New fic - Star Wars: "Per Exasperatio Ad Astra Chs 14"
I suddenly realised that I have been posting to AO3 and neglecting to do it here.
Chapter 14: In which there are wardrobe issues
Lando’s latest venture was living up to its advertising. Nimbus City was being both very kind to the sorry remnants of the Resistance, and extremely discreet. Leia and Rey were tactfully ensconced in the President’s Suite (one of four: the others were the First Chancellor’s Suite, the Emperor’s Suite and the Grand Master’s Suite), together with Poe, Dr Kalonia, Commander D’Acy, Artoo and Threepio. Chewie had a spacious, Wookiee-adapted apartment in the residential quarters for senior staff, which he had preferred as being closer to the bay where the Millenn…Stellar Envoy was getting a much-needed refit. The porgs had, with some difficulty, been extracted from the ship and moved to a luxurious and well-appointed quarantine area for guests’ animal companions. Everyone else was in the attached quarters for the entourage that the kind of personage who would actually stay in the President’s Suite would usually have, being scrubbed down, re-equipped and offered various forms of physical and psychological therapy.
Rey was in a state of mild shock.
A soft-voiced silver droid ("I am D9-PABP, your dedicated personal assistant and bodyguard while you are with us, ma’am. Please call me D9") had calmly and gently walked her through a full medical scan, de-worming, multiple vaccinations, dental treatment and a contraceptive implant, and then her first water shower (and the associated concepts of soap and hair treatments), a long soak in a pool of hot, mineral-scented water big enough for a dozen beings of Rey’s size, the delicate but inexorable application of skin exfoliation, depilation, mosturisers, a seemingly endless array of hand, foot and nail treatments and a hair trim. Her mild panic at every new procedure was assuaged by a constant supply of unfamiliar but delicious snacks (personal-care droids having of necessity sensitive and sophisticated customer-response analysis capabilities).
Several hours later, Rey found herself in her private sitting-room, slightly stunned, sipping some sort of warm, slightly sweet fruit tea, and confronted with a bewildering array of garments that had apparently just been made specifically for her (the President’s Suite came with a dedicated, ultra-high-end, fabrication unit). The clothes she had been wearing upon her arrival had, D9 informed her politely but firmly, been sent to the recycler. All she had now was the garment in which she was presently enveloped, something vaguely reminiscent of Luke’s robe on Ahch-To, except soft, warm, and a nice dark-orange colour with additional decorative stitching ("it’s called ‘embroidery’, ma’am”) in different colours along the edges.
"Taking into account your need for comfortable, becoming, hard-wearing, easily-cared-for, and technically functional clothing that will accommodate an active and adventurous lifestyle, ma’am, I took the liberty of selecting some items that you might find agreeable," D9 said in mellifluous tones, as ever more display racks came floating into the room, each bearing more clothes than Rey had ever seen in her life.
Rey suppressed the urge to scream for help and managed a slightly strangled, “Thank you,” and gracious nod (those Old Republic holodramas that she had found on her scavenged and refurbished datapad, with their strange, elaborate codes of behaviour, were coming in useful; the fact that Kylo Ren, with whom she had recently been sharing a mind in varying degrees of intimacy, had been born and raised in the manners required of a princess' son had nothing to do with it, not at all).
"It is my honour, ma’am. Since a soldier marches on her boots, ma’am, let us start by showing you some suitable socks…."
. . . . .
Snoke’s quarters were unlit. The walls of the gravity-shaft unfolded around the throne platform into total darkness.
“Lights 80 percent!” Hux snapped. Nothing happened.
“Wait a moment,” Ren said. His left hand tapped a complex rhythm on the arm controls of the throne. After a moment dim illumination crept slowly through the space around them, revealing still, pale drifts of what looked like white gauze, long enough to pile on the floor, and anchored from some unseen location on the unlit ceiling above. They seemed to flow back into the dimness, layer upon layer, hiding whatever occupied this bizarre place. The air was as frigid as in the throne-room, but even through the dry chill a faint, unpleasant, sour-sweet smell pervaded the air. Hux wondered in passing whether that was what Snoke had actually smelled like, under the dressing-gown. He had never been physically close enough to the creature to tell (this had undoubtedly been a Good Thing).
He made a note on his datapad to have the place thoroughly sterilised by hazmat droids before the ship was evacuated, so as not to leave any hazards for Engineering.
