#patience is the Jedi way

[nevermindigotthis]

Yes, that���s very reassuring, thank you! I hope your muse finds you well. I know people asking when sequels are coming can be stressful and It’s not my intention to put pressure on you, just know that I‘ll be patiently waiting for whenever you manage to keep going. I have the „oh my god it‘s happening“ gif ready to send to my friends when there is a next part, no matter when that may be. Until then I‘m happy rereading and drawing my little fan arts about it. Thanks again and all the best!

Hey, I‘m kind of a die hard DMW fan. Since I discovered them in 2021, your works have replaced Canon in my heart and I‘ve been much happier about the SP fandom since my friend recommended me your fics. I‘ve actually drawn some fan art on my Tumblr if you‘re interested, and last year for Christmas I (very clumsily) bound the first book for myself and 3 of my friends.

All that being said, I‘ve been dying to know if you‘re still planning on continuing the series eventually. I know you‘ve been busy IRL and I‘ve been trying not to get my hopes up, but it would really give me some closure/make my day to know.

You deserve the world for DMW and all that you and AmaraqWolf have already written in that verse, I‘ve never loved a fanfic that much before. You made me love characters that barely even existed in canon and DMW makes me feel safe while still being exciting and suspenseful. Just, thank you for writing.

Oh and if you would like to have the pdf I formatted for the books I‘d be happy to send it to you.

'Clumsily'. Those are gorgeous is what they are. I'm very glad you've taken them offline where you can't lose them, especially in such a lovely manner. Not that I remove my creative works, as a rule, but there's no quite telling what the Internet will do, so I always encourage people to make copies.

To answer your question: yes, I am still writing DMW. I've been thinking about it a lot lately. When I might, I dare not speculate, let alone promise. Sometimes the knowledge that people are waiting on it has its own dampening effect, so I'm slowly training myself not to be bothered by the expectation. (Don't feel bad about being hype, though. I'm a reader too. Sometimes you just Want.)

It's funny to me when people say 'I know you're busy irl' because honestly, writing *is* my irl. If I'm not writing one thing I'm writing another (or trying to figure out my shit so I get back to writing. Unpacking from the move comes under this header). The biggest competitor to my time is video games. And the need to work for income for shelter and sustenance, I GUESS.

There's a lot I want to write and each has their season, but the writing will always be there. The series is not over yet. Until it is, it will be there waiting for me. Hopefully that's as reassuring as I meant it to be.

[chaoticspacefam]

There’s quite a few points in the Consular story where it’s honestly really hard for me to determine what Aria would do, and sometimes the answer is a WEIRD one. This bit on Taris is one of ‘em.

So, you’re offered a choice between saving this woman, Laria (Light-side) and saving the Jedi holocrons with a bunch of medical data that could save “thousands” of lives - supposedly (Dark-side). I always thought Aria would be the “pick to save the holocrons” gal but strangely enough after agonising on the decision for a few minutes....I ended up concluding she’d save Laria. NOT out of the goodness of her heart though (sorry Laria, I like you pfft🤣) but rather because, well...on one hand, Darth Noctis (her father) would certainly have interest/be invested in getting his hands on those holocrons full of information he might be able to eventually use to his advantage. But on the other...letting the holocrons explode means the Jedi don’t have access to them either. Considering Aria’s whole schtick is “sabotage the Jedi from the inside out so that by the time we hit Tython at the end it’s almost a clean sweep” I feel like objectively it makes sense for her to “choose” Laria over the holocrons in this instance.

It’ll be really interesting from my perspective to see where else in this story she ends up choosing the “Light-sided” dialogue options except in Subterfugeverse canon it will be entirely for fucked up and selfish reasons so, you know, objectively it is NOT a light-side choice at all for that reason. 🤣😛

[siempre-bucky]

what am i to you?

Qimir x Reader

Summary: You decide to leave Qimir, thinking your feelings are one-sided till an encounter with the Jedi Order proves otherwise.

WC: 1.3k

Warnings: she/her pronouns, mentions of blood

A/N: I hope you like it Anon <3! Requests are still open for Qimir!

“What am I to you, Qimir?” You asked him as you placed your hood over your head, your small bag placed at the side of you, “Whore? Helper? Companion? What other names do you use to describe me to your Acolytes?” 

“This is new for you, my dear,” he chuckled, amused as if you were a child trying to use big words. You were never the one to bite back, you would normally happily accept your role as his right hand. Not now, the years of trying to convince yourself he loved you had your patience growing thin.

“You don’t get to call me that, you seethed. “I’m leaving, Qimir. I can’t be here, knowing you don’t feel the same. I’ll never be more than whatever this is.” 

The Sith stayed silent after that, he merely watched as you accepted your defeat and picked up your things to disappear in the night. 

Tears fell as you walked through the forest, trying to expel memories of late night tangled in sheets and days of trips to the beaches of his favorite planet. He showed you all those wonderful things and touched you in a way you could only imagine, only for it to mean nothing. You wasted years on him. 

Something suddenly felt off, the hair on the back of your neck began to rise and the forest grew silent. Someone was there with you in the forest. A small smile tugged at your lips, he came back for you! You turned around and smiled at the figure that stood in the trees. About to tease him, the figure reached for his belt, a lightsaber igniting. Yellow? 

Before you had the chance to run, the Force knocked you to the ground roughtly. The figure grabbed you by the hair and pulled you to your feet. The man frowned “You’re the Force wielder?” he questioned. 

“N-no!” You cried, punching at his arm. 

“The Order keeps sending you to die,” a third voice entered the space, and you could recognize that distorted tone from anywhere. 

The Jedi swiftly turned the two of you to face the Sith standing a few feet away. Dressed in his helmet and cloak, Qimir watched as the Jedi released your hair and placed you in a chokehold with his free arm. The other turned off the saber and placed it on your temple, the heat of the metal making you cry out. 

This Jedi wasn’t like the rest of the ones the Order sent after Qimir, there was something in his eye that screamed rogue. “You either surrender,” the Jedi panted, tightening his grip on your throat and his saber pressing harder to your temple, “or I kill your… Acolyte? Is that what she is to you?” 

“Those are words of a Sith, Jedi, are you sure you’re not on the wrong side?” The Stranger spoke calmly, his voice distorted by his mask. He couldn’t see the fear in your eyes or how the Jedi was starting to bleed from you digging your nails into his forearms. 

You wish you could read him, be able to get inside his head, and know what he’s thinking one last time. Maybe he had some compassion for you because love was out of the question. He was here to kill you before you could get away. The Jedi pressed harder, the metal cutting into your skin. You screamed in pain and he laughed? Amused at what was going on. 

This was it. You heard his finger slide to the trigger. 

Qimir. 

I love you. 

I love you. 

If there’s an afterlife I wish for something kinder. 

You heard the ignition of a lightsaber, and in an instant the grip on your throat released. Then there was a thud, the crunch of leaves and snapping of twigs followed after. You fell to the floor and curled into a ball, heaving for air. Were you dead? Was this the afterlife you were just praying to the Maker for? “Get up,” the distorted voice commanded. You crawled a couple of inches and sat up, pushing your hair out of your face and looking behind you. 

Lying on the ground was the Jedi, a red lightsaber right through the center of his head. Your eyes widened and the last of the tears flowed from your eyes. You watched as Qimir called his saber back to his hand, a perfect circle left in its wake. He pulled you up by the shoulder and hurried you back towards the hideout. 

You walked hurriedly in silence, looking back at the deep forest every now and then to make sure you weren’t followed by anyone else. The Jedi Order had been desperate to capture him since the murder of that one Jedi on Udea. Qimir kept a tight grip on your wrist, you didn’t dare to pull away since he was the only thing keeping you alive. 

That silence remained when you got to the small cabin. He whipped off the mask and threw it violently into the corner. Your body stilled, wondering if you were in for a worse fate than with the Jedi. Qimir killed violently, he’d kill anyone. You were nothing special. Not to him.

He turned to you with fire raging in his eyes, they only softened slightly when he saw the blood trickling from your head, a few drops of crimson landing on your chest. He extended his hand, a small wooden box rushing towards him. He caught it effortlessly and sat on the makeshift bed. “Sit.” 

You did as you were told and took a seat by his side. He went to work bandaging your wound, but you noticed something. Why didn’t he just heal it using the Force? Why was he taking the time for something so futile for a Sith? You also noticed his fingers trembling as he picked up the small scissors among the supplies. He made it halfway to your head before he shakily dropped them into your lap, the fabric of your cloak delicately breaking the fall. Your hands connected as you both reached out to collect them. 

Qimir let go of the scissors and held your hand. “Are you ok?” he asked, all bite vacant in his tone.

“I think so,” you nodded. 

Silence filled the air, and you could feel his stare burn into your skin. He just went back to work, dabbing at the blood and cleaning your skin of dirt and blood. You nearly begged him to say something, anything to release you from the choking silence. 

After the job was done, Qimir stood and collected his supplies, putting everything away silently. Your gaze followed him, you had always wondered how he could act so calm in these situations, you almost admired it. Then he stood in the center of the room, his shoulders hunched and his gaze lingered on the ground, analyzing the cracks in the wood. 

“I didn’t know they we—”

“—I love you.” 

I love you. Those words sounded so foreign to him, he had spoken them once, before the Order and before they took him away. It had been so long—too long. He was embarrassed that it took that long to say to you. Qimir had learned his lesson.

You stood up, the wood creaking below you as you closed some distance between you. “Why tell me now? When I’m about to die at the hands of the Jedi.” 

“I should have told you a long time ago,” he jumped in, his hands flexing, “I heard your thoughts, your pleas. I’m sorry.”

You lifted your chin, “What am I to you, Qimir?” You asked him the same question as earlier, this time you had no fight left. 

The Sith raised his hand and connected it to the side of your face, “I think they would have called it a soulmate?” He pulled you in closer, “I should have never let you feel differently.” 

“Never do that again,” you said bitterly, jabbing your finger into his chest. 

He pressed his lips to your forehead, letting his eyes flutter closed, “Never.”

[saphronethaleph]

The Deal

“Only through me can you achieve a power greater than any Jedi,” Palpatine said. “Learn to know the dark side of the Force, Anakin, and you will be able to save your wife from certain death.”

“What did you say?” Anakin asked.

“Use my knowledge, I beg you…” Palpatine pleaded.

“You’re a Sith Lord!” Anakin said.

He reached for his lightsaber, then paused.

“That story you told, about Darth Plagueis,” he said. “You mean – that was true? He really did discover a way to save people from death?”

“Yes, Anakin,” Palpatine agreed. “And I will-”

“So,” Anakin interrupted, frowning. “How do you know it? You said his apprentice murdered him in his sleep.”

“Because he taught everything to… his apprentice… before dying,” Palpatine explained.

“Again,” Anakin said, patiently. “How do you know it?”

“I was that apprentice!” Palpatine explained.

“So you killed your master in his sleep, and you ordered me to kill your apprentice, Dooku,” Anakin said. “You know, Chancellor, this isn’t a great job offer.”

“But think of what you have to gain, Anakin,” Palpatine said. “I can save your wife. Isn’t that what matters?”

“...yeah,” Anakin agreed, still frowning. “So when did Plagueis die?”

“About… fifteen years ago, now?” Palpatine said. “Maybe sixteen? Something like that. Why does that matter?”

“Just wanting to make sure I’ve got all the information, Chancellor,” Anakin replied. “Who have you been healing? Because I don’t actually think you’ve got any loved ones.”

He made a face. “Obi-Wan once took me aside and told me about what to look out for when an older man was going to try and touch me in the wrong way.”

“You see?” Palpatine asked. “He doesn’t trust you!”

“I see his point, though,” Anakin said. “Because you don’t have any loved ones that I can think of, like I say… so who have you been healing?”

Palpatine frowned.

“...why does that matter, Anakin?” he asked.

“Because it sounds like you learned how to do this at least fifteen years ago and you’ve never actually tried it,” Anakin clarified. “Which really sounds like you can’t do it, or even if you could before your medical license has expired.”

“I most certainly can!” Palpatine said, his patience fraying slightly. “Anakin, I am trying to help you!”

“Okay, then,” Anakin replied. “Teach me now.”

Palpatine made a face.

“If I do that, then how will I know you won’t betray me?” he said.

“...you’re saying that the only thing that would keep me from betraying you is if you don’t teach me the healing technique,” Anakin said, nodding. “So you’ve got no reason to get around to teaching me. I know how to lure an Eopie, Chancellor.”

“It will take too long to teach you, anyway,” Palpatine declared. “We can’t do it tonight. It won’t fit.”

“You’re really trying to help me, huh?” Anakin said. “Because all the visions I’ve been having about my wife dying are about it happening soon…”

He stopped.

“Actually, how do you know about that? I don’t think I ever told you.”

“Oh, please, it’s obvious that you’re married-” Palpatine said, rolling his eyes.

“I mean about the certain death bit,” Anakin explained. “It’s a bit of a guess.”

He frowned, visibly thinking. “And, uh… okay, so what you’re saying is that… you’re a Sith, you want to take direct control of the Jedi, and that’s because of the war against the Separatists, who were led by Count Dooku. Who was your apprentice… and then for me, personally, you want me to turn to the Dark Side so you can teach me a healing technique you’ve never actually used yourself, while you’ve killed the last two people who worked directly with you the moment they were no longer useful to you.”

Palpatine looked pained.

“That’s a very negative attitude, Anakin,” he said.

“I want to make sure I’ve got all this straight, is all,” Anakin replied.

Mace Windu’s commlink beeped, in a specific pattern that indicated it was a member of the Council.

“Windu here,” he said, raising the device to his ear.

“Master, I quit,” Anakin told him. “Also I married Senator Amidala at the start of the war, Palpatine was the Sith Lord, and I’d quite like to sleep for a week at some point. I’ve had a very long day.”

“...what?” Mace asked, a bit overloaded himself.

“Like, I’m pretty sure my day has had the sun go down three times so far,” Anakin went on. “Also the Chancellor exploded when I killed him. It’s okay, he was shooting lightning at me, that makes it fair.”

[darthfighter]

patience

Chapter Five of Your Shadow Series

warnings: oral (f!receiving), fingering, p in v, lightsaber as a lamp, pure smut.. like.. the whole thing is :D MINORS DNI !!!!!

summary: stuck in a cave waiting out a sandstorm, what’s the worst that can happen?!

word count: 2.3k

authors note: this is my first time publishing smut & i’m a bit nervous.. so here you guys go, as promised !!! hope you enjoy

part four here !

Kissing Qimir never felt enough. As you two meshed together, kissing as one. You wanted to drown in him. In a way, you started to feel yourself suffocate under him. Feeling as though kissing him was starting to drown you. This makes you break the long, choreographed like kiss the two of you shared.

Both of you heave out your lungs from catching each other's breath. Your hands continue to roam his chest, but you begin to reach from under his shirt feeling his soft skin beneath the cloth. Immediately he rips off his shirt but all you can do in this moment is feel, no matter how open your eyes are. It’s still pitch black in the cave you both took cover in while waiting out the sandstorm.

His lips crash against yours like the waves back home. The sounds of your lips smack together repeatedly like waves meeting the shore, growing more hungry. You start to lift your back off from the makeshift bed and lift your shirt off. After it's off, you continue to kiss a bit more after this, but Qimir wants to taste more of you. His lips unattached from yours and move towards your neck. You hum as a reaction and he feels the vibration of it beneath his lips. Qimir makes his way down to your chest. His lips are warm and soft. His bare hands slide their way up your stomach, eventually resting above your bra. Your hands plant themselves above his, and signal him to take it off.

