallways.
She prowled her domain during night cycles with fur well-groomed, eyes sharp, and ears sharper, her pale whiskers twitching before her. Officer and Stormtroopers alike rarely noticed her as she stalked through the vents and around dark corners.
**
Rumor had it that General Hux kept a cat.
Some say it was a gift from his mother, a small predator from her remote home world. Others say it was just a very large house cat, and was crabby and tabby and shed viciously.
Engineering and sanitation could confirm there indeed was a cat. It kept the ship clean of small pests stowed aboard with supplies and cargo, and left orange hairballs in its wake. The latter was much easier to clean than the former.
FN- 2187 had once managed to stroke its fluffy tail. He got a hiss and a swipe for his troubles, and was reprimanded for carelessly damaging his armor.
Dopheld Mitaka could confirm there indeed was a cat. Her name was Millicent, named after fortitude and industry, virtues of the First Order, and she was ever darling. But even when bribed with extra rations, the Lieutenant would not say if the cat was General Hux’s.
On some night cycles Mitaka would curl up in his tiny officer’s bunk with a data pad held in his hands, and Millicent’s heavy form draped over his lap, purring like a small engine. Sometimes he swore the cat was reading along with him.
**
Unamo was professional and never gave her a second look, trusting her in her duties as a cat aboard the Finalizer just as Hux trusted her as his chief petty officer.
Thanisson was still young, and made toys out of scarps for her when he thought no one was looking.
Mitaka’s lap was the best. She knew the man well, as he knew her well. He left her blue milk, knew exactly where to scratch behind her ears, and told her all the Officer gossips.
Phasma’s bunk was the second best. She respected the Captain, as the Captain tolerated her. Her bunk was nice and snug and warm. The buzzing of the many Stormtroopers so near and so easy to hear.
**