#back on my lightsaber bullshit again

[imogenkol]

Master and Apprentice Lightsabers

Jedi Master Rejna Shúl

— Components —

blade: Blue emitter: Diligence switch: Persistence grip: Temperance pommel: Persistence

— Materials —

primary: Silver Aloy secondary: Stainless Durasteel accent: Jedi White Paint grip: Gorraslug Leather

Jedi Padawan Imogen Kol

— Components —

blade: Green emitter: Temperance switch: Serenity grip: Diligence pommel: Justice

— Materials —

primary: Two-Tone Brass secondary: Stainless Durasteel accent: Polished Iron grip: Gorraslug Leather

[malusmagpie]

Dueling Fates.

Pairing: Anakin x Jedi!Fem Reader

Summary: Anakin really, really wants to win for once.

Warnings: 18+ definitely smut. Minors DNI or I’ll find you and bite you. Hatefucking (?), reader gets dominated, vulnerability, name calling, restraint, hair pulling, neck kisses, biting, honestly the works.

A/N: This is my first smut in years and i got a bit carried away with the lead up cuz im a sl*t for tension and foreplay and i had to cut it short but i’m pretty proud of this for my first time back. I’m sorry if i made any mistakes, i proofread but mistakes happen! Thanks for reading <3 Enjoy filthy Anakin.

Word count: 3.1K (I know it’s long I got excited.)

Anakin wasn’t a sore loser, not by his definition at least. He just knew he could do better. That’s why when he lost against you again in a sparring session something began to boil his blood. He stood up and stared at you for a moment, you knew what that look meant.

“Again.” He spoke sternly, not at all to your surprise. His lightsaber was still ignited and held in front of him with shaking, frustrated hands. His eyes were glazed over as if possessed by the idea of winning. This had been your third session together and prior to you two partnering up you had been training for 4 hours.

“I’ve been at this for hours I would much rather go eat than tend to your bruised ego, Skywalker.” You put your lightsaber in its rightful spot on your hip and looked up at him with your arms crossed.

It was true that Anakin rarely lost but almost every time he did, it was to you. If you had a scoreboard to keep track, it wouldn’t look good for him. You were older by two years and therefore had more experience. Not by much, but enough to make a difference. He was strong, big, and extremely quick with his reflexes but you were small, agile, and had levels of pattern recognition too high for him to catch you off guard. All his best traits came to your advantage and he hated it.

“Cut the bullshit. I know you’ve got one more in you.” He spoke, his eyes looked your tired frame up and down. You didn’t, in fact, have one more in you but you still agreed. Your legs were hurting in places you didn’t think they could and your arms were burning so badly they might as well have been dipped in lava.

“Fine.” You muttered as you neared him, taking your spot across from him at the training ring. You readied your lightsaber and the sound of it igniting filled your ears. His expressions were small, almost unnoticeable, but you could see how riled up he was in the small movements of his lip twitching and his eyes flickering from you to your lightsaber. You knew your mind wasn’t in it, your Master would have sent you to bed at the sight of you and you knew Obi-Wan wouldn’t encourage Anakin in the state he was in, as well.

A hint of something flashed across his face when you agreed and that settled the feeling you had, this would not be an easy one. The rivalry you two had was nothing more than friendly competition in the eyes of most but truth be told you were both too similar and stubborn, and it really did feel like you were truly enemies sometimes.

“Any day now, Y/L/N.” He spoke in that cocky tone that made you want to slash his head clean off his neck. You tightened your grip and swung first, the sound of your lightsabers clashing echoed through the large, now empty room. This was the best way to do it, offensive to start, swinging so he had the confidence that he could block your blows. Then when you began to feel even the slightest bit of exhaustion you’d play the defense, which was your specialty, until he spent himself. The rest? Too easy.

Your legs, while in pain, moved quickly. You dodged and rolled away from him multiple times. You enjoyed the feeling of him having to come to you, in the same way a dog owner experiences contentment when their dog obeys their commands.

You didn’t know what happened. You didn’t even know how it happened in the moment. He swung directly down your middle and you blocked him, pushing him back with a grunt. The noise he made in response was almost animalistic. It shocked you for just a fraction of a second but he swung and your block was delayed. He didn’t expect it and neither did you so when the swing connected to your leg you both froze. His reaction time, bless the Maker for it, was quick enough for him to stop before he melted your leg clean off but not quick enough to prevent it from grazing you.

You staggered back, retracting your lightsaber. Not a word left either of your mouths for a few seconds, though it felt more like a lifetime. The adrenaline was helping you feel less of the pain but it wasn’t fixing much.

“I didn’t think you’d connect.” You said through gritted teeth as your face contorted in pain. You dropped down on your ass to inspect the wound. “I didn’t think you’d fail to block.” He muttered as he rushed over to lean down next to you.

“I’ll get to a medic. Just leave me alone.” You nearly seethed at him. “I knew you weren’t the nicest sparring partner but I didn’t know you played dirty when you’re mad.” You pushed yourself off the ground, your injured leg bent at the knee as you hopped toward the exit of the training room.

Anakin narrowed his eyes as he walked next to you, not bothering to help due to your comment. “I don’t play dirty. Watch that loud mouth. It’ll be the reason you eat through a straw one day.” His hands were folded behind his back as he watched you struggle to get up the steps to get back into the temple.

“Whatever.” You rolled your eyes and held on to the railing for dear life as you hopped up each step. You felt an arm slide across your back and under your armpit.

“I’ll show you dirty if you keep this up.” He muttered, it was barely audible but you heard it and decided the pain in your leg was far more important than his incessant rambling.

“Don’t touch me.” You seethed but you made no attempt to move away from him. He looked down at you and you got the reply of sweet silence. For once, he chose not to respond.

“The medical bay is in the opposite direction-“ You started. “No. It’s just a surface scratch. I can clean it out for you and avoid us both getting in trouble for training after hours when we should have been eating.” He said sternly and a laugh escaped your mouth followed by a short wince.

“You mean avoid yourself getting in trouble. I wouldn’t get in shit over this. You challenged me and hurt me.” You responded. He shook his head and continued walking over to the dormitories. You recognized the hallway he was walking down to be the boys sector. You decided to bite your tongue for the time being. The wound, while not dangerous, was painful and you wanted to save your energy for something more worth while.

He opened the door to his room and placed you down on the small chair by his desk before turning to close the door. He walked away from you to find medical supplies while you inspected the wound and poked the skin around it, wincing in pain.

“Do you enjoy hurting yourself or something?” He muttered as he returned to see you poking away at your sensitive skin. You dropped your hand and looked up at him, your eyes followed him as he kneeled in front of you. You’d rather die than admit it but he did look good on his knees. Again, you stuck with the cold shoulder response, it was easier when you didn’t argue with him. You averted your gaze fairly quickly when he looked up at you for a moment. You didn’t even feel his hands on your hips until he spoke.

“Up.” His hands rested on the waistband of your pants and you cocked an eyebrow. “No funny business.” You muttered as you raised your hips to allow him to get the pants off and have better access to your thigh.

“Only in your dreams.” He spoke with a level of confidence that made you want to scream and rip his hair out of his head, but still, you stayed fairly silent.

He cleaned and dressed your wound, his touch was softer than you’d expected apart from the moments you would flinch and he’d use a bit of strength to hold your leg in place. “You’re gonna need new pants.” He said, his face was close enough to your skin that you felt the air leave his mouth as he spoke and it immediately created goosebumps on your legs. It was clear he noticed it because he did it again. “What? Is it cold in here?” His low voice sent vibrations to your leg and they flared up in little bumps again. His eyes trailed up your leg and the rest of your body until they finally rested on your own eyes. There was a look in his eyes that you had never been able to pin point and he had it often when he’d speak to you.

“Give me my stuff. I think we’re done now.” You said with a look of annoyance blanketing your expression. He followed promptly with a ‘tsk’ and his low voice, almost a growl, spoke again. “I don’t think we are.” His grip on your thigh squeezed gently and you tried snapping your legs shut only to be met by the barrier of his stupid head.

“What’s your deal, Skywalker?” You ask, your eyes boring holes into his own. You never made a single effort to move away, something about him was entrancing. His thumbs traced circles on your inner thigh by your hips and your legs twitched. You could feel your heart in your throat as he stared you down with the same intensity at you. A smirk curled at the corner of his lips when he felt you get nervous.

“What’s yours?” He mused as his hands travelled up to your waist and he pulled you down from the chair to sit on his lap where he was kneeling on the floor. A soft gasp escaped your lips and you felt a hand push on the back of your neck. Your foreheads were touching now and it felt like all the oxygen in the room had some how disappeared. Your hands instinctively rested on his chest as you straddled him.

Your mind was moving too quickly for you to say anything and before you knew it you felt his lips press against yours. His hand moved from its place on your neck to bunch up your hair and he held it in a tight grip causing a gasp to leave your mouth again.

‘I’ll show you dirty.’ His words from earlier rang in your head and you felt yourself shiver. He pulled away from you and laid you down on the cold, hard floor.

“Anakin-“ You started and he climbed over top of you, caging you in with his arms. “Years. I’ve spent years resenting you for the way you make me feel. Years watching you strut about and walk around with the confidence of thinking you’re better than I am. I hate how you speak to me and I hate the way you act.” He spoke, his eyes never left yours and your eyebrows furrowed.

“If you hate me so much why are you on top of me?” You found enough air to finally say something, your words came out shaky and breathless. “There’s one thing I can do to make myself feel better than you.” Anakin’s head dipped toward your neck as he spoke, he licked a stripe up from the base of your neck to the bottom of your ear before biting on your earlobe.

Your body quivered again and he smiled against your ear when a yelp left your mouth at the feeling of teeth biting down. “I can make you look pathetic and desperate. Just like you look right now.” He whispered again, your cheeks reddened and a small whimper left your mouth as he bit down on your neck, leaving small kisses between each bite. You couldn’t speak, you could barely breathe but you liked it. Your hands reached around to tangle into his hair and you pulled him up to make eye contact with you before pushing your lips against his in a desperate manner, open mouths collided as his tongue slipped into yours. After all the years spent being at each others throat when this is what you’d always wanted, you didn’t hesitate to push it to where you needed it to go.

Your hands fumbled with his utility belt and he smiled before lifting a single arm from beside your head to undo it in a moments notice. He sat back on his heels and pulled your belt off, your robe and tunic promptly followed. Your bare skin shivered as you laid back on the tile floor in his room and he smiled down at you. “Too pretty for your own good.” He mumbled as he pulled your underwear from your body leaving you completely vulnerable while he was still clothed. Your hands went for his robe and he pinned them down above your head, his hair flopped over his forehead in a way that made him look absolutely delectable.

He shook his head and another ‘tsk’ followed before he ducked down and placed his mouth right on your nipple that had hardened from the cold floor and excitement. A moan escaped your mouth and you bit down on your lip to stifle it. His eyes flickered open and he looked directly into your own, eye contact was definitely something he enjoyed. His free hand grasped at your chin and his thumb pulled your lip from between your teeth. “Try and hide how good you feel again and you’ll regret it.” His voice was stern and it made your head spin. You nodded.

“Use your words.” He said again and your back arched a little as his mouth returned to your nipple. “Y-yes, Anakin.” Your breathless words came out almost unintelligible. “Louder.” He said and grazed his teeth over your hardened bud. “Yes, Anakin.” You said louder as the shock of the feeling engulfed you. He smiled against you and returned to his position of hovering above you.

His hand trailed down your body agonizingly slowly, stopping right where your pussy was. His fingers traced the outside and you squirmed beneath him. “Please..” You whispered and his eyes darted back to yours. “Please what?” He spoke with his fingers still tormenting you, dancing around where you needed them the most. “Please, Anakin.” You whimpered and he smiled. “So fucking pretty when you say my name.” His mused, his voice almost came out as a low hum as his fingers finally slid up and down between your folds, picking up the juices that had collected. He pushed his lubricated fingers against your swollen clit and started to rub small, slow, circles against it. Your entire body jerked and he let go of your hands to press your hips down, your tailbone pushed against the tile and you winced causing your eyes to squeeze shut. You felt his fingers stop and instead felt a hand push your cheeks together causing your eyes to snap open, the smell of your pussy wafted toward your nose and a moan escaped your lips.

“Look at me. Don’t close your fucking eyes.” Anakin said, pushing your face to the side and letting go. His hand reached back down between your legs and he slipped two fingers into you. A yelp escaped you as he began to slide in and out, curling his fingers upward. Your eyes didn’t dare leave his as he continued to graze against the top wall. Your legs squeezed and his body kept them from closing. “Open those legs.” He seethed and removed his other hand from holding you down to push your leg back down before returning to its spot on your hips. You pulled your legs apart and he continued to stare into your eyes. He ducked down and his tongue pushed against your clit as he fingered you.

“Y-yes.. Please..” You moaned as he began to flick his tongue against the nerve endings. He still hadn’t broken eye contact and you felt a knot begin to form in your stomach, your legs began to shake as well. His mouth moved away from you but his hand continued to defile your hole. “You cum when I say so, you desperate, needy girl.” He spat and slowly returned to licking away at your clit. Your eyes widened and your breath hitched loudly in your throat. Your cheeks and ears burned at the words that fell through his lips.

“Yes, Anakin.” You said through your moans. You began clenching your pussy to hold back but that made the feelings even more amplified. Your breathing began to get heavier and heavier as you tried to take your mind somewhere else to keep yourself from going against his words but it was nearly impossible when you were forced to stare directly at him. He went on for what felt like an eternity before whispering against you. “Now.” He said and the vibrations of his voice made your entire body convulse as you let yourself go. You whimpered and squirmed while he held you in place. The knot in your stomach unraveled and warmth spread through your whole body, you couldn’t help but squeeze your eyes shut as you whimpered his name like it was the only word you knew. He pulled his fingers out and used your robe to wipe them off, his mouth followed shortly. He threw your clothes back at you and stood up.

“You can go now.” He said with a hint of a triumphant smile gracing his features. You sat up and immediately began to put the clothes back on, suddenly feeling far too vulnerable for your liking. When you stood up he grabbed you by your arm and pulled you toward him as he stared down at you with a firm grip on your bicep.

