#i'd make this set in the gffa but i know about as much about star wars food

[absolxguardian]

After I made a post asking for fic recs that aren't setting aus, and generally being frustrated going into ao3 fandom tags and seeing so many setting aus, I thought about why I don't like them. The answer isn't relevant, but I did realize one setting AU for Ted Lasso I'd read the fuck out: Star Wars (probably because it's my main special interest).

Except I'm not interested in a fic where the cast are Jedi or something. Instead, I'm thinking about one where Ted is a coach for Outer Rim grav-ball (space American football)- perhaps for the Academy of Applied Sciences on Lothal (I'm just saying that because the children's chapter book that is half a high school sports book is set there. I know this would made Ted more comparable to a high school football coach, but ages for secondary and tertiary education in the galaxy is weird) who gets hired to coach a professional Core grav-ball team (space European football).

And this fic would really work by exploring the changes caused by the different societal norms between the gffa and our world. Homophobia? Nonexistent. Sexism? Also gone, which would change Rebecca and Rubert's dynamic. And sports aren't gender segregated. Mental health stigma? Honestly probably worse than current times given its unclear how prevalent therapists are in the galaxy.

But the big change would be that Ted goes from being an American expat to someone moving within the same nation that has a massive urban/rural divide as well as provincialism. His accent would be something people would discriminate against him for.

It would make things pretty dark, tbh, I think setting it during the Empire would be the best. Ted goes to work in the Core not just because he needs time away from Michelle, but because something doesn't feel right with AppSci becoming an Imperial feeder school and the new Athletics director is a racist ass.

The story would become about what you're supposed to do when you're just trying to be a semi-regular person within growing fascism. I think Ted would eventually snap and join the Rebellion (probably with a good portion of the main characters). There's the blockade and presumable communications blackout of Lothal, new policies banning aliens from professional sports, and probably one of his star players gets kidnapped by the Empire because they're force sensitive (there would be a higher than average occurrence of force sensitive people in professional athletics).

Some other new elements would be Nate (who is an alien) trying to be one of the "good ones" with Rupert, who is a die-hard imperial loyalist. He starts coaching for the Hammers at the same time aliens are banned from playing and only keeps his job because of Rupert's protection. Trent has the additional motivation to quit journalism that he doesn't want to have to deal with Imperial censors day in and day out, even though with sports there isn't much censor. Heck, Trent has always struck me as too somber and cynical to be a sports reporter, and maybe the reason he does sports reporting is because its the most honest specialty left.

The final new element I've thought of is that when I was running through my head for what planet the Greyhounds would be in, I landed on Chandrila. Which means that Rebecca and Rubert would be Chandrilan upper-crust- so instead of what we have in canon, Rebecca and Rubert are similar ages and were arranged to be married eachother when they were young (adults in their society, teens in our world). Instead of Rubert hurting Rebecca, they were both hurt by their society- which turned Rubert cruel. All the arranged marriages also means that divorce is more stigmatized and cheating more tolerated. This would also make Ted's in to the Rebellion through Rebecca and then Mon Mothma. Rebecca originally becomes a bit of a rebel sympathizer because Rubert is just so pro-empire.

[tennessoui]

au where anakin runs a cooking youtube channel and obi-wan runs a baking one and they’re both hugely successful and have many recipe books and a few restaurants/bakeries between them---for obi-wan, the youtube/tiktok videos are a lark, something one of his more social media savvy agents suggested. for anakin, that’s how he got his start so he still religiously uploads a few videos per month.

their fans want them to do a collab video---they both cook dinner and then they both make dessert. their agents love the idea, and they’re put in contact with one another to work out the kinks and figure out what to make.

anakin is thrilled because he loves obi-wan’s videos and routinely watched them during culinary school as a sort of calming meditation technique. obi-wan is thrilled because he’s always wanted to try one of Anakin’s meals, as they look so amazing.

so for a few weeks they’re like high key flirting over DMs and texts, both becoming more and more excited to meet in person......

only for their cooking styles to completely not mesh. they’re both ready to strangle the other man halfway through making dinner. 

(“roughly chopped” is fine in baking, ah-na-kin, are you really seriously trying to throw out all this onion? oh, perfect. you’re just passively aggressively cutting it smaller. lovely.)

