#obicobb

[inkformyblood]

hey there darling

Obi-Wan x Cobb Vanth, ObiCobb. Canon Compliant, Pre-Canon The Mandalorian and Kenobi Show. Canon Era Star Wars. Post-Order 66

Ben drags his fingers through the warm puddle of his own spilled drink, considers the irony of trying to drown his sorrows on a desert planet, and presses his sleeve into it instead. It won’t make a difference on the slightly sticky residue on the cantina countertop, but it would keep the droid from circling back to hover over Ben’s small kingdom of empty cups for the third time since the stranger took up sentry at his elbow. 

He hasn’t drunk nearly enough to do anything other than bleed limply at the man’s chosen line of questioning. 

“Why?” Ben asks instead of answering. He selects a cup at random, pressing the pitted rim to his mouth, and tips his body backwards with a single fluid motion. There’s nothing but dregs left, the sharp sense memory of whatever moonshine had been poured into it, a whisper of another’s touch hot on its heels. He shoves the cup back amongst its fellows with a sigh, sliding his gaze along the countertop to the man.

He’s a tangle of wire drawn thin and taut, the tendons splayed over his knuckles carved into stark relief as he leans closer to Ben, one arm propped on the counter, the other tipped over the harsh angles of his thigh. His fingers trace over the fraying edge of a patch at his knee, the stitches holding up where the fabric doesn’t. “I need a reason?”

“Most people do.”

“Darlin’, I’m not most people.” 

Ben laughs despite himself, a harsh exhalation as he tears his gaze away to survey the rest of the cantina once more. It’s an obvious habit to anyone who would care to watch for it, the man’s gaze searing a deliberate hole through Ben’s temple, but not out of place in a cantina that’s just enough off the beaten track that the majority of its patrons are labourers or freed slaves. Here, Ben is just another rat in the nest, dismissible, forgettable. 

“Oh?” Ben draws his arm up from the countertop, the line of his forearm damp as he folds his hands into his lap. Again, the actions of another man, the death throes of a corpse that hadn’t been able to rot. “You will want to find someone more interesting than me to talk to.”

The man leans closer, starving for the space Ben has just seceded. His stool scrapes as he drags it closer, his arm braced against the countertop, his knees bumping against Ben’s thigh when he halts the motion firmly intertwined in Ben’s orbit. There’s intended flattery in the action, Ben hasn’t been removed from the world for long enough to forget this particular dance, and Ben considers giving in. It would be easy enough to brush his fingertips against the man’s, to lean a little closer into the scant space between them, to ghost a kiss over his mouth that’s cracking beneath the desert heat and taste the sharp bite of whatever he had been drinking moments before. 

“I think,” the man says, lengthening his words into a smooth drawl, his grin a shade too sharp to hide the way his gaze flickers over Ben’s face, “that you are plenty interesting. So, will you let me get you another drink?”

He’s young, desperately so, or maybe Ben is just far older than he had ever expected to be. 

There’s a faint scar at the nape of the man’s neck, his hair not long enough to cover where it branches around the junction of his shoulders. Ben’s gaze fractures there, studying the man beneath the sweep of his lashes, knowing he’d already made his choice the moment the man slung himself into the seat next to Ben and grinned at him so tentatively sweetly. Metallic dust lines the cracks of the man’s palms, a faint shimmer over the sharp line of his cheekbone where an old bruise heals sour and yellow, and some dust clings to his temples in a mimicry of the silver already bleeding through the red. His eyes are dark, something hopeful clinging to flotsam despite the rising tide. 

“Okay.”

“Yeah?”

There’s that grin again, wide enough to fracture at the edges and shake some debris free from the fragile foundation Ben has been trying to maintain. The man stands in a lopsided slide, his leg braced against the crossbar of the stool as he leans his hips into the counter to brace himself as he waves both hands at the Twi'lek further down the cantina. “Two Sunrise mixes, please, Finu?”