Your bra comes off, and immediately Qimir bolts his lips onto your breasts. You sigh so loud in the air the wind storm beyond the cave can’t cover it. You feel the sensitivity on every inch of you start to grow. Your body grows hot, feeling as if you are directly under the suns.

As Qimir plants kisses and sucks over your chest, you start to reflect. You remind yourself that this is what your life was missing. You were missing these feelings of want and desire. You were missing Qimir. You no longer felt out of place when you were with Qimir. He understood you, you and your wants. In the past, you would shut the feelings you feel now down into your mental vault. Knowing it wasn’t the Jedi way. Now, Qimir opened this vault, and you didn’t want it to close anytime soon.

He starts to shift more down, making his way down your stomach. His hands pull your pants down along with your underwear, and you lift your bottom to help him. You feel your heart squeeze in anticipation so much it hurts just a bit. Qimir starts to caress your bare legs, shifting himself in between you while lowering himself down.

Qimir breathes out heavily, and you feel the cold air hit your core. Your whole body shivers in response and you whine into the air.

With one swift, broad tongue, he licks your cunt.

Your whole body feels a wave of pleasure and overwhelmness. Your hands reach towards Qimir, and you lace your fingers through his hair. The more he massages your folds with his tongue, the more you pull his hair.

His mouth vibrates against your core and your mouth grows slack with pleasure.

You feel yourself throb from underneath him while you squirm, but Qimir’s arms wrap around your legs to hold you in place. He’s eating you, and you're enjoying it. You bite your lip so hard it stings under your teeth. Qimir’s fingers grip onto your skin, leaving imprints you can’t see.

After long sucks and licks, he removes his mouth. You feel the warmth leave you and you immediately huff out your mouth in want.

Qimir starts to tease and make this all last longer by planting soft kisses along the side of you, especially on your thighs. You start to grow impatient and its making you shift. He tightens his grip on you as he presses soft and gentle kisses onto you, and you swear you can feel his smile into the kisses. He’s enjoying driving you crazy for him. You decide to shut down his amusement and tell him what to do. “Do it again, please.” You whine through the force.

He wastes no time, and latches his mouth onto your wet aching cunt.

You moan as loud as you can, uncontrollably. You cover your mouth with your hand, but he reaches towards your forearm and holds it down himself. Making you loud just for him.

When you think of desire, this is what you feel. You feel all the nerves of you a million times more sensitive. One of your main feelings is being treated as you are wanted. He wants to taste you, he wants to touch, and kiss you.

How could you live life without this? How empty would that be?

You suck in your breath and it hitches. You feel overwhelmed. You are over your cliff. The cliff you always feel like you're on around Qimir, but it's different this time. Below the cliff are waves crashing. Your body wants to join the waves, and Qimir senses it.

“Let yourself feel.” He orders in your head.

You start to feel yourself be engulfed by the waves, feeling the powerful ocean come to you. You reach over the edge, and your body shakes under him. You cum on his tongue and he groans in response. Savoring the taste of you.

You begin to gasp in and out, trying to catch your breath. You ache for the come down and your body sends aftershocks. Qimir decides to go easy on you, and removes his mouth from you.

Qimir wastes no time and grabs ahold of your face again to guide himself back onto your lips. Your lips move together and you taste yourself on his lips, and his tongue. The prickles of Qimir’s facial hair rub along your upper lip.

His hair dangles in your face above you, and your hands brush the hair back. Feeling the black strands intertwine with your fingers.

Without saying anything, Qimir rests your hand that was on his head, and guides it down his chest, down his stomach, and finally above his hard imprint in his pants. His grip on your hand tightens as you touch him.

You loved feeling this. This desire. It felt warm and hot. It felt scorching under your touch and inside your chest.

Qimir rests his forehead on yours, as he loses himself into the pleasure you are making him feel. You can even feel the warmth of his panting on your face. You breathe him in.

You start to grow impatient, wanting more. In a way, you’re sitting on the shore. Coming down from your high. You want to feel yourself in the waves again. With that in mind you start to reach upwards onto the waistband of his pants, and tug.

You feel (but can’t see) him shift beneath you knowing it must be him taking his clothes off. With your senses you hear the fabric fall to the floor, then immediately feel the soft but hard skin of his cock beside your thigh.

The tip glides itself in between your folds, feeling slick and hot. You naturally grind yourself into it and move your hips. Then, your eyebrows frown as you hear Qimir groan in annoyance. You stop in fear you are doing something wrong, and he senses it.

“No no- keep doing that.”

And you do. Your hips roll below you and you feel yourself get closer to the waves. Although Qimir’s annoyed groans only continue, and he acknowledges it. “Fuck. I can’t-” he puffs above you, heaving his chest in and out “I can’t see you.” and without a second to waste, you feel the force fill the air. Next thing you know the cave is illuminated red from Qimir’s lightsaber.

He wanted to see you ride his dick so much that he force pulled his own weapon, and turned it on to see you. The vibration of the saber resembled the way you felt inside, quivering and hot.

Finally after only being able to feel, now you get to see. Qimir’s eyebrows frowned in concentration, his eyes scanned your entire bare body before him, his broad shoulders, his arm holding out the lightsaber above you, his toned stomach doing small paces to rub himself onto you, and his huge thighs in between you. You blushed so hard that your eyes started to water from your blood pressure rising.

You started to feel impatient. You ached for him to be inside you. Your hand reaches towards his cock, and you align it with your entrance.

“H-hold on. I haven’t warmed you up enough.”

The sandstorm beside you both can’t even cover your next words with how loud you yelled. “What?!” you blared between you two.

With Qimir’s free hand, he strokes your folds with his fingers delicately. He knows he doesn’t wanna say these words out loud, because he knows he needs to say this in a deep, condescending tone that he won’t execute out loud. “Did The Jedi not teach you patience?”

You clutch your fist in frustration, but especially arousal. He was teasing you.

His lustful eyes leave yours and sets them on your pussy. His mouth forms an O shape from how wet you were for him. He didn’t even need to use spit anymore. With how slick you were for him, he gently pushes a finger inside you.

You inhale sharply and feel yourself in a different way, and start to know yourself in a new way as well. You’ve never felt this amount of desire in your whole life. Sure, you had your moments, but you never gave into them this far. Qimir made you feel more than you knew was physically possible.

Then, you moan the dirtiest and loudest moan as his finger curls onto your soft g-spot. Your body launches forward from the pleasure causing Qimir to softly curse.

“Fuck.” He lifts his saber higher to bring it farther away from you. With this action, it brings him satisfaction to know he’s making you feel this strongly and it brings a smile to his face. A smile on his lips as his eyes study your body below him. Your body is red and aching.

The more Qimir fingers you, the more you feel the waves get closer. You can feel the wind of them brushing against your skin. It starts to bring goosebumps onto your flesh, and Qimir can see it. This makes him add another finger inside you and repeat his action.

You become so overwhelmed that grab ahold of his hand below you. Though you just rest it on top of him and he waits for you to pull him away, but it never comes. Qimir continues to pump his digits in and out of you and bites his lip as you unravel around him.

The waves are closer, your skin is feeling the sprinkles of the powerful waves before you. You’re close. You can practically walk and enter the ocean— but not like this.

Your hand pulls his wrist and he immediately stops. You open your tight shut eyes and see Qimir’s expression reading concern, you can even read his lips faintly saying “You okay?”

You nod your head with your hair damp from sweat. Your shaking hand reaches towards his cheek, and you speak to him through the force once again “I wanna let go around you.” You immediately feel Qimir’s cock twitch beside your thigh.

Surprisingly he is still holding up his lightsaber ahead of you. Clearly meaning he wants to see you, every part of you, and every moment. His hair dangles in front of his face as he lowers his head down to align himself with your entrance.

Slowly, and as gently as he can, he pushes himself into you. Your whole body grows tense in anticipation waiting for all of him. You look up to him seeing his adam’s apple bob in pleasure.

For a bit, Qimir repeatedly inches his way in and out of you. Trying his best not to overwhelm you. When the time comes when he’s all the way in, he rests it inside you. You look up to him, with red highlighting every pore on him, you see his face. Although you are so focused on the insane amount of desire you feel, you don’t comprehend what’s in his mind.

In his mind, he’s blown away on what he has before him. He has the one he’s been searching for inside of him, wrapped around his cock. You don’t realize it yet, but you have him wrapped around you too, around your finger.

Qimir still holding his lightsaber up, he starts to pump repeatedly, slowly. With his free hand its caressing your thighs beneath him. Roaming your legs like he’s trying to personally heat up his hand from your touch. You croak out moans into the cave. When Qimir finally reaches a pace he is satisfied with, and you as well, he rests his hand above your pubic bone, and lowers his thumb onto your swollen clit giving it the attention you need.

The waves are beneath your feet, slowly but surely reaching you. You can feel the powerful waves flow through your body. From your clit, up your stomach, your sensitive breasts, heaving chest, marked neck, and moaning mouth. This all repeats.

It repeats until you are close. You look into Qimir’s eyes, and he reads them. He knows you, knows you well enough to know what your eyes are trying to say.

Instead of speeding up his pace, he keeps it. Knowing this feels best for you. The sandstorm can’t even cover his moans escaping his lips.

The waves crash a second time. Feeling more powerful than the first. Your walls tighten around him and you can feel yourself throb around his cock. The waves grow slower, and you come down. Qimir slides out of you, and you immediately feel empty.

His saber turns off, and the cave is pitch black once more. Though, this time instead of being alone in the darkness. Qimir rests beside you and holds you, drowning into your ocean.

chapter six here !

[pinescent-and-gingerbread]

✧Night Moths

✦ Pairing: Arthur Morgan x Fem!Reader ✦ Summary: Arthur has a simple task to do, searching for any lead possible at the Mayor's party. Only problem? You also have a job of your own. Based on “The Gilded Cage” ✦ Warnings/tags: guns, strangers to…sinners?, SMUT 18+, reader is part of a St Denis gang, cover names used at first, smoking, Arthur is extremely horny and a little rough with you (you pushed his limits), cursing, outdoor sex, fingering, tits play, multiple orgasms, unprotected p in v ✦ Words: 9,8k ✦ a/n: YES. I KNOW. This is super long. I have absolutely zero excuse. I feel like this is my best piece yet, but I'm so nervous about posting it! Once again, a big thank you to the incredible @zae-heeyyy, my jedi master, my confidence-booster and patience Queen, who beta-read this big baby and helped me so much with so many things, as always. (Go check her blog I'm begging you)

Glasses are twinkling and clinking all around you. Words are spoken, laughs are let out, champagne drank.

You're leaning against one of the stoned garden walls, fancy decor of the Mayor's house, the perfectly cut bushes looking just as fresh and neat as every guest at this party. You can hear the distinguished music coming from a quartet playing under a gazebo a few meters away from you, and smell the fresh air of the night blending with aromas of flowers, expensive alcohol, hint of vanilla and sweet scents hiding a stronger note of sweat and cologne. Around you, all the richest, wealthiest, and noteworthiest of people in St Denis. You can hear them talk; their conversation as dull and superficial as an empty chrysalid, an abandoned cocoon emptied from all substance, from all interest and life.

You hated those kinds of discussions. Hated those kinds of people, the ones that have the easiest and simplest life one could ever have; being fed, being cared for, even being told what to think and do. You almost envied them in a way, they didn't have to worry about a single thing apart from losing their power. It seemed comfortable somehow, worry-free. The exact opposite of what you had always known.

And yet, you had to bear with them. A very specific task had been assigned to you by your gang. A simple job, one you were often sent off to as you had grown by the years into a great thief and a terribly efficient shapeshifter; blending into any type of party, or gathering, always making a good impression, putting people at ease. You were now an expert at this little game, especially with rich men. They were all the same, always wanting more, demanding the same thing from you. You had learned how to play with their greediness and lust to turn it into your advantage, saloons becoming your jungle as you sneaked easily between your prey to rob them, a deadly and redoubtable leopard in a world of apes.

You needed to steal some important documents from the mayor's office. The main informer of your gang had specified it was a pretty strong lead, and that you could gain a lot from it; something to do with Leviticus Cornwall's dirty deeds with the mayor, a blackmail opportunity. 

Your boss had decided to send you, knowing you would easily integrate the party, and even more easily steal the documents. So here you were, feline eyes looking all around you, scanning, observing, evaluating. You couldn't just come, steal the papers, and go; it would have been too suspicious. All the contrary, you needed to be seen and leave a good impression like you always did, maybe stay for a couple of hours, and then smoothly retrieve your goal before disappearing in the secrecy of the dark night. A flamboyant, harmless butterfly… on the surface.

You sighed, trying to pay attention to what was being said to you. Right in front of you, a middle-aged man was talking, explaining something about how he had acquired his incredible wealth. His speech was sadly boring, his eyes glum, his clothes basic, his face awfully bland.

The empty chrysalis in all its gloomy glory.

You forced yourself to nod and give the man a charming smile. This was your job. You had to at least do it properly. Why was tonight a lot harder than the others? Were you frightened to be right under the Mayor's nose, fooling him into his own home? Were you tired, or sick? 

In a way, you were. Sick of this life, of this constant pretending, of being here listening to the literal hollow vessel bragging about himself, sick of needing to appear actually interested, charmed even. 

Suddenly, the music coming from the quartet is too loud, sharp violin blending with his words, making you even less focused. You were here for too long already, you needed a break and to finish your mission.

You politely interrupted the stranger, placing a gentle hand on his forearm, a gesture that you had noticed was prompt to soften most men. Along with your most charming smile, you excused yourself from him and quickly walked to a less crowded area, praying that no one would interrupt you.

You made your way up to the exterior stairs of the luxurious mansion just before the patio door and windows, and stopped on top of them, placing your hands on the central low wall, between two Greek columns. Another fancy facade, the house itself was just an imitation from another culture. Did any of these fools have any personal identity at all?

From here, you had a good view of the whole party. Countless fake smiles, masks, a literal scene of a play that could have its place at the Théâtre Râleur. A play of pale phantom shells.

You reached for your purse, taking a cigarette out, mindlessly putting it between your lips. Maybe smoking would help. You searched for a match, silently cursing realizing you hadn't any left.

"Ya need some fire, Ma’am?"

A deep voice said behind you, making you turn, surprised. It was unusual for people to startle you, your ears had been trained to notice the faintest of footsteps in order to survive.

You got even more surprised considering who had talked. A man was standing before you. He was taller, and largely wider than you, his black suit struggling to contain what looked like a well-built body; which made you wonder how could he have been so quiet. His shoulders especially looked way broader than the men you had the habit of running into at those sorts of gatherings. A very classical white bow looked like it was strangling him. His black tailcoat and white jacket looked larger too, making you wonder how much did he had to pay for the tailor to sew them custom-made.

His hair had a soft indescribable color, somewhere between a light brown and a sandy blond. His face, the work of a brutal draftsman, rough edges and strong squared jaw gratified with some scars. One on his chin, another on his nose, nose that seemed broken now that you were thinking about it. It looked like the artist that had drawn this man had sharpened his pencils too much and traced lines in a hurry, piercing through the canvas, his features ending up rugged and scared, some trace of graphite shrapnel that would have damaged the portrait.

What disturbed you the most were his eyes. They looked out of place considering how robust his features were. One could have expected them to be dark, black even. But they were the exact opposite, their bright and soft indigo color leaving you disarmed, two sapphires locked on your own pupils.

