The first few sips burn going down, which is what he wanted to feel, anyway. Then his lips go numb, and a fire pools in his stomach, and he finally feels his taut muscles relax. The next cup tastes much better, and the third one gets tossed down so fast that taste isn’t an issue. Something drips into the empty cup, plunking in the dregs of the amber liquid, and he realizes he’s crying. Cardinal hasn’t cried since Jakku. He hasn’t had a reason to.
Sometime later, he blacks out on his bed. And it’s a relief.
When his personal alarm announces the next shift, Cardinal has no idea who he is, where he is, or what’s happening. Everything is sticky and unclear, and his head is pounding. It’s a struggle to open his eyes, to stand, even to shower. Every other day on the Absolution, he’s woken with purpose, ready to face the day and make the First Order proud. Today he doesn’t even shave, just shoves his helmet down over beard scruff. He doesn’t have time to polish his armor, just has to scrape it up off the floor and fling it on before the children’s klaxon rings. He finds Phasma’s knife by the half-empty bottle of booze and wraps it in a piece of cloth, tucking it into one of the ammo boxes on his belt, along with the beetle. He chokes out a sad laugh. It turns out evidence only works when you’re allowed to present it.
At breakfast, he feels as if he’s merely watching someone else’s life unfold. The children greet him and smile and show deference, and he goes through the motions, all the while feeling hollow and sick inside. He gets his tray, and the cafeteria droid offers him an extra packet he hasn’t received before.
“For the hangover,” it says, its voice toneless.
Cardinal glares back at Iris, who bobs as if with a shrug, and he considers what it would feel like to take a droid apart with his bare hands. But instead of finding out, he simply takes the packet without thanks. He’s about to remove his helmet to eat with the children when he realizes that his face is most likely a complete wreck. Instead, he takes his food to his room and finds it more tasteless than usual. The hangover packet is a powder, which turns his water orange and slightly fizzy. Once the liquid is down, the dull pounding in his skull lets up a bit, but the emptiness around his chest doesn’t budge. There’s an ache, deep down, that won’t go away.
He gets to the training room before the children and surveys what he’s always considered his domain. Spotlessly clean, perfectly maintained, everything exactly where it should be to maximize their training. He stands on the high balcony overlooking the fighting arenas on one side and the window to the cavernous sim room on the other. Five technicians sit at the computer banks, waiting for his word on which sim to run. It occurs to him that sims are not real, and he wonders what it’s like for his new recruits, serving their first planetside tours under the watchful eye of Phasma. To go from Cardinal’s well-run sims and patient training to holding a real weapon and taking human lives under Phasma’s command. Many of his fellow soldiers seemed to enjoy such work, but Cardinal always found it distasteful, if necessary. Phasma probably relishes it.
As he watches the tiny children in their equally tiny armor arrive and pound on one another with riot batons, he realizes that he’s going to find out, and soon, what it’s like to fight when there’s something very important at stake.
AS THE DAY GOES ON AND Cardinal walks through his life like a ghost, trailed by a droid that now feels less like an accomplice and more like a nursemaid, he feels an increasing pressure in his chest. He takes his tray back to his room at dinner but has no appetite. Even the water is hard to swallow, as if there’s a knot in his throat. Disgusted, he tosses it all in the garbage chute and heads for the shower.
Last night’s shower was a slapdash, angry attack on his flesh. Tonight he moves through his First Order–outlined ablutions with a new sense of calmness, taking pride and comfort in every small step. He washes as they taught him at Brendol’s academy, left-down-up-right. He uses the precise amount of cleanser. He dries off in the way that minimizes time. He shaves with absurd precision, taking satisfaction in the rasp of his razor. This time, he does not nick his skin. When he shaves his head, he feels as if a new creature has been revealed.
“My name is Cardinal,” he says to the mirror. “Once CD-0922. Before that, Archex. But now my name is Cardinal. I am a decorated captain of the First Order, and I am a loyal soldier.”
