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The day is thick with the humidity of a breaking winter, tepid and damp, and to Hux, it’s like passing through a cloud.
He’s uncomfortably warm in his greatcoat, a sheen of sweat gathering beneath his collar and mingling with moisture shed from the air. Beside him, Phasma’s pallid hair has begun to work itself free from her pomade, frizzing in the warmth, framing her weathered features like a halo. She walks with her helmet beneath her arm, mirroring the way he holds his hat, both of them marching in time with the escort of troopers that surrounds them.
It’s nearly noon, the nearest sun high in the overcast sky, and when Hux climbs the steps to the platform the dull ache in his head reminds him of how long it’s been since he slept. The bitter taste of stimulants still lingers on his tongue, and he worries a cracked lip, skin raw from the burn of stomach acid, in the moment before he faces the crowd. The vista is a sobering echo of his audience on Starkiller—troops flanking rows of uniformed officers and clusters of civilians, some seated, others without chairs. Before him, an empty coffin rests draped in a First Order flag, representing the thousands dead.
He stands there, shoulders back, folding one hand over the other in front of his waist. He allows himself a long breath, swallows against the curl of nausea in his empty stomach.
“Faithful citizens of the First Order,” he says.
The seated individuals rise like a wave.
“We unite both to celebrate a great victory and to mourn a great loss. With the destruction of the Hosnian system, the New Republic has been obliterated, the scattered fragments of its cowardly Resistance sent running. We have, in one mighty strike, wiped the stain of a corrupt institution from the face of the galaxy. And this glorious achievement, this triumph of industry and ingenuity, would not have been possible without those whom we honor today.
“It is because of these untiring people, toiling ceaselessly towards a brighter future, that a final conquest sits within our grasp. It is because of these workers, these soldiers, that we may savor the joy of renewed hope. We are indebted to their labor, their loyalty, their legacy. These are the heroes our children will come to know and to admire. These are the legends whose names will grace our histories.
“However small their respective roles, how seemingly insignificant their tasks, they have earned our esteem. I affirm this because I witnessed the courage with which so many of them strove to the last. I am proud to have had the privilege of working alongside people of such caliber, people who have so embodied the principles for which this Order stands. They have allowed me the certainty of this promise—that from the fire of their fall, we will light the galaxy.”
His voice shakes, and as the unsteady words leave his lips he feels a jab of panic. Throat tight, he looks across the first few rows for signs of disapproval, only to meet rapt gazes and tear-stained cheeks, locked in anticipation of his next words. He swallows again.
“Upon the ashes of their sacrifice, we will rest the foundations of law. We will fulfill the undertaking they left to us, and allow them to serve as an inspiration to us all.”
He raises his left arm, hand clenched in a fist. “Glory to the Order!”
The crowd echoes his words, mimicking the gesture. The swell of sound seems to vibrate through his frame, and in his anxious mind, beneath the collective pressure of those needy eyes, it resounds like a condemnation.
*
In subsequent weeks, the conflagration haunts his dreams.
He had watched Starkiller collapse from the viewport of his departing ship, witnessed the way the blaze had shot through cavernous seams in the stony terrain, incinerating decades of work in a matter of minutes. He had considered turning his back, knowing that the sight would be replayed in all its awful futility across countless media holos and briefings, but in those fleeting moments he’d felt a need to confront the disaster in its own place and time. To torment himself, perhaps, with the incarnation of failure.
He stirs feverishly awake, imagination and memories blending, the heat smoldering deep in his bones as though he had never made it out. The sensation drives him to his feet, tearing off his clothes and staggering to the refresher, running the shower as cold as he can stand. He sags against the wall, trembling, and waits for the illusion to fade, for his stomach to settle enough to accept the mercy of sedatives.
It’s by the grace of such medication that he maintains any degree of functionality, confronting the day with his uniform pressed and face clean-shaven, making every effort to occupy his mind. There is always more to be done and he takes refuge in routine, the familiar schedules, lists, and charts, the details he can control. He turns his thoughts to future plans, yet unrealized maneuvers, in order to repress their endless cycling among past possibilities. There is no point, now, in revisiting a hundred variables that perished with the birth of a sun.
But it haunts his dreams and it haunts his days, in old documents and deactivated accounts, in passing comments and the way he slips every now and then. In meetings he references vanished ships, suggests the use of departed squadrons, recommends transferring supplies from stores that no longer exist. There is always an awkward pause on the part of his subordinates, one that highlights his mistake before any verbal response, and he feels embarrassment creep from his neck to his ears. They never hold it against him, occasionally making similar errors themselves, but it still chafes like a blow.