He was handing you a match, and you slowly took it, your fingers slightly discovering how his palm felt under them. Firm, calloused.  Another stone-like feature of him.

He looked like those Greek statues carved by artists. His beauty so singular and yet enticing. So different.

"Why, thank you, kind sir." You showed your gratitude to him with a grin, lighting the match by simply rubbing it against the cold stone of the fence, a little flame appearing instantly. You brought it to your mouth, the cigarette finally catching fire, and you breathed in.

"Ya don't smoke much?" He questioned, voice deep. You hadn't noticed how deep it was the first time, nor how pronounced his accent was, dragging and drawling every word, a slow melody of his own.

"Not too often, indeed." You informed him. It was the truth, you were basically just smoking during jobs to blend in more easily, most people doing it. It was an easy way to start a conversation with anyone. Just like he had done with you, you noted.

"Needed a break from high society?" He inquired, a sarcastic tone in his voice.

"I guess you could say that." You answered, exhaling a long drag of smoke. 

You were now completely turned to face him, your cigarette making back and forth from your mouth to the air where you tossed the burned ashes with a little movement from your thumb to the cigarette’s end. Your motions were elegant, distinguished but looked natural. It caught his interest.

"What's your name, sir?" You spoke again, curious about this uncommon newcomer.

"Tacitus Kilgore. What is yours, Ma'am?" He asked you back before placing himself on your left, both of you leaning on the low fence of the patio. 

You contained a chuckle. There was no way in the World this man was named like this. You knew something was odd about him. The scars, his knuckles redden and subtly wounded as if had fought recently.  His strong stature, miles away from a lazy bourgeois being served, his wild hair longer than the actual trendy haircut, his stubble fitting more a countryman than an actual St Denis gentleman. 

Years of playing with people and observing them had made your eyes alert and expert, and you could see when someone was pretending.

When someone was playing a role just like you were, not belonging into this World.

"Rose Schultz." Of course, it wasn't your real name either. You had to be a really poor thief to give him your actual one. He didn't react to it though, his face impassible just like the start of your whole conversation.

Apart from this vague feeling you had about him not being a rich gentleman, you found trouble in reading his emotions. His facial features were closed, impenetrable, mysterious. This also disturbed you as you had the habits of figuring men out right away; he on the other hand was a whole challenge by himself, his intentions hidden behind an emotionless face. This man probably was a champion at poker.

"Nice t' meet ya, Missus Schultz. Are you, erm, hidin' from someone here? Or jus' judgin' everyone from your perch?" He went on with a more amused voice.

"Just know that I'm not the type to hide from someone, Mister." You replied, a little grin curling up your lips.

"Yeah, you sure don't look like it..."

"You wanna know what I think you look like, Mister?"

"Go ahead."

"A wild horse who's trapped, and can't wait to be freed again."

Silence. His eyes stared deeply into yours, stabbing you in sharp blue flashes of Apatite, as keen as the blade of a knife. After just a few seconds, you finally see his mouth moving, his cold expression changing as a slight grin made his way between the stillness of his features.

"You sort of a witch or somethin' ?" He asked you, amused once again. His little smile is even more evident in his eyes, his lower eyelids crinkling slightly in amusement.

"Maybe." You answered cockily, feeling more at ease with him now that he was slightly more open. 

Still, there was something that was making you feel weak in the knees; maybe it was his tall stature, his strong build, or the palpable tension you could feel beaming out from him, as if he was ready to jump on someone who would have crossed him at any second.

In a way, you liked it. It was almost exciting.

"I better not mess wi’chu then. Don't wanna end up cursed or somethin'." He joked, features relaxing, body leaning slightly more against the low wall in a more comfortable position.

"Oh, I wouldn't dare. You also look like the type of man you don't wanna mess with..."

"I'm surprised how well you already know me, darlin'." He admitted, internally enjoying your conversation more and more.

Your heart swelled at the surname. It felt so good in your ears, it sounded better than from any person who ever said it to you. You wanted to hear it again. You wanted to hear him say it just to you.

"I'm kinda talented at figuring people out." You simply replied, before taking another drag at your cigarette.

"I too. And I also think you're not here to jus' play nice with everyone and enjoy yourself." He suddenly confessed to you with a knowing gaze, eyebrows raising as if he was trying to make you understand something.

He knew too. You both knew you weren't from this world, like two predators from the same species, recognizing themselves, circling, judging, from one individual to another. Your breath stopped for a very short time, nobody could have noticed it, but somehow you were sure he did.

"Don't ya worry little "rose", I won't tell no one..." 

You didn't miss how he was playing with your false name. On top of being astonishingly handsome, he had some spirit…

He's still looking intensely into your eyes. "In return, I expect you to do the same...", he added in a low voice, his tone firmer and even more resonant than earlier.

A threat. His presence only intimidates you, and it's working so well that you're almost sure he must be an expert in terrorizing too. He must be one hell of a weapon all by himself.

You slowly nodded your head, trying to swallow as naturally as possible to look unphased. 

"Guess we have a deal here, "Tacitus"." You emphasized his name, making it clear you're more than doubtful about it being real too.

It made him laugh, and you almost lost it at the sound of it. It was as deep, raw, and genuine as his entire being seemed to be. You loved it. You loved it too much.

Exhaling some smoke, you noticed he had pulled out a cigarette too and had joined your smoking, holding it between his thumb and index finger. You had mixed feelings for this man. He was just as intimidating as he was enticing, and you let your curiosity win the best of you as you carried on your conversation with him.

"I hate it here." You suddenly confessed.

 There was no point in playing anymore, and even if you didn’t really know why you had told him that, a part of you felt like maybe, just maybe, he could have understood you.

"Yeah, I get what ya mean. Sometimes I think that those people are jus'… reptiles in fancy clothin'."

You had seen right. Your chest felt light, as if he had lifted a weight in you with just those simple words.

"I just want to be anywhere else but here. Somewhere nicer, more authentic. Like in Big Valley..." You went on with your regrets.

"You too know about this place uh? Yeah, I can picture ya picking flowers in Lil’ Creek..."

This time it was your turn to chuckle, your laugh creating a little puff of smoke in the air. Was he being serious or just teasing you? You didn’t really care. Now, you felt like something special was linking you both as you knew exactly where this spot was, a happy memory brought back in your mind thanks to his words. The wild and fresh river, the meadows covered in thousands of violet flowers, the snowy mountains in the background.

Your cristal-clear laugh made him smile back at you.

"So... What does a woman like you is actually doing here, then?" He asked you, his eyes roaming all along your body while he did. 

You were glad you had put on the prettiest dress you had, its dark burgundy color matching perfectly the tone of your skin, and its generous cleavage showing a delicious amount of your chest, underlined by a black translucent shawl covering your shoulders and twirling around your arms. You were offering a tempting sight for every man. You knew he had looked at it, his eyes lingering there had almost burned your skin, sent a warm feeling between your tights, and made your hand hold your cigarette tighter.

"You really thought it would be that easy, Mister?" You answered with another cheeky grin, looking at him with a sensual gaze, your words let out in a languorous whisper, knowing damn well he was trying to gain information, probably to probe if he could get something out of it for himself. "You really thought I would just confess everything to you about myself and what I'm doing here, just because you've got a firm tone and pretty face?"

He let out a dry single chuckle, his cigarette hanging in the air, smirking some more. This damn smirk, it was making you have more and more inappropriate thoughts about this man. The wildness, the dangerousness he was emitting should have made every girl flee, but you, all the contrary, were attracted by it like a moth to a flame.

Or maybe he was the Moth. Maybe he was the beautiful, singular, and ephemeral Moth in the world of chrysalides you were searching for all along.

"Oh trust me, I could make you spit out everythin' I want, Miss." He replied to your taunting words with the serious threatening tone he had used before. "Could make this pretty mouth behave..." He added, looking right into your soul, bending slightly towards you.

You felt like the tension was about to make your whole body burst. There was something between you two, you were sure he could feel it too. A sinuous, dark creature swimming and circling incessantly under the surface of a frozen lake; waiting, craving to be unleashed, to break the thin layer of ice that was keeping it caged.

He was inviting you to measure yourself to him. Bent towards you, wanting you to close the other half of the space between you both. A challenge, or a mark of respect, the case you didn’t want to venture into this territory.

But truth was, you wanted to. You wanted to break the ice yourself, you wanted to just kiss him, right here, right now.

Of course, it was a bad idea. And you were a professional, on a mission.

Instead, you put your hand on his bicep and brought your head inches away from his, not closing the space between your mouths. You’re accepting this silent fight, excited to show him what you’re capable of. You’re enveloped by his strong scent; your lips so close to his. You can see by his widening smirk how delighted he is you didn’t change your mind nor lost your guts. Responding to your bold move, he slowly snaked an arm around your waist. His hand landed on your lower back, just on the verge of being offensive.

Both of you stayed like this for a moment, your breath mixing, merging in a dangerous and exciting cocktail, but neither of you actually crossing the limit.

He could sense just how close he was to though, his muscles were tensed under your fingers, his forehead almost resting on yours with a light frown on it. You could see in his impassive handsome face a whole new emotion. 

Pure, raw lust.

"You're such a temptatious, thorny rose..." He mumbled in a hot whisper against your lips, the warmth between your legs now burning like a wildfire. Your pussy was aching for him, and you couldn't hold it anymore.

You felt his body twitching as he was going to finally do it, finally break the ice of the frozen lake, finally let his impulses and needs break free, his unholy, deep, atrociously torturous desires-

"Ah, Arthur !" A relieved voice interrupted both of you and he immediately let go of you, his head snapping to look at the man who had talked, eyes widening.

A tall gentleman with a perfectly cut mustache as black as his long curly hair and hat was looking at your companion with a contained,  amused smile.

"Will you excuse us, Miss?" He said unctuously to you, his voice polite and charming.

It was more of a statement than a question. He quickly took one of your hands and put a polite kiss on it before bending slightly towards you, as a gentleman would, and looked at your opponent with an insistent gaze.

Arthur was fulminating. He wasn't actually showing it, his face had come back to its usual cold, emotionless expression. But you could feel from where you were the unbearable tension and frustration that was dripping from his body language, almost as a halo of warmth you could physically touch with your hands. He took a last look at you, eyes expressing a mix of regret and bitterness.

"Goodnight, Miss." He coldly greeted you, walking next to you to follow his friend and go down the stairs, his shoulder brushing against yours while doing it.

"Goodnight, Arthur..." You answered him emphasizing his name once again, making it really clear that you remembered it was not the one he had given you and that you were pretty proud you had seen right. A playful, teasing grin on your face, you look one last time at him before he vanished in the ocean of guests.

Your Butterfly had disappeared just as quickly as he had materialized; leaving you alone with the empty cocoons once more. It was more than time for you to do your job and get out of here. Your cigarette finished, now feeling cold between your fingers, you tossed it away and headed into the mansion, feeling just as frustrated as so-called Arthur.

Arthur was pissed. He had never felt so frustrated in ages, and it was making his thoughts even less easy to discipline. His cigarette was on the verge of being smoked all at once from how intense he was getting and how heavy his breath had turned, the end of it constantly burning in a red shining little point as he was walking. 

This whole year he had felt like he didn't have any control over anything anymore and he hated it.

He was already feeling embittered in his everyday life, Dutch listening less and less to his opinion, Micah sneaking around him more and more, Mary coming back to him just to ask him to help her goddamn father who had always treated him like shit. 

On top of that, Dutch had made him look like an idiot using his actual name in front of you, making him wonder what was even the whole point of having a cover if he wasn't capable of sticking to it; which he had bitterly pointed out to him, but his superior had shrugged it off, seemingly happy to be here amongst the important people, looking as careless as ever.

Yes, Arthur was feeling frustrated, frustrated and tired of this. Tonight, instead of giving of himself, he wanted to take, for once. He needed to, even. He was about to before being interrupted, and this thought was gnawing at him from the inside. 

He was barely paying attention to what Dutch was saying to him and the others once Hosea and Bill had joined them. All he could see was your insanely beautiful face, your inviting lips, the perfect outline of your breasts from your cleavage, like engraved into his pupils.

The way you were talking, charming and teasing, the way you were smoking, all of this dreadfully turning him on during all your conversation. He had made an enormous amount of effort in order not to just kiss you.

He had joked about you being a witch, but it was the only explanation: you had bewitched him, threw your darkest, most sinful curse on him. Never in his life he had felt so attracted to someone after having talked with them for only such a short amount of time. What an insane fool he was.

On top of it, he was raging about the fact he probably wouldn't have the occasion to see you ever again. He had understood you clearly weren't just another rich man's wife, and he was certain you had given him a false name. His cock was throbbing terribly hurtfully in his pants, making his jaw clench, his brows frowning even more than usual. It was begging to be buried in you, between your legs, in your mouth, or your hands, even your breasts or your ass, anything but the cold feeling of nothingness he was feeling right now around it.

The sudden explosive sound and colorful lighting of fireworks had pulled him out of his blasphemous thoughts. 

He understood Dutch was ordering him something about following one of the Mayor's domestic, and gladly obliged, relieved to have another thing to focus on. Something about Cornwall sending an important letter to Lemieux, which he had to steal. Nothing difficult, he had done those sorts of things countless times. 

Nothing new. 

Nothing puzzling, like you had been.

As he followed the man, eyes locked on his white suit from afar, he quickly took a glance at the patio to see if you were still there. You weren't. His dick ached as he let out a deep exhale. Damn it.

Arthur rapidly found himself inside the Mayor's house. His servant had entered what looked like an office. He waited a few seconds after the room had felt silent, behind the corner of the walls, just to be sure, and entered it.

The room was indeed an office, a little desk with an armchair on his left, bookcases covering every wall, simply illuminated by a flickering orange lamp. Everything looked normal, except for the dark figure of a person in the middle of the place.

You.

He recognized your sensual dress immediately and witnessed you shoving some papers in what looked like a leathered little pocket held around your right thigh by leathered straps, just like a holster would be. His mind raced, a million reflections flying under his eyes. 

You were some sort of professional thief. And he didn’t have to be a genius to understand you had just taken the precise thing he was there for.

"That's why you were here, lil' rose?!" He asked you almost in disbelief, closing the door behind him.

You looked at him with a bold grin, looking almost amused by the situation. He, on the other hand, felt nothing but amusement. Anger, to have been fooled so easily, and that you had got ahead of him, losing the quiet game that had been played out between you. Envy, as you were now possessing two things he wanted to take away from you. Arousal, as his eyes were glued to the thigh that was now visible to his greedy eyes as you had pulled up your dress to put the sheets in your hidden pocket. Need, as his member felt hard again just by the sight of you doing it.

"Yeah, and you can only dream for me to give them to you if those papers were your target too, Arthur."

Damn, that teasing, cheeky mouth of yours. His fantasies came back in full force, and his gaze darkened. As temptatious as you were, he needed those documents. And he would do anything he had to to have them back.

"Give ‘em to me." He lowly ordered you, voice so severe you could have melted right into the carpeted floor of this damn office. But you didn't.

"Hell no."

"Give ‘em t’me, woman. I won't ask nicely a third time."

"If you want them, you'll have to catch me, pretty boy."

Lord, why was everyone so prompt to call him this way lately? He almost grunted at the way you had said it, and he would have lied if this time he didn't like it when it fell from your lips. He wanted to reply with something witty and even more threatening, but in a flash, you had opened the window, and easily jumped outside.

