#he's got a lotta useful tools in his kit

[slashingdisneypasta]

More Toon Patrol Family Headcanons

I'm going more in depth about ^ these ^ . My personal headcanons for the Weasels families.

Warnings; Cheating scandal, adoption (As in 'giving a child up for'), orphans, homeless living reference, Sanatorium living, abandonment, Deadbeat Father, Nasty Deadbeat Mother, fearing you're like your parents, etc.

Greasy:

Greasy was conceived on a desk... in a frenzy... by a business man and his pretty secretary.

Yeah. Bit of a saucy origin story, not that he knows it. Greasy was a complete one-night-stand accident child, neither of his parents wanted a kid and they weren't the types to force their way through raising him just cuz a few drops of semen leaked and carried winners. Also, the whole 'business man and his secretary' thing was an obstacle aswell,.. considering he was married...

When Greasy considers who his parents might be and why they didn't keep him, he thinks... eh, well he doesn't really think anything, these days. He came up with a million different reasons why he was left alone, before (When he was kit in an orphanage clutching his sheets in a storm, when he was a 12 collecting trash for pennies, when he was a teenager and working 2 dodgy jobs plus getting Select Items into prisons for cash, when he was a cruel 20 year old realising he had a knack for dealing with bad people and using them and his criminal activity skyrocketed) but he hasn't considered them in a while- not since joining the Patrol. That was when he really found a place to actually stay still (A.K.A, a place to feel relatively safe and to put his ~books~, a job he's really good at, some freaks who actually notice him as more than a tool to use. As a manipulative pervert moron, maybe, but for some reason it feels better when Wheezy rolls his eyes at him for saying something sleazy then it ever has having some gang leader praise him for having a good eye.), and since then... he hasn't really felt the need to think about his parents, or why they left him alone or didn't want him. He doesn't care.

He grew up part of the time in orphanages and part of the time on the street, which is how he learnt to be so intuitive and manipulative with other people (Though quite of a lot of it is natural talent). Its honestly a stroke of luck the insane asylum rejects he calls family now found him- no one else would be able to deal with him.

Psycho:

Yeah, so Psycho's family disowned him. I think that he spent a time in his life living in a Sanatorium, because he became just... a lotta work, for them at home, and they couldn't deal with him. Or, wouldn't. So they left him there, and after a short while, they... stopped visiting him?... One missed week turned into 2, 4, 8, 14... until Psycho grew bitter to the thought of them. He didn't want them to come back (Would you??)- he hoped they wouldn't.

And they didn't.

When he got out (When the Toon Patrol helped him escape) he just kinda... didn't think about them. He didn't really wanna see them again, not even to hurt them for abandoning him like that. As far as he was (Is) concerned- his family might as well just be the guy that drew him. And that's that. He's just him. Psycho. No family name.

Its a little lonely, a little empty... but better. Yes. Better then those looks 'family' give you when they don't want you. Better then waiting.

He does have a soft spot for Stupid, though. Big dumb hot water bottle that he is. Good for the winters.

He doesn't necessarily consider the rest of the TP his new family (Just that word gives him the Ick), but there's no doubt that if his old family ever did, miraculously, come find him and want him back (For some reason??), he would... hide behind Smartass and Greasy. Hissing, growling impressively disgusting obscenities, feeling ready to lash out with his razor, but yes... from behind Smartass and Greasy. He's not scared, he doesn't think they could protect him better then he could himself or even that they would, but he just.. feels better there. These two chose him.

Smartass and Stupid:

OKAY!! So- their father was a c o m p l e t e deadbeat. And a cheater. He was with Stupid's mum (A 'homely', hard-working, tough-as-nails badass of a woman) during the day and then Smartass' mum (An alcoholic who owned the bar he frequented. Very tough also, but also completely ruined as a person- nasty in natural personality and totally broken by life) at night. Stupid was a planned child, Smartass was an accident.

Smartass' mother... did not want him. Very plain and simple. She would come to half regret it later, but she give him up after a few years to his father- who promptly drops him off with Stupid and his mother and then ditches them all. Raise two sons?? Fuck that. So Stupid's (And, now, Smartass') poor mother is left working 3 jobs and taking care of a little boy who eats everything in sight as well as a tiny, weak little boy with a huge chip on his shoulder. She does the best she can and she has two very grateful sons for it ^^

Smartass is all torn apart because of this. Its complicated for him. He always felt like his mother's son (The one that gave him up. The spiteful, dirty, alcoholic mess); Like he couldn't escape it. Still cant. He feels like its in his genetics. He feels like he could never truly be one of them (Stupid and his mum), because he's too much like her- too cranky, too pessimistic, too cold- but with them he did feel loved, at least. Stupid's mother never made him feel like second fiddle, she tried her best to make him recognise that he was now more hers then anyone else's, and that was good enough... but only most of the time.

Stupid loves his brother ^^

Wheezy:

This is best done in dot points- so here we go.

Yes, he is the chill Big Brother of the Toon Patrol- but that is not saying much XDDD He is still the neurotic, addiction addled criminal of his family! They truly do love him, but goddamnit, do they have some things to say about his lifestyle.

First of all- he's related to the two grave digging weasels in Mickey's Christmas Carol XD They're his cousins. They take the shit right out of him every time that they see him XD They'll drop cigarettes just to watch him lung to grab them before they're wasted because they know he cant help it and then shake their heads at him looking oh so serious ("Come on Wheezy, do better then that... " "Yeah Wheezy come on man, that's pathetic," while he's standing there looking pissed, arms crossed, but puffing away and taking it), they'll go ahead and tell on him to his mother at the drop of a hat if they something (Like if he got a girlfriend, or the Toon Patrol did something that got in the news, or he was smoking in the bathroom, etc. Like, "We love you cuz but we couldn't help it! Your life is a train wreck and we don't have a TV."), they'll tease him endlessly, etc.

I mean, they love him and they get along mostly but yeah... they love to hassle him XD 😅 Don't worry, Wheezy can take it.

He has a mother who frets about him and is down to go toe-to-toe with Smartass so he can get some days off (Another @marinerainbow idea! ^^). She's not an overbearing mother, she'll see his cousins sneaking the cigarettes out of his pocket before he even notices and not say a damn word, but when it comes to his health and relationships... she does still treat him like he's living with her XD Like, she wants to meet the Toon Patrol to assess them (And when she meets them she immediately demands that he q u i t- ), she wants to set him up with nice women ("You're so handsome Wheezy!! Please, let me find you a nice girl. Sandra, at the butchers, she just got her degree and broke up with that boyfriend of hers and I just think- " "Mum, I'm fine." "... I'm gonna give you her a number." "No thanks, Ma!- " "Did you hear the words 'Can I' leave my mouth? No? Thats because it wasn't a question."), and she wants him to eat well ^^ She doesn't call him everyday to make sure, but when he does come around she makes him leave with so much tupperware XDD He goes home with two bags full, dumps it on the table, and goes like "Guys!! We're fed for the next week!"

His father is a very very scary looking guy, himself. But he's a very good man and actually loves his sons 'friends' XDD Except for Greasy. He doesn't care for Greasy. If he sees the Toon Patrol he'll greet each of them and then promptly ignore Greasy's 😅😅😅 Just like-

*Handshake* "Smarty, good seeing you. Sharp tie." *Shoulder pat* "Stupid my boy you got a little something... its right there, on your mouth, its... eh, whatever. Save it for later. Good to see you." *Nod* "Psycho, your hair's lookin extra big. Very good." ... *Greasy hesitantly holds out his hand* "Oh look, a bird- Seeya, boys."

Its because he thinks he's a freak XD The first time they met, a risqué page from a magazine flew outta Greasy's suit and Wheezy's dad has never forgiven him.

Wheezy also has uncles, aunts, more cousins, and grandparents- but this is all I got right now XD

[operatordevavani]

A smol selection of some BIG FISHU.

I’m having more fun than is strictly justified with the fishing minigame. Even with things still trying to kill you--I think that makes it even more hilarious. Going from quietly listening for fish bubbles to murder spree then back to fishing like nbd... It’s great. Plus I’ve got my Helios, Yel-Ulidar, watching my back. Deconstructor Prime is actually really good. (And at night I make a bunch of Eidolon Lure friends, too. My little fishing entourage~)

[thevioletjones]

36 and 58

Looks like these involve a lotta meet-cutes. Lmao. Ok, I scrapped the #36 “Established relationship,” because it didn’t fit with any of the other requests really. I’ve combined #58 with a request from @tarantula-teeth for #16, which gives us...

Space AU / Innocent Physical Contact

“God… fucking… dammit!” Ian cussed as he smashed his finger into the same button over and over and over again. He then moved to toggling the switch next to it on and off and back and forth fruitlessly. “Piece of shit… motherfucker!”

Somewhere over his shoulder, a mellifluous, sarcastic whistle sounded long and loud as it approached. “Problem officer?”

“Officer?” Ian asked incredulously before turning around in his chair. “I’m not an officer, I’m a pilot.”

The guy in front of him was short, with dark hair, but pale skin, and he was wearing a maintenance jumpsuit.

“My bad. This is my first gig on this particular spaceship. All you different crews have your own titles and semantics, but it’s none of my business really. Just tell me what you want me to call you.”

Ian’s brow furrowed. “Who are you and why are you talking to me right now?”

The guy pursed his lips and scratched at his eyebrow. “Think it’s pretty obvious that I’m a repair guy… from engineering?”

“I didn’t call for a repairman.”

“No, but your boss did,” the guy replied, thumb indicating an older gentleman across the deck.

Ian bent his head around and caught the captain’s eye, receiving a cheeky smirk and a knowing nod. Ian looked back at Mickey and rolled his eyes.

“Look…” he raised his eyebrows questioningly.

“Mickey,” the maintenance guy answered.

“Mickey… I think I can handle this. I’m about to run some diagnostics, and in the meantime,” he glanced at his co-pilot to the right, “Russ here has perfectly good control of the ship.”

“Uh huh,” said Mickey with a condescending little smile. “Well, that’s not really gonna work for me, see… the captain is the captain, and he ordered my boss, the head engineer, to send someone to fix this for you. Guess that means he knew you couldn’t handle this sorta repair on your own. Anyway, you can make yourself scarce for a while, since you’re not actually flying anything.”

Ian’s mouth dropped open. He was usually treated with reverence aboard the ship. At the very least, people respected him. He was the fucking pilot, after all. They put their lives in his hands every day. Yeah, he was part of a team, but he was like the first in the frontline whenever shit went sideways. Maybe he wasn’t the captain, or the commander, but he still couldn’t help but silently think of the craft as his ship. And he wasn’t about to wander off on a long break and let this yahoo he didn’t even know have free reign of his gear board and equipment.

