#he reads ALL the comments | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

yukipri · 10 months

Text

Clone File: Morbs (YukiPri OC)

Basic info:

Name: Morbs Number Designation: CC-4413 Generation: 1 (0.9) Rank/Title: Chief Mortician of the GAR, Kamino Chief Mortuary Trainer (former) GAR Affiliation: Entire GAR, primarily stationed with the 212th Attack Battalion Character status: YukiPri Original Character

Disclaimer: Morbs' story will likely make more sense if you've read The Prime Override, as he's introduced with context in this fic. He will also make more sense if you've read about the other 2 clone medics mentioned in this file, Ashe and Stabber.

Backstory beneath cut!

Overview:

Clone morticians are specialists even among medics. Every clone medic knows the basics of how to care for the deceased, but in war, priority must always go to the living. As such, it is common to find only one clone mortician per star destroyer or permanent GAR base, with greater numbers stationed in Tipoca City or various Republic medical centers.

Morbs, or CC-4413, is considered the Chief of this group of medical specialists. He is the originator of the division, and was assigned to develop both the position and the training curriculum of clone morticians in tandem with Ashe’s primary medical training.

Prior to the start of the Clone Wars and through the early war period, Morbs oversaw the Tipoca City Primary Clone Morgue, which processed all clone bodies. There, he managed biopsies, distribution of cadavers, and the care and processing of all of the bodies of his deceased brothers. He also trained other clone morticians who had completed general medical training prerequisites and were approved by Ashe, as well as future Chief Medical Officers who were required to have completed hands-on training time in the morgue to earn their certifications.

Morbs would have been content to remain in this morgue for life, but as the main body of the GAR prepared for deployment, it became clear that the number of bodies being processed on Kamino would plummet. Morbs was reassigned to the front lines, where his expertise would see more active use, leaving his morgue behind in the hands of his assistants. He primarily travels with the 212th Attack Battalion, but frequently visits medical centers and goes where he is needed.

Background:

Morbs was one of five Generation 0.9 CCs selected by Nala Se to begin the development of the clone medical track. While all subsequent medics are CTs, the Generation 0.9 CCs underwent manual age acceleration, putting them physically ahead of their Generation 1 peers in chronological age. Morbs and his fellow CCs were test subjects used to establish the start of the medical specialization path before their younger brothers were of age to begin that training.

As CCs, they are overqualified for the general medical training that Nala Se is building, and Nala Se quickly turns to using them for other experiments as well. Their unique position as the first experimental medical clones gives Nala Se more oversight over them than any other clones, with far less supervision as well. They are “her” clones to test as she pleases.

In the depths of her labs, Nala Se conducts experiments that she had been banned from conducting on standard troopers by the contract with the Prime Clone, Jango Fett. Morbs later learns that these tests would be considered “torture,” and are illegal in the Republic. He and his brothers are tested for the physical limits that clones can reach, including tolerance for exposure to various stimulants such as heat or chemicals, as well as sensory limits such as their maximum threshold for pain. She also experiments with the potential for building up tolerance and even immunity to various drugs and poisons. She takes all of the data she gains and incorporates them into the medical training for the clones—thus, ensuring that her tests still fall under the scope of “developing medical training.”

Two of the five CCs perish as a result of these experiments. Ashe is ordered to decommission the third when he fails to meet Nala Se’s standards. This leaves Morbs and Ashe as the only survivors of their initial group. They cannot speak of their experiences to anyone else, as Nala Se is the only other witness. Not even Kote knows what they experienced. Between the two of them though, they can never forget that their senior medical positions were earned with blood.

Morbs has always been a quiet but keen observer, and knew from early on that Ashe has reasons for wanting to be in the medical track, and that this is a path that he’s chosen and is motivated to push through. Morbs is brought into the Ghosts’ plans relatively early, and having had the most first-hand experience seeing just what Ashe’s position entails, he wishes he could do more to help his brother. However, Morbs is also realistic, and knows that he doesn’t have the same passion and dedication driving him. He does what he can, but he can’t see himself being the medics’ leader that Ashe is. He feels guilty for not being able to offer to take Ashe’s place, when he’s the only one in a position who could. He tries to make up for it by loyally following him, and doing what he can as a supporter.

In addition to not having the drive, Morbs also feels he is cursed with misfortune. While he excels as a medic and not even Nala Se can find anything lacking in his record, most of the patients that Morbs touches seem to end up dead for reasons unrelated to his skills as a medic.

He’s assigned to oversee a group of cadets, who end up having a fatal genetic mutation that gives them all heart attacks while he’s on observation. The wing with patients that he oversees collapses due to an architectural problem, and they all die. He’s conducting a surgery, when the power goes out, and he’s unable to save his patient with the tools he has available. He tends to some brothers, who leave his exam room fine, but are killed in a training accident a few hours later. He’s assigned to take over a simple check up, and finds his patient already dead before he enters the room.

Every additional incident makes him increasingly uncomfortable with working with living patients. He knows he has the skills, but it doesn’t seem to matter, because most of his patients end up dead anyway. Statistically, it’s not impossible, but after a certain point it’s certainly improbable, and yet it continues to happen. Clones are rarely superstitious, as they have no cultural basis for it, but Morbs feels that there’s something absurdly wrong with the amount of death that seems to follow him everywhere.

He only feels that he’s safe for his brothers when working with those already dead. He can’t kill them if they’re dead before they’re even assigned to him. When Nala Se announces that a new mortuary sub-track will be added to the primary medical track, Morbs dives for it because he can’t think of a better position for himself. If death follows him, he might as well embrace it.

