Armitage and Counselor Rax

[lavender_sage]

 I’ll admit that I felt pretty ambivalent about reading the Aftermath Series because, to be honest, I only feel invested in a small number of characters in it.  So, I decided to just read the last one, and a lot of it is not that interesting to me.  However! The chapter where Gallius Rax gifts Brendol Hux’s murderchildren to his son is worth the price of the book for the insights it gives.

The chapter is presented from young Armitage’s point of view and details his first experience with having power over others. This is how the chapter opens: “The redheaded boy sits on a ship without viewports so he cannot see the endless dunes or the raging war going on above them. All he can see right now is the other children: two dozen of them lining benches on each side of the transport ship, all of them in white, all of them staring at the young child as if he’s a gobbet of meat and they’re a pack of slavering yenavores.”

Needless to say, Armitage is terrified.  When Rax appears, we quickly learn two things: that Brendol is on the ship and that he has not explained what is going on to Armitage.  His father knows where he is and is, presumably, perfectly content with him being there.  Wookiepedia describes what is going on in this scene as Rax “tak[ing] pity on Armitage.” Now, I don’t go to Wookiepedia summaries looking for insightful analysis–that’s not their purpose–but I would argue that this is straight up wrong. Before he gives him this gift, Rax manages to make Armitage even more upset than he already is.

It is Rax who introduces the idea that Brendol is neglecting Armitage because he dislikes him: “Brendol does not much like you, I suspect.”

Armitage’s reaction is just what one would expect: “Tears line the boy’s eyelids as he nods in agreement.”  He’s not telling him anything he doesn’t already know, but this exchange is an interesting preface for what follows.  After Rax gives Armitage the gift of authority over these children, he makes it quite plain what the consequences of not using it effectively will be: “They want to kill you, I fear.  The want to slash at you with their fingernails.  The want to bit you until you are just unrecognizable pieces.  They would, if given half a chance, beat you with common rocks until all your limbs were broken sticks.”

Once he has Armitage nearly ready to wet his pants with fear, he offers an alternative.  It’s not that Rax will take him out of this situation or stay with him to keep him safe.  It’s, “You will lead these children.  They will serve you [ …] It will be your life’s work to take children like these savages and hammer their malleable minds into whatever shape you require.  They will be tools for the work at hand.”

Rax’s manipulation here is very effective.  He makes sure that Armitage (and the children listening) know that the person who would protect him under normal circumstances is not going to do that, not because he can’t, but because he doesn’t want to.  He plants these incredibly violent images in all of their minds and then leaves them to test their new relationship alone.  He essentially throws Armitage into shark-infested waters and says, “Swim, kid!”

Armitage is ambivalent about this.  The other children’s agreement with Rax’s directions both “disturbs and thrills” him.  When Rax is gone, he orders one boy– who, unsurprisingly, looks like him–to hit another.  It might say something that he immediately resorts to violence, but after Rax’s speech, violence is on all of their minds. Though he is initially afraid that the children will not listen to him, Armitage’s reaction to seeing the other boy bleeding is to feel “a strange and sinister buzz of excitement.” Is this excitement simply sadism or is it the thrill of realizing that he is not, in fact, about to be eaten alive?

This scene gives us an example of manipulation that, as I understand it, we’re left to imagine for ourselves regarding Ren and Snoke. There is nothing here to indicate that Armitage is anything other than a normal kid in an appalling situation.  And given that he remains in this situation, working side by side with his father–he’s a grown man when Phasma murders Brendol–it’s unsurprising that he grows into an appalling adult.  Nothing interferes with the plan Rax outlined for him and, as far as we know, he’s never offered any alternative besides the original one: being eaten alive. I would argue that fear is still a strong motivator of Hux’s actions, and there are still good reasons for that fear, as TLJ makes plain.  He’s still trapped in a closed system in which violence and power are the only alternatives.