“If you think I’m going anywhere while you work on my station, you’re outta your fuckin’ mind, pal.”

Mickey chortled. “Pal? What’re you gonna call me next? Buddy? Champ?” He casually pushed past Ian and dropped his case to the floor. “You wanna hover around over me, be my guest, but keep your damn trap shut and let me do my job, alright Sparky?”

Ian tried his best not to fume, but he wasn’t entirely successful. Still, he managed to stay quiet as he watched Mickey arrange his tools and open the circuit board beneath the console. He was actually fascinated with the mechanical guts of the spacecraft, but he’d always been terrible at anything remotely mathematical, and couldn’t make it into engineering school no matter how hard he’d studied. When it came to ships, he could work it all, but he didn’t know exactly how it worked, and that was frustrating as hell at times like these. Knowing the theory wasn’t enough.

Mickey worked quietly for over an hour, never daring to say a word to Ian, despite his watchful presence. Occasionally, he would accidentally brush against Ian’s leg, and that sent him into a tailspin thinking about how long it’d been since he’d gotten any, followed by wondering why the hell he was thinking about sex just because some repair guy grazed him through his clothes, culminating in deep frustration that he had no prospects to speak of on this entire ship-full of 2,000 plus people.

If his horniness was making him long for this random dude that clearly didn’t like him at all, he was definitely in a bad way.

“I’m gonna need to solder this, and I didn’t bring my kit for that, so I’ll be back in like 15. Think you can handle it, coppertop?” Mickey said, breaking Ian’s reverie.

“My name’s Ian,” he responded tersely. “See you in 15.”

Mickey smiled at him then, and it didn’t even seem sarcastic. Ian didn’t know how to react, so he just blinked and turned away to grab his handheld computer. He spent the minutes waiting on Mickey answering messages from his family back on New Earth.

Once the soldering was about to be underway, Ian was eager to observe again, and Mickey tossed him a face mask without a word before he got started.

Another hour later, and everything was patched up and properly reassembled, the little buttons and switches working the way they were supposed to again. Ian still had a few hours left on shift, and Mickey hung back to watch as the control was shifted back to the main board, from the co-pilot’s station.

After a good ten minutes of smooth sailing, Ian switched to auto and stood up to reach out for the engineer’s hand. “Looking good. Thank you, Mickey.”

Mickey gave him an almost coquettish once over. “Same, Gallagher.”

“Oh, so you know who I am now?”

Mickey shrugged. “You’re the pilot. I knew who you were before I came down here.”

“Coulda fooled me,” said Ian, noticing that their hands were still clasped. He looked down at them, then back up into Mickey’s eyes. They were a sparkling, pretty shade of blue.

“Act like a dick, get treated like one,” Mickey replied.

Ian gasped and let his hand fall. “You were the one being a dick, not me.”

Mickey rubbed his nose and reached into his pocket, pulling out a genuine piece of paper and a pen. Ian hadn’t seen anyone use those in years.

He scribbled something down quickly and handed the paper to Ian.

“Block E, number 492,” Ian read aloud.

“That’s my cabin number, pilot boy. Maybe you wanna come over for a nightcap later.” His impeccably arched eyebrow left no room for misunderstanding.

Ian tittered breathily. “I think I just might.”

[motleymoose]

Homecoming Pt.3: Bits & Pieces Ch. 3

Chapter 3

This Isn't A Peace Talk

Fandom: The Mandalorian, Star Wars Characters: The Mandalorian (Din Djarin), Gender Neutral Reader, The Child Words: 2.3k+ Warnings: SO MUCH ANGER AND SQUABBLING

Summary:

I get to use my mech skills, but also I have a fight with the bounty hunter.

Notes:

I don't know why it took so long to get this chapter out, but it's here now!!!

Thanks for reading!

Homecoming Masterlist

***GIF NOT MINE***

The hours bled into one another as we flew ever closer to the Mandalorian’s destination, and I was becoming nightmarishly restless. After checking the patched wiring in the hold’s crawlspace and tinkering with a few spare parts in need of cleaning, I snooped around the hold some more. Most of the hold was empty, except for a couple of crates marked FOOD AND MEDICAL and half-dozen still-frozen bounties in the carbonite lockers. With nothing to do and a whole lotta time to do it in, I prowled about the lower decks in tight figure-eights, much like a wild creature stuck in an observation tank. The boredom was driving me bonkers.

Unable to take the utter lack of stimulation anymore, I grabbed a portable equipment chest in one hand, shouldered the diagnostics kit on the opposite, and made my way precariously up the ladder to the top deck.

It didn’t take long for the bounty hunter to find me, borrowed tools scattered around me and a diagnostics pad in hand, pottering around the engineering room with grease smudged across my forehead.

“I told you to stay put,” the Mandalorian gruffed, nearly tripping over me. I sat cross-legged on the floor, running a simple program to check on the aural sensors. I glanced up at him dubiously. His fingers brushed his blaster in a convulsive if threatening manner.

“You told me to stay out of your way. Engineering isn’t anywhere near in your way, unless you deviate from your way on purpose.” I stopped, trying to sort out what exactly I meant by that. But I batted it away with a hmph. I didn’t have time to figure out my own nonsense. “Besides, can’t a person ogle another person’s band limiter cuffs without the third degree?” Still seated in front of the sensor panel, I craned my neck over my shoulder and up, agitated at the interruption.

The visor tilted upwards, contemplating. Gloved fingertips drummed on the pistol’s grip until he sighed deliberately and relaxed his arm. “Fine,” he said gruffly. “Just - don’t break anything important.”

“I’m a blackthumb. If I break it, I’ll fix it better,” I said, forcefully bright and smiling. The little diagnostics computer dinged. I unplugged it and stood up, stretching the kinks from my spine. Sidestepping the Mandalorian, I slapped his pauldron good-naturedly as I slithered past him and into the bay.

“I do want to take a look at your pressors, though. This ol’ girl ‘bout rattled the teeth out of my head when she came out of hyperspace. May also need to tweak the conversion module to keep up with all that new tech you’ve got back there,” I said, easily falling back into Professional Mechanic Mode. Making my way to the cockpit, I crawled underneath the control deck, holding a pen light between my teeth as I lay on my back and surveyed the wiring system.

A tiny, warm body flopped onto my legs, and I was delighted to see that the child had come to join me. He scrambled up my thighs, across my belly and came to rest on my chest. Big ears wiggling happily, the kid propped his chin in his hands and stared at me intently. I removed the flashlight from my mouth and wedged it between my neck and shoulder, making it easier to talk to him.

I happened to be in the middle of explaining the intricacies of navcomp programming to my rapt pupil when the toe of the hunter’s boot nudged my hip.

“What?” I asked curtly as the long mental list of small improvements faded from my mind. By then my hands were caked in carbon dust, and the child made no move to slide off of me. Resigning to my fate, I signaled for the Mandalorian to continue with whatever it was he had to say; I wasn’t going to be moving out from under the control deck any time soon.

A flutter of cloth on steel, and the bounty hunter was in my space, crouching beside the pilot’s chair, his helmet parallel to the lip of the deck.

“What are you doing to my ship.” His tone was smooth yet menacing.

Rolling my eyes, I shooed the child off of me and clambered out from under the panel. The Mandalorian had retreated to the door while I’d wriggled out. Brushing dirty fingers across the chest of my jumpsuit, I sunk heavily into the co-pilot’s seat, scratching my forehead with my opened multitool. The little one trundled to me from out of the console’s shadows and tugged at my pantleg until I was obliged to pick him up. He held a small silver object tightly in his grubby little hands, and he ferreted it away underneath his tunic as soon as he settled onto my lap.

“Just a few minor adjustments and reroutes. Nothing too fancy or critical. Did you know this ship was stripped by Jawas?” I gestured animatedly with my custom multi-purpose tool. “I wouldn’t have noticed with how amazing the rebuild was, but I could tell by the wiring harness modifications. Distinctly Jawa scavenged mods.” Grinning stupidly, I shook my head in amazement. “Whoever rebuilt the Crest sure knew what they were doing!”

“Yes,” the bounty hunter replied, a little more brusquely than I thought the conversation warranted. He leaned against the cockpit’s door frame, arms crossed and exuding false indifference. He was strangely emotive for how much beskar covered his body.

“No doshing way?” I exclaimed. The prospect of Jawas intrigued me to no end; they were a scavenging people, mainly dealing in mech and droids. Their methods of acquiring said mech and droids could be considered loosely in the vicinity of ethical, if you squinted really hard, but they always did have the best stuff.

The Mandalorian stared out into the inky dark of space, starlight blurring over the silvery dome of his helmet. He cleared his throat, started to say something and then stopped. I waited patiently, the prickly curiosity holding my jittery nerves in place. The kid whined and made grabby hands at my multitool, so I folded it back into itself and gave it to him. It looked absurdly gigantic in his tiny fingers, but he gnawed on it with gusto.

A sigh crackled over the bounty hunter’s vocoder. “An Ugna- my friend. His name was Kuiil. He negotiated to get all the parts back from the Jawas, and then he-he helped me repair the Razor Crest.” The tension he had been holding suddenly dissipated, and his shoulders sagged in something akin to relief. His breastplate rose and fell in a juttering, painful beat, and the strangled sigh of modulated air buzzing from his helmet told me everything I needed to know. Whoever Kuiil had happened to be, I knew that he must have been a very good friend to the Mandalorian, and his loss was still felt across hyperspace.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered.

The bounty hunter huffed. “Nu kyr’adyc, shi taab’echaaj’la.”

“Not gone, merely marching far away,” I murmured in turn.

The Mandalorian stilled. For a beat, neither of us moved. The silence widened the already substantial gap between us, sweeping away what little bit of common ground we had found purchase on. Having that tiny foothold crumble beneath me in a matter of seconds set me on edge. I didn’t like him any more than he liked me; our mutual dislike for one another had turned into something more, something almost companion-like. But since I had to go and open my big dumb mouth, we were back to Square One.

The kid let out a loud, wet snerkt!, pulling us both out of our respective thoughts.

Arms uncrossing and leather gloves tightening into fists at his sides, the bounty hunter took the two steps from the doorway to the co-pilot’s chair. Without a sound, he took the slumbering child from my arms and stomped off to his quarters.

“I -” A tiny kernel of guilt blared in warning. “Wait, I didn’t mean to- ah, blast it,” I muttered, crossing my arms over my chest. I hadn’t meant any disrespect to his friend, or his Creed. I only knew enough Mando’a to get me into trouble, and I hoped I hadn’t overstepped any boundaries by saying the tribute in Basic. Fiddling with my multitool for a long moment, I tried to come up with some sort of apology that would convey my cultural misstep.