Ren stared tensely into the unrevealing shadows for a moment, then relaxed. “It’s all right. They’re dormant at this temperature. For now, anyway.”
WHAT
“Supreme Leader,” Hux said, keeping his voice level with some effort, “Is this location biohazardous???!!!”
Not just sterilised, but STRIPPED DOWN TO THE INFRASTRUCTURE AND VENTED TO VACUUM.
Only slightly, but yes, that would probably be a good idea, Ren said into his head. In a while. I need to check some things first.
The things that looked like curtains were not, apparently, curtains, but pets. Or part of Snoke’s personal security system. Or possibly a symbiote necessary for his and his attendants’ health. Or they snacked on the stuff in their off-shifts. The images he was getting from Ren were unclear, and for once Hux preferred to keep them that way.
“We’ll need more light,” Ren said. “It won’t get brighter than this.” Hux remembered the aliens in their shrouding purple robes and the lenses that concealed their eyes or equivalent organs. Snoke had mentioned casually once that their species had weak vision in the human-visible spectrum, though his own eyes had been unshielded; then again he had never claimed to be of the same species as his…servants, allies, whatever they were. Hux trusted that Rear-Admiral Telatten was taking advantage of their current enforced residence in Harbinger’s med-bay to have them scanned down to the sub-cellular level. He sent a note to her through AK-49, just in case.
Tiekte and Garmuth were producing hand-lamps, and Hux hurriedly followed suit. Like Garmuth, his attached to the insignia on his command cap; Tiekte’s had a strap that went around her forehead. The droids also lit wide-angle beams, which at least increased the light-level in the immediate vicinity. It did not, in Hux’s opinion, improve the view.
“Keep behind me,” Ren said, setting off into the tenebrous depths without bothering to look behind him. “Don’t shoot anything until I say.”
Marvellous. Tiekte was already at Ren’s heels. Hux loosened the blaster in the extra holster built into his greatcoat-pocket, and followed. Garmuth brought up the rear, followed by his droid.
Snoke’s quarters were entirely alien in layout and fittings, an insolent intrusion upon the First Order’s flagship; the white not-curtains, which lifted aside from their path with a twitch of Ren’s fingers, hung everywhere, seemingly at random. As they moved deeper into the space, the only vaguely familiar thing that Hux could glimpse on either side of their path was a kitchen-droid unit; otherwise, there was a collection of low, round things that might equally have been tables, beds, sitting-platforms or sanitary units, and far too many completely unidentifiable installations of design and materials foreign to both the Republic and the First Order. The smell was becoming stronger. Garmuth sneezed behind him. Hux’s nostrils twitched nvoluntarily, and he pinched the bridge of his nose to cut off the reflex.
“Nearly there,” Ren said. A low partition, light-coloured and flat-topped, ran almost all the way around a dark, circular patch of floor. Several dozen small, polyhedral …objects rested at irregular intervals along the top. Some of them glowed from internal light sources, though a quick query to AK-49 revealed no detectable electro-magnetic emissions outside the visible spectrum. Another of those mysterious structures rested in the absolute centre, with, incongruously, a large cushion made of some dark, sheeny fabric on the floor in front of it.
The entire set-up looked suspicious in the extreme.
The Supreme Leader said, “This is…was, Snoke’s library. The main databank is in the centre, subsidiaries are in the surrounding ring, and those are his collection of Sith holocrons. Don’t touch anything and stay outside the circle.”
A completely unnecessary injunction, even if no-one knew what “holocrons” were (which no-one did, even the droids). The modifier “Sith” was quite enough to keep everyone away without a direct order otherwise. The image of Snoke, reclining on his cushion in his dressing-gown and slippers while he consulted his library and nibbled on …bits of white thing, entered Hux’s mind, paused long enough to engender nausea, and was forcibly ejected out the other side.
Ren stalked forward through the gap in the circle, shadows swirling around him. His foot came down a couple of centimetres above that dark surface, and stayed there while the other came forward and joined it, in the air. AK-49 hurriedly told Hux (and Garmuth) that no, the circle was not a static repulsor field.
“Er,” whispered Garmuth, “Sir. Did you know that he could do that?”
Hux didn’t answer. No sense in letting FSB know just how out of his depth he was. In the last few hours, Ren had been doing things that Hux had never seen him do before. Was fairly sure he had not been able to do before. What exactly had happened to Ren, down on Crait?
“Director-General,” Ren said, having walked on air over to the databank-and-cushion arrangement.
