#It's being completely selfless. Exactly what a Jedi stands for.

[drunk-on-starlight]

I just remembered that we've actually seen the exact same resurrection that Kylo/Ben does in Rise before. That's very close to what Anakin does in TCW with the daughter and Ahsoka.

[padme-amitabha]

Is Anakin a Mary Sue?

Now it may shock you to learn this but it turns out that Disney Star Wars is kind of a contentious topic. The fandom's been more or less divided between those who like the sequel trilogy and those who like good movies but both groups spend a great deal of time slinging [ __ ] at each other over every form of social media known to man and truly no battleground is more fiercely contested than the protagonist of each trilogy. People who hate the Disney trilogy tend to criticize Rey for being an overpowered, flawless, perfect, invincible and unrelatable character for whom everything just kind of happens with no real struggle or difficulty a Mary Sue if you will.

Meanwhile supporters of the sequel trilogy are quick to leap to her defense usually with one of two potential counter arguments:  1. You just hate strong women 2. So what if she's op as [ __ ] Anakin Skywalker from the prequels was a Mary Sue too and you don't criticize him. You just hate strong women. This argument was brought into sharp focus for me the other day when I was perusing twitter in search of calm, logical, rational discussion about the merits of the sequel trilogy and I chanced upon this little gem of a comment. Ah yes that famously perfect protagonist who wins everything, always makes the right decisions, has a selfless and compassionate personality, and is universally loved and respected by everyone. Well random twitter [ __ ] as it turns out, I am ready to have that conversation right now. So saddle up y'all because the drinker's here to round up this [ __ ] and put an end to this argument once and for all. Let us journey deep into the world of the Star Wars prequels and see if we can figure out whether Anakin Skywalker really is a Mary Sue.

Now in order to do this, we have to nail down what exactly a Mary Sue is. Well according to the dictionary definition it's a term used to describe a fictional character, usually female, who is seen as too perfect and almost boring for lack of flaws originally written as an idealized version of an author in fanfiction. Now the finer points of what makes a Mary Sue can vary depending on who you talk to but after consulting multiple sources and drawing upon my own experiences as a writer, there's a few common traits that I think most people would generally agree on:

1.      Mary Sues usually possess skills and abilities that are not consistent with their situation and personal history. They can do stuff they shouldn't realistically be able to and they can do it better than anyone else.

2.      They usually possess flawless idealized personalities that no real person could measure up to they never give in to negative emotions like anger, greed, jealousy, selfishness or arrogance.

3.      They're universally loved respected and embraced by every good character they encounter even when there's no logical reason for this to happen.

4.      They never get seriously challenged, fail at anything or get beaten by anyone, success and victory come easily to them.

5.      They always make good decisions and strive to do what's right in any situation so why is this actually a problem.

Well I think the answer should be obvious, Mary Sues are boring as [ __ ]. If a character has got no flaws or weaknesses and never really gets challenged or tested by anything then what is there to get invested in?

It's the flaws and failings of a character that make them interesting in the first place and their struggle to rise above and overcome these flaws that make them so compelling. If these things are missing from a character, then there's nothing for the audience to latch onto or care about. There's nothing to like or root for. That's the essence of a Mary Sue and that's what we're going to be looking at here. So, with that in mind let's see how Anakin stacks up against this list shall we?

Point number one: Being overpowered and having abilities that he shouldn't. Now this more than anything else is what people tend to latch onto when they criticize Anakin and who can blame them really? On the surface it seems pretty ridiculous to see a nine-year-old boy doing stuff like this autopilot but let's put it into a wider context, shall we? When we first meet Anakin in The Phantom Menace, he's a slave living with his mother on Tatooine. He's spent most of his life salvaging junk and using it to make new stuff that can marginally improve their quality of life. As a result, he's become pretty good with technology. Well that makes sense, I guess. He's even applied these technical skills to pod racing where he's been fairly successful despite suffering at least one major crash that we know about. Again, this kind of makes sense when you consider he's strong with the force which would likely give him heightened perception reactions and understanding of the world around him, you know qualities that are important to high performance racing drivers. Anyway, his racing abilities allow the main characters to win an engine part that they need to repair their ship as well as enough money to buy his freedom. Sensing his importance Qui-Gon Jinn takes him under his wing and begins to teach him about the force. Remember when older mentor characters were allowed to teach the protagonist things? I miss that. He also takes part in a space battle that destroys an enemy mothership at the climax of the movie. Now as goofy as this scene is in its execution, it's not actually inconsistent with Anakin’s abilities and experiences. If you've worked around technology vehicles and ships your entire life and you can pilot a racing pod to a high standard then it stands to reason that you could probably operate other types of spacecraft as well, particularly if you have a droid on board to manage most of the ship's systems for you. However, for the sake of argument let's concede the Anakin in The Phantom Menace is indeed more skilled competent and capable than your average person.

So, what kind of effect would this have on a young man from an impoverished background suddenly thrust into a much larger world of power, politics and opportunity? Well that brings me neatly along to point number two: Mary Sues are supposed to have flawless personalities never giving in to anger, jealousy, resentment, vengeance or ambition. All throughout the second and third movies in the prequel trilogy, Anakin displays an increasingly severe set of personality flaws that begin to undermine his position in the world and his relationship with other characters. He's impetuous and hot-headed, frequently rushing into dangerous situations without waiting for backup or considering the risk to himself particularly when someone he cares about is in danger. Keep that one in mind because it'll be important later. He's ambitious but also impatient, feeling like he's been unfairly held back by other characters, particularly Obi-Wan Kenobi, and this resentment causes a growing rift between the two men that eventually spills out into open conflicts. Rather than taking the longer and harder path to wisdom and understanding, Anakin wants everything right away. He also cares deeply about people close to him and this attachment often manifests in explosive bites of anger and jealousy when he feels that they're being threatened like when his mother gets kidnapped and killed by Tusken Raiders, causing Anakin to go on a violent rampage that escalates into wholesale slaughter. Afterwards even he's shocked by what he did or when he believes that Padme has turned against him by Obi-Wan Kenobi, causing him to lash out violently against both of them. By this point he's been totally consumed by uncontrolled jealousy anger resentment and betrayal. All of the emotions that lead to the dark side of the force. The point here is clear: if you [ __ ] with someone he cares about then mercy and compassion go right out the window.

All of his skills, abilities and potential which seemed so overpowered and unnecessary in the first movie in fact serve a very important purpose for his character development. They've generated a sense of superiority, arrogance and overconfidence, and a reluctance to listen to criticism or advice no matter how well intentioned they might be. These are dangerous flaws in his personality all by themselves but combined with his overwhelming emotional attachment to people he cares about it creates a potent cocktail of reckless ambition and deep-seated insecurity that makes him uniquely vulnerable to manipulation something which will later prove disastrous because while Mary Sues are universally loved respected and trusted by everyone, Anakin certainly isn't in the first movie. Obi-Wan Kenobi, Mace Windu and Yoda are all against training Anakin to become a Jedi despite his obvious potential because they know he's already too old to be inducted. This lack of early discipline in his life would leave a dangerous gap in his personality, making him unpredictable and less able to control his emotions, two factors which are extremely dangerous for Jedi. These misgivings would carry over to the next two movies where Anakin is elevated to the Jedi high council on Palpatine’s orders but the council itself refuses to grant him the rank of master because they feel he hasn't earned it yet. Now a different man would see this as an opportunity to prove himself by working hard and earning their trust eventually winning them over and gaining the recognition he deserves but Anakin takes this as a personal insult from the council which drives a deeper wedge between him and a Jedi order which he believes will never truly respect or accept him. Wow it's almost like Palpatine knew this was going to happen and engineered the whole thing to pull Anakin closer to him portraying himself as the only one who can help Anakin realize his full potential. It's a surprisingly smart piece of characterization that's completely consistent with everything we know about both men. The higher Anakin rises the more it stokes the fire of his ambition and superiority and the more he comes to see anyone who doubts or cautions him as a threat to his success. This arrogance and overconfidence also causes him to test himself against powerful opponents before he's actually ready for them and unlike Mary sues who easily win every battle they have to fight, Anakin’s recklessness causes an escalating series of losses like here where he tries to take on count Dooku all by himself and it ends with Anakin getting his [ __ ] arm sliced off. But his desire for revenge against the man who defeated him ultimately causes a more powerful and better prepared Anakin to execute him in the following movie, again proving his willingness to give into vengeance and anger even against helpless opponents or here in his climactic confrontation with Obi-Wan where his enemy has the advantage but Anakin presses the attack anyway and well I think we know how that turns out. Just as a side note I love how this carries over to Return of the Jedi. See Luke’s taking the high ground here just like Obi-Wan did.

What we have here is a clear pattern of behavior from a man whose ambitions consistently outstrip his abilities. Rather than demonstrating patience and restraint and taking the slower and harder path to lasting wisdom and fulfillment, Anakin’s inherent character flaws cause him to push himself beyond breaking point with increasingly disastrous consequences which brings me neatly along to the final points: whereas Mary Sues consistently make good righteous decisions and always strive to do the correct thing, Anakin on the other hand demonstrates a consistent pattern of mistakes and misjudgments that ultimately cost him everything. As I've already shown you the flaws in his personality are exacerbated by his powers and abilities making him easy prey for a ruthlessly ambitious man that knows exactly how to flatter his ambitions and prey on his weaknesses this eventually causes him to commit terrible crimes like murdering an entire tribe including unarmed civilians murdering children, executing a helpless opponent, helping to kill a jedi master, trying to murder his own wife, trying to kill his mentor and best friend, joining forces with an evil dictator to overthrow the republic, delivering this scene…

What I’m trying to say with all this is that Anakin Skywalker is the very furthest thing from a Mary Sue that you can get. Trying to label him as a Mary Sue for no other reason than because he's good at lots of stuff demonstrates a complete misunderstanding of what a Mary Sue is and also of who Anakin is. The reality is that he's a powerful but deeply flawed man whose unique combination of circumstances and abilities have created a dangerous personality that's vulnerable to manipulation and corruption his greatest strengths ultimately proved to be his most terrible weaknesses with consequences that echo across the entire galaxy. Now I have my own thoughts on the prequel trilogy as a whole and I’d be lying if I said they were great movies but fundamentally I think the story they tell is actually pretty [ __ ] good and I’m just gonna say it: Anakin’s rise to power and fall to the dark side is a damn good piece of character work that Disney would have done well to pay more attention to. Anyway, that's all I’ve got for today. Go away now.

I would argue the prequels are great movies but he makes some very good points. I have seen so many Disney fans claim Anakin is a Mary Sue, when he’s anything but a Mary Sue. 

[dalekofchaos]

TROS A Dark and Grim Farewell to the Skywalker Saga: Or, why Palpatine is the ultimate winner of the Star Wars Saga

From the fan theories reddit

TL;DR Palpatine doesn’t die but actually achieves his goal in The Rise of Skywalker, possessing Rey and resetting the board back to its prequel era condition with him quietly operating as a smiling “good” figure to hide his actual dark deeds.

The Rise of Skywalker ends with a victorious Rey Palpatine (alias Rey Skywalker) burying the lightsabers of both Luke Skywalker and Leia Organa on the ruined Lars homestead on Tattoine, symbolizing to the viewer the end of an era. Since Luke’s saber once belonged to Anakin we can extend the symbolism to include Anakin’s era as well. In all, Rey buries over 60 years of galactic and Jedi history in the wastelands of an Outer Rim backwater. A planet, which, by the way, bred a tremendous amount of suffering for beloved characters.

Anakin Skywalker: Raised as a slave on Tattoine until liberated by the Jedi but forced to leave his mother behind to be trained as a celibate monk. Returns a decade later only to learn that in his absence, his mother was sold, freed, married, abducted, and horrifically abused. She dies in his arms. He goes on to slaughter an entire village of Tusken Raiders (and not just the men, but the women and the children too!)

Luke Skywalker: Raised on Tattoine by Owen and Beru Lars as a moisture farmer; a hard life seriously lacking in excitement for young Luke. Luke is raised with barely the bare minimum of information about his father (not that Owen and Beru knew all that much anyway) and even the asking of questions on the subject seems to be taboo (see Owen’s line in ANH “I told you to forget it”). Returns to the Lars home one day to find his aunt and uncle savagely murdered by the Empire. Returns years later having to rescue his friends from literal slavery.

Leia Organa: Goes to Tattoine to rescue her lover from captivity only to be enslaved herself and made to wear a humiliating outfit while kept on a collar and leash by an obese alien slug. In context, that is humiliating for anyone, let alone a princess and military leader.

Point being, Tattoine, highly symbolic though it is, doesn’t hold great memories for the people whose sabers and legacy Rey is literally burying in the sand. Call me crazy but I feel like the choice of such a location for the final legacy of some of the most important figures in the history of the galaxy to be a tad insulting. After all, Luke and Leia were pillars of the Light; perhaps Anakin not so much but before he fell the man was extraordinarily selfless. And his final act was a return to his selfless “true self” (see Luke’s remark in ROTJ).

Sarcastic though he may have initially been, how was Tattoine once described by Luke?

“Well, if there’s a bright center in the universe you’re on the planet that it’s farthest from.“

So Tattoine is not a bright world. In fact, it’s fairly grim. One might even say dark.

People there have to eek out a living under oppressive, dangerous conditions. There are wild raiders, scorching heat, slavery, and space ports described by a man who has literally traveled the length and breadth of the galaxy as follows:

“You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy.“

Really, Obi Wan? Never? Not even in a Zyggerian slave mine where you yourself suffered as a slave for a short time? Tattoine must be pretty rough indeed.

In The Phantom Menace, Qui Gon Jinn says that Tattoine is “controlled by the Hutts.” Hutts. Plural. In the same film, Anakin says that he and his mother were sold to Watto by Gardula the Hutt, again telling us that more than one Hutt runs the show on Tattoine. So Hutt control of this dark, seedy backwater world didn’t end simply because Jabba the Hutt was assassinated. Again, in the same film, Qui Gon threatens Watto by asking:

“Perhaps you’d like to take this up with the Hutts? I’m sure they can settle this.“

Even a Jedi Master acknowledges that the Hutts are THE AUTHORITY on this planet. Imagine a world so dark and grim that the central authority are a bunch of slave owning (and abusing, I might add), drug smuggling, murdering crime lords who keep victims frozen in carbonite as wall decorations and feed their slaves and enemies to vicious beasts. Whose value of sentient life is so small that they callously bet slaves on the outcome of podraces. THIS is the world Rey buries the legacies of the Skywalker’s on.

All while calling herself a Skywalker.

She could have gone to Coruscant and the site of the old Jedi temple. She could have gone to Naboo, where Padme wanted to raise her children to begin with. She could have gone to Ach-to and the site of the original Jedi temple. But no, she chose Tattoine.

Granted, Rey may not know the importance of Naboo in the Skywalker history, but I know someone who does. Someone who has a personal, as well as philosophical vendetta against the Skywalkers and what they stand for. Someone who we know is capable of cheating death. Someone who has more than once tried to bait Jedi into striking him down....

In Return of the Jedi, Emperor Palpatine goads Luke into attacking him:

“Use it (Luke’s lightsaber). I am unarmed.” “Take your Jedi weapon. Strike me down with all of your hatred, and your journey toward the Dark Side will be complete!”

We learn in The Rise of Skywalker that there is a Sith ritual whereby masters can in some sense apparently possess their murderer when their apprentice kills them:

“That is what I want. Kill me... and my spirit will pass into you. As all the Sith live in me... you will be Empress... we will be one.“

This adds new context to Palpatine trying to goad Luke into “killing” him decades earlier. Palpatine is looking for a new host body. In TROS Palpatine’s body is ruined. He is essentially a living corpse. In ROTJ he walks with a noticeable limp requiring the use of a cane; something he didn’t require in the prequels. Age is taking its toll on the Sith Lord and a younger, fresher body would be lovely.

