Work Text:
Hux would, of course, push at the bonds of propriety. He knows Kylo is even more prissy and repressed than he is, but they share an understanding. They get one another’s sense of humour. The acerbic comments, the undertone to perfectly ‘normal’ conversation. The things unspoken, the hyperbole, the sins of omission, the damning with faint praise. An orator’s son, and a self-styled wordsmith.
It stands to reason that they’d bring their foreplay to the forefront, without anyone knowing. In fact, what most see as an entirely antagonistic working relationship is a complicated, multi-faceted injoke of epic proportions.
Yes, they have spats. No, they aren’t lasting. Yes, the make-up sex is incredible.
But it isn’t the case that the mask makes Kylo more stable. Without his trappings, without the familiar things to hide behind, he’s made more crude, more… roughshod. The rough overwhelms the diamond, and the cracks in his face echo the cracks deeper down inside. He’s no longer the esoteric and Other, he’s… a man with a frown and a slightly whinier voice. He’s… Human.
He’s a man half way between identities, and the friction rubs Hux’s fine fabric up the wrong way, against the nap. The rules of engagement have changed, and it’s no longer the same understated, we’re-better-than-everyone game.
Now it’s… now he’s not so sure.
Before he could read the man, even through his mask.
Now it’s like he’s star-systems away, speaking another language, and Hux is left out of alignment, too.
He misses the mask. He never thought he would, but he does. He misses it like mad.