As he puts on a fresh bodysuit, he can’t help noticing the muscles he’s developed through years of hand-to-hand combat, running, and calisthenics. He’s a man in the prime of his life, in top shape. He can outrun any of his charges, do pull-ups or push-ups until everyone else is winded. Just because he hasn’t needed or accessed his power in several years doesn’t mean he’s helpless.
Before putting on his armor, he goes through it, piece by piece, and shines it until there are no scuffs, no rough places. He selects a freshly pressed captain’s cape from the row in his closet and arranges it flawlessly over his shoulder. Once he’s fully dressed, he checks the boxes of ammo on his belt, then each of his weapons, ensuring his blaster is primed, ready, and set to kill. Phasma’s knife still sits on his table; he recalls inspecting it last night, holding it up to the light as if to discover some secret hidden in the blood-flecked blade. Now he returns the knife to the box with the beetle on his utility belt, unwrapped and blade-down.
As he stands before his mirror, he sees a soldier that anyone would be proud to command. A leader and a warrior, flawlessly trained and adept at split-second responses to any situation. Brendol Hux once told him that together, they were training a new generation of stormtroopers that would far surpass the flawed troopers of the Empire. Cardinal believed him then, and he still believes him. Cardinal knows, in his heart, that he’s unbeatable.
The only problem is that he now suspects Captain Phasma is much the same.
As he puts on his helmet, he realizes that it’s become home. Yes, sure, the Absolution is home and these austere quarters are home, but Cardinal feels most himself when he’s polished to a shine and seeing the world through the polarized lenses of his helmet. Is it strange, he wonders, that he’s more himself in a uniform? In a costume? Up until yesterday, there was nothing strange at all, nothing to question. Now, staring at his fully dressed image in the mirror, he understands that his humanity has been erased. The violently red uniform is just the outward expression of what they’ve done to a small boy found half starving, alone, on a backwater planet. They’ve made him what he is, the First Order and Brendol and even Armitage. He’s not the self-made man he’s always considered himself to be. He’s just another product, another perfect cog stamped out and plucked from a long belt of cogs to do his part in a larger machine.
He was happy as a cog. But now that he knows the entire machine is a fraud, that Phasma and Armitage are selfish killers who care more about their own advancement than about the First Order, what’s the point? Those children he’s training will just graduate to Phasma’s care and be molded, in turn, into whatever sort of monster is requested from on high. It’s sickening. It’s awful.
And, as Cardinal sees it just now, it’s all Phasma’s fault.
Cardinal’s eyes are locked with the reflective darkness of the helmet lenses. What color are his own eyes? Does he even remember? Before he realizes what he’s doing, his fist shoots out and shatters the glass. This time, Iris does not beep in alarm. The droid appears unsurprised.
Turning on his heel, he marches out the door, and Iris follows. It’s only a short walk to where he’s going: the training room.
Phasma is known for her personal attention to every part of the stormtrooper training regime she oversees, and every time she leaves the Finalizer to visit the Absolution she fully dissects every component of Cardinal’s curriculum, taking note of his students’ performance and the battle simulations they’ve been running. Before, he’s merely seen this as an intelligent way to transition the children’s education as they age out of his barracks and into hers. But now he recognizes it for what it is: arrogant meddling and intrusive
surveillance. It’s just another reason to hate her, but at least it means that he knows exactly where to find her today.
The door slides open for him, so at least General Hux hasn’t taken decisive action based on their little discussion earlier and locked him out of his own training room. After being excluded from the meeting, Cardinal has half expected to be marched out of his own quarters and tossed in the brig. If Cardinal knows Armitage, and he’s known the weasel since he was a snotty and vindictive child, he knows that he won’t be allowed to continue in his current capacity for long. Much as Cardinal gives demerits to recruits who tattle on other recruits, Armitage surely keeps a running tally of marks against him, and this is one scorch mark that can’t be erased with a good polishing.