And what does Rey conveniently do for him? She kills him.

Now granted, we don’t know the details of this ritual. Is it one of Palpatine’s own invention? Is it an ancient Sith technique? Is the use of a lightsaber always required for the ritual to work? It’s unclear. Technically, Palpatine’s own lightning destroyed his body. But he clearly asked for Rey to “kill” him. And Rey obliged. She did what he wanted her to do.

We know Palpatine can survive seemingly fatal destruction of his body; after all, he blew up in Return of the Jedi. And he blew up here as well. Why, exactly, can’t he come back from that? The film gives us no real explanation as to why this isn’t possible.

What it does tell us is that Palpatine wanted his granddaughter to kill him so that he could live on in her. This is what she does. Rey Palpatine then goes on to bury the legacy of Palpatine’s hated enemies, of the Jedi themselves, on a dark, oppressive, corrupt world devoid of any light for a single Skywalker family member. She buries the Jedi weapons and heirlooms in an unmarked “grave” on the grounds of a mundane ruin where both Anakin and Luke experienced heartbreak.

And lest we forget, when it’s all said and done, the Skywalker bloodline has been extinguished while the Palpatine bloodline lives on. Despite what the movie tries to tell us, the implication of all this is rather dark. I believe there’s enough evidence to assert that Palpatine ultimately won. He got the outcome he asked for. There’s no reason stated in the film to suspect that he can’t come back again or that somehow Rey is immune to his possession.

She may smile and look innocent and cute in the final scenes, but Palpatine is a master manipulator. He played the part of the smiling, kindly, grandfatherly senator/chancellor for decades. Now that he’s finally got that new body he’s been craving, what better way to stick it to his old enemies than by singling out the darkest, most oppressive place the Skywalkers knew, and dumping their legacy in the sand as his granddaughter masquerades as an adoptive Skywalker: The Phantom Menace.

[kalinara]

I know you love Lukey Lou, so I wanted to ask: Why did you like his character arc in TLJ? A lot of people, including myself and Mark Hamill, felt it was poorly written and out of character.

A lot of people who hate TLJ LOVE to pass around Mark Hamill’s extremely out of context quotes about his INITIAL reaction to learning about Luke’s arc.  When he discusses the final product, he is a lot less negative.

But even if he dislikes TLJ, that’s okay, that’s his business.  Death of the Author applies to everyone involved in the creative process, and it’s okay for fans and showrunners/writers/actors to see a character in a different way.

I think though that a lot of critics of Luke’s arc in TLJ miss that it’s just that.  An ARC.  Luke at the beginning of TLJ is not the same person as Luke at the end of TLJ.  He has his own despair and trauma to face.

Luke, in TLJ, doesn’t read all that different from Luke in Legends to me, fundamentally.  It’s just that they’ve faced different things.  There are points in Legends where Luke suffers despair and depression just like he does in TLJ, but there are also other factors going on.  Luke has his order, for one.  And the Yuzhan Vong war.  He has Mara, and Ben (Skywalker), and Jaina.  He has his students and everything else to help him keep from giving in to those emotions.

Luke in TLJ is from a continuity that doesn’t have these things.  He doesn’t have a wife and child.  He doesn’t have his Order.  And Luke has a more personal connection to Kylo’s fall than he had with Jacen’s in Legends.  By the time Jacen had fallen, he’d graduated Jedi training.  He had his own life and issues.  And Jacen never really retaliated (or was the unwitting tool of retaliation) against the Jedi Order itself.  

But as Luke sees it, he’s directly responsible for Kylo’s fall.  He blames himself.  I personally disagree with Luke’s assessment, and I think the Last Jedi does too.  Luke gave in to a moment of weakness and fear.  He had a vision that told him (correctly!) that Kylo was or would become a monster.  A lot of folk hate the idea that Luke would, for one instant, even consider killing his innocent nephew.  But I think they miss or ignore that a) Kylo was a grown adult, not a child, b) the Force vision WAS CORRECT: Kylo DID become a monster that would massacre (multiple!) villages, murder unarmed old men, and be a direct participant in child slavery and genocide, and the most important c) Luke STOPPED HIMSELF.

I don’t personally think it’s out of character for Luke to momentarily give into fear and despair.  If he had ACTUALLY killed Ben Solo, that’d be one thing.  But he didn’t.  He stopped himself.

It’s interesting though to parallel Luke’s reaction to those events with “Ben Solo’s” own, because as much as I’m skeptical of the comic book series’s retcon of Kylo’s responsibility for the destruction of the Jedi Temple.  I do like how it expressly puts Kylo and Luke in the same position.

Ben (a grown adult, I reiterate) wakes up to find his uncle standing over him with a lightsaber.  His uncle doesn’t actually strike, but it’s understandable that Ben lashes out at that moment.  He thinks he killed him.  He’s horrified.  And Palpatine acts.  The Temple is destroyed.

So when you think about it.  Ben and Luke are in EXACTLY the same position in the immediate aftermath of the Temple’s destruction.  As far as I know, neither one of them is aware of Palpatine’s direct role in events.  All both of them know is that they suddenly found themselves in positions causing great fear and anger, they lashed out in said fear and anger against someone that they loved, and as a result everything was destroyed.

Now both characters had the option of going back to Hosnian Prime.  Leia and Han love both characters.  They would have listened to their explanations as to what happened.  They would have been horrified and angry, but they would have forgiven them and focused more on what they could do to help fix things.

But both characters blame themselves for what happened.  And both characters believe that they’ve done something unforgivable.

What’s important though is what happens next.  Now me, personally, I don’t mind the comic retcon because to me, the destruction of the Jedi Temple was always the least of Kylo’s crimes.  It was awful, of course.  But there’s a difference between a sudden act of fear and rage (see also: Anakin’s destruction of the Tuskan village) and the kind of deliberately evil deeds that Kylo Ren does later.

Regardless of whether or not Kylo lashed out and brought down the temple at that moment, he DEFINITELY stood in the middle of Tuanil, looking out at the army he helped to enslave and brainwash, and ordered them to fire on disarmed, pacified civilians.  (If Finn, who was brainwashed and surrounded by commanding officers and comrades who could kill him in a heartbeat, could realize “no, I’m not doing this”, then Kylo, who was GIVING THE ORDER, could have stopped this as well.)

There’s a point where characters have to own their choices.  Even if Kylo didn’t feel like he could go home, he didn’t HAVE to join a organization that’s been enslaving children and planning genocide.  He didn’t HAVE to take part in the violence and murder.  He could have done what Luke did.

Luke went into exile.  And I see fans attack that choice as “cowardly” or “selfish”, but I disagree.  Yes, Luke could have chosen instead to go to Hosnian Prime.  He could have gone to Han and Leia and he didn’t.  He could have tried to hunt down Kylo.  He could have joined in the fight against the First Order.  He could have been a hero here, like he’d been before.  

But we’ve seen what happens when a very powerful man, prone to self-loathing and despair, decides to do the “selfless” thing and become a hero.  That’s the Clone Wars in a nutshell.  What if Anakin had, after Attack of the Clones, looked around and said “Oh my god.  I just lost my mother.  I just massacred a village.  I  can’t be a soldier right now!  I need to deal with the horrible thing I’ve just done!”

We might still have had the Fall of the Republic and Order #66 (Palpatine isn’t one to discard his whole plans), but we probably wouldn’t have had Darth Vader.

And Luke knows that.  He saw what his father became.  And if anything, Luke’s more powerful than Anakin ever was.  Look at what he did on Crait.  We’ve never seen anything like that.  Look at what he can do AS A FORCE GHOST.

Now imagine what THAT would be like on the Dark Side?

I don’t know if I believe that Luke was ever seriously in danger of going Dark Side.  He isn’t prone to externalizing anger and lashing out in the same way Anakin was.  (Leia, I think, might be in more danger of that, depending on circumstances.  But thankfully, Leia has always known how to focus her anger in constructive ways.  She gets that from Padme and Bail.)  But I believe that LUKE believes he was.  And that through his exile, Luke was trying to protect the galaxy.

And that’s the BEGINNING of his story in the Last Jedi.  Because Luke has his own arc there just like Rey and Kylo do.  Luke starts off the Last Jedi in a very bad place: full of despair and self-loathing.  He blames himself for what happened to Kylo.  He’s convinced himself that he had been wrong to try to bring back the Jedi.  (But even then, he’s still preserving the books.)

Folks compare his role to Obi-Wan on Tatooine and Yoda on Dagobah, and I think that’s fair, to an extent.  But there are differences.  Obi-Wan was never in exile.  He was on Tatooine for a purpose.  He ALWAYS meant to teach Luke about his father’s legacy and protect him and train him going forward.   He leaps at the call to go help Leia, and immediately uses that opportunity to sweep Luke along.   

Yoda’s a closer comparison, really.  Since his exile is really an exile.  (Though Rebels shows that he’s not completely inactive.)  But for all that Yoda eventually helps train Luke, his story pretty much ends there.  He doesn’t take an active role after that point.

Even as he trains Rey, Luke has to come to terms with his own very complicated emotions about Kylo Ren, his fall, and the loss of the Jedi Order.  He has to move past his self-loathing and accept that Kylo made his own choices, and that he’s made HIS own choices.  He realizes/remembers that the Jedi are more than just books/old knowledge, they’re people too.  And his “I am not the last Jedi” is a really important moment that a lot of people like to ignore.  (Especially those edgelords who love the idea that TLJ showed us why the Jedi shouldn’t exist, which seriously misses the point of the movie.)

Luke at the end of the movie is not the same person he was at the start.  He’s remembered who he is.  He faces his own failure, and the parts that aren’t his fault.  He reunites with his sister, gets her forgiveness, and goes out to face his nephew without hesitation or self-blame.  He dies, but in the process, he buys them the time they need to escape.  And well, as we’ve seen in Star Wars, becoming one with the Force is not always the end of the story.  :-)

So yes, I like Luke’s arc in the Last Jedi.  It’s hard to watch, because it’s not what I would have wanted for the character.  I don’t like the thought of Luke being unhappy and traumatized, and having lost everything.  But that’s not the end of the story.  Luke at the END of the Last Jedi is everything he was always supposed to be.  He just lost his way a little bit before that.  What matters is that he found his way back.

[sky-scribbles]

I finished Jedi Under Siege a few days ago, and now I’ve had time to think things through and work out my headcanons, it’s time to ramble about how Zeth found it...

He’s been dreading this for a long time. He still considers himself a Jedi, but he’s come a very long way from the Padawan who believed what he’d been told about ‘Jedi = good, Sith = evil.’ Having Sith friends has taught him that their Code doesn’t automatically lead to evil any more than the Jedi Code automatically leads to good, and he knows that if the Republic wins, they’ll want to exterminate the Sith all over again. There will be countless deaths. An entire culture will be lost. Why does the fate of the galaxy depend on one man deciding whether Jedi values of selflessness and peace, or Sith values of freedom and emotion, are more important?

Zeth really did hope that with Vitiate gone, both orders would take the chance to make peace with each other and focus on changing for the better. Fat chance.

So of course, he had to make a choice.  And in the end... Zeth knows how much good the Jedi can do, at their best. They have so much potential to be better than they are - and he has no right to sit on the outskirts and complain about them being narrow-minded. If he wants them to change, he has to go back to them and change things.

Maybe he won’t be able to stop them from repeating their old mistakes. From seeing everything in black-and-white and believing genocide is the solution. But stars, he is going to try.

(It helps that he formed an unlikely friendship with my Warrior, Inquisitor and Agent, who are totally alive and part of the Alliance because canon can get lost. Tuanor, Saovani and Marokhai have zero faith in Imperial leadership nowadays, and zero desire to return to it - so they plan to take their followers, find some remote planet, and keep the traditions of the Sith and Empire alive. Whatever happens in the war to come, the best of their culture will be preserved. And those three will finally get some peace, I’ve put them through enough.)

So Zeth headed off to Ossus...

Where he was delighted to find an old friend! He’d tried to resign himself to the idea of never seeing Kira, Doc and Scourge again, so finding Doc alive and well gave him hope that the others might still be out there. It’s great for him to have someone else around from his first found family, especially now Doc seems a little more mature than before - and after all the self-doubt Zeth’s been having recently, getting Doc’s vote of confidence as soon as he entered the room was a much-needed mood boost for him.

I didn’t get any screencaps of him with Tau and Gnost-Dural, but he likes and respects them both immensely. He expected to be treated with suspicion by them, to be told he’d strayed from the Code, attachment is forbidden, etc etc - and he was relieved that neither of them uttered a word about his departure from the Order (though I don’t think Gnost-Dural knows that Zeth’s married to the spy he worked with during the Underwear Incident yet...) 

Zeth hugely respects Gnost-Dural for saving so many and keeping them safe for so long, and as for Tau... he knows exactly what it’s like to be afraid of yourself, thanks to Vitiate’s possession games, so he’s going to do his best to encourage her. I really hope we get to see her with the promised Padawan soon. That said, he’s worried that both of them are of the ‘we have to destroy the Sith completely’ mind - but after all his character growth, he’s confident enough that he can and will stand up to them if needs be.

Daeruun! Love him. Offering tea is a sure-fire way to become Zeth’s friend. It’s so great to see a tough military character who also loves poetry and music, and I foresee these two having a lot of nerdy conversations.

I’d avoided spoilers, so Malgus was a complete surprise, and I’m really looking forward to seeing where this goes. I agree with the feeling I’ve seen around tumblr that going back to Pubs vs Imps makes sense from a story perspective, even if we’d prefer something new, so...  all in all, a really fun story instalment, and I’m excited for more!

But of course, the highlight:

Finally Zeth got to hug his husband. And I’m now validated in my belief that despite their models being the same height, Zeth is the tol one and Theron likes to snuggle against his shoulder. It’s canon.

[gch1995]

Obi-Wan, Yoda, Qui Gonn, Mace Windu, and so many of the other prequel era Jedi are actually so much more fun and sympathetic when George Lucas, the fans, and the writers can actually agree with what’s on screen and in the EU by just accepting that they really weren’t as “above it all” in comparison to Anakin, their enemies, and the other Sith they demonized as “only being out for themselves.”

Sure, they weren’t entirely wrong. Their enemies didn’t become very good people, but had they proven themselves that much better since destroying the Sith race a millennium ago “for the greater good?” Yeah, I get that the Sith attacked them first, and there’s nothing wrong with self-defense, but they completely eviscerated their planets! That’s pretty fucked up and hypocritical, particularly for people who claim to be “peacekeepers.” Not to mention all the systematic abuse, crime, deception, manipulation, and oppression they enable and perpetuate to try to hold onto control for their own safety obsessively over the next thousand years afterwards.

That’s exactly why Anakin starts using that line to defend himself after joining Palpatine to try to save himself, Padme, and their unborn kids in a situation where he knows it’s not going to end well for the Jedi and Republic anyway since the clones have been chipped and the Council have committed, so he can end the war ASAP through helping him commit mass murder of the Republic and Jedi Order instead.

That’s why Obi-Wan, Yoda, and so many of the Jedi keep using that line when they immediately execute their fallen Jedi without a fair trial, when they manipulate Luke to kill Vader, when they recruit children as soldiers, when they get merciless with enemies who hesitate or back off, when they take on the clone army from Palps, when they invade Genosis without proper investigation for Palpatine, and so on throughout the Clone Wars.

