Sorry it's taken so long for me to get this next part up- there was a crisis at my job and I had to pull double shifts, so by the time I got home I was way too tired to do anything other than take a shower and pass out, and then I got working on something else. Since it looks like things have calmed down some I shouldn't take this long in the future.
Despite the disturbing nature of their encounter, Hux didn’t have much time to dwell on the information Ben had given him. First, Lieutenant Mitaka had come down with a terrible case of the Kuyper pox, and had to be evacuated to the quarantine facility on Starkiller Base before the pathogens spread through the recirculated air and infected the entire crew. Upon arrival at the weapon, Hux was informed that there had been a setback with the construction. Apparently the building materials for the proton cannons had to be imported from one of the Outer Rim worlds, and the Resistance had taken it upon itself to set up a blockade between the source-world and one of the other planets that served as a refueling station. One of the ships had attempted to force its way through, only to be blown up.
Hux really hated the Resistance. How the hell had they even known that the transport ships were First Order? It’s not like the ships had the sigil of the organization painted on the side! All First Order transport ships were flagged as belonging to a neutral planet, usually one of the planets that was known as a pirate world. In general they didn’t care one way or another who flew their colors. Was there a mole somewhere? No, that wasn’t possible- none of the troops would know how to contact the Resistance, none of the officers would commit treason like that, and none of the transport crews were suicidal enough to run the risk of being executed by either the First Order or the Resistance. There must have been another explanation. There were some neutral planets in that area of space- maybe the Resistance had business at one of them or the other and had thought there was something suspicious about the ships. That had to be it.
Hux was in the middle of a discussion about the building delays with Lieutenant Parsons, one of the engineers in charge of the project, when his communicator chirped. “What?” he barked into it, aggravated.
“General Hux, sir? This is Doctor Arkkriss, of the Finalizer.” Hux recognized the voice of the female doctor who had explained Ben’s medical status to him a week earlier. “Please return to the medical bay at once… we need your orders as to how to proceed.”
“What’s wrong?” the general asked.
“Ah… it’s probably best if you come here and see it for yourself…” came the reply. “The patient you asked us to treat… he’s not doing well.”
“Explain,” Hux demanded.
“He had a lung hemorrhage,” the doctor replied. “We were able to aspirate most of the blood from his lungs, but he’s still in severe respiratory distress and is showing signs of going into septic shock. I have never seen anything like it. We await your orders on whether to continue treating him, or to let him die. It would probably be best if you saw the situation firsthand before making a final decision, sir.”
Before Hux even really could process what he was doing, he had terminated the connection on his communicator, made an excuse to Lieutenant Parsons, and started off at a full run back towards his ship. He didn’t know why he was doing it. Why did he care so much, whether or not that man died? He didn’t even know him, and the few sentences they had exchanged had been full of vitriol and bitterness. Ben was essentially suicidal anyway. He’d begged for Hux to kill him the first time they’d met. Maybe it would just be kinder to let him die, to order the doctors to stop treating him. Obviously it was what the man would want. Maybe he’d even gone so far as to sabotage the medical equipment in order to let himself die naturally.
Really, there just wasn’t a good reason to continue trying to save someone who didn’t want to be saved. But at that moment, Hux didn’t really care much for reason. For some reason he just wanted to keep Ben alive, no matter what.
Re: FILL: Ghost in the Machine [7/?]
Despite the disturbing nature of their encounter, Hux didn’t have much time to dwell on the information Ben had given him. First, Lieutenant Mitaka had come down with a terrible case of the Kuyper pox, and had to be evacuated to the quarantine facility on Starkiller Base before the pathogens spread through the recirculated air and infected the entire crew. Upon arrival at the weapon, Hux was informed that there had been a setback with the construction. Apparently the building materials for the proton cannons had to be imported from one of the Outer Rim worlds, and the Resistance had taken it upon itself to set up a blockade between the source-world and one of the other planets that served as a refueling station. One of the ships had attempted to force its way through, only to be blown up.
Hux really hated the Resistance. How the hell had they even known that the transport ships were First Order? It’s not like the ships had the sigil of the organization painted on the side! All First Order transport ships were flagged as belonging to a neutral planet, usually one of the planets that was known as a pirate world. In general they didn’t care one way or another who flew their colors. Was there a mole somewhere? No, that wasn’t possible- none of the troops would know how to contact the Resistance, none of the officers would commit treason like that, and none of the transport crews were suicidal enough to run the risk of being executed by either the First Order or the Resistance. There must have been another explanation. There were some neutral planets in that area of space- maybe the Resistance had business at one of them or the other and had thought there was something suspicious about the ships. That had to be it.
Hux was in the middle of a discussion about the building delays with Lieutenant Parsons, one of the engineers in charge of the project, when his communicator chirped. “What?” he barked into it, aggravated.
“General Hux, sir? This is Doctor Arkkriss, of the Finalizer.” Hux recognized the voice of the female doctor who had explained Ben’s medical status to him a week earlier. “Please return to the medical bay at once… we need your orders as to how to proceed.”
“What’s wrong?” the general asked.
“Ah… it’s probably best if you come here and see it for yourself…” came the reply. “The patient you asked us to treat… he’s not doing well.”
“Explain,” Hux demanded.
“He had a lung hemorrhage,” the doctor replied. “We were able to aspirate most of the blood from his lungs, but he’s still in severe respiratory distress and is showing signs of going into septic shock. I have never seen anything like it. We await your orders on whether to continue treating him, or to let him die. It would probably be best if you saw the situation firsthand before making a final decision, sir.”
Before Hux even really could process what he was doing, he had terminated the connection on his communicator, made an excuse to Lieutenant Parsons, and started off at a full run back towards his ship. He didn’t know why he was doing it. Why did he care so much, whether or not that man died? He didn’t even know him, and the few sentences they had exchanged had been full of vitriol and bitterness. Ben was essentially suicidal anyway. He’d begged for Hux to kill him the first time they’d met. Maybe it would just be kinder to let him die, to order the doctors to stop treating him. Obviously it was what the man would want. Maybe he’d even gone so far as to sabotage the medical equipment in order to let himself die naturally.
Really, there just wasn’t a good reason to continue trying to save someone who didn’t want to be saved. But at that moment, Hux didn’t really care much for reason. For some reason he just wanted to keep Ben alive, no matter what.