“Sir,” said Tiekte with unimpaired good cheer; Hux made a note to find out what she was on, and get some; he tagged it highest priority for AK-49, and hopefully he would have a dose or ten waiting in his office by the time he got back to it.
“I believe your droid’s load-lifting capabilities have not yet been exceeded.”
“The shopping-bag, sir? There’s still plenty of capacity; do you want us to collect the thingies?”
“The holocrons, yes. Don’t touch them directly and don’t come within the ring.”
“Do they need padding or environmental control, sir? Because there’s only one compartment for temperature-sensitive objects, and we have Leader Snoke’s fingers in those, we should avoid contamination either way…”
“Ah. No, they don’t need any particular protection. They’re quite tough.”
“Yes, sir.” Her droid floated forward, ejected a rapidly unfolding soft-sided bag and a pair of calipers, and began neatly nipping up each…holocron, carefully staying on the outside of the ring.
“Hux, Garmuth, please stay alert. Removal of the holocrons may trigger a security response, and I’m going to be busy with this for a while.” Then he sat down on the cushion, cross-legged and facing the installation.
AK-49 and Garmuth’s droids had already mapped the entire space, located it in relation to the sector and identified the appropriate spots at which a suitable egress could be cut through the bulkheads as quickly as possible. Hux checked his pad. Engineering was on its way, ready to hack its way in on his word. FSB had a full battalion mustered for heavy security suppression, including hazmat operations. Science (a department of the Civilian Arm) had a specimen-collection team ready. Hux glared at Tiekte, oblivious on the other side of the ring with her droid.
Hux was about to give the go-ahead, when the Supreme Leader added, “Tell your troops to hold off, this location is unstable, and cutting through the bulkheads may do serious damage. And stay within one metre of DG Tiekte.”
Unstable???!!!! How, unstable???!!!! There was no answer. The Supreme Leader stayed on his cushion; if there was justice in the universe he would pick up something nasty from it.
You had better hope not. Snoke left a lot of traps. I’m disarming them.
Garmuth said “What?” but drew his blaster and moved into a guard position automatically.
Unaware of the mental colloquy, Tiekte looked up at the sound of her name, left her droid to sweep up the rest of the ‘holocrons’ higgledy-piggledy, and jogged back towards them, blaster out and pointed down in correct safety position. “I have no idea what’s going on, gentlemen, but perhaps I should stay in between the two of you.”
“Yes,” Hux said. “Cover the centre, we’ll cover the flanks, the droids to cover the Supreme Leader, our rear and the ceiling, and warn us of potential hostile activity beyond our visual limit in any direction. Garmuth, take dressing from the DG and stay in arm’s reach of her.”
Rage, the foundational drive of Hux’s personality, had already been bubbling up as they passed deeper into Snoke’s lair, and was rapidly reaching eruption point. Since he could not direct it at Ren (although bringing them into this ghastly, alien death-trap without warning or back-up was something that he could certainly blame Ren for), and Snoke was already dead (about which he was feeling happier by the minute), he was perfectly willing to share his feelings with any monster that chose to try conclusions with him.
It’s not a death-trap, Ren said in his head. The …um…, A completely indescribable image combining security/snack/symbiote/fabric landed in Hux’s mind, giving him an instant headache… have been weakened significantly by Snoke’s death. Just give me some time to take over the library, and then your engineers can start cutting in.
“Should we put on the filter-masks?” Tiekte asked. “We don’t know what those curtain things are, or what will happen if we burn them.”
“Yes,” Hux said. “Good thinking. The Supreme Leader says that they’ve been weakened by Snoke’s death, and I assume that blasters will have an effect, but he didn’t give me any other parameters.”
Don’t let them get anywhere near you<,/i> came the instruction.
Fine. “And don't let them anywhere near us. Garmuth, DG, fire at will the second anything so much as twitches in our direction. Garmuth, I assume your droid is armed? Good. Droids, please deploy your deflectors against any threats from above, and shoot at your discretion. Supreme Leader, I’d appreciate it if you could signal when you’re ready for us to be extracted.”
Garmuth sent him a quick, puzzled glance. Much of the First Order had retained the Imperial prejudice against giving droids too much autonomy, but their current personnel losses were going to take a long time to make up. Adult recruitment wasn’t going to replace the lost, and was unreliable anyway, so droids it was going to have to be. Hux had come to this conclusion among many others during that nice little rest he had had in his own head while Ren and the Resistance girl had been arguing inside it; now he could put it into practice, like a logical person (unlike some other people). Garmuth was reasonably intelligent, he’d work it out.