As he and Ashe are given more access to resources including those from outside of Kamino to help them develop their respective training curriculums, Morbs finds himself increasingly interested in not just the practical aspects of death, but also the more cultural and spiritual elements as well. It’s sparked by his own unluckiness and wondering if others have experienced the same, but is fed by his curiosity when he realizes that most nat-born cultures have different ways of processing death and grief that are deeply engrained in how they handle their dead. Nat-born lives are for the most part extremely foreign and utterly irrelevant to anything clones will likely ever experience, but death is almost universal. Morbs finds this fascinating.

The clones are brusquely told that they “march on,” when they die, as Mandalorians do. But why? Where do they march to, with whom? What is waiting there? If that is the inevitable eventual fate of all of them, regardless of Ashe’s or Kote’s efforts, shouldn’t it perhaps be Morbs’ job as the Chief Mortician to at least consider what happens after?

While Morbs has no answers for the afterlife, he certainly has many thoughts, which he shares with the silent cadavers who he works with. It seems like they can hear him, he thinks, for all that none of his words are spoken out loud.

While sitting in on a Ghosts meeting as they develop code words for their growing underground organization, Morbs mentions off-hand that their brothers who are dead, but aren’t, are, “Marching on to join Kote.”

It’s not his fault that their overseers failed to really explain what “marching on” means, nor really instill any true understanding of “glory” either. So if they choose to define it for themselves, with “marching on” meaning to join their other brothers (who may or may not be dead), and “glory” as fighting for their brothers, something tangible that they actually understand and care for…well. They are, after all, supposed to die for the glory of the Republic anyway. No one will question the language.

While most of Morbs’ brothers are exceedingly practical, and must be, Morbs finds his niche in thinking about the not practical. If having ways of respecting and mourning the dead helps all other sentients, why shouldn’t it help them too? Morbs experiments with how he thinks their dead should be treated, and the bodies in his morgue are, as always, his silent audience.

He grows to consider the dead bodies in the morgue “his men” in “his army.” After all, those who are also marked dead, but are actually just with the Ghosts, are also allowed to “consider serving” despite being equally dead on record. And are not the bodies that he repurposes to hide the missing bodies, the dead whose organs and limbs save the lives of their living brothers, not also serving their brothers? Just because they were unlucky, like Morbs, doesn’t mean that they aren’t still being helpful, aren’t still actively saving their brothers. Because that’s all what any of them want to do: help each other.

Morbs assigns himself their Commander, as he is in charge of them, cares for them, and directs their “campaigns.” The rows of cold lockers that house their bodies are “barracks.” He talks to them, praises their missions, and grieves for them when they finally march on to their second deaths via cremation, only after which they are truly gone.

While none of Morbs’ students go to quite the same level as Morbs himself in humanizing their deceased brothers, he makes sure that all of them leave his morgue with a firm understanding that even when dead, their brothers are still their brothers. Pieces of his ideology and treatment of bodies linger in all of the medics who handle their dead.

Morbs treats the dead as his men because he wants them to be able to live on just a bit longer, but admittedly that’s not all. It’s something that also helps with his guilt over not being able to assist Ashe in his decommissionings. He can’t stop those deaths any more than Ashe can, and he can’t even share in the pain of murdering them. But he can promise them, and can promise Ashe, that once their bodies leave Ashe’s blood-stained hands, that Morbs will welcome them gently to his morgue. That they’ll be treated tenderly, with humanity, and that their existences won’t mean nothing. That if they’re capable of it, Morbs will do whatever he can to ensure that they too can serve Kote before their bodies are gone.

Morbs likes to think it offers Ashe some comfort.

General Info:

Most clones have only ever heard of Morbs, who is extremely elusive. Even after deployment, he rarely leaves the morgue wing attached to medical. Whereas Ashe feels a complicated mixture of self-loathing and knowing that he’s unwelcome in other spaces because all other clones loathe him too, Morbs is simple. He likes being with his men, they’re his favorite group of clones. The living get plenty of attention amongst each other. He just is happier with his own men, and prioritizes giving them his own attention.

He’s eccentric and more than a little creepy, but his reputation means that many of his brothers are very curious about him. He has a strict “no one alive past this line” rule at the entrance of the morgue, with very few exceptions, so not even those who try to catch a glimpse of him while visiting medical have much luck. Spotting him outside the morgue is both like an exciting cryptid sighting, but also potentially a bad luck omen. Morbs is oblivious to the excitement his presence causes, as he’s usually just in a rush to get back to the morgue.

Morbs is so mysterious that only a very limited handful of his brothers knows how truly odd his habits are. He has an assigned bunk, but ignores it and sleeps in a specially padded cold locker so that he can “sleep in the barracks with his men.” He calls it his favorite bunk, and tells the other medics he wants to rest there when he one day inevitably dies. He will sometimes forget to take care of himself, ignoring his own living needs to eat, drink, exercise, hygiene, etc. until a medic, usually Stabber, drags him out of the morgue to handle it. Stabber thinks Morbs is an example of how truly unfair their genetic enhancements are, because Morbs somehow maintains his solid CC-class physique with essentially zero effort on his part.

Unlike Ashe, who wants to be out in the field, Morbs never wants to leave his morgue for anything. Once he has been relocated into the morgue on the Negotiator, he only steps out when absolutely necessary. He doesn’t want to see the sights of the outside galaxy, doesn’t want to see the people or try the foods. He thinks all air outside of the morgue that is not optimized for the preservation of clone bodies is distasteful. He especially hates heat, sunlight, and humidity, insisting that it will “cause us to decay faster.”

The one exception to this is if there is a morgue, funeral, cemetery, or something else death-related going on. He learned about other cultures’ death practices, and he’s admittedly still curious about them too, mostly in the context of whether there’s anything else he can do to improve the experience for his men. If the ship is planetside and there’s supposed to be a famous cemetery, he might be seen quickly slinking outside, face completely veiled to avoid exposure to the elements.