Not that it matters. Cardinal sees what he wants. Looking down from the balcony into the sim room, he watches Phasma. She’s down there in full uniform, helmet and cape on, riot baton in hand, working through a simulation Cardinal personally programmed as the graduation test for his oldest recruits. She’s destroying it, of course, smashing even his best students’ scores. Taking the remote control as he so often does when interrupting a sim mid-battle to offer instruction or admonition to his students, he walks down the stairs and opens the door to the sim room. Phasma doesn’t notice him at first, as she’s in total immersion mode, all her senses fully focused on fighting a particularly agile Twi’lek in Resistance gear, so he hits PAUSE , freezing the scene mid-fight.
“And how do you find my program, Captain Phasma?” he asks. Even through the helmet’s vocoder, he sounds mocking, and he doesn’t care whether she senses it.
She unfolds from her fighting stance, lets her shock baton drop, and turns her head slowly, as if he represents zero threat and she’s surprised to learn he can speak.
“You know how I feel, Captain Cardinal. Your numbers are superlative, but your clever simulations and Armitage’s automated regimens are no match for real experience. No matter how pretty, such insubstantial simulations can’t compare to a flesh-and-blood foe.” Her hand brushes the Twi’lek’s face, then slaps it. The droid underneath the holographic Twi’lek skin bobs from the hit. “You can’t have a real reaction to a fake fight. You never know a soldier’s true worth until they’ve stood on the battlefield, faced with death.”
Cardinal clicks the remote, and the hologram disappears. Sand, beasts, droids, civilians, obstacles, and enemy combatants disappear to reveal a huge room filled with combat holo droids in standby mode. The walls are lined in weapons and lit coldly from far above. It’s just them, now. Captain Cardinal, Captain Phasma, and their single witness, a floating droid silently recording their every word.
“So, you’d—what? Have me send children into real battle? Award them points for murdering civilians and possibly one another? My job is to make them soldiers. You’re the one who makes sure they’re killers.”
Phasma steps closer, and Cardinal hates that she’s taller than he is, forcing him to look up.
“Correct, Captain. I do make sure they’re killers, because that’s what the First Order demands. Courage, tenacity, and the ability to pull the trigger when the trigger needs pulling. That is how supremacy is won. You’ve never seen actual combat yourself, have you?”
Cardinal shrugs and casually pulls out his red blaster. Pew pew pew, and he’s hit the bull’s-eyes on three targets at the far end of the room.
“Of course I have, and I always received top marks. I consider it my duty to do as the First Order wills. I do as they command to the best of my ability, as Brendol Hux trained me to do. Even Supreme Leader Snoke speaks highly of my results and my skills. If you think my lack of recent experience is a problem, I suppose you could take it up with him. Or Armitage Hux. He does seem to appreciate a soldier with firsthand experience of murder.”
The cold way Phasma cocks her head reminds Cardinal of some predator in the wild. He has her attention now, completely, and he’s utterly sure that this is a predicament few people have survived. In the chrome of her helmet, all he sees reflected is a field of bright red.
“You seem to be hinting at something rather dangerous, Captain Cardinal.”
Cardinal rams his blaster home in its holster. “A loyal soldier never challenges his superiors. But as we’re both captains, I suppose I do have some questions about your commitment to upholding First Order ideals.”
“You’re wasting my time with these childish games, Cardinal. If you have something to say, say it.”
The moment stretches out. It’s impossible to lock eyes when both parties are wearing helmets, but Cardinal feels like whoever blinks first will lose. In the end, he isn’t sure what to say. His training prevents him from directly accusing a fellow officer of murder, even if he’s 99.9 percent sure she’s guilty.
“That’s what I thought,” Phasma says, clipped voice dripping with disgust. “Coward.”
Every wretched thought from the last day coalesces into rage. Cardinal snatches up her dropped riot baton, which flares to life the moment his magnetized gloves activate it. With a scream of rage, he swings for Phasma, desperate to feel the weapon collide with actual flesh, his enemy’s flesh.
But Phasma is too quick for him, spinning out of range and darting to the rack of batons on the wall. Ripping off her cloak with one hand, she whips her baton into position and charges at him, shouting a war cry of her own. The ululating scream echoes off the high walls, and Cardinal’s training kicks in.