“Watch that wound and come back tomorrow.” He said with a voice that would have made any innocent bystander believe that nothing had happened in the last ten minutes. He placed a surprisingly gentle kiss on your head and his free hand moved your hair from your face.

You simply nodded and mumbled a quick, “Yes, Anakin.” before ducking out of his room and speed walking back to your own quarters, praying nobody saw you and suspected anything. You knew exactly how proud and cocky he looked as you left, you didn’t even need to look back at him. You felt like the dog obeying commands now and you really liked it, too.

PART TWO HERE YA NASTIES

@likeavillian24

[anakinskywalkerog]

My Very Soul (Chapter 34)

Anakin Skywalker x Jedi!Reader

Link to Chapter 33

Warnings: a bit of sad reader, a bit of angsty Anakin, FLUFF, clandestine love affair bullshit!! and a very subtle implied *you know* at the very end (rated teen as always)

Summary: Your training with Obi-Wan constitutes a new beginning; you and Anakin reckon with the fight you had after Felucia (WE HAVE NEW CLONE WARS ANAKIN GIFS TO USE I'm screaming)

Word Count: 4.2k

You felt the crisp, cool, morning air of the Temple hit your face like a bucket of water, as if the wind wanted to keep you awake and upright. You walked slowly through the hallways, focusing on your breathing, on the cold air, the hard marble beneath your feet, on anything but the whispered conversations you heard around you. Not heard—felt. You knew that the few Jedi you passed in the halls were not responsible for the accumulation of the voices in your head. This was just how it was for you, now—you couldn't help but pick up too much, like you were receiver that was too sensitive, picking up too many transmission signals.

It was easier to ignore the feel of all of the whispering voices than it was to ignore the pain you felt in your entire being. Walking through the Temple halls, even, felt like walking through thick, piling sand, your limbs aching. But you knew you mustn't focus on the pain—the pain of your grief, still so heavy, or the pain that twinged in your mind as you thought about the fight you'd had with Anakin last night—you mustn't let it consume you. You had work to do.

You felt horribly guilty for how you had shouted at Anakin the previous evening, how you had pushed him away, how you had told him to get out. Not that he had listened; he'd held you all through the night, and even after you'd calmed enough to dose, you still felt the guilt of it in your veins. So, when you'd awoken to the coruscanti light streaming in through the window slats, and you'd seen Anakin fast asleep, his peaceful, beautiful face finally at ease, you knew it wouldn't be right to wake him. You'd taken one last look at his face, admiring the shape of his jaw, his eyebrows slightly downturned in sleep, his eyelashes that shown blonde in the morning light, before you'd slipped out from under the covers and donned your robe, holstering your lightsaber before sneaking out of your apartment.

There would be time to apologize later. Now, you knew, you needed to clear your mind. You kept walking. As you passed the archives, something that you had been thinking about since you had returned from Felucia flashed through your head. Later, you told yourself, turning to look ahead and stilling yourself for what was to come.

You stopped outside the meditation chambers. You knew you didn't need to knock—knew that he would sense your presence. And, as you heaved another sigh, working to keep your body upright, fighting the weight of that ever-present grief, you heard his quiet voice.

"Enter," Obi-Wan said, and you pushed the button on the panel on the wall, walking slowly into the darkened meditation room. Everything inside was a shade of blue and grey, even the pale light slipping in through the mostly-covered windows. The room contained only a few soft ottomans, and gave the impression of stillness, of calm. Even so, you had to hold your breath as you bowed to Obi-Wan and took your place on the ottoman across from his. Everything in this Temple reminded you of Yuma. Everything reminded you that she was no longer here.

"Thank you for agreeing to meet with me," Obi-Wan said gently, his eyes grazing over your form, your face. You realized you still had yet to visit the refresher, your hair still looking like a nest something might crawl out of. You couldn't find it in yourself to care.

"Thank you for...offering, to help me train," you responded, bowing your head again slightly, forcing yourself to look him in the eye.

"I will do what I can," Obi-Wan replied, folding his legs on the ottoman, assuming a straight-backed meditative position. You followed suit, and found that your body felt comforted in this position, like muscle memory, as if its familiarity made the weight a little bit easier to bear.

"It is my understanding that you were unsuccessful," Obi-Wan began, stroking his beard thoughtfully, "when trying to extricate yourself from Yuma's thoughts and memories in the Force."

"Yes," you said, swallowing hard, trying to ignore the lump that had formed in your throat as you thought back to those training sessions, some that had taken place in this very same room. It felt like a different lifetime, compared to the one you were living now.

"And you were unable, as well, to stop reading other's presences, when you tried." You felt Obi-Wan's thoughts drift lazily toward Anakin, and you checked to make sure your own Force presence was folded neatly and minutely into yourself. The last thing you needed from this training was to reveal too much.

"Yes," you said again, watching Obi-Wan with interest.

"What did it feel like? When you tried to disentangle yourself from Yuma's presence?" Obi-Wan sounded genuinely curious. You swallowed again, pushing your head and back up straight, blinking away the pang that her name sent through you.

"It felt like..." you thought back to those training sessions. "It felt like there were thousands of...tendrils, connecting my presence to Yuma's presence, in the Force. And all of the tendrils were tangled together, knotted and looped...it took so much effort to disconnect one, or two, but before I could make progress, her thoughts or emotions would shift, and new tendrils would take their place. I could never get too many disconnected at once."

"An interesting metaphor..." Obi-Wan mused, his hand gracing over his mustache, his eyes unfocused as he considered your words. "My thought is that we are going about this the wrong way." He looked up, making eye contact with you once again.

"I'm listening."

"I've observed your Force empathy myself..." Obi-Wan said, looking at you as if he could see through you, right to your very soul. "I've found that your own emotions form a strong connection to those you read in others."

You thought back to all the times you'd mistaken others emotions for your own...with Anakin, the first day you'd even met him, or with Henry, when you'd seen his memories and assumed they were yours. You nodded.

"Sometimes...sometimes they even become indiscernible," you confirmed. "My own emotions, and those I read in others." Obi-Wan nodded as well.

"Logically it follows that extricating your emotions from the emotions of others would be very difficult," Obi-Wan said. You thought back over your relationship with Anakin—how at first you'd been afraid your feelings of affection, longing, of love weren't yours at all. Over time, though, your own feelings had grown such that their strength couldn't be denied. They had asserted themselves over you, over both of your lives. You shuddered at the thought, at how difficult it felt, even now, to not be by his side, not be in his arms. How those emotions threatened to swallow you whole.

"If the two are inseparable," Obi-Wan continued, snapping you back to attention, "instead of trying to separate your emotions from the emotions of another, I'm wondering if we can cut both off at the source."

"You mean..." you pondered, thinking this through, "not feel anything?"

"Not exactly, no," Obi-Wan explained, his voice thoughtful. "You are gifted at meditation, yes?" You nodded, wanting to see where he was going with this. "Instead of trying not to feel anything, you might think to separate yourself from your own emotions, when in particularly dangerous or high-stakes situations."

"You're speaking of impermanence," you murmured softly. Obi-Wan nodded. It was an old Jedi principle, one you had learned from a very young age—that the root of all suffering was impermanence. That to fear the impermanence led to anger, and then to hate, and then to suffering. A Jedi must accept the impermanence of all things. Especially emotion, you thought to yourself.

"I think you might have more success if you were to try to separate yourself—your being, your very soul—from those momentary feelings. The emotions you feel, and those that others feel, entangled and entwined as they are." Obi-Wan watched you, waiting for your response.

"So, it isn't about trying not to feel..." you said, thinking deeply. "But rather, allowing my sense of self to detach from my feelings, when the occasion calls for it."

"Yes." Obi-Wan affirmed. "It isn't about escaping your own emotions...but rather, forming a stronghold against them, and the ones you might read in others." Obi-Wan paused for a moment while you thought this over. "The Sith are controlled by their emotion." You looked up, and for a moment, instead of Obi-Wan's blue iris, you saw the purple one that had haunted you in your dreams. "They draw strength from it, yes," Obi-Wan continued, "but they also let it consume them. It seems to me that when you intuit Sith presences, that emotion consumes you too."

You thought back to when Count Dooku had taken you prisoner in your own mind. It had felt like being led down a dark path, one that narrowed, narrowed, until...until you'd been trapped. You didn't want to be rendered useless ever again. You didn’t want anyone else to come into harm's way because you were unable to keep your own mind for yourself. As your resolve hardened, you sat up straight, meeting Obi-Wan's gaze.

"What must I do?"

It was difficult work. Obi-Wan led you through a series of visualization exercises, and then meditations. You waded so deeply into the weeds of your own mind that you felt, for a moment, afraid you might get lost in it once again. But Obi-Wan was there, his voice guiding you, allowing you to continue mapping those deepest parts of yourself. You soon found that you were not one whole, but a composite mix of things; you were not solely a Jedi, nor were you solely the self that Yuma had taught, nor the woman that Anakin loved. You were many different things, different forms, ever-shifting and changing along with your consciousness.

By the end of the lesson, you'd achieved a moment—only a moment—in which you had looked at Obi-Wan and felt nothing emanating from his presence at all. It snapped away as you lost your focus, and you'd been certain that it was a mistake, but Obi-Wan had assured you that he did not have the gift of hiding his Force presence, and that if you had not been intuiting it, you had made great progress. You could admit that the flow of conversation in the back of your mind, the ever-present murmuring, had quieted to only a trickle. This was a great improvement from the storm of voices you had grown accustomed to. After only one day's effort, you and Obi-Wan had achieved more than you and your Master had been able to accomplish in six months.  

"Thank you," you said, breathless, sweat dripping down your brow from effort. For the first time since Felucia, you felt a bit looser, like you didn't have to try quite as hard to stand up straight.

"I appreciate your gratitude," Obi-Wan said kindly, "but you know it isn't necessary. I want to do anything I can to help you." You nodded your thanks to him, all the same. Obi-Wan's face became thoughtful. "I've never encountered anything like you, in the Force," he added, considering you.

You paused, taken aback. Obi-Wan, one of the most talented Jedi in the Order, who'd had a Padawan that—

"But...Anakin..." you mumbled, confused.

"I've never encountered anything like either of you," Obi-Wan said, chuckling and rubbing his beard. "You astound even the wisest of us." You laughed too, and felt yourself surprised to hear the sound.

"I know it doesn’t help," Obi-Wan remarked softly, "But I…have been in your position before. I watched my own Master be killed." You went quiet, your eyes fully on Obi-Wan, his head bowed, his hair hanging over his face, his eyes glazed with the memory. "And I was there, and I could do nothing to stop it. The mark that it leaves…it gets easier, with time. Easier to bear the weight of it."

You had never heard Obi-Wan speak of his Master before. Qui-Gon’s passing had happened when you were so young—it had scared you, at the time, with all the rumors surrounding how it had happened, but you hadn't thought, at that young age, of the effect it must have had on his Padawan.

"It does help," you told him quietly. The two of you sat for a moment in comfortable silence.

"How do you feel?" Obi-Wan asked, looking you over with careful concern. You considered his question honestly, allowing your body to express itself to you.

"I feel...hungry," you breathed, surprised at yourself. Obi-Wan smiled widely, and you grinned back at him, feeling, for the first time in a while, like there was solid ground beneath you.

Anakin stalked through the halls of the Temple. Jedi who were in his path moved swiftly to get out of his way; a maintenance droid squealed as the toe of Anakin's boot just missed it, but he wasn't paying attention. He looked down for a moment, but could barely see the tendons in his hands as he clenched his fingers into fists. He barely noticed the way the other Jedi were looking at him, his furrowed brow, his tall stature. He had other things on his mind.

He had awoken in your bed to find it empty. Fear and panic had gripped his heart as he tore apart the sheets, looking through the apartment, calling for you. It was only then that he remembered your training with Obi-Wan, your promise from the previous day. It had calmed him, but only a little. He had dressed quickly, sneaking out of your Jedi apartment with ease. He knew he had to find you.

Anakin's heart raced thinking about how you had been these previous days, how immobile you seemed, how you had been refusing to eat or drink, how you hadn't been able to get out of that bed. It terrified him whenever your eyes started to glaze over; when you didn't seem to fully see the room you were in. He was worried you might slip back into that Force haze at any moment, that space where you had seemed all but lost to him forever. He wouldn't let that happen.

The meditation room was empty; Anakin paused in the doorway only for a moment, before wheeling around and continuing down to the lower level. Where could you have gone? Surely not back to the medical chambers, unless—unless something had happened to you, during your training? Unless your mind had gone back into that cloudedness—

Surely there was no way the council had already sent you into command, was there? Anakin himself had been granted a small reprieve after the events of Felucia. He knew the council had appointed you general of the 415th batallion, Yuma's former position. He knew you had accepted command—what else could you have done? But could the council have sent you back into combat so quickly? Panic gripped Anakin's heart as he considered what it might mean if you returned to battle in your current state. He paused just outside the Temple gardens, half-ready to turn around and head back up toward the medical bay, to the council chambers, to demand to know where you were, when—

He felt a tug within him in the Force. It was a familiar presence; it felt like comfort, and reddish brown hair, the sleeve of a tunic...

Anakin found him on the other side of the gardens, in the corner, sitting with a cup of tea.

"Where is she?" Anakin demanded, looking around quickly. Obi-Wan seemed relaxed, so, at the very least, nothing horrible could have happened to you.

"Good morning, Anakin," Obi-Wan said, his voice sounding tired.

"Where is she?" Anakin asked again, bouncing back onto the heels of his boots for emphasis, feeling unable to keep still, even in the presence of his seated Master.

"I believe she went to get something to eat," Obi-Wan replied, looking warily up at Anakin.

"To eat?" Anakin asked, pausing for a moment, debating turning around on the spot and heading for the mess hall. But if you had gone to get something to eat, then—

"Training went well, then?" Anakin asked, lowering his voice, perching on the bench next to the one on which Obi-Wan lounged, in the corner of the Temple garden.