Relationships:

Morbs maintains a close relationship with Ashe, though it’s one he’ll rarely show in front of others, always maintaining a professional distance if they have company. But Ashe is the only living person that Morbs will seek out for company, always while Ashe is alone. Morbs is the only one who knows the extent of what Ashe suffered during his early training, and had experienced much of it with him. He is concerned about Ashe, but doesn’t offer medical help, as he feels Stabber does that enough, and he doesn’t trust himself to think of Ashe as a patient; that never ends well. He will instead offer Ashe silent company.

Morbs claims to despise Stabber, especially since he’s the one responsible for taking him away from his morgue on Tipoca City and forcing him onto a star destroyer. Because Stabber is the CMO of the 212th, prior to Ashe joining them, Morbs is forced to interact with him the most. Morbs doesn’t like Stabber because he considers the other medic, “far too alive.” Stabber’s high energy, movement, and noise levels all grate on Morbs’ preference for stillness and darkness. Still, he reluctantly respects Ashe’s former assistant’s skills as a medic, and will follow his orders.

He also won’t admit it, but Stabber was the one who gave him his name. Stabber had a habit of announcing that Ashe’s work buddy “has the morbs,” a phrase he’d picked up from one of Ashe’s training resources that he claims means “has emo vibes.” Stabber liked the sound of the word so much that he began shouting it every time he encountered Morbs, and it ended up sticking. Morbs pretends he doesn’t care, but secretly thinks it’s fitting.

On the other hand, Morbs has a surprisingly amicable relationship with the Jedi he interacts with most frequently, Obi-Wan. He was very leery of letting Obi-Wan come anywhere near the morgue, not trusting an outsider with his delicate men who are unable to defend themselves. However, Obi-Wan found Morbs’ ruminations and philosophies fascinating, and was easily able to bait him into a conversation by expressing interest. Despite being surrounded by war, Morbs often seems strangely detached from it, preferring to speak less about the realities of war and the gears that move it, and more about why various cultures frame death and the afterlife in certain ways. While the conversations are often melancholy in nature, Obi-Wan appreciates the strange normalcy of it, knowing that Morbs would likely have these same questions regardless of whether there was a war. Morbs likewise is invested in hearing about death traditions from an outside perspective.

While the other clones aboard the Negotiator were at first both morbidly fascinated by Morbs, they were discouraged from actually interacting with him because he says things like, “You should not be in here, unless you are dead. Unless you would like to be dead, in which case I can help you,” or, “Oh, well you don’t look like you’re dying. How unfortunate.” However, they gradually realize that Morbs is not as aloof as he first appears.

He isn’t opposed to speaking, as long as it’s about his men. They realize that while Morbs refuses to let any curious bystanders or unqualified personel enter the morgue for no reason, he’s always eager to learn more about those in his care. Clones who have lost brothers can always count on him wanting to hear about the deceased, and if they’re present in his morgue, Morbs may even allow them to visit. When the first clone brings Morbs some flowers, because he saw that some nat-borns planet-side were laying flowers by the graves of their lost loved ones, Morbs is tickled by the action. Clones are not granted proper graves, and those in Morbs’ morgue are still “on duty.” But Morbs creates a little sterilized shrine in a corner of medical close to the morgue, where he collects these offerings and allows his brothers to visit. If the tablet Morbs laid there is turned a certain way, Morbs knows that one of his brothers wishes to speak to him about someone deceased, and he slinks out of the morgue to listen to them.

Because Morbs is the Chief Mortician, he not only processes the bodies that pass in front of his own hands, but he obsessively goes over the reports sent to him by all other clone morticians and standard clone medics, who are in charge of marking all final fatalities. As such, he has the most comprehensive knowledge of all deceased clones. On the rare occasions that they are able to conduct larger, collective remembrances, if Morbs is available, he will often be called to lead them.

Obi-Wan observes that Morbs is acting almost like a priest or other religious leader, but Morbs scoffs at the idea. He has no intention of leading a religion; he just cares about his men.

And all of the clones will join his army, one day.

Appearance:

Morbs wears a modified version of the clone mortician uniform, a black version of the standard softshell white medic uniform. As the Chief Mortician, Morbs wears a longer knee-length version of the uniform, along with a black kama over it to signify his CC status. He also has a rank bar, and red shoulder pieces to show his personal training from Nala Se, like Ashe and Omega. He technically has armor, but he’s never worn most of it since his fitting, and he doesn’t plan on wearing it either. His men serve without wearing armor, so why should he? If the ship is ever boarded, he intends on going down with his men in the morgue, a plan that no one will allow him to follow through on.

The one piece of armor he does occasionally wear is his helmet, which is a black version of Ashe’s. He must occasionally process bodies that have been exposed to hazardous conditions, and in these cases, he’ll don his helmet for its filtration and advanced sensors. He is so utterly uninterested in his own armor that it was left unpainted, and Ashe decided to paint it black for him, so it can match Morbs’ aesthetic preferences. While Morbs never acknowledged the gesture, he shows his appreciation by not protesting when he’s told to wear it.

After leaving Kamino, he grows his hair long and wears it loosely tied back, because as a non-combatant, he isn’t limited to practical hair styles. The exact length changes constantly as he uses his own hair to create wigs and patches for any of his men who may have had their own hair damaged. He refuses to share his hair with anyone who isn’t dead.

He also gets tattooed, two dark lines dripping down his cheeks from his eyes. He saw nat-borns with the look in some funerary documentaries he watched as a cadet. He doesn’t know that what he saw was nat-borns with running makeup, but he likes the look because it looks like a trail of permanent black tears on his face. He takes it to be a metaphor that he is always thinking of his men.