Hux slipped the filter mask over his nose and mouth, took a deep breath to activate it, drew his blaster, and settled down to watch for something that he could destroy. The reasonable wish would be for Ren to finish whatever he was doing before anything happened, so that the professionals of FSB and the hazmat team could deal with the alien infestation between them; he had enough to do, pest extermination wasn’t his job. Still, a bit of extermination (of anything, really) would be very soothing to his nerves.
Tiekte murmured beside him, “Luggy, please put the bag down behind us and then get up near the ceiling. I’d like to see what that stuff is attached to. Don’t let any of it touch you.”
The droid chimed acknowledgement, and there was a soft thump as a bag full of Sith …artifacts landed behind them. Hux risked a quick look back to check its location, (since tripping backwards and landing inside that dark circle would probably be bad for him, and would also make him look silly), caught a flicker of white out of the corner of his eye, and incinerated a fold of whatever-it-was that was somehow hanging rather closer to the Supreme Leader than it had been five minutes ago when all this had started. The white length scorched and rippled violently as the plasma hit, and its remnant retreated into the shadows, turning a vivid shade of purple as it went. The exact purple, in fact, of the robes that shrouded the aliens in constant attendance upon Snoke.
They were in Snoke’s wardrobe. Being attacked, not even by aliens, but by alien uniforms.
He shared this insight out loud.
“Urrgh,” said Tiekte through her filter mask, and fired at a hanging length that had quite definitely twitched. Half of it shrivelled into ash, and the rest turned purple and withdrew in good order. “That’s so undignified”.
A sensible, right-thinking woman, even if she had the good medication and wasn't sharing any of it with him.
“We have a problem, sir,” Garmuth said, sending a bolt of his own at another intrusive quasi-textile. “These things are clearly resistant to blaster-fire, and they could just smother us if they all attack at once.”
Yes, and why they hadn’t already done so was worth considering. Hux duly considered - Ren’s injunction to stay close to Tiekte came to mind, and what he had recently revealed about Tangrians, - and came rapidly to some conclusions, none of which needed to be shared with FSB.
“The Supreme Leader did say that they had been weakened,” he said instead. “Hopefully they will not become too aggressive before we can get out of here.”
If the Supreme Leader would just get himself together and let them get out of here, preferably before any gold dressing-gowns appeared to join the fight.
Tiekte’s droid whistled urgently. Its wide-beam lamp showed the upper end of the white curtains - multiple rows of cilia clinging like myriad, boneless fingers to the ceiling far above, and a slow ominous ripple of movement towards them. The weight of the hanging portions kept them still for the moment, but it was obvious that it was only a matter of time before they swept in and over the small group at bay beside the circle.
“I think,” Tiekte said cautiously, “that they’re homing in on the direction of our shots. Luggy, keep moving as you shoot, please.”
“All droids to do the same,” Hux said. “Garmuth, DG, keep alert for movement below.”
AK-49 sent its acknowledgement to his pad, as did Garmuth’s droid, and the three droids spun away in a floating, dodging dance among the hanging tangles, shooting as they went. Multiple fires flared, and then went out, leaving black ash and purple remnants in their wake. The hangings writhed indecisively, apparently unable to work out where the attackers were. A proper security system would have eliminated them as soon as they arrived on this floor. Snoke really had been asking for it.
Ren, we can’t hold them off forever!i Hux focused on this thought with all the considerable power of his irritation (not fear, not yet; he did not truly believe that Ren would let them die here). To his troops, such as they were, he said “Cover the front, I’ll watch the rear. Droids, keep drawing those things away from us.”
A shrilling scream rose from the … artifacts at his feet, and light flashed, bright enough to show through the bag. Hux jerked back by reflex; the other two (he noticed approvingly) had startled but maintained discipline and held their positions. Ren had sprung to his feet, hand out towards the library in a commanding gesture. His voice rose above the din, shouting words in an unknown but ineuphonious language. The hangings thrashed furiously all around then, darkening first to purple and then to black, and then, as the screams cut off at their highest pitch, collapsing into limp inertia. Ren kicked the cushion aside, took a step forward (still walking on air), and set his palms against the library installation. In the silence, Hux could hear a sudden deep hum of discordant notes, slowly resolving into a chord that was strange but reasonably harmonious to the human aural system.