"I would say so," Obi-Wan said in his infuriatingly calm voice. Obi-Wan took another sip of his tea, looking out at the garden as if deep in thought.

"What does that mean?" Anakin asked, feeling impatient.

"I'm not sure," Obi-Wan replied, his voice still infuriatingly calm.

"Don't be cryptic," Anakin accused, leaning back on his bench and crossing his arms defiantly over his chest. "Do you think you'll be able to help her, or not?"

"I am optimistic," Obi-Wan said, finally turning in Anakin's direction to look him over. "You should be patient with her, Anakin. This was a serious loss for her."

"I know that," Anakin responded, his heart pounding, his anger jumping up a pitch. "I am being patient." Did Obi-Wan think he, Anakin, didn't know what you needed? How could Obi-Wan not see that your well-being was the most important thing in the world? Of course, Obi-Wan couldn't know about your relationship with Anakin...but didn't Obi-Wan realize the importance of keeping you alive, regardless? Didn't Obi-Wan realize how much danger you were in? Anakin took in the posture of his former Master, how calm Obi-Wan seemed, how superior, and felt his frustration grow. Obi-Wan sucked in a breath.  

"She's grieving—" Obi-Wan tried, but Anakin cut him off.

"Felucia, Obi-Wan?!" Anakin rasped, his volume increasing. "That wasn't grief!" Anakin recalled again the way you had looked with your body limp, your eyes clouded over, milky white, unable to hear him, trapped in your own suffering.

"I'm looking into it," Obi-Wan responded quietly, lowering his eyes.

"Well, look harder," Anakin said, his breath coming out in a huff. He leaned forward again, looking to Obi-Wan beseechingly. "If she takes command of the 415th, and she doesn't have this under control—"

"If you don't trust her by now," Obi-Wan began, but Anakin cut him off again.

"Of course I trust her! But you know as well as I do—as well as Yuma did—that her gifts are a liability!"

"She is not a liability to the Order—"

"I don't give a kriffing gundark about the Order! I'm talking about her—her life. You need to help her, Obi-Wan. We need to...to find a way to make sure..." Anakin's breathing was heavy. He found himself looking down at his hands, his shoulders moving up and down quickly with his breath. He blinked, his fear overwhelming him.

"We will help her," Obi-Wan said, putting a bracing hand on Anakin's shoulder. "And she will help herself."

You sat, staring into the archive memory, sifting through the holobooks to find what you were looking for. The Temple library was quiet, the atmosphere one of focused attention. Something about it calmed you, but you also found it a bit unnerving, that every bit of galactic knowledge that existed could be found in these very archives.

Your stomach was full for the first time since Felucia; you were sitting upright, able to fight the weight of the grief that had been threatening for days to consume you. You felt exhausted, and sad, but it was a start. And after attending to your needs in the mess hall, you'd come straight here, to the Temple library. Even in the darkest parts of your grief—even when you'd been totally trapped under that weight—you'd known what you needed to do next. You'd been forming your plan. All you had needed was the strength to begin. And, thanks to your training with Obi-Wan, today you'd found it.

You used the controls to pull forth one of the holobooks, and as the holoimages came up, you sat down to focus. You felt yourself getting lost in the text, trying to remember everything. Your focus was so intense that you didn't feel his presence coming until he was right behind you.

"Why are you researching Galactic Sign Language?" Anakin asked, his hand gently stroking your shoulder. Such a small, subtle movement was likely to go unnoticed by those other Jedi in the archives, absorbed as they were in their own research. The sound of his voice made your body electrify—all of the longing, the guilt, and the desire passed through you at once. You shivered.  

"It's a long story," you told him, turning around in your chair to face him full on.

"I'm sorry," you breathed, right as Anakin had said the same thing, leaning in toward you, his eyes wide. You felt the corners of your mouth turn up at the sides, and Anakin's face fell open, his surprise taking away his supplication.

"Me first," you said, getting up out of the chair and shutting off the hologram. As you faced Anakin, you felt through his emotions in the Force, sifting through as if the man in front of you were a different type of archive memory—one that was tangled, passionate, complex, brilliant, and beautiful. His emotions mirrored your own; you felt his guilt, his longing, his love for you. The first and most prominent emotion surrounding his presence was worry, and this made you feel even more guilty.

"I'm sorry I shouted at you," you told him quietly, aware of the others milling about the great library. "I'm sorry I took my anger out on you. It's only anger at myself—" Anakin looked as if he were going to cut you off, but you silenced him, holding up your hand. "I shouldn't have gotten angry with you at all. Not when you are so kind," you voice grew quieter, "and so loyal, and so patient with me." Your faces were closer together now; if anyone were to look over, they might wonder why you were having such an intense, whispered conversation. "I'm sorry I fell apart," you continued, feeling the hint of the tears pinpricking the corners of your eyes. You pushed through, closing your eyes to keep the tears from falling. "You shouldn't have to worry about me. I won't let it happen again. I promise I'll be here for you. With you."

"I'm the one who should be sorry," Anakin said eagerly, acting as if he were about to take your hands in his, and then looking around, thinking better of it. Instead, he surreptitiously reached up and brushed under your eye, stroking away the ghost of the tear that didn't fall. "I shouldn't have said anything about...I shouldn't have assumed I know anything about what it felt like for you, on Felucia."

You nodded, but really, he didn't need to apologize. You'd put your own words into his mouth; it hadn't been a fight between you and Anakin, but one between the warring sides of yourself. And you knew now that you needed to face those warring sides head on, and deal with them before they could manage to hurt anyone else.

"You don't have anything to apologize for," you said, pulling half of your mouth up in a small smile. Anakin's eyes were stars, on fire, the blue looking like it was burning, like it would melt out into the air.

"Obi-Wan said training went well," Anakin whispered, hopefully, looking around you for a moment before grazing your hand with his.

"I think it did," you whispered back, looking up into his eyes. You wanted nothing more than to take his face in your hands, but you held back. All this secrecy, you thought, might just drive you mad.

"And you'll tell me about your research..." he continued, glancing back at the archive computer behind you.

"Another time," you assured him, looking around again, making sure no one was close enough to overhear while you leaned in closer toward him. "You know that I love you," you breathed. Anakin's face broke into a joyful smile, his body leaning in closer to yours.

"You know," he said quietly so only you could hear him, "that I love you more than all of the books in this archive." He glanced back at the other Jedi, huddled in their research. "And more than all of the stars in the galaxy, and more than all of the galaxies in the universe." Anakin met your gaze, his sorrow gone, his eyes alight and mischievous. You felt the intention in his Force presence, and it made your insides turn over, your breath becoming short.

"And I love you more than whatever lies beyond that," you whispered, smiling up at him, your heart full. Anakin surreptitiously stroked his hand over the top of yours once again.

"Do you have much more research to do?" Anakin asked, his face forming a familiar, cocky smile.

"It can wait," you murmured, smiling and cocking your head as you strode past him toward the doors, gesturing for him to follow.

************************************************************************

thank you all for being patient with these updates <3 if you are following this story, you and I are besties, that's how it works

let me know if you want to be tagged when I post the next one!

divider credit to @racingairplanes

taglist: @iyoogi @cluelessgurl @layazul @annadastra @graciexmarvel @galaxiasyamor @organasith @indigoblues1207 @outoftheregular @katsukiswrld @prettyboyrryy @jellydodger @wildflower57 @padmeamidalaslover @em-asian @heavenseraph @iloveinej @leapofblank @sahverah @elsyyie @usuallyunlikelyfox @jadeonce @papadragun @dopejellyfishfury @stxrrielle @lilianashomaresparza @prettylittlecarstairs @deadunicorn159 @atoelicker @arelisskywalker @maythefloorbewithyouanakin @your-local-crzy-lady @dontmindme262 @xenochuguardian @cassiopeiashift @allihavenegativethoughts @hamiltonwc @1-800-nostalgiaaa @heyitsaloy @haydenchristensenluvbot @sunflwrsunnieshine @muthafuckingstargirl @window-to-nothing @shadowhuntyi @jedi-archives @inmourningforanakin @vivsmcdo @betrund @ahqkas @aquaamethyst96 @escapepoet @randomstuff2040 @kenjikishimotosupremecy @nycweb-slinger @anxlaufeyson @magic-magnoliaa @theezlife @unipugrose22-blog @anhsoka @lucyysthings @hopefulpursepeanutdeputy @captainson-of-coul @zelzablues @chrisevansslutttt2

[lillylvjy]

Only you.

a/n// well hello! long time since I’ve written and I kinda just mustered this up last night and called it a day. I hope you enjoy it even if it might be a bit shit. Also yes this is part of my Dr collective fics!

warnings// kissing, reader falls and hits their head, mentions of Tommy overworking himself, Tom and reader being children, pretty much pure fluff. If I missed anything please tell me.

cc!tommy x reader

wc: 1.2k

“You chose the wrong person to fuck with, love.” Tom said as he spun the saber in his hand.

Tom had been super busy lately. Not getting enough sleep, barely eating anything unless he had too, and always staring at his phone or computer screen, aggressively typing. He was streaming when he could, not taking breaks when he needed them, wanting to give his fans content. And you loved how much he loved all of them and how much he cared about his career, but you also cared about your boyfriend and his well-being. So when you finally got the chance to steal him away and convince him to take a break, you had came up with the best idea.

You had challenged the great Tommyinnit, or your boyfriend, to a lightsaber fight. He always spoke so highly of himself and his ability to beat anyone in a fight if he had too, which you and all of your friends knew was bullshit. But you wanted to challenge him into a different fight. One you knew he’d absolutely have a blast having with you.

“Oh did I now? What if I end up beating you, darling?” You asked Tom with a smirk as you start to circle around the living room, had moved everything out of the way for this specific event.

Tom scoffed as he started to move with you, bringing the lightsaber to a halt in his hands as he looked at you with a playful glint in his eyes. “Oh, sweetheart. I can assure you you won’t.” Tom raised his eyebrows at you as you smiled.

“We’ll see pretty boy. You don’t know the tricks I have up my sleeve.” You halted in place as you turned the lightsaber in your hand on, the toy making a loud striking sound as it slowly turned green.

Tom quickly turned his on, it making the same noise but turning blue. “Oh you’re on!” Tom challenged as he got in a stance, placing his saber out in front of him.

You quickly shortened the distance between the two of you as you swung the lightsaber to your left, quickly trying to hit toms exposed side but was quickly denied by his saber clashing into yours.

“You think you’re slick, huh?!” Tom exclaimed as pushed your saber back and quickly pushed his towards your side, barely skimming your stomach as your turned away from it.

“Actually-“ you smirked up at him as you leaned in closer to him, face close enough to feel his breathe against your cheek as you whispered in his ear. “I don’t think I’m slick. I just think I’m a good distraction.” You smiled up at him as he quickly scrambled back away from you, shaking his head.

“No, no. No, that won’t work on me.” Tom said with a determined voice, almost like he was talking to himself.

“Looks like it almost did.” You said, pointing out the blush that took over his face, laughing at how he quickly tried to change the subject by swinging the lightsaber around once again.

“Oh you’ll pay for this!”

“Will I now?!” You said with a playful smile as Tom quickly swung the saber to his right and clashed with yours. As Tom continued to strike anytime he could, you quickly realized how off balance you were from the continuous strikes. Once Tom let a blow to your left side, nearly getting you, you tripped over your feet and onto the floor, quickly laughing at the sudden events.

“Oh my god! Are you ok?! What hurts? Do I need to call an ambulance? Can you see me? Love I need you to an-“

“Tom! Tom. As much as I love to hear you talk, you need to calm down and talk slowly.” You cupped his cheek as you looked at his beautiful blue eyes.

Laughing lightly, he nodded and took a deep breathe, trying to calm down from the fight and from the heart attack he nearly had when you fell. “Are you ok? Anything hurt at all?”

Shaking your head lightly, you winced as you started to feel a slight throb in your head as you slowly sat up, Tom grabbing your waist quickly to help you. “Yeah I’m good besides hitting my head to hard on the ground. I’m like you now!”

“Oh fuck off!” Tom laughed out as he slowly helped you up to your feet and wrapped his arms around your waist. “May I add I haven’t gotten a concussion in a long time, one. Two, I didn’t look as graceful as you did when you fell.”

You rolled your eyes at his comment and slap his chest. “I’m just too cool to look bad, Simons.” You smiled up at him as you leaned closer, touching the tip of his nose with yours.

“Eh, are you though?” Tom joked back as he connected his forehead with yours.

“Shut up and kiss me, yeah?” You told Tom as he quickly nodded and gently pressed his lips against yours, softly pressing closer to you as he placed his hands to cup your face. Placing your hands on his chest, you grabbed his sweater and leaned up into the kiss and deepened it.

“What the hell did we just watch?!” You and Tom both jumped away from each other as you snapped your bodies towards the mystery voice.

“Seriously Wil?! You had to ruin the moment?” You looked behind the tall man to see your brother, Aiden, standing beside him, hitting his shoulder, giving him a unsatisfied look.

“How the hell did you two get in here? Also when did you get in here?!” You questioned the couple across the room as Tommy wrapped his arms around your waist and hid his face in your neck out of embarrassment, making a small groaning noise as Wilbur continued.

“You do remember that Aiden used to live here too?”

“Technically I still do but-“

“We also got here right when you guys started your little sword fight thingy-“

“Lightsaber!” You and Tom both yelled at Wil for disrespecting the name of the light up kid toys you were using earlier.

“Yeah Wil, lightsabers.” Aiden mocked as he started walking to his room as Wil followed him like a lost puppy, groaning about how it was “technically the same thing sense they weren’t real.”

As you sighed, you turned your body back to Tom and wrapped your arms around his neck. Tom pulled you closer to him as he peppered soft kisses on your neck.

“So? Who won?” You asked the blonde in curiosity while thinking back to where you left off.

“…… I don’t think anyone did.” Tom said as he leaned back up from your neck to his full height.

With a smirk on your face, you went over to one of the sabers lying on the floor. As you picked it up, you turned the toy on, smirking as it turned blue this time.