(yes, i know the recipe called for 2 cloves of garlic, obi-wan, i can read. but we’re going to add four and cook them in butter instead of oil because the flavor is better. can’t you just trust me???)

[ooops-i-arted]

Have you seen S2E4 yet?? I'd really love to get your perspective on it as a teacher/from a child-development POV

Since I just did Baby Yoda’s child development in the last ask I’ll do my Thoughts On The Space School for this one because I was SO EXCITED to finally see a school in Star Wars!

The Good:  The classroom seems to be pretty well-supplied.  Enough desks and materials for everyone (maybe the teacher didn’t even have to buy them).  Another shot shows little cubbies for the kiddos to keep their stuff in.  There’s certainly enough light and air though the room seems a little cramped/close for all those kids.  It was so cool to see all the supplies on the side - lots of globes (although one is straight up Jupiter??? the front most one of that cluster of 3 in the middle of the pic.  Did they forget to repaint that one??)  The board is definitely visible to everyone and it’s just awesome in general that the importance of education is recognized by a person of leadership, since Greef is clearly pretty proud of what they’ve accomplished on Nevarro.

Also I’m just so excited to see a space school in general.  I have my own headcanons of course but it is cool to just actually see a school in Star Wars.  Even if, as a teacher, many things grated on my nerves because I know how a school really has to roll. :P  (I am about to complain so much, I swear I really did like the space school, it was a cute lil classroom.)

The Bad:  Uhh..... why does Greef just drop the baby off here?  Isn’t there a class for another, more appropriate age group?  There’s honestly not really enough here to even engage elementary school students* - they are listening to a droid drone with nothing but a desk and a tablet-like device, though at least they’re allowed snacks - so a toddler is gonna be bored as hell.  And a bored toddler is a destructive toddler.  There’s nothing for him to do and presumably no age-appropriate activities for him, since this is an elementary school class and he is a toddler/possibly a preschooler.  They are NOT interchangeable.

Also *Peli voice* you can’t just drop a kid off in a class like that!!  Even in a drop-off program I would rip Greef a new one for that!  1.  Interrupting the class without asking, it’s a miracle those kids didn’t take 10 minutes to be calmed back down.  2.  The teacher has NO information on the kid.  Allergies, health issues - and I imagine that’s even more important when you live in a galaxy with a billion different species - emergency contact info, etc.  3.  YOU DIDN’T EVEN ASK IF YOU CAN LEAVE THE KID THERE.  Okay I know it’s because it’s a tv show but BASIC DISRESPECT.  4.  Since the teacher had no idea Baby Yoda was coming, do they even have enough materials?  How fast did they have to whip up a separate more appropriate version of the day’s activities with differentiation to make it more accessible to his tiny hands?  Any teacher would’ve had a couple extras but still.

Also the kids 100% should’ve fuckin’ rioted when Baby Yoda got brought in.  He’s new and exciting and weird they would’ve gone apeshit.  Pre-COVID anytime a baby sibling got brought in during pickup we all had to see the baby and this would’ve been no different.  Hell we gotta stop and look if someone brought in a new Batman backpack or something.  Well-behaved quiet class? 0/10 too unrealistic

The Ugly:  Oh I see.  While canon does sometimes address droid sapience, droids in Star Wars are usually used for menial tasks or tasks “below” an actual person.  Including, apparently.....teaching.

You think a fucking droid can do my job?  I guarantee you none of those students were learning  A DAMN THING.  All that droid was doing was droning on boring information with no effort to engage the students.  No activity, no music, nothing fun or interesting, just dry boring info while sitting at a desk, so that info is going in one ear and out the other.  My students don’t learn because I bleat dry information at them.  They learn because even during teacher-led times, I make it interesting and engaging for them.  I don’t have them just sit and listen constantly - hell even if they are sitting and listening to a book I’m asking them open-ended questions to engage them and get them thinking + my puppets and read-aloud song to make it fun, and I don’t even do that every day.  I also use activities where they are actively participating and involved because that’s how kids learn.  Think back to your own school experience - you don’t remember the boring stuff, do you?  You remember the fun things, and likely the teacher that engaged you and made you want to learn.  A teacher like that is absolutely vital to education and students learn best when they have a connection with an adult they like, trust, and value the knowledge of.