Therei, Ren said in his head. All done.
Chapter 14: In which there are wardrobe issues
Lando’s latest venture was living up to its advertising. Nimbus City was being both very kind to the sorry remnants of the Resistance, and extremely discreet. Leia and Rey were tactfully ensconced in the President’s Suite (one of four: the others were the First Chancellor’s Suite, the Emperor’s Suite and the Grand Master’s Suite), together with Poe, Dr Kalonia, Commander D’Acy, Artoo and Threepio. Chewie had a spacious, Wookiee-adapted apartment in the residential quarters for senior staff, which he had preferred as being closer to the bay where the Millenn…Stellar Envoy was getting a much-needed refit. The porgs had, with some difficulty, been extracted from the ship and moved to a luxurious and well-appointed quarantine area for guests’ animal companions. Everyone else was in the attached quarters for the entourage that the kind of personage who would actually stay in the President’s Suite would usually have, being scrubbed down, re-equipped and offered various forms of physical and psychological therapy.
Rey was in a state of mild shock.
A soft-voiced silver droid ("I am D9-PABP, your dedicated personal assistant and bodyguard while you are with us, ma’am. Please call me D9") had calmly and gently walked her through a full medical scan, de-worming, multiple vaccinations, dental treatment and a contraceptive implant, and then her first water shower (and the associated concepts of soap and hair treatments), a long soak in a pool of hot, mineral-scented water big enough for a dozen beings of Rey’s size, the delicate but inexorable application of skin exfoliation, depilation, mosturisers, a seemingly endless array of hand, foot and nail treatments and a hair trim. Her mild panic at every new procedure was assuaged by a constant supply of unfamiliar but delicious snacks (personal-care droids having of necessity sensitive and sophisticated customer-response analysis capabilities).
Several hours later, Rey found herself in her private sitting-room, slightly stunned, sipping some sort of warm, slightly sweet fruit tea, and confronted with a bewildering array of garments that had apparently just been made specifically for her (the President’s Suite came with a dedicated, ultra-high-end, fabrication unit). The clothes she had been wearing upon her arrival had, D9 informed her politely but firmly, been sent to the recycler. All she had now was the garment in which she was presently enveloped, something vaguely reminiscent of Luke’s robe on Ahch-To, except soft, warm, and a nice dark-orange colour with additional decorative stitching ("it’s called ‘embroidery’, ma’am”) in different colours along the edges.
"Taking into account your need for comfortable, becoming, hard-wearing, easily-cared-for, and technically functional clothing that will accommodate an active and adventurous lifestyle, ma’am, I took the liberty of selecting some items that you might find agreeable," D9 said in mellifluous tones, as ever more display racks came floating into the room, each bearing more clothes than Rey had ever seen in her life.
Rey suppressed the urge to scream for help and managed a slightly strangled, “Thank you,” and gracious nod (those Old Republic holodramas that she had found on her scavenged and refurbished datapad, with their strange, elaborate codes of behaviour, were coming in useful; the fact that Kylo Ren, with whom she had recently been sharing a mind in varying degrees of intimacy, had been born and raised in the manners required of a princess' son had nothing to do with it, not at all).
"It is my honour, ma’am. Since a soldier marches on her boots, ma’am, let us start by showing you some suitable socks…."
. . . . .
Snoke’s quarters were unlit. The walls of the gravity-shaft unfolded around the throne platform into total darkness.
“Lights 80 percent!” Hux snapped. Nothing happened.
“Wait a moment,” Ren said. His left hand tapped a complex rhythm on the arm controls of the throne. After a moment dim illumination crept slowly through the space around them, revealing still, pale drifts of what looked like white gauze, long enough to pile on the floor, and anchored from some unseen location on the unlit ceiling above. They seemed to flow back into the dimness, layer upon layer, hiding whatever occupied this bizarre place. The air was as frigid as in the throne-room, but even through the dry chill a faint, unpleasant, sour-sweet smell pervaded the air. Hux wondered in passing whether that was what Snoke had actually smelled like, under the dressing-gown. He had never been physically close enough to the creature to tell (this had undoubtedly been a Good Thing).
He made a note on his datapad to have the place thoroughly sterilised by hazmat droids before the ship was evacuated, so as not to leave any hazards for Engineering.
Ren stared tensely into the unrevealing shadows for a moment, then relaxed. “It’s all right. They’re dormant at this temperature. For now, anyway.”