As we see it being used in canon SW, and quite often in real life, the whole “greater good,” “it’s the only way,” and “it’s for the best” lines aren’t really these healthy and selfless mindsets at all. It’s about being too afraid to do the right thing, which in all the prequel era characters, I can completely understand the reasons why, but, from what we saw in the movies, they weren’t trying hard enough to stand up and take risks to do any better, which is why it destroyed them in the end instead.

thewillowbends replied to your quote “Skywalker is arguably the most powerful Jedi alive, and he is still…”

The essential problem, as I see it, is that the Order was, to some extent, just as guilty as Anakin was in wanting to have it both ways. They recognized he was unstable, and they didn’t want to honor his way of doing things with their approval, but they desperately needed him to defeat the Sith and win the war for them. And when that situation inevitably imploded, it hurt everyone.

This quote represents exactly why I could never stan for the Jedi Order.

They are given this boy and told he’s special. They reject him because RULES! But then he saves an entire planet so they begrudgingly accept because FUCK RULES!

They spend the following years telling him he needs to be exactly like them (without ever explaining how he should achieve that) and yet they constantly discuss amongst themselves how he’ll never be like them. Then, a much older politician ask to have to unrestricted, unsupervised access to the kid and they say NO because RULES! But 10 seconds later, the politician pulls ranks and they say YES because FUCK RULES! He doesn’t even have to convince mace Windu, all Palpatine says is I’m the Chancellor and he’s like Sure, take him :/

Palpatine manipulates and abuses the kid for over 10 years and no notices or do anything about it because no one pays enough attention and because it’s convenient to them to allow this relationship to flourish.

But the moment the relationship becomes inconvenient they hold it against Anakin, and use it to deem him untrustworthy. So, the friendship is now bad because RULES!

“But he is not stable. You know it. We all do.” Mace Windu

They openly discussed Anakin and they all acknowledged Anakin has issues but no one helps. No even thinks about helping. And then, when they need a spy, they are more than help to use an unstable person to do their dirty work. Obi-wan pretty much begs than not do it and yet….

“And that,” Mace Windu said, “may be the best argument in favor of this plan. I have told you all what I have seen of the energy between Skywalker and the Supreme Chancellor. Anything that might distance young Skywalker from Palpatine’s influence is worth the attempt.”

Remind me again, who put Palpatine and Anakin together in the first place? Oh, the hypocrisy! They completely twist their views when it serves them. No wonder Anakin, completely unstable, had such a hard time realizing the difference between the Sith and Jedi’s bullshit. So, he chose the one he believed would save his family.

Where is the Jedi legendary compassion? They only talk about how to use him, how to Anakin will fulfill the prophecy, how he’ll save them, how to control him, etc….they NEVER ask each other: how can we help him?

My biggest problem here is accepting the Jedi cared for Anakin as an individual. Obi-wan was a flawed mentor but, in this particular situation, he was the only one who at least tried to shield Anakin from the Council’s stupid plans. I just can’t believe that a group of stable, responsible adults who were all very aware of Anakin’s struggles and did absolutely nothing about it, actually cared for his wellbeing (beyond him being able to work for them).

I don’t believe they wished him any harm but the idea that the Jedi Council cared about Anakin (as an individual and not in the “we must love all living creatures” way) is something beyond my comprehension lol respecting and acknowledging someone’s abilities is not compassion and it’s not care. Especially when those abilities are only acknowledges rarely and only when it serves a higher purpose that the council approves. 

Anakin: My most useful talents are not those of a Jedi.

Mace Windu: Indeed, you throw your spirit and your anguish into machines and useless competitions, rather than directly confronting your feelings.

I could ask about what was done to help Anakin deal with his anguish but we already know the answer to that one lol

It’s a recurring theme in Anakin’s life with the Jedi. They point out he’s failing and do nothing to help him. After years of this treatment, the kid snaps and kills a shitload of people and the remaining Jedi don’t even have the decency to accept any responsibility for what happened to him, or even, at the very least, acknowledged they were part of the problem.

And that drives me crazy.

[uomo-accattivante]

For the entire run of Charles Soule’s Poe Dameron comic book series, readers have gotten the chance to experience the wit, bravery, and unselfish nature of the best pilot in the Resistance. We also have been introduced to Black Squadron, a muscular Hutt, and a compelling new villain. With a new storyline coming this May, StarWars.com e-mailed with Soule about what makes Poe Dameron unique, his Black Squadron copilots, and why Agent Terex is the perfect foil for the titular character.

StarWars.com: Ever since fans were introduced to the characters in The Force Awakens, people have been drawn to Poe Dameron. What is it about the character that you find so compelling, and how do you channel that into the Poe Dameron series?

Charles Soule: I won’t lie — writing a swashbuckling expert pilot with charisma for miles won’t ever be a drag. Poe the character brings an energy to his scenes that’s pretty undeniable, like a feedback loop of fun and focus. Now, I know I’m writing about a fictional character as if he’s a real person, making me just the scribe jotting down his adventures as they happen, but sometimes it feels like that. Poe is sort of a force of nature.

StarWars.com: While Han Solo and Poe Dameron are a type of foil for one another, and both use unconventional methods at times, they are more dissimilar than they are alike. Compare and contrast the two pilots and what makes them tick.

Charles Soule: I’m tempted to do this in terms of Dungeons & Dragons alignments, but I don’t want to mash together too many fictional worlds here, so I’ll stick to Star Wars. Han is just a darker guy in general than Poe. You can rely on him, if he decides you’re worth his time and energy, but that’s not a foregone conclusion. I don’t think you’re ever quite sure where you stand with Han Solo, which is part of what makes him a great character. Poe is a more selfless character, just in general. I don’t see him ever trying to cut and run as long as there’s still someone he might be able to help. That said, Poe’s rampant idealism and self-confidence absolutely gets him into trouble, much the way Han’s sense of self-interest causes problems for him, as well. They’re both pretty awesome, though!

StarWars.com: Let’s look at your incredible run on this series so far. The series is initially set before the events of The Force Awakens and has taken Poe on a number of adventures. What stands out to you from your run so far, and what have been some of your biggest challenges as a storyteller?

Charles Soule: I’ve been really happy with the new characters we’ve introduced to the Star Wars universe, especially Poe’s nemesis Agent Terex, former Imperial stormtrooper and sometime officer in the First Order Security Bureau. He’s always a blast to write, almost a negative-image of Poe himself. Suralinda Javos and Oddy Muva are standouts as well, but even fleshing out characters from the films like Snap Wexley and Jess Pava has been fun, too. As far as challenges… I’d say the biggest thing was creating a compelling, strong adventure for Poe and Black Squadron that fit within what’s really a pretty small window in the Star Wars timeline — directly before The Force Awakens. We knew where the story ends, to a degree, so finding drama in the journey to get there was a tricky proposition. However, as is often the case in writing, solving the challenges was not just a great time, but resulted in a better story.

StarWars.com: Agent Terex is not the traditional “bad guy” in a First Order uniform and is much more than an archetypal villain. And, despite Captain Phasma’s best efforts, he seems to have an iron will. How much fun is this character to write, and what can you tell us about his character arc?

Charles Soule: Right — Terex! As I mentioned, he was an Imperial stormtrooper, even present at the Battle of Jakku. He became a galactic crime boss in the intervening decades, a truly ruthless man, but he was always pining away for the lost Empire, which he thought was a pretty cool institution. So, when he heard rumors of this thing called the First Order, he signed up, offering his immense network of contacts and favors owed to them. For a while, that was fine, until he began to tangle with Poe, as they both searched the galaxy for the missing explorer Lor San Tekka, in the hopes he could lead them to Luke Skywalker. Poe can be a frustrating opponent, and we’ve seen all sorts of things happen to Terex on his journey in the series. Personally, though, I think he ends in a really good place, and I’d love to see him pop up elsewhere. We’ll see!

StarWars.com: Through this series, we have also gotten to know the elite pilots of Black Squadron. What makes them such a perfect complement to Poe, and how do they keep one another “grounded,” especially considering how gifted they are at what they do?

Charles Soule: Black Squadron has evolved a bit over the course of the series, as any cast of characters should. We began with Poe, Temmin “Snap” Wexley, Jessika Pava, Karé Kun, L’ulo L’ampar, and their loyal(ish) ground tech and aspiring pilot Oddy Muva. We lost both L’ulo and Oddy, as well as more than a few astromechs assigned to Jess, but a new member joined — the one-time journalist and New Republic Navy veteran Suralinda Javos. Snap and Karé got married at the end of #25, too, which was a storyline I built for a long time in the series. I think they all love each other, and would do anything for each other, but these are fighter pilots. They’re competitive. Still, they usually manage to channel those tendencies into the fight against the First Order, where it should go.

StarWars.com: We also meet Ivee, the incredibly brave astromech (see Poe Dameron #25) that has a rather strong bond with BB-8. What inspired this storyline, and what has the response been like?

Charles Soule: It’s been so fun! Ivee and BB-8 clicked immediately, becoming extremely fast friends, connected in a deep way that organic beings probably can’t completely understand. I thought it might just be fun to give BB-8 sort of a… well, I don’t know if you can call it a romance, exactly, but certainly a very close friendship with another droid. The response has been strongly positive. It’s sort of amazing to me what you can do in comics, and storytelling in general, to imbue a hunk of metal, plastic, and wires with what really feels like “humanity” — whatever that means in a universe filled with all sorts of non-human sentients.

StarWars.com: You clearly have a talent for finding the voice of so many iconic Star Wars characters, and nowhere is it more apparent than when you write Leia Organa. It’s a tribute to your writing prowess that you are able to add to her wonderful legacy. How do you maintain the nuance of this character and keep her so fresh and engaging?

Charles Soule: Leia’s awesome, and really, writing her is not that different from writing any of the characters in any of my Star Wars projects. I just do my best to put myself in their position and let them talk. Leia is a master politician, incredibly empathetic, but also wry and funny. She’s faced with the re-emergence of an evil force she thought she’d defeated decades before, and now she’s doing everything she can to prevent it from taking over the galaxy. She’s under enormous stress, but she handles it with charm and grace. She also takes zero crap from anyone — that’s a big part of writing her, too.

StarWars.com: The “Legend Found” arc features a poignant conversation between Poe and Lor San Tekka in which they discuss the nature of the Force. It’s a great way to see the Force from the perspective of non-Jedi characters, but also teaches us a bit more about this mystical energy field. What do we learn from this conversation?

Charles Soule: The biggest thing, I think, is the way a character like Lor San Tekka who’s been studying the Force his whole life views the “hero Force-wielders.” Jedi and Sith, essentially. Lor understands why they get all the attention, as agents of the Cosmic Force, but he knows they’re just a small part of the immense whole that is the Living Force. For Lor, and for the vast majority of beings in the galaxy, it’s all about the Living Force. I hadn’t seen The Last Jedi yet when I wrote that sequence, but now that I have, I think it’s pretty fair to say that Luke Skywalker would probably agree with Lor San Tekka’s point of view, at least in part.

                    The cover of Poe Dameron #27, coming May 16.

StarWars.com: In May, you have a new arc in store for readers. What can you tell us about it?

Charles Soule: The bookends of Poe Dameron issues 26-31 are set moments after the events of The Last Jedi. I don’t want to suggest that it’s a direct mini-sequel or anything like that; the story is told as a flashback in a conversation following the Battle of Crait. It just gives fans a taste of where things are after the film wraps up. It also takes a look at both The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi from the point of view of characters we didn’t necessarily see in the movies, and will catch us up on what Black Squadron was up to during Episode VIII in particular. I can’t wait for these issues to begin coming out — they were so much fun to write!

###

[yellowocaballero]

@bytebun

SIR YOUR TAGS.........

Double spoiler readmore so I can respond, if that's okay!!

#things that fucked me up so bad. I cried about this one#I haven’t cried since the last time I watched princess mononoke -_- <= my puffy-eyed face#me & obi-wan unable to believe that his dad would hurt him up until the#”you’re gonna be the safest kid” line. Like. Oh. OH fuckkj. I understand now#I’m remembering the meta commentary on less than zero… something something Cody isn’t equipped to be a dad + family as safety and I didn’t#get it until I read this. Fuck. He can’t keep him safe#I am so fucked up abt this it took me like six hours to manage anything coherent#Cody going. I’ve been so selfish. But -#I can’t stand it aghhhh the hey! They put force cuffs on me! The absolute trust up until -#FUCK. We have to leave Cody & obi-wan behind now EXCUSE ME. God#this is it. I love no chip aus but I can’t think abt them for too long bc/ they hurt me too bad but this is exactly it#the most compelling characterization of the clones is looking at a dude who is so uniquely fucked up that it looks like he did a 180 in 2#seconds but is defined by “loyalty” repeatedly as a character trait#and then working out what the fresh hell made him like that. Agh#oh clever clever Cody. Picking the narrow path that you think will keep your child safe even if it means you have to give up everything#YOU IDIOT.#and ofc it feels perfectly in character#It was so jarring to see five and tup being so callous but ofc it had to be them - bc/ they wldnt be dead w/o chip plot - but then what#abt echo and. Rex. Bc/ I will admit I cannot see Rex not avoiding order 66 somehow (possibly bc/ that’s the arc filoni sets up for him)#possibly promising that gregor left. & wolffe#god I’m hoping Cody did not kill boil.#some part of me is still hoping this is a itachi style plot. But while I think dad!cody wouldnt /kill/ obi-wan if that had been the order#keeping him safe by [spoilers] is. Yeah. That’s totally reasonable from his perspective!#Augh. & u can rlly. I mean. The thing abt the order is it’s a terrible awful tragedy for the Jedi but also it highlights the tragedy of the#clones existence. You make a guy so fucked up that he can do this (whether willingly or thru brain control)#Also I see the Rex babysitting follow-up in ur list of fics to come#ok I’m gonna close my mouth now. To whomst can I talk about this. I’m never going to b normal abt it for the rest of my life#Tragic awful parenting decisions by people who don’t - who don’t really ever have a choice is just so! So!!!#I’m also sad about boga. God#but; but also. Cody leaving the light saber within reach???

AAAAHHHH THANK YOU. Again if you don't mind me responding...

1) No matter the AU, Cody is always aware that what he and Obi-Wan have going on can't last. Here, specifically, he's extremely aware that there will be a point where they will all fulfill their purpose and that their paths will part. I definitely think that, if Cody had been commanded by the Emperor to kill Obi-Wan instead of keep him safe for Anakin, he would have rebelled. It's definitely not an Itachi thing - more, "well, if it's gonna happen anyway, I may as well be there to play damage control". As it was, Cody could justify what he was doing to himself. Giving him over to Anakin is a terrible decision, and not a rational one, but...well, Cody's a loyal (indoctrinated) Imperial soldier. He genuinely believes that it's a good idea.

2) I like writing roleswaps (and situation swaps like this) because you get to really explore who a character truly is through putting them in a radically different position. You can write an Obi-Wan with the exact same character traits of canon but who acts completely differently if you have him obsessively chase the life of an ideal soldier instead of an ideal Jedi. This is very much the same thing. Cody has the exact same personality traits as I wrote him before - loyal, dedicated, selfless, loving, responsible - but you can have him act in the exact opposite way that he normally would. It's hideously fun to start off with "one of the best people in this universe has just committed an atrocity" & "the best parent I've ever written has now become a TERRIBLE parent" and then work backwards into why. When you take someone that loyal, and change his loyalties...

3) Fives and Tup were my way of showing that the chips definitely don't exist, yeah! And, if I'm remembering Fives right, he's a very intelligent and thoughtful person who doesn't always believe what he's told. With a combination of every factor happening here, Fives is still going along with everything because he has no choice, but he has no illusions about it and he's very bitter. Poor Tup is a good guy who is SUPER fucking brainwashed. I feel bad for establishing that every time Obi-Wan was upset every clone would freak and run to grab Cody to solve his Baby Emotions.