“Are you thinking what I’m thinking, toms?” You asked your boyfriend as your turned around, spinning the lightsaber around in your hand.

“I think I am. Round 2? First one down is the loser?”

“Oh, absolutely.”

“You’re going down, sweetheart.”

“I’d like to see you try, pretty boy.”

taglist: @mysticalsoot @canonically-a-genloser (if I forgot anyone/if you want to be added, feel to message me or send an ask!)

[girlfriendsofthegalaxy]

tuesday again 1/23/2024

listen i got my last job through one of youse on here so weirder things have happened: i got fired bc the nonprofit wasn’t doing so hot. let me know if you have a weird data/database or market/tech research job. i promise my worksona is so so so nice and pleasant to work with. remote only, looking more in the $75k range but can be a bit flexible if it’s a cool enough job, i am in the central time zone of the USA and will not need sponsorship anywhere but DO need the cadillac of healthcare and dental plans. portfolio, publication list, and linkedin with my government name available on request!

listening

both of these are from my sister! this is another FULL ALBUM rec (good lord). The Offline’s album La couleur de la mer is a soundtrack to a movie that doesn’t exist, inspired by his long walks in the fog on the French Atlantic coast. a little spacey, a little soul, very sixties/seventies neonoir. i am quite fond of the very first track, Thème de la couleur de la mer.

she’s also sent me a bunch of tiktoks with Perfect (Exceeder) by Mason and Princess Superstar. hell of a goddamn music video for this thing. mid-aughts clubbing music at its finest. stopped me from dissolving into a puddle of emotions on the way to and from the vet today bc it’s too goddamn bouncy to be sad around

reading

im reading a trilogy i want to discuss as a whole whenever the third one comes through as a library hold, and a book by a friend. i do not typically talk about books or fics by friends here bc none of them have ever asked for critique, and i dont want to play favorites or inadvertently miss someone’s work. so here’s a story about porn on Wikimedia, which is the kind of database drama and technical arguments that fascinate me.

given the number of articles from 404 Media i shout about here and elsewhere i really should sign up for their $5/mo subscription tier when i have a steady income again

watching

somehow missed Star Wars Visions 2, their second anthology of weird little shorts. i was not super impressed by the overall storytelling this time around, but it was fun to see them reach out to more global studios and see a wider range of styles. there’s some goddamn incredible stop motion in here.

i particularly enjoyed Journey to the Dark Head, which not only has some interesting fringe Force believers and beliefs but has one of the sickest anime bullshit lightsaber fights in this season. this one is by Studio Mir, most known for the Legend of Korra.

also really liked The Spy Dancer by Studio La Cachette, partly bc it’s incredibly beautiful and i like when Star Wars leans into art nouveau, and partly bc it felt the most like a complete short story. emotional arc and everything! strong beginning middle and end! this IS a really low bar, but a lot of the shorts this season did not have a coherent little story to tell or a strong emotional arc, or fumbled their arc partway through, and were just kind of vibes and animation showcases? nothing necessarily wrong with that, also how i felt about most of the last collection. my expectations are underground for any Star Wars media.

playing

as is tradition i dithered about this section the most. this is more of a What’s Next? planning ramble.

the laptop gets shipped back to my old job today so i will no longer have a working modern computer. i have to dig the switch out and see what’s up. maybe start a whole new run in breath of the wild or whatever the last pokemon game was. i think i also have the sword boyfriend game everyone was up in arms about two years ago? and i think i am somehow part of a switch family plan that lets me have some older games?

this section may look very different in the next ??? amount of time until i get a company laptop again. or finally replace the motherboard on my personal desktop but that sat in my car for several weeks during the heat wave this summer while i did not have an apartment and i am really REALLY afraid to open that box.

oh the free epic game this week is a platformer, a genre i have historically not cared about. godspeed to those of you who do

making

soup bc aldi had alphabet pasta and that jolted me out of myself for long enough i was briefly convinced making alphabet pasta soup would fix me. so i found this recipe while in aldi. despite this not being a very good soup or a very good recipe, i feel a little triumphant bc i now know enough to brown the tomato paste before putting it in the soup. unfortunately i overcooked the pasta. there’s kind of a lot of texture happening here, and i wish i had chopped things finer, but i will probably steal my best friend’s blender tomorrow and blitz some of it down.

it’s edible. im going to eat it all. it will not be going in the rotation

[p4nishers]

i need content of codywan that just started working together like the first few months where their dynamic is cody barely resisting the urge to strangle his general and obi wan being like. already fucking head over heels for him.

like cody was expecting someone highly impressive based on his records so he obviously is excited to work with him cause his batchmates already met him on kamino and genosis and they all liked him which was, looking back, probably a prank on codys sanity and his bastard gremlin vode were absulately dying laughing at him. anyway so he obviously has high expectations and then this slutty "hello there" mf turns up with no self-preservation whatsoever, a feral demon child of a padawan, half the republic tailing him for every bullshit imaginable and beef with EVERY SINGLE SITH EVER???? WHICH HE SOLVES BY ???? FUCKING FLIRTING WITH THEM????? so you can imagine codys not having a great time.

meanwhile, obi wan daydreams about cody constantly. draws up their wedding invitations before even meeting him. praises him every opportunity he gets. kicks his feet and giggles about codys sarcastic comments ABOUT HIM while being in a room with CODY. stops talking in the middle of his sentence when he spots cody across the room and waves at him with the biggest smile possible. sets up regular sparring practices with the vode just so he MIGHT have an opportunity to be close to cody. labels the time when cody accidentally fell on him because of an explosion and touched his lips for 0.00001 milliseconds as their first kiss and gossips about it to quinlan. calls bant regularly to update her on everything cody does ever. buys every kind of tea and caf he can afford as an excuse to talk to cody and go into his courters. flirts with cody 24/7 and blushes tomato red when cody smirks at him and thinks about it so much he constantly walks into walls and tables and chairs and shinies and. breaks a table after cody stubs his toe into it. passes the fuck out when cody carries him this one (1) time, not bc of blood loss or anything simply too much attraction. constantly searches the force for codys signature even when they're not in the same system. calls him disgustingly sappy petnames in every other sentence. corners all of codys batchmates and asks thousands of questions about cody bc he cannot get them out of the man for the life of him and yes, wolffe, he absulately will die without knowing codys favorite color what kind of question is that. cody smiles once a month and obi wan thanks him everytime. cody hands him back his lightsaber for the first time and he proposes, loudly, cody ignores him completely and walks away. convinces anakin and ahsoka to drop "subtle" hints that he would be a good husband.

and everyone around them is having the time of their life watching codys right eye twitch whenever he's in a room with kenobi long enough while the man himself doesn't take his eyes off the commander during the entire 4 hour meeting and blushes everytime cody looks at him without a fail. cody barely refrains from throwing his datapad at his general when he suggests some self-sacrificing bullshit again.

it's truly like:

obi wan, beaming and eyes possibly gleaming with adoration: hello there, cody. how are you today?

cody, grinding his teeth together: fine, sir. wanted to talk to you about this report cause it's seems to be mistaken. surely, you're not thinking of blowing yourself up just so that TWO man, who are not even in any immediate danger whatsoever, can escape. right?

obi wan, brightening even further bc he loves their daily "banter": oh but of course, my dear, they're valuable men and anyway, i promised anakin he'd get to use the explosives this time.

cody, right eye starting to twitch horribly: right, of course, stupid of me to ask. one more thing, general, you wouldn't decommission me for anything i do, would you, sir ?

obi wan: what– darling, of course not. why would you–

cody: alright then [punches obi wan then walks away]

obi wan:

obi wan: i'm so in love with that man.

it's said that to this day obi wan still giggles in the most inappropriate times about that punch because cody was SO HANDSOME YOU DONT GET IT MACE THE LIGHT HIT HIM JUST RIGHT AND–

anyway codys hatred lasts till obi wan saves rex by putting himself in danger and when they get back, both bruised and bloody but amazingly alive and obi wan smiles at him like he always does with rex draped across his scarred shoulder, something in cody just settles and thinks. oh. oh. so this is what bly was talking about.

[jedi-enthusiast]

My Thoughts on Episode 2

I have now moved into my dorm and gotten more used to college life, so here is the post about Ahsoka episode 2 as promised---keep in mind, though, just like episode one these are just my thoughts upon first watching it. They may change or I may go into further detail on them in the future.

----------

Once again, the scenes just feel...so utterly hollow and flat.

There's no emotion exchanged when Sabine and Ahsoka talk---neither Ahsoka nor Sabine ever actually seem worried- (whether it's about Sabine or the map) -nor do they ever seem stubborn, defensive, irritated/angry, or anything else that you would expect.

Again, it's all just hollow.

----------

I'm gonna be honest, the villains are the singular interesting part of this show for me right now.

----------

LOTH CAT!!!

----------

So, even though other people have literally died by getting a lightsaber to the gut, Sabine is perfectly fine to be sitting up and working on a droid and moving around like...a day or so afterwards?

The fuck?

Even if her surviving is possible- (since other people have pointed out that it is, when taking other things into account) -she shouldn’t be all fine and dandy and moving around! That shit should hurt!

----------

Also, I've seen so many people point to Ahsoka telling Sabine- "no, you've done enough." -when Sabine says she can help as this badass line and saying- "yes, let Ahsoka be angry!" -but, ignoring the fact that there was no emotion whatsoever when she said that...

...how is it badass or "sticking it to Sabine" when she literally goes back to Sabine for the help she offered like an hour later?

----------

Again, Sabine should not be moving like that after getting stabbed with a lightsaber.

----------

"Yes, let's put this whole hospital full of people in danger because we can't be bothered to relocate, because of a timeline that we have not been very clear about---a timeline that may or may not have consequences, because we also haven't been very clear about why the timeline is the way it is or what will happen if it's not followed."

Wow, this show is just...really trying to make me not like or root for these characters at all.

I'm just...wow.

----------

I've said it once and I'll say it again, the villains are the only interesting part of this show right now.

Also, I fucking loved Baylan mentioning Jedi younglings and that little snippet of Jedi culture---the fairytales they were taught.

Although I do think it's fucking nuts that the Darksider, the villains, are giving us more insight into Jedi culture than the actual fucking "Jedi" of the show.

----------

CHOPPER!!!

----------

Someone else explained it better in another post- (I'll reblog and add it here once I actually find it again) -but the guy that's playing the "businessman who's only loyal to his investors- (aka he does things for greed)" -is an actor, who I think is Jewish if I'm remembering correctly, who is known for playing pretty much only Jewish characters...

...I don't think I need to explain how making his character one who does things only for greed is antisemitic.

----------

Again with the Sabine as a Jedi thing???

Non-Force-sensitives can't become Jedi---being a Jedi is being apart of a culture that is specifically centered around Force sensitivity!!!

And Sabine already has a culture, she's Mandalorian for fuck's sake!

Just-

I'm sorry, this whole fucking thing pisses me off---she better turn out to be Force-sensitive and Dave is just retconning that, because otherwise I'm going to lose my goddamn mind.

----------

"I heard your repairs were complete."

Except they shouldn't be because she literally got stabbed with a fucking lightsaber, it should take longer than just about a day to heal---with or without a bacta tank.

----------

I swear to fucking god-

Not this bullshit again.

Please, please, I'm begging, just retcon Sabine to be a little bit Force-sensitive and don't pull some "non-Force-sensitive Jedi can be a thing" bullshit. Please-

----------

"I'm a general, nothing's classified to me."

That's not how that works.

----------

CHOPPER AGAIN!!!

----------

I love Chopper so much istg, I'm at least glad my favorite homicidal droid is back in action <3

----------

LOTH CAT AGAIN!!!

----------

Ok, this scene is reminding me of it specifically, but why hasn't Sabine been wearing her armor? We literally never see her without it in Rebels and being Mandalorian is a huge facet of her identity, why has she not been wearing it?

Once again, I assume this'll be explained later, so I'm trying to hold back my judgement, but if it's not explained later then...honestly it's just confusing.

----------

Wow, so not only was the Jewish actor cast to play someone whose motivation is greed, but they also made him a bad guy...just...wow.

----------

*long sigh at Ahsoka calling Sabine "padawan"*

----------

Oh hey, the big evil bad guy station kinda fucks ngl

----------

I'm gonna be honest, Baylan---again, the bad guy---honestly shows more emotion at there being "so few Jedi left" than Ahsoka---who's supposed to be the good guy, and who's apparently just decided to take up the Jedi mantle again---does.

Also, isn't this show set before the Sequels?

So how are there "so few Jedi left" if Luke is building a new Order that's apparently successful enough to have Order 66 2.0 in the Sequels?

[magnetarbeam]

I'm too tired to really be capable of coherence, but my ideas about the TCW-based fighter pilot drama fic - I've called it Jedi Ace so far - aren't very coherent yet anyway, so I feel like I can infodump about that.

This is meant to be about a whole squadron of pilots, which is twelve, but I want the most focus of those to be on Ahsoka and the troopers Kickback and Swoop, the only survivors of her fuckup at Ryloth. I've seen one or two fics that have her apologize to them after it, and I think in all of them they forgave her for it for reasons that revolve around that she was a kid forced into a command position with no choice and no training. Here, I want to acknowledge, in some capacity of substance, that there was more to it than that.

Yeah, it was Ahsoka not knowing what she was doing, but it was also her not thinking things out because her outstanding (for her age) skills at stuff like lightsaber combat had gone to her head and she assumed she'd be able to do this too.

(For what it's worth, I wouldn't be too surprised to learn that Filoni thought she would have been able to take out a Lucrehulk with just the lasers on her Delta-7B, but in this case that ignorance is actually useful.)

And of course, Ahsoka also constantly feels the need to prove to her Master that she's good enough for him, so he doesn't decide to give her back after all, which she failed to do here.

The first thing I really need to do here is come up with actual characters for Kickback and Swoop, but I have a hard time imagining them both forgiving her instantly in this. Part of it depends on how much time actually passed between the two assaults on the blockade forces over Ryloth. If it was, like, a couple days, there could be time for some emotional processing.

