#✧･ﾟ: * TARKIN ( of power i could tell you much. )

[kalak]

Au where luke has a weird ancient force superpower. He literally can come back from the dead. He can resurrect, just like that- the more gruesome the death is, the longer it takes for him to come back, but other than that there's no side effect whatsoever.

This contributes to luke being even more reckless than in canon (obiwan having an aneurysm in the background); he gets killed by slavers, Tusken raiders, a random mugger, a malfunctioning vaporater, being out in the desert for too long, getting lost in the desert... etc etc. But he comes back! Every time! So Owen, Beru, and Ben are like oh no. This power is the worst thing this boy could have but also it apparently is the only thing keeping him alive so. You win some you lose some I guess (Owen still grounds luke every time he comes back from the dead though)

Now in the rebellion, luke kinda.. doesn't tell anyone about this power bc 1. He got drilled into his head to keep it secret as he was growing up becausr he'll definitely get experimented on (obiwan led many of the cover ups) 2. He got self conscious about it. Other people were so praising of his 'selflessness' and 'sacrificial nature' but he thinks he's like That because he can shrug off death. How can you tell people that when they're all like woah you're awesome!!!

But! That doesn't mean luke doesn't utilize his power. Whenever an imp catches him he's like fuckin kill me you wuss. You coward. And then he gets up after they shoot him and leave his dead body. He has a tracking device on him in case he gets stranded in space after his ship gets blown up. Han & Leia were horrified at first but by the fifteenth time they're like *resigned sigh* *pulls out a mop*. Luke calls it just having a little nap :]

Now for the fun part: Vader has no idea about any of this. So when he reads the spy intel, the impression he gets is that Luke is reckless to the point of being suicidal, and that. He might be fatalistic and actually craving death at every moment.

This gets worse when Luke jumps off in cloud city - (he actually just dies here falling but he's ok again :)) after that, with a mental connection between the two established, vader's like ??!?@?@?? because luke's force presence keeps blinking out.. Like he's dying?? But that can't be it...? And he just keeps flashbacking to padme's death and hyperventilating about it but it's actually just luke blastering himself bc he woke up at the wrong side of the bed.

And then Vader finally captures luke. Luke is like oh no fuck you fuck you fuck you and he tries to jump out of the airlock - (vader catches him at the nick of time) steals vader's saber - (vader thinks that he's gonna attack but nope, luke tries to skewer himself) and vader's like oh no. Oh no I need to protect him from himself.

Then there's a hostage situation - tarkin's gripping luke, blaster to head, threatening Vader. Vader is backing off for once in his life, fearful... he's ready to accept any deal, almost agrees - but Luke's like no. Vader might be an arse but he's been nicer than tarkin and amicable, I'm not letting him lose to tarkin of all people. Also this would be a nice fuck you to both of them.

So he goads tarkin, telling him that he's a wuss and that tarkin thinks the tarkin doctrine only works because tarkin himself is a coward dictated by fear, who ironically hasn't known true fear - fear for someone rather than himself - his way will never work because a seven year old has more backbone than him- And that's when the blaster goes off, tarkin's temper getting the best of him.

Vader rushes to Luke's side, but it's too late and Luke's dead. Vader's like *flashbacks to padme* *flashbacks to shmi* and he's apologizing to Luke's body, telling him that he's Luke's father,

That's when luke comes back being all like yeah I needed that that's much nicer and vader's like. ??what in the palpatine's saggy nutsack and Luke's like what the fuck do you mean you're my father-

[marvelstars]

Vader really wanted both death stars gone

I was remembering all those scenes from the original trilogy and Rogue One in which Vader makes quite clear his distate for the Death star and I have come to the conclusion that while he definitely wasn´t a double agent, as much as I love fics like those, he definitely wanted those two technological terrors gone and I am a little surprised Palpatine trusted him with both projects as much as he did.

Lest star with Rogue One, Vader´s scenes are short but they tell a lot about his general mindset about the death star.

In Rogue One Vader´s makes a point of calling to his castle Director Krennic, who is been in charge for years of the death star, Vader´s is quite aware of Krennic´s competitiviness with Tarkin as well as his thrist for greater power which didn´t concern him too much and didn´t seem to care to intervene between the two of them, that´s until Jedha´s main city was destroyed. For many high ranking imperials Jedha was just a small sacrifice neccesary to probe the death star capabilities, for Vader jedha was a civilian city, uninvolved with the galactic civil war and also an old holdout of force knowledge neutral to both the Jedi and the Sith a rare thing indeed, that was destroyed without much thought about it. Vader is pissed off and until Krennic admitted it wasn´t his call but Tarkin, the current favorite of the Emperor, Vader changes the subject and tells Krennic to clean his mess with Erso, protect the plans and also a version of the events on Jedha that hide the Death Star existence from the Senate. It´s very interesting for me to see that of all imperials involved, Vader seems to be the last one who cares about the Senate oppinion on anything, the same happens at the beggining of ANH.

Next time we see Vader, Rogue One has managed to send the signal of the plans for the death star to Leia´s starship and Vader gets to the place of the battle just in time to see Tarkin, again, sacrificing an imperial world and military base for the small chance of stopping the rebels from getting the plans, which is already too late, Tarkin doesn´t acomplish anything besides destroying an imperial intelligence center, soldiers and all.

Tarkin has officially become tigger happy with the death star, has killed Director Krennic, his main competition and now holds sole authority over the death star, with the exception of the Emperor himself, who is on Coruscant and as far as Vader knows, wasn´t consulted on those decisions and neither was him , Tarkin feels confident enough in his position to do bassically, whatever he believes is neccesary to do with this new found power.

Vader technically, isn´t Tarkin´s underling but he isn´t in charge of the death star either, the DS is the Emperor´s baby project but Vader is getting more and more furious over what Tarkin and the other high ranking Grand Moffs are doing with it.

It´s an interesting situation because Vader can´t accuse Tarkin of being unfaithful to the Emperor but he seriously has stopped asking for orders either and he is going tigger happy on the galaxy with the new death star.

Then we have the famous Hallway scene in which Vader does his best to get back those plans, only there´s something curious happening here, Vader is certainly taking matters into his own hands but for someone who has the force, he took a bit more time than neccesary in getting the data disk with those plans. It´s almost as if he expected the rebels to get them.

Then in A new Hope, he doesn´t get the data disk either, thanks to Leia´s quick thinking but when she proves to be resistant to his interrogation, he tries to convince Tarkin not to execute Leia, he tells his soldiers to use non-lethal force on all people from Leia´s Ship in case they know something, Obi-Wan could feel on hyperspace Alderaan´s destruction, can you imagine how Vader and Leia felt in close range as two strong force sensitives?

Later Vader convinces Tarkin to let Leia escape with the plans and in this way, get access to the location of the rebel base, which he does but admits it´s a big risk, Leia was aware of this, she knew they allowed her, Han,Luke and Chewie to escape and knew their only hope was to destroy the Death Star before they destroyed the rebel base.

Then Vader does something very interesting, he decides to attack the rebels on his own, with only two imperial soldiers flanking him a mission that´s frankly below his rank but makes sense for his personality, this takes him out of the death star,maybe because he was already aware of the flaw on the Death Star? after all he is a great engineer even if weapon building isn´t his especiality, why allow the rebels to get so close to the trenches of the death star? plausible deniability? or was he aware of the danger and did meant to try to stop the rebels before they destroyed the death star? In fact moments before the Death Star destruction, Tarkin receives the report that there´s danger in the attack the rebels made agaisnt the death star and some soldiers and high ranking officers are evacuating while Tarkin decides to stay because he feels they are close to victory.

This ends with the death star destroyed, the rebels celebrating, Tarkin dead and Vader alive if chastited and degraded by the Emperor for losing the death star even if he keep his place as leader of the imperial military forces, so Vader could see this as an aceptable sacrifice.

Mind you, this doesn´t mean I am impliying Vader was coming back to the light side of the force at this point but even as Vader, part of his self given mission after losing bassically everything that mattered to him was "Order in the Galaxy" and as a force sensitive, something like the death star probably was seen by him as a cancer that needed to be taken out to preserve Order.

Just some food for thought.

[tarisilmarwen]

Rebels Rewatch: “Rebel Resolve”

Boy, say that ten times fast.

Some ominous rolling piano notes that accompany the chicken walker, sounding just as lumbering and mechanical.

Subtle animation appreciation moment: That one extra squashing himself flat against the crates to give the troopers and walker some room.

Cymbals crash on cue with our pan up to Sabine and Zeb.  And some heroic trombones pipe in the moment Zeb and Ezra make their move.

He’s a little shit and I love him.

The downbeats stagger along with the walker legs.�� This cue is tight-wound and frenzied sounding, no recognizable themes but still a dynamic, exciting track for the scene.

Chopper’s vocalizations are so pronounced you can almost make out words here.

This is not the first stolen Imperial vehicle we will see them in the cockpit of lol.

Ezra very insistent that Kanan’s alive.  Of course, he can probably sense it.  High canon still hasn’t really confirmed that Force Bonds are a thing (outside of the dumbass dyad thing but we’re not counting that) but Ezra’s agitation this episode and his uncanny “just a feeling” type knowledge that Kanan’s alive has all the earmarks of it.

Oh hey speaking of!

Kanan seems juuuuuuuust slightly out of it, safe to say he’s probably had truth serums pumped into him in preparation for a mind probe.

Not only no fanfare but a deep bellowing bass note, oh fun.

Sabine has decided to take up the back gunner’s seat and this whole sequence of the three of them sniping at each other is a bit darkly hilarious.

“Excuse me I’m the rear cannon thank you very much!”

The Alliance variation of the Force Theme comes in as Hera swoops down and let’s just appreciate the skill it must take to keep the Phantom both steady and ahead of an advancing walker.

I unabashedly love that Chopper stayed behind still trying to get information that would help them find Kanan and how sorely he misses the man and how he really steps up this episode to be useful.  The orange tin can murderhobo does care.

:(

Oh boy, do I get to talk about Ahsoka ordering Hera not to rescue Kanan now?

You know it’s really kind of amazing that this moment of all moments did not garner many bad faith rancid takes.

Ahsoka gets a weird amount of leniency from fandom on this, frankly.

I mean arguably Ahsoka is basically choosing to let Kanan get tortured and killed or turned, in order to keep the wider Rebellion quiet and out of sight.  That plays a bit into the conflict in later seasons and even Rogue One, and the Alliance’s eternal debate about when to take direct action and when to wait and be cautious and shore up.  It’s a bit interesting that both the Spectres and Rogue One taking the risk and initiative essentially forces the Alliance’s hand, tipping them into more open conflict with the Empire.

The Rebel Alliance might tell you off for being stupid but at the end of the day it will have your back.

So yes, in that sense it was right for Hera et al to disobey orders and go after Kanan anyway.

...But Ahsoka also kind of has a point.  Hera was risking getting herself and her whole team captured or killed and that could have been disastrous for secrecy reasons and a devastating blow to morale for the people who’d heard the message, squashing any thoughts of rebellion inside them before they could fully form.  Because you know Tarkin would advocate to make an example of them, he even said as much.