Wracking my brain for Mando’a phrases to express my regrets at my choice of words, I didn’t hear him return to the cockpit.

Huffing once more, the bounty hunter startled me from my guilt trip. I averted my eyes, swallowed my pride and braced myself to deliver an apology. “Look, bud. I’m not good with-”

“Where did you get this?” he asked, cutting me off from my apology.

“What are you -”

“Where did you get this necklace??” he repeated, hissing through his teeth.

Silver flashed into my field of vision. I blinked a few times, my eyes refusing to believe what the bounty hunter dangled in front of my face. “Wha-” My voice cracked dangerously. I couldn’t believe it. It was my pendant. My eyes followed the Mythosaur skull as it swung back and forth, mouth gaping in astonishment. A small spark of Hope rekindled somewhere deep down inside my chest, clearing a slim but bright path through the anger and the guilt that had been dogging me for the past several days.

“My - my..” I said weakly, tears pricking at my eyes. “Where did -”

The hunter lunged suddenly, slamming both fists down on the armrests on either side of me. I yelped in surprise, shrinking back in the co-pilot’s chair. Pinned in, I could do nothing more than stare at him, confused.

“This shouldn’t exist. It shouldn’t be yours.”

The small, flickering flame of Hope guttered out, and once more I was cold and empty and full of rage.

“What gives you the right?” I spat. I leaned as far forward as the hunter’s presence would allow, my nose almost pressed against the beskar helmet. “You don’t know me. You don’t know where I came from, or what I’ve done to get here. All I am to you is a bounty that went wrong. It’s not up to you to decide what I can or can’t have.” Chest heaving and fists clenched together in my lap, I stared down the Mandalorian. I was too confused to be scared of what he could do to me, too pissed off to care about his reasons.

That pendant was mine. And I wanted it back.

The Mandalorian’s blank, glassy facade didn’t move. No words, no sounds escaped his modulator. Hot waves of anger rolled off of him, anger that I didn’t understand, didn’t want to understand. The co-pilot’s seat trembled underneath me, but I wasn’t sure if the movement was his or my own.

“Give it back,” I growled, finally breaking the silence. “It’s mine.”

“No.” The rumbling baritone was tense, straining against his control. His whole body held unspeakable amounts of emotion, and he was unwilling, or unable, to let it go.

“Bastard.” I swung up from my hips, clipping the lip of his helmet smartly with my clasped fists.

He stumbled back, dropping the necklace as both hands came up to straighten his helmet. Seeing an opening, I rushed the bounty hunter, driving my left shoulder into his side and pushing him into the opposite wall. With a roar, he ducked out of my grasp, using his momentum to kick out at my knees. I dodged sideways, his boot only grazing my shins. Now off-balanced, I staggered back and tripped over my own feet. I took a nosedive, landing heavily on the pilot’s seat. The air was knocked from my lungs, and for a moment too long I was dazed. At that opportunity, the Mandalorian grabbed the back of my collar and hauled me out of the chair.

“Hrrkt!” I choked, scrabbling to loosen the stranglehold my jumpsuit currently had on my neck.

“Last time. Where. Did. You. Get. This.” With each word, the hunter shook me like a ragdoll. The calm he exuded was frightening in comparison to the violence he was promising.

“Uunrkt,” I replied.

The Mandalorian released the back of my jumpsuit, and I crumpled, catching myself on the pilot’s seat. Pressing my forehead into the roughly-woven seat cushion, I panted laboriously. Tears were streaming down my face. I sniffled loudly and wiped my nose on my sleeve before I spoke.

“That is mine. It was given to me by my caretaker.” The anger I had been feeling melted into sadness. I was tired of fighting the emotion, so I embraced it, allowing myself to finally feel. “It’s the only thing I have left.” I broke off with a sob, burying my face in my hands.

“What was his name.”

I went rigid. Names held power, even I knew that growing up where I did. But he was dead, so surely the issue was moot? At least, I hoped he was dead. The alternatives to why he never returned hurt my heart too much to bear.

“You wouldn’t’ve known him,” I said thickly.

“Try me,” the hunter said gruffly.

I couldn’t get around it now. Even if he wasn’t dead, sharing his name with one of his brethren probably wasn’t the worst thing I could do.

But, then again, if he wasn’t dead, that meant I didn’t owe him anything for leaving me behind.

“Reyn. His name was Drys Reyn.”

[gravescratch]

A Rediscovery

“Hey, you did find something in there! What’d you-“

Blackspark stopped halfway through the door of his workroom as Gravescratch growled at him, entirely taken aback by the aggression, and dropped the bundle of chains he’d been carrying. “Woah, hey… hey, now… I’m not gonna take it. You know I’m not.”

 Gravescratch bared his fangs for a klik more, shielding something behind his back, and didn’t even look remotely sorry for the threat as he rumbled “this is mine” at the mech who’d disturbed him. Yes, he knew that Blackspark didn’t take things, but… this was… this was his. Had to be sure.

 “Yeah, hey, sure- it’s yours. Not- not even gonna bother arguing that. You know I’m not gonna steal y’ stuff… it’s yours. I don’t do that.” Blackspark soothed, very slowly moving closer, and sat down in the second chair a short distance away from Gravescratch. “Now… what’d you find? Didn’t think we’d get much out of an old kennel… all I got were chains. Prob’ly melt ‘em.”

 Gravescratch’s antennae flickered on his helm and he slowly began to bring whatever it was out from behind his back, optics still narrowed slightly, before pausing and growling again. “Don’t. Laugh.”

 “I’m- I’m not- Gravescratch, you know me. I don’t take people’s things, and I don’t laugh at things that’re serious. I’m not a terrible person. I’m an idiot sometimes, but… I try ta be decent, you know that. C’mon, now… what’s up? You got real worked up over somethin’ outta some… random…”

Blackspark trailed off as a realization struck him, and his voice was much, much softer as he spoke. “That… that wasn’t some random kennel, was it?”

 Gravescratch slowly shook his helm, then, almost reluctantly, brought the object out from behind his back.

It was a large toy hound, about twice the size of his helm, made of wire mesh and soft metals. Unsurprisingly for something fished from the rubble, it was beat up and a bit chewed on, but it was mostly in one piece- and Gravescratch had been carefully reattaching one of the limbs. It didn’t seem to be sculpted after any creature in particular, but someone had modified the helm. Someone who had etched four additional optics on each side and one on the fore-helm. Someone who had evidently also bitten at the toy with a series of tiny teeth contained in long, narrow jaws.

Gravescratch looked the toy over for a moment, then held it to his chassis and, in a voice softer than Blackspark had ever heard from him, whispered “this is mine”.

 Blackspark stayed quiet for a moment, then, slowly, stood up and moved towards Gravescratch. Purring very softly, he wrapped his arms around Gravescratch and held the lanky mech close, rubbing gently at spots along his back that he knew the scent-hound liked.

Not sure what to say, he left it at just the hug for a little while, not letting go as Gravescratch made no attempt to get loose, and spoke quietly when the words did come.

“Ya know… I know you’ve told me ‘bout how they treated you, but… don’t think it ever really sunk in that we might find somethin’ o’ yours in a kennel. ‘m sorry, mech.” Blackspark sighed, optics dimming slightly, and didn’t move except to continue petting. “You, uh… y’ wanna tell me th’ story there? And, here- you know what? Lemme grab this kit- let’s go t’ berth, more comfortable.”

 Gravescratch silently returned the hug, leaning into Blackspark for as long as he could, and didn’t speak until the bounty hunter let go and began to gather up the repair kit. When he did speak, his voice was still quiet, still soft, as if he wasn’t quite certain he wanted to share this. Honestly, he wasn’t.

“I was… not born alone. You know this. There were others- not exactly like me, we were all prototypes, but… similar. And they… kept us together. Social species, after all. They’d found that isolation made for unwanted results. So… I  had batchmates of a sort. I don’t… remember if they had names, though. Probably just numbers. And I don’t remember their numbers because… well, there was… there was an accident. When we were all young. Something… there was an explosion, I think. I don’t remember, but… I do know they were gone.

“From what I remember, I… wouldn’t stop howling. You- you must understand, I’d never recharged alone in my life, and it was cold without them. I… wasn’t old enough to really understand that they were gone, and I don’t think it would have helped if I had.

“Well, they’d learned that… that punishing young beings made for terrified, cowed tools rather than useful ones. So, instead… one of them gave me this. It- it holds heat very well, and… it was no substitute, but… I’d tired myself out enough that it worked.”

Optics soft, Gravescratch looked down at the toy for a moment longer, then nuzzled his face into it to muffle a quiet little noise. Which didn’t work very well, since he usually spoke with his mouth closed anyway.

“I thought this had been destroyed. The- the war, there was… some kind of a bomb. They emptied the building and left, wouldn’t let me take this with me, and… we never went back. I thought… I thought it had burned, or been buried hopelessly. But I… but I found it. This is mine. It’s the only thing they ever let me have, and it’s still mine.”

 Blackspark finished packing up the repair kit and just… listened. Quietly. When Gravescratch seemed to be done talking, he very gently took one of those narrow servos in his own and pulled, coaxing the scavenger to follow him.

With the kit in one servo and Gravescratch’s claws in the other, he stepped out of his workroom and walked the short distance to their berthroom, then shut the door behind them both- just because this felt like a private thing. Even if there was no one else on the ship.

As Gravescratch watched, Blackspark sat down on the berth, spread a tarp out, and put the repair kit on it, and patted a spot right next to himself. “Gravescratch, honestly, I don’t know what ta say. I got a lotta really angry words in mind, bu’ they won’t help. So… c’mere. Sit. I’ve patched up a few li’l toys… lemme help you fix that? Promise not ta make it worse.”

 Gravescratch stared for a moment, swaying side-to-side in uncertainty, and almost retreated with his find-

But he didn’t.

Instead, he slunk up onto the berth, sat down, leaned against Blackspark, and very slowly pressed the toy into Blackspark’s servos. He didn’t let go of it, but he offered it. Which was… the closest he could get.

  Much later, Blackspark smiled to himself and rubbed very gently behind Gravescratch’s largest set of antennae, purring gently as he watched the lanky mech sleep. They’d cleaned the toy, tightened all the loose parts, and added paint not just to the original eyes, but to the ones Gravescratch had etched in himself. It still looked beaten up, but it did in fact hold heat very well, and that was being put to use.

Gravescratch was curled up on his side, helm against Blackspark, with the toy tucked against his throat. He was either recharging or very close, his field was nothing but contentment, and he kept kneading his claws on the toy.

Frankly, it was adorable.

Not that Blackspark would ever admit that.

[murasaki-murasame]

I was planning to make a whole post anyway about my hopes and predictions for Gala Leif if he ends up happening next month, but there’s also a whole lotta other stuff to talk about now with the FEH rerun, the Ciella fight teaser, and our first gala dragon, so I guess I’ll take the chance to just talk about everything all at once, lol.