Okay, to be fair, a droid with the right personality for it could probably teach a great lesson.  I for one would love to see R2-D2 run a classroom.  (Or Chopper.  “Hello and welcome to Murder 101.”)  But from what I saw?  Nah, that’s clearly a droid who’s not supposed to be a teacher but a babysitter.  Because this is a show made by Americans and that’s how waaaaaay too many Americans think of their educators.  And I’m not a fucking babysitter, I am a professional in my field, and teaching isn’t one of those jobs just anyone can do.  Anyone can read a lesson, but it takes training and practice and effort to teach.  /rant

*I’m not gonna get into it because my specialty is preschool, not elementary school, but sitting at a desk all day isn’t really developmentally appropriate or the best way to learn despite it being the norm in America.  I’ve always headcanoned that in the GFFA they know better and have better schooling, so I’m just gonna pretend Greef dropped Baby Yoda off on substitute day when the regular teacher was out and it was a makeshift lesson and not what they normally do even during teacher-led lesson time.

Anyway Greef hire me for your space school I will set up an awesome preschool class for you, just pay me a living wage and let me teach Baby Yoda and see Cara Dune’s biceps on the regular

[tennessoui]

“You’re such a bitch.” Would love it if you could make it work in the Cheating AU (cosss I'm obsesssssedd with it).

Ideally Anakin saying it to Obi-Wan, but doesn'tneed to be, whatever inspires you 💙.

hey hi hello!!! ok so this is set in the cheating au (gffa au where obi-wan and anakin cheat on their partners---satine, who knows and doesn't care and padmé who doesn't know and will definitely care---to be with one another), and i'd go into detail about the timeline more, but actually I think the characters pretty much say everything you need to know. In my mind this is about three months before Anakin gets hurt and obi-wan makes him choose between his wife and him.

(2k) (cw: infidelity, jealousy, asshole behavior from obikin)

The twi’lek waitress keeps making eyes at Obi-Wan and the man is letting her. His wife is right there, next to him.

Anakin is right across from him while he gently touches the server’s wrist, compliments the length and coloring of her lekku, refers to her by her name that he remembers—Niv’era—and laughs over jokes she hasn’t even really said. 

It’s all very disgusting, and it’s even worse when Anakin catches Satine’s eye from across the table. She has the most annoying knowing look, and Anakin blanches beneath it. He hates that for a second, they’re in the same sort of twisted club. In love with a man who is an incorrigible flirt.

Well, Satine has said many times she feels no romantic inclination towards her husband. Anakin just can’t believe that’s true.

It’s Obi-Wan.

Obi-Wan, who has taken a singular bite out of his correllian beef tenderloin and has stopped Niv’era on her way past the table to praise her for the suggestion, as if she personally cooked it herself. She probably can’t even cook. She looks younger than Anakin’s children, and they’re three.

Padmé shifts next to him, setting her fork down and placing her hand over his own fisted hand, as if trying to soothe him.

The movement catches Obi-Wan’s eye, and he pauses for a second before he continues, even louder and more flirtatious than before, running a hand through his hair with a roguish grin as the star-struck child of a server tells him about the last time she visited Stewjon and what she did there with her family.

Out of some unpleasant and nameless emotion, Anakin flips his hand over and intertwines his fingers with his wife. He can feel her wedding band against his knuckle. Anakin had forgotten to wear his ring. He usually does these days when he knows he’ll see Obi-Wan.

“Your anniversary is coming up, no?” Satine asks. Anakin glares at her, but she simply smiles in return. Bitch.

“In two weeks,” Padmé says, taking a tiny sip of her plum wine. Obi-Wan’s whiskey is untouched on the table before him. He’s finally dismissed the waitress and has turned his attention fully back to them.

Anakin fights a sneer and wonders if in a few nights, Obi-Wan will come back alone to this restaurant, ask the girl for a tour of the place, push her into a closet and coax her into breaking her marriage vows for the chance to lick the taste of whiskey out of his mouth. She probably wouldn’t say no.