Morbs also has deep permanent bags under his eyes. This is due to a mix of him constantly forgetting that he needs sleep, along with him not wanting to sleep because he has so many thoughts to ponder.

While he usually just wears his uniform, he has a veil that he throws over his head whenever he has to step outside of the ship or Republic medical facility for any length of time. He also has an ornamental headdress he’s fashioned for special occasions, such as when he has to welcome an exceptionally large number of men to his army, is conducting a field cremation, or is leading a remembrance. The headdress is created from shards of plastoid armor he’s had to pull from his men.

Note:

Morbs’ designation, CC-4413, was chosen because the number 4 means “death” in many Asian cultures, due to how it sounds similar to “death” in many Asian languages, including but not limited to my own Japanese/Chinese cultures. Tetraphobia, or the fear of the number 4, is a thing! The number Thirteen is an unlucky number in other cultures. The number “4413” felt fitting for this character who is so immersed in death and bad luck!

Related links:

Clone File on Ashe

Clone File on Stabber

Read them all on AO3

PLEASE DO NOT REPOST, EDIT, TRANSLATE, OR OTHERWISE USE MY ART. To share, please reblog! Reblogs and comments greatly appreciated!!!

❀ You can see the rest of my art through the Masterpost pinned to the top of my blog!

#YukiPri art #Morbs CC-4413 #Ashe CC-2222 #clone trooper #YukiPri OC #clone OC #OC #the clone wars #thePrimeOverride #Artist comment: Here he is months after I posted him on Patreon ^ ^;#I thought it would be hilarious and ironic to post him on Life Day #His story will make a LOT more sense if you've read the Prime Override!#what the Ghosts are and how they work is all explained in there #and yup he also gets a Plague Doctor bucket #He and Ashe are the only ones who do #Ashe is the Doctor of Life (but feared to be death)#and Morbs is the literal Doctor of Death (post-mortem)

554 notes · View notes

crispyjenkins · 1 month

Text

mandalore the young cont.

original post/discussion here! it was just getting really long and i for one hate scrolling so far, so. here's this. have also added this au to my masterlist in my pinned post!

@malcontent-crow

#i had a whole wall of tags and it didnt save! lets try this again#i am loving this. the potential for world building and the consequences of knowing more than you should (literally)

#i had forgotten that DW wasnt in peoples thoughts as a threat during the Clan Wars#and the idea that Pre was so far underground with the movement is a very good thing to remember as well! #on one hand you have this driven and spirited young verd that is inspiring Clans to start reassessing who they are fighting and why#on the other you have this clanless outsider that knows waaaaay too much about all the potential major players and is saying#that this major threat isnt really as gone as everybody thought and hoped. sith parallels out the wahoo for ppor obi#and hes standing there watching them all argue over his head about this threat that he KNOWS needs to be dealt with#he is seeing himself as pretty on par or above with the Old Guard in terms of mental age or prowess or large scale battles#so he sees them doubt him maybe even to his face and knows he'll need to get things started on his own

#and becauae everything in the galaxay has at least one person watching it from the outside... how quickly does the news of a jedi padawan#going off the rails on this mission get out? whos keeping track and who points fingers at the jedi for attempting to control the outcome#of the war of their historical enemies in their favor? the senate (read sith) want mandalore defanged before their war but what does it look#like the jedi want? how does the council answer for his actions? do they condemn or condone him? do they try to stay out of it?

#the world building potential of the Manda and the Ka'ra is delicious.#what does it mean to be a mando or darmanda? can you walk around and have people look at you and know you have failed in your oaths?

#and ouch! Obi-Wan considering the fact that he has never been allowed to be his own person.#from padawan to knight/master and then a general and councilor and sheesh. hes really never had the chance to see who he is as a person#outside of his responsibilities to everybody around him and right now hes a war worn adult in a war worn teens body#hes always had somebody else there. as a battle companion a teacher a student as somebody to protect and guard and guide#and now he has this entire culture looking at him and waiting for his next move. and im guess it still feels like less than a burden than#the care and raising of an entire child on his own. sure he had the temple resources and other jedi to lean on but anakin always looked to#him first to solve any problem or teach him something new or cuddle him after nightmares as hes trying to hide his own dreams#and grief and flounding to find his footing as an independent adult

#so right now hes looking around at the entire mando population and realizing thats he might need to reshape himself again for somebody else#to make himself what others need and knowing he can and will do it if it means saving somebody else

#and when exactly did he come back from the war? did he have satine die in his arms and see the ruin that is madalore after a pacifist reign?#does he see the potential for that ruin to happen right now if he doesnt succeed? where does he see himself in regards to the jedi?#has he considered the consequences of stepping up to be the Mand'alor to this culture he has never seen as his own?#has he let himself think about the choices he needs to make and how some things you cant always come out the other side the same as before?