I want to point out the emphasis Ahsoka puts on Ezra here.  It may have been Kanan’s idea to send out a transmission, but it was Ezra on the broadcast, Ezra’s message and words that rang out across the galaxy, and so it’s Ezra’s safety that’s paramount.

Stop me before I go into sobbing meta about Ezra as the Hope Bringer and Ezra as a narrative Chosen One (but not THE Chosen One), he is the bridge between peoples, he is the voice of freedom, his power of connection is the key to liberating his people, if Ezra is caught that hope will die.

*blubbering*

See fandom, this is what we call a “protagonist”, as in their actions drive the plot and the narrative shapes itself around them, y’all seem to forget that towards the latter half of things.

Anyway have a cap of Hera being emotionally devastated and sad by the hard call she has to make now.

I notice at least six Star Destroyers shown in orbit above Lothal here.

Ahhh there’s the strings of the Force Theme prelude and more of Ezra just knowing that Kanan’s alive, tell me it’s not their Force Bond, Dave, I dare you.

If Hera sounds stilted and rehearsed here it’s because this is the Rebel Leader script coming out.  These are the kind of lines she practices and repeats over and over inside her head to keep herself on-mission, remind herself of The Cause and what it costs to achieve.

Metatextually I can’t quite figure out if Ezra’s actions this episode are supposed to be any kind of endorsement or indictment or commentary on “attachment”, or rather what fanon osmosis thinks attachment is, as mentioned the rescue is portrayed as the narratively correct option aside from some token scolding about how reckless and dangerous it was, and I’ve already commented on Ezra’s clinginess when it comes to Kanan and his potentially problematic fear of loss.

The juxtaposition of the Ghost crew’s passionate actions against the clinically objective (somewhat cold-sounding) position that Ahsoka/The Rebellion hold, and how the Spectres are narratively validated, seems a bit deliberate despite that A) that’s just How War Be sometimes, which the show DOES know, and B) Ahsoka’s usually not allowed to be wrong.

I could make the argument that this is still early on in Ezra’s character development, and specifically in the back half of Season Four the show leans into the lesson of “don’t burn down the galaxy simply to prevent yourself from losing things, accept the loss and let go” for the express purpose of forcing Ezra to have to grow past the stubborn impatience, rashness, and cock-surety he displays here but I don’t think I could say with confidence that I have creator-backed intention on that end.

Filoni-led projects, for the most part, align about 85% with George Lucas’s own commentary and intentions when it comes to How The Force Works 101 (Spoiler Alert: It’s Space Buddhism), it’s that 15% of “steeped just a little too long in the rancid fanon soup” that you have to watch out for.

So this whole arc could maybe be a deliberate Played Straight/Ultimately Subverted comment on being willing to sacrifice for the greater good (and various other deep-seated Discourses™ in Star Wars fandom).

Orrrrrrrr this could be something I’m way overthinking and there wasn’t any kind of intended wider takeaway at all.

I rambled a bit there, I know, but basically my point is that even though Ezra’s right, so was Ahsoka, this could have gone Very Very Badly.

They’re lucky the Force loves them so much.

Moving on.

This scene here with Ezra and Chopper is adorable.  It’s the first (but not the last) time Ezra would conspire with Chopper on a secret plan, which speaks to the depths of trust he’s managed to build with the droid.

How dare you inflict more pretty shots on me, show.

Frick, the waver in Hera’s voice right here always gets to me.

She kept the secrets from Kanan too, out of obvious necessity, and he trusted her, he agreed with her, and now he’s probably suffering for the things he doesn’t know and ghgkshkhkhkh stab me and it would hurt less there’s so much guilt and anguish in Hera right now.

Interesting to note, Sabine has already been informed of and trusted with the secret plan, and agreed to it.  Zeb wasn’t told at all, just kind of roped into it once the kids ganged up on him.

And this is why he does not count as adult supervision lol.

Look at my little chaos gremlins. <3

Chopper’s diversion doesn’t last very long, Hera’s already suspicious.

Oh good, back with Kanan and the torture squad!  Some ominous bassoons accompany Grand as he enters here.  We forgo the dramatic chorals of his theme for very steady low bass notes just droning on under the dialogue.  The chorals don’t return until mid mind probe when Grand exerting his power, and even then it’s fainter and quieter than usual.

Tarkin still doubting that Kanan’s really a Jedi, I guess it’s Kanan’s relative youth that���s throwing him maybe?

“You will tell me where to find your Rebel friends.”

“No... Ezra... Not him.  Not. Him.“

<33333333333333

One of my absolute favorite Papa Wolf Kanan moments, Grand starts digging for information in Kanan’s head and his very first thought is to protect his padawan.  (Again with the emphasis on Ezra’s importance, narratively overall and personally to Kanan.)

Kanan tanks the Force torture so Grand resorts to classic more mundane methods, his theme coming in stronger as the electricity comes on.

This scene is kind of a microcosm of what I was talking about earlier.  Ezra is taking a huge risk by revealing that he and Kanan are Jedi, heck, by talking to Vizago in the first place.  Does it work out?  Yes.  But it’s the kind of gamble you can’t always risk in a wartime scenario, no matter what personal feelings are involved.

Even secrecy-hating Sabine cautions Ezra against spilling the truth here.

That aside, this moment when Ezra floats the crate?  Epic.  The hesitant flute playing the Force theme right before Ezra makes his declaration, how it comes back stronger with a glistening sound effect and the familiar Force ring, Vizago’s dumbstruck look...

You’re a dumbass but I’m proud of you kiddo. <3

Sabine sharing my worry about Ezra going with Vizago alone here.  Sure we know Vizago cashes in the favor for something petty now, but this caused more than a bit of apprehension in all of us the first time around, trust me.

The ominous music didn’t help.

Ezra having no idea what to do to seal the deal is adorkable and Vizago’s offended bewilderment is hilarious.

Mama no happy.

Hera scolding Ezra here is pretty similar to how furious she gets in “Steps Into Shadow” and she gives the same reasons for it too: You put yourself in danger and the rest of us/the wider Rebellion at risk, you were reckless, and you disobeyed direct orders.

The difference between the two situations being that the plan here pulled off without a hitch (they might not have even needed the Rebel reinforcements if Chopper had stayed put instead of going to fetch them) whereas in “Steps Into Shadow” things went sour pretty much from the get-go, necessitating Hera to mobilize and risk the fleet to pull Ezra's ass out of it.  (Again, the Rebellion will always begrudgingly come to help you.)

Maybe the major narrative difference is that here they could be argued to be trusting in the Force and in “Steps Into Shadow” Ezra was arrogantly relying on his own power and skill, plus the Dark Side, and that’s what caused disaster in one instance but not the other?

I dunno, like I said I think I’m getting a little bit too into my own head here.  Apologies if that’s making this recap less fun.

(I at least think there’s a good case to be made that Hera could have easily been persuaded to change her mind without Ezra going off to consult Vizago since she relents pretty quickly here.)

Have I mentioned how pretty this show is yet?

Chopper’s little nod when Ezra says, “For Kanan.” awww.

Tarkin is finally starting to admit that Kanan seems very Jedi-like.  And thus recommends transferring him to another torture location.

Meanwhile Grand seems weirdly baffled and perturbed that Kanan doesn’t actually know anything about the wider Rebellion and ow I just hurt myself stumbling over “Jedi cannot help what they are.  Their compassion leaves a trail.” Kenobi show feelings, because of course Grand would assume that Kanan is deeply involved in the Rebellion because that’s what Jedi DO.

They get involved.

Lol this poor droid just straight up faints at the sight of Zeb.

Love how the troopers don’t question the missing sentries because they literally don’t care, they’re running late.  That one guy sounds absolutely Done.

Please enjoy how beautiful Lothal was pre-crispening.

This is a new cue and I think a unique one, not used anywhere else in the show; the percussion stands out most to me in it, I’m hearing a lot of cymbals and a strong drum rhythm.

Chopper just brazenly starts copying data while the Imperials are looking on his memory drives, the balls on this droid.

Zeb’s maniacal grin when Ezra tells him he should watch the courier droid “Because you’re intimidating.” lol.

Oh yeah, nope, all those Stormtroopers that got sucked out the airlock with Chopper?  They dead.

This is an excellently staged sequence.

Chopper adds another droid to his body count, lol.  (Though tie-in material shows that this one winds up okay, runs out of power for a bit in that field but gets picked up by some farmers later.)

Seriously, show.  These clouds have such a soft painterly feel and texture.

Hera holding Ezra’s hands here, awwwwwwww.

AND MUSTAFAR NAME DROP.  Fandom collectively “Uh-oh”ed at that part and this was before Rogue One revealed that Vader has his personal Minecraft Lava Castle Of Bullshit And Sadness down there.  Also before we learned the Inquisitors operate out of Nur in the same system.

So you know, it’s been a rolling ball of Fridge Horror since then.

Though softer, the lighting almost calls up the fires of Mustafar already, oranges and yellows, the brightest spot straight ahead as if to symbolize how they’re about to go into the inferno.

Another TO BE CONTINUED title card and yes, I was in fact close to gnawing my arm off the first time through lol.

Whew!  Didn’t think I would have much to say about this episode.

And in fairness--aside from my attempts to mentally reconcile Hera’s “It’s okay to disobey orders when I do it/when it’s something that leads to what I want.” versus her reaming Ezra in Season Three even though he basically did the same thing both now and then, and whether or not there’s any kind of larger commentary on the themes and messages of Star Wars at play (probably not but a girl can hope)--I don’t think I had that much of substance to comment on.

This episode is just good.  You get lost in enjoying it.

We’ll wrap up Season One tomorrow with the finale.

[enaelyork]

Wedding proposal Headcanon [Krennic x Tarkin daughter reader]

I'm crazy about it. 🫣

Tag list : @alotofrandomfangirling , @starlady66, @fenharel-enaste, @lady-of-imladris

Ask for tag here

I'm feel a little between romantic/destructive mood so, enjoy =D

His request will be grandiose, disproportionate and above all public. He'll preferably arrange for your father to have a ringside seat to attend (because what better way to humiliate Tarkin than to remind him how much he's owned his daughter body and soul since the day you laid eyes on him ? ).

It is for all these reasons that he will choose, for example, a demonstration or presentation of his most beautiful masterpiece. Moment when all the high-rankings of the empire and half of Coruscant are present. He will arrange so that you do not leave your father with a sole until the apotheosis.

You once joked that you would only agree to his request if he somehow posted it on the Death Star.

And this motherf*cker did.

He asked you with a comlink to look at the sky to better admire his work adorned with his most beautiful colors. Yours. You understand then that this is only the beginning of a show of which you are the heroine and you wonder how this weapon of mass destruction can become the symbol of a passionate love. It was so absurd that you laughed and cried at the same time.

Your father did neither. Probably far too busy imagining how he was going to kill him. He knows you've been dating Krennic for some time but secretly hopes to see you come to your senses. The director has decided to bury all his hopes tonight.

After the colors, words appeared on the wall of the Star.

Baby Tarkin

Will you

Do me

The honor

To become Miss Krennic ?