The Twi’lek, heavyset and all the more smug because of it, sets her hip against the counter as she surveys him, her lower lip indented between her lower teeth as she assesses them both. The man huffs out a laugh, a flash of gold at his mouth, and he plucks a chip from a pouch at his belt and spins it over the flat of his knuckles before he drops back into his seat, his attention locked onto Ben once more. “Cobb Vanth.” He offers Ben a hand, barely a tremor threading through his outstretched fingers and Ben, helpless to stop the knife from boring deeper into his chest, thinks of Cody. 

“Ben,” he answers, taking Cobb’s hand in his own. It’s an easy pantomime to fall back into, to twist their joined hands so he can press a kiss to the gnarled surface of Cobb’s knuckles, tasting the ever-present salt and grit of the desert there. Looking up from beneath the sweep of his lashes, Cobb’s cheeks burn pink, the colour invading the exposed shells of his ears. There’s a pale scar through one lobe, near invisible against his tan skin but highlighted through his blush. It’s sweet to have him so besotted already when Ben is nothing special, just another body amongst hundreds.

(Cody had been another clone amongst thousands and Obi-Wan would have known him deaf and blind, Force-forsaken and dying.)

The man in front of him is not Cody, Ben knows that. However, Cobb carries with him the strange sense of being lost in time that the clones had, too old for his years and too young in action, and he looks at Ben the same way that Cody had, like Ben had hung the suns in the sky and stirred the stars in to fulfil a request. 

Intoxicating after half a lifetime of denial. 

It wouldn’t go further than a drink. Ben squeezes Cobb’s hand carefully, releasing the other man as he straightens back into his watchful perch, with a snapshot of his attention still locked onto the door behind him. Off the beaten path did not mean invisible, and the Empire had caught better Jedi than him from less information than a passing resemblance. Just a drink and an instance of delirious what-could-be to keep Ben human for the next decade. 

“So, darlin’,” Cobb says, coughing as he rights himself on his seat. “You didn’t answer my question earlier.”

Cobb hands over the chip to Finu before their drinks touch the countertop of the bar, a smart way of working, and Ben grabs at his own. It’s strong, a generous allocation of cactus juice to cover for the bite of spirits, and Ben sips at it as Cobb picks his own up, dragging his finger around the rim before he tips his head back to drink it. It’s half-empty when Cobb emerges, his cheeks flushed by his own actions, a sly twist to his grin. “What’s a pretty thing like you doing in a place like this?”

“My darling,” Ben answers, echoes of a man he can no longer be in his voice. “You have no idea.”

[sammvitches]

Blood-Drunk (9561 words) by StressedWriterTM Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: The Mandalorian (TV) Rating: Explicit Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Din Djarin/Cobb Vanth Characters: Din Djarin, Cobb Vanth Additional Tags: Vampire Din Djarin, witch cobb vanth, Sex, Biting, Haunting, just a little bit of ghosties, Blood Magic, ritual blood stuff, Blood, Magic, tatooine is Weird and Strange and very Hostile, and also Beautiful and Gentle and Safe, Theres an obicobb reference in here if you squint Summary: In a few months, the days will stretch and stretch and stretch, until there is always a sun hanging in the blue sky, and a second climbing the horizon. The heat rises and rises and rises until it should break, then rises some more. This is the heat that drives the storm currents, but it’s a long way off yet. On Tatooine, the twilight season will pass for winter, as well as anything does. And rolling ever closer is the longest night, almost a full 10 hours of dark, and a further 16 of twilight. ~*~ Din returns home from a hunt, and Cobb takes him on a trip (or a date, or a ritual, or a long night worth remembering)

My art piece for the DinCobb Mini Big Bang

[catalpa-waltz]

Obi-Wan Kenobi / Cobb Vanth  // E // 3.5k 

(sequel to “Come all ye jolly tinner boys”, set ~10 BBY) 

Even after everything Ben's done to make him cognizant of the danger their association puts him in, Cobb just can't seem to stay away. And he comes bearing gifts.