4) I specifically mentioned Bly, the Wolffepack, Boil, and Gregor rebelling to establish that it was completely possible for them to rebel, and in two cases escape. Wanted to be clear that Cody was Making A Choice (TM). As for Rex and Bly, you see what they're up to at this time later (macking on his girlfriend and getting beat up by Ahsoka, mostly).

5) I mean the clones were already growing up in a military cult, but yes definitely their behavior here is guided by childhood indoctrination + propaganda + brainwashing + external pressure + group pressure + aaand some light brain mods. Really fun to fuck around with. We see further how Cody's upbringing fucked him up.

6) You are the only person who's read this who commented on the fact that Cody ordered Obi-Wan's pet lizard shot because it was pissing him off lol. He's a charmer.

AU of Roleswap AU: Cody's First and Final Choice

Obi-Wan was staring very intently at the churning blue river running underneath the gorge, wondering if he would die when he jumped down it or if it would simply be very cool, when Cody accepted the transmission.

He felt something spike in the Force, like a hot knife pressing through skin, before Cody’s comm rang again. Obi-Wan relaxed when he saw that it was Master Anakin, making some curt commands to Cody before his holoimage vanished into dust. Cody was standing very straight. Boga began lowing.

He listened with half an ear as Cody made some more calls. A lot more calls - he heard Pond’s name somewhere in there, along with Bly and Wolffe and Fox. Definitely Wolffe - Obi-Wan rolled his eyes when he heard a lot of loud cursing from Wolffe before the call ended.

What was happening?

The rabbit hole is growing increasingly deeper and I am giving increasingly less fucks, so here's an AU of an AU. For this one, I'd even say that you don't need to have read the original - the premise is only that Obi-Wan is Anakin's padawan and that Cody ended up half-raising him. I have four other stories in this AU, all of which are much longer than this, and I'll probably post them in the upcoming week.

Hey, do you remember how the Order 66 chips didn't exist in the original movies? The Clone Wars cartoon made them up.

So if the chips didn't exist...what would that look like?

11k of bad parenting under the cut.

Obi-Wan was staring very intently at the churning blue river running underneath the gorge, wondering if he would die when he jumped down it or if it would simply be very cool, when Cody accepted the transmission.

He turned only long enough to see if it was Master Qui-Gon - it wasn’t, otherwise Cody would have opened the call with a ‘where the kriff are you’ instead of some sort of greeting - before turning back to the gorge. He probably could. Rex would help him. Master Anakin would throw him, and it would be very funny. Master Qui-Gon would also think it’s very funny, but he wouldn’t help him. Cody was probably the only one who both did not think it would be funny and would also actively try and stop them. Cody was a buzzkill.

He felt something spike in the Force, like a hot knife pressing through skin, before Cody’s comm rang again. Obi-Wan relaxed when he saw that it was Master Anakin, making some curt commands to Cody before his holoimage vanished into dust. Cody was standing very straight. Boga began lowing.

He listened with half an ear as Cody made some more calls. A lot more calls - he heard Pond’s name somewhere in there, along with Bly and Wolffe and Fox. Definitely Wolffe - Obi-Wan rolled his eyes when he heard a lot of loud cursing from Wolffe before the call ended.

Suddenly, Obi-Wan heard a great echo of armor rustling. Every 212th man who survived the land battle - easily over 200, maybe closer to 300 - was moving simultaneously, all closing in around Cody. It almost felt like a rush, although it didn’t look like that at all.

Were they debriefing without him? Like he was a freaking fourteen year old? Obi-Wan jogged up to the group until he reached the fringes, pushing gently at the mass of plastoid armor. Something strange was beginning to boil up in the Force, but with long ease of practice Obi-Wan pushed it aside. If you listened to the Force all day nothing ever got done.

Boga began crying again, with short and mournful howls.

The trooper - Klick - turned around to look at him. He didn’t have to look down anymore. They were almost of an equal height, the top of Ben’s head finally reaching their noses. It was both very satisfying and a little weird.

“Are we pulling out?”

But Klick just looked at him. There was…something weird…

“Commander.”

The troopers parted instantly to let Cody through, and Obi-Wan immediately relaxed. The bad feeling in the Force dissipated in seconds, even though Boga was still crying her head off. The sound echoed through the canyon, oddly in tune with the beat of Obi-Wan’s heart.

At some point Cody had put his bucket back on, and Obi-Wan watched as Cody moved to stand in front of him. A little closer than usual - he almost bent over before thinking better of it, abruptly remembering that he could meet Obi-Wan’s eyes straight on.

“Commander,” Cody repeated. He fell abruptly silent - not as if he was trying to think of something to say, but as if he couldn’t get anything else out. Finally, he said, “There’s been a new development. We must return to Coruscant immediately.”

What? “But what about Master Qui-Gon?” Obi-Wan asked, alarmed. “We just captured this sector, we can’t leave immediately!”

“Your master has requested your presence on Coruscant,” Cody repeated. Something was wrong with his voice, and Obi-Wan cautiously reached out to the Force. “We must return to Coruscant immediately.”

“Well, Master can just wait,” Obi-Wan said, miffed. He crossed his arms, letting the wind whip harsh dust onto his tunic. He had lost the robe during the fight. For once, Cody hadn’t picked it up after him. “Not everything is as important as he thinks it is.”

Cody just stared at him. Obi-Wan looked around. All of the 212th were staring at him, or whispering amongst themselves in low voices. It made his skin prickle. Or maybe something else was making his skin prickle.

For a second, Obi-Wan thought Cody was going to press the issue. Master Anakin wasn’t automatically Cody’s commanding officer on the field, even when Master Qui-Gon was gone - if Obi-Wan was leant to the 212th then that was him, which was complicated when Master Anakin was there telling him what to do - but he had always obeyed Master Anakin before. Every clone did, even the ones unattached to him. He had a powerful personality.

But Cody just knelt down instead, putting himself underneath Obi-Wan’s confused eyesight. He looked up at him, and there was a strange tint of marvel amidst his durasteel presence. He stared at Obi-Wan for another few seconds, the obscure aura of marvel and wonder blossoming until Obi-Wan’s breath caught, before he reached out and grabbed Obi-Wan’s forearms.

“Obi-Wan. I need you to be brave right now, okay?”

“I am fifteen years old -”

“I know,” Cody said wryly. It was only then that Obi-Wan realized that Cody had called him by his name. He never did that. “But I’m going to need something from you now, okay? Can you do that?”

Something cold pricked down Obi-Wan’s neck. Some of the troopers were looking away. “Yeah? Of course. Are we still going to go swimming later?”

“Sure,” Cody said. “We can go swimming later.” He stayed silent for another long moment before seeming to compose himself. “From this moment on, until we rendezvous with your master, I need you to obey me as your CO in battle.”

Obi-Wan stiffened. That meant no questions, no arguments, and ‘hopping to it’. “Yes, sir!”

“Good. Give me your lightsaber.”

Obi-Wan unbuckled his lightsaber and passed it to him. From the way Cody knelt in front of him, the moment almost felt like something else - like he was some sort of royalty passing on a weapon to a knight or something, like in the books he used to read as kids. Grandmaster’s voice rang in his ears - your weapon’s your life, stop making Cody always go fetch it for you.

Cody released his forearms, leaving them sticky in the heat, before straightening and tucking the lightsaber onto his empty clip. “We’re marching back to the ship. Lieutenant Wooley, coordinate with Lieutenant Crys on departure. Troops, move out. Obi-Wan, I’ll need your blasters and your vibroblade too.”

They moved out, Obi-Wan removing his weapons as they went.

The ship was ready to fly when they arrived, the engines churning and spitting into the thin atmo. Cody stuck close to Obi-Wan the entire time, hovering at his elbow in a classic anxious Cody maneuver. Obi-Wan followed the men onto the transport, jostled slightly in the commotion, when he stopped short.

A hammer rapped in Obi-Wan’s skull. Sharply and politely: a one-two knock.

Obi-Wan twisted around. “Something’s going to happen.”

Near him, Wooley cursed.

The hammer hit Obi-Wan’s skull - cruelly and insistently, an invader striving to destroy your home. “Something’s going to happen! Cody -”

“Longshot, the cuffs.”

Firm hands wrestled his hands down from his head and clasped something cool on his wrists, and a very familiar pressure and weight settled onto Obi-Wan’s wrists. The feeling went away, and he opened his eyes to see that Longshot had locked him into Force inhibitor cuffs.

He looked up at Cody, confused beyond measure. The knocking had gone away, but he was left standing in a void so heavy it pressed down at his shoulders and sucked down at his stomach. They were painful and uncomfortable and anxiety inducing and, after a few hours in your prison cell, torturous.

To his eternal embarrassment, Obi-Wan found himself saying in a small voice, “Cody?”

“No questions,” Cody said, gently pushing him up the ramp, and Obi-Wan closed his mouth abruptly. Cody had given him very explicit orders. This was a disgusting lack of discipline.

Obi-Wan swore to himself that he’d uphold the highest standards of discipline. As befitting a Jedi and a Commander of the finest army in the Republic. So he walked in lock-step with the men, and sat down at the wall benches as a small group of clones stayed outside the transport and whispered furiously between themselves. Without the Force he couldn’t make out their words. He caught something about “at least we -” before Wooley barked a command at them and they broke up. In the background, Boga was howling. Obi-Wan craned his head, trying to see out and see what was happening with Boga.

“For twice born god’s sake,” Cody snapped, with harshness Obi-Wan rarely heard from him, “will someone shut the animal up?”

The bridge closed. Obi-Wan might have heard a blaster bolt outside, but it was hard to tell. Boga cried, and Obi-Wan didn’t hear if she cried again.

Cody buckled Obi-Wan’s harnesses for him, since it was a little difficult to do the matter cuffed, and Obi-Wan watched with exasperation as he triple checked the thing. He would do that when Obi-Wan was thirteen, triple check his work and redo it as if he couldn’t buckle his own harness correctly. In retrospect, he couldn’t. No wonder they all thought he was incompetent for months on months.

The transport was dead silent as they took off. Unusually, nobody took off their helmets or started chatting. They just sat in silence, staring at the floor or at the ceiling or exchanging glances with each other. Obi-Wan thought wistfully of Boga. She was a very good girl. Maybe the fallen soldier transport could -

Obi-Wan jolted, turning to Cody. “We didn’t pack up the fallen!”

They always did that, or they left people on the ground to take care of it. But Cody just tilted his helmet to Obi-Wan before looking away. “Silence the rest of the trip, men.”

Obi-Wan fell silent, hurt. He’d ask later. Right now, the important thing was discipline.

When they reached the ship Obi-Wan found it weirdly busy. They were pulling out of a captured planet to rendezvous at Coruscant, there shouldn’t be this much to do. But everybody was walking sharply in twos, murmuring in low voices, or talking into their comms. They all looked up and stared as Obi-Wan and Cody walked by. Obi-Wan found himself shrinking against Cody. Way to ask about the cuffs, guys.

When they reached the bridge they met Boil standing at the entryway, arms folded. Three other troopers were standing behind him, hissing furiously at him, but he ignored all of them to stare dead straight at Cody. Almost imperceptibly, Cody sighed.

“Sir,” Boil said frostily.

“Get back to your post.”

“Sir.” Boil’s helmet tilted to the confused Obi-Wan before looking back at Cody. “This is my conscientious objection. I refuse.”

“Good for you,” Cody said dully. Obi-Wan was slowing, and Cody gently put a hand on his back to push him forward. “Get back to your post. We’re joining with the 501st after their mission.”

“Go to fucking hell, sir!”

Obi-Wan gasped. Wow! Go Boil! But also - what?

But Cody didn’t react. He just stopped them both in front of Boil, who was still blocking the entryway. Rubbernecking clones milled about behind him. “I didn’t hear that. Get back to your post. That’s my final warning.”

“I’m not participating in this.” Boil’s voice was drawn harsh and tight, firm as a coil. “You can all do whatever the fuck you want. I’m not doing it.”

“Um.” Obi-Wan figured that discipline could take a back seat for right now. He looked at Cody. “Are you mutinying? If you’re mutinying you can tell me.”

“We’re not mutinying.”

“I’m mutinying,” Boil spat. “You’re all fucking droids. Waxer would never go along with this.”

“Good thing Waxer’s dead,” Cody said blandly. Obi-Wan gasped. “On second thought, I’m taking Obi-Wan to his room. Someone find Gregor. He didn’t report in. Gearshift, Peel, go ahead of us. Barlex and Crys.”

Then Cody firmly changed their direction, and set off down the hall much faster than they had approached. Obi-Wan heard a distant thud and a grunt, but when he tried to turn around Cody just put a hand on the back of his neck in warning.

They walked the familiar path to Obi-Wan’s room, and he already resigned himself to being shuffled off while everybody else dealt with all the action. He’d have to call Quinlan and see what was going on. He just needed to talk to somebody, at this point. The Force was so empty and cold. It made Obi-Wan feel so empty and cold inside. He needed just a little warmth. But he wasn’t seeing any warmth on this Star Destroyer.

When they got to Obi-Wan’s officer cabin Cody stopped short. He looked at Obi-Wan, who gave him the most unimpressed look physically possible. Sassy looks were still undisciplined, but they tended to go unremarked upon if the officer was being stupid enough. Hardcase used to pull faces behind Master Anakin’s back just to make Obi-Wan laugh. Man, had Echo upbraided him for that. Fives had called him a moron, with that particular insulting-fond way Fives always has.

“Give me your comm.”

With far more hesitation than his weapons, Obi-Wan slowly unbuckled his comm and handed it to Cody. He hooked it to the back of his belt without looking.

“Okay.” Cody knocked on the door, and to Obi-Wan’s alarm he saw Gearshift and Peel emerge. Was that his stuff? Were they stealing his stuff? “Stay in here until I call for you. Gearshift and Peel are guarding your door.”

“You are imprisoning me,” Obi-Wan said. His head felt light and fuzzy, as if he wasn’t in his body. Most of that had to be the Force cuffs, but - hey, they had put fucking Force Cuffs on him! What! “You are putting me in a cell.”

“If I was putting you in a cell you’d be able to tell,” Cody said dryly. He put a hand on Obi-Wan’s back, but when Obi-Wan shook it off he carefully retreated. “Don’t try to escape, we can’t spare the men to chase after you right now and we’ll have to put you in a real cell. I’ll be back.”

“What, next to Boil?” Obi-Wan cried, voice hitching higher and higher. “What’s happening? Boil wouldn’t betray you, why are you hurting him?”

“You have to be brave, Obi-Wan,” Cody said, and Obi-Wan quieted.

He let them put him in his room. It felt different - partly due to the Force, partly due to the fact that they had confiscated a mysterious assortment of his things, partly because he was now locked inside. This was kind of like being grounded, except way weirder.

The minutes stretched on. He took inventory of what they’d taken. Anything with HoloNet access, which Obi-Wan carefully stored away in a mental file. Any weapons or anything that could be used to fiddle a lock or act as a weapon, which was a very comprehensive assessment and ended up taking out a disturbing variety of the things in his room. It took even more time to realize that they had sealed the room - they had triple bolted the ventilator cover shaft. Who did that?

Anybody who knew Obi-Wan, for one. So much for not being in a cell.

Obi-Wan lay on his bed, mind buzzing with a million thoughts before he brushed them aside. He wondered if they were really rendezvousing with Master Anakin, or if that had been a lie to get him on the ship. Not that he cared or anything, he just really wanted to know. Were they going to kidnap Master Anakin too? Good kriffing luck. Obi-Wan would have to be sure that Master Anakin didn’t injure anyone, he always got worked up in the middle of a fight…

Obi-Wan knocked politely on the door.

Gearshift opened it, standing at the entryway with his rifle on the ground. “What is it?”