On the bridge he asks, twice, for reports from a Lieutenant Nittilo, before a man in her seat tactfully informs him that Nittilo had been one of the personnel transferred planetside for Starkiller’s debut. Hux regards him with a sort of vague sense of displacement, recalling her dark hair and soft features, the way she used to fetch him caf during lengthy operations. She had confided in him once, while the bittersweet drink brought his senses back alert, that she had two children back home. She was looking forward to their growing up in a world where the war was won.
He unearths her personnel file that evening, checking to ensure that her family is being appropriately compensated. His caf, brought back by a petty officer assigned to the fifth shift, is the powdered stuff from the troopers’ galley, dark and acrid with too little creamer.
He drinks it anyway.
*
The morning Kylo Ren returns from training, Hux is already on edge.
He had been roused to contend with news of another Resistance attack, this one off of Bespin and beneath the jurisdiction of a different general. The forces there are undersupplied, and through hours of complicated reassignments and remote collaboration they are able to put an end to the skirmish. He is walking out of a final briefing, nerves stretched thin and in dire need of chemical aid, when Ren steps straight into his path and dares to ask him about Skywalker.
Skywalker. That one-note refrain, that wild goose chase that had inspired Ren to spare the girl and throw the first of many wrenches into Hux’s carefully fashioned plans. The mere mention of the man strikes Hux as a kind of brazen absurdity. To think—weeks of sleepless nights, mislaid dreams, the weight of guilt and failure crushing his shoulders, and Ren has the gall to come in as though nothing had changed, stand in his way and demand that he prioritize Skywalker.
It happens so suddenly that he fails to stop himself. In that moment, he sees red, feels the heat overwhelm him, and he lunges for Ren so abruptly that the knight himself is taken by surprise. Hux goes for his throat, shouting about his selfishness, his insolence, his complicity in Starkiller’s fall when he could have so easily put a stop to the sabotage had he only paid attention, wanting more than anything for him to feel that same breathless, scorching pain—
And then gloved hands reach around to tear him off of Ren, who stands there in flustered astonishment. Keeping her grip on one of his wrists, Phasma all but drags Hux down the corridor, past the other officers and into a refresher. She jerks him down over one of the sinks, waving to activate the tap.
“Close your eyes,” she orders.
He does as told, and she splashes a small amount of lukewarm water onto his face. The sensation helps distract him, his fury ebbing to a dull throb, hot blood flowing back down from his head. As he straightens, he wobbles on his feet, and Phasma tucks an arm about him, letting him lean against the solid trunk of her armor.
“I apologize,” he mutters, his voice shaking. “That was highly unprofessional.”
“You’re lucky that he didn’t have the wherewithal to retaliate.” She turns her head to regard him. “You look ill, General.”
“I’m fine. I simply lack the patience to—”
“When did you last eat?”
He gazes at her, his brow furrowing. “That question isn’t within the purview of your position.”
“It needs to be asked.”
He hesitates, and she lifts off her helmet, affording him a view of her expression. The sharpness he had expected is absent, the lines of her face etched instead with entrenched weariness, eyes rimmed in shadow and thin lips drawn into a muted line.
“This morning,” he says.
She exhales softly. “Hux, I can smell the vomit on your breath.”
He glances towards his reflection in the mirror, pallid and hollow.
“Things have been difficult,” he tells her. “You must understand. I—I lost a great deal.”
“Do you think I didn’t?” she asks with a scoff. “That you’re the only one that has to contend with this? Entire squadrons of troopers I had trained—talented, brave soldiers—were incinerated in that fiasco. Do you think I don’t still wonder what else I might have done when I had that blaster to my head?”
“You didn’t have a choice.”
“One always has a choice.” She casts her gaze towards the floor. “This wasn’t only your doing, nor Ren’s, nor mine. The only way any of us will live with it is if we recognize that burden for what it is.”
“It was my responsibility,” Hux whispers, the words choking in his throat. “I should have—I ought to have—”
Phasma rests a palm against his shoulder. “You didn’t deserve to die there, Hux.”
He tries to say something, anything, but his airway seems to clench shut. He coughs to clear it, so violently that sickness roils in his gut and he grips the countertop, certain that he’s going to be ill in front of her—and then he inhales, filling his lungs as though breaking through the surface of an ocean. He breathes hard and fast, clutching at his mouth and nose in a futile effort to contain the tremors, and for all his restless thoughts, all his obsessive reasoning, he can’t comprehend why his eyes are stinging, sending rivulets of dampness trailing down his cheeks.
“We’ve all lost too much,” Phasma murmurs, her own voice wavering as she draws him back beneath her arm. “We need you. We need all the help we can get.”
*
That night, he sees Starkiller again in his dreams, engulfed in rivers of fire. He watches it grow progressively smaller and brighter, until it is at last one star among many, an unremarkable luminary set against the vast darkness of space.
He wakes cold.