I feel like I went through every possible human emotion in the span of like ten seconds when I saw the gala banner announcement a day or two ago and then saw what it was actually about. That sure was a roller-coaster.

I honestly don’t really care about Mars that much [mainly because I’m always just more interested in adventurers than dragons], but I’m really curious about the precedent this is setting, with this being our first gala dragon, and this also happening only one month after the last gala banner.

They’ll probably talk about it in the next This Month post in a week or so, but I’m gonna just assume for now that we’re gonna get gala banners on a monthly basis from now on, rather than every two months. Which is a little bit scary to think about since it gives us less time between each gala to save up for each one, but we’ll just see how it goes.

Everyone’s predicting that we’re gonna alternate between gala dragons and gala adventurers, but I’m not sure it’ll be strictly scheduled out like that. I feel like we’re just switching to a monthly schedule and we just happened to get a gala dragon as the start of the schedule shift. I think it’s more likely that we’re going to start seeing reruns of old gala units between entirely new gala characters. I mean, it’s pretty obvious how much revenue it’d get them if they ever decided to rerun Gala Cleo or Gala Alex, lol.

Mostly I just can’t even think of that many options for what they could release in terms of gala dragon alts. We might get some of the other dragons that the royal siblings have pacts with, but we only know of like two other ones.

Mars’ introduction is bringing up the whole hot button issue of powercreep in the fandom, but honestly I don’t think Mars being really powerful is that big of a deal. He’s not exactly essential for any content, and tbh at the end of the day I just think it’d be weird if our first gala dragon WASN’T notably powerful. People already complain about dragon banners as it is because they have such low value. I can only imagine how many complaints there’d be if we got our first gala dragon and it only ended up being a sidegrade to the existing options. From what I’ve seen of how Mars changes up things on the DPS sim, I think they struck a good balance of making him powerful without him being super gamebreaking. I honestly think that Marth’s mana spiral is a much more blatant example of powercreep, and has had more of an impact on the flame meta than Mars alone.

Anyway, on the note of Marth and co, the FEH rerun has finally begun, and I kinda have to agree with everyone that the defense gamemode just doesn’t really feel good to play at all when it’s locked to solo, lol. It’s so obviously designed for co-op instead. It’s not really that big of a deal, but it does feel like more of a slog than it should, especially since you have to do it like 45 times for the event endeavors, and since there’s so many valor rewards. I’m curious to see how it pans out when this becomes a regular gamemode for future events, though. Hopefully they get better at balancing it and making it fun to play.

Even though I still don’t have any interest in pulling on any of the FEH banners since I just want to save for Gala Leif, I did decide to 70MC Alfonse, because haha bad decision machine go brr :) But I honestly do like him a lot, and I’m excited to get Sharena from the upcoming event. I hope she’s a light lance since I don’t have H-Elly or H-Vanessa, but we’ll see how it goes.

We also got some more teasers of the new FEH event and how it’ll play out. It looks like it’ll be a wave-based arena mode of sorts where you fight lots of enemies, which apparently include boss versions of different gacha characters. I think they mentioned a while ago that they’ll be introducing a new event type to the event rotation along with defense battles, and I assume this’ll be the first example of it. If they do, I hope they keep the part with you fighting boss versions of gacha characters, since that’s a neat idea that makes them feel different from the other events we get and the bosses we fight.

They haven’t really said anything about what the new FEH units will be like aside from Sharena, and I can’t really make any guesses since I’m not a Fire Emblem fan to begin with, but I’m already bracing myself for the inevitability of us getting a two-part banner for the new units, lol.

We’re also getting Ciella’s fight at around the start of next week, and they posted a preview video of the standard difficulty version of it. It seems like she inflicts a unique debuff called Vulnerability, so I’m really curious to see if I end up being correct with my previous theory about certain wind units getting debuff cleanse mechanics added via mana spiral upgrades. I think there’s at least one part in the video where Lowen heals the team and it doesn’t cleanse Vulnerability like it does with Plague, and it’d be a bit weird if you’re just meant to deal with having the debuff until it eventually wears off, so it’d be neat if they do introduce a new debuff cleanse mechanic.

Though tbh I can’t actually tell exactly what Vulnerability is meant to even do, since I don’t think it seemed to have a big impact on how much damage characters took, even though it definitely sounds like it’s meant to be a defense debuff or something. Either way, it’s probably going to be the central mechanic of Ciella’s fight, so hopefully we get tools to deal with it.

They only showed off the standard version of her fight so things will probably get more complex in expert, but it looks like her fight’s going to be built around making you move around a lot to dodge attacks. She seems to have various purple attacks, as well as homing attacks, and one move that seems to fire projectiles that bounce around the map. I don’t know how much this will really impact things, but it at least seems different to how relatively little you have to move around in Kai Yan.

It also looks like she might have unavoidable freeze-inflicting attacks, which might be interesting. They probably want you to use at least one freeze-res character. Which might not really diversify the meta much from where it is now, since Hawk has freeze res, but we’ll see how it goes.

We haven’t heard anything about us getting more wind mana spirals, but I’d be kinda surprised if we don’t get any more for this. In general wind is in a bit of an awkward spot, and if we don’t get more mana spirals for it soon, I feel like the Ciella meta is just going to be Tobias + Hawk [and maybe Lin You] again, if only just due to a lack of good options.

I’m also still really interested to see what the wind Agito weapon buffs end up being, and how much they might benefit certain characters. I think that a crit rate buff might be pretty nice, at least for characters like Ku Hai, but that sort of a buff probably wouldn’t help people like Lin You or DY-Xainfried much since they have crit rate buffs in their kits already. A crit damage buff could be interesting, but unless you’re playing as Lin You or have a DY-Xainfried on the team, it might not be as good as a crit rate buff.

Either way, I’m slowly getting a 0UB wind CT2 of each type just so I have all my options available to me, but I feel like the first wind Agito weapon I get will probably be a blade or wand, since I’ll probably end up using either Tobias, Noelle, or DY-Xainfried against Ciella most of the time. I do have a 70MC Lin You, though, so I might get an axe too.

We’ll see how it goes when the fight comes out, but I’m gonna assume that Ciella will probably be about as difficult as Kai Yan. Though since she doesn’t seem to have the same ‘you deal twice as much damage to the boss as you normally would for some reason’ mechanic as Kai Yan, and since wind is way less broken as an element than shadow as a whole, it’ll probably take a bit longer to clear. Though tbh I’m still like 100% expecting people to be able to clear it notably faster with full shadow teams than wind teams, so there’s that to consider, lol.

Anyway the main thing I’ve been thinking about recently is Gala Leif, who I’m still hoping against hope will come out at the end of next month.

It’s not like we know for sure he’s gonna ever be released at all, but with chapter 13 he’s officially joined Euden full-time, and he got a whole new redesign and 3D model to commemorate it, which really seems like blatant set-up for him getting a gala alt. Like how Sarisse has her NPC design, and a 3D model based on it for Melsa’s event, but then she got a new outfit and 3D model for her gala alt. Even Mym technically got her design tweaked a bit for her gala alt compared to her regular NPC artwork.

I wasn’t even sure at first if Leif got a new outfit for chapter 13 or if it was just a different pose, but it’s definitely a different outfit. Or, more accurately, it’s basically his old outfit but tweaked and redesigned to be more ornate and fancy and detailed, which is pretty telling. And I’m pretty sure his 3D model from the Void Poseidon fight was a new one based on his new outfit, which is also just even more additional design work to put into someone who’s currently just an NPC.

I heard that in chapter 9 he was basically given the same sort of internal coding as Albert [like how NPC Zethia in chapter 1 was apparently based on Hildegarde’s data], but I don’t really think he’s going to be a light unit, at least if he does end up as a gala unit. We already have Gala Euden as a gala light sword adventurer, and I don’t think they want to double up on that. I also feel like one way or another Leif is going to be fairly support-based, which would make him overlap with Gala Euden even more if he were a light sword. So I’m just hoping that doesn’t happen.

In the long run I think that his role in combat will be more relevant to the question of which units he’d overlap with, rather than his element/weapon combo. I mean, we could have a purely offensive gala light sword and they wouldn’t actually conflict too much with Gala Euden because they’d do different things. The various changes we’ve gotten to how co-abilities work, and the introduction of unique co-abilities, means it’s not really a big deal to have two units with the same weapon type in a team together so long as they do different things.

Which is also why I don’t want him to be a wind or water element sword unit, either. Gala Ranzal is [kind of] defense-oriented already, and also he just doesn’t deserve to get directly overshadowed by a hypothetical new gala wind sword, lol. And even though Gala Elly is a different weapon type, Leif would definitely conflict with her in practice if he was a support-oriented water unit.

Funnily enough I think him being a shadow element gala sword built around team buffs could work fine, and he wouldn’t really overlap with anyone aside from maybe Patia, but realistically I doubt we’ll get another gala shadow sword so soon after Gala Alex, no matter how different they might be in practice, lol.

So basically due to process of elimination I think I’d want him to be a gala flame sword. On the one hand the idea of a gala flame sword doesn’t really interest me at all, but honestly I think he could be surprisingly interesting and really shake things up if he’s support-oriented. Nearly all of the flame swords we have are pretty much entirely offensive, and nobody uses Karl even though he can technically be used as a support-based flame sword with the right set-up. So I honestly think that Leif could have his own relatively unique niche in the flame meta even if he ends up with such a common element/weapon combo.

There’s also the fact that Volk seems like it’s going to end up being the hardest Agito fight by a substantial degree, so I think it’d make sense to start introducing more flame units designed to let people break into that fight. And from what I know of the Volk meta [from having never actually played eVolk myself, lol], it seems pretty obvious that the big hole in the flame meta at the moment is how H-Lowen is basically the only accepted support unit, and he’s an entirely support-focused unit who does next to nothing to contribute to the team’s DPS. If eVolk and HMS didn’t have unavoidable damage and high difficulty in general, he’d probably lose his place in the meta, which I feel like is kinda already happening as a result of Hawk and Marth’s mana spirals. So I feel like what flame really needs right now, rather than more good DPS units or more good healers, is a support unit who can also contribute to team DPS.

So basically what I want is for Gala Leif to be like a mix of Tobias, Gala Elly, and T-Hope. If he wants to be an alternative/replacement to H-Lowen, he’s going to need at least SOME healing, on top of offensive/defensive buffs. I wouldn’t actually want him to have enough healing to straight up replace H-Lowen as a healer, but if he wants to be an alternative to him then he at least needs enough to deal with stuff like cleansing plague.