This Goddamn woman. What was she exactly? Some sort of feline? Yeah, probably a panther, agile, impressive, dangerous like one.

He instantly ran after you, jumping through the window too, landing in a loud thud. He quickly spotted your dress running away, escaping by the entry’s portal, then in the nearest street, disappearing behind St Denis's myriad of flashing lights. 

How could he had missed it? His mind was filled with images of it.

He had the common decency of grabbing back his gun from the butler at the party's entry, making him almost fall on the ground as he hadn't slowed but had grabbed them while running, the poor man wondering what the Hell made both of these people in such a hurry.

He was now flying at full speed around the luxurious streets, following the faint glimpse of your dress's color at the corner of every turn. He felt like he could follow your scent like a hunting dog, your sweet and peachy perfume confirming him you had passed there before.

He had enough, feeling his restrain and manners crackling more and more into little pieces. You were making him feel like a damn animal, reducing his whole being to primal needs and functions. He should have been disgusted with himself for that. But all he could do right now was thinking about the damn documents hidden against your damn alluring thigh.

"Stop now, you Goddamn... Evil woman!" He tried to call you out, but you just wouldn't stop. He started firing at you, getting angrier and more fed up by the second, a bullet exploding a piece of the bricked wall right next to your head, some splinters cutting slightly the top of your ear.

You bent over to dodge his bullets one more time and you heard him cursing again loudly behind you. On top of being big, strong and clever, he was fast. In a quick movement of your feet, shaking them, you removed your shoes, unable to run at your fastest speed with heels. You continued your frenzied course, way more at ease.

Arthur rushed in where you were just mere seconds after you, noticing the shoes abandoned on the floor. What the Hell was even this woman, he asked himself for the second time this evening. Some sort of temptatious, dark retelling of Cinderella?

He almost made himself laugh at the thought, understanding your move because his own polished shoes were frankly a pain to run with, making him slip with every shift as if he was walking on soap and regret his good old boots, before acknowledging he had lost your trace.

Shit!

He looked all around him, his eyes scanning every inch, his breath rapid and sharp, his forehead and neck a pool of sweat. No signs of you, unless... 

Something fell right on his face, but gently, as a caress from a fresh breeze. Your perfume filled up his nostrils and lungs and it made his heart race. He took it in his hands, the sensations pleasant under his fingerprints. 

It was your black shawl.

Tilting his head up, he found you.

You were making your way up to the roof of the town by climbing on a thin ladder.

Arthur exhaled deeply through his nose like a buffalo. He was used to this kind of high-speed chase, but this was a whole new thing, which made him regret his lasso too, his hand searching for it on his belt out of habit but closing on nothing. 

Damned party, damned suit, damned you. 

He climbed after you, refusing to give up, enraged like a wild beast. 

He would catch you, dead or alive.

In a way, this was making him even more aroused than any work-girl show he had ever seen.

"I'm going to kill ya, that's a promise!"

You could hear just how furious his voice was now, and you were starting to pray you would flee successfully from him, cause you knew he would eat you alive if he could get his hands on you.

Arriving on top of the building, you caught your breath for a microsecond, before searching for a way out, gaze frantic, heart beating out of your chest. You were considering climbing to another roof, but the deep, breathless sounds of your pursuer prevented you from doing more thinking.

Arthur had reached the top of the roof too, and was already aiming his gun at you. This time he didn't even bother to say anything, shooting at you again while getting up. He was so seething you wouldn’t have been surprised to see saliva bubbling from his mouth.

By divine intervention, you dodged again, and without any thinking, you ran all the way to the edge of the roof, and jumped.

You stayed in the air for a few seconds.

You felt like time had stopped, the air brushing against your skin, your heart hanging somewhere between the sky and the total void.

You landed on a fancy and illuminated balcony a few meters away. You hurt your feet and legs with the shock, but smiled proudly to yourself. You were out of reach, he was way bigger and way heavier than you, there was no way he coul-

A gigantic mass fell on you, as Arthur had proved you wrong and jumped from the roof you had just left and was crashing directly into you. 

Both of you fell on the ground and struggled for a few seconds; you tried to resist him but it was a fight already lost, this literal force of nature easily handling you like he wanted. 

You ended up lying on your back, Arthur sitting on you, towering over you with all his might, quickly grabbing your wrists to prevent you from fighting, his legs parted around your hips stopping you from escaping. You were trapped.

"You're a pain in the ass girl, you know that?!" He shouted at you, breathless, raging mad. You were both panting, sweating heavily. His face was entirely red, and your cheeks even more crimson.

You both looked at each other, eyes locked, and you stayed silent. The dark creature prowling under the thin floe had returned and it was getting bigger, stronger, out of control with each passing second. There was something extremely erotic in the way he was almost lying on top of you, both of you out of breath, sweaty, and burning red, both your hearts beating at full speed in the same erratic rhythm.

Just like before at the reception, you knew he could feel it too. You knew it from the dark gaze he was looking at you with, the shady swirls of the murky leviathan reflecting in the depths of his pupils, from the deepest well of his urges, forbidden territory to which no man ever had access.

A simple touch of his hand, that's all it took.

He put both of your hands into a single one of his, using his other one to pull up your dress, fingers roaming on your thigh.

You couldn't hold it anymore, you bent toward him and slammed your lips against his in the most powerful and decadent kiss you had ever shared with someone, almost biting him.

The moment you did, Arthur's mind exploded, and every poor drop of restrain he had evaporated as quickly as if it was on the Sun's surface. The beast had won, finally shattering the weak layer of ice into a million pieces; your two souls blending in what could have felt like a fevered dream.

The grunt he let out onto your kiss was animalistic, and the tension in his body just as powerful as a waterfall with a brutal, unstoppable current. The hand that was holding your wrist let go of it and slipped under your head, fingers in your hair, as his tongue licked against your lips, searching for a way in. You let him in, eagerly, wondering if he would have forced the way if you didn’t. 

He tasted strong, as if to match his whole being, a powerful flavor of tobacco, merged with a faint trace of sweetness and bitterness from the champagne he had drank. Like if you were smoking the finest and strongest of cigars. It made you love it even more.

Abandoning all your restraints too, your hands wrapped around his neck and your hips started pushing up against his, even if you couldn't move much, his two muscular thighs keeping you grounded to the balcony's paved floor. It felt so cold against your back, contrasting with the heat Arthur was burning with, consuming, devastating, raging.

He growled again when he felt your movement under him. He needed more of you, right now. This whole seduction game, the adrenaline rose by the chase, your bold charming attitude, your insanely insolent beauty, it was making him insane. He roughly ripped off his bowtie with one hand, needing some air; it felt like you two were under the desert’s scorching sun, stifling, dazing. 

The right hand he had on your thigh traveled even higher under your dress, devouring every inch of flesh it could, and his appetite was only getting worse the more he discovered you. He smoothly moved his legs from around yours to put himself between them, and you instantly, almost from instinct, hooked them around his hips.

The sudden contact of your blazing core against his equally hot bulge made you sigh in pleasure, and he loved it. Breaking your kiss for the first time since you had initiated it, he pulled back to look at you, his deep gaze devouring you, undressing you just by its stare. 

“What’s your real name?” He asked you, voice hoarser than ever, demanding it from you.

You told him your name, limbs feeling like mush under his intense eyes. He repeated it quietly, like a prayer he would recite on his own. You felt less and less like the panther you thought you were, and more and more like he was the predator alone. In a shaking tone, you questioned back to know his full, real name, needing to know what words you’d have to whisper in gratitude when he would finally take what he wanted from you. To whisper, or shout to the Heavens.

“Arthur Morgan.” He let out, his lips quickly returning to their current addiction, your skin. The way they were attacking your neck didn’t have an ounce of control now, his mouth opening widely to almost take a whole bite of your flesh there, letting kisses everywhere it could.

“Tell me if you don’t want this.” He added against your skin, between two greedy open-mouth kisses.

A way to escape. The predator stilling, letting a way out. But you didn't wanted it. Not at all. Not now that he had surrendered to you, trusting you with the intimacy of his real name, that would be stuck in your mind for God knows how long.

“I want it.” You asserted, voice almost cracking with the weight of your need.

He moaned a relieved sound in answer, his nose exhaling some air that tickled your neck.

You weren’t even sure he could stop himself if you had said no. He was consuming you, and he felt completely drunk, as if you were coated with a powerful whiskey. Strong alcohol that his tongue was now licking all the way from your shoulder, up to your ear.

You moaned, the feeling of his hungriness so good and perfect on you.

"Gonna take care of ya now." He growled in a rumbling whisper, making your legs feel weak. Another one of his promises, but this one was going to give you salvation, and you were thanking him for keeping it. 

The bold hand he had under your dress took another step towards insanity by landing on your undergarments, his thick fingers searching for a way in. You were trembling with anticipation. You couldn't even register the fact that you were really doing this, right now, with a complete stranger you had met only a few hours ago, and who wanted to kill you minutes before, on the balcony of what looked like a habited place.

The obscenity, the depravation, the boldness of it was only matched by his relentless thirst for you.

His fingers had finally pulled your underwear to the side, and you sighed seeing him on top of you, eyes drawn to your bare pussy, carnal features empathized by the obscurity of the night. The tip of his fingers traveled amongst your folds, wolves into the forest, a territory they were now claiming as theirs.

You almost begged for him, for the wolves to eat you up all and let nothing behind them, please Arthur, and he offered you this damnation, the desperate call of his name igniting another fire in his already infernal mind. A single, calloused finger pushed into your folds, making you spread your legs even more to grant it better access. It was stretching you pleasantly, his skin rough and firm inside. You started letting out sweet, quiet moans, showing him just how much you were enjoying this.

Your two hands now gripping his back, holding on for something, anything, his dark jacket suddenly feeling way too smooth to grab onto; you were wondering how touching his naked back could feel.

Arthur was doing everything in his power not to burst once more, grunting in response to your loving sound. Slowly, he pushed another one, thriving in how wet and hot your cunt felt around his fingers, craving for the moment he would finally be able to feel this downright perfection around his cock. He felt like he was ruining you, throwing you to these wolves, and you were thanking him for it.

For now, he focused on you, blue eyes glued on your face when he started curling his digits inside of you, searching for this so special, so delightful spot within your walls. He was observant, noticing every sound you were making, every muscle tensing, to know if it was the place you liked that he was brushing right now. Wanting it to be the place you liked most.

By adding his thumb on your clit and pushing a little deeper his index and middle finger in your desperate pussy, he realized he finally had found the Graill as your back arched against the ground, your own hands gripping harder on him, eyes shutting in pure pleasure.

"Oh, God! Yes, right there..." You rewarded him, voice high-pitched and filled with delight, a tingling sensation spreading on your legs and shoulders.

He exhaled deeply, your words making his own member gorging, pressing against the fabric of his suit that felt too small to contain him. He started pushing in and out, pulling a whine out of your throat with every movement, as the thick tip of his fingers rubbed against your sweet spot every time, wolves once again in a world of sweetness and honey, lapping your delight, feasting on your pleasure.

“Told ya I would make this pretty mouth behave…” He said cockily after one of your moans. He was enjoying this all too much, finally feeling in control again, being the one and only responsible for your ecstasy. 

The distance between his mouth and you seemed to be unacceptable for him as he had succumbed once more to his needs, his lips finding your skin again, tongue tasting, teasing your chest this time, everywhere he could on the cleavage he had desired since the first time he had laid eyes on you tonight. Bent over to you, looking like a curved beast feasting on its prey.

You were feeling your pleasure building, Arthur’s face hungrily searching for one of your nipples under the neckline of your dress, and sucking it once he had finally found it. His teeth and nose had pulled your dress, freeing your entire left breast, bare, defenseless in front of him. 

Maybe he was the wolf himself. He sure looked like it, his face a maw fed by your soft flesh.

Every nerve of your pussy screamed for deliverance, this familiar sensation taking form in your lower stomach. Your moans were becoming even more high-pitched, breathless, almost obscene, much to the outlaw's delight.

You had thought of him before being a terribly efficient and multi-functional weapon. You couldn’t have known just how right you had been, your hardening nipple still chewed by his mouth while his right hand was sending you to your edge, thumb skillfully circling on your clit faster and faster, the two other fingers tearing apart your sweet spot, in and out, in and out, again and again, until…

“A-Arthur, don’t stop, please!” Your voice slit the night open, tone pleading as if you were begging for your life.

“I won’t girl, it’s all okay… Give it t’me…” He encouraged you, even his breath feeling rough against the skin of your chest before he sucked hard on the skin of one of your breasts, accompanying you to your salvation.

It was enough to send you over your limit, your pussy clenching, throbbing, entirely consumed. You moaned so loudly it could have turned into a scream, hips jerking against his palm, his other hand quickly grabbing your hip to steady you and carry you through it as his fingers were dragging every last drop of your pleasure out of you. 

“Yeahhh, that’s it gorgeous, just like that…”

He was frowning, the sinful sensations of your wet cunt coating his fingers in a warm slick and tensing around them making his eyebrow and jaw just as tensed, his face just a hint of how fucking riled up he was because of it.

Your head was still spinning and your breath uneven when he finally pulled his digits out of your walls, the fresh air replacing them. Lost in your haze, you weren't capable of doing anything else but looking at him through lidded, heavy eyes.

He was absolutely beautiful, even more than at the start of the night. His true nature out at last, his white fancy shirt disheveled now that he had removed his bowtie and soaked from efforts. Cheeks and throat as red as a sanguine sunset. Pearls of sweat sparkling on his burning skin with the Ocean of street lights of St Denis, reminding you of a night sky, making his sandy hair stick to his forehead in the hottest way possible. 

You didn't knew how could all this had escalated so quickly, but at that moment, you felt like this man before you was your whole universe, his deep ultramarine eyes completing the stellar work of art he was, shining, shimmering, more than any star in the sky, as if the Gods had capture the entire Milky Way and imprisoned it in his being.

Arthur had ultimately pulled his cock out of his black suit pants, only piece of flesh out of his clothes, and your thoughts were immediately contradicted; there was no way any virtuous God could have made a man so depraved. He was the work of the Other Side, Lust and Temptation personified. King of the wolves, he could have had all the Hounds of Hell kneeling before him.

He pumped himself a few times, unable to resist the call his member had been screaming for hours, reinforced by the way his fingers had tasted your wet cavern. Some precum had already leaked from his big pinkish head when he was fingering you and was now glistening in the night, making you think about the stars again. Your breath got caught at this sight and you couldn't stop yourself from letting out a praise.

"Perfect..." You simply stated in a whisper, eyes glued to his throbbing, veiny member, relieved he had already pulled an orgasm out of you because there was no way he could have fit in you otherwise. Your eyes followed the dark path of his hair, from the glimpse you had on his chest between the open collar of his shirt, all the way down to his pelvis and at the base of his shaft. 

You could only imagine what it looked like without any clothes on, and you were dying to know.

"Trust me, you're the perfect one, darlin'." He asserted, firm tone leaving little to contradiction. 

He positioned himself in front of your entrance.

You weren't even completely back from the world your first relief had brought you to, and he was already at your door again. But this time, Arthur couldn’t stop himself.

He had given once again, just like always. Now he wanted to take. He needed to take. The starving, depraved wolf. Slowly pushing, teasing himself, making his cock’s head sink into your dripping territory, creating wet and soggy sounds, a hardened spear into honey. 

He couldn't hold back a baritone moan, the feeling was even better than what he remembered. He hadn't taken the time or allowed himself to lay with a woman in ages, and God, what a return to this primal bliss.

