Chapter Text
1916, Hosnian Prime, Russia.
It happened once upon a december, when the territories of the Hosnian Empire of Russia -- Cardota, Courtsillius and Rayshoo -- gathered at the capital. It was Hosnia's tricentennial, and the air was full of cheer and elegance, everywhere one looked. Shimmering lights reflected on every crystalline surface -- in vases and jewelry and decorations -- creating flickering embers all around the palace. Colors whirled around like rainbows, from the skirts of all the dancing ladies and the mantels where lavish feasts were served. The palace was truly a wonderland -- a majestic haven filled with warmth, in contrast to the snowstorm outside.
Amidst the crowd of thousands, there was the princess, sitting by the Dowager Empress’ throne, uncaring about the guests when she had the attention of her grandmother all to herself.
Young Armitage Hux had been observing from one of the dessert carts. The princess looked beautiful in her dark blue gown. Yet again, he didn’t remember a time since he’s known her, when he didn’t think she was the prettiest. He thought that even in his finest suit and with his ginger hair all properly combed, he couldn’t ever be worthy -- not ever, being the bastard child of General Brendol Hux.
“ARMIE!” Ben’s sudden ambush pulled Armitage’s eyes from the princess. Ben was the son of Senator Leia Organa and General Han Solo. His family was entirely on the political opposite of his, but that was completely irrelevant to the two boys. For always accompanying their parents to events like this one, at 15 years old they were already inseparable.
“Are you going to dance with the princess tonight!? Ben teased.
“Stop it! I’m not doing that!” Armie whined; despite him denying his crush, Ben knew better, and seemed determined to encourage his friend to go beyond his comfort zone and approach her.
“It is now or never, Armie! Go ask her to dance!” Ben playfully shoved him around by the collar of his coat.
“No!” Armie squished Ben’s cheeks in retaliation.
“You might never get another chance!”
Suddenly the lights went out. The mirth died down and the crowd parted as three figures emerged, stomping through the marble floors with a greenish, supernatural mist enveloping them. The figure in the middle looked like a skeleton with its flesh barely hanging on its bones, cloaked in dark robes and short hair as white as the snow outside; the soldier beside him wore a steely helmet that covered his entire face, and the one opposite him was robust with blood-shot eyes and ginger hair, much like Armie’s.
“Palpatine!?” The Hosnian Emperor came forth. “What is the meaning of this!? You’re supposed to be dead!”
“I have died before. Dark magic is a path to many abilities. You should’ve never betrayed me” his raspy voice croaked as he lifted a boney finger to Emperor Nicholas.
Palpatine had been the right hand man of the Emperor for many years before, until rumours spread that he was an evil sorcerer. The Emperor had exiled him to the badlands in Mustafar but when Palpatine resisted, he was ordered to be killed. That he had cheated dead was impossible...unless the rumours had been true.
“The Revolution begins now, Nicholas! Hear my curse!” Lighting cracked from Palpatine’s fingers as he roared, “Your reign ends here! I will not rest until your entire family dies by my hand! My army will take Hosnian Prime! The dawn of a new era arrives!” The lightning struck the grand chandelier which instantly fell to pieces, forcing the people to scamper madly. Ben and Armie got lost in the sea of people, unable to get to their parents in time.
“COMMANDER VADER, GENERAL HUX, EXECUTE THE ORDER!”
A chill ran down Ben and Armie’s spine as they recognized that the helmeted ghoul that was pulling out a sword to behead Emperor Nicholas was Ben’s grandfather, and that Armie’s dad was the pillar of the undead soldiers that spread all over the room to annihilate the the rest of the Romanovs.
Both kids took each other’s hands and ran in search of their mothers but the panicked masses of people made it impossible for them to find their way around the ballroom. Instead, they ran straight into the Dowager Empress and her granddaughter.
“Come with us!” Armie urged, taking the princess’ hand and hurrying to one of the many escape doors that he and Ben had discovered in their years of play inside the Palace. But the crowd was like a colony of ants crawling all over each other and delaying the swift exit for everyone else.