Anakin hadn’t.

“And how many years will that be?” Satine asks, nibbling at the edge of a crust of bread. “Five? No. Six?”

“Six,” Padmé agrees. “We married very young.”

Anakin had married very young. Padmé had married at a respectable age.

“Six years, wow,” the blonde woman says with a tiny shake of her head. She raises her wine glass. “Here’s to six years of love and commitment. May there be many more.”

Padmé laughs and raises her own glass, tilting her head up to look at Anakin. She’s probably expecting a kiss from her husband. Anakin is hardly her husband anymore, and he is absolutely not the man she married.

Obi-Wan raises his own glass and tossses the entirety of the contents back in one go. “You’re such a bitch,” he tells Satine, pushing away from the table. “Excuse me.”

Padmé’s hand has fluttered to her mouth in shock at the words, eyes wide and quickly turning angry for the sake of her friend. “That was absolutely out of line, I’m sorry, Satine.”

“Oh, it’s alright,” Satine looks amused more than anything. “We’re all tense over the elections.”

“There’s no need for that level of disrespect though,” Padmé declares. Anakin knows he should say something, fall in line with his wife and agree. But Padmé doesn’t have all the information. Satine was being a bitch, and she’s the only one at the table who doesn’t know it or understand why.

 “I know you two have an…unconventional marriage—” it’s no secret among friends that the Kenobi-Kryzes have an open marriage, something Padmé has never been able to fully understand— “but if my husband talked to me like that in a serious manner, I would divorce him on the spot.”

She looks at him and he nods because he’s supposed to nod. He’s supposed to find the threat slightly funny, and agree that he would never do something so uncouth like that.

But all he can think is, Promise?

“I’m going to go check on him,” he says, standing and putting his napkin on the table. He can’t spot the waitress either and now he’s thinking the worst. His chest is tight. If he finds Obi-Wan and he’s kissing someone else, Anakin doesn’t know what he’ll do.

It feels like it would be a betrayal. Of them. Their relationship.

But aren’t they both betrayers already? Obi-Wan’s marriage wasn’t open until three years ago, when Satine had declared to the pair of them that she wanted to have just as much liberty to take other partners as Obi-Wan apparently thought he had. And, she’d said, having an open marriage meant that she wouldn’t have to hide it. Unlike Obi-Wan and Anakin.

And Anakin and Padmé’s marriage….It was not always what it is now. The guilt should eat him alive and sometimes when he’s in the fresher, washing off the scent of Obi-Wan before his wife comes home, it does.

Most of the time though, it’s not there anymore at all. It’s been four years, sneaking around with Obi-Wan. He’s addicted.

Addicts can’t let guilt consume them. That’s what the addiction is for.

Padmé has slid over to his chair to grasp at Satine’s hand. She’ll probably have a long fiery speech prepared for Obi-Wan when he gets back. Suddenly Anakin doesn’t want to hear it. 

For a brief second, he wishes he could just find Obi-Wan and leave the restaurant all together. Leave the planet. Run off into the stars.

He looks at the back of his wife’s head. She’d spent an hour styling her hair in the fresher mirror before coming out tonight. He’d been asked to hold certain pieces in place as she pinned them. In the early days of their marriage, which was also the early days of their relationship, he’d been humbled and awed to be invited into such a precious domestic scene. Tonight, he’d only felt vaguely irritated that she cared so much and that her caring had made them late, which meant minutes where Obi-Wan and Satine were alone at a restaurant like they’ve been for years before.

Anakin stares at the back of her head and feels the words rise into his mouth. You’re such a bitch, he imagines telling her. He wants to tell her.

But more than that, he wants the words to be true, and he knows they are not. He’d married a kindhearted woman with a soul just as beautiful as she is. And yet.

And yet.

Obi-Wan is in the restaurant’s fresher. It’s deserted otherwise, which is good because Anakin is fuming and he’s feeling reckless and as soon as Obi-Wan turns to look at him, he pushes him up against the edge of the sink.

“You’re such a fucking asshole,” he snarls and Obi-Wan’s hands immediately come up to fist into Anakin’s dress tunics, mess them up. Pull him closer. It’s always about closeness with Obi-Wan. 