Your father died of heart attack before he stared angrily at you. Then the last words came out and definitely melted your soul.

Forever and ever, Nébuleuse?

Tell him no! Are you going to say yes? Are you still not going to say yes? Oh god, she will! Exclaimed your father when you threw yourself on a technician carrying a comlink.

Orson Callan Krennic ! Did you yell into the comlink you ripped off a tech. Get down from there right now to tell me that you love me before you become my husband for the worse !

When he arrived in his personal fighter and you raced down the trail to join him, he walked towards you before kneeling at your feet, like a knight in front of his queen. He handed you the box before opening it before your eyes, revealing a silver ring carved in the shape of a cluster of stars similar to the nickname he gives you.

I know I was not the perfect companion for you. I know you deserve better. But the truth is, no one deserves you. You are above that world. And it makes me sick. I could never let anyone but me touch you. You are the ultimate accomplishment of my work, of myself. I can say today : i love you, but i cannot promise you a life without tears.

You giggle. Idiot, your cheeks have already been drowned in your tears for at least fifteen minutes.

I have a stupid new nickname for you, baby Tarkin. My Nebuleuse. I am now offering you "Wife" and you must answer me quickly because patience is still not one of my qualities.

He is my prince. The cruelest of all, but mine. You think and you probably couldn't have dreamed better than him. You said yes because it was the only option available. The easiest choice of your life.

You don't care that everyone is watching you when they hug you and lift you into the air. You wrap your arms around his neck before asking him to kiss you.

And he kisses you. Your lips mingle in a soft kiss full of passion. A powerful tenderness emanates from you when you press your foreheads together and your eyes dive into his.

Forever and ever, he whispers softly against your mouth and you give him a satisfied smile, letting a few tears stream down your cheeks.

I choose you you reply.

(I don't know why, but i'm sure Krennic has a beautifull accent when he say Nébuleuse for Nebula. I'm sorry for it =p)

[princeescaluswords]

Not a Fairy Tale

While Star Wars is not my primary fandom, I see a lot of the same pathology here as I do in my own. And I've seen a lot of defenders of the Jedi having to argue that "Star Wars is a fairy tale! Of course, it has to look at things in a black-and-white way."

Except it's obvious, when you take the full 46 years of story telling, that it's not "black and white." People are being confused by the wardrobes.

The Old Republic which the Sith destroyed was indeed weak and corrupted. The Jedi Order may have been hidebound and it was certainly vulnerable, especially when it was forced into a role it had never foreseen for itself. The New Republic may be overwhelmed and clumsily inept as it tries to undo thirty years of an almost unbelievable violent, cruel and repressive Empire.

These are all true, admitted by the characters, and displayed in all their unpleasant consequences.

But they aren't the Sith. Even if the Jedi "persecuted" the Sith a thousand years ago, I've watched a lot of these stories. I didn't see any Jedi designated "Sith-Hunter General." I didn't see padawans tested by stern-looking proctors looking for suspicious "Sith-like" traits. The only thing I ever saw was a small green teacher suggesting that a young boy might have gone through too much as a slave to be trained to use mystic power as a weapon. (And the teacher was right.)

And when the Sith won, they forged an empire supported by an army of talentless, faceless drones and ran by backstabbing and unimaginative torturers and bureaucrats. It was clear that the Sith did this on purpose, stomping on the spirit of sentient life so no one could supplant them. Because fascism is built on fear.

And the ultimate expression of that fear was the Death Star, built by forced labor in secret and unleashed on an unsuspecting planet out of whim. There was no Jedi or Republican senators forcing Grand Moff Tarkin's hand. They didn't demonstrate its power on a lifeless planetoid to cow the opponents. And when it was destroyed, they built it AGAIN.

So, no I don't think it was a fairy tale.

Because of characters like Lando Calrissian and Luthen Rael, forced to compromise their souls, or characters like Cassian Andor and Leia Organa, willing to die to stop the Empire that warped their actual lives. It's not a fairy tale because of Porkins.

Yeah, you heard me. We laugh at Porkins because he was a fat guy with an ironic name. But you know what? He flew a starfighter shorter than a tractor trailer against a ship the size of a moon. His last words was "No, I'm alright," but he wasn't. He blew up, like billions of other people, murdered by the Sith who argue that they should get what they wanted because they want it bad enough.

So, again, no, I don't think it was a fairy tale.

And my ultimate proof? Because even more four-and-a-half decades later, there are still people arguing that the Sith had a point, that they were forced to do this, and scorning the idea that it's "black-and-white" thinking not to concede that fact.

Star Wars could have made the Good Guys without flaws and the Bad Guys immune to sympathy, but I've never seen any property that does that, not even the Christmas Special. The stories just pick a side. They say "fascism is bad, no matter how satisfying it is to individuals, and democracy, self-discipline and compassion are good no matter how big the screw-ups they make." I agree.

[thiswaycomessomethingwicked]

The glow of the tablet in dim, late-night office lighting paints everything that white-blue that hurts the eyes if a person stares at it too long. Or, Krennic supposes, forces a person’s eyes to become utterly immune to dry air, screens and projections. Adkin tells him he’s going to go blind in his old age.

He replies, Thank you for implying I’m not old yet, lieutenant.

Adkin: I wouldn’t go that far, sir.

He has over ten files up, circling around his head as he focuses on one in particular. A matrix outlining who is responsible, accountable, provides support, coordinated with, and informed for the operations and maintenance of the repair station he’s building in support of the DS-2.

The closest he’s been allowed as it regards his favourite project. The one that wouldn’t exist without him. The one Jerjerrod is taking all the credit for.

And the headache. 

There is that. No longer having the emperor breathing down one’s neck does wonders for stress levels. Even if playing a support role reduces his opportunities for advancement, he’s taking it as a gift for the moment.

Jerjerrod is bound to fuck up in some catastrophic way and Krennic intends to be waiting in the wings for when that happens.

Krennic can be patient, coolheaded, and entirely sound when he needs to be. Something he thinks someone needs to tell a certain Grand Moff who occasionally messages him such nonsenses as:

Stop antagonizing Jerjerrod, he doesn’t need help further delaying the project, and, if you perhaps cooled your heels for ten minutes you might be able to convince people to once again trust you with greater responsibility, and, please refrain from sending an entire message to me in sentence bites. I know your opinions on the dreaded block text but you could consider its merits, and, for fuck’s sake, Krennic, we are not re-litigating whether the Fiorites are a cult or a rebellion. I know you’re bored. Get a new hobby.

Krennic always delicately points out that it isn’t his own fault that he’s bored. If someone could have a word with the powers that be about Krennic’s skills, abilities, and what a value-add he would be to the DS-2 delivery…

Tarkin usually replies: As I’ve said before, commander, learn to be content. 

No, we none of us can be content. 

I had a weird Tarkrennic dream the other night that involved much death and insanity and at one point Krennic was wearing a t-shirt instead of his uniform or any in-universe style clothes and I feel like Tarkin was judging his sartorial choices. Which is entirely in-character and something that for-sure happened in canon.

Then Tarkin was murdered by maybe Krennic? Or someone else? It was unclear.  

Anyway, reminded me of these two so, no promises, but here’s a potential start to a potential third installment of Tarkin & Krennic Road Trip Through Space aka This Multiplicty and Propagating Structure 

[for-the-sake-of-color]

[x]

And that's a Wrap for Tarkin. F.

May your death serve to do something you never did in life.

Something Good.

“Another wave!” Howler shouted as he pulled the sith behind cover again, shots reflecting off him as Howler shot back several of his own past him.

Howler hoped the sith wouldn’t remember just how many times he used the guy as a shield if they got out of here alive and he got the disruptor off. He had to admit though it was… pretty effective. Real Mandalorian Iron really was everything the legends said. And the siths aim with a blaster was decent, even under fire, but Howler really did have to tell him who to shoot at pretty much every time. And where to walk, and when to run, and when to duck. Like the world's shittiest yet invincible protocol droid.

Terrain data show them as still being nine klicks from the citadel, and the droids knew they were here. But occasionally, strangely, packs of the drones flew right past them. Did… did the Jedi actually come back for them? That was a suicide mission.

“You think we should hold tight and see if they catch up?” Howler asked the sith, who had just finished shooting down the last of this wave of drones, Howler pulling him back into the deep cover of an overhang’s wall.

“Quid est?” [what?]

Yea, he also got that a lot anytime he tried to ask the guy anything that wasn’t a direct and pointed question. 

“You’re a lucky son of a bitch if someone actually came back for you. Cause they sure aren’t coming back for a single pilot. Although with the shit you just pulled I guess the Jedi wouldn’t want to leave you to the separatists. I don’t know how the hell you pulled us from space in an instant from systems away”

The sith shrugged the motherfucker, “divinitas excludit distantiam” [divinity excludes distance]

Howler had to scoff, “You’re far from a god now” 

“noluerunt me esse deum” [they did not want me to be a god]

And Howler did wonder about this guy. He had actually met him before, back on Bothawui. He had watched him haul a trooper, a medic maybe, if he remembered right, to Howler's ship, picking up wounded that had managed to gather for extraction. He had come back and picked up many other groups of survivors that night, although he hadn’t caught any more glimpses of the man. And he had heard that he had been assigned to a squad on the Resolute, although he hadn’t run across the sith again since. But he had heard plenty of rumors.

“Is it true you’ll do whatever your clone captain says and that's it? You don't even listen to the generals?”

“mei sunt, ego illorum sum” [they are mine, I am theirs]

“And your squad… didn’t want you to be a god?”

“Sic” [yes]

“And you just stopped trying to be a god because your squad didn’t want you to?” Howler asked, puzzled. 

“Sic” [yes]

“Why?” Why would someone give up apparent godhood, and Howler wasn’t going to count out the fact that it could have worked because he was here. And potentially the Resolute was still here, and that shouldn't have been possible given they had been three systems away. He didn’t know if that's the kind of power a god wielded, but it was certainly more than he could ever imagine being able to.

“quid vis?” [what do you mean?] 

Howler shook his head as he checked his scanner. No droids on the pop-up currently, but no help either. He supposed it wouldn’t hurt to take a short break. Especially since he was actually fairly certain that the siths ankle was broken instead of sprained given the way his knee had also started giving out as they ran/climbed/dodged. And his arm hadn’t really stopped bleeding either, although it had slowed some, he hoped from clotting and not lack-there-of to bleed. He wondered if it was the scrambler or just the siths personality that kept him from verbalizing what must be a decent amount of pain. He just really didn’t get this guy. 

“Why would you give up godhood for some clones, if you thought you could actually do it?”

The sith tilted his head at him, “quia amo eos, et quaesiverunt” [because I love them, and they asked] 

He scoffed at the sith as he drew his blaster, scanner picking up more drones incoming. Of course, love. 

“Drones, over there”

“Euge.” [Yay.] 

-

“We are going back for them, aren’t we Master?”

“Unfortunately, Brek’s squad still has Tarkin, who still has the other half of what we need.”

“Aww you like Brek, skyguy. Admit it.”