He runs to meet her.
IT’S CLEAR FROM THE FIRST STRIKE that the stakes of this fight are different. Their batons clash, hard, the impact jarring up Cardinal’s arms, making his bones ache. He spars regularly with SC-4044 and his other subordinate instructors, but it’s always a friendly, relaxed experience. Not this…this madness. Phasma beats at him mercilessly, grunting and shrieking with each impact. As he parries, his body reacting half a second before his mind can keep up, he seems to separate into two selves. One is acting on autopilot, his muscles and nerves perfectly timed as if he’s a droid running a program. The other is a purely emotional being filled with rage and fear and fire, and his lip curls as he merges those two selves, putting the power of fury into his strikes.
“You’re weak, Cardinal. You strike like you’re following directions someone else wrote,” Phasma says, her voice a growl and her accent far less clipped.
“You’re a killer.” He goes for an uppercut, but she slashes his baton aside, making him stumble and recover.
“If you don’t fight like it’s a fight to the death, are you really fighting?”
She lands a hit on his armor, and electricity writhes over him but can’t pierce his suit.
“They should write MURDERER under your poster, not EXEMPLAR . Those children look up to you, Phasma!”
“As well they should!”
His every parry is thrust aside. She’s bigger, but she’s fast, and each hit echoes through his nerves. He glances at Iris, but she’s powerless to help him. He never programmed her to defend his life, and she couldn’t harm a First Order soldier, in any case. She can only watch.
“You’re only out for yourself. Your loyalty means nothing. Brendol should’ve left you where he found you!” he shouts.
Their batons clash and hold, and Cardinal pushes as hard as he can, his teeth bared as sweat drips down his forehead under his helmet.
“Your loyalty is disgusting,” Phasma spits. “You were like a dog pissing itself at Brendol’s feet. Do you think he cared about you outside of using you? Do you think he respected you? Do you think Brendol Hux was worthy of your allegiance, your adoration? If you think I’m a killer, then you should’ve gotten to know the real Brendol. Who he was off this ship.”
The metal squeals as Cardinal struggles to hold her baton away. It takes everything he has not to fall back, but he’s not about to let Phasma see any weakness.
“Oh, I’ve heard. I’ve heard all of it. I know you killed Brendol, and I know you killed your own brother, and I know you let eve
ryone else you ever pretended to love die. As long as you survived, what did you care?”
Phasma steps back, causing Cardinal to stumble forward. Her baton sweeps up and cracks against his helmet, making the readouts buzz and glitch and his ears ring. In the moment that he’s confused, she hooks his ankle, and he goes down on his back. But he’s been trained for this, too; he rolls with the energy, right over his shoulder, and stands again, baton at the ready.
She wags a finger and tsk s. “I know all your moves, Cardinal. I’ve studied your programs, run your sims. There is nothing you can do that would surprise me.”
The only answer, it seems, is to step back and throw his baton at her head. As she ducks, Cardinal tackles Captain Phasma to the ground.
This is not a First Order–sanctioned move.
First Order stormtroopers are taught never to release a weapon. Dropping a weapon gives the enemy the advantage—and another weapon. And disregarding his training works, because Phasma goes down like a sack of sand, her chrome armor clanking against the floor. As she flails, Cardinal exerts his weight and reaches for her knife, pulling it out of his ammo box and aiming for the bodysuit peeking out from the armor at her neck. It’s a dirty move, but that’s the biggest gap in her armor, and he knows he’ll only get one chance.
Before it sinks into flesh, the knife is stopped. He presses harder, but it just rasps against the slick metal on Phasma’s forearm. She snakes her other arm around his neck, pulling him close and trapping him. Unable to move, Cardinal is stunned to find this is the closest he’s been to another adult human. He’s never embraced a woman, never put on his plain uniform to mingle in one of the ship’s bars or taken leave off the Absolution to visit a backwater world’s darker alleys. Even though their skin is hidden under layers of armor and thick body gloves, even though they’re both wearing helmets, there’s a strange intimacy here that Cardinal can’t process.