In general my basic idea of how I think his kit could work in order to fulfill that role is that he could have an S1 that has a big strength boost and a smaller defense boost [so like a reverse of Patia’s S1], and an ability/chain co-ability that gives Team Healing Doublebuff. Preferably on the level of 5% HP per tick instead of 1% HP per tick like with T-Hope. I think that’d basically be all that he needs to be able to work as a team support unit who can contribute to team DPS while also providing enough healing to deal with plague and recover people from unavoidable damage, even though he wouldn’t be as good of a generalist healer as H-Lowen.

For both Volk and HMS there’s also the issue of interfering with melee baiters, and needing to do ranged baiting for certain moves, so in spite of him being a sword unit, maybe they could give Gala Leif an S2 that gives him a ranged attack stance like Tobias, so he can let the melee units do their thing.

This is all just more or less baseless speculation, but this is just what I’m thinking they could do to address the fact that Volk is the hardest Agito fight, that the support role is the most exclusive and difficult role in that fight, that H-Lowen is basically dead weight DPS-wise who seems to slowly be losing his relevance in the face of 4DPS team comps, and that Emma has basically never been meta for Volk and has become way less important for HMS with how co-abilities work now. So introducing a new gala unit who provides fairly substantial team DPS buffs along with adequate healing seems like it’s exactly what the flame element needs right now. And considering that Gala Alex has poison and buff dispel it’s not exactly impossible that we could get a gala unit designed to work against Volk. It might make more sense for us to get a wind gala unit next to go against Ciella, but I still think that Ciella won’t be as hard as Volk, and wind also already has more in the way of viable support units than flame does at the moment.

The fact that our first gala dragon is also a flame one designed for DPS units, along with Marth getting a super powerful mana spiral, also just makes me think that they’re still trying to address the Volk meta and give people more options for it, so I think it’s reasonable to assume our next gala unit might be designed to address the support/defense part of the flame meta.

It’s worth noting, though, that I’m pretty sure Leif had some sort of team defense buff when he showed up in chapter 9, which is basically the main reason why I’m assuming he’d be a support/defense-based unit rather than an offensive one. Patia also ended up being a team support unit so it’d just make sense if he ended up being kinda similar, lol.

Anyway this was way too many words to just say that I want my boi to finally come home :v

[acdbengal]

Takeaways from Tallahassee — Whole lotta hemp

Whole lotta hemp

Federal progress, pilot projects, new legislation, and recent key state hires clarify that hemp is what’s happening.

Complementing this culmination: The newly launched Florida Hemp Industries Association.

The new association will focus on connecting individuals and companies to the Sunshine State’s burgeoning hemp industry. It’s spearheaded by Jeff Sharkey and Taylor Biehl, two lobbyists who’ve made their dent in the state’s pot landscape — primarily through their Medical Marijuana Business Association.

You got a friend in me: Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried has made it crystal clear she’s a friend of the hemp industry.

Because other positive developments fill the backdrop of the hemp landscape in Florida and beyond, the launch likely couldn’t come at a better time.

Industrial hemp can be modified to produce a negligible amount (less than 1 percent) of THC, the compound known for producing psychotropic effects. Legislation in 2017 allowed universities to research the plant and its viability in Florida. Florida A&M University already has identified seven hemp projects for study.

President Donald Trump in November signed a farm bill that officially removed hemp from the feds’ list of controlled substances, paving the way for broader research programs.

And just this week, Senate Agriculture Chair Ben Albritton, a Wauchula Republican, filed a bill that would create a state hemp program overseen by the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services.

Democratic Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried, meanwhile, has made it crystal clear she’s a friend to the industry. Her newly hired cannabis director Holly Bell also appears eager to direct resources to hemp.

Coming up, the usual assortment of tidbits, leftovers and not-ready-for-prime-time moments by Danny McAuliffe, Drew Wilson, Jim Rosica, Michael Moline, and Peter Schorsch.

But first, the “Takeaway 5” — the Top 5 stories from the week that was:

Take 5

DeSantis acts on school safety — Gov. Ron DeSantis is calling on the state Supreme Court to impanel a grand jury to investigate school districts throughout the state regarding their school safety practices. “The best tool that we have to bring accountability but also move forward in a better way is a petition that I filed today with the Florida Supreme Court for a statewide grand jury,” DeSantis said this week. He hopes the grand jury will have more powerful subpoena power than that held by the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Commission.

DeSantis wants school choice scholarship — DeSantis recently called on the Legislature to create an “Equal Opportunity Scholarship.” The money would help students wishing to attend private and charter schools. DeSantis envisions the scholarship would cover 14,000 students, at about $6,500 apiece. He suggested possibly funding the program through tax credits and tax revenue, though he ultimately is leaving it up to the Legislature to decide. “For me, if the taxpayer is paying for the education, it’s public education,” DeSantis said. “It doesn’t matter if you’re going to the district school that you’re zoned for, or if you’re going to a public magnet or a public charter, if you take the Tax Credit Scholarship to go to a private school, or if you use an ESA for home-school, to me that is all a public commitment to make sure that our kids have the best education.”

Fried hires concealed carry chief — Fried this week tapped Stephen Hurm to oversee the state’s concealed-carry permitting process. Hurm is the husband of former U.S. Rep. Gwen Graham, who competed in the Democratic primary for Governor last year. He will serve as the director of the Division of Licensing at the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services. The division, among other things, screens for and doles out concealed-carry permits. “[Hurm’s] experience implementing successful risk management strategies makes him the careful, competent, and qualified leader the Division needs as we move forward to remedy the past failures,” Fried said. A lawyer, Hurm boasts more than 30 years of experience working with or advising law enforcement, including stints at the Okaloosa County Sheriff’s Office and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. Hurm most recently worked as director and researcher at the Florida State University Institute for Law Enforcement Research and Policy.

House moves pot bill — Following last week’s contested Senate panel hearing of legislation that would permit smokable marijuana for patients, the House this week discussed its own version of a bill that seeks to accomplish the same. The House Health & Human Services Committee forwarded the bill, which would require smokable marijuana to be sold as a pre-made, filtered cigarette in Florida. The Senate’s current version of the legislation requires a patient to get a second opinion before he or she could get medicinal cannabis for smoking. DeSantis has given the Legislature a March 15 deadline to pass legislation allowing patients to smoke the medicine.

Arming teachers gets momentum — The Senate Education Committee in a party-line vote forwarded a bill that in part would allow public teachers to carry firearms. The legislation (SPB 7030) was approved 5-3 by the panel. The bill was modeled off recommendations from the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Commission, a fact-finding panel created to study best security practices following the attack last year. The measure picked up support from Republicans, while Democrats voted against it.

Instagram of the Week

‪The best mascot in the land is @rockyd_bull ! Thank you for your support in Tallahassee too! #USFDATC #makinglifebetter #hornsup #GoBulls ‬#rocky #mascot #greenandgold

A post shared by USF Health (@usfhealth) on Feb 14, 2019 at 3:26am PST

Moody highlights progress on rape kit backlog

Attorney General Ashley Moody thinks there’s an end in sight for the state’s backlog of untested sexual assault kits.

Pointing to a report from the Florida Department of Law Enforcement that showed 7,137 were tested by the end of 2018, Moody called the progress “encouraging news.”

An end is in sight: Atty. Gen. Ashley Moody says there’s been headway in reducing the number of untested rape kits the state has in backlog. Image via TCPalm.

“I want to thank the Florida Department of Law Enforcement for their hard work and great progress to eliminate the backlog of previously unprocessed sexual assault kits,” Moody said, while also giving kudos to her predecessor Pam Bondi.

During the 2016 Legislative Session, Bondi worked alongside the Legislature to secure $2.3 million for testing, along with other related expenditures.

Israel hearing update

Lawyers for DeSantis and suspended Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel will convene in Tallahassee this week for a case management conference ahead of Israel’s Senate hearing.

According to public notice, that means Senate Special Master Dudley Goodlette will discuss with counsel “scheduling of the prehearing conference, hearing, and any matters arising during the case management conference that require scheduling.”

Israel’s day in ‘court:’ Suspended Sheriff Scott Israel is preparing for his Senate hearing, with a management conference hearing this week. Image via the South Florida Sun-Sentinel.

The meeting is set for 1 p.m. on Tuesday in Room 401 of the Senate Office Building.

DeSantis suspended Israel shortly after taking office last month. The Republican Governor replaced Israel with former Coral Springs Police Sgt. Greg Tony.

Israel has requested a hearing from the Senate.

Guardian follow-up

Lawmakers are expected to address some significant changes to the school guardian program put forth by the state last year.

Sponsoring one under-the-radar change is state Sen. Darryl Rouson, a St. Petersburg Democrat. The bill (SB 136) would include school guardians in the state’s false personation statute.

Punishing imposters: Darryl Rouson is looking for harsher punishment for people who impersonate a school guardian. Image via Colin Hackley.

If signed into law, it would make impersonating a school guardian a third-degree felony.

The measure picked up swift and unanimous support in the Senate Criminal Justice Committee earlier this week.

AFP-Florida awards Ocala lawmaker

Members of Americans for Prosperity-Florida this week paid a visit to state Rep. Stan McClain to thank him for his free-market policymaking.

The reason: He’s the latest recipient of the organization’s Champion of Economic Freedom Award.

Free-market champion: Stan McClain has been honored by Americans for Prosperity-Florida, earning an A+ on last year’s scorecard.

McClain, an Ocala Republican, earned top marks (A+) on last AFP-Florida’s 2018 scorecard. The organization, a liberty-minded think tank, grades lawmakers each year.

“I appreciate this recognition and the good work AFP-Florida does,” said McClain. “There’s no question that prosperity and economic opportunity could quickly be short-circuited with the wrong policies in place.

“It’s an honor for me to support legislation that keeps government in check and allows the free market to flourish, and I look forward to continuing to work with AFP-Florida and other like-minded folks as we head into the 2019 Session.”

McClain recently was selected to serve as a deputy majority whip in the Florida House.

FDOT’s Daytona 500 message

Heading to Daytona Beach this weekend? The Florida Department of Transportation wants you to take advantage and notice the extra messaging made available for one of the city’s premier events, the Daytona 500.

“Extra signage will be in place along various roadsides to help with wayfinding,” said a news release from the state agency. “In addition, real-time traffic information will appear on overhead dynamic message signs and be communicated on FL511, as well as other traffic apps, including Waze.”

A day at the races: The FDOT is making sure anyone can find the Daytona International Speedway, without having to listen for the roar of the engines.

The agency is working with event staff, law enforcement and local officials to manage traffic before, during and after the NASCAR event.

“Drivers are urged to watch for pedestrians and allow plenty of time for travel,” continued the release. “Safety doesn’t happen by accident.”