“Okay, Maybe I want to see him try to talk his way out of his squad's mutiny charges when they actually find him, or try to talk his way out of whatever the council is going to say about bringing the Resolute here with the force. But, for now, let's just focus on defending the cruiser until we get the call to Captain Jet back up or until reinforcements arrive and we can go looking ourselves” 

Ahsoka grinned as their LAAt landed in the Resolutes Hangar, directly next to their starfighters. Defend the cruiser, indeed.

-

Nihlus had been sitting in nothingness for a while, staring into the abyss of the sky occasionally interrupted by red and blue blaster fire, when he suddenly snapped back to himself like a cold glass of water being poured down his back, and he had to bite his fist to muffle the scream he made at the agony in his arm and his leg at the moment. He was… he was sitting in the wreck of a crashed LAAt, and Margo was shaking his shoulder, face pale.

Something was very wrong.

“Save us, save him” She whispered at him quietly, obviously injured, but not the worst of them. The screaming was actually coming from 

“Sprig” He said, searching for the munitions expert

There, next to the barricade Jet, Cynic, Lake and Torch were firing from. He crawled his way over the best he could, Sprig's breath coming out in short bursts now, in between his shouts and moans. Charred hole in his armor, on his side, right next to his heart. The only reason he was not already dead of blood loss right now was the sheer intense heat of the shot that had hit him had cauterized multiple blood vessels.

And there was nothing Nihlus could do. He looked up and back to Margo, and there was an intensity in her gaze he had never seen before.

Save us. 

Nihlus felt agony in his heart. He couldn’t. The disruptor had sapped everything from him and he couldn’t. He could do a transfer but then Nihlus might die, and he still had the rest of the squad to protect

“Aren’t you supposed to be some sort of Jedi? Get up and help us!” Captain Tarkin shouted at him, firing off a volley of rounds into the oncoming droids

And it was like time crawled to a halt as Nihlus realized what he had to do to save Sprig. To save all of them. But… he looked to Margo, who nodded once, and the grin Nihlus gave her was all teeth, because…

“No, I’m a Sith” And then he raised his hand, and ripped out the soul of the one guy here he just could not fucking stand since the moment he had met him

-

Holy shit, holy shit. The second the sith had gotten the disruptor off he had murdered that Captain! Why wasn’t the squad doing anything? 

Howler watched as the sith turned to the wounded soldier on the ground. No. no, he was not going to let him take more lives, he was insane. Howler got maybe three steps towards the sith before he was yanked to the ground by his belt.

“Stop, let him work” The trooper who had grabbed him said

“Let me go, he’s going to kill him”

“Is that what you think is happening?” The trooper asked rhetorically, pinning Howler to the ground as he struggled to get an eyeline of the sith. 

“What?”

He watched him reach his hand to the wound and… hover there for several seconds before the trooper gasped deep breaths, grabbing at… where the hole in his chest had been moments before. The previously dying trooper grabbed his blaster and began to fire with the rest of them once more. Oh yea, the guy was a healer.

The siths head snapped towards him and Howler would have scrambled backwards if he could except… no he wasn’t looking at him, he was looking at the soldier holding him. And then suddenly he was next to them, and Howler could move again. So… he scrambled the fuck backwards.

“Margo?” The sith said softly, brushing his hand over the soldier's side. The trooper almost seemed to relax, “Pelvis fracture? That must have fucking hurt, but thanks for holding him”

“What the hell is happening” Howler asked

“Howler… Thank you for keeping me safe.” Brek said, turning to look at him, before kneeling at his eye level, those strange glowing eyes feeling like they were boring into his own, even from behind his visor, “I can… absorb the life force of a person and use it to heal another. Or kill another, or several of either. I would do anything for my squad, you understand?” 

“Yea, I can see that” Howler replied, glancing at the charred lump of what used to be Captain Wilhuff Tarkin, and thinking back to the siths proclamations of godhood

“Howler, my squad committed treason to come and get us, you know.”

“Nihlus-” the one he had called Margo hissed at him, but he just continued

“They committed treason, because otherwise that Captain wouldn’t have allowed them to come back, and we would have been left to die, because he had the other half of the information they needed for a hyperspace route, and I think he would have been able to talk Skywalker into leaving us. I actually already have both halves of it. But they don't know that one yet. Anyways, I killed Tarkin, because I needed his life force for healing or I would lose members of my squad. But you’re still alive, even though you aren’t part of my squad”

“Because I kept you safe?”

“No, because you’re not an asshole, even if you used me as a meat shield.” The sith paused, tilting his head in that same manner he had before with the disruptor. Must just be his thinking face. Then he met his eyes and gave him a lopsided grin, “You admire the forms my loyalty takes to my squad, you admire their loyalty for me”

“So what?” Howler asked defiantly, crossing his arms

“You’re on the precipice of a choice. You see, Margo can either repair the ship, or repair the distress beacon. Only so many power cells, after all, and there are only enough parts to fix one. Can cycle the engine, or we can call for help. But a ship isn’t much used to us if we can't fly it, and no offense to Cynic, he did do his best, but he is the reason we crashed here, after the pilot was shot. And he is the best pilot of us.”

“So either I join you, and fly your ship, and keep my mouth shut about Tarkin, or you kill me and use the beacon to call in another ship?”

The sith rolled his eyes at Howler, “Of course not, I don’t kill clones. You’ll just pass out with a concussion and no memory of the past week. Or, you join us, lie a little, and you gain a favor from me, and I’ll be a little more fond of you. And you understand exactly the sort of lengths I would go to for those I care about.”

Brek stretched his hand out, helmet flying into it, “Look, you have a little while to make your choice, it’s going to take Margo a minute to finish the power cell. I hope you’ll make the fun one.” 

Before he put his helmet on, stood, and for the first time since Howler had met him, Ignited his lightsabers, placing himself between them and the enemy, and throwing their blaster bolts right back at them. 

Howler gripped his holdout blaster tightly, before he stood and moved to the barricade. Maybe a slice of some deranged fucking loyalty like that wouldn’t be half-bad.

-

“Well that could have gone worse” Jet said as the onslaught of droids began to peter out, piles and piles of scrap lining the grounds around them

“It would be nice if we had not crashed a second time” Nihlus replied dryly from the other side of the barricade, occasionally lazily batting off bolts

Jet laughed, “Hey! Second time for you. This is the first time we crashed, so I think it’s going pretty well.” 

“What’s with all this ‘we’ shit, Cynics the one that crashed” Torch complained

“Why don’t you take the reigns next time hot shot, see how well you can keep us in the air and dodge seps” Cynic said

“Actually, I think that’s my job” The pilot from LAAt three interrupted, “Or at least, I’ve heard you need a new pilot. Corporal Howler, Sir” He said, saluting Jet

“We’re picking up strays now?” Cynic asked Nihlus who just shrugged and said, “I picked up a whole squad of them, what’s new?”

“I think we picked you up, actually. Now and originally. There was a whole jedi council meeting over it and everything?” Lake replied, “We have pictures.”

“That seems to have completely slipped my memory” Nihlus replied, “Must have been the scrambler” 

“Oh don't start that again.” Margo said from the ship, “You can’t blame everything on the scrambler. I’m not buying it this time”

Nihlus laughed, “I can do whatever I want, that doesn't mean it’ll work”

“It won’t! I’m not carrying you to bed again because the ‘scrambler's residual effects gave you an unbearable headache’ the next time you’re feeling lazy.”

“But Margooo,” Nihlus whined, “Margo my ankle is broken, Margo!”

“Go bitch to Heron about it,”

Heron chimed in, “Because I’m a medic or because I’m missing a leg?”

“Yes” Margo said simply, before returning back to her work, Nihlus muttering, “She does got me there” 

[space-blue]

🍌 🌷and 🔥 please (:

Thanks for the ask, and sorry for the delay! It was actually harder to find excerpts than expected. The obvious ones needed too much set up, and I don't hava that many unpublished wips!

🌷 favorite sweet quote from a published work

This is from a Sith Obi-Wan adopts Anakin story.

Not a day goes by without Anakin privately thanking Chenini for bringing the Jedi to Mos Espa and leading them to Watto's shop. She's the greatest of the moons after all—Ruler of the stars, Maiden of luck, Goddess of fate and fortune—she has to be the one who guided them. And what a different fate the Jedi brought, what impossible fortune, to be taken away by them, to a world covered in endless water, and then one covered in steel and duracrete, as far and as deep as the eye could see and the mind conceive.

Anakin's new master says he has no one to thank but himself, and that Chenini holds no power over him. His deep blue eyes shimmer with flecks of golden light as he smiles down on Anakin and tells him he's a child of the Force and master of his own fate.

'The Jedi, at least, can't be thanked for anything,' he says with a grimace. 'Perhaps I'm the one who should thank them, for putting you across my path.'

Anakin is grateful too, even if this isn't what master Qui-Gon promised.

🍌 favorite funny quote from a wip

I'm cheating as this is a published WIP. I'm trying to convince myself I'll continue it soon... x'D It's a Thrawn/Obi-Wan, where Thrawn acquires Obi as a gift, in carbonite! (Obi currently wearing a force nullifying collar)

It sends a shiver coursing down Obi-Wan's spine, to see these lambent red eyes staring at him when he looks up again.

'Who are you? And where... is this?'

The man smiles, and without the Force Obi-Wan can't quite tell if it is meant kindly.

'We are on my flagship, the Chimaera,' he explains. 'We are travelling from Tatooine, where I obtained you, to Arkanis.'

'Obtained... me?' Obi-Wan asks.

He digs through his memories, but dreams and nightmares mix and merge and confuse the timeline of his life. Has he been to Arkanis? How does one obtain a Jedi? What happened to him?

'I believe it is the right word for the occasion. I was dispatched to settle issues the Empire is having with the Hutts, Jabba Desilijic Tiure in particular. I believe you must be acquainted?'

Is this amusement in his voice? Had he mentioned carbonite? It would explain the head full of fog, and the way he was "obtained".

'Yes... I'm afraid I've met Jabba. On several occasions.'

'Not happy ones I assume, given how he kept you on his wall.'

🔥 wild card: dealer’s choice of quote from a wip

I'm not 100% sure if this is new to the tumblr crowd... Going to torture the poor anons who come in here and now to ask if the Tarkin & Soka fic still exists. True WIP.

Ahsoka watches Tarkin pace from behind the one way window of the small medbay. He walks from one end of the room to the other and back, bare feet silent on the lino floor, gait predatory, shoulders rolling as if he could shrug off the bacta bandages sticking to his skin.

His gaze is cast down, his focus turned inward. His emotions are cold—like this place, redolent of blood and pus, veiled by the acrid tang of antiseptic. Life and death and cleaning agents. His thoughts are eratic. His past a tale interrupted, shreds of memories scattered and mysterious, like the countless scars crisscrossing his skin.

Ahsoka squints, curious. She's no strangers to scars. At twenty she's a war veteran, and her robes hide a respectable collection.

She has the burns of blaster bolts, gouges from a Zygerrian's claws across her back, left to fester while she hung in a cage. A bite mark from a critter on Felucia that somehow hadn't reacted to bacta and bothered her for weeks. Countless cuts and scratches from her time in Trandoshan captivity, where bacta hadn't been an option at all.