"Wish I could tell them what you did," Cobb says. "How you saved us. Wish I could make everyone see you the way I do."

"What would that accomplish, exactly?"

"Don't rightly know. Just that I think you deserve to be a hero, seeing as you are one."

Ben's resulting huff of laughter is dry, humorless, but without bitterness.

"Believe me," Ben says, making no move to return to his feet. "It's nowhere near as fun as it sounds."

[catalpa-waltz]

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Star Wars - All Media Types, The Mandalorian (TV), Obi-Wan Kenobi (TV) Rating: Explicit Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence Relationships: Obi-Wan Kenobi/Cobb Vanth Characters: Obi-Wan Kenobi, Cobb Vanth Additional Tags: Inappropriate Use of the Force, Blackmail, Blowjobs, Gothic Horror, you know, the usual, Explicit Sexual Content, Cobb Vanth: Emotional Support Murder Cowboy, Hurt/Comfort Series: Part 3 of Come all ye jolly tinner!verse Summary:

"So what I'm hearing here is that I'm good for business?"

"I don't know if you could call it 'business,' precisely."

"But whatever it is," says Cobb, sidling close, "I'm good for it, that right?"

"You are."

And there it is again, Cobb thinks. That vehement, violent fondness. That den-animal urge to place himself at the mouth of a cave with Ben secreted safe inside, and tear the throat out of any living thing that tried to get at him.

How many other people have you done this to? Cobb wonders. How many folk out in the galaxy right now, still half out of their minds from what you did to them?

Or: Cobb gains some new insight into the purpose of Ben's presence on-planet, and does what he must.

[inkformyblood]

New year,, kicking writing off with some ObiCobb

“Afternoon, stranger. You looking for trouble?”

Ben doesn’t straighten fully as Cobb approaches, remaining in that wary slump of his, one shoulder set low, his stance set wide as he’s torn between the urge to flee or fight. Cobb isn’t one to pry, Lord knows he’s got plenty of his own demons to contend with, but he knows a hunted and haunted man when he sees one. It just makes a change that this one isn’t reflected back at him from black-flecked warped glass. 

“Is that what you’re calling yourself now, Cobb?” Ben tips his head just enough to catch Cobb’s tilted shadow over the dipped hollows of his cheeks, the low sun setting his hair on fire in equal parts silver and bronze. He is handsome, objectively so, and Cobb can see where he had happier years in the fan of wrinkles next to his eyes and the lines near his mouth. He had been a man who smiled and laughed freely. The closest Cobb can draw free is a tight-lipped grin, fond suspicion and warning in equal measure. 

Cobb slows his walk, rolling to an uneven stop. There’s sand in his boots, sand in the lines of his palms and pittering against his cheeks as a breeze hisses through him. “Nah, not yet anyway. I’ll give it a few weeks to see how it tastes.”

[catalpa-waltz]

Self rec time!

Fic authors self rec! When you get this, reply with your favorite five fics that you’ve written, then pass on to at least five other writers

tagged by @brightmouth and @saltsprite

Come all ye jolly tinner boys // ~6K //Obi-Wan/Cobb // E :  This wasn’t the first ObiCobb piece I ever wrote, but it has certainly had the most thrilling and unexpected impact, inspiring some of my favorite writers to climb aboard this little dinghy I lashed together with little more than grit and chewing gum. Part 1 of a (for now) 3 part series.

Might blow this world down // 15K (3/4 chapters posted) // Dincobb // E : 1930s Noir-ish AU, with Din as a grizzled, jaded PI in the style of Chinatown and Cobb as a Guthrie-esque strummer and folk hero, this AU has been slow going, but has a good and grimy setting that I love to play with, and one of my favorite Din backstories I’ve ever written. 

All Seasons Sweet // 4K (1/3 chapters posted) // Dincobb // E : Din and Cobb crash land on a primitive planet at the center of a spacetime anomaly, but all that is really just the set up for a gently rambling pastoral fantasy, in which our Heroes finally learn how to let go and settle down to a good thing because the universe gives them no other choice. Will eventually transmute into a meditation on the married state, with lots of id mixed in. 