The race begins at 2:30 p.m. on Sunday.

DEO extends application deadline for Irma relief

Floridians facing housing issues resulting from Hurricane Irma will have more time to apply for federal assistance this year.

The Florida Department of Economic Opportunity said this week that it is extending the deadline to Mar. 29 to register for Rebuild Florida, a long-term recovery pool backed by $350 million in federal funding.

Rebuild Florida “helps repair, rebuild or replace damaged homes,” said a news release from DEO. Communities eligible for funding are highlighted here.

No time like the present: The Florida DEO is extending the application for Rebuild Florida, a long term recovery pool backed by federal funding for hurricane Irma damage.

Priority is given to “those low-income residents who are elderly, disabled, families with children under the age of 18 or persons displaced from Puerto Rico or the U.S. Virgin Islands who are permanently resettling in Florida as a result of Hurricane Irma or Maria,” the release added.

“We have extended the Rebuild Florida registration deadline to allow as many homeowners as possible to register for assistance, and I encourage anyone who still has damage from Hurricane Irma to visit RebuildFlorida.gov to get help,” said Ken Lawson, executive director of DEO.

Florida Housing to help first-time homebuyers

The private-public Florida Housing Finance Corporation is again launching a federal program that helps finance down payments and other closing costs for first-time homebuyers.

The Florida Hardest-Hit Fund Down Payment Assistance Program will start on March 4.

Floridians in Clay, Duval, Hillsborough, Osceola and Pasco counties will be eligible to receive assistance. The program provides up to $15,000 in aid for first-time homebuyers. It’s forgivable over five years.

The program initially launched in 2010, in the aftermath of the housing bubble burst.

“Statistics show that foreclosures have drastically decreased in Florida and that our state has recovered from the housing crisis,” said Trey Price, executive director of Florida Housing. “This funding will further assist with the continued stabilization of recovering, distressed neighborhoods.”

Enterprise Florida chief attends AT&T ribbon-cutting

Enterprise Florida CEO Jamal Sowell recently participated in the unveiling of the newly renovated AT&T call center in Sunrise.

And as the head of the state’s job agency, Sowell had good reason to be there. It used to house just 40 call center employees. But now nearly 475 call center agents and managers work in the 104,000 square-foot building.

Enterprise Florida CEO Jamal Sowell helps cut the ribbon of a newly remodeled AT&T call center in Sunrise. Image via the South Florida Business Journal.

AT&T expects to add another 200 jobs in the building by the end of this year after another phase of the project is completed.

“Any city in any state would welcome the opportunity to create more than 600 jobs in their community and welcome a state-of-the-art call center,” Sowell said. “This call center is a direct result of Florida’s elected leaders passing good public policies that encourage investment in our state.”

AT&T Florida President Joe York and Sunrise Mayor Mike Ryan joined Sowell at the ribbon-cutting ceremony.

Audubon highlights Gulf restoration projects

A 90-page report from Audubon Florida identifies some projects and programs that would help restore the Gulf of Mexico.

Included in the report: a recommended investment of more than $1.7 billion for such efforts.

“The challenges are huge, but we have an enormous opportunity to save much of the Gulf Coast for both birds and people,” said David Yarnold, president and CEO of National Audubon Society. “We can’t afford to blow this.”

Don’t blow it: National Audubon Society CEO David Yarnold recommends an investment of more than $1.7 billion to help restore the Gulf of Mexico.

Audubon Florida, the state branch of the organization, “identified critical priorities in the Sunshine State to confront challenges including a changing climate, sea level rise, and harmful algal blooms,” said a news release.

“Restoring and acquiring the places in this plan will provide refuge to rare and imperiled bird species while mitigating for the impacts of a changing climate,” said Julie Wraithmell, executive director of Audubon Florida.

The report, “Audubon’s Vision: Restoring the Gulf of Mexico for Birds and People,” can be viewed online here.

Justice reformers to screen ‘The Sentence’

The Project on Accountable Justice and FAMM will host a movie screening of HBO’s “The Sentence” at 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday at the Challenger Learning Center in Tallahassee.

An IMDB summary describes the 2018 documentary as an “intimate portrait of mandatory minimum drug sentencing’s devastating consequences.”

Cindy Shank is featured in the HBO film ‘The Sentence,’ which examines the devastating effects of mandatory minimum sentences. Image via Getty/Time magazine.

All interested media are welcome to attend.

Afterward, a panel of leading experts will discuss criminal justice reform. They include State Sen. Jeff Brandes, FSU visiting law professor Carla Laroche, Butterfly Life Journeys Founder Patricia B. McCray, Freedom Partners chairman Mark Holden, and FAMM fellow Matthew Charles.

Some lawmakers, including Brandes, are hoping to pass significant sentencing reform this year through the Florida First Step Act.

Stay together for the kids?

New research from Florida State University suggests family shake-ups might not have a long-term influence on child behavior.

A study led by criminology professor Kevin Beaver found that family changes — namely divorce — can impact a child’s criminal behavior immediately, but such an effect will fade.

FSU criminology professor Kevin Beaver says that family changes (particularly divorce) could have a short-term effect on criminal behavior, but fades with time. Image via FSU.

“Essentially what we found is divorce, broken families or blended families might be detrimental for the child in the here and now, but that impact may erode over time,” Beaver said. “It might not have this long-term effect.”

By reviewing data from another study, researchers discovered that divorce and moving in with a stepfamily did not have a significant impact on a child’s delinquency over time.

Divorce did have a significant, but temporary impact on delinquency, although “we didn’t find substantial changes in criminal behavior in late adolescence or adulthood,” Beaver noted.

Desloge named to FEMA panel

Leon County Commissioner Bryan Desloge was recently selected to serve a three-year term on the Federal Emergency Management Agency National Advisory Council.

The 35-member panel advises FEMA “on all aspects of emergency management to ensure input from and coordination with state, local, tribal and territorial governments, as well as the private sector,” said a news release from the county.

Safe and resilient: Leon Commissioner Bryan Desloge was selected to serve on the FEMA National Advisory Council.

“There is no higher priority than protecting our citizens before, during, and after disaster, and this FEMA committee will have a direct role in shaping policies and practices to keep everyone safe and resilient,” Desloge said.

Desloge will focus on closing the “all-hazards insurance gap for renter policies” and bettering code enforcement as a member of the Federal Insurance and Mitigation Subcommittee. His term lasts until May 2021.

If you’re not at the table …

Andrew “Andy” Reiss is updating the lunch menu at Andrew’s restaurant.

Folks in The Process frequent the downtown Tallahassee locale. Some are fortunate enough to have menu items named after them.

You know you’ve really made it when there’s an entrée named after you. Photo via AP.

Coming soon: Dishes taking the namesake of Gov. DeSantis and Tallahassee Mayor John Dailey, among potential other changes.

“This year’s edition includes new names or titles, including Gov. Ron DeSantis’ DeLicious Salad Bar Buffet and Mayor Dailey’s Caprese Burger,” said a news release.

Cabinet members, legislators, and other city and state officials are expected to join Reiss to unveil the menu at 11 a.m. on Tuesday.

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[junker-town]

Derek Barnett is one move away from NFL greatness

Retired NFL defensive end Stephen White says the Tennessee pass rusher could end up being one of the most productive in the draft this year, with just one more move in his tool kit.

At the end of my breakdown of Myles Garrett I mentioned Derek Barnett, whom I had occasion to watch lot of because I played for Tennessee and therefore still follow the team. I didn't watch most of his games live the last two years because I thought I was a jinx for awhile. I would DVR the games and watch them the next morning.

And maybe, at times, I take these kinds of things way too seriously. [Shrugs]

I will say that after I stopped watching live my quality of life improved tremendously. My blood pressure was lower, and I was in a much better mood overall from week to week. I don't think I'm ever going to go back to watching the games live so long as Butch Jones is still the coach.

But, I digress.

Barnett was one of the few projected first-round picks who I was already pretty familiar with. I had seen repeatedly what this guy was capable of doing since he was a freshman.

However, there's still a huge difference between watching the day after a game for my own edification and actually breaking down the tape to assess Barnett's potential as an NFL prospect. So I was looking forward to seeing how my perception of Barnett's skills might change after taking a closer look.

Barnett's ability to bend as he turned the corner as a pass rusher is special, possibly better than Garrett's as I said in that breakdown. As they are wont to do, folks took issue with that statement, so I decided to start this breakdown off by showing my work, so to speak. Here’s Barnett hitting that gangster lean as he wins an edge rush.

And a few more: Against Alabama, Florida and Texas A&M.

You folks who were big mad after you read the Garrett breakdown, can we touch and agree that I was actually right, at least about Barnett's lean and keep it moving?

I'll tell you straight out that I prefer Barnett to Garrett as a football player. However, I can definitely see why some talent evaluators may favor Garrett as a prospect because when you look at his combine workout and his measurables, Garrett's ceiling is sky high. Barnett's workout numbers weren't quite as impressive.

But when I watched Barnett's tape his performance made me catch the holy ghost a few times (if you are Southern and/or country you will definitely get this reference). I never got the same feeling watching Garrett.

Do I think that Barnett is a "perfect" prospect? I wouldn't go that far.

There are a few things that I think he could improve on in the NFL that could make him into an even more dominant player. Things that he really needs to work on if he wants to become a superstar on the next level.

He needs to develop a better second inside move.

Barnett’s situation reminds me of a guy we had here in Tampa by the name of Stylez White, no relation (Uncle Rukus voice). Stylez had a real knack for turning the corner even though he wasn't blazing fast. The problem was that Stylez only had a hump move as a counter, and it’s hard as hell to try to win with a hump move repeatedly. He never developed a second counter-inside move, and I believe it held him back during his career.

Barnett has one decent inside move. I call it a reach through, where Barnett takes two steps upfield, swats the tackles' hand as he steps inside with his inside foot, and reaches through on a quick arm over with his outside arm around the elbow of the tackle's inside arm and steps through with his outside foot.

He may not have the same kind of success with that move in the pros because it works best after you force the tackle to start bailing, looking for a speed rush. Barnett won a lot with his edge rushes in college with good get off, hip turn, hand work and lean, but not with straight speed. And it’s usually that crazy speed that gets NFL tackles bailing out. Even if Barnett is good winning around the edge (and I think he will be), that doesn't mean he will get tackles to jump out enough to open themselves up to that kind of quick inside move.

He needs to develop a late spin as a counter-move to his speed rushes. Here’s why.

When he realizes he can't beat a tackle around the corner and is about to get pushed deep, opening up lanes for the quarterback to scramble, he can dip with his inside shoulder to get the tackle to lurch forward and step through with his inside foot to set up the pivot. Then, he can push off his outside foot and swing his outside arm around to give him the momentum he needs to finish the spin by using his outside elbow to knock the tackle by and to keep him upright so Barnett can have a clean win at or near the level of the quarterback.