(following the trend of each of these getting longer, this has hit just under 5,000 words, so just a heads up lol? so much world building is happening in this one)

sorry you had to rewrite so much! that last exchange was cursed, it seems lmao

it's so easy to write Obi-Wan as prescient, or the route I'm going with in Dha Kar'ta, so i think it's a fun change-up to have him knowledgeable for completely different reasons! I'm actually going to avoid visions almost at all for this Obi, but everyone else certainly won't know the difference, and he doesn't tell them otherwise (though he won't encourage it either. I do actually have a Naruto time travel where Nart pretends to be psychic à la Shawn Spencer, so that isn't the route I wanna go for this Obi). the consequences of knowing too much, indeed

hmmm many of these questions depend on how deep into Jedi and galactic politics I wanna go, and I'm not sure it's very deep at all. or at least, not very dragged out. i'll explain in a mo

SO first: yes, this Obi is from after Satine dies, in 19 BBY, maybe a month or so after, but before the bombing of the Temple so before Ahsoka left the Order. He was back on the front, no time to properly mourn, though he was doing his best, and was meditating on the whole war, but especially the Sith and their hand in everything that happened on Mandalore. It went deeper than Maul, he knew, had been going on longer than Maul and even Dooku, and it occurred to Obi-Wan that the Sith either wanted a Mandalore that will side with them but not be too much a threat, or they wanted them not a threat at all. He realised his hand in that, in helping put the New Mandalorians on the throne that led to the demilitarisation of the entire sector. Obi-Wan had practically teed Mandalore up for Dooku and then Maul's interference, and if the Republic won the war, he could all too easily see them doing another excision. won't get too much into it to save it for the fic, but he is mediating with something beskar, and he gets a lil too deep into the Force, and of course this is post-Mortis so...... 👀

so this Obi-Wan, back in time, is helping Mandalore to prevent any more Sith machinations in the future, to change the future for the whole galaxy, but even before he's Chosen, he realises he's also doing all of this for Mandalore. for his own hand in its destruction, for the Jedi's hand in the Excision, for his personal connection to Satine drawing Maul to it. it's for atonement, for reparation, and also because Mandalore deserves to be saved, and Obi-Wan is in a place he can help do that. it isn't just about the health of the galaxy, anymore.

I usually shy away from having Obi-Wan leave the Order, no matter what AU I'm throwing him in because I believe in the fundamental goodness of the Order and the people in it, and Obi-Wan is fundamentally a Jedi, one of the best, one of the best. however, in this case, I don't think he can have his cake and eat it too. if Dooku had to leave the Order to accept his countship, then Obi-Wan would have to leave to become Mand'alor. Jedi are (supposed to be) politically neutral, and Obi-Wan is all too aware he'd nullified his own neutrality the moment he decided to go for Keldabe to find Jango.

one of my favorite... tropes? in time travel fic is Obi using his future fellow councilmembers' access codes to get into things he shouldn't, and he certainly knows how to work the Order's internal systems in his favor, so he

wait so i was gonna have him go in and tender his resignation from the Order directly into the systems, and backdate it for before the Mandalore mission, so that anything he's done on Mandalore so far cannot be blamed on the Jedi BUT WHAT IF he just. deletes himself. like completely. from admin to the Archives to the crèche's own internal systems to the Shadow's private servers, Obi-Wan Kenobi was never a Jedi, was never a Temple bastard, was never Qui-Gon Jinn's padawan. his mission records are all in Qui-Gon's name now, his medical file simply doesn't exist, his crècheling clan is listed as simply having been a person short compared to other clans that year. he goes so far as to delete comm histories with him or mentioning him, it's like Obi-Wan Kenobi just doesn't exist anymore.

he does this first thing after leaving Jango, he spends the entire week back to Mandalore ensuring he's been completely erased from absolutely anything relating to the Jedi, and then uses his future councilmember knowledge (and lessons from Quinlan) to erase himself from Republic systems, too. any planet he'd helped as a padawan will suddenly have no records of him as having been there with his master, so the senate or Order can't subpoena them for the info, though Obi-Wan knows he can't have gotten everything (such as any planet not in the Republic, or who don't have holonet access to their files, or both, like Melida/Daan), but he figures he's done enough to absolve the Order if anyone comes knocking about what he's doing.

he buries his lightsaber in the deserts of Mandalore, not knowing that in his old future, he'd have done the same on Tatooine.

so as far as the Jedi are aware: Obi-Wan went on a mission with Qui-Gon that (predictably) went to hell, got separated from his master for weeks to months, then suddenly changed, at the same time their Jedi with the highest prescience collapsed due to his visions, which have also changed. Obi-Wan left Qui-Gon behind to hightail it through the Mandalore sector, and Qui-Gon couldn't catch up or find him, and then Obi-Wan disappeared from anyone's radars for two weeks. then Qui-Gon senses him reenter the Mandalore system, right before breaking his training bond with him, and the Order wakes up to Obi-Wan completely erased from their systems like he never existed in the first place. everything is going so so wrong, and yet. and yet.

and yet the Force is telling them all that this is right, that this is the least Dark course of action, that whatever Obi-Wan is doing is indeed the Will of the Force

so the Order mourns one of their own, and tells Qui-Gon to let him go. and then the Order ups their cyber security because what.

i think he leaves an unsigned letter/comm message for a few people. Bant, Quinlan, Mace, Feemor, his old crèchemaster, Yoda, maybe Jocasta Nu. it's short, basically thanking them for their hand in his upbringing (Feemor hasn't even met him before so is very confused by this), apologising for leaving abruptly, but to follow the Will of the Force, he had to leave; the first part of the message is all the same, but ends with little individual notes. he apologises to Madam Nu for fucking with her archives and hopes she can one day forgive him; he asks her to keep her friends close and to mend the tension between her and Dooku, that Obi-Wan should not know about. He tells Yoda that the future is always in motion but they must move with it; he asks Yoda to meditate on his dwindling lineages and learn to accept all that he cannot control. He reminds Quinlan to wear his gloves and asks him to thank Tholme for looking out for him when Qui-Gon wouldn't or didn't; he thanks him for their years together, and asks him to check in on Feemor every now and then. He apologises to Mace for all the shatter-points he likely caused and will continue to cause, and suggests he put a permanent reminder in his comm to remember to refill his migraine prescription that sixteen year-old Obi should not know about. He asks Bant to look out for a young Togruta initiate that will join in seven years, and suggests Bant might like the healer track rather than the knight corps; he thanks her for being his longest and most dearly-held friend. He thanks his crèchemaster for realising his visions were more than dreams (which will inadvertently lend credence to that theory for why Obi-Wan changed so suddenly), for supporting him when Bruck was at his nastiest, and for always being someone he could turn to even after he became a padawan. For Feemor, Obi-Wan apologises that they hadn't had the chance to meet before then, and for the relationship they won't have anymore; Feemor has no idea who this message is from, until he starts hearing the gossip that Obi-Wan Kenobi has left the Order again. He too mourns never getting to know his padawan brother.