Munda Cor Meum //  6K // Dincobb // E : The med student!Cobb, Catholic seminarian!Din fic with one of my favorite endings. *Slaps Mando on his shiny head* this bad boy can fit so much projected religious trauma in him! 

Prajna Paramita // 34K // Obi-Wan/Din  // E : The fic that asks, how much time would the Mandalorian have to spend on Tatooine to learn both Tusken speech and sign, and was it long enough to meet a certain someone (and what if they kissed lol)? I have no justification for this other than this was the idea that got me back to writing fic after a 6 year pause, and rough around the edges though it may be, I’m awful fond of it.

Tagging @dowhatyoudream @dosmit-raeh @fickleobsessions @r0b0tb0y @multifandomhoodies if you’d like :) 

[catalpa-waltz]

tagged by @brightmouth (thank you dear!) 

3 ships —DinCobb, ObiCobb, Obitine 

1st ever ship — 1st ever ever? Aragorn/Arwen lollll 

Last song —not gonna lie fam I have been mainlining the Andor OST Vol. 3 pretty much nonstop. But also Tobacco City - Till The Moon Don’t Shine made me tear up earlier 

Last movie — The Magnificent Seven 

Currently reading — enjoying “The Flatness and Other Landscapes” by Michael Martone 

Currently watching — nothing! rec me shows! 

Currently consuming — a little tacita of Malbec 

Currently craving — the rugelach being brought out of the oven in my kitchen rn 

tagging @saltsprite @multifandomhoodies @beyoursledgehammer if you like! 

[catalpa-waltz]

For the wrapped asks: 6, 19, and 20 <3

<3 <3 <3

6. Favorite title you used?

I actually want to get better about not filching my titles from other places, but it’s a tie between Are you a mountain? Are you a man? And To Vex Me, Contraries Meet which is from my favorite scrap of John Donne. As far as original titles go, I still laugh at the title of my first ever foray into ObiCobb, which I called "Tall Glass of Water" ;) 

19. One pairing you want to explore next year? 

VELCINTA. Anything with Mon Mothma. Anything with Brasso. I’m slowly chewing on all my favorite Andor blorbos like a cow with a big hank of grass and I think in the interval between New Years and Mando S3 I will be doing quite a lot with them. 

20. Which work of yours have you reread the most? 

In the process of writing it? "Teeth Marks" by a country mile. I usually one-and-done these things, but that one got cut up and rearranged and reworked in a dozen different ways until I felt I got it right, and I like to think it’s better for it <3 

[catalpa-waltz]

9,12, 28, and 29 for the ao3 wrapped

9. Favorite pairing

- Dincobb was obviously my touchstone for much of the year, but tbh I think paddling out in the USS ObiCobb and collecting a lovely little passel of crewmates might be one of my personal highlights. Especially proud of “Come all ye jolly tinner boys” for that one. 

12. How many WIPS do you have in your docs for next year? 

- Yeesh, not as many as I feared, going over my GDocs. Maybe 6 with any serious chance of getting finished? Including a radio play, a weird bit of magical realism set in 17th century Spain, and a fun desert gothic romp. I also am fully determined to wrap up my long-suffering 1930s private eye AU. 

28. Favorite work you wrote this year? 

- this is HARD, but I’d say for its between “Prajna Paramita” which launched me back into the stratosphere of putting words to paper, and “Teeth Marks”, which had the most satisfying arc and the most enjoyable payoff :) 

29. Favorite line/passage you wrote this year? 

- Still very fond of this line from “Might blow this world down” 

The singer pauses, whistling a filigreed version of the rest of the verse. Whether he does it for fun, just to break up the monotony, or because he forgot the words, Din doesn’t know. He doesn’t whistle like a farm boy, or a ranch hand, or a bird. He makes a kind of ethereal instrument from his own lips, and Din senses this is probably the most honest way he knows to make a sound.

Thanks anon!