Kujen and Pettiness

[rocky41_7]

One of the most defining aspects of Kujen, to me, is the extent of his entertainment in petty cruelty. Here is a man who has literally cracked the secret to immortality, one of the rulers of the most powerful force in the galaxy, and he delights so much in these small acts of meanness. We see it the most with Jedao.

It’s not clear that Kujen is capable of love at this point, but I do think he genuinely cares for Jedao, in whatever fashion he’s able. The whole refrigerator spiel—I really think this was the greatest gesture of love Kujen can give. It’s his way of saying “I will never let you go hungry” which for him, is also saying “I will always take care of your material needs.” He thinks of the things that scared him most, that made him the most unhappy in his youth, and he wants to assuage Jedao that he will never have to experience those things. So to me, clearly, Kujen cares for Jedao.

Yet he can’t seem to stop himself from being mean to him, in ways that don’t really gain Kujen anything and serve no purpose but to make Jedao a little more unhappy. It’s a fascinating aspect of a character who is so powerful and really, has everything he’s ever wanted.

“Kujen liked to needle Jedao about his fear of the dark” Why is Jedao afraid of the dark, Kujen? What has happened over the last four hundred odd years to make Jedao afraid of the dark? This is insane. Even setting aside Kujen’s documented lack of empathy, he would logically know why this would be upsetting for Jedao. And yet he does it. He stood by and listened to Jedao crying out for him in the dark after seven months with no human contact, after Hellspin Fortress and said nothing to him. And he thinks it’s funny to make fun of Jedao for his fear of the dark. Peak "babe can't you take a joke?" behavior.

Going to also separate the aforementioned—hearing Jedao calling out in the dark of the black cradle for any human connection—“Kujen can you hear me? I miss you. It’s so dark. Kujen, are you there?”—and refusing to respond in a way Jedao can hear. Hearing Jedao thrash around like he’s trying to bludgeon himself to death and doing nothing.

“Kujen liked to put Jedao in clumsy bodies…to remind him of what he’d lost.” This one is going near the top because it’s peak Kujen insanity to me. This is such a phenomenally cruel power trip. It’s such a small thing. It doesn’t help Kujen at all or really impede Jedao, except to be annoying. But it’s also a great big flex of just how much power Kujen has over Jedao. I could write an entire post just about this. We know Jedao was an assassin for the Shuos, which suggests to me he’s at least reasonably athletic and in control of his body, and Kujen took that away and put someone who was used to being able to move the way he wanted to into a body that could no longer do that, just for laughs. It also creates a minor weakness in Jedao, this new inability to control his body, and allows Kujen to step in and be so gracious and accommodating to poor, clumsy Jedao who needs help with these dance steps and keeps running into things. That he uses this to create these facades of tenderness where he’s guiding Jedao through dance steps is whack. The whole thing is a bonkers insane power play and there’s literally nothing Jedao can do about it.

Deleting Jedao’s memories at a whim just for the giggles. Jedao can’t even trust that his mind is his own; in a terrifying sense, the Jedao we meet in Ninefox Gambit is already not Jedao—it’s Jedao as Kujen has allowed him to be.

The snide little comment and chuckle when it becomes apparent moth!Jedao does not remember being hunted and assaulted by Khiaz. Oh this is so funny, someday you’ll remember how she publicly raped you and then you’ll understand! Dude, what the fuck?

This is comparatively minor, but the dismissive little “Call me by my name, no one uses that honorific anymore.” He is well aware that moth!Jedao’s entire world has just been turned upside-down and that that will continue in traumatic fashion, and he can’t even pretend to have patience for Jedao trying to adapt to this situation.

"I knew you’d come back to me.” Moth!Jedao is in so many ways the Jedao Kujen really wants—the one who isn’t aware of what an awful person Kujen is, the one without all the memories of the way Kujen has abused him, the one who Kujen has tailor-made to his desires. And he is fully willing to take advantage of this Jedao’s ignorance.

Oh child, no one else will ever love you.” Even when he understands he’s fundamentally lost, his last move is to impart this final, brutal cruelty on moth!Jedao (which I’m sure he would also have said to Jedao Prime, if he’d been able to). And he knows the likelihood of its truth! Jedao has lost anyone who might have once cared for him a long time ago; he is a man out of time; and he is known the galaxy over for the horrors he has inflicted. Moth!Jedao has the cherry on top of being a grotesque biology experiment that horrifies anyone who knows what he is. The true kicker is, of course, it’s questionable that even Kujen ever loved Jedao, or was even capable of doing so. He knows that so much of Jedao’s life has been spent in abject loneliness, and his last act, his last word, is to try to make sure he can never heal from it.

I’m sure I’m forgetting some, but it’s such a gross and fascinating character dynamic. Kujen genuinely seems to take pleasure in these little bullying acts which is just so astoundingly small-minded for someone with his power and knowledge. In some ways, he never outgrew becoming the warlord of his youth.

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