He slowly moved some more, his hands spreading your legs a bit wider from around his waist to allow him to penetrate you more easily. Once you had entirely enveloped him, his tip deep inside, he let out another deep throaty grunt, the feeling making it hard for him to keep his thoughts clear. 

"Ahh... Shit, darlin’... So tight…"

Considering how his length was stretching you, you bet he felt your pussy tight. The first word that came into your mind was “complete”. So complete with his huge cock inside of you; you felt like you could have died happily like this. One of your hands slipped from the top of his back to the lower part of it, just above his ass, pressing there, showing him just how much you wanted him to move, to let go. 

Arthur didn't need much more as he pulled back slowly only to snap his hips back against yours, his cock pushing again all the way through your cunt in one hard single time, giving you another wave of pleasure as you both moaned together, unable to resist the intense sensation he was creating for both of you.

Hearing you whine, finally feeling your perfectly tight and warm pussy around him, it was making him lose all sense of restraint, and as your other hand ran through his hair, your angelic voice whispering his name as if he was your Lord and savior, he lost it. 

He started to pull in and out of you faster, harder, your bodies colliding in a delicious way, obscene noises echoing through the silence of the darkness. His increase in pace made your body scream in pleasure and you buried your face into the crook of his neck under the collar of his shirt, biting his skin there.

It made him grunt loudly, and one of his hands roamed from your hips to your rear, grabbing a fistful of your ass in an instinctive response. His other hand was on the ground next to you, keeping him from crushing you against it. It made your head blank with pleasure.

"Shit, Arthur! M-more!" You begged, feeling like you could die if he stopped, your voice turning into high squeals.

"Anhh- God... More? Don’t worry girl, I'll g-give you more...-Mmh!" 

His voice was heavy with pleasure, words cut off by moans and grunts you were delighted to hear, the most unholy and arousing music you had ever had the honor to listen to.

True to his words, he obliged, hips thrusting endlessly, member empaling you with each move. You could feel the flesh of his pelvis against yours with how deep he dived into you, and around it the stiffness of his suit, rubbing again the breast he had pulled out of your dress before, nipple sensitive after his previous treatment. 

If what was between you was once a frozen lake, it had now turned into an Ocean of lava, magma exploding, engulfing both of you in the most burning and devastating passion you'd ever experienced, a volcanic explosion of desires.

The hand he had on your asscheek reluctantly let go of it, but you ended up thanking him for it, cause he was now using it to put your left leg above his shoulder, grabbing under your knee, allowing him to fuck you in an even better angle than before. He was ruining you once again, but this time felt like the pack of starving enraged wolves had taken him with you to consume him entirely.

You leaned against the floor, back of your head feeling the paved coldness, only hint that everything was actually real. Arthur's eyes locked with yours as he kept on fucking you hard and fast, this intimate contact making his member twitch.

You felt so goddamn good around him, and looked so goddamn gorgeous like this, your cheeky grin long gone, replaced by a delightful frown of pleasure, mouth open in a quiet scream. Arthur felt his peak coming dangerously close, but his pace hadn't slowed, his fat cock thrusting in and out of you. In and out, like a furious, sacred metronome. In an out, like a blessed psalm you'd both be reciting together.

“Come on girl, I know you have another, -Damn it!-, another one in ya. Give it to me, come on, jus’ for me…”

Words and voice drowned in a flood of pleasure and curses, of deep grunts and growls, his possessiveness sending you over the edge once again, your inside closing its trap around him, squeezing just how he needed to.

His eyes shut close, eyebrows furrowing in utter pleasure as he sank so hard and deeply you could have felt him splitting your guts in half, his dick throbbing and harder than ever. It reached a spot so deep and good inside of you, burning it, your pleasure bursting as you felt your orgasm coming for the second time.

"A-Arthur!" You cried out as you came around him, creaming him, walls clenching in a delicious sensation that made him reach the stars.

"God, damn it!" He shouted, voice deeper and rougher on the curse word before quickly removing himself from you in a flash of lucidity, finishing messily, cum spilling from his red sensitive member in white spurts that ended up right on your belly as a feral, powerful growl escaped his chest and his head tilted backward, letting you see his throat covered in sweat and veins.

For a moment, both of you had turned into beasts, shattered all the limits, broke all the shackles, diminishing you into your more primitive instincts. The Wolves of Lust had devoured your being into the very last delicious bone.

And that’s how you felt. Boneless.

Now, stillness. A cold breeze enveloped the pair of you, the only sounds now being the distant agitation of the city and your pantless breaths. He slowly brought his chin back down and opened his eyes, mesmerized by the sight of you returning from the realm of pure pleasure he had provided for you for the second time.

He felt powerful. He felt good. Better than he had for months, finally satisfied. Like a God, a King. King of all the Wolves, Cerberus, the only guardian of your unholy realm.

He wanted to do this again with you, as soon as possible.

He carefully put his softening dick back in its clothed cage, fingers fumbling with the buttons of his pants as he felt completely spent, his hands shaking slightly. He wanted to help you get cleaned up, but you had already brushed what you could of his release off your dress. 

It would probably leave stains on your clothing nevertheless. 

A twisted, dark part of him, the part that came from the same pit as the dark creature and the Wolves, felt almost aroused and proud at the thought you would keep an imprint of him on it. This part was relishing noticing the big ruby mark it had left on your breast as you were putting it back under your neckline; he grinned to himself knowing it would make your memories of him more difficult to forget. 

He didn't want you to forget.

He slowly got up, offering you his hand to help you stand. You quickly put back your dress in its usual state, and wiped the sweat off your forehead. A silence settled between you two, thousands of questions floating in the air, but none of you ready to ask them out loud yet.

Finally, as you started shivering, only realizing now how cold this night was without Arthur's burning hot body on top of you, he spoke, voice even hoarser from having pushed on it too much, accent making every world sound heavy when they fell from his mouth.

"When can I see you again?" More than a demand, a promise. An order even. Cerberus needs his territory.

You already knew he kept them; his promises. Except for the one he had made to kill you. But in a way, he did, because you felt like you wouldn’t be able to ever feel so alive again without him. 

Like a condemnation.

"You won't." 

Certainty in your voice. But he didn't mind it. He had already broken you before.

"Oh, but I think I will, darlin'." Was all he said before stepping over the fence of the balcony, ready to jump off it. Before doing it, he pulled something out of his jacket and waved it at you.

The fucking papers.

A lightning of understanding and panic struck you; what you had thought was a lustful touch on your thigh, the one that had set everything on fire between the both of you, that had unleashed the Wolves, was in reality his sneaky hand retrieving the document from your hidden pocket.

Shit!

He gave you his cocky grin, blue gaze sparkling with mischief, greeting you with a two finger’s salute then jumped, disappearing in the night, away from you once again. You could have gone after him, as much as your weak and spent body would have allowed you to, but somehow, after all that he had done to you tonight, you felt like he had well deserved those damned letters.

tagging: @a-court-of-valkyries credits: Arthur's pic is not mine, belongs to fv8tt on Pinterest. Dividers and little moths doodle by me.

I reall hope you liked this one! I'm thinking about writing another part where the reader could confront Arthur again... Tell me if you'd like that! -Pine 🌱

[gars-weaponeer]

Let's talk about he unwarranted Fox hate.

I often see that a lot of people tend to hate on Commander Fox, often portraying him as a villainous kind of character or very cold and selfish compared to the more heroic and beloved Commander Thorn.

I see these two characters portrayed as "the good commander" and "the bad commander" of the Coruscant guard, when in reality they are both pretty much the same character.

But just for the fact that Fox killed Fives, the public decided to label him as a "bad guy".

But that's not the case, in fact if we changed characters and placed Thorn hunting after Fives and Fox on the diplomatic mission, chances are both situations would have ended the same way: with Fives dead at the hands of Thorn and Fox dying heroically for the republic.

Why is this?

Well for starters we need to understand what a Coruscant guard is.

These were clones that were raised and trained differently from common clone troopers as their assignment was to act as a security police force for Coruscant. As a result, they dealt with different threats than normal troopers.

Clone troopers knew what their enemies looked like, the separatist forces were easy to recognize in the battlefield. But for the Coruscant guard the enemy could take many forms. They would not see battle droids on the streets attempting on the lives of the senate. They would have to deal with terrorists, dressed as common folk or unconscious work droids. They had to be more alert and more skeptic of their surroundings 24/7 as the fate of the republic laid in their hands.

One false move could cost the lives of the chancellor and the senate and with them the Republic would fall. That is the weight these clones carry on their shoulders. This is the responsibility that both Fox and Thorn carry along with the other commanders in red.

Both Fox and Thorn are very similar in canon.

Fox appears more than Thorn and we can see from his canon(and legends) appearances that he is a fiercely loyal clone to the republic, hard working and honorable like many of his brothers. He is the first to charge into battle, leading his troops with bravery and has little patience for criminals.

Thorn seems to have a similar sense of duty, loyalty and bravery that Fox has, as he also stands his ground during battle, refusing to surrender til the very last second. We sadly don't see more of Thorn beyond his one and only appearance.

So why do people hate Fox so much, when he and Thorn are not that different?

Well, he killed Fives.

But I don't think he should be hated for it.

To explain this, join me to see things through the fox's eye, and learn the other side of the story.

We as the audience know Fives since he is a Shiny, and we see him grow up, level up, become an ARC trooper and survive many perils. We see him discover that one plot that we know causes so much death and destruction and even tho we know the ending of the story, we want to root for him and we get frustrated when we see no-one hears him out. We also, as the audience, know that Palpatine is the bad guy, he is playing chess against himself and ruining the lives of countless people for his own sick pleasure in his path to rule the Galaxy.

But Fox doesn't know any of this.

He doesn't know Palpatine is secretly Dath Sidious. He doesn't know there is a secret plot to destroy the Jedi and that he and his brothers are just pawns in a greater scheme.

As far as he is concerned, the Chancellor is the head of the Republic, and if anything happens to him it might mean the end of the Republic and the death of not only him but all his brothers. It's his duty to protect Palpatine from harm. And there are a lot of people trying to hurt him.

He also doesn't know Fives.

He might have heard of him as Fives is a respected ARC trooper from the 501st. But he doesn't know him personally like we do, like Rex does. He has no real connection to him other than Fives being another Clone like him.

So when he hears that there is this erratic clone that tried to kill Palpatine and is now on the run, of course he would see Fives as a threat.

Remember that the Kaminoans covered the whole inhibitor chip thing by saying it was a behavioral regulator, that kept Clones from becoming aggressive and erratic. The Kaminoan even took the example of Tup's chip malfunction as proof that without the chip the clones turn irrational and unpredictable. This is the information the characters have. The ONLY ONES that know the truth are Palpatine, the Kaminoans and Fives.

So in Fox's eyes, Fives turned erratic because he also has a chip malfunction. He became irrational, unpredictable, erratic and has attempted to kill someone before. He might try to do so again and is now on the run. It's his duty as head of the Coruscant guard to find him and stop him before he hurts someone.

When he finds Fives, he has Anakin and Rex as hostages and is talking nonsense, acting erratic and paranoic. He could hurt Anakin or Rex, two very important and prominent figures in the GAR and their deaths could result in disadvantage against the Separatist forces. Fox cannot afford that. And yet he doesn't enter shooting, he points his gun at Fives and orders him to raise his hands and surrender. He gives Fives a chance to go peacefully, to de-escalate the situation. And when he sees that Fives looks at the blaster on his side he even yells at him to stop, he asks him not to do it, not to take the gun and make things worse. But Fives doesn't listen, he takes the gun yelling and Fox has to make a split-second decision.

In a moment like that, when you are a second away of a disaster, when you, your brothers or the hostages could get killed by the shot of a unhinged person. You don't get enough time to think.

Fox reacts and shoots Fives to stop him from harming others.

Sure, we could argue that Fox could have used stun instead, or that he could have shot Five's hand, anything to not kill him.

But we need to understand that in situations like that, when tensions are high, then it's life or death and you have to take a split-second decision, you don't usually have time to be rational.

Even the most trained people can't always take the most rational option, and often choose the best option they can.

Fox took the best option he could in that situation.

And I don't think that Thorn, Thire, Stone or any of the other Shock trooper Commanders would have done any different, any better.

They all would have been faced with the same dire situation, and they all would have had to take the split-second decision.

One could argue that the fact that Fox was not present in the circle of Coruscant guards taking off their helmets as they mourn Fives, could imply that he was indifferent to his death.

And maybe? However I don't think that's the case.

Remember that Fox tried to stop Fives, he tried to give him a chance to surrender and in the end he couldn't stop. He had to shoot a fellow clone. A clone whose face he sees in all his brothers, the companions he trained with, fought with, work with everyday. He did not wanted to kill Fives.

That has to be very haunting.

I like to believe that Fox is not the mourning circle, because he had to take a step back to come to terms to what he has done.

Fox has been proven to be an honorable man. How can he stand a join the mourning of a man he just killed? How can he see into Rex's eyes as he cries for the close brother he has lost? Maybe he felt like he had no right to be there.

Then again this is just my speculation, considering what little canon we have of Fox.

In general I don't think we should hate on Fox for Fives' death. Sure, Fives is easily my second favorite clone, way above Fox in my raitings, and I suffered a lot when he died. But I do think that the situation was way to out of hand and Fox did as best as he could to keep everyone safe.

Fives was not at fault either. Remember he was drugged, and he was feeling frustrated, paranoic, confused, he was panicking and not thinking clearly.

The only one at fault here is Palpatine and his schemes.

That said...

I'm not saying that you should stop portraying Fox as a cold and ruthless character.

Hell, I myself like to represent him as a more stoic and sarcastic person compared to his brothers and I've seen many different portrayals of this character, with many different personalities that I love!

You are free to a enjoy the fandom as you wish after all!

Just keep this post in mind and please don't hate on people who like Fox as a character.

We all deserve to enjoy Star Wars and it's wonderful characters that inspire us.

┕━━━━━━━━━━━━ ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ━━━━━━━━━━━━┙

Well, this has been my Rant! If you reached all the way down here thank you for reading ♥

And may the force be with you.

[gffa]

Disney, hire me as your Attachment Advisor, I will shove so many George Lucas quotes at your producers and writers, I will shove so many context-laden clips from the movies and TCW at your creatives, I will make powerpoint essays about how it's more Buddhist-aligned, not Attachment Theory-aligned, I will cite literally every time attachment has ever been discussed by Lucas AND in the show itself and show you that it's always aligned with fear, possessive feelings, and selfishness, I will do this work for you for free, I can even literally just point you to my Jedi Citations collection, DISNEY, HIRE ME AS YOUR ATTACHMENT ADVISOR, I CAN HELP YOU.

Everything I saw in the show aligned perfectly with my view of what the Jedi mean by attachment from the movies (especially with Episode II). You fail to understand that George Lucas words outside of the movies mean shit. You cane have the largest collection of words that has come out of Lucas's ass and it still does not change the movies. Look at the poster for AOTC. A Jedi shall not know love. Obi-Wan speaks beautifully about the undercurrent of remorse he feels for not being able to have an attachment with Satine because he lives by the Jedi Code which forbids it.

You people are so delusional.

Hi! You are so right bestie it has been way too long since I've talked about my love for Mace Windu! You are so right to have brought this up and I will meet your challenge! He is the Force's strongest soldier because the absolute nonsense he has to put up with every day, as someone who deals with the rest of the Council being hilarious assholes, who deals with Kenobi and Skywalker's nonsense, who has Yoda as a friend, and yet he seems to genuinely like all of these people?? Even when they're bonkers?? My man is stronger than I could ever be.