“I’m an asshole? What was I supposed to do, listen to your wife talk about your fucking facade of a marriage until the desserts course?” Obi-Wan spits right back. “You’re a fucking—”

Anakin kisses him to shut him up. It’s angry and too much so fast, too much teeth and spit and Obi-Wan is kissing him like he’s trying to draw blood, like the only reason he’s kissing him is so that they’ll go back to the table and his wife will notice Anakin’s red lips and ask what happened.

The thought that Obi-Wan is kissing him for any other reason than because he loves him—he knows he does, he’s said—makes him even more furious. He rips himself away as quickly as he’d attacked.

Obi-Wan is breathing heavily against the sink.

“Don’t fucking flirt with the waitress in front of me,” Anakin says as calmly as he’s capable of. He catches sight of himself in the mirror behind Obi-Wan, and he doesn’t even recognize himself. His eyes are dark and his mouth is red and his chest is heaving.

“Don’t fucking hold hands with your wife in front of me,” Obi-Wan shoots back like he has any right to demand that from Anakin, any right at all to dictate his relationship with his wife.

It makes Anakin let out a crazed sort of laugh and he scrubs his hands over his face, through his hair. “Fuck, Obi-Wan. What the fuck are we doing? This…this is too much. This—”

He cuts himself off because Obi-Wan has stepped forward, into his space. It’s dangerous and it’s perfect and half of Anakin wants to pull him closer. The other part wants to push him away. That part has never won, and Anakin doesn’t think tonight will be the night it suddenly does.

Carefully, almost apologetically, Obi-Wan fixes the lay of Anakin’s tunics, covers him up and makes him presentable. His hands move just as gently up to his hair to comb it into place. Anakin shivers and lets him. This side of Obi-Wan is addicting as well.

After he’s been fixed and fawned over, Obi-Wan’s hands come to the back of his neck and rest there. For a second, Anakin thinks that he’s going to rise up on his toes and kiss him. Instead there’s fumbling and then Obi-Wan lifts the necklace Anakin is wearing off his neck.

Anakin thinks he needs to stop him. After all, it had been Obi-Wan who had given the jappor snippet back to him in the first place two years ago, telling him that there was no way his wife wouldn’t notice.

“Why don’t you keep this for me?” He’d said. “Wear it around your neck, tell your wife you’ve just been missing Tatooine. It wouldn’t be a lie. We’d just be the only two that knows what it means.”

The symbol on the pendant that Obi-Wan turns to fasten around his own neck means homesick. He’d carved it for the man after a month and a half of not being able to see each other. He’d—it’d been hard. It’d felt impossible, it’d felt wrong. Homesick for Obi-Wan.

When Padmé had noticed the new addition to her husband’s wardrobe, she’d asked what it meant. After all, he’d given her one all those years ago, a snippet he carved that meant good fortune. “We’ll match,” she’d said with a charming giggle, showing him the bracelet she’d fastened the snippet into. “And let’s see about visiting Tatooine soon.”

What neither Padmé nor Obi-Wan had understood, of course, was that on Tatooine, nothing was more important than one’s home. A place for family. A place to shelter from the elements. Safety and comfort and love wrapped in one.

On Tatooine, the symbol for homesick had five lines diverging from the middle and curling around themselves in a knot to leave an empty circle.

The pendant around Obi-Wan’s neck right now has the same design, but the circle is filled in. This symbol means, simply, home.

“This is mine,” Obi-Wan tells him. They both know they’re not just talking about the pendant. “I’ll remember if you do.”

Anakin wishes he could bring himself to forget, but it’s impossible. Obi-Wan makes it impossible just by being in the same room.

Later that night as he’s getting ready for bed, Padmé asks him what happened to his pendant.

“Must have slipped off some time during dinner,” he tells her. 

“Oh, that’s such a shame! You should call the restaurant tomorrow morning and see if they’ve found it. I know you were attached to it.”

“Yeah,” he says. “I will.” You’re such a bitch, he wants to say. But it’s not true. It’s not true and he can’t hurt her like that, not when he’s already hurting her in other ways. Ways she doesn’t even know about yet.

Yet.