and Obi-Wan sends Qui-Gon a message, of course, thanking him for his teachings, apologising for "leading him on" as an apprentice, leaving and coming back so many times only to permanently leave this time. he reminds Qui to reach out to his friends and his support system, asks him to at least consider talking to a mind or soul healer about Xanatos (knowing that once it gets out that Obi-Wan is a planetary leader, it will likely badly trigger Qui-Gon), and asks him to at least try and mend his relationship with Dooku, though understands if that's not something Qui-Gon is willing to do. asks him to keep Satine safe, but to deeply think about why the Republic is so intent on helping her faction, and why Qui-Gon had questioned so little of the New Mandalorian ethos.

so by the time Obi-Wan finds the Old Guard, he's broken from the Order completely, has buried his saber, has broken his training bond, has cut his braid. I think he shaves his head entirely to let it grow out at the same rate, because the padawan cut is *Eliot Spencer voice* Very Distinctive. he paints his armour white for, yes, his men, his vod'e, but also for cin vhetin. he can't be the man he was before, nor the teen he was before, neither are who Mandalore needs, and as long as he can stay true to his morals and upbringing, he will be what Mandalore needs him to be.

okay now onto the Manda vs. the Ka'ra vs. the Force. the Force is a scientific concept of an energy connecting absolutely everything in the universe, and the Jedi have a religious view on the scientific concept. for both purposes, the Force just is. I really like the idea of other non-Jedi ideas just being different aspects of the Force, different religions and cultures based on the same scientific concepts. for Mandalorians, their "aspect" of the Force is the Manda, the collective souls of every Mando'ade that's ever marched on. just what it means to be Mando'ade has varied greatly through history, and is varied between different groups even now, but none of that changes what the Manda is, which is an aspect of the Force only Mando'ade can touch. sort of like their beliefs of it being separate from the Force have made it so?

now I haven't really talked about this before, but from the beginning of me writing Mandalorian related things, i've separated Ka'ra from ka'ra, which was a little bit me misremembering there was another term for "stars", and then it became it's own thing. kar, meaning "star", with it's plural kar'e or kare, to me, means physical stars, the way we'd call our sun a star. ka'ra, uncapitalised, is the more poetic and/or spiritual "stars", the way we might say something is "written in the stars", which actually aligns with how jate'kara is spelled; for my writing, i've used this form for Mandalorian Force-sensitives being Star-touched ka'ra-touched. Ka'ra, capitalised, is that "ruling council of fallen kings", the Mandalorian myth and it, the way I've always interpreted it, is a separate part of the Manda made up of specifically the souls of every Mand'alor already marched on. So, Tor Vizsla could have joined the Manda after death, but not the Ka'ra; make sense? all that ka'ra vs Ka'ra worldbuilding was done very early in my writing for star wars, and has since expanded to include the idea of the Manda as something separate, and I would now actually consider Manda-touched over Star-touched to describe Force sensitive Mando'ade, because that's really what I think Mandalorians would consider causes their supernatural powers: ancestors rather than the stars.

so what does that mean for this fic? the Manda is directly influenced by all those that consider themselves Mandalorian, Force-sensitive or not. it is, however, not affected by New Mandalorians, unless they worship the Manda in some facsimile, and I think many, many, many do not, not the way they were raised to. this worship looks different for every clan and every individual, and I've always interpreted it as more of a broad spiritual practice across the whole culture rather than a religion, per se, the way a real-world broader culture might pray at shrines at New Years even if individuals themselves or their family aren't religious. this is what I'm referencing when I say the Will of the People: the alive Mando'ade and their choices and emotions affecting and influencing the Manda, the collective amalgamation of every passed-on Mando'ade, and it's when these two are in tandem that they "pick" a Mand'alor. HOWEVER, such a pick is also up to the Ka'ra, the Mand'alor'e that have all marched on; to one day enter the Ka'ra themselves, a Mand'alor must be "picked" by both the People/the Manda, and the Ka'ra. Tor would be "picked" by a significant part of the People and the Manda, and so would Jaster have been, but (according to me, myself, and i, obviously), only Jaster had been chosen by the Ka'ra. Pre is "Mand'alor" only in name, only in a tenuous loyalty existing in House Vizsla and Death Watch, not even by the Manda; just simple human (et al) loyalty. Jango had a weaker "pick" from the Manda than Jaster did, but was picked by the Ka'ra, meaning if he did not declare himself dar'manda (even just internally; I don't think he's ever said it out loud), he would have joined the Ka'ra after death; if he ever reconnects with himself as a Mandalorian, I like to think he'd have that chance again. Canon Jango, though, who went on to make the clones? Absolutely not.

what does this all mean for Obi-Wan? he'd spent weeks inadvertently drumming up support in the people and therefore the Manda, and maybe most haven't really looked at him and thought "sure I'd follow him as Mand'alor", but they have looked at him and thought "that one has mandokar, that one wants what's best for Mandalore, that one is touched by destiny". I dunno, man, like. Obi-Wan is their hope before he is their leader. That will make all the difference when he does end up uniting them. His searching out Jango had made Jango finally confront that he feels dar'manda, until then he hadn't really lost the Ka'ra's support, but that severs that connection. and now the Ka'ra are without a Mand'alor, but look at that, there's a mandokar'la little idiot right there, already strong in the Manda, already rallying hope and purpose, already so invested in the nurturing and the future of Mandalore, how could the Ka'ra not choose him?