This is the sort of scars Tarkin wears. The stripes and markings of someone without access to bacta. Many look decades old, faded and stretched by growth. A child's pain.

It baffles her. She's only met Tarkin twice (two times too many in her opinion) and she hadn't gotten the impression he was a man of action from either of those interactions.

[antianakin]

You don't seem to be asking this in particularly good faith, but sure let's go for this argument again.

What do you expect the Jedi to have done about the situation? You acknowledge the Jedi weren't responsible for what happened, that the whole deal was engineered by the Sith and that the clones were made for the REPUBLIC, not the Jedi, so the most you can actually accuse the Jedi of is working with "slaves" in the same army.

I'm putting the word slaves in quotes because at no point in canon are the clones really ever acknowledged as slaves beyond one line in one episode by a clone who is deliberately written to be untrustworthy anyway. I don't deny that this is exactly what the clones SHOULD'VE been acknowledged as, they AREN'T acknowledged as slaves within the context of the Star Wars universe. This is the same problem you find when people make the claim that droids are slaves. If you follow that to its natural conclusion, then you get to the belief that Luke Skywalker is a slave owner. And Luke Skywalker, I think we can all agree, is the hero of that particular story. He's clearly a good, kind, compassionate dude. He's the person we're supposed to be rooting for and he wins in the end. He also owns droids. So if droids are slaves, then Luke Skywalker is a slave owner AND the hero of the story which means that Star Wars as a story is now advocating that slavery is a good, heroic thing. And I feel like most people would agree that that's not the story Star Wars is telling, even if the situation with the droids sometimes veers uncomfortably into feeling like slavery given how much sentience the droids are often given.

The situation is the same with the clones, the narrative doesn't ever acknowledge how uncomfortably similar their situation is to slavery in any real way, and even if we argue that they ARE supposed to be seen as slaves, the natural conclusion to come to is that we as the audience are intended to see the Jedi as slave owners, who are generally considered pretty unequivocally evil. The problem with this is that the entire Prequel Trilogy ends with the Jedi all being killed off with sweeping sad music behind the scene, which tells me that the narrative wants me to be sad that the Jedi are dying. But if they're slave owners, why should I be sad the Jedi are dying? If they're unequivocally evil because they owned slaves, why would the narrative of Star Wars advocate that I should be sad when they're murdered? Even if you personally don't feel sad at all during the Order 66 scene and cheer when Anakin murders all of the children in the Council chambers, I find it hard to believe that you could effectively argue that the audience isn't INTENDED to be sad during that scene.

Getting back to a more in-universe argument, though, what do you think the better response would have been in this situation?

I assume your answer to this would be to simply refuse to fight in the GAR at all out of protest regarding the Republic's use of the clones. Cool, let's look at what the consequences of this would be. The clones are still enslaved in an army owned by the Republic, but now they're going up against a bunch of really powerful enemies without a single person who has the ability to protect them fighting on their side. Now the clones are being led by people like Tarkin or Yularen who don't care about the clones at all and are pretty likely to just treat them even MORE like tools instead of people and throw their lives away every chance they get in search of victory.

And if we back away from the consequences to the clones directly, if the Jedi refuse to fight, the Separatists win the war. Like, unequivocally, the Separatists win the war if the Jedi aren't fighting in it because the Separatists have several Force users on their side (or people specifically trained to kill Force users) and they aren't afraid to cheat and use human shields and bioweapons. And the Separatists winning is, in fact, a BAD thing, because the Separatists are run by a bunch of evil people who are pretty happy to keep empowering other evil people to commit atrocities all over the galaxy.

So the Jedi are in a position where they KNOW that there's nothing they can do to stop the war, they KNOW the other side of this war has some pretty powerful opponents in it, they KNOW the other side of this war is willing to lie and cheat in order to win, they KNOW there's nothing they can do to save the clones from having to fight in it. So quite honestly, what is the benefit to sitting it out? How does this help anybody? And none of this even touches the consequences TO THE JEDI of sitting out the war. Palpatine is prepared to launch a smear campaign against the Jedi no matter what, and the Jedi refusing to help protect the Republic would make his life 10,000x easier, which basically removes any possible political power the Jedi might've once had.

If they fight in the war, they have the ability to protect the clones as much as possible, protect the Republic, free innocent civilians on Separatist controlled worlds, maintain what little political power they have left, and hope to at least get everybody through this war to the other side where maybe they can try to fight for a better world overall, which presumably would include freedom for the clones once there was no war that had to be fought. Just because this future never came to pass doesn't mean it wasn't worth fighting for. Just because they lost doesn't mean that they made the wrong choice or that the alternative would've somehow landed them or anyone else a better result. It wouldn't have.

The Jedi made the only choice they could have within the confines of the situation. And the confines of the situation SUCKED, sure, there were no GREAT options, but there were some pretty obvious WORSE options that they chose to avoid. People who bring up this argument choose to ignore the obvious consequences to whatever alternative you seem to think was available to the Jedi.

The Jedi didn't WANT to fight in a war, they didn't WANT to be handed an army of people bred only to fight and die in it. But they didn't really get given a ton of choice in the matter, either. The Sith spent YEARS engineering the situation to put the Jedi in a position where their choices were bad or worse. So how can we possibly vilify the Jedi for making the best choice they could have in a situation designed to be impossible? Why is it so wrong of them to have chosen the bad choice instead of the worse choice?

Lastly, ALL OF THIS assumes the Jedi had any choice about entering the army at all. Word of god tells us the Jedi were DRAFTED into the war, which means they really weren't offered a choice about becoming Generals. Individual Jedi could just accept it and go along with it, or dodge the draft by leaving the Order entirely (which means they are now separated from their home, their family, their friends, their community, their culture). Those were the two options, there was nothing in the middle.

I don't know if you were asking this in good faith at all, most of the people who ask me this question aren't asking me this because they care about the answer and they've already made up their minds that the Jedi are evil slave owners, so I'm not holding out much hope, but that's my defense of the Jedi working with the clones during the war.

I never, ever say the Jedi were flawed, and here's why.

It's not because I don't think people can BE flawed, or that I don't think GOOD people can be flawed, of course they can. Even people who are genuinely doing good things and making good choices and trying their best to be selfless and kind and compassionate can make mistakes and have a bad day.

But there's really only two reasons I see anybody bring up "the Jedi were flawed."

The first is from Jedi fans who are trying to stave off the Stanakins and the anti Jedi crowd by adding that in as a disclaimer. "OF COURSE the Jedi are flawed, but it doesn't mean they aren't good people!" It's a meaningless statement because the side saying it doesn't even really believe it to be true and the side they're saying it TO thinks the Jedi being flawed means they all deserved to die. This is the kind of statement that leads to people deciding that individual Jedi are okay but their culture needs to be completely reformed in order to allow people like Anakin to just do whatever they want whenever they want and then they can all live.

The second is from people who DON'T really like the Jedi much and will insist that "the Jedi are flawed" is part of the whole point of the narrative of Star Wars, especially the prequels. This is the kind of statement that leads to people like Leslye Headland INSISTING that George Lucas intended for the story of the Jedi to be one of failure and criticism and casting the Jedi as "the evil institution" in her interpretation of Star Wars. This is what leads to stories like the Ahsoka show insisting that the Jedi were elitist bastards whose arrogance led to their own genocide. These people usually try to claim they like the Jedi, but they'll still cast the Jedi as the bad guys in the story instead of, say, Anakin. These are the people who genuinely have no idea what attachment is and don't care to learn. These people believe that, at best, the Jedi THOUGHT they were doing good, but that they had completely lost their way and were truly not that much better than the Sith anymore and their destruction was necessary to create balance in the galaxy.

I have no desire to appease people who don't like my interpretation of Star Wars, and I don't think that "the Jedi were flawed" was ever the point of Lucas's story and I genuinely think it takes a lot AWAY from his story to say that it does. So while I am perfectly happy to admit that people in general, even overall GOOD and kind and selfless people, are always flawed and can make mistakes, I will never, ever say that the Jedi were flawed. The Jedi lost, yes, but not due to their own flaws. They lost because of EVERYONE ELSE'S flaws, so what does it MATTER if the Jedi were flawed or not? If you truly believe the Jedi were good people who did everything right and simply lost due to other people's selfish choices, then what does it add to the story to insist the Jedi were flawed? How does it change anything, for the better or otherwise? The Jedi were right IS the point of the story, so insisting they were flawed actually takes away from that by distracting from how the Jedi were RIGHT, and it's people choosing not to listen to them or trust them or act like them that brings about the downfall of an entire galaxy.

The Jedi weren't flawed. The Jedi were RIGHT ABOUT EVERYTHING and that is the hill I will die on.

[novelmonger]

Moments That Bring Me Joy: Star Wars Episode IV - A New Hope

I'm going through some of my favorite childhood movies and listing all the moments in them that bring me joy. I'm fully aware that many of the stories I loved as a kid are deeply flawed, but I just want to take some time to appreciate what they did well. Just because I'm focusing on the positive doesn't mean I'm unaware of the negative.

Note: I chose the word "joy" deliberately. Not all of the moments that bring me joy bring me (or the characters) happiness. Scenes involving death or pain might not be very fun or cheerful, but I find joy in a good story well told.

And here we are, the movie that started everything! I don't think it's an exaggeration at all to say that this movie changed my life forever. I could tell, as I went to bed that night when I was 8, that I would never be the same again. This movie has almost as much nostalgia for me as Episode I, because while I didn't watch it quite as constantly as that one, Episode IV was the first Star Wars movie I owned, so until I got the whole original trilogy and then Episode I, this was the one piece of the fandom I could consume...over and over and over again ^^'

You know, I really like Jawas and their chattery language.

"All right, shut up, I'll take this one." "Shutting up, sir."

"But I was going into the Tosche Station to pick up some power converters!"

"Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi. You're my only hope."

"No, I don't think he likes you at all." *sad beep* "No, I don't like you either."

Ohhh, that lovely Tatooine sunset... <3

Alec Guinness' Obi-Wan is just so...warm and comfortable to me. He really came into his own as my favorite in the prequels, but I love him as an old man too. I just love listening to the cadences of his voice as he calmly explains things to Luke.

"You know him?" "Well, of course I know him. He's me."

I really like that subtle, cold sound when Darth Vader chokes people. You might not even notice it at first, but it just supplements what you can see on the screen so well.

That moment where Luke stands in front of his burnt-out home, staring in horror at the skeletons of his aunt and uncle, while the Force theme swells....

"You don't need to see his identification." "We don't need to see his identification." "These aren't the droids you're looking for." "These aren't the droids we're looking for." "He can go about his business." "You can go about your business." "Move along." "Move along, move along."

"He doesn't like you." "Sorry." "I don't like you either. We're wanted men. I have the death sentence on twelve systems." "I'll be careful." "You'll be dead!"

"Sorry about the mess." *flips coin at bartender*

Tarkin is probably my favorite Imperial officer (is it weird to have one of those? XD). He's just so...deliciously evil. And just look at those cheekbones!

"That's no moon. It's a space station."