(My Legends-supremacist attitudes are gonna bleed through a bit here because I'm using the books' description of Ryloth, and also completely rewriting the second assault to neutralize the bullshit about Ahsoka having come up witn the Marg Sabl, which itself is discussed in a completely fucking different context in the books.)

In any event, I want them to have forgiven her enough to fly with her again by the turn of the second year of the war. The setup for how she finds out about their Force-sensitivity is a battle I'm not gonna go into full detail about, but I'm using a generous dose of Canon-Typical Inaccurate Astrophysics by having it take place in the Roche system (I have no idea what side, if, any, the Verpines actually took in that war, but I like it as setup here, so I'm not gonna change it unless I specifically find out that they weren't loyal) when fleet elements working with the 501st and 327th are reprovisioning after retreating from Felucia for the fuckteenth time. For this battle, Kickback has to be transferred out of Ahsoka's squadron (which at that point is her Delta-7B and eleven of the weird clone spinoff models of the Z-95) and put in charge of twenty-three shinies in BTL-B Y-Wings. For tactical reasons, the fighters are limited to communications of a sufficiently low power to only reach the distances of a single squadron's formation.

Here, I've chosen to reference one of the few bits of IRL naval history I actually know, which is the Battle of Midway, and how (at least the way it was told to me) it was basically just dumb luck that the one guy's bomber squadron showed up to the Japanese fleet at exactly the same time that all the Zeros were going after the other guy's bomber squadron.

This time, however, the "dumb luck" of their two squadrons coordinating their attack perfectly, without comms, makes Ahsoka suspicious because she knows just as well as any other Jedi what that can be a sign of. After she investigates, she finds that Kickback and Swoop are both not only Force-sensitive, but have already formed a bond through which they're unconsciously coordinating in combat.

A few months later, the first operational squadron of the new Eta-2 Actis interceptors are delivered to the Resolute. These are not only faster than the preceding Delta-series interceptors, but they're also intended for mass production and use by clones and regular natborn pilots in addition to Jedi, who can strip out a bunch of sensor and targeting systems and cut mass to make them even faster, and they have to rely on the Force to make up for the ship's own capabilities that were stripped out. Ahsoka is inspired by this, and the sensitivity of two of her pilots, to conceive an idea that she presents to Anakin and Yularen: A full squadron of the new interceptors, all stripped down to Jedi specs, and flown by Ahsoka herself and eleven clones with the necessary ability and training to coordinate in combat through the Force.

Yularen and Anakin have their doubts about whether it'll work, especially since finding that many clone troopers with Force ability, let alone training them, is going to take weeks. (If I was not constrained by the timescale of the entire war, it would be a lot longer.)

Nevertheless, Anakin agrees to put the word out among the other battalions(/legions/what-the-fuck-ever) asking for more troopers that are suspected or confirmed as Force-sensitive, and in the meantime Ahsoka works on more training for Kickback and Swoop as the start of the idea.

That's about my attention span for now.

[thesummerstorms]

Don't ask me why I'm having SW feelings bc I don't know where they came from, but I'm back on my Eldritch!Last Fullier Force bullshit.

I don't normally even like horror, but for some reason I've got this ghost story in my head of Kast Fullier's ghost testing Etain, except it's more like the Force is wearing him as a cloak. And as they have their exchange, his face slowly morphs closer to what it was at the time of his death, tortured to his grave by Ghez Hokan.

Etain still calls him "Master".

His face ripples again, until the stream changes and it's a face Etain only knew from holos. Rhosaar, her master's master, whose dying blood stained the belly of a slave ship. She smiles gently at Etain, her throat still slit.

Etain calls her "teacher".

And finally They become a shadow from millennium before Etain was born- but one who knows her path better than most ever could. Targe Vizsla extends his open hand, his eyes gone as black and vast as galaxies.

Etain calls him "ancestor". It's presumption on her part, but his laugh would be kind if it didn't echo so.

A ghost The Force hands her back her lightsaber, and she accepts it with all its weight. These are the lessons the Purge taught her, that she is learning still.

(There is no Death, there is the Force.)

(technically, no non-Forse sensitive should be able to see this, but at the same time it would just add to the vibes if one of her family is there watching all this like "what the fuck what the fuck what fuck-")

[photogirl894]

I have a minor thought to share about the latest Ahsoka episodes below the cut...only look if you've watched them.

For people who are complaining about Sabine getting stabbed by a lightsaber and surving...

Y'all ever heard of bacta? 😑

Seriously, it literally shows her waking up in what appears to be a med room and in med clothing. They weren't that far from the city, so Ahsoka was most likely able to get her back in time to get her proper medical attention. Plus, she was stabbed in her side more than her gut, which isn't always fatal. Hence why she was able to survive.

And comparing what happened to Qui-Gon, Satine or characters like the Grand Inquisitor or Reva? Well, let's look at that.

Qui-Gon: stabbed pretty much directly between his gut and his chest, a more fatal area of the body, and was not in a position to get medical help right away. Same with Satine. Hence why they died.

Grand Inquisitor? It was the whole "my hatred/the Dark Side kept me alive" bullshit, which frankly I just feel is a cop-out just to keep villains alive (looking at you, Maul! Not complaining that they kept him alive cuz he turned out to be an awesome character, but that whole reasoning just seemed cheap as if they couldn't think of a legit reason of how they could bring him back)

As for Reva, I'm pretty sure it was the same as Sabine, but it's been a while since I've watched Kenobi, plus I'm fairly certain that it doesn't really show where she got stabbed anyway. It was most likely more of a flesh wound than anything truly fatal.

Overall, the point is: it's not just "anyone in Star Wars survives lightsaber stabs now"; it's the fact that they have bacta and advanced healing technology that helps with that. It's not "dishonoring" Qui-Gon or Satine's deaths in any way, like I've seen people say. That's just ridiculous. It's not anything out of the ordinary, yet so many people seemed shocked or offended by this. It's not that hard to figure out if you just pay attention. If characters can survive being freaking chopped in half by a lightsaber, then this really shouldn't be surprising and is nothing in comparison. Again, also with proper medical help.

Seriously, have y'all forgotten this is Star Wars? 🤨

[thecleverqueer]

Random thoughts during A New Hope:

*Rogue One really did enhance the first scene of this movie for me. They went through such an epic battle to get those plans, and now they must follow through to honor the sacrifice that brave crew made. Get ‘em!

*I just love R2-D2 and C3-PO. Those damned droids have changed hands so many times, and yet, they’ve been kept in the family.

*Leia Organa was the original. She’s such a badass. Smart, snippy, resourceful, all around brilliant character.

*GNK or gonk droids are also amongst my favorite. I wouldn’t want one personally, but I appreciate that they exist.

*I’d forgotten C3-PO’s first job was programming binary load lifters. Holy shit! I’m going to assume because his memory was wiped at the end of The Revenge of the Sith that it wasn’t the same binary load lifters that Ahsoka and Trace chased down in the under city on Coruscant, and none of that was C3-PO’s fault (though it wouldn’t surprise me).

*Owen blatantly telling C3-PO to shut up is peak Star Wars. Seriously.

*That red R2 unit’s motivator blowing at the moment that it did was either a fine example of how coincidentally chaotic the universe is, or how incredibly the force works in mysterious ways… and since this is Star Wars…

*It warms my heart that Luke was still playing with that space ship that Obi-Wan gave him so many years ago.

*C3-PO telling Luke that he’s not good at storytelling is also bullshit. We saw you in The Return of the Jedi telling your story to the Ewoks… with your compelling narrative and your sound effects. Come on.

*Since Owen calls Old Ben a wizard, does this mean Obi-Wan was being ballsy and tinkering around with the force after his rescue of Leia? Is that what the kids are calling Jedi these days? Space wizards?

*I love how Obi-Wan emerges using force scream to frighten off the sand people. That might be a power I would want. I dunno. It wouldn’t be my first choice if choices are given.

*I also wonder why Obi-Wan doesn’t seems to remember R2-D2 and C3-PO. How could he forget them? They were always there running around with him in space…ESPECIALLY, R2-D2.

*Oops. Luke just called the droids “robots”. Close, not quite.

*Leia probably could have resisted it, but I wonder why Vader opted to use drugs to get the location of the Rebel base and not mind probe? That’s a power all good Sith Lords should possess.

*I really wish Disney would release the original versions of the original trilogy before it was digitally remastered. I watched it hundreds, if not thousands, of times on VHS before they did it, but it’s hard to remember and I’d like to.

*Luke’s Intro to Jedi mind tricks.

*Obi-Wan is the undisputed king of chopping off arms.

*You also have to give it to Obi-Wan when he pulls out the lightsaber in the cantina in the first place. Balls. It didn’t seem to bother the majority of the patrons that there was a Jedi in their midst, people looked, the Bith band kicked back up and folks returned to their drinks. Still, there’s always a fascist rat in the crowd someplace that squeals to the Empire. Every. Time.

*”I’m never coming back to this planet again.” -Luke. Don’t be so sure.

*Han shot first.

*One of my least favorite things about the digitally remastered version of A New Hope is the conversation between Han and Jabba in the hangar. Han and Greedo had the exact same conversation in the cantina that he and Jabba had in that hangar verbatim. It’s almost as if Lucas just couldn’t help himself as the Jabba/ Han conversation was probably his original plan that he couldn’t pull off when Star Wars was originally released. And at this point, they couldn’t replace the Han/ Greedo interaction because it is iconic. Now, it all feels like a pointless, redundant afterthought. Also, it’s odd that Han calls a Jabba a wonderful human being. What!?! Jabba is a huge f*^%ing space slug! TF you mean, “human being”?

*The Millennium Falcon is a badass ship. That is all.

*I can’t stand Tarkin. He’s such a f*^%ing fascist asshole.

*Oh Alderaan…. The Empire did that shit on purpose. They blamed / tried to guilt Leia, but I bet they wanted to take out Bail equally bad. RIP Bail.

*”That’s no moon. It’s a space station!” -Obi-Wan. You can feel that HOLY SHIT moment. Yeah. I don’t know. It’s one part Geonosian (because those stupid f*^%ing bugs) and one part Galen Erso… luckily, Galen rigged it to blow. The bugs would have destroyed the galaxy.

*This goes without saying, but stormtroopers are kinda stupid.

*Tarkin says “the Jedi are extinct”. Nah, fam, there are, like, four of them and a part-timer…

*I have to wonder what all the water was in the trash compactor. Was it sewage, or… ? Yuck. Get out of there! There’s some sort of space worm in there amongst human excrements and god knows what else!

*I appreciate the fact that they left the scene where the stormtrooper hits his head on the door in the digitally remastered version.

*Luke tells C3-PO to shut up. See!?! Peak, I’m telling you.

*Vader telling Obi-Wan that he’s the master is laughable. No. You’re still not a master. You’re Palpatine’s bitch.

* Turns out, Anakin was the death of Obi-Wan. Sadly, Obi-Wan becomes one with the cosmic force. It’s okay. He will manifest himself into a force ghost. Now there are three Jedi and a part-timer…

*Does a simulator where you sit in those gunner seats of the Millennium Falcon and blow up tie fighters exist? If it doesn’t, it’s a hugely missed opportunity in every arcade on the planet. What a game that would be! I’d play.

*They’ve got 15 minutes to blow that shit up before it beats them to the punch.

*I feel like Wedge Antilles is an often underrated character. Wedge is an utter badass, and one hell of a pilot.

*Three minutes.

*One minute.

*Thirty seconds.

*”You may fire when ready.” F*^% you, Tarkin.

*Han comes in clutch. Luke blows up the technological terror (and Tarkin). Party on Yavin!!

*I can’t believe that Chewy will have to wait until The Rise of Skywalker to receive his medal.

[running2reanimation]

Dark Lord: I’m going to hell.

Purple: Probably.

Dark Lord: I'll pick you up?

Purple: *nodding* Carpool.

—

Dark Lord, holding a toy lightsaber: I’m Darth Vader!

Chosen One: I’m done with everyone’s bullshit.

—

Chosen One: How did you break your leg?

King: Do you see those porch stairs?

Chosen One: Yes.

King: I didn't.

—

Dark Lord: And then they ran into my knife. They ran into my knife ten times.

King: You mean you stabbed them?

Dark Lord: They ran into my knife.

—

Purple: ARE YOU-

Dark Lord: Fucking.

Purple: KIDDING ME?! YOU-

Dark Lord: Fucking.

Purple: IDIOT!

Chosen One: …What was that?

Dark Lord: King banned Purple from swearing, so I’m helping them out.

—

Dark Lord: If you get in trouble, I'm gonna be like... a lawyer to you. Ok?

Purple: Okay.

*later*

Chosen One: Purple! Sit down on the chair, you're in trouble.

Dark Lord, whispering: Deny everything.

Purple, loudly: That isn't a chair.

—

Dark Lord: God has let me live another day and I'm going to make it everyone's problem

—

Chosen One: *eyes glowing* Go to Bed. This is no longer a request, This is now a Threat.

—

*Dark Lord drunkenly wanders around the house and Purple is drunkenly giggling*

King, completely sober: *sighs* Well, looks like it's just me and you against the world, Chosen One.

Chosen One, going to their room: Nope, just you. *shuts door*

—

Purple: Don't joke about murder. I was murdered once and it offends me.

—

Purple: Dinosaurs aren't extinct. I mean, King is walking in this room.

Dark Lord: *wheeze*

—

Purple: No problemo!

Purple, internally: But it was all problemo.

—

Dark Lord: I could kill you if I wanted.

Purple: Yeah? So could any other human being. So could a dog. So could a dedicated duck. You aren't special.

—

Dark Lord: Look, I know you think my judgement's clouded because I like King a little bit.

Chosen One, holding Dark Lord's notepad: You doodled your wedding invitation.

Dark Lord: No, that's our joint tombstone.

Chosen One: My mistake.

—

Dark Lord: Y’know, maybe things aren’t so bad. I’m here. I got the nice ocean breeze. Just alone with my thoughts.

Purple: Hey, Dark Lord.