Was that confusing at all? It's much easier for me to show a guy how to do a late spin move than is to explain it.

If he can develop an inside spin move, it will force left tackles to play him honest instead of bailing out to make it harder for him to turn the corner.

Right now, Barnett's spin moves are hot garbage.

The one spin move I saw that did work was when Barnett faked inside and then spun back outside. That's a move I used in the pros — ask Kurt Warner — so I have to say I was impressed.

The key to a spin move working well is selling a speed rush at first. That means everything has to look like a speed rush to the tackle.

It was blatant that Barnett was spinning away before he ever planted with the inside foot. He was just going through the motions of a speed rush to try to get to the spinning part of the move.

That’s a common mistake for young defensive linemen. I was blessed to be able to watch guys like Chuck Smith and Todd Kelly do spin moves the correct way while I was in college and learn from watching them kill fools while I was still riding the bench. With just a little bit of coaching, Barnett could end up being great at it.

(Somebody tell him that Chuck Smith, another fellow #VFL, is an excellent teacher of spin moves.)

If Barnett can get that late spin move down, most NFL tackles are going to have a helluva time trying to block him one-on-one. With the late spin, he can get clean wins against blockers. Quarterbacks will end up drifting into his waiting arms thinking he is way upfield and no longer a threat.

Without it, his coaches will be pulling their hair out watching him running 10 yards upfield while the quarterback is breaking the pocket and slicing up the secondary. Aaron Rodgers would be licking his chops!

I can't say that for sure if someone will teach him that. There are a lot more shitty defensive line coaches in the NFL than most folks want to admit. He has the physical tools to easily come up with a better counter move, but I’m not going to take it for granted that he will. I have to hold that as a knock against him ... for now.

Stop jumping offsides

I am also concerned about some of the offsides penalties Barnett committed, but only because once I got to the pros Rod Marinelli didn't allow us to jump offsides.

He drilled it into us every day to get a "credit card" alignment with the football and to get off without guessing. I'm not going to say that Barnett was definitely guessing snap counts a lot, as many of his best rushes came on the road, but that's usually what jumping offsides a lot points to.

On the flip side I do know that not every defensive line coach is Rod Marinelli, so for them jumping offsides a few times might not be that big of a deal. Especially if you are getting more than your fair share of sacks and pressures on other plays and forcing the offensive tackles to commit false starts from time to time as well.

Both of those requirements apply to Barnett in the games that I watched.

For most teams, his jumping offsides will be a small issue, not a huge knock. I know from experience that with a good defensive line coach its something he can correct in short order.

That is about the extent of my complaints about Barnett's tape, however. The kid is pretty damned good, otherwise.

What position should Barnett play?

Well, there is one other thing, but I'm not exactly sure that it’s a knock. I'm not 100 percent sure what Barnett's best position would be, mostly because I see a diverse skill set.

He has shorter arms at 32 1/8 inches, but he also plays with very good hand technique and with good leverage. I'm not sure how many reps Barnett is going to put up with 225 on the bar, if he ever actually does it, but you can see the kid has enough strength to get the job done in the trenches.

I saw him line up in a six technique over tight ends, and he did a good job with that. He does not play afraid. Barnett will definitely stick his nose in there when a kickout block or a puller is coming his way, and he stands his ground against base blocks. I'm not worried about him as a run defender at all, no matter where you put him on the edge.

In contrast with Garrett, Barnett played with a whoooole lotta dog in him too, which also gives him an edge.

The question is where would Barnett be most beneficial as a pass rusher, because make no mistake, pass rushing is his top selling point. If he goes somewhere with a smart DC who will put him in positions to exploit matchups, I don't think there's any question that Barnett could be a consistent double-digit sack guy. At the end of the day Barnett is just a really good football player. He is going to make plays, but in the right system he could make a lot more of them.

I was thinking about another guy whose film I really liked coming out, whose tape also clearly showed to me that he was just a really good football player. A guy who I wasn't quite sure where he would play as a pro, but thought was going to end up being very productive.

That player was Trey Flowers, a second-year player who had seven sacks during the regular season and 2.5 sacks as the unofficial MVP for the Patriots in the Super Bowl.

It’s crazy how similar Flowers' workout numbers and physical dimensions were to Barnett's, except for Flower's superb 36.5-inch vertical.

I don't think Barnett will end up being used inside as much as Flowers, but if a team does decide to do that, Barnett can handle it.

I lean towards Barnett as an outside linebacker who lines up primarily on the left side. My Vols certainly had him dropping enough to show that he has the ability to do that.

And hell, he even had a few really nice breaks on the football.

I could also see Barnett as a left defensive end in a 4-3 attacking style defense, who maybe kicks inside some on passing downs. It just dawned on me earlier how appropriate it was that Barnett broke Reggie White's career sack record at Tennessee rushing from left defensive end (where Reggie spent most of his Hall of Fame professional career). He only played 10 reps there in the games that I watched.

I'm not sure about Barnett being a good pass rusher inside, because everything happens faster in there. I haven't seen him do it with my eyes in the five games that I re-watched, but I wouldn't put it past him to be good at it, either.

Here's a secret: guys who show themselves to be good football players on tape tend to end up doing well on the next level. I don't care what their 40 time is or how high they jump. Those things matter, but good tape is always going to take precedent. Barnett has been balling since day one at Tennessee. He had 10 sacks as a freshman and has only gotten better since then.

Barnett stacks up against the best of the best

Hell, most of Barnett's success has come against SEC competition, not cupcakes. I watched him against four SEC teams and Nebraska, good competition for this breakdown. Remember when I talked about expecting Wisconsin left tackle Ryan Ramczyk to make good college pass rushers ordinary? Barnett made good college left tackles look average at best.

I hear Alabama's left tackle is supposed to be pretty good.

Barnett beat him for a sack, too.

Cam Robinson is apparently the best left tackle that the SEC has to offer in the draft this year — maybe the best left tackle in the draft period — to hear folks tell it. Barnett still gave him the business.

Even when teams were scheming to double Barnett, knowing that he was one of the only consistent playmakers for Tennessee, he still had at least one sack in each of the five games I watched.

Bruh.

Bruhhhhhhhhhhh.

Barnett’s biggest game

You could throw away all of the other games, but that bowl game against Nebraska? That was a first-round type performance.

Both Nebraska and Tennessee were well aware of the fact that Barnett was one sack away from breaking Reggie's record.

During the game it seemed like the Cornhuskers were more concerned with keeping Barnett from breaking the sack record against them than actually moving the ball or scoring on offense.

I can't really blame them considering how out of his mind Barnett played that game.

And Barnett still went out there and found a way to get a sack — really two, but he was robbed earlier in the game (Nebraska 6:21) — in the fourth quarter to both help seal the win and break the record. He also did it rushing from a side that he rarely rushed from. All this after he spent all day fighting against double teams and chip blocks.

Hell, look at the replay.

The right guard is trying like hell to help the right tackle, and the right tackle himself was trying to grab Barnett. All to no avail. Barnett was just too damn good for them both.

I'm pretty sure Barnett's wallet says "Bad Mother Fucker" on it.

In that bowl game, I had Barnett with:

The sack and the sack and caused fumble that they robbed him of earlier in the game.

Eight pressures (!)

Five other tackles.

Five other plays where I thought his effort was just outstanding.

Maybe Garrett had a game that was just as impressive, but I can't go by something I didn't see with my own two eyes.

And maybe it doesn't mean much to you, but seeing the whole Tennessee team go out to celebrate with Barnett showed me just how much his teammates love and respect him. I want guys who others gravitate to; that's Barnett all day long.

In closing, yes I get it that Garrett has a lot more potential and upside than Barnett because of his athletic ability and size. I'm just telling you don't be surprised if three years from now Barnett is having the better career, barring injury. There is also a good chance that Barnett is more ready to be a productive pass rusher right off the bat than Garrett.

There's no guarantees, but that's one way I could definitely see things going.

I think Jonathan Allen is a better prospect than both of them, but as far as pure edge rushers, the team you root for could do a lot worse than drafting Derek Barnett in the first round.

A lot worse!

Since I don't have access to all-22 for college football games I use the next best thing for my draft profiles and go to Draft Breakdown where they the TV copy of a bunch of top prospects' already cut up and ready to go. Also their site is compatible with the new NoHuddle app which turns your cell phone into a "cowboy clicker" which is pretty damn neat. For the purposes of this breakdown I watched Tennessee edge rusher Derek Barnett play against Florida, Georgia, Texas A&M, Alabama, and Nebraska. Those represented the fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh (before the off week) and thirteenth games on Tennessee's schedule last season, respectively.

[motleymoose]

Homecoming Pt. 3: Bits & Pieces Ch. 1

Chapter 1 Ashes in a Vacuum

Fandom: The Mandalorian, Star Wars Characters: The Mandalorain (Din Djarin), Gender Neutral Reader, The Child Words: 2.5k+ Warnings: Injury, Angst, A whole lotta attitude

Summary:

I AM ALL SORTS OF ANGRY AT THAT FRAGGING BUCKETHEAD!!! He's leaving me with more questions than I have the ability to ask, and I don't like it one bit.

But dang, that little greenie is cute!

Notes:

Heya! Thank y'all for reading!!! I'm not sure how many chapters this part is gonna have, so??? We're coming up on the halfway point of the story. Maybe my editing skills will improve by then (ha).

(See the end of the work for more notes.)

Homecoming Masterlist

The way everything hurt, I was sure I was dying.

Squinting at the dim, fuzzy gray light of my bunk, I ran an internal diagnostics check. With every little wiggle and flex of an appendage, I gradually realized that I was not, in fact, dying, but I wasn’t in prime fighting shape either. Slowly, gingerly, I scrubbed sleep from my burning eyes with the heels of my palms, my vision spotty and fuzzy in places. It felt good to let them linger, pressing heavily into the closed eyelids and relieving the pressure built up behind my eyeballs. As killer headaches went, the one I was experiencing in that moment wasn’t the worst I’d ever had, but that didn’t mean it didn’t hurt like doshing kung.

Now that I was sorta awake, I took physical stock of my body. My eyes still wouldn’t clear, the large flecks of gray shadow swimming lazily in my periphery, so I used touch to see what was going on. Letting my hands do the work, I started with my head, running my fingers lightly down my neck to my shoulders and chest. Something felt off about the shape of my body as I continued to scan downwards to my hips. Foggy memories swirled inside my head, screaming and pain and choking smoke. A jumbled mess of noise and smells overpowered everything else, and the bits and pieces of the fight and flight from Bosph scattered nervously into the darker recesses of my brain.