"Who's the more foolish, the fool or the fool who follows him?"

Luke and Han's argument about whether to rescue Leia or not is so good XD Especially "If you were to rescue her, the reward would be..." "What?" Well, more wealth than you can imagine!" "I don't know, I can imagine quite a bit."

"We're fine. We're all fine here now, thank you. How are you?" *cringes*

I love the misunderstanding when Threepio thinks they're being crushed with the garbage, but they're actually whooping in triumph and relief XD

Han pelting down the hallway, screaming bloody murder as he chases several stormtroopers...only to burst into an entire roomful of them!

The stormtrooper falling down the shaft before Luke and Leia swing across was Baby's First Wilhelm Scream :P For years, before I found out that's actually what it's called, I referred to it as the Stormtrooper Scream.

"Close the blast doors!" *five seconds later* "Open the blast doors, open the blast doors!"

The duel between Darth Vader and Obi-Wan has always been so epic and dramatic, but there's so much added weight to it now, after the prequels and especially after the Obi-Wan Kenobi show. It might not be as flashy as a lot of other lightsaber fights, but wow, is it powerful.

Endlessly useful, quotable line: "I care."

"You think a princess and a guy like me--" *too quickly* "No."

Biggs: "I can't see him!" - Why did my brother and I latch onto all the weirdest lines to quote incessantly in everyday conversation?

"Stay on target...stay on target...."

"Almost there...almost there...."

Han Solo swooping in at the last moment, knocking Darth Vader out of the sky with a space-cowboy "Yeehaw!" 8D

The exuberant, practically incoherent joy of the main three when they get back after blowing up the Death Star is just perfect. That's exactly how it is to achieve something amazing and then celebrate with your friends <3

[pamela-amidala]

was just rewatching rogue one, and i noticed some stuff i kind of wanted to talk about

i think like andor, rogue one explores themes to do with not having the energy to care about a movement, even when you know and believe it's the right cause. this is manifested in andor in cassian wanting to just keep doing small thefts and jobs against the empire so he can live a comfortable life, *technically* hurting the empire but never really doing any real damage. in rogue one it manifests with jyn not seeing the rebellion as worth fighting for. that she'd rather just live her life and deal with the empire, as she expressed when she said "it's not a problem if you don't look up". i really really love cassian and jyn's character development with this.

the galactic empire to me, in some ways feels like how america would be viewed if it had less effective propaganda. grand moff tarkin ordering the destruction of the city on jedha, and then planning to tell the senate that it was because of a mining incident, resembles the CIA's various crimes against humanity, and the fact that the american government, which claims to be trustworthy and for the protection of the people, to this day has no problem with letting the CIA cover up horrific things as if they never happened. as long as it serves the interests of the american empire to keep things covered up, there's nothing wrong with doing so.

this is much much more minor, but i did enjoy the fact that even though chirrut was able to use the force to fight opponents and dodge attacks extremely effectively, he is still very much blind, and the force, while useful and while keeping him alive, doesnt just straight up counterract his blindness. we can see this on scarif when he walks through the direct fire of deathtroopers unharmed, and then struggles to find the master switch. a lot of blind characters in fantasy often have abilities that greatly aid, and sometimes almost completely negate their blindness. for example daredevil, at least in the show, his only real weaknesses are patterns on completely flat surfaces, like writing or computers. quite literally everything else, he can see even better than anyone else. it was really cool for a change to see a badass blind character who still was very much blind, and still required a lot of assistance from his friend baze.

this is a less developed thought i have, but i have mixed feelings about the way the movie seems to try to portray saw gerrera and his crew as "as bad" as the empire, because of their methods. it feels very idealistic rather than based in reality. yes, saw and his followers have done some horrendous things for the cause, however, the fact that they're fighting against the empire ALONE means they could never be as bad as them in my eyes. sure they're doing bad things, but the real issue with the empire is in my opinion, the sheer amount of power the empire holds in the galaxy, but also their intent. the intent of the galactic empire, is total control and power of the galaxy, through any means necessary. the intent of saw and his followers, is FREEDOM from this fascist regime, through any means necessary. sure he may use some extreme methods, but compared to the empire he's a saint.

i absolutely adore the soundtrack of this movie, it's been stuck in my head since my rewatch today. it makes me very happy to see a star wars soundtrack not composed by john williams, that holds up so well. the soundtrack is one of the things about filmmaking that always stands out to me, a good soundtrack can make an ok movie, into one of my all time favourites. movies like the batman, batman 1989, dune 2021, spiderman 1-3 (tobey), and of course any star wars movie, always stand out to me and are much more memorable than movies with an uninteresting orchestral soundtrack that you'd see in a lot of action movies. i had a big fear that once john williams stops working on star wars the soundtracks could majorly fall off, but i now feel confident that as long as the studio picks the right person, it can still be an iconic soundtrack (the mandalorian is also a great example of this).

great movie, sobbed at the end, loved all of the costume design as per usual with star wars, perfect casting, conclusions suck, blah blah blah. pls don't come at me for spelling of grammar mistakes bc proofreading is for nerds who can read. if you want to add something or disagree with something here feel free to write something!

[marvelstars]

Leia & Vader: Rule of Law, beliefs and family

Another aspect I liked of Leia and Vader first scene in A New Hope is the different way in which Leia tries to appeal her case with Vader in constast to Tarkin. Lest remember Leia was trained as a diplomatic since a young age as a future Senator and member of the Organa monarchy so the way she wields her words there tells much about what she knows of the person she´s talking with.

With Vader Leia uses the "I am a member of the imperial Senate on a diplomatic mission to Alderaan" card when Vader mentions this wasn´t about a "mercy mission" and she was a rebel and a traitor.

This tell me two things:

1.- Leia believes Vader will respect the authority of the Senate on this matter.

Vader may be the Emperor right hand man but he´s someone Leia knows who at least tries to follow the rules and Vader response talks about previous experiences of this happening.

2.- "You werent´on any mercy mission THIS TIME" Leia and Vader meet before, possibly during one of Leia´s mercy missions and on the Senate.

Vader is impliying here if Leia was truly on a mercy mission from Alderaan then he would have not problem with it, he says she should stop trying to play games with him and to tell him where are the plans the rebels sent her.

What´s interesting for me here is that Leia is appealing to Vader´s sense of law and order because this has worked before, she has used many mercy missions to help the rebel alliance making it look like she was sending help to planets in trouble which Vader seems to not have a problem with.

Vader says to Luke on ESB about becoming leaders of the Empire to "put order in the galaxy" so Leia going on mercy missions to help the population in other planets falls neatly into Vader´s idea of order.

Leia also believes she can lie to him, which is understable, he´s someone Leia believes can be talked down to given how the Emperor treats Vader, he shares "Vader´s leash" with Tarkin and maybe other officials, so Vader may have some personal authority but she knows he´s completely subjected to the Emperor´s will and Tarkin´s, she doesn´t know why but know´s is the truth.

This is in complete contrast with Tarkin who Leia automatically starts insulting and says she´s surprised he´s going to take the responsibility for executing her, Tarkin is the Emperor proxy there narratively speaking.

Leia doesn´t try to appeal to Tarkin using the Senate, the diplomatic laws or the fact she´s on a mercy mission because she knows he doesn´t care for any of that but he may care for taking responsibility for killing her because she´s a member of a Monarchy from one of the Core worlds of the Galaxy and a Senator. She´s trying to use her power in relation to his own because Tarkin main motivation and what he responds to is power.

All this tells me Vader and Leia meet on the Senate and kind of had a rivalry for their respective political agendas but despite this fact, Leia still expected Vader to follow the Law when the Emperor and Tarkin would not if they didn´t choose to.

It´s a shame this period, the meetings between Leia and Vader before the Death Star is completely ignored and once Vader shows Leia his other face, the face of the executioner, he losses all credibility she may have given him previously and while she´s a aware Tarkin gave the order to destroy Alderaan she blames Vader by proxy because he was the only one left alive of the first Death Star and I believe their previous meetings makes this more personal for her and I think this plays perfectly later in ROTJ when Luke told Leia about Vader being their father.

Leia believes Luke, Leia wants to keep Luke´s safe but more importantly, Leia doesn´t think Luke is crazy for believing he can bring Vader back from the "darkside", she doesn´t think his self appointed mission lacks merit despite her having all the reason in the world to tell Luke he´s wrong for ever believing Vader could be other thing than evil or stop being the Emperor´s slave and I think the reason why she understands Luke´s mission is because she herself has seen this little light, this aspect of Vader many other people ignore but she cares way more about Luke´s safety so she tells him to run and hide while wishing she could go with him because they are family.

Leia´s actions here also oppose her rebel leader persona, as leader of the rebellion Leia could have the right to detain Luke because he plainly told her, "I want to make sure Darth Vader isn´t on the second Death Star when the alliance blows it up because he´s my father and I want to save him" Leia stays on her mission because she´s loyal to the alliance but truts Luke to do his self appointed mission and scape safe because he´s her brother and she loves him, even if it means the rescue of the second in command from the Empire. This is an amazing show of trust and loyalty from Leia to Luke, her trust that he may have a point in trying to save Vader.

I know Leia being Luke´s sister and Vader´s daughter wasn´t planned in a New Hope but this still connected neatly with the first movie because those subtlies were still there.

[nimata-beroya]

I couldn't have said it better myself, bestie. And in all honesty, I don't want them to hug. YET. I want a screaming match first. I want Crosshair to tell them how hurt he is because they abandoned him, to wonder of if they'll leave him again if they get the chance, to tell them what should he give a kark about them when they didn't give one for him?; I want Hunter to be angry at Crosshair because he returned to the Empire, for everything he (allegedly) did to them voluntarily. I want them to yell at each other because that will clean the air between them.

And after a few weeks of building trust again, asking forgiveness, then, just then, they might hug.

I know some people in the fandom still see this as a black-and-white situation. It's not that. Never has been and never will. There's no side that's completely right or completely wrong. Everyone made mistakes, and now they have to work in making amends.

Because nobody can deny that Crosshair tried to kill them, several times. You could argue that he was under the chip's influence. True, but according to Crosshair, not always. You could also say that he didn't really want to kill them, which is also true, but he put up an excellent act pretending. If you were put in Hunter's shoes, in what he knew and believed, you can't say it wasn't convincing.

You say that the Batch should've made efforts to rescue Crosshair from the beginning? ABSOLUTELY!!! 100% AGREE!!! But it wasn't that easy as we wanted it to be. First, because the first betrayal was Crosshair's to the Batch in Kamino. WE know it was because of the chip, but they didn't know at the time. And they didn't truly believe the power of the chips until Wrecker's chip activated. By then, Crosshair tried to fry them with an Ion Engine. He had all the Empire's might as his disposal, and the Batch knew how hard it was reaching someone under the chip's control. Crosshair wasn't going to go willingly. Purely strategically speaking, it was too much of a risk. Hunter wasn't willing to risk anyone else's life for someone who wouldn't want to come with them.

