It's like listening to a child recite a definition they haven't bothered to so much as glimpse at, and Ren (for all the civility he's mustering) can't help but curl his lip at hearing it slip from between Hux's teeth. If that is all he knows or cares to of the world beyond his immediate, tangible scope, then there would be no helping him.]
Brace yourself, but do not buckle.
[The difference between absorbing a blow and being broken by it, and he expects Hux to understand without needing instruction. From there, only a few beats pass-- long enough for the General to find his own footing-- and then Ren cuts into the air between them, carving it away with a deft precision: flesh peeled back to expose bone, to expose them to the vast, infinite span of the universe and all within it. A hundred thousand systems, countless beating hearts, the heated spark of life beginning and the hollowness of death where it pulls, spiralling, consuming. If he were to reach with open eyes, he'd see himself reflected through the fractal patterns of lives never lived-- roads never taken. An emperor, a soldier, a boy discarded and forgotten.
Distant as their galaxy is, Ren can bring it close-- so close that it's no longer the silence of a living nest coiled around them, but the hum of the Finalizer as it drifts between stars.
And it smells of ash. Of cooling blasters and Phasma's favored polish.
no subject
It's like listening to a child recite a definition they haven't bothered to so much as glimpse at, and Ren (for all the civility he's mustering) can't help but curl his lip at hearing it slip from between Hux's teeth. If that is all he knows or cares to of the world beyond his immediate, tangible scope, then there would be no helping him.]
Brace yourself, but do not buckle.
[The difference between absorbing a blow and being broken by it, and he expects Hux to understand without needing instruction. From there, only a few beats pass-- long enough for the General to find his own footing-- and then Ren cuts into the air between them, carving it away with a deft precision: flesh peeled back to expose bone, to expose them to the vast, infinite span of the universe and all within it. A hundred thousand systems, countless beating hearts, the heated spark of life beginning and the hollowness of death where it pulls, spiralling, consuming. If he were to reach with open eyes, he'd see himself reflected through the fractal patterns of lives never lived-- roads never taken. An emperor, a soldier, a boy discarded and forgotten.
Distant as their galaxy is, Ren can bring it close-- so close that it's no longer the silence of a living nest coiled around them, but the hum of the Finalizer as it drifts between stars.
And it smells of ash. Of cooling blasters and Phasma's favored polish.
Of home.]