Not to mention, he goes on a whole ass mission with Jar-Jar, has to watch him make out with his girlfriend, the queen of the planet who told falsehoods about your family, and you have nothing but patience and kind words to say about them, and you only roll your eyes a little at Jar-Jar's antics, something even Padme does and she's worked with him even longer than you have, and by the end, you're friends with him, you like him and would probably hang out with him again if the chance arose???? Mace Windu is on ANOTHER LEVEL from what I would have done in his position!

And he's a former theater nerd! "The Council's gain was the theater's loss." Jocasta Nu says about how he didn't have time for it anymore after he got so busy with the Council, like can you IMAGINE Mace Windu doing plays? I want to know sooooooo bad how Jedi plays are different from non-Force-sensitive people's plays, I want to know what kind of cool effects they create with the Force, I want to know if they use their psychic empath abilities to literally connect with their audience! I want to know DOES MACE WINDU HELP THE YOUNGLINGS STAGE CUTE LITTLE PLAYS IN THE CRECHE? BECAUSE I BET HE DOES.

Because that man is so good with kids! Remember that Star Wars Adventures comic where he was so gentle and sweet with the little Twi'lek girl? Reaching down to help her up, smiling openly at her, walking with her back to her village to make sure she was safe, talking with her to make sure she understood how important and valuable she was in the galaxy? Because I'm still not over that!

His relationship with Anakin in canon is pretty great, too, like, yeah, Anakin should take a seat and stop borderline pitching a fit about getting a rank he didn't earn, and Mace still offered to believe him, despite that Anakin had accepted Palpatine's forcing the Council to put him on it. He still trusted Anakin to help him in that fight against Palpatine! Plus, oh, man, their banter on the Endurance when they're teaching the cadets? That was such good-natured teasing, that was exactly the kind of banter Anakin would have had with Obi-Wan, and by the end of that whole fiasco (do you ever think about when Anakin was in danger and Mace yelled, "Anakin!" and desperately yanked him to safety, because he was worried about him? because I think about that a lot), Mace complimented Artoo by saying he saw what Anakin saw in him, that he was complimenting Anakin at the same time? Or pretty much EVERY interaction between Mace and Yoda is absolute hilarity, the side-eye they give each other, the teasing Yoda does when Mace is on a mission with Jar-Jar, the way Mace holds his hand out in the comics for Yoda to springboard off of into the middle of a fight? ICONIC FRIENDSHIP, I WOULD TAKE A WHOLE NOVEL ABOUT IT, DISNEY.

Or that time even AT THE END OF THE CLONE WARS, like they are just a MONTH out from Revenge of the Sith, if that, and Mace is STILL trying to get the droids to stand down, that he's destroyed thousands of them, none of them have listened, but he's still trying, offering them a better life away from the war, a purpose again, even if he knows it probably won't work, that man still believed in compassion for anyone and everyone. Like, baby Boba Fett TRIED TO KILL HIM and Mace STILL argued for leniency and rehabilitation, rather than jail, because he saw a young child who was hurting and he wanted better for him. He was direct with Boba, he didn't try to befriend him, Boba would never have accepted that, but he told him, you're going to have to get over your hatred for me, he says this for Boba's sake, not his own, because he knows what poison the desire for revenge is, look at the path it's already leading Boba down.

Or EVERYTHING WITH THE ZILLO BEAST, he tried so hard to rescue that poor creature, he fought the Senate so hard, he was so gentle with the hand he carefully pressed to its face, even when the Zillo beast was dangerous, even when it had attacked them and could so easily kill more, he wanted leniency for it, he wanted to save it because he understood where it was coming from.

Or EVERYTHING WITH PROSSET DIBS, that guy tried to murder him, was ranting about how he would dance on their graves or whatever, and Mace looks at him and says, we need to help him, it's our duty to help him find the light again. And his big punishment is literally just library duty, because when Mace can decide the outcome, that guy always goes for helping people, always goes for the option that would bring them back to the light.

Even as a young Padawan, his greatest struggle was to temper his anger, which was sparked because PEOPLE WERE BEING HURT by the false prophet on Mathas, he was angry because he saw how many people were suffering and the people in charge just let it happen, his heart hangs heavy when he witnesses people in pain, because Mace Windu deeply, deeply cares about the people in the galaxy.

He cared about civilians, he cared about clones, he cared about his fellow Jedi, he didn't have to be bouncy or super smiley to show that, either. It was in every action he took. He cared so much.

And, okay, yeah, he was COOL AS HELL AND WOULD HAVE BEATEN PALPATINE'S WRINKLED ASS IN A FAIR FIGHT.

OR THAT TIME ON RYLOTH THAT WAS LITTERALLY THE COOLEST SCENE THEY EVER ANIMATED, THE SOUND DROP? THE ABSOLUTE BANGER PHYSICAL STUNTS MACE WAS CAPABLE OF? GODDAMN HE WAS SO GOOD.

AND LEST WE FORGET--CUTEST BB YOUNGLING EVER!!!!

[skywalkr-nberrie]

Throughout her career as Queen and later as a Republic Senator, Padmé became desensitized to romantic advances. Her life's work was surrounded by people who were fake, two-faced, manipulative, and full of loud bravado. Nobody was sincere, and anyone who approached her always had ulterior motives, whether seeking to benefit from her high status or gain importance by association.

What's often overlooked, however, is that Padmé also harbored similar reservations about the Jedi. While she deeply respected and admired the Jedi, she found their mannerisms, etiquette, and stoicism unsettling at times:

Padmé's discomfort with the Jedi endures, unaffected by her numerous encounters. This lingering unease is consistently reflected in her thoughts, as recorded in the Queen Amidala Journal and other Star Wars novels.

Padmé admits they’re brave, wise, and respected beings but she can’t fathom them the way they are in nature. She finds them rather irritating 😂

As we see here^^ Padmé also finds their lack of emotional repression quite obnoxious as well. So much that she’d made a vow that if she were to ever become Chancellor, she’d have every Jedi demonstrate at least “one emotion” a year.

{When the topic comes to companionship, trust, and seeking aid, Padmé has enough professionalism to know that the Jedi are people she can always rely on. She heavily respects them and trusts them no matter what. But outside the professionalism, she doesn’t mesh well at all with them because her ideals, values, and beliefs are like night and day with theirs.}

This understanding of Padmé's perspective sheds light on why she fell deeply in love with Anakin. She famously declares him the only Jedi she could ever love, and it's clear why. Despite the odds against them – his Jedi vows, her senatorial duties – Anakin proves his devotion, showing Padmé the depth of his love and desire. Passionate and hopeless romantics, Padmé and Anakin share a profound connection. Much like kindred spirits. Anakin's all-consuming passion resonates deeply with Padmé. His patience, vulnerability, and unwavering commitment ultimately capture Padmé's heart, making him her soulmate.

[izzystizzys]

the thing about being the highest-ranked and most-decorated officer in any GAR/Guard capacity, fox thinks, is that unsurprisingly nobody could give less of a shit or listen to anything he says. it’s not like he earned those medals and recognitions and perfect test scores or anything, now is it, kote?

or, after the zillo beast disaster, the coruscant guard medbay just so happens to be much closer than the GAR one, and surprise surprise, senators don’t want meatdroids to be treated in their facilities after they’ve just protected them with their lives. fox tries to reason against this. fox is unsuccessful, because no one listens to fox.

which is how he finds himself crammed into a corner along with cody, ponds, bly, rex and their jedi, looking out across a medbay which is quite frankly a goddamn disaster rivalling the fight with the zillo beast in proportions. skywalker tries to step out towards one of the medics, and has to be pulled back by the collar of his shirt by amidala, squawking loudly when he’s nearly rammed over by mauler, crucifix and a shrilly screaming crash cart.

it’s not like fox said this would be a bad idea or anything.

“um, vod”, cody begins, unsure, “what’s - is that guy sewing wooley up with thread?!”

meathook, who is in fact sewing wooley up with thread, and looks about as happy about it as his patient, and who fox honestly thought was going to cry when he announced the influx of patients about to descend on them, snaps something about triage over his shoulder at hound, whose arm is decidedly bent in a way it shouldn’t be, jerking his head to gesture at the rickety cot next to cody’s ARC. fox is pretty sure they salvaged the thing from a dumpster. he slaps a bandage on the stitches that fox fears might be from the same dumpster.

“putting those advanced reconnaissance training skills to use, kote”, says fox, who invariably turns into the worst possible version of himself whenever cody opens his mouth within a klick of his vicinity.

skywalker harrumphs, evidently at the end of his impressive patience. “well, why?! hey, trooper! these men need bacta!”

“do they, now? i’m sorry, i hadn’t noticed”, a low voice hisses angrily behind them, and fox is the only one who doesn’t jump on account of he’s too dead inside to be scared of his CMO anymore. a grave error, he’s sure. “i guess i’ll just go pull some out of my ass along with a tank and painkillers, then! hadn’t thought of that yet!”

warcrime, whose eye is twitching and who is holding a bloody saw in visible consideration of using it, pins skywalker with a look that has had shinies all over the guard peeing themselves. “we don’t have any fucking bacta, you absolute numbskull.”

“but that can’t be right”, cody pipes up again, next to a very troubled looking generals kenobi and windu. fox sympathises very much with the patented migraine-glare on windu’s face. “why do you not have any bacta?”

“because i like to smear meiloorun juice all over my patient’s stab wounds, commander”, warcrime says. “it’s a homeopathic medicine thing. because the chancellor refuses to give us any, genius.”

“what?!” skywalker says, bristling. “that can’t be true! he wouldn’t -“ he’s cut off by his comm pinging loudly over the moaning and crying in the medbay, and warcrime leaning close enough to be heard with a whisper.

“well, he would, and if you don’t believe me, there’s a holorecording of him telling marshal commander fox why biological weapons on the homefront have lower priority and therefore half rations of everything. now get out of my medbay or find out why they named me warcrime, sir.”

amidala, the collective braincell holder for both her husband and the senate combined (on occasion), tugs him out of the way of warcrime’s bonesaw and ire. fox, who very much enjoys not being the primary target of a medic for once, unfortunately also has to be the adult in the room. “sirs, a transfer to the GAR barracks medbay might be a preferable- AH, MOTHERFU-“

“get him, stabby!”, rabid whoops from where he’s resetting thire’s nose, who echoes a much more nasal and muffled, “go, ftabby!”

“get kriffing FUCKED, stabby, you absolute-“, fox seethes, trying to swipe for the medic’s head and nearly planting one on cody instead by accident, who unfortunately manages to evade the swing fox is admittedly projecting very obviously on account of the sedation hypo jammed into his flank.

“medbay rules, sir”, stabby calls, dancing away towards mauler and his crash cart, while someone bumps something solid and flat against the backs of fox’s thighs that he can’t help but tumble back on, already seeing two codys and blys dancing around his vision. “commander fox protocol dictates he is to be helped to sleep as often as possible, sir.”

“a desperate but well-founded measure, i’m sure”, kenobi of all people agrees, and fox waves an unsteady hand in what might be the general’s direction to the sound of cody’s scandalized gasp. “as you were, officer… stabby.”

“traitors”, fox slurs, just as his com-unit begins to ping with an urgent notification. before he can try and answer it, warcrime has ripped it off his arm and flung it somewhere out of his sight. eh, it probably wasn’t anything THAT important, fox thinks. and if he wakes up two days later to a near-hysteric meathook kissing the glass casing of the guard’s brand new bacta tank over and over again, he decides to just roll over and go back to sleep.

[multi-fandom-imagines8]

Star Wars request! Could I have one where anakin has a Padawan only a couple years younger than him and he’s secretly in love with her and is fiercely protective to the point that obi-wan points it out regularly and one night after being flirted with by a fellow student, anakin goes a little too far and ends up confessing his feelings for her in private? Lots of fluff please thanks 😊

Word count: 1.8 K.

From the start, you were opposed to being Anakin’s Padawan for two reasons: first, he was a rule- breaker, and second, he was very handsome. You were afraid that you might develop feelings for him- attachment, which was forbidden for a Jedi. However, since it was the Council’s decision, you couldn’t object. What would you even tell them?

Your fear became reality, but you convinced yourself that you could control your emotions- or so you thought.

It didn’t help that he was always so protective of you; some would even say overprotective. In a way, you enjoyed it, but on the other hand, it felt like he was keeping you from reaching your full potential. This led to many arguments between the two of you.

Fortunately, Obi-Wan was on your side most of the time, telling Anakin that he needed to have faith in you, that letting you take risks and go on missions alone was the only way for you to improve and eventually become a Jedi knight.

Anakin would eventually let you go on missions alone, but the ones he chose were usually safe. There were a few exceptions, but these were typically the Council’s orders. 

When you returned, he’d often reprimand you for getting injured, giving you a lecture about how you should be more careful. It always ended with him saying this was why he didn’t like sending you on such missions. This was rich, coming from him-  the most reckless person you’d ever met.

What you didn’t understand was why he acted this way with you. He didn’t treat anyone else like this- not with his former Master, his friends, or his troops.

Then, one night, everything became clear.

You were returning from a dangerous mission on one of the Outer Rim planets. The mission had been a success, but you were seriously injured while defending your men. 

The minute the ship landed, Anakin rushed to check on you, as he always did. But this time, you weren’t there to greet him. Instead, it was one of your men. When he didn’t see you, his heart sank.

“Where is she?” Anakin demanded, anger bubbling beneath the surface.

“The infirmary, she’s-“.

Before the poor man could finish his sentence, Anakin pushed past him, making his way to you. He was furious- angry at your men for failing to protect you, at you for putting yourself in danger, and at himself for allowing this to happen.

But all that anger evaporated the moment he saw you unconscious in the infirmary, your face covered in bruises and cuts. His anger was replaced by worry and fear of losing you.

“How is she?” Anakin asked the medical droid.

“She sustained serious injuries, but she’s doing much better now. I recommend rest and a few days away from missions requiring heavy physical activity”.

He sat quietly at the edge of your bed, watching the steady rise and fall of your chest. He was about to reach for your hand when your eyes fluttered open.

“Master?” Your vision was still a bit blurry.

“I’m here”.

You examined your surroundings, slowly remembering where you were. Realizing the situation, your eyes widened. You knew you were in a lot of trouble “Master, I can explain-“.

“Rest now. We’ll talk later” Anakin said, sensing your panic. As much as he wanted to scold you and know exactly what happened, now was not the time.

The following evening, you were almost fully recovered when a fellow Jedi friend invited you to celebrate your victory at a cantina. Needing to relax after such a grueling mission, you agreed.

Anakin went to check on you, but when you weren’t in the infirmary and your commlink was turned off, his frustration grew. He searched for you everywhere, his patience wearing thin. When one of your fellow Jedi sensed his distress and approached him, Anakin asked about your whereabouts.

Upon hearing you were at the cantina, his heart skipped a beat. Fearing the worst, he rushed there, and when he found you, his fears weren’t entirely unfounded.

You were on the dance floor with a couple other Padawans, one of whom was shamelessly flirting with you. You spoke to him kindly, which Anakin immediately misinterpreted as flirting. Seeing you laughing and being friendly with the Padawan was the last straw.

He strode toward you, gripping your wrist as he leaned in “Can I speak to you in private?”.

“Yes, Master. But can’t it wait until tomorrow?” you pleaded.

“Now, Y/n” he ordered.