WHAT
“Supreme Leader,” Hux said, keeping his voice level with some effort, “Is this location biohazardous???!!!”
Not just sterilised, but STRIPPED DOWN TO THE INFRASTRUCTURE AND VENTED TO VACUUM.
Only slightly, but yes, that would probably be a good idea, Ren said into his head. In a while. I need to check some things first.
The things that looked like curtains were not, apparently, curtains, but pets. Or part of Snoke’s personal security system. Or possibly a symbiote necessary for his and his attendants’ health. Or they snacked on the stuff in their off-shifts. The images he was getting from Ren were unclear, and for once Hux preferred to keep them that way.
“We’ll need more light,” Ren said. “It won’t get brighter than this.” Hux remembered the aliens in their shrouding purple robes and the lenses that concealed their eyes or equivalent organs. Snoke had mentioned casually once that their species had weak vision in the human-visible spectrum, though his own eyes had been unshielded; then again he had never claimed to be of the same species as his…servants, allies, whatever they were. Hux trusted that Rear-Admiral Telatten was taking advantage of their current enforced residence in Harbinger’s med-bay to have them scanned down to the sub-cellular level. He sent a note to her through AK-49, just in case.
Tiekte and Garmuth were producing hand-lamps, and Hux hurriedly followed suit. Like Garmuth, his attached to the insignia on his command cap; Tiekte’s had a strap that went around her forehead. The droids also lit wide-angle beams, which at least increased the light-level in the immediate vicinity. It did not, in Hux’s opinion, improve the view.
“Keep behind me,” Ren said, setting off into the tenebrous depths without bothering to look behind him. “Don’t shoot anything until I say.”
Marvellous. Tiekte was already at Ren’s heels. Hux loosened the blaster in the extra holster built into his greatcoat-pocket, and followed. Garmuth brought up the rear, followed by his droid.
Snoke’s quarters were entirely alien in layout and fittings, an insolent intrusion upon the First Order’s flagship; the white not-curtains, which lifted aside from their path with a twitch of Ren’s fingers, hung everywhere, seemingly at random. As they moved deeper into the space, the only vaguely familiar thing that Hux could glimpse on either side of their path was a kitchen-droid unit; otherwise, there was a collection of low, round things that might equally have been tables, beds, sitting-platforms or sanitary units, and far too many completely unidentifiable installations of design and materials foreign to both the Republic and the First Order. The smell was becoming stronger. Garmuth sneezed behind him. Hux’s nostrils twitched nvoluntarily, and he pinched the bridge of his nose to cut off the reflex.
“Nearly there,” Ren said. A low partition, light-coloured and flat-topped, ran almost all the way around a dark, circular patch of floor. Several dozen small, polyhedral …objects rested at irregular intervals along the top. Some of them glowed from internal light sources, though a quick query to AK-49 revealed no detectable electro-magnetic emissions outside the visible spectrum. Another of those mysterious structures rested in the absolute centre, with, incongruously, a large cushion made of some dark, sheeny fabric on the floor in front of it.
The entire set-up looked suspicious in the extreme.
The Supreme Leader said, “This is…was, Snoke’s library. The main databank is in the centre, subsidiaries are in the surrounding ring, and those are his collection of Sith holocrons. Don’t touch anything and stay outside the circle.”
A completely unnecessary injunction, even if no-one knew what “holocrons” were (which no-one did, even the droids). The modifier “Sith” was quite enough to keep everyone away without a direct order otherwise. The image of Snoke, reclining on his cushion in his dressing-gown and slippers while he consulted his library and nibbled on …bits of white thing, entered Hux’s mind, paused long enough to engender nausea, and was forcibly ejected out the other side.
Ren stalked forward through the gap in the circle, shadows swirling around him. His foot came down a couple of centimetres above that dark surface, and stayed there while the other came forward and joined it, in the air. AK-49 hurriedly told Hux (and Garmuth) that no, the circle was not a static repulsor field.
“Er,” whispered Garmuth, “Sir. Did you know that he could do that?”
Hux didn’t answer. No sense in letting FSB know just how out of his depth he was. In the last few hours, Ren had been doing things that Hux had never seen him do before. Was fairly sure he had not been able to do before. What exactly had happened to Ren, down on Crait?
“Director-General,” Ren said, having walked on air over to the databank-and-cushion arrangement.