I posed the question previously whether or not Mando'ade can tell who has been chosen to be Mand'alor, and I think I've ironed out what that'll mean for this fic. non-Force sensitive Mando'ade will have this sense when near their Mand'alor, a subconscious and inherent trust in them, and indeed, some will be disturbed by this and fight it. that's alright, that's their right. Some never clock this extra sense, some are aware of it always, some just chalk it up to "gut feelings" and the like. The more spiritual or religious Mandos maybe put a little more stock in this feelings, I think especially goran'e and other spiritual leaders, but the fact that the Manda can technically pick more than one person at a time (like Tor and Jaster, and then Jango), this extra sense isn't a perfect indicator of a properly chosen Manda'lor.

now. what about Force sensitive Mando'ade? Well, the Manda is an aspect of the Force, and is in fact how said Force sensitive Mando'ade connect to the Force, by going through the Manda, first. their relationship with sensitivity is inherently different from others in the galaxy, at least those that connect to it directly. they are the ones that can sense or see if someone is chosen by the Ka'ra, depending on their sensitivity. Some see the ghostly line of previous Mand'alor'e stretched out behind them (like the Avatar cycle lmao), some see a wavering crown of stars around their head, some just sense there is a duplicity (/neutral) to their Force presence that doesn't exist in anyone else. how common is Force sensitivity in Mandalorian space? not fuckin very. Jaster had three in his entire faction of aprox. 2 million (fanon number), at least that were aware they were sensitive. Jango only had a few more, and only because he had gained a couple hundred thousand more followers before Galidraan. so i'll make the nearly-arbitrary number that Force sensitive Mandos are 1 in 1,000,000, across the entire sector. by some calculations, in the whole galaxy at around the time of the Clone Wars the number of Force sensitives is 1 in 5,000,000 but these calculations do not generally include societies and species with a near or 100% chance of Force sensitivity, because we simply don't have the data for it. does this all make Mandos slightly more likely to be Force sensitive than others, by my own numbers? sorta. which i'm making an issue of underreporting, based on Mandalore not being a part of the Republic, and also contention with the Jedi and Sith; they don't consider those Manda-touched to be Force sensitive, and with the way I've built this, they aren't exactly wrong.

for the purposes of this story, there are maybe eight Manda-touched Mando'ade in the Mandalore system at this time, and all but one are goran'e. that single non-armorer is part of the Old Guard. I have the roster for the Old Guard decided, so I'm debating whether the Manda-touched one is Cort Davin (a journeyman protector), or one of the women. Instinct wants Vhonte Tervho, but I have plans for her to be related to the goran Obi-Wan got his armour done by, who I wanted to be one of the seven Force sensitive armorers, soooo. lmao how fucked would it be if Isabet Reau is the Force sensitive one? I like the angst of that, since I definitely do not plan on redeeming her, but I kind of want the only Old Guard that can sense Obi-Wan is Chosen by the Ka'ra to be really quiet and accepting of it, while everyone else is arguing. hmmm I have an unnamed Wren as part of the Guard, that I haven't fleshed anything out for yet; perhaps them?

okay I think I've solidified what it makes a Mandalorian, at least for the function of this fic. it is tied to the Resol'nare, and following it, which does allow those who had Chosen Tor Vizsla as their Mand'alor to technically still be following the Resol'nare, and are therefore not dar'manda. at least not for that. but part of the reason the Resol'nare is even able to determine who has a Mandalorian soul, is because they believe it does. Those alive and those dead influence the functionality and reality of the Manda, which also allows for those pre-Resol'nare to still exist in the Manda. What causes someone to become dar'manda, if they are technically following the Resol'nare?

maybe it's reductive, or over-simplified, or maybe even too broad, but it makes sense to me and allows for many many different types of people to still fail, and this is obviously not the only way to become dar'manda, but one thing that will always strip someone of their Mando soul? treatment of children. caring for children. not harming children. this allows many of Death Watch to still maintain their Mando souls, but still be fucked up awful people in other ways. It allows even True Mandalorians to have lost their souls and not realised it because they otherwise adhered to the Resol'nare, because they'd chosen to interpret "defending oneself and family" and "raising your children as Mandalorians" to not include other peoeple's children. Or maybe they were abusive in the belief they were caring for their children. This would also make every single one of the Cuy'val Dar dar'manda, which I think is a fascinating concept.

to answer your question directly, no, one cannot look at someone and know they're dar'manda, even the Force/Manda sensitive ones. one will only know in death, whether or not they have a place in the Manda.

NOW what does this mean for New Mandalorians?? well, by technicality and the way I've set the Manda up, one can interpret the Resol'nare in ways that could align with New Mandos. Perhaps they interpret "armour" as more than specifically "beskar'gam", maybe they wear armourweave or other protective fabrics. Maybe they interpret "defending one's family" as putting down arms instead of raising them, in order to create a peaceful future for their children. I think there are plenty of New Mandos that technically tick off all the boxes, and believe in themselves and their fellows so much that the Manda is like "yeah sure why not, we'll make that count". I think some tenants are more easily... bent, like swearing to the duchy in place of the Mand'alor, but I think an easy one New Mandos miss, is "speak Mando'a." I think many New Mandos were all too quick to switch to Basic for everything except religious and spiritual ceremonies, and I think those already in the Manda would find that very hard to forgive. I actually get into this a little in Dha Kar'ta very soon, but for this fic, i'll have Satine not outright outlawing Mando'a, but it is socially heavily discouraged. you're not allowed to speak it in the palace unless in aforementioned ceremonies, you cannot fill out paperwork in anything but Basic, you're not allowed to use Mando'a titles (including Mand'alor), you're not allowed to teach it to your children. no outright like. punishments for speaking it in public, but if your kids are caught, there are repercussions, including investigation into how else you're raising your kids, and if you're found to be doing anything else, they can take your kids from you. not every New Mando agrees with this, of course, and go about adhering to the Resol'nare as best they can in secret, but so many do give up the language by convincing themselves it's not as important as the other tenants and, well, the duchy hasn't steered them all wrong yet, has it?