Frustrated, I sat up, ignoring the sharp tug at the pit of my elbow and the violent, painful thumping rattling my brain. “Fragging buckethead,” I hissed through clenched teeth. He had got me in this mess. Sure, it was my fault for getting a bounty put on me, but if only he’d listened to me in the first place, we coulda avoided Bosph entirely. The anger, bitter and sparkling and pulsing red, numbed the headache and the bruises slightly. And as the ire rose, so too did the functionality of my brain.

I could focus now on what my hands had been trying to tell me: all of my possessions, from my boots to my jumpsuit and everything in between or tucked into pockets, was gone. A worn coarseweave tunic hung from my curved shoulders, the sleeves neatly rolled up around my biceps, and a newer looking pair of long johns, the baggy legs bunched around my knees, had replaced my utilitarian and well-loved apparel.

Oh Mother of Kwath! Had the Mandalorian undressed me?! I mean, I was an adult. He was an adult. And apparently I had been injured enough to warrant such an invasion of privacy. Still, I couldn’t fight the blush burning brightly across my chest and face.

So doshing uncomfortable.

Nope, nope, nope. Didn’t want to think about it anymore.

Pushing down all of the humiliation and trauma and apprehension until the feelings were little more than an annoying itch under my skin, I allowed the rage to take over a little more. It was easier to be angry than to feel anything else, the outrage a warming presence in my chilly body. It also gave me the little boost of courage for what I had to do next.

Screwing my eyes shut, incredibly unprepared for the worst possible outcome, I touched the place under my collarbone where my silver skull pendant rested, a solid, reassuring weight...

Nothing.

Instead of skin-warmed metal, I was met with warm, padded resistance. Peering into the neck of the tunic, I found a thick, dull-colored wrap encasing my midsection from under my armpits to my hip bones. It smelled of the sea on a warm summer’s day, and I wrinkled my nose automatically. Bacta. Whatever injury I had sustained must’ve been bad enough to call for the precious, oftentimes expensive goo. The wrap wasn’t so tight as to constrict breathing or some movements, but it wasn’t exactly comfortable either.

The physical uncomfortableness brought me back to the question of why the bounty hunter was keeping me alive, but just like all the other feelings, I ignored it. I needed to find my clothes, my necklace. Get dressed. Leave this beautiful ship and her tyrant pilot behind and become a krill farmer out on the Outer Rim.

Well, probably not a farmer. A droid mech, perhaps.

The soft skin on the inside of my elbow twinged again, pulling me out of my daydreams as I reached for the blanket covering the lower half of my body. A thin, clear tube snaked from a needle inserted into a vein to a nearly-empty pouch hanging from a hook in the bunk wall. Fumbling, my fingernails worked their way underneath the sticky medical tape, peeling up an edge wide enough to pinch. I ripped the tape from my arm, gritting as it pulled hair and skin with it. Once the tape was gone, I slid the needle out of my arm with a hiss, tossing it aside to leak between the cot and the bunk wall. Whatever cocktail of drugs the bounty hunter had mixed into the IV, he’d probably added a good dose of sedative to keep me down for the count. That would’ve explained the fogginess.

And it made me so mad.

I let the full-blown, all-consuming fury in, jerking the coarseweave blanket off of me and freeing my legs. Exhaling forcefully, I tested my injured knee, poking at the matching bacta bandage. The original searing-white agony I had experienced on Bosph was muted now, less of a screaming torment and more of a dull throbbing. Healed enough to put weight on. Hopefully

Groaning and cursing at stiff muscles and bucketheaded hunters respectively, I wriggled on the bed until my bare feet skimmed the floor. The cold steel of the hull platform sent shivers through my flesh, feeding the annoyance and anger and frustration. I inhaled, steadying myself for the shooting pain sure to follow standing on both legs. Pleasantly astonished as I was that it didn’t hurt too horribly, I wasn’t prepared for the lightheadedness. The blood rushed from my face, my vision blackening around the edges.

“Oh frag,” I managed to croak before slumping to the floor in an unconscious heap. --------------- I awoke, some time later, inside my bunk. The coarseweave blanket was tucked firmly beneath my chin, the IV reinserted into my arm, and my red-hot rage completely dissipated. An imposing, blurry figure stood at the foot of the bunk, and I took my time adjusting myself from lying flat to reclining, eyes tightly shut to avoid the spinning shadows. Once I was comfortable, I cracked an eyelid. The Mandalorian’s blurred steely stare greeted me, a clear bag of liquid over one arm and a sling supporting the other.

“You’re awake,” he stated matter of factly.

“D-Didn’t want to give you the satisfaction of travelling in silence,” I replied dryly, voice husky with disuse. “By the way, where’s my jumpsuit?” I opened my eyes all the way, blinking rapidly to dispel the fog coating them. It didn’t work.

The bounty hunter harrumphed softly. “Incinerated. You had a fractured knee, two broken ribs and a blaster wound to the stomach. Plus severe retinal damage and dehydration. You’re lucky you even made it off-planet.” He angled his visor away from me to tap out something on his vembrace.

“Wait, what?”

He tilted his visor towards me and put it simply. “You almost died.”

I feebly waved the non-IVed hand in front of my face. “No, not that. Did you say you incinerated all of my stuff?!”

Ignoring me, per his style, he continued to tap on his vembrace’s control panel.

Devastated, depressed and not a little bit murderous, I glowered squintily at him. I was reeling inwardly, but on the outside I was colder than carbonite.

As he ignored me, I studied him as closely as my recovering vision would allow. I could tell there was something different in his appearance, but it took a moment for me to recognize what it was . A softer quality to his edges that I couldn’t quite understand, his body looking less defined, less bulky than normal. I blinked several times to refocus, and was rewarded with infinitesimally better vision.

“Where’s your armor, shabuir?” I sniped. I may have been more than a little miffed that all of my worldly possessions were now ash and lumps of twisted metal, and biting at a Mandalorian was a temporarily soothing balm to my aching heart.

The hunter reached over me and unhooked the empty bacta IV bag from a rod above my head, replacing it with the one he’d brought. Adjusting the solution valve, he tapped the drip chamber twice before turning his attention back to me. “There’s a spare jumpsuit in the ‘fresher. Keep the bacta wrap on for another hour, at least.” As an afterthought, he added, “We’ll be on Nevarro in a few days.” A frown tainted his voice. “Stay out of my way ‘til then.” Spinning on his heel, he marched to the ladder and disappeared onto the upper deck.

………

It took about twelve hours for me to feel well enough to rid myself of the IV and bacta wraps and get out of the bunk without having the ship buck underneath me like a wild bluurg. I took that time to cry myself to sleep, wake up and cry some more. The loss of my tools and kit was a huge blow to my self-worth, but the loss of the pendant, well. It was the only piece I had left of a life full of fear and hunger and love; it connected me to home. If I didn’t have that, where did I belong?

It took another three hours for me to get up the nerve to get cleaned and dressed. I prowled around the cargo hold, poking and prodding at the carbonite storage, the control panels and the refresher. There hadn’t been much of a chance on my earlier voyages to explore, so with the Mandalorian occupied guiding the ship through hyperspace, I felt emboldened to figure out more about him. Not that there was much to glean from my investigation; the hold contained only the basics of survival for deep space travel, and weapons. Lots of weapons.

Oh, and several beings in what looked to be forced-stasis, frozen in carbonite.

Shivering in sympathy for my hold companions, I turned and shuffled back to the bunk. What I really had hoped to find was the incinerator - most ships kept them below near the back for easy dispatch of trash - but I hadn’t found hide nor hair of one below deck. It could’ve been located above. Not exactly the safest or most pleasant location, yet with all the fire power and carbonite in the hold, it kinda made sense. No need to put three dangerous elements all in one place, if you had the room.

A little voice at the back of my head reminded me of something else: that fragging Mando had all but ordered me to stay put. If he thought for one second that I was going to listen to him, he had another thing coming. I held no ill-will against Mandalorians in general, but this one was getting on my bad side. First arresting me and then almost getting me killed and then destroying the only thing I had left of home reminded me that I only had myself to rely on, that everyone else was out to either disappoint me or kill me.

I’d be doshed if I was going to let that buckethead dictate what I could and couldn’t do, especially since he was the one who took me off that Maker-forsaken moon in the first place.

Especially since he handed me over to Mihcas without an apology.

And took my pendant and tools to boot.

Ascending the ladder turned out to be a formidable feat in my weakened condition, but I prevailed. It took more effort than it should have, and I collapsed onto the cool steel platform once I made it all the way up.

“What are you doing?” The modulated baritone came from my right. Swiveling my head, I watched as the bounty hunter stomped out of the captain’s quarters, a bundle of clothes clutched to his chest and fingers unsurprisingly reaching for his blaster. Whatever was in the bundle must have been precious, for he shifted it away from me to his injured arm. It obviously still hurt; he held the bundle in the crook of his elbow, awkwardly bent and trembling with effort.

Good.

Rage flared in my chest, licking its way up like flames and leaving a red mask pounding behind my eyes. Pushing the anger away, I clambered up to my feet. I was going to get answers, and I’d be fragged if I was going to show emotion in front of him.

“Where’s the incinerator?” I spat savagely. So much for not showing any emotion.

Obviously taken aback by my vehemence and bluntness, he cocked his helmet and pulled his hand from his blaster, resting it casually on his belt buckle. “Why?”

Simple enough question, simple enough answer. But I didn’t feel like answering him. Opening my mouth to respond, a cooing sound interrupted me. It sounded like it was coming from the bundle still shielded in his injured arm.

Snapping my jaw shut with a painfully audible click, I raised my eyebrows pointedly at him. “Trafficking something illegal there, chakaar?” Anxiety clenched my stomach in its viselike grip, and I had to force the bile from rising in my throat. I was still weak from Bosph, but if he was buying and selling living beings to make a living, he was no better than my ex-boss. No better than me. Which meant I was going to have to hurt him or die trying.

A sharp hiss of an inhale through the vocoder told me I’d hit on something. Something he didn’t want me knowing. A whispery stream of very impolite Mando’a floated in the space between us. The air was thick with tension, and both of us were patiently waiting for the other to make the next move.

The coo came again, slightly muffled, followed by a bubbly giggle, startling us out of our stare-down. The bundle wriggled, and the Mandalorian shifted his attention from me to it as the thing became too much to handle with one injured arm. Grunting either out of pain or frustration, the bounty hunter stepped backwards until he was in the doorway of the bunk. Squeaking and chittering indignantly, the lump in the clothes broke free with a victorious huff.

And it was the cutest fragging thing I’d ever laid my eyes on.

_____________________

Notes:

chakaar - corpse robber, thief, petty criminal - general term of abuse shabuir - extreme insult - *jerk*, but much stronger