“Sir,” said Tiekte with unimpaired good cheer; Hux made a note to find out what she was on, and get some; he tagged it highest priority for AK-49, and hopefully he would have a dose or ten waiting in his office by the time he got back to it.
“I believe your droid’s load-lifting capabilities have not yet been exceeded.”
“The shopping-bag, sir? There’s still plenty of capacity; do you want us to collect the thingies?”
“The holocrons, yes. Don’t touch them directly and don’t come within the ring.”
“Do they need padding or environmental control, sir? Because there’s only one compartment for temperature-sensitive objects, and we have Leader Snoke’s fingers in those, we should avoid contamination either way…”
“Ah. No, they don’t need any particular protection. They’re quite tough.”
“Yes, sir.” Her droid floated forward, ejected a rapidly unfolding soft-sided bag and a pair of calipers, and began neatly nipping up each…holocron, carefully staying on the outside of the ring.
“Hux, Garmuth, please stay alert. Removal of the holocrons may trigger a security response, and I’m going to be busy with this for a while.” Then he sat down on the cushion, cross-legged and facing the installation.
AK-49 and Garmuth’s droids had already mapped the entire space, located it in relation to the sector and identified the appropriate spots at which a suitable egress could be cut through the bulkheads as quickly as possible. Hux checked his pad. Engineering was on its way, ready to hack its way in on his word. FSB had a full battalion mustered for heavy security suppression, including hazmat operations. Science (a department of the Civilian Arm) had a specimen-collection team ready. Hux glared at Tiekte, oblivious on the other side of the ring with her droid.
Hux was about to give the go-ahead, when the Supreme Leader added, “Tell your troops to hold off, this location is unstable, and cutting through the bulkheads may do serious damage. And stay within one metre of DG Tiekte.”
Unstable???!!!! How, unstable???!!!! There was no answer. The Supreme Leader stayed on his cushion; if there was justice in the universe he would pick up something nasty from it.
You had better hope not. Snoke left a lot of traps. I’m disarming them.
Garmuth said “What?” but drew his blaster and moved into a guard position automatically.
Unaware of the mental colloquy, Tiekte looked up at the sound of her name, left her droid to sweep up the rest of the ‘holocrons’ higgledy-piggledy, and jogged back towards them, blaster out and pointed down in correct safety position. “I have no idea what’s going on, gentlemen, but perhaps I should stay in between the two of you.”
“Yes,” Hux said. “Cover the centre, we’ll cover the flanks, the droids to cover the Supreme Leader, our rear and the ceiling, and warn us of potential hostile activity beyond our visual limit in any direction. Garmuth, take dressing from the DG and stay in arm’s reach of her.”
Rage, the foundational drive of Hux’s personality, had already been bubbling up as they passed deeper into Snoke’s lair, and was rapidly reaching eruption point. Since he could not direct it at Ren (although bringing them into this ghastly, alien death-trap without warning or back-up was something that he could certainly blame Ren for), and Snoke was already dead (about which he was feeling happier by the minute), he was perfectly willing to share his feelings with any monster that chose to try conclusions with him.
It’s not a death-trap, Ren said in his head. The …um…, A completely indescribable image combining security/snack/symbiote/fabric landed in Hux’s mind, giving him an instant headache… have been weakened significantly by Snoke’s death. Just give me some time to take over the library, and then your engineers can start cutting in.
“Should we put on the filter-masks?” Tiekte asked. “We don’t know what those curtain things are, or what will happen if we burn them.”
“Yes,” Hux said. “Good thinking. The Supreme Leader says that they’ve been weakened by Snoke’s death, and I assume that blasters will have an effect, but he didn’t give me any other parameters.”
Don’t let them get anywhere near you<,/i> came the instruction.
Fine. “And don't let them anywhere near us. Garmuth, DG, fire at will the second anything so much as twitches in our direction. Garmuth, I assume your droid is armed? Good. Droids, please deploy your deflectors against any threats from above, and shoot at your discretion. Supreme Leader, I’d appreciate it if you could signal when you’re ready for us to be extracted.”
Garmuth sent him a quick, puzzled glance. Much of the First Order had retained the Imperial prejudice against giving droids too much autonomy, but their current personnel losses were going to take a long time to make up. Adult recruitment wasn’t going to replace the lost, and was unreliable anyway, so droids it was going to have to be. Hux had come to this conclusion among many others during that nice little rest he had had in his own head while Ren and the Resistance girl had been arguing inside it; now he could put it into practice, like a logical person (unlike some other people). Garmuth was reasonably intelligent, he’d work it out.
