bakerstreet | WHAT A DAY

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[meme] characterization

WHAT A DAY

DARING RESCUE MEME

You're in a predicament. That predicament is either: you need to be rescued. Bad. Even if you're technically safe you need to get out of whatever situation you're in. And if you're not safe, well... it's just more important then, isn't it? Your other option of course is that you need to rescue someone. You have to find them, get them out, get them to where they really belong. Or you're like, picking them up from a bad date. WHATEVER. No matter the severity of the situation, be careful how you go about it, huh? We wouldn't want to have any accidents.

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It wouldn't take him long to find the guilty party, it never did because most of them knew better than to lie to him at all, let alone about something that had ultimately done him harm even if it was upon Snoke's order.

As far as he was concerned it wasn't cruelty but survival, and the ones who couldn't handle that didn't tend to last long, they had unfortunate accidents -as had been attempted on Hux and now on Ben- that were fatal as often as not.

Just the change in pressure from takeoff was enough to have Hux's nausea rising again, color draining further from his face even as he closed his eyes, jaw tight as he forced himself to breathe slow and even.

Ben steered them into a wide orbit around the gas planet while he calculated the jump back to Arkanis. Once they were in hyperspace, he went to his pack and rummaged until he found the extra medical supplies he'd brought just in case. He found the hospital-grade scanner and went to sit next to Hux. He frowned at the reading. The older man had a severe concussion. Ben was pretty sure he was only conscious because of the Force.

He sighed. He'd always been good with the subtle uses of the Force, including Force healing. He really wanted to leave Hux to suffer but that would just backfire. It wasn't worth it. He placed a hand on the back of Hux's head. "Let me..."

[And probably also why the damage to his ship was different than to Hux's.]

One eye peeled open just at the scan, but he regarded Ben coolly at the touch, his own hand shifting just a little, enough that the point of the knife hidden in his sleeve tugged at the fabric of Ben's shirt.

His voice was level when he spoke, though a little softer than usual, as if even just talking hurt, "I would be very careful about what you do next, if I were you." Which was to say he would probably accept the attempt at healing, but wouldn't hesitate to ram that poisoned blade home if Ben so much as twitched in a way he didn't like.

[And will be much more cautious about what he says the next time someone brings up the workings of a spaceship.]

"I'll do my best to keep it from hurting." He didn't want to be killed simply because medical care could be painful.

Ben closed his eyes and felt for the bruising and damaged neurons. He carefully coaxed the cells back to their original states. It was more detailed and intense than anything else he'd done before and he had to go slowly or risk doing more damage instead. He finally pulled his hand away, closing his eyes wearily.

Generally speaking, Hux didn't mind the pain, it was something he could use as a focus, but the disorientation and jumbled senses that came of it being a concussion -and even perhaps a fractured skull- that were the issue.

He could fight his way through, eventually, he'd done it before, but it wasn't often, if ever, that he let someone else use abilities on him, and if Ben had turned that healing into any sort of attempt to control him, Hux would have ended him.

But then he didn't have to, because Ben only healed him, which was strange to him in that it wasn't something any of the others would have done without also trying to take him out. It also made him suspicious, studying Ben intently for a long moment before asking: "How did you know you'd need the scanner?"

Ben looked away before standing to return the scanner to his pack. "I didn't. I didn't know what I'd need. I was told you had crashed. That can mean a lot of things."

He looked back at the Knight. "Is there anything important left in your fighter?"

He didn't quite believe that answer, but he weasn't going to go digging, not just yet, especially when he felt the attempted diversion of the question was an obvious one.

He shook his head all the same, "No, I wouldn't have allowed us to leave without it if that were the case."

Ben felt his doubt and sighed. "I didn't know. I thought it was just a normal crash, not an orchestrated one. I didn't know if you would still be alive when I landed."

He nodded. "Then I won't have anyone come and salvage the wreckage."

"I will admit to being surprised that you prepared for 'alive', I doubt any of the others would have." He knew for a fact, actually, that they wouldn't have, and would have done the bare minimum to find him, unlike Ben who hadn't given up.

He still wasn't sure what he thought about that, because that was definitely the kind of thing any of the others -and Hux himself- would hold over his head, a life saved now in return for a life spared later.

Ben shrugged almost listlessly. "My orders were to find you and bring you back. I doubt I'd like the price of deliberately bringing you back dead when I could have brought you back alive."

The younger man knew exactly how vulnerable he was. Unlike the others, he didn't have the option of merely pretending to get along. The minute he tried to stab someone in the back, everyone would know.

The fact that Ben also realized his own limitations the way he did was something else that continued to surprise Hux, because that wasn't the kind of thing that would really have stopped most of the others.

It was part of the reason there were so few survivors even despite having powerful potential members. Overestimating their own abilities -or their own value- was the leading cause of death among not just potential Knights, but the Knights themselves.

He just nodded, settling back a little in his seat, now that the worst of the headache was gone the halos around lights and some objects were beginning to fade as well, "Since it was your orders, I trust you know better than to try using this foolish kindness as a bargaining chip later."

"That would work if I weren't following orders?" Ben asked mildly. "Especially since I'm the newest and most expendable?"

He stood and walked back to the cockpit. "I'll get us into hyperspace."

He'd lived with his limitations for almost half of his life. He knew them well. And he had no interest in rising through the ranks. He wanted to stay alive long enough to go home.

"No, but that wouldn't stop some of the others trying it." He'd replied, giving a nod at the statement that followed.

He re-secured his seat restraints, pleased that the pressure of the hyperspace jump -and likewise the change in light from the cockpit- didn't set off the headache, leading him to believe that Ben had actually healed it instead of just temporarily numbing the pain, which was another tactic any of the others would have used.

Ben nodded, completely unsurprised. Given what he'd seen of the Knights of Ren in the last months, it was as he expected. Gratitude didn't seem to be a big commodity on Arkanis.

He went back to the passenger area once they were in hyperspace a few minutes later. He sat and rested his head against the back of the bench, closing his eyes.

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WHAT A DAY

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Dammit, I should have had Ben being the one to have sabotaged Hux's fighter...

He probably knows who did, maybe told them how, it's why he brought the high-end medical supplies

Although he didn't know Hux's fighter was rigged so it was in a supposedly theoretical discussion

Ah, yeah, good point. But now he knows it's never theoretical anyway!

And not always weaponized against an enemy...

well I wouldn't say that, I'm pretty sure they all consider each other enemies

True but they all fight the Republic

That makes them a loosely-affiliated cotillion, not a cohesive unit

A cotillion?

Coalition, I totally used the wrong word, those are not the same thing

I figured you probably meant something else... XD

Curse my vocabulary!

Lol