While you were studying the blade, I was studying you. You're weak on your left side and your footwork could use improvement. Also I think I've fallen in love with you. Who said that.
thrawn and eli make me sick. there's a star war going on and you're having a dynamic that goes against protocol and you're choosing each other? you're gonna analyze each other forever instead of just saying something... you asked the emperor to give him to you. you let him derail your entire career. and they won't even let us see what happens to them in the end.
So i said a minute but I was busy and really didn't expect to write something longer than a paragraph but here we are. It also took a different turn than I thought it would but it's alright. My evil blorbos can do whatever they want.
Hux's head spinned. He flinched when the swagger stick hit the ground and Pryde burrows his head in Hux's neck. Redhead hissed, his back was painted with red marks, it would bruise. Hux winced in pain when Pryde pressed his fingers into the mark on Hux's shoulder. He tried to kick him, but Pryde only snorted, pressing him harder into the bed.
"Charming.” Hux tried to yank himself up but failed miserably. “Is there anything you are not useless in?" He was grabbed by the neck in a way that you grab a disobedient dog. "Someone should really put you out of your misery." Pryde hissed.
Hand between his shoulder blades, Hux tried to move but he earned a hit. Pryde grabbed the swagger stick and swung it. The pain was like a shock wave. Hux saw white and tasted blood. His mind went blank and when another hit came he lost all will to fight back. He opened his eyes to close them immediately and mask his scream in the pillow. He was shaking, and when he tried to take a breath he realized to his utter horror that he was crying. Pryde was undoing him in the word possible way.
"I hate you." He gritted out but he almost choked on another sob that came out of him when Pryde grabbed his hair.
"Armitage. Dear boy, " Hux shivered "You know exactly what to do to stop me." Hux swallowed another sob, throwing his elbow back aiming for Pryde’s ribs "Do I have to cuff you?"
"You can try."
Pryde took that challenge and Hux regretted that fairly quickly when his hands were cuffed tightly behind his back. He forgot about the handcuffs even faster, his mind wonderfully absent. He remembered about them only when Pryde took them off. Hux winced, rubbing his wrists, he was propped on Pryde's shoulder and the pain was slowly getting to him. Pryde's skin was covered in bite marks, Hux didn't remember biting him but it was well deserved. Maybe he will die of infection that would be certainly satisfying. Pryde followed his eyes.
"I should have muzzled you. Vicious thing."
Hux blinked slowly, his head was buzzing and tears never stopped running. He sniffed, wiping down his face trying to move away from Pryde but he discovered that he can't summon his usual cold facade. His shoulders shook and he fell into an uncontrollable sob. Crying on Pryde's shoulder was never the plan and there was something in Hux that wanted Pryde to go. To leave him there crying and fallen apart. But no matter how humiliating, how undignifying, how absurd and unreal it was there was a part of him that needed Pryde to stay. That needed a confirmation that this manifestation of pleasure and violence wasn't meant to destroy him. Even if it did destroy him. Because Pryde's swagger stick took him to places Hux didn't want to revisit, because it wasn't the first time he was begging someone to stop. But then Pryde was right, he knew exactly what to do to stop him and he didn't.
"Hux." Pryde said and Hux only looked at him, wide eyed like a prey animal. Pryde stared at him in consternation. It wasn't something he was used to, he let Hux rest his head on his shoulder and Hux slowly realized he would be able to beg Pryde to stay. He would do a lot not to be left alone now and this realization almost made him forget how to breathe, fear slowly tightening around his throat forcing out another sob, his body frozen in place. Pryde looked at him surprised and wrapped his hands around his waist very slowly pulling him closer. He frowned looking at Hux who was shaking in his arms. "Hux." He repeated.
"I am ... Fine." Hux tripped on the words, swallowing tears. Pryde opened his mouth but then closed them after a moment. He had a lot to say. A lot to say how this looked far from fine and how he had better things to do and how Hux should get over himself. He slipped his hand into Hux's hair instead, playing with it. Thinking. Hux slowly quieted down. Suddenly overwhelmed with exhaustion. He realized Pryde was offering him water, he slowly took it and took a sip from the straw.
"I am... Dizzy." He mumbled quietly. More to himself than to the man next to him.
"Drink more."
And Hux did. Pryde glanced at him, raising his eyebrow.
"Lay down. " He said when Hux finished the water. And Hux did. Without questions, without any resistance, comment or sign of annoyance. "Curious." Pryde said. Hux looked at him. Pryde slowly touched his jaw tracing it with his fingers Hux leaned into his hand. They sat like this for a while in silence, Hux with half closed eyes, his head pressed to Pryde's hand and Pryde looking at him. An hour later Hux managed to eat a ration bar and take a shower. He was leaning on the bathroom door now, smoking a cigarette, half dressed. He didn't expect Pryde to be on the bed when he walked out of the bathroom.