Dark Lord: GODDAMNIT

—

Purple, Entering King's room: Chosen One did it again.

King: Peace disturbance?

Purple: What no-

King: Arson..?

Purple: NO, JESUS CHRIST, HOW MANY-

King: uh....Attempted murder?

Purple: NO, THEY ATE ALL THE FOOD IN THE FRIDGE, BUT WHAT THE FU-

—

Chosen One: If I see a bug, I simply leave the room elegantly and require someone else do something about it.

Chosen One: If no one fulfills my wish, I simply never go back in there

—

King: What's gone wrong, Dark Lord?

Dark Lord: Hey! That’s one hell of a thing to say to a person. Just because I’m calling doesn’t mean there’s a crisis.

King: That’s technically true, I suppose. Why are you calling?

Dark Lord: Well... There’s a crisis

—

King: I don't need to go to bed. I'm not tired, I'll be fine.

Chosen One: But, darling, I'll be so lonely without you. Come curl up in my arms so I can feel whole again.

King: O-oh. Well. Are you trying to seduce me into healthy sleeping patterns??

Chosen One: Is it working?

—

Dark Lord: Hey, King. These candies you gave me? They sucked.

King: But you ate them all.

Dark Lord: I had to make sure they all sucked.

—

King: *about Dark Lord and Chosen One* They make a cute couple, huh?

Purple: They certainly are standing next to each other.

—

Dark Lord: That shirt looks great, Chosen One.

Chosen One: Thanks.

Dark Lord: But I bet it would look even better on King's floor.

King: Are you hitting on Chosen One... for me?

—

*At the police station*

King: Hi, I’m here for Dark Lord.

Police officer: Who’s Dark Lord?

King: Ah, you must be new.

—

Dark Lord: When I see initials carved into a tree with a heart I think it’s so romantic. Two lovers on a date... one of them carrying a knife for some reason.

[enkisstories]

Daniel: “And what mission would that be, if I may ask, Lord Kylo?”

Kylo: "I know where a wayfinder is hidden..."

Connor: "A wayfinder!"

Kylo: "...that shows the way to Exegol."

Connor: "You know where one of the fucking wayfinders ended up at, but make me fight Daniel for the shits and the giggles? You could have said a word earlier! We could already be off and halfway to our destination!"

Kylo: "Ey?"

Connor: "You... typical... showy... moronic... good for nothing... dark side users. “Lord” Kylo - when you're done wasting my time, prepare a ship, while I go grab some proper clothes!"

Kylo: “Cooperation? That comes unexpected!”

Connor: “Daniel - you’re coming along, too! The way you have improved, you will be of great help and, well, maybe if we spend time together, we can bridge our differences, after all.”

Kylo: “I daresay I have a say in this!”

Connor: “Aw, shit, of course! Kylo Ren, would you prefer to control me through the Force all through this quest, fighting my will every step of the way and making yourself vulnurable in this fashion, or will you take Daniel along to ensure my cooperation?”

Kylo: “Daniel - pack your things. We’re leaving tomorrow morning.”

Connor: "What kind of world are we headed for?”

Kylo: “You’d love to know, don’t you?”

Connor. “Ah, right. Dark sider bullshit again. I’ll pack for a variety of climate zones and obstacles, then.”

Kylo: “Do you see that, Daniel? He’s almost skipping from excitement. If only the rest of you combined had the same motivation!”

Daniel: “...then you’d be dead.”

Daniel realizes that he has overstepped one boundary too many, but there is no taking back his words, just like the truth of them wouldn’t have went away if they’d never gotten spoken out loud.

The next moment Daniel already sees red - front, left, right, up and down, it is as if he was standing in a shower of crimson energy, as the lightsaber flashes around the knight with uncanny precision.

One Kylo Ren - tantrum later Daniel stands de-robed. Fortunately he is always wearing his leightweight leather clothes under the robes. 

The humiliation could have been worse, but Daniel’s heart is still pounding from fear. It could just as well have been himself getting sliced into tiny slivers by the leader of the Knights of Ren instead of just his overcoat.

[rogueshadeaux]

Chapter Twenty — Gambit

“He set them up to die!” She interrupted me, voice surprisingly shrill. “Something has to change if we as a species are going to survive! If we want sanctuary, we have to take it. We’re not going to be given grace otherwise.” Her face hardened, and something in her eyes changed that made the waters around my forearms build almost instinctively. “And I am not going to let anyone get in our way again.” 

6.2k Words | 23 min read time | TRIGGER WARNING: canon typical violence, drowning, injury, body horror, death.

She waved a hand, and pillars of concrete shot out of the Sound, their tops growing rapidly and lacing together to create a large platform for her to land on. Brent’s wings grew back on him and he dove towards her as I pushed pressure into the waterspout below me and let it spit me out, soaring through the air on my own arch of sorts.

Brent got to her first. He pulled back in his flight, legs swinging out from under him to kick her in the chest and send her sprawling further back. She hit the platform with a splat that almost made me feel bad for her, tumbling back and barely catching herself before she reached the edge, dazed. 

I shifted into a downpour and splashed onto the platform a few feet away as Brent landed just in front of her and stuck a hand out, making the plating of her armor jut up from her chest like it was trying to break away from her. There was crackling from it as I solidified in the rain’s splashback, just in time to catch Augustine’s wrist in a gauntlet of water and slam it down when she lifted it with the intention of hitting Brent. 

The armor popped and snapped a few more times, something in it shattering before the black paint lost its uniformity and the material under it burst open, shavings of steel lifting to Brent’s outstretched hand. The steel seeped from everywhere, cut Augustine’s jawline and sliced through the seams of the armor, releasing the bright blue liquid from her suit and leaving it to drip down her like inverted blood. 

We did it. 

Brent finished draining the armor of steel and left the swirling gauntlet it gave him on, glaring down at Augustine as I approached to join him at his side. Her fingers ran along the seaming of the suit and she exhaled shakily when they came back stained blue before glancing up at us — and for the first time, I saw fear in her eyes. 

Brent’s wrist flicked like he was flipping something, and the hilt of a sword appeared in his hand, the blade quickly extending from its end like a lightsaber. “We told you — leave.” He growled, sword coming to cross his chest defensively. 

I held out my hand — bitch or not, I didn’t like how he looked ready to strike down Augustine. We didn’t need to kill, we were better than that; Dad didn’t kill anyone in Seattle when fighting her. It was possible. “It’s over,” I warned her. “People already know you’re here. There’s probably a bunch of Homeland Defense on their way to arrest you, and we don’t plan on letting you get away. Don’t make this harder than it needs to be.” 

She pushed herself up from her elbows to a sitting position, looking at the thin pool of blue that outlined her figure. She hadn’t gotten to re-up her concrete powers before everything fell apart; she had to be low, right? Still, I kept my water gauntlets on just in case she tried to pull something sneaky. 

Her vision shifted from the puddle around her to the cracks in her armor, only glancing up to acknowledge me. She wouldn’t look me in the eyes; her glare stayed somewhere along my jawline, the scowl quickly turning into an elated sort of smirk that made something in my body ting in warning. “This is far from over.” She said, looking up to meet my eyes. “It’s barely begun.”

“I’m getting tired of the cryptic bullshit,” Brent growled under his breath. He took a half-step forward and the long sword came down to point at Augustine. “What’s barely begun?”

“Change.” She answered simply, shrugging. 

“What kind of change?” I demanded.

Augustine glared at the tip of Brent’s sword for a moment before looking to meet our eyes in back-and-forth glances. “It’s been twenty-five years since the first Conduit was activated, and look at the world. Look how they treat us! Conduits in Guyana are being pushed out of the country, there’s active bounties that call for our deaths in Pakistan. Militias in Texas mark homes where they think Conduits might live, the National Guard in Alabama have already started relocating our kind to the internment camps! It’s time for change. It’s time for our people to live, not survive.”

“Aren’t you the same person that imprisoned every Conduit in the US?” 

“Unless they were her little lackeys,” Brent added sarcastically. 

“I wanted to make sure they wouldn’t be exterminated. I didn’t want our people’s blood to be the price of freedom. War isn’t won in battles, but bloodshed, and the only way they will be satisfied with our existence is if it’s by completely eradicating us.” 

“You yourself said this isn’t war.” I said through grit teeth. 

She shook her head. “No, it isn’t. Not yet. But you’re a fool if you don’t believe we’re being led in that direction. The Humans will never let us live freely if we don’t give them a reason to fear us.”

“You don’t need Delsin Rowe to do that.” Brent interjected. “You can go do all the terrorism you want without pulling him into this.”

“Rowe was the catalyst for all of this,” She spat back. She moved like she wanted to sit up more but Brent responded by thrusting the sword tip forward, coaxing her back down. “If it weren’t for his interference in my plan, none of this would be happening.”

“The plan where you imprison people against their will? The plan where you torture and test on Conduits for fun? He freed our people–”

“He set them up to die!” She interrupted me, voice surprisingly shrill. “Something has to change if we as a species are going to survive! If we want sanctuary, we have to take it. We’re not going to be given grace otherwise.” Her face hardened, and something in her eyes changed that made the waters around my forearms build almost instinctively. “And I am not going to let anyone get in our way again.” 

Augustine’s hands shot out and gripped the flat of the sword on either side, concrete along her knuckles slinking away and encasing the grip in enough concrete for her to throw Brent over her body and off the edge of the platform. He disappeared from view almost immediately, the metal in Augustine’s grip shattering and leaving him to grapple nothing but a hilt. “Brent!” 

Augustine burst to her feet in an aura of concrete and glared me down, pulling up a wall of concrete that caught my jets of water in time. “How much farther do you plan to push this?” she demanded, the shield bursting away so she could face me again. “You hold loyalty to a people that won’t be satisfied until we’re taken out one by one, until we’re no longer threats to their livelihood.”

“We don’t have to be threats!” I reasoned, flitting back in a burst of water and dodging the spear of concrete she embedded where I stood. “No one else needs to die!”

Augustine’s brow cocked. “Like Abigail Walker? Would your mother believe in peace?” She cocked an eyebrow and took a step forward. “You don’t get to know the answer to that question because of that fear the Humans have, the hatred they carry for us in their heart.”

Heat crept up my spine, and the water on my arms bubbled. “Don’t talk about my mother!”

I brought the balls of my hands together and flared my hands out, combining the pulses from both of my hands until their spray turned into a cannon like they used to put out the wildfires, blasting Augustine directly in the chest. She flew back with the hit, barely able to put up a wall behind her in time to slam into. I kept the pressure on her, using this chance with her pinned to connect to the Sound, searching for Brent in the waters. 

Something cracked in my body, and the water vision superseded my regular one until it was like I was wearing sunglasses; both melted into each other until I was granted a new kind of vision, one that let me see past the platform’s scaffolding and down into the Sound. 

Brent was at the bottom, sunk, and seemingly fighting to get leverage he simply couldn’t. I couldn’t see specifics — he was a silhouette, barely an outline — but I could see his arms thrash, watch him try to jump from the Sound’s silt only to sink back down. The idiot — why wasn’t he making one of those beams? 

I wasn’t going to lose another person in my life; Mom was gone, this bitch wanted Dad, and Brent was on the verge of drowning. It wasn’t hard to take one hand away from the cannon and turn it instead to a spray, using the free one to push the waters of the Sound around until another small whirlpool was forming above where Brent was. I spread the funnel, made the swirl push deeper until Brent’s head was no longer underwater, and forced it wider further still until his torso was free. I saw molecules of mist shoot around his body before he took off to the sky, the sun catching in the grateful look he gave me. He motioned his head towards the cliff sides and I nodded, watching him zip off to drain something again. 

Seven seconds. It took seven seconds for Augustine to get the jump on me, to parry my water with a jagged arm shield and send spears of concrete my way. I was distracted by Brent and releasing my hold on the Sound that I didn’t get to block anything this time — just barely turned my shoulder so instead of impaling my abdomen, only one of the spears connected, ripping through the hoodie and my sweater and scraping along the ribs on my left side. I cried out and staggered back, losing my footing and slamming down onto a knee. 

“Abigail Walker was betrayed by every Human she knew.” Augustine continued her tangent. “I remember the day we received the call from her parents, how her mother said she just didn’t know how to raise something like her. Something. To them, we lose our humanity the moment we show ability.”

“And you’re any better?” I gasped out, glancing down at the slice on my side. It didn’t look too deep, thank god, but the light blue sweater I had on was staining red quick. I pulled some water around from my spine to the wound, rinsing out the tar and leaving the liquid there for when it moved to heal. “You trained her to kill. You used her for your stupid publicity stunt,”

“I gave her the chance for revenge.” Augustine took another step forward. “To absolve herself of her sins. To show her that she shouldn’t be ashamed of being a Conduit even if her power killed her brother. We should not have to carry the burden of our existence because those without powers deem us nuisances.”

I didn’t really catch what she was saying; all I heard was that one line, thrown in like an offhand comment. Killed her brother. “What?” I breathed out on a gasp of pain. Mom didn’t kill our Uncle, he was killed because of gang war shit. That’s what Dad said.

Augustine didn’t hear me. “How long are you willing to fight for these Humans when they’re guaranteed to turn on you in the end? Even the great Cole MacGrath was betrayed by his closest companion. There is no peace so long as we both occupy this world.”

“So, what?” I demanded, getting back on my feet. My side was still lit up in pain, making me lean in place slightly. “Kill or be killed? Only one can survive? I don’t believe that,”

“No?” She laughed, looking beyond me to the Longhouse. “Tell me, you’re Native American — do you think your ancestors felt the same as they were killed or carted off to reform schools? Do you think African Americans have the same feelings about peace when they’re still subjected to age-old Jim Crow thinking? Peace is a farce, a bribery tool politicians use for votes — I’d know, I was one of them. Peace is nothing more than a selling point for a heaven no Conduit will know if Humans get their way.”

She took another step forward, and the concrete on her left arm disappeared entirely. The burst made me flinch, made me throw some water at her that she easily sidestepped. “How much are you willing to bleed for these people, when they don’t respect you as they should? How long are you willing to fight for them…” She glanced down at my side, and that disgusting smirk slid back on her face, “When you’ll bleed out just the same as they will, in the end?”

