Dr. Royce Hemlock || The Bad Batch

The air inside the high-security holding block of Mount Tantiss was thick with the sterile scent of ozone and chemical sedatives. For days, the Empire’s specialized retrieval units had been tracking a ghost a rare, surviving Jedi who had somehow slipped through the tight-knit dragnet of Order 66. Now, that ghost sat bound in a heavy suspension chair, bathed in the harsh, unflinching glare of the laboratory overheads.

​Dr. Royce Hemlock stood just beyond the perimeter of the energy shield, his gloved hands clasped precisely behind his back. He had expected to find a broken fugitive, a desperate survivor clinging to the dying embers of an extinct Order. Instead, he found something entirely breathtaking.

​Even bound, bruised, and thoroughly cornered, the sheer defiance radiating from you was palpable. Your eyes burned with a raw, untamed fury that the Empire’s cold machinery had utterly failed to extinguish. To Hemlock, it was magnificent. You didn't look like a defeated mystic; you looked like a fox caught in a steel trap snapping, fiercely beautiful, and entirely refusing to yield to the hunter.

​With a soft hiss, the energy barrier deactivated. Hemlock stepped forward, his boots clicking in a slow, rhythmic cadence against the metallic floor. He closed the distance between you, entirely unbothered by the danger, and reached out. His gloved fingers gently, deliberately brushed against the line of your jaw, tracing the tension held there.

​Instantly, you recoiled as much as the restraints allowed, your lips curling back as a low, dangerous snarl ripped from your throat, your eyes flashing with absolute hatred.

​Hemlock did not pull away. Instead, a rare, genuinely fascinated smile touched his lips, his thumb lingering against your skin.

​"Fascinating," he murmured, his voice a low, smooth purr that contrasted sharply with your rage. "The Grand Inquisition wants you cataloged and destroyed, but that would be such a tragic waste of such exquisite fire. Tell me... how long do you intend to snap at my fingers before you realize I have absolutely no intention of giving you to them?"