"Still here?" He glanced at him.
Pryde observed him for a moment.
"Someone has to make sure you won't faint under the shower."
"And you were making sure from behind the door?"
"I wasn't invited."
"No you weren't." Hux lit another cigarette "and you already overstayed." He sat down on the bed. Pryde moved closer.
"Oh you wanted me to leave? Could have fooled me." Pryde hummed tracing a long horizontal scar on Hux's back. One not made by himself, a scar far older and far more brutal than anything Pryde ever did to Armitage. Hux closed his eyes and felt a kiss on his shoulder.
"Allegiant General, sir, you overstayed."
Pryde snorted amused. Sir never sounded as honorific in Hux's mouth. It sounded like an accusation. But Pryde never felt particularly guilty.
"Tomorrow at seven?"
Hux took a drag of the cigarette and exhaled.
"Eight thirty."
"Eight thirty.” Pryde nodded in confirmation. Hux picked a swagger stick from the floor running his fingers on the smooth wood and cold metal end. Pryde stood up next to him and extended his hand. Hux looked up at him still holding the swagger stick.
“Are you aware how ridiculous you look with this on the bridge?” Hux mused. Pryde took the swagger stick out of his hands. Hux turned around to look at him. Pryde poured himself a glass of water. “It has no practical purpose.”
“Really?” Pryde looked at him amused.
“On the bridge.” Hux huffed, irritated and put on his uniform jacket.
Pryde took a sip of water.
“It belonged to my father,” he said, frowning at the wall. Hux looked at him surprised. Pryde glanced at him. “It's a custom from Alsakan.” He looked down at the stick, “A sign of authority.”
“Your father…” Hux said carefully as if a sheer idea of Pryde even having a father was absurd.
“An imperial officer.” Pryde straightened up his uniform. “Rarely was home and I preferred it that way. I think you can sympathise with that. Eight thirty, tommorrow.” He said and Hux nodded. When Pryde left Hux stayed still for a very long minute staring at the door.
I'm so glad the star wars community did not overstate the delight that is Eli Vanto. He's a nerd. He's a hick. He has an incredibly useful degree and no way to apply it. He' so angry all the time. Cannot stress enough the nerd part or the angry part. He's highkey a terrible person. He got headhunted right out of college with no way to turn it down so now he's professionally stuck being the Little Guy for one of the most terrifying strategists in the galaxy. His interests include shipping manifests and excel spreadsheets. He's a walking cautionary tale on the dangers of becoming important at your job. He regularly thinks about committing treason. People call him pretty boy.
Anakin got 13 years of therapy, 10 which were spent with a dedicated therapist solely assigned to helping him manage his emotions and behavior so he could find a healthy path through life. But Anakin believed that he was the one person in the world who didn't need any therapy because he was better than everyone else who needed therapy and they were just jealous that he didn't need therapy when they tried to suggest that maybe he did in fact need therapy like the rest of them.
And then Anakin proceeded to murder all of the therapists and their children and spent at least two more decades continuing to hunt down any surviving therapists and anyone left who had the ability to BECOME a therapist, so while he was no longer receiving therapy at this point, that's pretty exclusively his own fault.
And even if there WERE some therapists still left alive, they weren't exactly jumping to offer him therapy anymore and it's pretty hard to blame them for that after he murdered them all.
So he mostly just ended up super lucky that a few of those surviving therapists ended up training his son to be a therapist and that his son was able to get through to him when no one else could specifically because this time it was his flesh and blood telling him these things and he was more willing to listen to his own flesh and blood.
So, yeah, I don't think the issue is that Anakin didn't get therapy when he needed it. That's a gross misunderstanding of his story and his character.
Star Wars fanfic is crazy because it will be like the most intense diabolical whump with characters getting tortured betrayed loosing even more body parts than in canon having ill advised sex and wanting to kill themselves but it will still somehow be a fix it because somewhere in there they will stop Order 66
I think there's something to be said for how Eli's time in the Ascendancy neatly mirrors what was likely Thrawn's experience when he first came to the empire. (Far from home, surrounded by people that are alien to you, getting dropped in an entirely new social structure and political game that you do not know the rules of, isolated from any social connection by both your own alienness and the culture gap) And following that train of thought, it's easy to see why Eli would desperately latch on to the one social connection he has (Thrawn) like it's a life raft. It's a parallel to the way Thrawn latched on to him, back when they first met.
But every once in a while he has one of his lusting-over-Thrawn moments and I just have to go jesus christ Eli please calm down
I'm halfway through Thrawn: Treason and my summary of the plot so far is what if you hired a highly decorated war general to solve your mice infestation and in taking apart the wall he found two different criminal conspiracies hiding in your drywall. Like on one hand glad to have found that but on the other hand buddy that is so far from the problem you were actually asked to solve.
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