I can hear someone in the back saying, "But THEy wEnT fOR HuntEr!". Yeah, they did, but it wasn't Hunter's decision. It was Tech's, Echo's, Wrecker's, and Omega's choice, going against Hunter's orders. I concede that it was like rubbing salt in the wound for Crosshair. It was. It sucked. OUCH! It is what it is. I can't imagine how awful it must've felt.

Especially, when all that Crosshair wanted was to be reunited with them. Pity that it was TO WORK FOR THE EMPIRE! We know how that ended. And for those who think Hunter's reluctance to get Crosshair rescued was baseless, I have a question for you. What happened the first time they tried? Tech (apparently) died. Hunter's instinct weren't that wrong, were they? His worst fear came true. It isn't fair sacrificing Crosshair for the safety of the rest, but guess what? Life isn't fair.

Could've been different if they had done it much earlier? Probably. But you know what they say about self-fulfilling prophesies, right? The harder you try to avoid something inevitable, most likely it's to happen.

Crosshair did the best he could under the circumstances, even though I don't agree with a lot of his actions. Hunter and the rest of the Batch also did the best they could with what they got.

The entire fandom should heed Tech's wise words

Just because you can see where someone's actions come from, doesn't mean you're ok with them. All this is to say that we need to have compassion for the characters, empathize with them.

Leave your anger for the real villains, you know: Palpatine, Hemlock, Tarkin, etc, etc.

I'm gonna go full Space Mama here and post another reminder I feel needs giving on this Bad Batch Eve as we prepare for this next episode...

This is NOT your fanfiction or other fanfics you've read online. The reunion we're gonna see between the boys more than likely isn't going to be all hugs and tears and words of forgiveness. There's probably gonna be some fighting and the forgiveness might not come right away. Maybe not even for a couple episodes.

The tension that is most likely inevitable is to be expected and justified.

Don't be mad at Hunter or Wrecker for not immediately forgiving Crosshair. The hurt between all of them is gonna take time.

Don't be mad if they don't hug. These guys are soldiers and not exactly the most emotionally in tune of men, so hugging each other might not be the first thing they think to do. Hugging Omega is different cuz she's a kid. And again, that's all fanfic versions we've all come up with that we need to separate from reality.

Now, if they do hug, then hallelujah! I would be more than overjoyed to see it, but I'm not expecting it.

Don't set your expectations too high, especially based on fanfic expectations. There are things we'd all love to see that would be so sweet and amazing, but some of those aren't the most realistic things. Don't be mad if those things don't happen.

Keep your expectations realistic!!

[enaelyork]

[Nebuleuse - NFSW WIP]

Am i sorry for this ? I don't know guys. Really i dont...

Tags/Warnings: age gap, trash talk, smut, oral sex (M! receiving), masturbation, sex in public place. 🫣

Tags : @fenharel-enaste, @starlady66, @alotofrandomfangirling

+18 DNI

I had stayed for a good hour in the street next to the offices, devouring pasta that I had reheated in a hurry, as if their digestion could do the same to me with the events that follow one another in my life.

Gobbling them up without thinking, as my heart tried to swallow my emotions until it sickened. The smell of tomato sauce and spices mix with the stifling and bitter atmosphere of the capital. A feeling sent back to me by the city and which strangely made me think of Krennic.

This city was in his image: Cold, ruthless, acid, the infamous smell less, of course. He smelled good, as long as his smell still haunted me several days after he touched me.

When I couldn't swallow anything more, I resigned myself to returning to the office, thinking that my stomach was as full as my soul was empty.

Broken.

Martyred.

The tumult of the building left me indifferent and when I took the deserted corridor reserved for our service I was exhausted. Nervously, psychologically, emotionally. I couldn't take any more of all this unsaid, of all this blackmail, I was tired of being a puppet at the mercy of the Tarkins. To have had to sacrifice my ideas to satisfy values ​​that do not belong to me. Then, suddenly, a violent shock brought me out of my torpor. I had just hit something as hard as a wall, but way too hot to really be one.

Krennic.

—What ? I groan at his piercing gaze. Now was not the time to get in my way. I didn't want to see him. Don't want to play. And it wasn't just because of the oath I had sworn to my grandmother and my father had just burned. Not just because of the shit Ellie was getting us all into while fucking with Thrawn.

But it was him. It made me mad with rage to realize the power this man had over me and I couldn't accept that anyone other than Father could afford it.

He remained silent, his shadow advancing towards me, forcing me back against the wall where my back crashed. He took his ranks from his pocket and slammed the plate against the identification window. A satisfied beep sounded and the elevator door opened to release my back from its grip, allowing us to step inside.

I was shaking, my legs were struggling to keep myself upright, and my heart was probably going to stop any moment now.

—Something wrong, Orson?" I say in a wavering voice. Because it seems to me that you got what you wanted and that was enough to move on.

He looked almost as serious as a death.

— It's more easier.

I blink. He wasn't drunk, not a single ounce of alcohol escaped his mouth when he blew against my forehead.

— Simple ?

— To be ruthless. To play. That's why they call me a monster. But people make me sick. Their looks, their contempt, their endless flow of absurd words. They like to listen to themselves, they like what they are when they have no merit, when they were born like that, whereas I...

If I opened my mouth now I was going to miss something very important, so I was so petrified at the thought of him getting discouraged that I almost couldn't breathe.

—That's why I hate them. They don't have a clue what it means to everything I do, everything I've worked for. So I play to survive. I play because I convince myself that they are no more valuable than me, and you, you...

Me ?

I wasn't going to know. Not immediately. But it wasn't necessary. He didn't need to tell me what I already knew. It took my breath away so much that I barely realized his hand was already unhooking the opening of my uniform pants. At that precise moment I couldn't push him away, I didn't want to, I never wanted to.

—I need to fuck you. he whispers in a shaking voice in my neck, pressing me a little more against the wall. That's all I think Vicky. You. I need it and it's messing up my existence, my galaxy, my head and especially my priorities.

—Do it. I moaned. My hand slipped into his pants to grab his dick. His erection was so strong it instantly took my breath away.

I wanted it too.

I needed to feel him inside me, needed him to make me forget the shit we'd gotten ourselves into. To forget that life was just a dramatic series of disappointments that bound together to form a pitiful tragedy. That was the reality. Him, me, Ellie, Thrawn, we were all entangled in a war machine that crushed our souls and we wanted more and more. We were instruments who had decided to do as we pleased, dreading the moment when we would have to fall into line for good.

Krennic turned to press the emergency stop button on the elevator and then lifted me up to allow me to wrap my legs around his waist. My mouth crashed into his, devouring all of the air that was trying to escape. I bit him almost bleeding, desperately, greedily. It was as if my life depended of his mouth and what he was going to do to me.

He devours me relentlessly, crushing my lips in a destructive kiss. He kisses me without stopping, lips, face, jaw and my closed eyelids. I was ready to die like this. In his arms.

Adored by the only motherfucker in the galaxy who could make me see the stars.

Beyond his pants, I tried to caress him, to feel his penis swell even more between my fingers and this feeling made me lose the little reason I had left.

— Please. Please…

—Please what? his voice was deep, and i can see desire in his eyes.

—Please fuck me.

He laughed nervously. I had never had to beg anyone in my entire life. No one had resisted me, no matter the area of ​​my existence. Except my family, except them, so it was up to me to bow down and accept the obligations. I couldn't take it anymore and never thought I was going to fuck them off begging someone to fuck me. But it was Orson Krennic. And with him there was always that moment of ruthless resistance that preceded a destructive explosion.

— It is complicated.

He was right. No time, no resources. One bastard in the family was enough. Nothing that allowed us to be able to do it in the rules. But it was too late to back down, too late to tell him to stop touching and biting me like he was doing. He had already given me too much and I wanted more.

—I want you inside me, you can't, you...

— I have a solution. He said with a smile, kissing the corner of the lips. He pulled back and dropped me to his knees, pulling his cock out of his pants before grabbing my hair to bring my face closer to the tip of his glans. I finished pulling his pants down to his ankles and grabbed his cock with my hand before kissing the end.

My desire for him was so depraved that I didn't feel a shred of shame at the thought of anything I wanted to do to him. So I took it as far into my mouth as I could, covering it completely before sucking it like candy. My hand moved back and forth around his base as we were captivated by noises that were sure to drive him crazy.

— Crap. He whispered as he wrapped my hair around his wrist. I was still pinned against the wall as he moved back and forth in my mouth, losing his balance so much that he had to hold one hand against the wall to keep from falling.

—Why do I always come back?" Why are you controlling me like that? What makes you so irresistible to me? Fuck.

I had no intention of responding to him, picking up my brisk pace and when my tongue pressed against the tip of his cock, the salty nectar tickling my tongue drove me crazy.

—Touch yourself, or I'll have to deal with you real quick.

And I comply, like the docile girl I was for him. Too curious to know where this little game will take us. But when I plunged into the throes of a pleasure that I barely discovered that I was interrupted by several shocks against the wall of the elevator.

— Somebody there ? Maintenance Droid!

— Shit ! Damn droid! he growled half-consciously, clutching my skull to hold me down as he sped up and down in my mouth. Tears welled up in my eyes from his repeated thrusts down my throat, steadily intensifying a little more.

—Keep on going. Touch yourself and let go of my cock. I'm going to cum, Vicky.

Hearing it rumble above me sent a shiver down my spine. We were about to get caught having sex in an elevator in one of the largest Imperial buildings and I couldn't see myself explaining how Krennic's cock had ended up deep in my throat. Because this droid was going to come back, write a report and it was going to sink us both. I should be panicking, but the situation was so exciting that I wasn't sure I would stop even if the robot were to force open the door.

— I will cum in your mouth. He repeated like a litany. It was delicious to hear the tone of his voice twist under the effect of the approaching orgasm. He was at my mercy, vulnerable, he literally depended on my mouth.

—Someone here ? launched the droid again through the metal wall. Krennic punched the wall hard.

—Director Krennic and Chief Engineer Tarkin. Can't send us help instead of bellowing? He roared in anger. I almost wanted to burst out laughing at how absurd the situation was. His body was starting to shake and his legs were starting to falter around my fingers. He was close, as long as he stroked my cheek as if to ask my permission. I nod gently and it doesn't take more than a few seconds for a warm, thick liquid to fill my throat. I had done this before, swallowing as fast as I could so the taste wouldn't soak into my mouth, but not this time. I let it sink into me for a moment before swallowing it while touching myself.

— Shit. He whispered, grabbing me by the hair and pulling me up. I hadn't reached orgasm and I fully intended to. He presses me against the wall, my hand still firmly anchored in my panties.

—I want you, Vicky. Entirely. Tell me you'll give me anything I want when we're down and I'll make you cum before that droid comes back.

—No. I say in a placid voice. I'm not excited enough, I lied. And now that I know that droid is coming back.

—He won't come, you'll come. Here. Provided you promise me that your little ass will be mine soon.

I laugh like a drunk. I was drunk to him, his scent and the feel of his body against my sweaty skin. His fingers, which rested on mine to guide them between my thighs, which I spread even further, made me dizzy. His middle finger slowly slid over my lips and moved up to tease my ass before returning to my drenched pussy and I pursed my lips not to give him what he wanted right away.