I followed her gaze down to my side, to where the water was still flushing a gaping wound that made no move to close. Even the water droplets that fell from the gash refused to rise and evaporate like they did for the last few scrapes. 

Why was it still bleeding, why wouldn’t it heal? 

I hadn’t noticed Augustine had moved until there was a flash of silver and a clank of metal and Brent fell from the sky, losing his wings and grappling Augustine to throw her back and pin her down, circlets of steel wrapping around her wrist and welding itself to the rockface. It didn’t matter, she wasn’t trying to attack us anyways; something small laid in the hand Brent pinned down, a disk just a bit smaller than her palm, made of some hard sort of black just like her armor. There was a giant thing in the center of it, a red creature with horns that barely connected in the back, making a horrid looking halo. Its two eyes were closed like it was at peace, the third in the forehead of its sharply symmetrical face open and alight. It wore a robe that reached down to its feet, a liner flowing down the skirt. It held some sort of -hedron in its hands — icosahedron, maybe? There were circles around each pointed corner, the end of the shape pointing up to the creature’s chin and down to the pedestal it stood on. Blue and red and purple glowing in the orb, the exact same colors reflected in the open third eye of the creature. And the pedestal — it had an eye too, one symmetrical open one that stared straight at us.

The Archangel.

“What did you just do?” Brent demanded, straightening. Steel crawled down Brent’s arm and extended past his fingertips, creating some extravagant overgrown sleeve that sharpened at the end like a blade. He held it close to Augustine’s face as he bent down to snatch the disc out of her hand, offering it to me without turning around. It was a disk with a print on it, nothing more. I could only find one button — in the center, where the Archangel was — and pressing it did nothing but turn it off. Turning it on brought back that green ring, and there were no access ports anywhere for batteries or something. For good measure though, I pushed water down my arms and trapped the little thing in a bubble, letting it sit in the wet until I saw sparks begin to fly from it as it floated, short-circuiting. 

Brent was still hovering over Augustine when I tossed the ball of water over the edge of the platform and watched the device plunge into the Sound below, asking, “Do you know what it is?” 

I shook my head. “I couldn’t find anything.”

He hummed. I wasn’t used to seeing this sort of fury on him; he looked cold, and it had nothing to do with him being steel in the middle of winter. He had that same look Dad did when he was talking outright to Archangel — like he wanted nothing more than to be given the chance to eradicate the issue. And it started with Augustine. “Now, you’re gonna tell us what that was, and maybe I’ll leave you to my dad.” He hissed.

Augustine glared back at Brent but stayed unmoving — that is, until something cracked on the other side of the Sound. It was the same sound from before; quick zaps that vibrated the air, pulses I could see now that we were so deep in the Sound. Four orbs of pulsating pure blue energy zapped into place, purpled wisps of their power slinking away like they were all small individual suns — I actually couldn’t look at them for long without their shape imprinting in my vision. The orbs levitated on the Sound’s surface, pulsing and slowly spinning before something in the center grew white-hot and they began to cackle. 

The next zap tried to force the orb larger than it was — so big that it almost dissipated the energy entirely. It snapped back like a rubber band, shrinking to almost nothing before stretching to a comfortable middle ground, a bit larger than before. 

This all happened in a blink of an eye, too — the second time the orb zapped, trying to extend, I missed it in my harsh blink to try and rid my sight of the orb’s imprints. It was larger now and trying to build still, the wisps on its edges seeping away into the mist that floated off of the Sound. 

The wisps around the orbs pulled in, the center of them grew brighter than the sun. I could hear it buzz from here before the sound quickly crescendoed into another, harsher blitz.

And this time, something came out of it. 

It looked like riot police meets that Halo: The Fall of Reach video game; red and black exo-suits that would have made any spartan jealous, mechanical and large and probably costing more than a regular car. I didn’t like the size of the rifles they were carrying, nor the fact that they came out of the orbs on the Sound and never sank. They stayed buoyant in an outfit that should have sunk them immediately, running on the Sound’s surface towards us with ease as four more Archangel soldiers were teleported in. 

There was a grinding sound behind me, and then the unmistakable ting of something dense hitting metal, and I glanced back in time to see Brent grapple Augustine’s concrete-aided punch and throw one of his own as he made some quip about being lucky Augustine wasn’t a lady but a bitch and that he could hit her. I don’t know, I couldn’t tell; the bzzzZIT from the orbs across the Sound was louder now as the tally of soldiers shot to twelve. 

I didn’t want to do anything to kill them, honestly, but I wasn’t sure they’d give me the same grace. Especially not now, after whatever Augustine did; I glanced down at my side and saw the water rotating there still tinged light pink, stained from the blood that wouldn’t stop. I had to keep them and those guns away before anything else happened to me, at least until this wore off. 

I stepped off of the platform and a puddle of water immediately formed under my foot, water from the Sound’s surface reaching up to meet the platform and encapsule my legs. I concentrated on the lull of low tide and held it back, letting the pressure build until pain pulled in my shoulder blades. 

And then I released, aiming the wave for the soldiers and their portals. 

The swell went from rippling under the surface to tearing over it, the wave eclipsing the soldiers long before actually reaching them. 

As I pulled the wave back so it wouldn’t flood the harbors of Seattle, I was confident for a moment that nothing else was going to happen; there was silence in the air, everything stilled. No more zaps, no more glowing. I still couldn’t see past the ebbing wave, but I felt like the issue was dealt with.

For a moment. 

Then something eclipsed over my wave, harsh and white and reflecting the light of the sun. There was a punch to my stomach, like that drop when you learn someone died; like something was wrong, irrevocably, and that I’d have to start scrambling with the aftermath. 

It was trying to convince me to run. 

The soldiers weren’t buoyant, but they were Conduits; they climbed onto whatever crystallized over the wave, that same bright white forming under their feet with each bound they stomped towards us. The first row charged as the second flanked and threw their power towards us, towards me, some hard stakes of something semi-transparent. Crystals, maybe? 

I pulled up a thin wall of water and forced pressure into it, hoping to make the other side choppy enough to catch whatever they were chucking. That didn’t matter. Their stakes sliced through the water with ease and only lost a little momentum, a few falling aimlessly, some pinning into the platform behind me. 

Four, though, cut into the whirlpool my legs were sunk into, and the churning stopped. I lost control of the water as the stakes embedded it like flesh, and watched the liquid as it slowly turned to ice.

For a group who came to capture Dad, everything sure felt like it was pinpointing me.

I was trapped between twelve Archangel soldiers and a Conduit Dad had trouble defeating. One had turned off my ability to heal somehow, and the plethora of others all seemed to share the one ability I couldn’t control. I didn’t even know more than one Conduit could have the same power! And yet they all ran on shards that sparkled in my vision, that turned stark white in their glittering like a warning. 

Brent and Augustine were now fighting one-on-one, a much more fair match considering his steel was stronger. That left me with twelve other fighters — now gunless, at least, though did that matter when they could take a shot that’d genuinely hurt now?

I mean, bullets would too, but this would in an oh so different, special sort of way. 

The whirlpool under me was turning to ice fast, and began shattering under my weight as well. I swung forward with another crack, barely able to balance myself, my legs solidifying as the freeze crept higher and threatened to frost my toes. I flitted back and landed in a puddle of condensation a literal half-second before the now-frozen whirlpool shattered, sending ice everywhere. 

I knew what was happening before having to even think hard about it; the water was too close to its freezing point for me to be able to control it once they got their Conduit-hold on it. If I wanted to be able to keep control of the Sound, it’d have to be warmer. If I wanted to fight, it’d have to be hotter. 

“I hope this doesn’t fuck up the ecosystem,” I muttered, thinking about the fish and orcas below like I hadn’t just given them the liquid equivalent of an EF-5 tornado. Stasis was important during the winter, and I knew specifically there was something about the salmon population that could be affected by this — but I tried not to think about it. I couldn’t psych myself out of doing this, I didn’t have the grace to risk anything. 

I put all my concentration into the molecules that lit up my vision, forcing their vibrations to quicken as I pushed a new ebb into the Sound and forced its surface to bounce like there was bad weather. The footsoldiers rushing towards us stumbled in their chase, two disappearing below the surf in their trip as the others tried to find a good way to continue forward with everything bobbing. 

I barely got to glance behind me to see what was going on there; Brent and Augustine were now in a versus of their own accord, wielding weapons and battling like the platform was some gladiator arena. Augustine was encased in concrete now, wielding some type of giant hammer and simply trying to stick a dent in Brent’s skull instead of pierce his skin. I spun back around in time to catch some more icicle spears in a wave that I quickly lost control over as it solidified in front of me. 

I pulled a wave up from behind, the waters warming at a pace that I wanted to scream about, and threw it over my shoulder, hitting the wall and bursting through it. The edges of each shattering of ice began to melt, but that wasn’t enough. I needed it hotter.

The Archangel soldiers abandoned sprinting on the ice on literal snow boots for extending their perversion of the Sound down to its silt, turning water to ice all the way down and then extending the reach even further, the towers rocketing under them until they shot into the air. The flanking soldiers kept to the Sound’s surface and stretched out their hand….absorbing loose moisture on top. 

They can absorb water? 

I let go of the condensation below me and plummeted to the Sound, turning into rain at the last second to seamlessly fall into the mass of water before pulling back together, my watery body only outlined by a layer of bubbles. I got to work warming it up — being connected to it like this made it so much easier —  keeping my liquid skin so that line between the water and I was so blurred there was no definite end or beginning. Just one force, one unstoppable storm. I was the water of the Sound, and every other river and stream and lake that these droplets had existed in before. I was the lifeforce of the earth, I was the element that people needed, wanted. I was a Human, I was a Conduit, I was a Rowland, I was a Walker, I was a Rowe — and I was going to be the pressure that made them bend. 

The water didn’t sting like menthol anymore, even when I breathed it in; it sat light in my lungs, comfortably on my skin, and I knew then that the Sound would return to being mine. 

Rising on the next whirlpool felt stronger, somehow. More confident. Steam immediately began breaking away from my watery body as I broke the surface, keeping the form to keep that deep connection. I lifted my arms, and up came two more spouts that I immediately redirected towards the soldiers, blasting them away with the water pressure of a firetruck hose. 

Three of them immediately disappeared beneath the surf, the others pausing in their rush in hesitation. That didn’t last long, though; the steppingstones of ice became chutes, the fuckers somehow managing to skate atop the frozen walkways. Others stopped to chuck more icicles my way in the hope of giving me a free lobotomy. 

I cast another wave in front of me, and this time it didn’t freeze immediately upon impact. The icicles embedded like knives in fat again, but only a small frost crackled around their stab and I was able to throw the wave aside with ease. The second wave of ice spears was deflected with a sudden pulse of water, a forcefield of wet that I felt bunch up in my chest and release like a nuclear explosion. The surrounding forcefield of water pushed back, catching the icicles in the height of their toss and returning them to their senders, buffeting into the soldiers and making them fall in their skating. 

There was a sudden commotion behind me, louder than Augustine and Brent’s usual grunts, and I turned in time to see Brent slip, pushed by the blast of water. His steel was too smooth to gain any traction and he fell back with a harsh slam, the hit knocking the wind out of him so roughly I could hear him sputtering from here. Augustine took the chance to strike him with the concrete hammer, the slam pinging with a harsh cry as the metal of Brent’s encasing caved a bit in the chest. 

I glanced over my shoulder in time to see the soldiers getting closer, so close I was able to spot the Archangel emblem painted over their hearts. A pledge to a cause I didn’t really understand yet. Those chutes became stairs as they rose to join the fray, to get to the woman that summoned them. 

Brent was trying to scoot back away from Augustine as her concrete burst from her and created a lance with a tip I knew even Brent’s chrysalis wasn’t going to protect him from. He barely caught her downward stab in time, straining against his stupor and her strength to keep from being speared through the heart. 

Icicles were coming at me now as I turned to keep both sides in my line of sight, and yet the tip of the lance was only an inch from Brent’s chest. He looked beaten, battered— would have probably been bruised had he had skin — and most of all, unable to call up any defense. I had the capability to stop Augustine, but only if I used the whole of my power against her. If I stopped the ice, I’d be able to help Brent…but it might be too late by the time I turned back around. I had to make a decision, and fast. 

It wasn’t a hard one to make. That was my brother. My twin. A half to our whole. I’d suffer as many hits as it took to keep him alive.

I spun to face Augustine and Brent, pushing the balls of my hands together and mentally forcing the two whirlpools at my sides to join in my attack as I pushed the weight of my capability at Augustine, throwing her off of Brent just before that lance could close the gap. She rolled around on her platform and almost off the edge, only saved by sudden gloves of concrete that sealed her to it. Brent blinked hard, coughing, the dent in his chest steadily rising with each shaky inhale, and looked to me with a silent thank you in his eyes.

I didn’t even get to move to acknowledge it before I felt the stabs in my back. 

The icicles pierced me like I wasn’t water, like my state of matter didn’t matter. It felt all the same as they pushed into the skin, lighting up my nerves and making the cool of their punctures burn me. I could feel them dangle in my flinch, feel them poke into pieces of me that shouldn’t have felt as solid as they did. A tingling spread through me that felt like a disease, and that scream in the back of my mind to run away was back, urging it now. If I turned back to human-body, I could push the icicles out with the effort. I’d do anything to get the pain to stop.

My skin layered back on, the color of skin and the hue of my jeans peeking through the water before becoming more than an illusion, and I nearly collapsed on my whirlpool when I felt the second half of that pain; the feeling of knife to flesh. The throb intensified with each beat of my heart as it forced blood out of the wounds in my back, and I suddenly lost a few feet of elevation on my whirlpool as the pounds broke my concentration. 

As my skin pulled from the liquid, I became warm, enveloped in epidermis. But that warmth stopped in my back. 

And then slowly, the cold reclaimed more of my body. 