“Alright, alright”.

He led the way out of the cantina, his grip on your wrist tight enough that it started to hurt.

“Slow down, Anakin. You’re hurting me”.

Anakin stopped, his eyes dropping to your wrist. He immediately let go, the fear of having hurt you flashing across his face. The last thing he wanted was to cause you pain.

“Get in the speeder” he commanded.

You complied, knowing better than to argue with him when he was like this, though his sudden aggression confused you.

The ride back to the temple was silent. Once you arrived, he led you into the temple and straight to his private quarters. Realizing where you were, you hesitated- this was the first time you’d been in his room.

“Come in and close the door behind you” he said, his voice stern but tinged with something softer. A mix of thrill and nervousness filled you as you shut the door and turned to face him. You could sense there was more than anger in his emotions- something deeper, familiar.

“Master, if this is about what happened on the mis-”.

“It’s not” he interrupted. There was a long, awkward silence as he seemed to wrestle with what he wanted to say,

“Then what is it about?” you asked, stepping closer, narrowing the distance between you.

“It’s about you. How reckless you are. You were seriously injured just a day ago, and now you’re out celebrating like nothing happened” he began, struggling to keep his anger in check.

“The recklessness, I learned from you, Master. We won- it was hard, but we made it. So yeah, celebrating seemed like a good idea”.

“Well, it’s not. You should be resting. And not everything I do is something you should be doing too” his voice started rising.

“That’s not fair. You never rest. I have learned so much from you, I’ve become a better fighter because of you. And now what? You’re mad because I’ve taken risks, just like you always do?”.

“It’s different for me” he snapped, stepping closer, his voice harsh now “I can handle the risks. You… you shouldn’t have to”.

“Why? Because I’m not as strong as you?” you glared at him, refusing to back down.

“No! Because I ca-” his voice faltered for a moment, but then quickly shifted, his frustration fueling his next words. “I saw you. You were just injured, and there you were, laughing, celebrating with them like nothing’s wrong. And him-” his voice turned sharp with bitterness “that Padawan, flirting with you like you’re just some… some prize, while I was worried sick about you”.

Your eyes widened in realization, and you let out a disbelieving laugh “Is that what this is about? You’re angry because some Padawan flirted with me?”.

“I saw the way he looked at you! Like you were just another challenge to him. You were hurt, and instead of resting, you went to a cantina, where anyone could’ve taken advantage of you” Anakin clenched his fists.

“He was just being nice. I can take care of myself” you shot back, stepping even closer.

“Nice? NICE?” Anakin scoffed, his voice rising with disbelief “I saw the way he touched your arm, the way he stood too close to you. It wasn’t just ‘nice’. I know the likes of him. In your normal state, I have no doubt in your abilities, but you were still recovering. He could’ve-”.

“You’re overreacting, Anakin. He wasn’t going to do anything. I’ve handled worse situations”.

“I’m not overreacting” Anakin grunted, taking another step toward you “I’m trying to protect you”.

“Protect me?” you scoffed, feeling your anger rise to match his. “I don’t need you to. I’m not some helpless child. I know how to defend myself. I’ve done it time and time again”.

“That’s not the point. I can’t just stand by and watch” he said, his voice breaking ”I can’t- I can’t lose you” his anger melted into something else, something raw and vulnerable. You could see how hesitant he was about the last four words.

“What? you asked in a voice barely above a whisper as shock settled in.

Anakin’s eyes finally met yours. They were softer, calmer than when the night began “I can’t lose you” he repeated, this time with more conviction. “I can’t stand the thought of you getting hurt, of something happening to you” his words were filled with pain, as if the weight of them was finally sinking in.

You stood there, staring at him, your heart pounding in your chest as the tension between you became almost unbearable “Anakin… what are you saying?”.

He looked away, his jaw clenching “I’m saying…it’s more than just concern for you as my Padawan. It’s not just that I want to protect you because it’s my duty” he exhaled sharply, running a hand through his hair as if searching for the right words. “It’s because I care about you. More than I should. I know it’s not right. I know I’m not supposed to feel this way. I’ve tried to ignore it, bury it, push it away, but I can’t”.

“Anakin, I-”  you whispered, trying to process everything.

“I don’t expect you to feel the same” he took a step back “I know it complicates things, but I couldn’t keep this bottled up. I couldn’t just pretend anymore, not when I thought I could lose you. I needed you to know. I care about you more than anything else in this galaxy, and the thought of losing you terrifies me. I will do anything you ask”.

For a long moment, the two of you stood there in silence, the weight of his confession pressing down on you. Then, slowly, you stepped forward, closing the distance between you once again “Anakin…” you said softly, your hand reaching out to gently caress his cheek. 

Anakin’s breath hitched at your touch, his eyes closing for a moment as if he were trying to gather himself.

“You’re not the only one who’s been pretending” you confessed. 

His eyes slowly opened, and you could see the flicker of surprise in them as he searched your face, trying to understand what you were saying.

“I care about you too. So much that it scares me sometimes” you admitted, swallowing hard “I tried to deny it, to fight it, and for a while, it worked. But now… this- this changes everything”.

“You…you care about me?” he asked, trying to hide his joy, still not believing what he was hearing.

“I do” you nodded, feeling the air grow thin as your breaths became heavier.

Anakin leaned in, his forehead gently resting against yours. His breath was warm, mingling with yours as he closed his eyes and pressed a gentle kiss to your lips.

Taglist: @mother-dragon-and-her-hatchlings

[jonathanrogersartist]

Anakin stans can be so strange sometimes. Don't they know the whole point of his story is a cautionary tale about selfishness, hubris, greed and lust for power? And that he ultimately made his own choices, to go down those paths?

Yes, he had many good qualities, and his past is very tragic, and he was living through some really traumatic situations, but Anakin's fall was still down to him making a terrible choice based on his own greed and refusal to accept the circle of life, as it were. He's not a poor pitiful baby angel that got a raw deal because of those wicked tricksy false Jedi, nor was he entirely a helpless victim of Palpatine's gaslighting.

Anakin had countless opportunities to question the poison Palps was pumping into his brain, but he chose not to.... because deep down, he loved the taste of that poison; it fed his ego and validated his own victim complex, that he used to rationalize being belligerent to his Jedi master and peers, who were showing him absolutely saint-like patience despite some of his actions.

Anakin Skywalker is no doubt a compelling, tragic figure who indeed had a noble and heroic side that we can mourn the loss of, upon his transformation into Vader. But the whole crux of the character is that his flaws were so toxic, and the way he chose to handle them was so counterproductive and self-destructive, that he created his own special hell that he would burn in for the rest of his life. THAT'S the epic tragedy of Anakin Skywalker.

You can love him as a character for how complex and tortured and fallible he is, but to paint him as almost entirely a victim of outside forces that destroyed his life and pushed him down a path of evil.... so profoundly misses the point of what George Lucas was trying to say about human nature, and how even a pure-hearted kid can one day turn into a pitiless fascist, if he refuses to straighten his shit out.

[stellarbit]

New Arrangements

Word Count: 5.4k Pairing: fem!reader x tech and crosshair, light Tech nods Warnings: NSFW receiving oral, piv, dp, all that good jazz Summary: Tech thinks of a different way to please you, as long as Crosshair is up for it.

This was a request a WHILE ago (ya girl is a slow, anxious writer). And it's been rotting my brain. Working on Part 2 of Two Faces too

“You worry too much.” Crosshair snickered into your ear. You shoved him off with a hard elbow. His voice, that close, sent a rush of irritation and something more exhilarating through your veins.

He chuckled, not deterred, and gripped your chin, playfully tilting your head from side to side. “Keep making that face, and you’ll age faster than us.”

You pushed his hand off, “And you say Wrecker needs to grow up.”

Crosshair let out a low, amused snort. His demeanor was always a blend of mockery and challenge, yet you had learned to navigate these waters.

Meanwhile, Tech observed the interaction from across the campfire. The three of you were on duty, guarding the camp while Wrecker, Echo, and Hunter were away. Your constant inquiries about their safety had invited Crosshair’s teasing, yet Tech appreciated how seamlessly you meshed with his squad. The Jedi Council had assigned you to Clone Force 99 abruptly, a move that often led to friction in established teams. However, whether due to your trained Jedi patience or simply fortune, you had adapted well.

The longer you worked with them, the more comfortable you became. It wasn’t a word Tech would use but, in reality, you were getting attached. 

That is, enough that you were able to coax out Crosshair’s more gentle side - if you could call it that. He interacted with you with a brusque familiarity he reserved for his brothers: never overtly kind, but his jabs lacked real malice. It always piqued Tech’s interest. Lightening Crosshair’s often grim demeanor was no minor achievement, and Tech found this development enjoyable.

 Anything that brought light to Crosshair’s attitude was a rare feat and a welcome one.

It had taken longer than with Crosshair, but you eventually won over Tech’s tolerance as well. As Tech generally had the more focused tasks, the two of you were paired together often. Your role as a Jedi made it easy to guard him while he was engrossed in his work.

Your time paired together allowed you ample time to listen to his rambling, ranting, and info dumping. A habit you initially deemed mind numbing, yet these moments quickly became your favorite parts of the day. Tech, often engaged in some task at hand, grew to find your presence calming as well. 

It seemed that Tech, in his own measured way, cherished your attentiveness. You relished you time with you and he you. Oh, he relished you thoroughly and every single chance he could.

Crosshair pulled on a strand of your hair, “I need to do a perimeter sweep. Keep your senses extended and comm me if you hear anything.” Tech didn’t miss the little flush his brother’s teasing brought you. Crosshair’s task was one that gave you Tech a slim window of opportunity.

Not long after Crosshair departed, you were splayed out on a cot in the tent with Tech between your legs.

“You enjoy it when I speak to you.” Tech said so plainly, as if he wasn’t squeezing three fingers inside you. He pushed them in deep, lowering his mouth to your clit as you whined back at him. He sucked on your bud, licking a few light circles around it, and felt you clamp down around him. Raising himself so that it was only his lips brushing you, he said, “Not being able to please you and speak to you is not the most ideal.”

He wanted to give you so much more, he wanted to push you farther every time. Singing he wished he had a second pair of hands for.

And a thought occurred to him. 

“Tech,” his name was a breathy moan. You squirmed on his fingers, trying to catch his lips on your clit again. “Your voice alone can finish me. Please.” Tech didn’t miss the desperation in your pleaing.

He kept working his fingers into you, further angling his head to watch your expression. The times he spent with you were becoming a game of strategy to him. One that he recorded and re-lived, as often as his little free time allowed. 

“And what is it you want to hear?” He swept a thumb over your clit, still aching for him, and sent an arch through your back.

Knowing he was in the midst of studying you, you threw your arms over your face to deprive him. If you were desperate and wanting, so should he be. “Read me binary code for Force sake. Anything.”

Tech thought he heard frustration in your voice, an unideal outcome considering his intentions. He unhooked the leg you had saddled over his shoulder and settled it beside his hip as he crawled over top of you. He gently moved your arms from your face and repositioned them above your head. Lining himself up with your entrance, he lowered his mouth to your ear. “Right now, I think I’d rather hear what you have to say.” Not making you ache another second, he easily slid inside of you.

It was a quick affair given the high risk of discovery. Tech completely worked you over just by whispering simple observations to you. Things like how you moved, looked, and felt around him. He took you right up to the edge of release, but cut you short. He was throbbing inside you, just as close to his orgasm, when he pulled out. 

Typically, Tech never left you wanting or waiting. He took pride in timing himself in getting you off. This time, if he wanted his idea to succeed, he needed you wanting more.

He grunted, struggling for composure. “Crosshair will be back soon. We should continue later.”

For a moment, you thought you might cry. You were wound so tight the ache was painful. Panting and foggy brained you just nodded along. Clearing your voice you said, “I didn’t know you were so cruel.”

He sat back on his knees, raked his eyes over your body once more, and tapped his goggles to end his recording. “Trust me,” Tech said, extending his hand. “It will be worth the wait.”

Afterwards, while the two of you composed yourselves, Tech gave you a sideways glance.

“Do you?” Tech queried.

“Do I what?” You responded without looking.

  “Do you trust me?”  He asked, stopping your hands as your head tilted in confusion. Surely that was obvious to him.

A second pulsed between you and you leaned over to give his arma squeeze. “With my life.”

Tech pushed, “And you have faith in my skills of observation.”

“Now, you’re just being silly.” You gave him a pat and pushed off the cot to exit. Tech caught your hand, adding weight to his question. For a moment you were stunned, you didn’t know what called for such seriousness. With a smile, you sighed and squeezed his hand. “I have as much faith in you as I do the Force,” you said and bent forward to kiss his hand. 

A barely there smile came to Tech. He sighed and stood with you. “I encourage you to keep that in mind in the future.”

When Crosshair returned you were still fanning the flush from your face. The ache between your legs had hardly subsided.

“Any word from the others?” He asked, setting his gun aside and discarding his helmet.

Tech tapped through his datapad, responding casually. “Negative and I suspect it will take longer now that the suns are setting.” Pausing momentarily, he brought his comm to his face. “Hunter, what is your status?”

It wasn’t immediate, but it was Echo’s voice that came back. “Hunter’s a little… tied up at the moment.” His inflection suggested that might be literal. “We still have a ways to go. Stay with the ship.”

Your head dipped back as you groaned, “That’s not good.” Swallowing your worry, you pushed off your knees to stand up. “In that case, I’ll be back.” 

“And where do you think you’re going?” Crosshair asked as he sat adjacent Tech.

You waved your hand over your shoulder as you walked off. “Just stretching my legs, I’ll be fine.” Stretch your legs and walk out the ache.

Crosshair’s gaze lingered on you, particularly the sway of your hips. He swallowed a groan and looked back to the fire.

Tech, noticing the shift in Crosshair’s demeanor, glanced over his datapad at him, assessing. “Your concern is unwarranted. She will be fine.” He observed Crosshair for a moment longer as he placed a toothpick in his mouth, then ventured into delicate territory. “Is it safe to say you find her attractive?”

Crosshair sputtered, wide eyed he whipped to look at his brother. “Wha- What does that matter to you?”

“Currently—a great deal,” Tech adjusted his goggles, his tone turning investigative. “Are you aware that she and I engage in physical relations?” When Crosshair’s stare intensified, Tech added for clarity, “Frequently.”

Crosshair covered his face with his hand, cursing into his palm. He had noticed the way you gravitated towards Tech and even suspected you’d caught Tech’s attention. Though considering your nature as a Jedi, he imagine you hadn’t acted on anything. It was why he let his teasing border on flirting.

It’s why he let himself fantasize about you.

“Why are we even talking about this?” The sniper groaned, exasperation already showing.

“Because I’m fairly certain she finds you attractive as well, and I have an idea that might benefit all involved. But first, I need to know: have you ever fantasized about her?” Tech’s question was direct, his curiosity unabashed.

Just as you circled back to the camp, Crosshair’s incredulous response pierced the air. “What?” Hearing this, you quickened your pace, pushing through the underbrush to catch an early glimpse of the scene.

When you burst through the final swath of foliage, the camp appeared oddly tranquil. Crosshair was casually leaning against crates on the opposite side of the fire from Tech, who was positioned exactly as you had left him, seemingly immersed in his datapad.

Neither of them said anything as you took a few slow steps towards Tech, still assessing the situation. Crosshair almost seemed like he was pointedly ignoring you. The oddity of it all made you smile curiously.