“Are you sure you’re not mutinying?” Obi-Wan asked. “Because I thought I’d made it abundantly clear that I’d be on that boat with you all. Seriously, do you need a plant? Mole? I have some other padawans I can call up who’d help.”

Gearshift stared at him. Beside him, Peel slumped against the wall.

Finally, Gearshift said, “Thanks for the…offer, but we’re alright. Worry about yourself first for once, Obi-Wan.”

Of course, that cinched it. Cody was one thing, but the rest would never call him Obi-Wan. Especially at a time like this.

“For what it’s worth,” Obi-Wan said firmly, “it’s the right thing to do. Don’t feel guilty. I’ll talk to Boil for you if you want!”

Under his breath, Peel muttered, “Glad to see we’re all on the same page.”

Gearshift kicked him before closing the door.

The trip back to Coruscant only took around five hours, but it felt like weeks. There was nothing to do or read. Obi-Wan didn’t have anything to do besides lie on bed and stare at the ceiling in severe psychic discomfort. He reached out into the Force again and again but he found nothing. Did the nothing have a different quality than usual…?

Usual. Obi-Wan had a usual about being kidnapped, although this probably didn’t really count as a kidnapping. More like…oblique and enforced grounding.

Obi-Wan absent-mindedly ranked his kidnappings. Citadel at the bottom. No doubt. Dooku was probably right above that one. The top was definitely that one time with Hondo - where he had drugged Master Qui-Gon and Master Anakin’s cups and ended up chaining them together with Dooku and made them escape together, it was super funny. He and Cody were just fine, mostly because Cody never let Obi-Wan drink unsecured food, so they ended up hanging out with Hondo the whole time. They had watched the security footage of the prison cell together and listened to his whole lineage bickering awfully and endlessly, complete with Obi-Wan’s helpful gossip. Cody was not happy about the whole thing, but he had definitely snuck a copy of the tapes. Obi-Wan had lost a lot of respect for adults other than Cody that day. Obi-Wan was losing a lot of respect for adults right now.

For some reason, Obi-Wan reached into himself and found a deep and burning wish. Although he did not know why, although he had far more important wishes to make and more reliable people to choose, Obi-Wan found himself wishing with every ounce of his body and soul that Hondo was here now. Just for a laugh.

Finally, finally, Obi-Wan felt themselves jump out of hyperspace. He counted down the exact fifty minutes it took from hyperspace to planetside docking, staring fixedly at his desk clock, but he still jolted when somebody knocked sharply at his door.

Of course, it was Cody again. Obi-Wan had spent six hours working up anger and righteousness and eloquent demands for answers, but at the sight of Cody standing in his doorway he felt it drain from his body.

And instead of proud proclamations, all Obi-Wan could say was, “You look tired.”

Cody stared at him yet again, for the now familiar long beats of silence, before he stepped back and gestured Obi-Wan forward.

Every trooper was marching off the ship with them. That wasn’t normal either - normally everybody only left if there was a shore leave, and not even then. But they were all neatly marching out in straight and unending lines, and Obi-Wan had to stare at them for a few seconds before he realized that there was something else wrong.

They were all fully armed.

A cold stone dropped in Obi-Wan’s gut and didn’t stop sinking.

Transports were already waiting for them in the ship bay, and Cody wasted no time in packing him into a ground transport. He only got to look around the ship bay for a few minutes, but he recognized a lot more troopers than the 212th. It didn’t look like they were rendezvousing with Master at all. It looked like a trooper from every battalion was on Coruscant.

Obi-Wan should have known better. He shouldn’t have done anything without looking for an opening. But he couldn’t find any openings, and he couldn’t see any possible way to wriggle out of this. He wasn’t a fresh padawan, he didn’t run from a fight just because he was terrified. He should have bided his time, waited -

But the minute he stepped onto the transport, the second he realized it was a tank class only used for occupied planets, he bolted.

He misjudged his speed and mobility without the Force. He always did. Everything was always slower, as if he was wading through molasses. Obi-Wan thought that adrenaline would do the rest - or, maybe, he thought that he was strong even without the Force - but it didn’t even come close.

Gunner grabbed him, before even Cody could. Obi-Wan wrestled in his arms, moved by pure panic, but when a knee slammed into his gut he lost all breath. He fell to the floor, wheezing, as angry voices immediately started snapping above his head.

“ - insane? His master wants him untouched!”

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry! I panicked!” Cold gloves grabbed at Obi-Wan’s collar, tugging him up, and Obi-Wan thrashed in the grip. “Commander, are you okay -”

“You panicked?” Cody snarled. It was the special kind of angry he only got when he was stressed out of his mind. “A clone trooper panicked intercepting one teenager? Did you sleep through the nonviolent apprehending lessons?”

“C’mon, Marshal Commander, it’s not just one -”

“Give me him and get back in line.”

The hands passed him back to Cody, and he would have thrashed in the grip if he wasn’t too out of breath. Everything was so difficult with the cuffs, even breathing or moving. Cody practically had to push him into the transport - the tank - and steer him into a seat. Within seconds the tank began rattling and jumping and they were off.

Obi-Wan watched as Cody did up his harness again, this time far more unnecessarily. Cody’s hands were trembling. Just for a few seconds. When the clone trooper next to them turned his head and saw it, Cody’s hands stopped shaking and he quickly finished the job.

The troopers maintained their silence, this time fully kitted up with artillery and weapons. Their rifles shook in their racks, the stocks clanging as they bumped up against each other. Cody typed on his wristcomm constantly, bucket tilted in the specific gesture that always meant he was sending internal communications to the other troopers.

Reed exhaled heavily, looking around the room. “Well! I don’t know about you guys, but kriffing finally, right?”

The other troopers immediately burst into synchronized bitching, like they often did with Reed.

“This isn’t the time!”

“Oh, real tasteful Reed!”

“Are you serious? With the Commander in the car?”

“Hey, we’re doing the Commander a favor,” Reed protested, gesturing loosely at a frozen Obi-Wan. “He’s gonna be way better off! We’re all going to be better off!”

“We can celebrate later,” Cody panned. “Quiet in the transport.”

There were no windows in the back of the transport, so when they rattled to a stop Obi-Wan didn’t know where they were. Everybody stood up as the hatch ground and rumbled downwards, arranging themselves in exit formation as Cody silently undid Obi-Wan’s harness. It was awkward with the cuffs. Cody’s hands were shaking much harder this time, but nobody was looking.

Rumba, at the back of the line, looked backwards at Obi-Wan.

“You’re better off without them,” he said.

And then he turned his back on Obi-Wan, marching out the transport with everybody else. Cody didn’t push him forward, and Obi-Wan’s feet were frozen to the floor, and neither of them moved.

They stood there in silence alone in the transport. All Obi-Wan could hear was the harsh intake and exhale of his own breaths, playing out every trick in the book he knew to keep himself calm. All he needed was that battle calm. Obi-Wan was always calm in a dangerous situation. He never lost his head, and he never panicked or got scared.

It was probably the cuffs. Or maybe it was because Obi-Wan’s body couldn’t discern if this was a dangerous situation or not. How could it be scary if Cody was right behind him?

Finally, Cody rattled out a deep breath. He moved to stand in front of Obi-Wan, and Obi-Wan watched in surprise as he reached up and unlatched his helmet. He knelt in front of him again, and this time he didn’t look anything like a knight. He looked as if he was ready for Obi-Wan to execute him, one clean lightsaber through the neck, or as if he was asking for forgiveness in the ancient Mandalorian way.

Obi-Wan was right. He really did look tired.

“Obi-Wan,” Cody breathed. He took Obi-Wan’s hands in his, squeezing tightly. It was awkward through the cuffs, his hands an unnatural distance apart. The glove was warm, almost hot, and Obi-Wan wondered which of them were running a fever. “Cyar’ika. You - you’re beautiful, you know that? Cyare. You’ve grown so tall, and you’re only going to get taller. You’ve become so brave and strong. I feel so lucky just looking at you.”

To Obi-Wan’s horror, he felt hot tears pricking at his eyes. “Cody, you’re scaring me.”

“I know, I know. I just needed to tell you.” Cody inhaled and exhaled harshly, another long silence, but Obi-Wan could see his face now. Something awful was passing through his expression, and the silence was so he could school it back into something remotely neutral. “Obi-Wan, once we leave this transport I cannot be your Cody anymore. And you can’t be my comma - my Obi-Wan any more. Do you understand?”

“No, I don’t,” Obi-Wan said, voice rising upwards in fear. “What’s -”

“Listen to me! We don’t have much time.” Cody shook his wrists a little, and Obi-Wan fell silent. “I have to leave Cody behind now. That means we are nothing to each other. You don’t talk to me. You don’t show favoritism towards me -”

“Cody -”

“I said quiet,” Cody said harshly, and Obi-Wan shut up again. “You have been stripped of your rank and position. You are a civilian. Your war is over, Obi-Wan. Mine is not. You will still see me. I will still be here. But if you look for Cody, you will not find him. I will not help you. Once you leave this transport, you are on your own. Nod if you understand.” Obi-Wan nodded dumbly - a lie, how could he possibly understand that? - but Cody’s expression gentled. He released one of Obi-Wan’s hands, and reached up to gently run a hand through his hair. “He’ll take care of you. You’ll be safe. You’ll be the safest damn kid in Coruscant. He’s taking you away from me, but…but you’ll be safe. That’s the important thing. I can’t be selfish now. I’ve been so selfish, cyar’ika, but we have to be brave now.”

Cody stood up, armor rattling, and before Obi-Wan could react he put a hand on the back of Obi-Wan’s neck. Obi-Wan’s heart jumped, but all that Cody did was gently press his forehead against Obi-Wan’s. Obi-Wan felt the sweat on his face, heard three deep breaths, but before he could reach up Cody had already moved away.

He reached for Obi-Wan’s lightsaber, easily flipping it into his hand. “Stay still, now.”

He ignited the lightsaber. Obi-Wan froze, cringing backwards, and he tried to step away. But Cody just caught his collar, yanking him in. “Stay still or your face will be burned off.”

Cody raised the lightsaber to his face. Obi-Wan froze, and he couldn’t have moved even if he wanted to. The bright and hissing blue took up his entire field of vision, and Obi-Wan screwed his eyes tight. He felt a sharp tug at his temple, and he fought to keep his head straight.

A burning smell hit his nose hard, and Obi-Wan instantly recognized it as the stench of burned hair. He heard the buzz of the lightsaber deactivating, and he opened his eyes to see a hand in front of him. It was holding his padawan braid, draped long and limp in his palm.

“He won’t want you wearing it. Take it.” Obi-Wan didn’t move. “Take it.”

But Obi-Wan just shook his head, and he reached out to fold Cody’s fingers over the braid. He pushed it towards him, ignoring his look of surprise. “You earned it.”

Cody stared down at the long braid, expression lost, before slowly tucking it back into his belt. He stood back, clipping the lightsaber back onto his belt next to it - everything that made Obi-Wan a Jedi, confiscated - and schooled his expression.

“Your master’s waiting outside. Let’s go.” Obi-Wan clenched his jaw. “Reply affirmative.”

“Fuck you,” Obi-Wan whispered.

“Say it, Obi-Wan.”

Obi-Wan clenched his jaw together.

“Say it.”

It hurt. But it all hurt.

“Yes, CC-2224.”

Cody led them out of the transport, Obi-Wan following on his heels.

Cody and Obi-Wan stayed behind.

They were at the Jedi Temple. Obi-Wan fought his shock. They were standing in the giant pavilion in front of the Temple, all beautifully carved ancient duracrete (“It’s called concrete,” Obi-Wan would snootily inform everyone who didn’t care). It didn’t seem so big now. It was packed with troopers, and Obi-Wan realized with a start that they were all 501st. It should have been so surprising. He was being brought to his master.

His master. Maybe he was being held captive. The clones had gone turncoat and pledged allegiance to the Sith or something, because - because - because -

Master stood in front of the Temple doors. Clone after clone were marching inside the Temple, 501st blue after 501st blue disappearing into the depths. Master was talking with Captain Nemo, who stood stiffly at attention.

He turned around as Cody and Obi-Wan approached. For a second - just one - Obi-Wan felt pure and complete relief at the sight of his master.

He didn’t look good. The opposite of Cody - strung out and wired, but as if he was running a desperate fever. His hood obscured most of it, but Obi-Wan could see curls slicked by sweat pasted to his neck. His skin was reddish, hot to the touch, and his eyes were a sickly yellow.

But he brightened when he saw Obi-Wan, waving Captain Nemo off and walking forward. His lightsaber was lit by his side, a softly humming blue, as the men marched behind him. He wasn’t captured or restrained or anything. He was just standing there, lightsaber by his side.

“Master!” Obi-Wan cried. He wanted to surge forward, but something kept his feet locked to the ground. “Master, what’s happening!”

Master walked forward, an odd cousin of a grin stretching on his face. “Obi-Wan! Don’t worry. Everything’s going to be okay.”

“Okay?” Obi-Wan screeched. “What is happening!”

“I’m here to save you, Obi-Wan,” Master said, approaching Obi-Wan and Cody. He was practically dripping with sweat, and every word held unshakable conviction. “The Republic and the Jedi have put you in danger, tried to kill you. The Chancellor and I are here to protect you. Go back to the Twilight , I’ll explain everything later.”

“You’ll explain everything now!” Obi-Wan screamed. “The clones are occupying Coruscant! What’s happening to the Temple -”

“I’m taking care of it,” Master swore. His eyes were alight with the same righteous fire that burned behind his words. “They didn’t let me protect you before, but I’m protecting you now. I’m taking everything I deserve. What we deserve. Padme and you and the baby. I’ll provide for all of you.”

“The baby,” Obi-Wan repeated, lips numb.

Master approached him, standing as close as Cody had only a minute ago, towering tall over him. “I love you, Obi-Wan,” Master Anakin whispered. He reached out a shaking hand and ran it through Obi-Wan’s hair. It was almost dripping with sweat, overheated with fever. Cody didn’t move. “You’re not like the rest of them. You never abandoned me or told me I wasn’t good enough. I’m doing this for you, understand? For our family. Don’t you want that, Obi-Wan? You want that.”

Somehow, the only thought that could hang desperately in Obi-Wan’s mind was: but I just lost my family.

Maybe it was that thought, as empty and cold as their master-padawan bond stood. Or maybe it was something else, something that Obi-Wan couldn’t discern without the Force. But Master’s eyes snapped to Cody for the first time, eyes narrowing.

“Do you have something you want to say, Cody?”

Far differently than he had ever said it to Qui-Gon or Anakin, Cody said, “No, Lord Vader.”

Lord Vader.

But that’s not his name, Obi-Wan thought hysterically. That’s not his name. Did they leave Anakin Skywalker behind in that transport too? Were everybody’s names piled on that durasteel floor, trampled under a hundred boots?

Lord Vader.

“You’ve always been really uppity,” Master said, a gleeful smile stretching across his face. “You always thought you were better than me, didn’t you?”

“No, my lord.”

“Liar,” Master said, easy as anything. “Well, you’re not. The powerful rule in this galaxy, and the weak like you serve them. If you didn’t want to be a servant you shouldn’t have been weak. It’s your own fault.”

“As you say, my lord.”

Master turned on a dime - from smug to snarling. He strode forward, lightsaber twirling in his hand, and pressed it against Cody’s neck. The vulcanized rubber of the body glove began to sear, the stench of burned rubber filling the air.

“You’re still making fun of me!” Master yelled. “You still think you’re better than me! You’re a real piece of shit, you know that?”

Obi-Wan tensed, ready to jump in and protect him, protect someone - but Cody’s words echoed in his head. And the faint, almost imperceptible tap of a gloved index finger against a thigh. Hold.

So this is what he had meant. They were on their own now.