Hux slipped the filter mask over his nose and mouth, took a deep breath to activate it, drew his blaster, and settled down to watch for something that he could destroy. The reasonable wish would be for Ren to finish whatever he was doing before anything happened, so that the professionals of FSB and the hazmat team could deal with the alien infestation between them; he had enough to do, pest extermination wasn’t his job. Still, a bit of extermination (of anything, really) would be very soothing to his nerves.
Tiekte murmured beside him, “Luggy, please put the bag down behind us and then get up near the ceiling. I’d like to see what that stuff is attached to. Don’t let any of it touch you.”
The droid chimed acknowledgement, and there was a soft thump as a bag full of Sith …artifacts landed behind them. Hux risked a quick look back to check its location, (since tripping backwards and landing inside that dark circle would probably be bad for him, and would also make him look silly), caught a flicker of white out of the corner of his eye, and incinerated a fold of whatever-it-was that was somehow hanging rather closer to the Supreme Leader than it had been five minutes ago when all this had started. The white length scorched and rippled violently as the plasma hit, and its remnant retreated into the shadows, turning a vivid shade of purple as it went. The exact purple, in fact, of the robes that shrouded the aliens in constant attendance upon Snoke.
They were in Snoke’s wardrobe. Being attacked, not even by aliens, but by alien uniforms.
He shared this insight out loud.
“Urrgh,” said Tiekte through her filter mask, and fired at a hanging length that had quite definitely twitched. Half of it shrivelled into ash, and the rest turned purple and withdrew in good order. “That’s so undignified”.
A sensible, right-thinking woman, even if she had the good medication and wasn't sharing any of it with him.
“We have a problem, sir,” Garmuth said, sending a bolt of his own at another intrusive quasi-textile. “These things are clearly resistant to blaster-fire, and they could just smother us if they all attack at once.”
Yes, and why they hadn’t already done so was worth considering. Hux duly considered - Ren’s injunction to stay close to Tiekte came to mind, and what he had recently revealed about Tangrians, - and came rapidly to some conclusions, none of which needed to be shared with FSB.
“The Supreme Leader did say that they had been weakened,” he said instead. “Hopefully they will not become too aggressive before we can get out of here.”
If the Supreme Leader would just get himself together and let them get out of here, preferably before any gold dressing-gowns appeared to join the fight.
Tiekte’s droid whistled urgently. Its wide-beam lamp showed the upper end of the white curtains - multiple rows of cilia clinging like myriad, boneless fingers to the ceiling far above, and a slow ominous ripple of movement towards them. The weight of the hanging portions kept them still for the moment, but it was obvious that it was only a matter of time before they swept in and over the small group at bay beside the circle.
“I think,” Tiekte said cautiously, “that they’re homing in on the direction of our shots. Luggy, keep moving as you shoot, please.”
“All droids to do the same,” Hux said. “Garmuth, DG, keep alert for movement below.”
AK-49 sent its acknowledgement to his pad, as did Garmuth’s droid, and the three droids spun away in a floating, dodging dance among the hanging tangles, shooting as they went. Multiple fires flared, and then went out, leaving black ash and purple remnants in their wake. The hangings writhed indecisively, apparently unable to work out where the attackers were. A proper security system would have eliminated them as soon as they arrived on this floor. Snoke really had been asking for it.
Ren, we can’t hold them off forever!i Hux focused on this thought with all the considerable power of his irritation (not fear, not yet; he did not truly believe that Ren would let them die here). To his troops, such as they were, he said “Cover the front, I’ll watch the rear. Droids, keep drawing those things away from us.”
A shrilling scream rose from the … artifacts at his feet, and light flashed, bright enough to show through the bag. Hux jerked back by reflex; the other two (he noticed approvingly) had startled but maintained discipline and held their positions. Ren had sprung to his feet, hand out towards the library in a commanding gesture. His voice rose above the din, shouting words in an unknown but ineuphonious language. The hangings thrashed furiously all around then, darkening first to purple and then to black, and then, as the screams cut off at their highest pitch, collapsing into limp inertia. Ren kicked the cushion aside, took a step forward (still walking on air), and set his palms against the library installation. In the silence, Hux could hear a sudden deep hum of discordant notes, slowly resolving into a chord that was strange but reasonably harmonious to the human aural system.
Therei, Ren said in his head. All done.