—You are very quiet today. he whispers in my ear. My eyes met his before hovering above us, letting myself be carried away by the delicious feel of his hand.

—I thought that was what you liked. The silence.

—Not with you. You are not like others, you are like me, you hate this world in the same way.

—Liar. You love this. Wealth, opulence, glory. You feed on it.

— Error. I'm just playing the game to get myself a place of choice, little star.

—Did you just give me a stupid nickname again, Orson?

My muscles contract gently around his fingers. This way he had to guide me in my caresses was a pure delight and I was too proud to admit it.

—It's always better than Honey

— I like that nickname.

—Would you rather little star, or baby Tarkin.

—No.

—Keep kidding yourself. He digs his fingers deeper into me and I scream as I cling to him, his teeth digging into my neck as I explode around his hand. No. I'm literally shattered. It was as if he had just slammed me against a wall and shattered me into pieces so violently that I wondered if I would ever be able to fix myself for good. The tremor that ran through me was so violent that I felt like I couldn't breathe. Knocks sounded outside.

—Director Krennic? K5W and K9SA for extraction. Stay calm.

Krennic looked at me smiling. He was buttoning his pants while I was doing the same with mine, my cheeks flushed. My face ravaged by what had just happened. I was persuaded to carry his stigmata for weeks and I literally consumed myself from within. Yet, I had never been so relaxed in my entire life.

—They said to stay calm. He put a mocking smile on his lips. His breath hit my forehead and I chuckled against his shoulder. If those poor droids knew what they had just escaped.

—Physically, I've never been this good. But here, we have just entered a dangerous zone, Orson. An area where I have never set foot before. I swallowed, fearing that my frankness would give me away completely. But the serious expression that crossed his electric eyes led me to believe that he was immersed in the same torments as me.

— Me neither. But I'm not afraid of the unknown. And you too, baby Tarkin, you survived on Geonosis, this kind of hostile terrain shouldn't scare you anymore.

[nevertheless-moving]

Imagine Luke and Leia ending up in the clone wars era but all of their force abilities are “what the actual fuck?” levels of bullshit, and neither of them ever realized that the things they could do with the force were considered extremely high level techniques.

that is one of my FAVORITE things to imagine yes. To me this is less about ‘Skywalker bullshit’ (though there is some of that) and more about the training they (didn’t) receive.

The high-Midi-chlorians-actual-descendents-of-the-force thing makes it easier to tap into the force, makes it more possible to do so without accidentally exhausting yourself. But, in universe, under the right circumstances and with the properly channeled belief anyone can do anything. That’s why Palpatine had to make the galaxy want an empire, why his first strategy was misdirection and his top priority was crushing hope. Chirrut was supposedly force-null and he walked through an army. Han navigated that astroid field because he had to. The force is everywhere. 

In an amusing but possibly unintended turn of events, 6-12 weeks of training in a swamp with an elderly frog who only talks in riddles without ever being exposed to Jedi culture except as a myth is actually IDEAL if you’re looking to maximize a Jedi’s raw strength. Most Jedi training that we see in the prequels is explicitly designed to put the breaks on a force-users raw power (for honestly very valid reasons). Channeling all violence through a single weapon that will start screaming if you get too violent, training to use it defensively, is definitely the soft-ball alternative to just squashing people like meatballs. 

Meditating, wearing beige, the code, shunning attachments, all that stuff is built around making sure force users never run above first or second gear even in stressful situations (again valid, when you run your jedi in the red sometimes they become murder monsters). The downside of this is that when they’re forced to maintain that placid pace for years at a time (i.e: prolonged war), they’re much more likely to burn out.

When Yoda told Luke do or do not, told him a luminous being was he, told him size matters not, the amazing thing isn’t that Luke believed him. That was karking objectively provable. Yoda lifted a spaceship, so now Luke knows he can too if he just thinks he can. So he does. Vader and Palpatine conquered a galaxy. Luke believes he can stop worlds, crush armies, conquer planets and so he can. 

The incredible thing about Luke is what he doesn’t do despite being tapped into the Force utterly free of mental restraint. Luke’s op character trait is his compassion, not his strength.

I assume at some point Luke puts Leia through a similar 2 month meditation class where he convinces her that her only limitations are the ones she imposes on herself. She has a complete meltdown when she realizes that she actually could have boiled Tarkin alive with her mind and saved Alderann. This causes a volcano to go off, devastating the ecology of a small moon. On the flight home, both of them slightly charred, she tells Luke that she wanted to focus on politics and didn’t really want to be a Jedi anyway. Luke nods quickly, supporting her decision, and resolves to seek out some Jedi texts about how to teach people they can do anything but also...maybe...not...anything.

And thus the Jedi order is reborn.

- - -

In the time travel version of this, it means that Luke is assuming that all of the Jedi are restraining themselves like he is. And they are, but they also aren’t, because their breaks are subconscious, built in since childhood, and have a lot of failsafes so even if they turn darkside they still restrain themselves pretty good (a la Dooku). 

Leia is, again, less interested with the Jedi-specific aspects of the war (especially now that she doesn’t have to feel guilty about being one of the only people who can pick up that mantle) and more interested in the diplomatic side. Again, Palpatine can only succeed if the galaxy at large accepts this, and from where she’s standing they’re fucking moving in that direction. If being a Jedi is tapping into the mystical energy field that binds all living things together to channel it through one specific person in one specific place, then politics is manipulating that same power for a diffuse impact on as many people as possible. 

This status-quo lasts until a major clone wars battle where Luke’s like ‘wait- the entire other side is sub-sentient droids? No living beings, and no droids with complex personality matrices? And they’re currently, actively killing living, sentient humans? Well kriff, come on! This is a no-brainer!’

Luke takes a deep breath. The air- it doesn’t disappear or anything- but it- it stops moving. It’s hard to explain...but breathing has an odd...resistance. The hair on the back of every clone’s neck stands up. Several get vaguely sea sick. One pukes a little. Plo Koon stumbles back, head ringing and afraid.

Luke Skywalker stands up and clenches his fists. 10,000 droids crumple like flimsi in the hands of a child. The battlefield is eerily quiet for a moment, then that imperceptible hum (which no one noticed until it stopped) fades and the air returns to its normal density. A few of the shinies start whooping, then the whole battalion is cheering.

Luke massages his temples, smiling wryly at Master Koon. “I guess I can see how that would get exhausting if you were doing it everyday.”

Plo Koon just stares.

[katarok]

My answers because I have time to kill. Here are the summaries based on what I think would happen.

1. We would get the OG plan for Star Wars, originally Lucas wanted to tell a more gritty story with Anakin having been the general princess Leia was seeking on Tatooine, where he would be raising his family far from the Empire. Instead Anakin was declared dead (then Vader) and his role was given to a new character Ben.

2. That is a whole fan fiction on itself. But It reminds me a bit of the old Legends romance of Obi Wan and Siri Tachi, if she was evil like Palps apprentice we could get a Mara Jade x Luke Skywalker similar story.

3. Obi Wan would follow Dooku, and together they would fail to destroy Sidious and possibly die. Anakin wouldn't lost his limb and got burned on Mustafar and would reign as Emperor Vader.

4. Prison time or execution for war crimes, or Luke would convince the new republic to keep him under his protection to act as some short of guardian for the new Jedi order.

5. Too little too late, who would listen to him, order 66 happens in mere weeks. There isn't enough time. But Maul on early rebellion perhaps with Saw's partisans doing good old terrorism. That would be fun, what fun. (Until he got killed by Vader)

6. I don't think the story would have changed much. Perhaps Luke would join a bit earlier and perhaps Leia and Luke would have known they are siblings from the get go. No kissing Hoth scene.

7. We would get Star Wars. Originally the Emperor was meant to be nothing more than a figurehead. And warlords like Tarkin where the ones who truly had the power in the Empire. It wasn't until the Empire Strikes Back where it was decided that the Emperor would be a strong dark sider.

8. Damn that actually changes a lot, Anakin is made Jedi Master, why because he trained a padawan to the rank of Knight. So he passes one of the biggest hurdles to be a master. With Anakin as a Master and access to the Forbidden Force Healing section of the library to save Padme I don't think he can fall so easily, so we get answer 1.

9. Lego Star Wars, rebuild the Galaxy?

10. That happens in the legends series Dark Empire, he becomes Darth Luuke. Fun Fact it is thanks to Dark Empire that we have the Darth title for Sith Lords, originally it was just the first name of Darth Vader.

11. Nothing would change except Ahsoka sticking on with the Rebels crew for a few more adventures. And we wouldn't get one of the best fights in all of star wars

12. It was too late for them to change anything. Order 66 was hours away. Maybe she could nudge Maul to join her in the Rebellion.

13 - 14. Not much would change for the crew or the plot. Kallus and Grand Inquisitor aren't huge players to make the impact last.

15. Man that would help the Rebellion a ton. A strategist on Thrawn's calibur would be a massive pain for the Empire but until Luke destroys the Death Star causing the Rebel Alliance to unite then he wouldn't be able to use his strategic brilliance to the fullest.

16. I assume you meant the Republic. Answer 1.

17. I think that happened for a while, but eventually Ezra and Thrawn had to part ways because being a ruthless fascist isn't something you can work aside to live with another.

18. He would be either an Inquisitor or Maul's apprentice. If they ever make a what if, I want to watch him and Maul take over the Galaxy.

19. Then I guess Palpatine loses, happy ending? Anakin after the war is over, leaves the Jedi Order to raise his children with Padme on Naboo happily ever after.

20. :) :) :) oh this happens. In Legends at least. I won't spoil things, go read the

Yuuzhan Vong War

I'm not the only one who thinks we need a Star Wars What If Show, right? And specifically these What If..?

What If... Anakin Skywalker didn't fall to the Dark Side?

What If... Padme Amidala was force sensitive?

What If.... Obi-Wan Kenobi became a Sith after Qui-Gon's death?

What If... Darth Vader lived at the end of Return Of The Jedi?

What If... Darth Maul left the Dark Side after Palpatine's betrayal?

What If... Padme Amidala lived in Revenge Of The Sith and raised Luke and/or Leia?

What If... Sheev Palpatine wasn't Darth Sidious?

What If... Ahsoka Tano didn't leave the Jedi Order?

What If... the roles were reversed? (every bad character is good and viceversa)

What If... Luke Skywalker fell to the Dark Side?

What If... Darth Vader didn't fight Ahsoka in Twilight of the Apprentice?

What If... Ahsoka Tano and Darth Maul became allies in Clone Wars?

What If... Alexsandr Kallus redeemed sooner?

What If... Kanan Jarrus saved Grand Inquisitor in Fire Across the Galaxy and he reluctantly became part of the Ghost Crew -just to stay alive- until he truly became a rebel?

What If... Thrawn became a rebel instead of an imperial?

What If... the Empire fell, but Anakin Skywalker didn't, and he had to raise Luke?

What If... Thrawn and Ezra had to put their differences aside to survive after Family Reunion – and Farewell?

What If... Ezra Bridger became a Sith?

What If... the Order 66 didn't happen?

What If... the Empire and the Rebellion had to work together to stop a threat, far more dangerous than the Empire ever was?