“My music box!” The princess wept as someone bumped into her and made her drop what looked like an intricate faberge egg.
“Run along, I’ll get it!” Armie yelled, but someone collided with Ben and Armie, making them fall into darkness.
The last thing Armie saw was his sweetheart and her grandmother, running out into the snow, and his last conscious thought was a vague prayer for her to be safe.
By the time they awakened, the Palace was completely barren.
Gone was the light and the laughter, replaced by shadows and torn walls. The boys made it to the snowstorm outside, but knew no more of their families or the royals. Only the far away sound of a train’s blowing steam as it left the station, and the cries of a woman, desperately screaming for Anastasia --
-- “EARTH to Hux! Are you listening to me!?” Kylo bumps his shoulder with Hux’s, who had been dozing off as they sat slumped on two old chairs, waiting for the next actress on their casting call.
“Piss off, Ren!” Hux swallows his yawn and pushes Kylo’s hands away from him, uncrossing his legs from atop the table in front of them.
Hux often dreamt of that time -- of that fateful night, fifteen years ago. He had buried those memories long ago, and still they haunted his dreams every now and again.
He doesn’t like to remember.
But ever since the rumours surfaced of Anastasia Romanov being alive, and that the Dowager Empress had put out a reward for whoever found her granddaughter, those thoughts had been creeping into his head more frequently.
He doesn’t like to remember how he and Ben never found their families. Yet they lived for a long time with the weight of having seen what Brendol and Vader had done -- that they were the children of Palpatine’s revolution. Ben even changed his name to Kylo Ren, not being able to carry his ancestry anymore.
They survived from one foster home to another until they aged out completely, thus becoming wanted con-men in Hosnian Prime. They had to eat somehow. Times were bleak and people seemed to survive out of the everyday gossip alone.
Now they were working towards their greatest scheme yet.
All they needed was an Anastasia look-alike, and they'd be able to bathe in those glorious, ten million rubles that had been promised by the Empress. Only time was wearing thin and their search had been disappointing to say the least.
“By God, this is depressing” Hux grumbles as he stands up and stretches -- his groan of pain echoes throughout the hollow Grand Palace.
For someone with such excellent posture he always seems to be fighting off some kind of back pain, which Kylo sees as an opportunity to tease him for, every time.
Hux just smacks him in the head, “How many left?”
“Ughhh, two, I think” Kylo replies, rubbing his palms on his face. “Fuck, Hux, what are we gonna do if we don’t find someone today? This is our last chance.”
“Let’s hope these next two girls are decent enough. Not like the one that kept saying Ana Karenina instead of Anastasia.” Hux rolls his eyes.
“At this point you’ll have to pray for a miracle.”
Hux scoffs and nods reluctantly, gazing off at the empty, decaying ballroom; he can’t help but grimace at the contrast between the present and what he’d seen in his dream earlier. “I’ll go take a little walk, want to join me?”
“Nah, I’ll wait in case one of the girls arrives.”
“Suit yourself.”
Where there was once vivid colors, now there’s nothing but desaturated, ripped fabrics that barely cling to the walls and dust-covered furniture. The marble floors are all cracked, and Hux could trace his foot through them, like scars from the past.
He’s certain that spirits haunt this place, when he looks up at the old portraits of the Romanovs.
If he’d concentrate hard enough, he’d hear their footsteps or their sorrowful cries or maybe their ghostly silhouettes, spinning around the room like they once did in their last dance.
That’s when he stills.
There’s a lone figure beneath the painting that overlooks the main ballroom -- dressed in a ratty trench coat, with their hair up in disarray.
“Who are you!?” he calls, and his voice rumbles through the palace, making the figure screech and turn around.
“Oh! Uhh -- I -- are you Armitage Hux?”
“Who’s asking!?”
The figure walks closer to him, and with every step, Hux’s heartbeat picks up. For each of this unknown woman’s features seems all too familiar, especially when he looks up at the painting and sees her -- the princess, just as he remembered her.
Could a face remain so unchanged, after fifteen years?
But it couldn’t be, could it? It had been a long time ago. And the name you give him when you introduce yourself is not the one of the departed princess.