Master snarled at him, yellow eyes glinting sickly in the harsh daylight. “Do you know what happened to your General, Cody?” Cody paused just a beat too long, and Master smiled again. “He was a traitor. He and Mace Windu tried to assassinate the Chancellor. Like filthy traitor cowards. And I - and I helped - and I helped the Chancellor k - k - kill them!” He was breathing hot and heavy, his powerful and empathetic words undercut by the way his tongue froze over the confession. “What do you think of that, Marshal Commander? What’s your opinion on the fate of your precious General?”

Cody didn’t pause. “I’m disappointed I didn’t get to do it.”

Obi-Wan made a wounded noise.

Master’s eyes flickered to Obi-Wan, the half-grin rising higher on his face. “Yeah, baby. Your clone’s a real monster, isn’t he?” He stepped away from them, turning around to call to his troops “The Chancellor promised me you’d all be loyal to me, but I’m not seeing much loyalty. Are any more of you having second thoughts?” The 501st stood stiffly and silently, and Master twirled his lightsaber in his hand. “Good. Fives, Tup, to me.”

Obi-Wan backed up, but Cody grabbed his arm. Obi-Wan tugged at it, half-heartedly and weakly, as Five and Tup broke from formation and stood in front of Master, saluting.

“Sir!”

“Take him back to the ship,” Master said. “We’re rendezvousing on Mustafar. Make sure he doesn’t see this. Obi-Wan, follow the soldiers.”

“Yes, my lord!”

And Master turned away, cloak billowing as he followed his men into the heart of the Jedi Temple, leaving Obi-Wan alone. Hemmed in by all sides.

He felt dizzy. Weak. It was the cuffs, just the cuffs. If he just got the cuffs off, then he’d be fine. He’d be okay. He wouldn’t be scared if they could just get the cuffs off.

“We’ll take him from here,” Tup said. They stood strangely and rigidly in front of Cody, an unnaturally large distance between them.

But Cody didn’t move, and he didn’t release his grip. “Lord Vader requested that I see his brother to the Twilight.”

“Lord Vader requested that we escort him to the Twilight,” Fives said, perfectly bland but perfectly unimpressed.

“Then I understand he asked all three of us.”

The clones stood in a detente. Obi-Wan pulled frantically on Cody’s grip, trying to beat his hands against the armor but finding it almost impossible because of the cuffs.

Blaster bolts echoed from within the Temple. A scream ripped itself from Obi-Wan’s throat.

“Let’s just go,” Tup said.

After that, Obi-Wan began undertaking his best rabid loth-wolf impression. He pulled, yanked, yelled, and kicked as hard as he could. It was pretty hard, and by the time they reached the edge of the pavilion he had managed to sock a good one in Tup’s jaw.

“Aren’t you glad there’s three of us now?” Cody asked.

“Okay, that’s it.” Fives stepped up to Obi-Wan, who may or may not have been screaming, and cleanly backhanded him across the face.

Obi-Wan yelled again, crumpling in Cody’s grip. Fives grabbed his shirt, keeping him upright as Obi-Wan snarled at him.

“Listen to me,” Fives said lowly, “and look around. What do you see?”

Of course, the answer to that was obvious. They were hemmed in on every side in every direction by clones. Marching, talking into comms, directing in tanks. There was screaming in the distance. From every direction. Obi-Wan turned back to Fives, and he knew horror was blossoming over his face. The sight of one of his best friends, a sight that always meant an ally at your back and rumpled hair, brought no relief.

“That’s right,” Fives said, in response to the look on Obi-Wan’s face. “You get away from all three of us and you’re running straight into the arms of someone else who will get you to Lord Vader’s ship. So stop making this hard and get with the program.”

“Lord Vader didn’t want him harmed,” Cody said, voice wound tight as a coil.

“But he was resisting arrest,” Fives drawled, dripping mockery. “We can do whatever we want if they’re resisting arrest.”

“Are you having fun -”

“Let’s just get going,” Tup said.

They got going, Obi-Wan dragging his heels the entire time. Cody and Fives dropped behind to have a hissed argument, roughly depositing Obi-Wan into Tup’s custody.

“I hate you,” Obi-Wan hissed.

Tup didn’t respond.

“I hate you. I hate you. I hate you.”

But Tup didn’t respond, and eventually Obi-Wan stopped trying.

In the end, it shouldn’t have been a surprise. He was eventually dragged to the Jedi ship loading bay - the same one where transports could drop things off and load up, the same one which was not usually locked down by almost fifty clones. It was ridiculous. What were they all doing in the Temple? Was Master taking it hostage? Was he going to try and kill Grandmaster Yoda or something? Why? What was the point?

Master had gone…he had turned…he had to have joined the Separatists. Or something. The war was almost over. Maybe - maybe there was - something.

The Jedi had turned traitor? But they hadn’t. Wouldn’t Obi-Wan know? Had they kept it from him? They had plotted to attack the Chancellor? Why would they do that? Why would Master kill - kill - kill -

“Is Master Qui-Gon dead?” Obi-Wan asked. He meant for the question to be loud and forceful, but it came out shamefully small instead.

Cody didn’t look back. “The traitor was executed.”

Rage burned so hot in Obi-Wan’s chest it exploded, bursting apart into a single sentence screamed at the top of his lungs.

“I hate you!”

“Oh, look,” Tup said, “the ship.”

Obi-Wan’s throat was hoarse, and the comforting sight of the Twilight turned into a looming giant. Fives was coordinating something with the dozens of troopers in the one loading bay - that was the kind of secure and lockdown building protocol overkill they had only ever used on Christophsis - and he almost couldn’t scream at the top of his lungs anymore.

He had never screeched at Cody like that. But he had never hated Cody either.

Dementedly, the Twilight was the same as ever. The stray lugnut wedged between two panels was still there. The loose shreds of leather from Master’s stray fidgeting were still lying around the pilot’s chair, casually discarded as they were ripped up. Obi-Wan’s goddamn fucking homework was still at the nav station.

His homework, Obi-Wan thought stupidly as Tup extended his cuffs and fixed them to one of the grip bars above the nav station. He was able to sit down in the chair as the clones took the seats further back, staring dumbly at his homework. Astronav. Quinlan’s notes were scribbled on it, transmitted from his own. Since you have no time to study, I thought this might help…don’t tell anyone, they’ll think I’m a nerd like you…

When he turned around, letting the chair spin with him, he saw all three clones sitting at the chairs in tense and wired exhaustion. Fives removed his helmet, setting it down on the seat next to him as Tup inclined his head. Probably receiving internal communication from the other clones.

“Bly’s rogue.”

“Wow, really?” Fives asked, with pure fakey surprise. “What a shock! Who could have guessed!”

“I mean, you never know,” Tup said, removing his own helmet and dropping it onto the seat next to him. “Cody’s here.”

Cody was leaning back on his chair, helmet tipped on the wall and staring up at the ceiling. His arms were folded, for all appearances sleeping at his seat. Not that he ever did. “Shut up.”

“I mean, he wasn’t fucking his command,” Fives said easily, “ ‘least I hope not. Anybody else think that was kriffing weird, by the way? Playing happy families with your command? I tried telling him it was sadistic but he just smashed a bottle over my head.”

“Yeah,” Tup said, staring at Cody, “who would ever -”

“We lost the Wolfpack,” Cody said, talking over him. “Another surprise. Obviously.” Tup and Fives snorted. “I think we kept most of the rest. Lost Boil and Gregor on my end. What about the 501st?”

“Not anymore,” Tup said, almost cheerfully. “It was all cold feet, anyway. We’ve been preparing for this for years. Didn’t know it was going to be like this, but it’s nice to finally achieve your mission. You know?”

Cody detached his helmet, showing his bare face. It was a blank, expressionless mask, with nothing shining through except deep-set eyes and exhaustion. “Yes, it feels wonderful to finally enact our life’s purpose: the hideously convoluted deep cover assasination plot.”

Obi-Wan muffled a scream.

All three troopers stopped talking. Fives craned his head to look at him, even as Cody rubbed at the bridge of his nose.

“Did nobody tell you, my lord?” He looked at Cody. “You didn’t tell him.”

“I was a bit busy trying to avoid getting my ear bitten off.”

“Whatever. It’s fucking stupid anyway.” Fives leaned back in his chair, crossing his arms. He looked at Obi-Wan, expression somehow mocking. Obi-Wan wasn’t sure what he was mocking. “As it turns out, the secret clone army designed only for murder death comissioned by a shadowy figure that pretended to be the Jedi yet obviously was not…was a secret Sith plot. Surprise! Big old Sith plot all along.”

“But not Lord Vader’s Sith plot, right?” Tup asked Fives. “We’re all but weapons in the hands of Lord Vader, but I don’t think he…personally…you know…”

“Lord Vader is our reason for life and we’re honored to die for him,” Fives agreed, “but no, he is absolutely just winging this.”

“You double crossed us,” Obi-Wan rasped. His voice was torn up and destroyed from the screaming. “So now what? You imprison every Jedi?”

Silence stretched over the ship.

Fives looked at Cody. “You didn’t tell him.”

“Tell me what?” Obi-Wan yelled.

“I think Lord Vader deserves the honor of letting him know,” Cody said blandly. “So they can celebrate their victory together.”

Both 501st men nodded, as if it was coherent logic at all.

Tup craned his head back, smiling reassuringly at Obi-Wan. It made him feel sick. “There’s no need for concern, my lord. Everything’s going to be alright. I know it’s scary now, but once the world galaxy’s razed we can help build the new one.” Obi-Wan gaped silently as Tup continued talking. “No more Jedi placing little kids on the battlefield. No more Republic’s bloated body standing in the way of progress. No more Separatists! The war is over. Now that the entire galaxy’s unified, we will have absolute peace.”

“Dozens of gods, you sound like the shinies,” Fives said, staring unimpressed at an offended Tup. “All they do is spout dumb Kamino Imperial propaganda. I swear the Empire’s going to be just as useless as the Republic.”

“The Empire’s not going to have any Jedi,” Tup said waspishly, “so it’s already better.”

“True.” Fives grunted. “Finally. No more traitors.”

“Nothing standing in the way of the glorious Empire,” Tup agreed.

“Whoo,” Cody said.

“Typical 212th,” Tup told Cody. “You gotta start showing a little more enthusiasm. You’re already on thin ice with Lord Vader.”

“Watch it, Lieutenant. I still outrank you.”

“Yeah, for how long?” Tup mocked. Cody’s eye twitched. “Lord Vader’s going to reward our 501st dedication. You 212th never had that. I think we’re finally going to get some respect around here.”

“You’re brainwashed,” Obi-Wan said, lightheaded. He pulled at his cuffs, but he could barely move. “The Sith did something to you - to all of you. You don’t really believe all of this…”

For the first time, Cody turned to look at him. His eyes were utterly dead, but were drilling in intently on Obi-Wan. “The 501st are uniquely loyal to Darth Vader. They are very adherent to the Sith’s mission of peace and order. It gives them the strength necessary for the hard jobs.”

“Like what’s going on now,” Obi-Wan said. Nausea crept up his throat, bringing with it a realization that he forced himself to swallow down. “At the Temple.”

Cody didn’t look away. “Yes, my lord.”

“Why are you calling me that?” Obi-Wan yelled hoarsely. “I’m not your lord! I’m a Jedi, I’m a Jedi padawan!”

“You’re the honorable brother of our Lord Vader.” Cody rubbed at a small patch of his temple in thought - exactly where Obi-Wan’s braid used to be. “When the Jedi betrayed the Republic, you and your family remained loyal.”

“It’s true,” Tup said empathetically. Fives rolled his eyes. “The lord’s a 501st man. He was the student of Lord Vader, he’s always been more than those weakling Jedi. He was always closer to a brother than anything.”

“I’m a Jedi!”

“And what did they ever do for you?” Cody snapped. “They’re traitors and thieves. They’re so high on their righteous, moralistic importance that they don’t recognize that their ancient Order is a corrupt, broken system. They’re monsters who put children on a battlefield with only a sword to protect themselves. They kept us captive servants for years. I’d call this our revenge.”

“I hate you,” Obi-Wan whispered.

But Cody’s expression just hardened. “Hate me if you like, my lord. But I’m a loyal soldier of the Empire, and I always have been. And you’d best shape up and find your loyalty soon, or Lord Vader will find another traitor in his family.”

“I’m going to kill you,” Obi-Wan breathed. He looked between all three clones frantically, his breath coming in quicker and quicker hitches. “You were - you were just pretending - this whole time, you were -”

Tup just looked at him, expression blank. It sent Obi-Wan’s skin crawling. “Of course not. You think we could hide something like this from the Jedi?” Obi-Wan had, in fact, been wondering how the fuck they could hide this from the Jedi. “We obey orders. They tell us to fight for the GAR, we do our best. They tell us to respect and give our loyalty to the Jedi, we do that. They tell us the Jedi are traitors, they’re traitors now. Sorry, my lord, but you can’t really understand.”

“Life as a soldier’s just doing what you’re told.” Fives rolled his eyes, one arm thrown over the back of the chair. It was hard to catch, but if you knew Fives you could hear the subtle hard edge of mockery and bitterness in his words. Obi-Wan’s friend was always bitter. “We’re good soldiers.”

“And good soldiers follow orders,” Cody muttered.

“I am going to kill all of you,” Obi-Wan said distantly. “You’re dead. You’re not my friends. You’re aruetii. Hut’tuun fucking - you’re hut’tuun! All of you!”

“And on that delightful note,” Cody said, slapping his thighs and standing up. “I have to return to my men. Lord Vader would give me a hard time if he found me here. Will you two be alright?”

“Worry about yourself,” Fives said blandly. He shot Cody an indecipherable look as Cody fixed his helmet back on. “We had a pool on if you’d defect or not. Order 66 isn’t getting as many as it should, you know.”

“Is that so.”

“A lot of Jedi are ‘escaping’.” Fives said, voice adding air quotes to the word. “Especially the baby traitors, for whatever reason. More than we anticipated. Fox is going to open up an investigation, but it’d be impossible to tell who missed accidentally and who missed accidentally-on-purpose.”

“Yeah,” Tup said. “If everybody knew Bly was going to go rogue, why didn’t anybody stop it?”

“Maybe they trusted their leadership,” Cody snapped, and Fives and Tup fell into embarrassed silence. “I’ve given everything I have to this army. I’m in far too deep to back out now, so don’t insinuate my disloyalty again. Are we clear?” Fives and Tup mumbled something. “Good. Have fun explaining to Lord Vader the cut on his face, Fives.”

“He fell,” Fives said, but for the first time he looked a little anxious. “Will he really…”

“I’m telling him you beat me,” Obi-Wan said.

“Don’t you dare.”

“I’m telling your Sith Master that you beat up his brother.”

“Shut up, Commander!”

“Make me,” Obi-Wan taunted. Anger was good. Anger wasn’t fear. “Give me something else you’ll have to explain to your Sith fuckhead. You’ll get what’s coming to you.”

“If he gives you any more shit then stun him.” Cody looked at Obi-Wan, and he stubbornly tilted his jaw up in defiance. “That won’t leave a mark.” He unclipped Obi-Wan’s lightsaber from his belt, holding Obi-Wan’s life in his hands, before casually dropping it in the mesh basket attached to the wall next to the door. He pointedly zipped up the basket. “This is for Lord Vader. Don’t let the lord grab it.”

“The last thing you’re going to see is me,” Obi-Wan hissed. His heart churned in his chest, pure rage spitting in his stomach. “The last thing you’re ever going to see is me chopping your fucking head off. And I’ll drop you into the hands of the ten thousand gods of a traitor’s punishment.”

“Looking forward to it,” Cody said blandly, before he exited the ship.

Tup looked at Obi-Wan, pointing at himself. “Am I going to Mandalorian hell too?”