I saw it in my ribs first, as I was looking at the slice on my side Augustine oh so kindly blessed me with; the skin was fighting to return to me, to make me whole, human again…and was failing. A thin layer of water stood between the skin and ice as they battled for preeminence, the water trying its hardest to heat up enough to keep the ice away — but I was working against the power of multiple Conduits’ pull and losing, left to watch the thin line of water retreat further and further as I began to freeze in place. 

No amount of pulling up water to try and fight it actually reversed the curse; it just pulled the water into that thin line before it froze over, the ice crawling over my ribs and towards the center of my abdomen now. I couldn’t even turn in place anymore, I’d lost the ability to swivel. I ran my fingers on my left along the cold that was now creeping around the sides of my chest and flinched when their brush resulted in my fingertips diving into that cold as well, turning purple and then a fighting, frothy blue before sinking to ice white. 

I was screaming, at some point after being stabbed in the back. I could feel the tears on my face, the burn in my now silenced throat as I watched myself slip away into the freeze. That scream caught Brent’s attention, who was now staring at me, wide-eyed. Behind him, Augustine was recovering, yanking her hands away from the hold on the platform and getting back on her feet, pissed. Her soldiers were only feet away now too, something frosty giving away from their arms as they prepared more ice to throw. 

I watched Brent’s eyes scan my chest as it froze, hover on my hips where it was now inching towards my legs. When he looked back up, eyes meeting mine, I gave him a sign I knew he’d understand. A sign in ASL. The ‘rock-on’ hand, piloting up: fly. 

Over the pain, over the stings and the prickles and the pin-neddles, I felt…nothing. Beyond dulled, beyond paralyzed. I was losing my vision at the corners, the strength in my knees, and was caught in that lightheaded before that came just seconds ahead of fainting. But I had enough energy to do one last thing, and he needed to get out of here before I did it. 

My right hand was shaking as I raised it, and I wasn’t sure if that was because of the pain, the cold, or the fear. Probably a combination of them all, honestly. I could barely still the tremble enough to find that connection to the Sound, to pull its waters up with my arm as the ice crept over my shoulder and locked it into place. The water behind Augustine’s platform rose, a tidal wave caught in its crescendo. The water frothed at the top in anger, bubbled in a vengeance I knew I wouldn’t be able to follow through fully on, but it would hopefully be enough. 

There was a weird sound, far off in the east, and suddenly the dark was overtaken by red. I couldn’t see much of them — my vision was becoming blurs more than anything — but I could see the humongous, twenty foot being that followed behind the red blobs, stark white in its heavenly light. It followed its own beacon of light, a laser of pink and blue that rushed on the water of the Sound, too far away for me to be able to make out the shadows of Dad in its glow. 

There was a tinkling and Brent was suddenly airborne, shooting far up into the sky before turning in his flight and tucking his wings back, diving straight for me. The Archangel soldiers behind me were close enough that I could hear them bark orders to each other, planning on striking him from the sky like Icarus. Augustine was recovered now, arms encased in concrete armor again and turning to look at the thirty foot wall behind her. The ice had crawled past my bicep and was now solidifying my elbow, keeping my arm elevated…forever, probably. An irreversible change so long as I couldn’t heal.

I tried to smile at Brent as he rushed to catch me out of my idea, some sad, pathetic grimace that came with tear-streaked cheeks. I hoped my eyes could say everything I wanted to in that moment. My vision was closing in fast, and I was losing mobility in the one limb controlling this all. So as the frost crept down my forearm, I flicked my wrist, the last of my joints still able to move, and let the tidal wave wash over me, Augustine, and the Archangel army.

The water didn’t bend around me this time, though it didn’t really matter; I was numb to its hit. I was numb to it all. I sank fast, past floating bodies, past the platform as it buckled under the weight of the wave, a slab of concrete crashing into my extended arm and causing fine-haired cracks in the center of its frost. My legs froze in place, my neck lost its dexterity, and my tunnel vision closed in as I sank deeper and felt myself slip away. 

[macabremoons]

Incorrect Quote Tag

LOVE THIS TAG FEELS LIKE IM IN A FANDOM. Thank you to @mjparkerwriting for tagging me!!! tagging @serenanymph, @repressed-and-depressed, @wrenofthewords, and anyone else who wants to do it! It's fun. Long post ahead.

Bonnie (brainstorming ideas for pranking Emilio): How much could a serial killer mask possibly cost? Menodora: Well it’s hard to find a high-quality one made out of leather or silicone, but if you did find a good one like that it’d be a couple thousands of dollars. I can try to hook you up with one but I don’t know if I’d be very successful. Bonnie: Huh, that’s pretty interesting actually- Wait, how the hell do you know that? Menodora: …I am very passionate about Halloween, Bonnie.

Menodora: *walks into the kitchen, ignoring everyone* Emilio: Hey, Menodora, how was your day? Menodora: *picks up an onion and bites into it, staring at Emilio* Hell. Bonnie, watching this unfold: *whispers* Who hurt you?

Emilio: What is everyone for Halloween? Bonnie: I’m superman. Menodora: A clown. Emilio: So I’m guessing we don’t need to get you a costume then?

Menodora: Why don't we just call it, "M.C. Donald's?" Emilio: Because it just sounds like a stupid rapper's name. Bonnie: It'd just be like- "Eyo, it's ya boy, M.C. Donald!"

Bonnie: If I die, my funeral will be the biggest party ever and you're all invited. Emilio: "If" Menodora: Great, the only party I'm ever invited to and they might not even die.

Benjamin: Menodora is mad at me, and I'm not sure why. Apollo: Okay, did you talk before she got upset? Benjamin: ...yes? Apollo: That's probably it.

Apollo: You really believe in Benjamin? Menodora: Luckily, he believes in himself enough for the both of us.

Benjamin: Menodora has never seen Star Wars? Apollo, the only people in the universe who haven’t seen Star Wars are the characters in Star Wars and that’s cause they lived them, Apollo! That’s cause they lived the Star Wars!

Benjamin: Hi, who's this? Apollo changed all of my contacts to mythical creatures. Menodora: What's mine? Benjamin: Dwarf. Menodora: HE'S SO MEAN, I'M NOT THAT SHORT! Benjamin: Oh, hey Menodora. Menodora: FUCK!

(fun fact for half of the books Menodora is taller than Apollo. She's 5'9 [175 CM])

Menodora: What if mayonnaise came in cans? Benjamin: Well, that would suck because you can't microwave metal. Apollo: Good morning to everyone except these two people.

Emilio: I swear to god I'm the only one here with a braincell. Bonnie, Benjamin, Menodora, and Apollo: ALL HAIL the keeper of the sacred braincell!

Emilio: Who the fuck broke the toaster? Apollo: It was Benjamin. Menodora: It was Benjamin. Bonnie: Benjamin broke it. Benjamin: Benjamin: ...yOU PROMISED-

Menodora: Is something burning? Benjamin, leaning seductively on the counter: Just my desire for you. Menodora: Benjamin, the toaster is literally on fire

Menodora: I don't need to go to bed. I'm not tired, I'll be fine. Benjamin: But, darling, I'll be so lonely without you. Come curl up in my arms so I can feel whole again. Menodora: O-oh. Well. Are you trying to seduce me into healthy sleeping patterns?? Benjamin: Is it working?

*Benjamin comes home absolutely drunk, undresses, and stands in Menodora’s bedroom.* Menodora: Babe, are you.. coming to bed? Benjamin: No thank you, I’m sure you’re lovely but I have a girlfriend. Benjamin: *Lies on the ground and falls asleep* Menodora: ...

Benjamin walking into the kitchen and seeing all their limes peeled: Menodora, I love you but, what the hell? Menodora, sipping coffee happily: I love you too :)

Benjamin: Everybody shut up, I'm thinking. Emilio, patting them on the back: Well, don’t think too hard. I wouldn’t want you to hurt yourself.

Benjamin, holding a toy lightsaber: I’m Darth Vader! Emilio: I’m done with everyone’s bullshit.

Emilio: I'll offer you some friendly advice- Menodora: I don't want your advice. Emilio: Well, then consider it unfriendly advice.

Menodora: I'm not mean. Name one mean thing I’ve ever done. Apollo: When we were younger, you convinced me eggs weren't real. Menodora: They're not. Apollo: Haha, very funny. Menodora: I'm serious. Didn't you hear? Apollo: No... what happened? Menodora: ...Why would you fall for this again-

Menodora: That’s the key slice of truth we need to complete the entire truth pie. Apollo: Ooh, can we get some actual pie? Menodora: I like the way you think.

Menodora: It’s nice to be wanted, you know? Apollo: Not by the law!

Can you tell i like these characters

[less-than-three-3]

fallen order lives rent free in my head

It's been like 3 weeks since I finished star wars jedi fallen order and it continues to live in my thoughts randomly so I just want to mind dump all of it here. tldr if you have not played the game you absolutely should!! one of my favorites of all time, it's fairly rare for a game to invade my thoughts and make me wish I could re-experience it all again for the first time (ok triangle strategy I also felt that way but I've just been playing more bangers recently) I'll get the spoiler-free stuff out of the way- it very much entirely feels like you are playing a star wars movie. And yeah "it really makes you feel like [thing]" is perhaps the most cliche thing to say about any video game but respawn really put their heart and soul into the presentation of this game because there is SO MUCH that's cinematic, and not in the way that the cliche mid-2010's AAA games just felt like you were watching a movie and pressing a couple buttons. The environments are super star wars (though the first major planet is kind of Just Ok in that regard), and the cinematic details of the cutscenes and ziplining and everything just feel awesome. The music goes without saying is super good, you could say it's derivative of John Williams but like, that's *entirely the point* and they do it super well. The characters feel extremely human in line delivery and animation, which is a thing that apparently we are still struggling with in current day. The only thing it's missing is the title scroll lmao Combat is very fluid once you get a hang of it, and even though you technically only have access to a few force abilities (being a goody two shoes jedi) throughout the whole game they add a lot to how you can approach enemies. It does feel sort of diet soulsborne, but that's entirely excused by the fact that you are a using a FUCKING LIGHTSABER it's so cool lol. And there's wallrunning and some parkour stuff that respawn excels at. If you are vaguely interested in souls games and/or metroidvanias I 100% recommend it, playing on the 2nd highest difficulty it was the right difficulty for me (on par with like hollow knight difficulty), but grandmaster sounds like the true souls bullshit experience if you really want that. ~~~~~~~~~Spoilers start here~~~~~~~~~~ I've gushed for a bit so I'll start here with the criticisms I had. Ultimately they all kind of boil down to "I wish the game was longer" and for a 20 hour (non-jrpg) game even that's kind of praise lol. But I did wish there was more of a final act twist or just something besides what you probably could have guessed would happen from the very start. That being "you find all 3 tombs and you get the holocron and the Second Sister steals it and you have a final confrontation with her and take back the holocron and end credits". That said there is a lot of character development for both Cal and Cere and a lot of lore building so I still found the story overall incredibly enthralling but I just wish there was *more* overarching y'know. You don't spend that much time with dual wield lightsabers and your own kyber crystal before you realize you're pretty much at the finale. And with only like 4 planets I just wished there were more places to go so there could be a lot more enemy types and boss varieties etc. And also I kind of wish the Nightsister did something more like idk fight alongside or teach Cal some combat techniques or something (but I assume that will probably be a thing in Jedi Survivor) but since she gets pretty much added to the crew at the end of the penultimate chapter she couldn't be particularly impactful besides saving Cal in the finale. Ultimately I think that's more an issue of "this is a prequel game to the main movie trilogy" than an issue with the game itself, by which I mean you know Cal can't entirely save the Jedi Order and defeat Darth Vader and Palpatine because that's what Luke Skywalker has to do. So when Darth Vader shows up and that awesome finale sequence happens there's a little bittersweetness because you know you aren't gonna *fight* him (or it'll be a scripted loss/he gets away due to some bullshit). It's the sort of phenomenon that I always talk about when people say like "man I wish Age of Calamity was a REAL prequel to BotW" like it functionally is for most of it except now you don't *actually* know the ending so there are actual stakes. Is it "less dark"? Sure, I guess, but I feel like going the entire story knowing the champions are all going to die would put a damper on the amazing character development and interactions throughout the game knowing none of it really matters because they're all gonna die and you know how they're gonna die from BotW. And just a nitpick is I wish the dual wield lightsabers were like a thing you could wield as a main weapon and not just a combo finisher lol but that's just me I fucking love dual wield it's always so sick!! But the combat is already super smooth, transitioning between single and dual blade lightsaber is very satisfying and weaving in force abilities and dodging it's already super fucking good, it could just be much sicker if you could just dual blade some fools. Going back to the story and characters, I just love pretty much the entire cast from beginning to end, allies and enemies. I could go through all of them one by one but like it's way too much to talk about I'd just recap the entire game lmao. Particular highlights are of course Cal's growth and tackling his trauma from Order 66 (an INCREDIBLE sequence built off of the "tutorial segments") and how it mirrors Cere's similar journey as they converge and work together in the finale, Second Sister and Merrin being badasses just in general, and the intro. Oh and of course BD-1. Just in general. BD-1 is a friend :) Map/dungeon design is also a highlight, there are a surprising amount of pretty interesting puzzles that I'd be shocked if they weren't directly inspired by Zelda dungeons. They're the puzzles that seem like the overall answer is fairly obvious but you just have to sit and think, run around, scratch your head as you figure out HOW to put together the answer. Yes, Fallen Order is one of my favorite Zelda games. (Alternatively, the Zelda team needs to make Zelda into a dedicated metroidvania it would bang!!!) I do wish there was better quick travel (or am I just spoiled by hollow knight benchwarp mod?) to better encourage exploring but I found that it generally wasn't really a huge issue; Dathomir is kind of a pain to get around but I never really hated backtracking for secrets, just wished I could benchwarp lol Moment to moment I loved the game and characters and music and cinematic presentation and I'm really hoping Jedi Survivor can push these pros even further and add even more cool combat options and add a little more QoL and be a like 100 hour game that would be cool. Just please don't pretend to be another game and instead build on Fallen Order's unique flavor in the sequel (looking at you Ori 2)(August 2022)