okay so on the subject of what the outside galaxy is seeing. I like the headcanon/trope/idea of like. the one thing all factions of Mandalorians agreeing on is fuck everyone else. oh, the New Mandos will emulate the Core and the Republic, but they aren't the Republic nor want to be, and this animosity extends to keeping as many internal Mandlorian issues just that: internal. no faction can keep news from leaving the system or the sector, obviously, but there also isn't a lot of interest in Mandalorian news? "oh look all the Mandos are fighting again", except that's been the standard for like. actual thousands of years. I like when fic have people outside the sector not evening knowing there are different factions, so I'll be doing that here, too, and I like the idea of non-Republic sectors having their own holonets, separate from the Republic one. so like, if Obi-Wan happens to go a little viral during his mad dash to Keldabe, that would be on the Mandalorian holonet, not the Republic one, so even if Obi-Wan was visibly still a Jedi (and he wasn't), actual news of him wouldn't reach the Mid and Inner Rims until like. possible years after it happens.

could this maybe be expedited by Sith machinations? absolutely, though I'm not sure I want to go that route, since I don't think the Sith are overmuch interested in Mandalore at this point, at least not in any hands-on capacity. I'm unclear on whether them funding Death Watch is fanon or not, but it is a headcanon I subscribe to, and I think they'd have stopped funding DW after Galidraan, to cause worse infighting and prevent DW from gaining enough power to actually restart their imperial conquering days. Palpatine has been senator for about ten years by this point, but has very little political power overall, and Demask would be looking basically anywhere but Mandalore at this point in time, both of them having written it off until they actively need something from the sector. if anyone had clocked Obi-Wan as a Jedi, this all would have gone very differently, news would have spread much further and quicker and I think undoubtedly would have reached Palpatine, but since I have Obi-Wan just... cutting ties to anything Jedi, news of him remains in-sector. is this perhaps unrealistic? maybe, but I kind of want to focus on Mandalore and not worry about galactic-wide politics for once, lmao, actually very much like Obi-Wan is doing. however, he will clock a lack of Sith interference and thinks That's Very Weird.

haven't decided how he finds Palpatine out yet, but I think it'll have to do with his Manda senses being different than his Force ones, maybe the Ka'ra even gives him a few tips or gifts to sense Sith since they've allied and fought with them so much in the past. regardless, that'll be after he's become Mand'alor and united the clans.

now to actual plot progression! Obi-Wan meets up with the Old Guard, they don't know what to make of him other than "he's kriffing weird. and young. and creepy. and probably Manda-touched." whatever other verd is Manda-touched will see him blessed by the Ka'ra, which causes them to look inwards more closely and realise they trust Obi-Wan inexplicably, which means they're blessed by the Manda and the Will of the People, too. they wonder if Obi-Wan has noticed, if any of the other Old Guard have noticed. they are one of a few that notice Obi-Wan sneaking back out while everyone is arguing.

Vhonte Tervho is another. She's at this lil summit to represent clan Tervho, tho isn't the clan head, because her ba'vodu, a Manda-touched goran, had sensed she needed to be at the summit. said ba'vodu is of course the armorer who reforged Obi-Wan's armour (need to find a name for them hmm), who had told their clan they were to cease fighting until their new Mand'alor called on them. Vhonte sees Obi-Wan, realises at the same time as everyone that he's the Kih'Manda, the Mand'ika that the entire system had been gossiping about for weeks, and she thinks of what her ba'vodu said. she looks inwards, like they had taught her to, and finds, yes, she trusts Obi-Wan, just like she used to trust Jango. And, well, her Mand'alor is obviously leaving to go do something, and she isn't going to let him go it alone.

the Manda-touched verd doesn't go with them, wanting to see what comes of this, but they already know Obi-wan is Ka'ra Chosen. they will come when he calls.

#prequel trilogy #time travel au #obi wan kenobi #star wars #crow i love the way you breakdown everyone's characters and expand on what i'm putting down #like in the two blocks of tags that i've italicised #they make me feel all warm and fuzzy that you're getting so much out of what i'm doing and also they're just a DELIGHT to read #and have informed later characterisations and changed how i've thought about stuff i've already written #mandalorans #world building #vhonte tervho #will be pulling many characters from repcom obv #but fuck karen traviss as both a person and an author so there's that heads up #also!! anyone can ask questions or comment or reply #would love to hear y'all's thoughts and ideas and i LOVE answering #this au would not exist without crow asking me all these questions. just straight up wouldn't exist #malcontent crow #still trying to figure out if i can work in luminara in a way that doesn't feel shoe-horned #several people have voted QuinObi which i am very much not against #it would be SO easy to have Quinlan just. book it to Mandalore #at first to convince Obi-Wan to COME BACK but then he sees what Obi is actually doing and realises he can't do that to Obi or to Mandalore #does Quinlan... STAY on Mandalore with him?? 👀 👀 does he accept he needs to let Obi-Wan go?#does he stay as a Jedi Shadow and help out or does he leave the Order too??#many questions many thoughts

147 notes · View notes