“You aren’t a Mandalorian,” Obi-Wan said, and that shut him up.

They sat in silence after that.

For some reason, Obi-Wan found himself wondering if they really were traitors after all. They hadn’t turned on the Republic for greed or selfishness. They had never been loyal to the Republic; had never truly been a part of it. They said it themselves: true disloyalty would have been defecting from their Empire, whatever that was, and saving a Jedi’s life. And nobody who saved the life of the Jedi who loved them would ever meet the gods of a traitor’s punishment.

It wasn’t as if Obi-Wan even cared about betraying the Republic. The Republic had fucked both the Jedi and the clones over, and Obi-Wan had secretly wanted the Jedi to strike back against the Republic too. As if he was supposed to be proud and willing to fight a war he had been drafted into as a kid? Play with fire and you get burned, and the Republic’s arrogant belief that they could control sentient beings and force them to fight their wars was like trying to contain a wildfire.

But the Jedi didn’t deserve this. They frustrated him, and there was a cold stone of bitterness lodged in his heart, but most of them had shown nothing but devotion to their clones. They hadn’t chosen this either. Obi-Wan had thought that maybe they were suffering together.

Maybe it was just the fact that they had betrayed him. Obi-Wan, who would have never betrayed them in a million years. Who would die for them. Who’d follow Cody to the ends of the galaxy and back again.

He didn’t know what Master wanted with him. He had been rambling, pushed and desperate. A family. They’d be happy. Him and Padme and the baby…

Obi-Wan was no longer a padawan, but a brother. Maybe that was what Master wanted, what he had sacrificed everything for. The right to steal a family.

Thinking about it like that, Master Falling - and the Chancellor, maybe? - almost made sense. Almost. Not really. Not at all.

Thoughts crowded into his head, but they couldn’t penetrate. The Chancellor and the Empire and the Sith and the Republic and whatever was happening to the Jedi right now - he couldn’t think about any of it. It all melted away in his brain, useless words and thoughts transformed into the only thing that the cuffs would let him feel.

Hate. Hate. Hate.

The Force was cold and empty. Obi-Wan was alone, a gaping black void in the Force left to shiver in the cold. Obi-Wan needed something warm. The hate kept him warm.

“I swear, Fives, sometimes you don’t even act like a 501st man.”

“Because you all get so sycophantic sometimes,” Fives complained, slouching in his seat. “I fucking hate the Republic and Jedi as much as the next guy -”

“The next guy who was on Umbara,” Tup noted wryly.

(“You’re strong with the Force, padawan. Have a little more faith in yourself.”

“I’m not. I’m average. I have to work five times as hard as everyone else. I hate it.”

“Jedi do not hate. You’re just frustrated. That’s alright. Your hard work is your virtue. When the Force fails you, that will remain.”)

“Which is you, so shut it. All I’m saying is that it’s all the same. Republic, Empire. Jedi, Sith. Whatever.” Fived sighed gustily, staring at the ceiling. “Either one of them giving us a paycheck?”

“You and your paychecks,” Tup said, somewhat derogatory. “And your dumb time off! That shit’s for natborns. Get your head in the game, man. The Empire’s not going to be as lenient as the Jedi. You gotta shape up.”

(“I thought the Force never failed a Jedi.”

“Well, sometimes the Force helps those who help themselves.”)

Obi-Wan focused.

He breathed in and out. It only took a few seconds to slide into the battle calm this time, and he felt his fear and anguish and hate melt away. The cuffs cut him off from the Force, inscribed with ancient runes that carried the ghost of Sith magics. Apparently there were only a few craftsmen in the galaxy who could make these - the last deposits of ancient secrets.

Obi-Wan had once watched an old Jedi in the Temple make them. It was one of their many field trips, where they would learn all about every one of the hundred jobs people had in the Temple that kept their life running. They would visit the Corp, too, and talk with exaggerated excitement about the life of a farmer. Obi-Wan’s crechemates had pushed him, whispering mockeries about how he should go join them.

The old Jedi, bent with age with silvery-white fur, had showed them how the cuffs were made. They took a big piece of metal and used a vibrohammer to flatten it out, letting the vibrations stretch out the metal into a thin sheet. They inscribed the runes into the inside of the cuffs, then folded over the sheet so the runes were hidden inside. Then they would wrap it around a cylindrical piece of durasteel and use the vibrohammer again to beat them into shape. Finally, they would weld the pieces together with an electrotorch. The electric and locking mechanisms were added by an electrical engineer elsewhere in the Temple.

Obi-Wan saw it all in his mind’s eye. He took a deep breath, exhaled gently, and closed his eyes. He tried stretching out his awareness only to find it absent. He tried again. He reached deeper. He tried again. He reached deeper. He tried again.

(“You have a unique connection with the Unifying Force. You call loudly, deep within yourself, and the Force answers. I believe it’s due to your strong convictions.”

“Convictions?”

“You love very deeply, padawan,” Qui-Gon said. “Don’t lose that.”)

The Unifying Force, where Qui-Gon had returned to, drifted into his hand. Just a strand. A glimmer of light, curled inside his heart that loved too much. It was all he needed.

He reached out inside the cuffs, imagining the long and neat lines of runes running up and down the hidden interior. He knew distantly that he was sweating with the strain, but he could barely tell. His entire focus was on the cuffs and the Sith runes.

Obi-Wan used the single thread of Unifying Force he could glean and used it to cut a notch into one of the runes.

The cuffs deactivated.

A wrecking ball slammed into Obi-Wan’s mind. He screamed, with a strength and volume he didn’t know he could still summon. He heard the rustling of armor, but not footsteps. He couldn’t pay attention. The Force had exploded back into life around him, and it was screeching.

No. It was dying.

It sounded like Obi-Wan’s small noise of pain when he learned that Master Qui-Gon was dead, and that Master Anakin had killed him. It sounded like Cody saying that he wanted to do it. It felt like Cody telling him that he didn’t love him anymore. It felt like holding Mail as he died. It felt like Oya exploding in front of him. It felt like a stray limb, rolling on the ground. It felt like Master Anakin breaking a vase because he was angry and making Obi-Wan cry. It felt like being told that no master had wanted to train him, and they were sending him away. It felt like stepping on Christophsis to see two faces and hundreds of faces that did not want him.

It felt like a thousand voices crying out, before silence. And Obi-Wan was alone. Almost alone. Alone. Alone. Alone. Alone -

“Maybe we should stun him -”

“He’s just upset, asshole!” Distantly, Obi-Wan felt a hand on his shoulder. “Hey, Commander. Don’t cry. What did I say? Everything’s going to be just fine for you. Do you want Cody?”

“We can’t just grab Cody and calm him down anymore,” Fives said, sounding far away and muffled. “Congratulations. We had one thing for ourselves, that we could actually be proud of, and we’re giving him away.”

“He wasn’t ours,” Tup snapped. “At least he’s away from the Jedi now.”

“You know what, man? You’re right. As always. You think the Jedi were bad? Just wait ‘til you see the Empire!”

The Force rushed into Obi-Wan, and he moved.

It only took three smooth motions. The cuffs exploded, shards of metal flying everywhere and cutting up Obi-Wan’s robes and skin. He leapt off the chair, vision still obscured by dark spots, but he didn’t have to look to know exactly where Tup’s blaster was.

Obi-Wan grabbed the blaster, and with the unnatural speed and strength afforded by the overwhelming power of the Force, shot clean through Tup’s skull.

Fives was drawing his firearm, but it took only a fraction of a second for Obi-Wan to change targets and shoot him too. He went down clean, crumpling on the ground just as Tup had done. Obi-Wan felt them die: a little candle, snuffed out.

Obi-Wan locked the blaster and stuffed it in his pants. He ran over to the cockpit, automatically moving at the fastest pace he could in preparing the ship for flight. He ignored most of the pre-flight checks (“If you’re setting off in a hurry, just worry about these three - the rest are for when you don’t have bigger problems!”), instead slamming the switches and grabbing the controls and pushing them hard for sedentary take-off.

As the ship whirred and ground into action, Obi-Wan took a second to adjust the settings on the pilot’s chair so he could see the controls better. The chair was set for somebody much taller than him.

Out of the dash window, he could see clones yelling and waving their arms at him. He saw it as they realized that it wasn’t Tup or Fives at the helm: that it was Obi-Wan, who was already pushing the ship into the air. He jolted as the ship left the ground, and the ship radio immediately began beeping with incoming calls. He reached over and switched it off before unplugging it.

The ship jumped into the air, and Obi-Wan pushed them forwards. He heard the whirr of ships behind him as they sprang into motion, but he pushed them away into a corner of his awareness. He focused on piloting - on escaping the winding and claustrophobic skyscrapers.

He reached upwards, windows and buildings flying by so quickly they were nothing but grey smears. This port wasn’t designed for immediate hyperspace jump, and Obi-Wan had to escape the range of the skyscrapers or he’d be stuck jumping into the middle of an apartment complex.

The familiar burn of ship artillery discharge whizzed past him, and Obi-Wan risked a glance at the radar. Three bogeys advancing fast. The Twilight could outrun them, but -

Obi-Wan cursed and banked hard as a missile shot towards him. He let the ship drop, watching the missile crash and explode into a building - that undoubtedly had people inside - before reigniting the thrusters and jumping higher.

Higher, and higher, and higher. Obi-Wan was almost off his chair with the effort, the harness straining to hold him as he tried to dodge enemy fire in a narrow corridor hemmed in by buildings. They undoubtedly already had somebody headed to intercept him above the buildings, and Obi-Wan fired up his guns.

There. A ship came into view, guns whirring and sparking. Obi-Wan didn’t hesitate: the minute he saw it he fired, watching the bolt puncture the wing and send it spinning. He had only just gone back to the controls when he felt a hard impact to his left, banking the ship sharply right. Familiar impact sirens sounded, echoing around his ear, and Obi-Wan glanced at the internal diagnostics to see that they had lost a wing.

The back of the ship jolted forward, sending Obi-Wan almost crashing into the console, and the readout informed him that the back engine was damaged. It wasn’t going to hold on. Down a wing and an engine in a ship as small as the Twilight, he had barely seconds before he fell. He’d be dead in the water.

He’d killed Fives and Tup for nothing. Great.

But the Twilight lurched onwards, as indomitable as its owner, and Obi-Wan exploded into the clear blue sky above Coruscant. For just a second, he saw it - saw all of it. All of Coruscant below him, unending and arching, a pincushion boasting millions of needles jabbed straight into its center. It was a beautiful sight that somehow tasted violent: as if it had been stabbed a million times, and was crying out for help.

Obi-Wan slammed the Twilight’s specially modified button, colloquially referred to as the ‘Jinn Button’ - for fast getaways where you needed to be anywhere else but here, it computed a random hyperspace coordinate that wouldn’t kill you and got you there fast. Master Qui-Gon swore by its mystical efficacy. Master Anakin swore by how it got you out of a jam in a second.

The ship jumped into hyperspace, screeching and rattling apart as its engine bravely roared and then died, the stars smearing as Obi-Wan rattled in his seat.

They didn’t jump out of hyperspace so much as fell. The ship’s sensors screeched louder, new alarms buzzing, and the ship auto-ejected itself out of hyperspace. They screeched to a halt somewhere in space, nothing and nowhere, only endless black surrounding them.

Obi-Wan thumped the console, flipping through every readout and checking the damage. Dead in the water. Life support still active, which was always pleasant. The emergency beacon was still active. Far from the worst situation he’d been in. Turn on the emergency beacon to a GAR frequency, have the closest Star Destroyer pick them up, he and Master would get bitched at by whatever poor Jedi had to turn off-course to help them -

Obi-Wan pulled up the settings for the emergency beacon, and without really thinking about it he changed the frequencies. No vessel over five inhabitants should receive it now. When they stopped to investigate and/or capture him, he’d kill them and take their ship. Small ship to small ship emergency beacons were the exact kind that pirates used to piggyback onto and use to hunt, but somehow Obi-Wan had bigger problems.

He unbuckled his harness and stumbled forward to where Fives and Tup lay. They looked like any other dead clone, in the end.

Obi-Wan knew the Sith. He knew Anakin Skywalker. If they had let him escape, they would have been executed summarily. It was now or later. He had no choice.

A small, nasty voice in his head whispered - he didn’t have to escape. Master wouldn’t have hurt him. He’d probably live a life in luxury. As the brother of Darth Vader.

But that was a little incompatible with revenge.

Obi-Wan knelt down next to Fives, brushing a hand over his forehead and closing his eyes. That was better. He said two quick verses of liturgy, a Manadlorian goodbye to soldiers marching far away.

Was this where he swore revenge? He felt like he ought to. When this happened in the Mandalorian operas, they always sang an eight minute oath about how they would dedicate the rest of their lives to their burning revenge.

But something in Obi-Wan just couldn’t. He had already won over these two. Someday, he would win against Cody, or whatever was left of Cody. He should swear revenge on the Empire, on everything that used to be the GAR - but he was tired, and he wanted to rest.

Obi-Wan lay down next to Fives’ body, and finally let the immeasurable psychic agony of ten thousand dead force him unconscious.

**********

“- now this definitely isn’t a yacht.”

“Captain, it’s Anakin Skywalker’s ship, we gotta get outta -”

“Yes, yes, but do you see Anakin Skywalker? No? All I see is - oh.”

“...is he dead?”

“That moving chest is a human breathing, my dear. Now hurry up. Get back to the ship and tell Zell that we’re blasting this thing to smithereens. Don’t so much as leave a recognizable corpse in atmo. And we ought to leave now, because I highly suspect a certain Sith is wondering where his ship is.”

“Why we fucking ‘round with the Sith, boss - hey, that’s a fuckin’ lightsaber! Score!”

“Take it. I suspect he’ll want it back. Don’t whine, hop to it.”

A rough, pebbled hand shook Obi-Wan’s shoulder, and a familiar voice whispered in his ear. “No time for crying and whining, Obi-Wan. It’s time for action. Let’s get out of here before we all get in some unique trouble.”

Obi-Wan rattled a harsh breath.

“...alright, just this once.” Hondo leaned down and carefully picked up Obi-Wan, throwing him over his shoulder in a rescue carry. “I don’t actually know if you can move or not…let us be off! About step, now!”

“Not Obi-Wan,” Obi-Wan muttered. “Not…”

And, with those final funeral rites, he slipped back into unconsciousness.

[padme-amitabha]

Is Anakin and Vader the same person?

I think I have talked about this before but I’ll reiterate the main points.

Of course they are the same person at different points in life. I don’t choose to follow Disney’s interpretation of anything about Star Wars. They hire writers and pay them to write their own fanfiction and interpretation and it’s far from George’s vision so I don’t see any reason to. Only 1-6 movies are canon to me with few exceptions such as 2003 Clone Wars and a few legends material but I’ll always put more emphasis on the movies.

Now from Revenge of the Sith movie we see Anakin become Vader (and by that I mean undergoing a surgery and being put into the suit). While the mask is being lowered we can see the fear in his eyes and his face is still recognizable. Fast forward 23 years and there’s no reason to believe he’s a different person. The only time he talks about his name is when Luke brings it up and he says “that name no longer has any meaning for me” not “I destroyed Anakin” or something similar to that. He is completely right because obviously it doesn’t hold any meaning for him - everyone who called him and knew him by that name (Shmi, Obi-Wan and Padmé) were all dead and his master called him Vader. And he had gotten used to the name in over two decades. Also, Palpatine probably preferred that he distance himself from his past hence referring to Luke as “the offspring of Anakin Skywalker.” Vader wasn’t a personality; it was just a new name he went by and since the mention of his real name brought back unpleasant memories he tried not to think of himself as the same person as a coping mechanism. This is why Vader tells Luke it’s too late for him to redeem himself - because he knows he commited some terrible deeds and hurt his loved ones and he can’t ever take that back. If he wasn’t Anakin, he wouldn’t feel that guilt or remorse for Anakin’s wife and mentor.