“I’m looking for traveling papers. I was told you were the one to see about that -- although I’m not supposed to say who told me.”
“Traveling papers?” Hux reaches the bottom of the grand staircase, looking up at you.
Disregarding his beating heart, the lightbulb in his brain goes off. Well it obviously couldn’t be, but their resemblance is uncanny, which...
“Yes! I’m going to France! Naboo to be more precise.”
“Naboo, huh? Well it just so happens that me and my partner have exactly three tickets for the next train to Naboo, right at our disposal...” Hux smirks, quickly slipping into the sly and shady character he’s created for situations like this. Of course they didn’t have jack-shit.
Yet.
“Oh you do!? Those are marvelous news--”
“--The thing is, the third one is reserved for the grand duchess Anastasia.”
“Oh?”
“Hux, what’s going on!?” Kylo arrives and halts at the scene before him, eyes quickly picking up the very same thing that Hux had upon looking at you. “Hey, who’s this?”
“Well actually, you haven’t given me your last time” Hux turns to you.
“Oh well, I-- I don’t have one. I’m actually looking for my family. All I have left of them is this locket,” you reach Hux and pull the golden necklace around your neck for him to see the inscription thar read, “together in Naboo”.
“I don’t remember anything about them, I was found in the snow when I was thirteen. But I believe that this right here is the clue to find my family.”
“Huh. Hear that, Ren? She doesn’t remember who she is.” Hux raises his eyebrows.
“And no one knows what happened to her...” Kylo adds with the same amount of mischief in his voice. Numbers are clearly flashing between the comrade’s eyes.
“Just what are you talking about?” You huff with exasperation at their vague exchange and the way they were eyeing you upside down.
“And stop staring at me like that, what, were you vultures in another life!? If you can’t help me I can get by on my own, thanks for nothing!”
“No, no, no, wait a second, wait a second!” Kylo interjects. “Listen, we’re looking to get out of this dump, right? and you got Empress Marie, looking for her lost granddaughter, am I right? And you look exactly like her, doesn’t she, Hux? Look!” Kylo points to the painting above them, and you follow his finger.
As you step closer to the painting you’re overcome with an indescribable feeling tugging at your heart. You’re unsure if you can see yourself in the eyes of the child depicted in the portrait, or if it’s just a trick of the mind because you hopelessly wish to belong -- mixed with how this dark haired man is talking to you, oh so persuasively.
“If you don’t know what happened to you, who's to say you’re not Anastasia!? We bring you in front of the Empress and there! We’re all out of here and onto our next adventure.”
“I mean...it’s hard to think of yourself as royalty when you’ve been sleeping on a cold floor all your life.”
“Think of this as a new beginning.” Hux adds, having kept quiet while Kylo took over the conversation. Somehow those bright greyish-green eyes contain so much hope -- that you’re almost tempted to give in, just by looking at him.
“What if the Empress doesn’t buy it?” you resist.
“We’ll teach you everything you need to know to make a believable impression! Trust us!” Kylo replies, while Hux chimes in with all the seriousness and composure that Kylo didn’t have, “Grand duchess or not, you’d still be in Naboo.”
They certainly made a good case. Were you really going off with these two strangers, all for the unbearable need to seek answers? The odds were so slim, and still…just like Armitage had said, whatever happens, you’d still get to Naboo.
“Alright, alright, alright, I’ll do it.”
“YES!” Kylo exclaims and puts his arm around you, “Empress Marie, I present to you, the Grand Duchess Anastasia! -- Oh, and I’m Kylo, by the way.”
You can’t help but laugh at Kylo’s enthusiasm, and embrace whatever fate might bring you next.
With your bags packed and coats in place, you
As you make your way out of the Palace at nightfall, with your bags packed and spirits up, Kylo and Hux share a conspiratory glance unbeknownst to you.
Best if you don’t know what’s actually in it for them.
---
From a cracked nook in the Palace’s floors, when the three of you are long gone, a thread of green mist begins to seep from underneath, and the ground begins to rumble.