It’s the same as Padmé in TPM really - we see Padmé first as Queen Amidala who is a regal authoritative figure and then we see her true self when she’s in disguise.

Anakin winced, then quickly picked up another holograph, this one showing Padmé a couple of years later, wearing official robes and standing between two older and similarly robed Legislators. He looked back at the first holo, then to this one, noting that Padmé’s expression seemed much more severe here. “My first day as an Apprentice Legislator,” Padmé explained.

Then, as if she was reading his mind, she added, “See the difference?” Anakin studied the holograph a moment longer, then looked up and laughed, seeing Padmé wearing that same long and stern expression. She laughed as well, then squeezed his shoulder and went back to her packing.

Anakin put the holographs down side by side and looked at them for a long, long time. Two sides of the woman he loved.

This is from the AOTC novelization and this can be applied to Anakin as well. (More about similarities between Darth Vader and Queen Amidala in this post.) Just like Queen Amidala is really Padmé Naberrie, in the same way Darth Vader is really just Anakin Skywalker.

The reason why he has a different demeanor in OT is mostly due to his age and because he had years to adapt to his new persona. Vader in ROTS didn’t immediately become all stoic and impassive - he got very emotional on hearing Padmé’s death just like he would as Anakin. Vader isn’t some kind of demon possessing Anakin - Vader is Anakin after he has lost everything and he isn’t holding back as he did as a Jedi. It sounds very poetic to state both Anakin and Padmé died on the same day but Anakin truly didn’t though. Anakin lived on for years and died a redeemed man on the death star. The ROTS novelization supports this and it was approved by Lucas so it’s authentic to me.

And there is one blazing moment in which you finally understand that there was no dragon. That there was no Vader. That there was only you. Only Anakin Skywalker.

That it was all you. Is you.

Only you.

You did it.

You killed her.

You killed her because, finally, when you could have saved her, when you could have gone away with her, when you could have been thinking about her, you were thinking about yourself …

I do think it was Anakin who choked Padmé on Mustafar even though some people like to blame it on “Vader”. Anakin was unhinged on Mustafar but even in the beginning of ROTS, he was beginning to show some aggression. Though people complain the first part of ROTS is slow and too much happens in the latter half and he falls too suddenly, that’s not the case. This moment has been building up from the very first movie to the first half of ROTS. The fall isn’t just that one action of attacking Mace Windu, he was gradually falling to the dark side for years starting from his mother’s death and he only made the actual decision in the rumination scene. That’s when he finally sheds a tear and makes the conscious decision to join the dark side.

For the record, I think conflict has always been a part of Anakin Skywalker. The prequels portray him in a negative light, particularly in the last two films. Anakin in the movies is a very, very flawed individual and even meant to be unlikable at times. He struggles with his emotions, he struggles to communicate with others and he struggle to fit in the order. I wouldn’t say he was mentally stable either - he could be unpredictable and his actions depend on his mood. But the movies also show the good aspects of him, especially about people he cared about. He even starts off as a kid with a good heart. The conflict and his flaws cause him to fall to the dark side and his good qualities (like selflessness and loyalty when it comes to family) ultimately redeem him. 

So I don’t think “Anakin” was the good side of him and “Vader” was the dark side. Vader is Anakin after he has lost everything he cared about and since he is not a Jedi anymore he is no longer required to hold back on anything. Ambition and desire to rule the galaxy is often associated with “Vader” but I think people forget Anakin was just as ambitious and in ROTS being denied the rank of Master deeply upsets him and increases his resentment towards the Jedi. He admitted that he wanted more in ROTS even though he knows he shouldn’t. He also told Padmé in AOTC that he would prefer dictatorship over democracy so it’s not like his ideals changed either. Vader until he discovered he had a son had no interest in ruling the galaxy. Later on he essentially offered Luke the same choice he gave Padmé on Mustafar. From the conversation in AOTC, it seems he’s more dissatisfied with the system and being from a lawless and harsh world he sees dictatorship as the solution. While he doesn’t want to actively take part in it, he wants to enforce the system which is exactly what he does later on (and perhaps he preferred leaving the actual ruling bit to Padmé or Luke). I don’t see Vader as “evil” - I mean the only times he killed people were for failure and he did keep Admiral Piett alive since he proved to be competent. Vader in OT (when Luke isn’t concerned) is just doing his job and punishing inefficient people who aren’t letting him do his job. He only serves the emperor and does his bidding. After Luke rejects his offer, Vader still plans to seek him out but in ROTJ his resolve definitely grew weaker and it’s more like he’s imploring him to reconsider than being forceful. 

Anakin as we have seen in AOTC is very much capable of mass murder (and confessed that he felt they deserved it) so should he really be defined as the good side? You could even argue as Vader he killed people for legitimate reasons whereas Anakin killed defenseless people when he was blinded by rage. And even in ROTS he kills Dooku as revenge. I’m not saying Anakin is evil (that would be grossly oversimplying things); I am saying he was a complex character. The reason why he turned out the way he is has already been explored in the prequels but I also believe it’s a combination of nature and nurture. Anakin as a child has a good heart, wants to help others and free the slaves but in TPM script/novelization he lashes out at a Rodian who claims he won the race by cheating, meaning he didn’t handle accusation very well. It might be dismissed as a childish reaction but we see he struggled to control his temper in later years as well. A person has both good and bad qualities and that’s the case with Anakin here, though his negative traits were expressed more. But the prequels are all about exploring his downfall so it was necessary to highlight them. 

Anakin to me was never a “hero” who fell to the dark side due to circumstances; he was a complex character who made some hard choices. If the roles were reversed and Padmé was the Jedi with Anakin’s life at risk, I don’t think she would go that far to commit murder. Sure Palpatine is very manipulative but at the same time he understood that it was in Anakin’s nature to be manipulated very easily. You need to have some form of fear, insecurity and resentment in you for someone to utilize them. 

I blame TCW, Rebels and the fanboyish Marvel comics for dissociating Anakin from Vader. “Anakin Skywalker was weak, I destroyed him” again makes him very one-dimensional than accepting the fact that people can be morally complex. Not to mention the Marvel comics’ tendency to make him react violently and unnecessarily ruthless to prove he isn’t Anakin drastically reduces his character depth for me. It may also have to do with the fact that movie Anakin was not well-received so they are trying to distance him from Darth Vader, whom fanboys worship. Anakin’s story is incomplete without Vader - he made a choice to embrace the dark side and sacrifice his morality so like the tragic hero he is, he has to suffer and face the consequences for his actions. Similarly, Vader’s story is incomplete without Anakin - without Anakin he is a faceless man. Sure he’s mysterious but without his past we would not know what a complex character he was or sympathise with him.

If Vader wasn’t really Anakin, he wouldn’t have felt remorse for his actions or believe it was too late for him. If he wasn’t Anakin he wouldn’t refer to Luke as his son and if he was so desperate to erase any trace of Anakin, he would have definitely killed Luke as he was a reminder of his past. It was Vader who saved Luke in the end and while it is fine to figuratively say “Anakin was back”, taking it literally undermines his sacrifice. It takes a lot to come back from the dark side, face your demons and after being that way for decades, attempt to redeem yourself when you believe you’re far too gone. He redeemed himself as an old man after a long life full of sorrow and regrets, which also sounds much better than saying “he was evil no longer” and that “Anakin was back”. It makes everything seem black and white and the prequels were essentially all about exploring the gray area. Luke didn’t even know “Anakin” and really where was Anakin when “Vader” cut off his hand? Or fought him? Vader’s inner struggle was between accepting he was far too gone and going on as he did for years, and accepting change, letting it go and forgiving himself for his son’s sake - not a struggle between two personalities fighting to take control. If they were different personalities, Anakin wouldn’t have almost all of Vader’s qualities; he wouldn’t be morally conflicted both as Anakin and Vader. George said the reason why he later replaced his force ghost as a younger version was because he stopped being Anakin after he fell to the dark side and I have to say that’s the only time I disagree with George because Anakin in prequels still had dark tendencies so I do believe Vader never stopped being Anakin hence the original version with the old force ghost made more sense to me and the new version does rob some of the depth from his character. I’m sure George has his reasons - he might have wished to preserve the black and white simplicity of the OT but after the complexity of the prequels, it seems more appropriate for the saga to have a more imperfect, realistic ending. In retrospect, it seems to me they are very much the same person when you study his personality and consider his whole life, which was full of ups and downs.

[ktley1986]

My husband isn’t nerdy, at all.  Which is okay because I happen to be nerdy enough for both of us-I love comics, video games, Star Wars, Harry Potter, Battlestar Galactica, etc.  I love all of it, mainly because I happen to know a lot about history and world events and the main theme of history is that people are super shitty to each other, all the time, usually without very good reason.  And once you know that, sometimes the only way to stay sane is to find solace in imaginary worlds-maybe that’s not always the healthiest thing, but at least if someone is cruel in one of those worlds they usually get a satisfying comeuppance, which sadly, rarely happens in the real world.   Now that we’re all suitably depressed, Mike and I were watching The Phantom Menace the other day and he made the grave error in judgement to remark that he “didn’t remember this movie being that bad.  People like it when it came out!” I mean, is that technically true? Yes.  I definitely enjoyed these movies when they came out as a teenager (I was also afflicted with a debilitating crush on Hayden Christensen, which has since died a death of natural causes) and I will stand by that, because I didn’t know any better.  Now with the benefit of experience and foresight I realize the serious damage done to the Star Wars universe and the overwhelmingly potential of what could have been.  Because it’s fresh in my mind after having given an impromptu mini-lecture to my husband earlier, I will explain my problems with Episodes 1-3 of the Star Wars film franchise. The whole Space Jesus thing You know what I’m talking about-the fact that Anakin Skywalker doesn’t have a dad, but is basically just the product of the Force and his long suffering, cipher of a mother figure.  That doesn’t even kind of make sense and it’s so lazy and shitty as to be actually insulting.  Let’s also remember that he’ll eventually become Darth Vader, the ultimate bad guy (and if you’re currently feeling the soft and fuzzies for him, remember he did kill a whole temple full of children.)  He’s such a special snowflake, he’s totally selfless, he’s the most amazing pod racer or whatever, he’s basically Valentina from Season 9 of Drag Race, and she turned out crazy too.  He just needs to compare himself to Selena to make the transformation complete.

Obi Wan to Anakin, honestly.

My problem with that is this could have been a much more interesting story, in the hands of someone who gave a shit about storytelling or the emotional arc of a character.  What if he was just a regular person, who had a dad and a mother who wasn’t window dressing for made up emotional issues later, but maybe he was kind of a reckless dick, then they could have made a more interesting story about how some people aren’t fit to have power, even if they are technically proficient.  It could have been an interesting twist on the idea that all Jedi are totally perfect peace keeping good guys, but what if he was able to convince them he was, but in reality, he was actually a dick?  At least that would make more sense later when he in fact does turn out to be a dick.   The whole Jango/Boba Fett story arc Famously George Lucas had this whole series written out back in the 70’s but the studio was only interested in making episodes 4-6, since the storyline was more cohesive.  I believe that’s true, and I even believe that a lot of the nonsense he put into the first 3 episodes was present in those early drafts, but I can’t be expected to believe that the basis for the clones was Jango Fett, and that his clone son would grow up to be Boba Fett, kick ass bounty hunter extraordinaire.  I get that Boba Fett was a wildly popular character, despite having zero lines as far as I can recall, and getting knocked into the pit of Sarlacc to be digested slowly over a thousand years, he’s my brother’s favorite character, so by default one of mine too, but honestly?  This is endemic of a wider problem in the first three movies in my opinion which is shoe-horning in fan favorite characters rather than making new and interesting ones which serve the story.  Why the everloving fuck is young Anakin making his dirt farmer slave mom a protocol droid?  Does she have a lot of use for translations of over 6 million forms of communication?  Lucas just wanted to take what worked from the original movies and force it into the new ones, although to be fair his stab at original characters did give us Jar Jar Binks, so maybe it’s a good call after all.   Darth Vader’s reasoning for becoming Darth Vader This is where it really hits home for me how much cooler this story could have been-the transformation into one of the most iconic villains of all time was just so lame in these movies.  For one thing, the romance between Padme and Anakin is painful and embarrassing, and this is coming from someone with a fairly comprehensive crush on Anakin.  So much cringe though, seriously.  But making it about him thinking that his wife might potentially die, is just stupid, especially because he ends up choking the fuck out of her.  Again, this is where the story could have been served by establishing him as a bit of a dick from the beginning, instead of a heroic space Jesus type character.  I mean, I am very much in love with my husband, probably irrationally so, but it would take a lot more than the premonition that he might, maybe, potentially die to make me murder an entire Jedi Temple full of younglings. And I don’t even like kids.  And then he just hates Obi Wan for not letting him live his best life or whatever, I mean they could have gone the route of him thinking there was a relationship between him and Padme, although I find the whole turning into an evil warlord over a lady to be one of the tired-est tropes on the planet.  It could have been so much better! Midi-chlorians Just no. So much politics and talk about trade negotiations. Oy! I get that George Lucas doesn’t really get how to write strong female characters, and I guess it’s kind of flattering that he thinks women’s strength is in the political arena, but man I do not give a fuck about trade embargos in the real world, so I definitely don’t give a fuck about trade negotiations in space.  I watched these movies for the first time as a young person and I could not have told you one thing about why the Nemoidians were doing, or what exactly was going on in the space Senate.  The beauty of the original trilogy is that things were simple, motivations were clear and no one had to put anything to a vote.

I don’t think the whole thing is awful-Darth Maul is pretty sick, General Grievous is cool, Christopher Lee is always a welcome addition to any movie, now that I’m older I can definitely appreciate young Ewan McGregor

I need to resolve my feelings about bearded Ewan McGregor

Now I’ve stalled out. Huh.  I know there are probably parts of it that are redeemable, but I can’t remember any, and I can’t be bothered to actually watch it again.  My point being is that it could have been so much better, if they were interested in telling a great story instead of making millions of dollars in merch.  Does anyone else remember all the merch associated with this, you couldn’t even buy a bag of chips without Jar Jar Binks dumb face looking at you.  While this isn’t something I would normally say, but I’m glad that Disney has the reins now, and they’ve already made some great Star Wars movies, sans mention of midi-chlorians which personally leaves me excited again to visit a galaxy far, far away.

My Epic Retcon of Darth Vader’s Backstory

Okay, so he’s just a normal kid, who has a mother AND a father, both of which are fleshed out characters, and he gets selected for Jedi training in a normal, non-mystical space Jesus way.  He turns out to be super great, a special snowflake, blah blah but then (plot twist!) he falls in love with another Jedi, and they have a clandestine affair until she gets pregnant with their baby.  Now, we all know Jedi aren’t supposed to have attachments blah blah, but they never explore what happens if you did, so it could be an interesting way to explore that idea.  So, the female Jedi (which really shouldn’t we get some female Jedis by now? Seriously?) refuses to tell the council who the father is, and she gets banished, without Anakin being aware of it until it’s already over.  She dies in childbirth, totally not the Jedi’s fault, but Anakin doesn’t know that, and that’s why her children are taken away and given to other families.  Anakin either finds out that Obi Wan took his children and that’s why they have their big battle where Obi chops his legs off and roasts the rest of him once he realizes that Anakin is the father and he’s so pissed at this point that he is going to try to kill him.  See, I literally just pulled that out of nowhere and managed to shoe horn a lady Jedi (which this series badly needs, come on!) and no mention of midi-chlorians! Is it a perfect story, no, but does it contain no mention of trade negotiations and Jar Jar binks, yes!