Sitting next to Tech you leaned over to whisper. “What did you do to piss him off?” Crosshair’s eyes narrowed in on you, a clear sign he’d heard you. 

Tech pulled his datapad away from his face, glancing at Crosshair. “He's not angry,” Tech clarified, setting aside his device completely. “If anything, he's nervous.” When Tech was fully present, more interested in a situation than his research, there was always a hint of amusement in his voice.

“Oh, really?” You chuckled softly, nudging Tech playfully with your elbow. “And what’s got moody over there so nervous?”

Tech gestured his hand you, saying, “Most likely due to the anticipation of your reaction.” 

Confusion briefly crossed your features as you gave a small shake of your head. “My reaction to what?”

Tech adjusted his goggles and cleared his voice, a small glimpse of his own nerves. “To learning I’ve disclosed the nature of our relations to Crosshair.”

Your cheeks went warm and, for a moment, you could only blink at Tech. “Tech.” You said in a cautious tone.

He began again with no hesitation. “Crosshair is now fully aware that you and I are involved.” You opened your mouth only to be met with Tech lifting his finger. “More significantly, I've proposed the idea of him joining us. As I see it, it would be a mutually beneficial arrangement.”

“Mutually beneficial arrangement?” You parrotted a little louder. You were suddenly very aware of Crosshair’s eyes on you. From your peripherals you noticed Crosshair shift his weight off the crates and your mouth went dry.

Tech twisted to face you head on. “The way you and Crosshair interact suggests a mutual attraction and, frankly, seeing him somewhat content is a rarity.” Crosshair scoffed from across the fire, but Tech continued. “I believe expanding our dynamics will prove enjoyable for all parties.”

Your lack of response, brows lowered but eyes wide, caused Tech to pause. A moment of hesitation passed over Tech as he considered the best path forward. His eyes shifted around before honing back in on you. The look in his eyes kept you locked in place as he leaned over and reached across his body to grip your thigh.

Facing away from Crosshair, Tech brought his mouth to your ear. Just for you to hear, he said, “And I believe you would find an evening with the two of us... quite exhilarating.”

Remaining still, your eyes flew to Crosshair. From the distance you were sure he couldn’t have heard Tech, but he was waiting, almost holding his breath, for your response. The ache between your legs bloomed again. Your thighs squeezed together, trapping Tech’s hand between them.

Between Tech’s proximity and Crosshair’s staring you down, you couldn’t hear anything over your own heartbeat. Abruptly, you stood, disentangling yourself from Tech, and nearly stumbled over your makeshift seat. You fanned your face, letting out nervous laughs while your eyes darted between them.

Before you could gather your thoughts to speak, Crosshair’s voice cut through the tension. “Now who’s nervous?” His tone was taunting, yet when you looked at him, your nervousness seemed to have evaporate. Crosshair poised, nearly predatory, as if waiting for a signal to spring into action. Undeniably captivating.

For Crosshair. Seeing you flushed and breathless with excitement brought his fantasies vividly to the forefront of his mind. He raised an eyebrow, his typical smirk softening into something more tender.

“Crosshair?” You managed to say with a small, flattered smile playing on your lips. “You want this?”

After a tense pause, he discarded the toothpick in his mouth and walked around the fire to where you stood beside Tech. With a steady voice Crosshair said, “I.. wouldn’t have agreed to discuss it if I didn’t.”

Eyes blown wide, your heartbeat throbbed between your legs. Holding Crosshair’s gaze a heartbeat longer you looked down at Tech with a nod.

A spark of excitement hit Tech’s eyes. “Excellent.” Tech smiled and pushed off his knees to stand. “In that case-”

You interjected quickly, “Right now.”

“Right now?” Crosshair repeated incredulously.

“That… would be my fault.” Tech walked past you and patted Crosshair on the shoulder. “You two head into the tent, I’ll be in shortly.” Without even having to see your shared confused expression Tech sighed, continuing to walk to the comm station. He clarified, “It would be wise to make sure we are alerted if the others are near.”

A hand settled on your lower back as Crosshair guided you away. “We’ll leave you to it then.” Crosshair said after him. He leaned down, ducking into you as you both crossed the tent’s threshold. As he pushed into you a breathy laugh kissed the skin of you neck. “Should’ve seen your face.”

You tried to shove him off with bump of you hips - a playful move you’d done dozens of times. With his hand still resting on the small of your back the movement slid his hand into place on your waist. 

He remained close, looking down at you and his grip firming on you. “Since when have you…” He started saying but trailed off. He didn’t need to finish, you knew what he was asking.

“Since the day you caught me from falling in the river on Kuat.”

He craned his neck back, a smirk shifting his lips. “Didn’t I then drop you into the river?”

Even just his hand waist sent your heart racing. “It made me laugh,” you replied with a light shrug. Rising onto your tiptoes, you whispered close to his ear, “Or maybe the first time I saw you shooting from one knee.” Settling back onto your heels, you shrugged again, smiling slyly. “I like the way you pose.”

Crosshair rolled his eyes, but his amusement was evident as he slipped his hand up to the nape of your neck moving to stand in front of you. Unable to think under the weight of his touch you stepped into his space. 

You opened your mouth but Crosshair’s voice came first, “Don’t even bother asking.”

He wasn’t wrong -you were going to ask him the same thing. Instead, you reached up and gently guided his hand from your neck to your chest, pressing his palm against your heart. When the pace of your heart registered with him you said, “I was going to ask you to kiss me.” 

His eyes widened and it was now Tech’s voice that rang out. “Oh good, at least you're somewhat comfortable.” Crosshair pulled away like you were too hot to touch. “I would not be shy if I were you, Crosshair.” Tech said as he started stripping a few armor plates off. “Otherwise this will not have the desired effect for you.”

Tech stood with the majority of his plating stripped from the waist down. He came to your back, hands slipping in front of you to make quick work of your belt. It clattered to the ground, and your tunics soon followed, each piece of clothing creating a soft thud. 

Crosshair, still only a few feet from you, memorized every newly revealed patch of skin with an intensity that seemed to magnify the air between you.

When you were down to the bandeau, his breath hitched. When Tech released the bandeau, and you were finally exposed to him, a shudder ran through Crosshair. He’d been hard for sometime, but the sight of you now made him painfully harder. He grit his teeth as his cock pushed against his codpiece.

The flush of your chest, heaving in a mesmerizing way, matched your face. Crosshair extended a hand, gently grazing your nipple. Your eyes fluttered at the touch and Tech felt you shiver. 

“You should kiss her.” Tech suggested as he trailed his hands down your sides, over your stomach, and to the buttons of your pants. “You must talk to her.”

Crosshair cupped your breast, running his thumb over your nipple before catching it in a pinch. You took a sharp inhale and Crosshair moved in on your parted lips. He was gentle at first, kissing you slowly and sucking on your lip, but when you moaned into him Crosshair matched the noise and deepened the kiss. He held your face in place moving his lips against you as if he’d rather devour you than breathe.

When he heard the sound of fabric rustling, Crosshair finally eased up. Leaving you panting and leaning into his touch. As Tech kneeled he pulled your pants with him, trailing kisses down your back as he went. 

Crosshair stood back to let you step out of the pile of clothes around you. You were completely bare and squirming where you stood. His eyes roamed your body, snagging between your legs before meeting your gaze again.

Crosshair chuckled and said in a low voice, “I should’ve tossed you in a river much sooner.”

“Not exactly the time, Crosshair.” Tech said as he tugged you towards a cot. Crosshair followed at half the pace. 

Sitting you at the edge of a cot, Tech positioned himself between your knees. He pivoted to look back at Crosshair who kept a distance. “Are you ready?” Tech asked.

Crosshair tipped his head to you. “Aren’t you going to ask her?”

Tech didn’t break eye contact as he took one finger and traced it up over your wet folds. A string of your slick trailed after him as he brought his finger back in front of him. “Oh,” He said as he examined his wet fingers. “I don’t need to ask.”

You hooked a leg over Tech’s shoulder and pulled his attention back to you. “I’m done waiting, Tech.”

Tech shrugged, quipping, “Told you.”

On his knees, Tech leaned in to place a kiss on your cheek and give you access to his goggles. Your finger traced the side of his goggles until you felt a button. A light tap and a soft beep indicated and you were recording. Tech pulled back to press a kiss to your lips. “Thank you, Sarad.” 

He traced a hand from your neck, between your breasts and down to your thigh. Pushing your leg farther to the side Tech tucked his head in close to you and blew air over you. You hadn’t even shivered through the chill yet when Tech took your clit into his mouth. He gave your bud light, fast licks that deepened into slow rolling laps.

You lowered yourself onto your elbows and let your head dip back. You moaned softly, mewling your pleasure as Tech worked you up. He slid two fingers inside and your head snapped back up, eager to watch him work. 

It took you a moment to remember Crosshair’s presence, but when your eyes met Crosshair’s you nearly came on sight. Tech felt you tighten and slowed his rhythm -  you needed to last longer than that. 

“Cross?” You panted, eyes dipping to see if you could spot any sign of his arousal. “Are you…?” You wanted to hear, see, and even feel more of him-  but the words escaped you.

Crosshair never witnessed the look you were giving him, but he knew exactly what you wanted. He took slow steps forward, his hands dropping to the plating below his waist. The first to drop was his codpiece, revealing a large bulge behind his blacks. “Does that answer your question?” He drawled, his eyes caught on Tech’s movements.

“Show her.” Tech said in a momentary breath. He kissed the thigh you had over his shoulder, mumbling into your skin. “She wants to see.”

Crosshair flicked his plating to another cot. His hands gripped into fists a few times before he slipped his blacks out of the way and released his cock. Another burst of excitement rushed through you and Tech immediately eased off. He looked up at you, assessing how far gone you were, steadily curling his two fingers inside you.

Focused on Crosshair’s length, unsurprisingly similar to Tech’s, you bit your lip. “Show me.” You whined, your order sounding like pleading.

Crosshair stepped within reaching distance and did exactly as you asked. His hand slid down his shaft, lightly squeezing at the base and started a slow pace as he watched you quiver under Tech’s touch.

For a while you basked in the high of the two men worshiping you. Tech pushed you to the threshold of release once more before he stopped moving. Pulling your eyes from Crosshair you watched Tech sit back and wipe his palm over his mouth. Gently removing your leg he moved around your side to be face to face with you. 

“Crosshair,” Tech said, brushing a knuckle over your cheek. He leveled a look at his brother and asked, “Are you or are you not going to participate?” Tech moved himself behind you, supporting you between his legs. He left the spot between yours as an open invitation.

Crosshair didn’t hesitate. He kept his eyes on you as he kneeled, hands sliding up your inner thighs. As he settled in, Tech used one hand to circle your breast and the other roamed the rest of your skin in search of sensitivity. “Gently licking her is the best to start.” Tech advised, his eyes consuming every reaction you made.

The sniper dragged his thumb over your pussy, making a noise when your wetness pooled over his finger. Catching your attention, Crosshair smirked and dropped his gaze. He couldn’t stop the moan he made at the first glimpse of how truly aroused you were. His eyes locked with yours again and he lowered himself to you. As he opened his mouth, a whine made it past your lips as you eagerly waited for his touch. When he finally pressed his tongue flat against your entrance he licked the entirety of you and ended with a flick over your clit. 

The pressure he applied felt like electricity shot through you. Your hand flew to his head, gripping through his hair to gently push him back. His mouth was slightly open, his tongue still wet from the taste of you. 

“Gently.” Tech said firmly. He pulled you back to rest against him, your head resting close to where his cock pressed through his blacks.

“She seemed to like it.” Crosshair countered with confidence, pushing out of your light hold to taste you. He ran his tongue over you again, but this time he finished with swirling around your clit. You rested a hand on his head, your thumb mimicking the motion of his tongue. Crosshair hummed at the touch and covered your clit, sucking gently on you until your hips bucked against him.

Meanwhile, Tech rolled your nipple between his thumb and forefinger. “You do like that,” he pinched slightly harder. “Your chest is flushing and your thighs are quivering - it would seem you are close.”

You admitted to it in a quick hush as your eyes fluttered to look up at Tech. Crosshair’s mouth was faster and more desperate than you were used to, but his gentle pressure was driving you to delirium. Tech watched your eyes gain the familiar glossed over look he constantly sought after. You were indeed close, painfully so.

Writhing under Tech’s touch, you rolled your head to the side and pressed your cheek against the heat of Tech’s cock. You kissed the hard length, then ran your tongue over the fabric separating you. Tech hissed and you felt him throb against you. 

“Ah, not yet.” Tech said, but didn’t pull your mouth away. When you tried twisting to gain more access, he finally moved you away. He looked down at you, angling his head to capture every inch of you. “I have a better idea.”

He said Crosshair’s name, who, recognizing the tone,immediately paused. Crosshair grazed your folds once more before pulling away while Tech slid his arms under you. You were used to Tech guiding you through positions and easily followed his lead until you were straddling him at the end of the cot.

Crosshair came up behind you, nestling his face into your neck. He deeply inhaled you and, on a strained exhale, saddled himself against your backside. You were so focused on the fact that Crosshair’s cock was pressing against you, you didn’t catch Tech pulling away his blacks.

Gazing up at you, Tech let his cock throb for a moment as he savored this view of you - panting, dripping, and blatantly pleased. He held your hip in place as he guided himself to your entrance. When his head glided over your slit, your focus dialed back in on Tech.

You felt the quiver inside you and couldn’t contain the way your hips gyrated in search of Tech. “You must lower yourself slowly.” Tech groaned as you did just that. When he was fully sheathed inside of you, you let out a breathless sound. The way Tech first filled you always took your breath away. This time you weren’t sure if you’d catch your breath. 

Tech pushed up into you, testing your limits, before rolling his hips back and lifting you back up. The two of you moved together like that for a few motions with Crosshair moving against you in tandem. When Tech was completely coated in you and you were adjusted to his size, Tech moved a hand to your back to pull you forward. As you bent with him, Tech kept himself buried inside of you.

He throbbed inside of you, but held you in place. “Crosshair.” He strained to say.

Silence fell over you and Crosshair as you both realized what Tech wanted. Crosshair found you already smiling over your shoulder at him and knew you were going to be the death of him. You were so confident and - “So beautiful.” Crosshair finished his thought out loud.

Another part of him wanted to know just how hard he had to fuck you to wipe that confident smirk clean. He cocked his head and snorted at the thought. Another time.

Crosshair leaned over, spitting on his cock as he began stroking himself again. He gathered his precum and covered the head of his cock in it. Sufficiently wet, Crosshair brought his cock to where Tech sat inside you. He slid his cock up against you and used his thumb to guide himself in. 

Each of you held your breath as Crosshair rocked his hips to slowly, inch by inch, work his was inside. He wasn’t even half way sheathed when you cried out.

Crosshair yanked you up against him. He was worried you were in pain, but was met with blissed out expression. Your leaned back into him, a hand reaching up for his face.

“We’ve hit her G-spot.” Tech explained as he took an exploratory thrust. When he slid back inside you, stretching you out with Crosshair, he felt the tell tale hip thrusts you made when you were about to cum. “Crosshair, hold her still.”

Crosshair fortified his hold on you, taking the moment to bury himself deep inside you. Suspended in the air, you were helpless against Tech’s touch. His thumb found your clit, pressing into you and he starting fucking you from below. 

You and Crosshair moaned in a similar way, both of you at the point of no return. Tech saw the two of you trembling against your pleasure and knew exactly what to do. He gave two hard final thrusts and squeezed your clit between his fingers and you were finished.

Pleasure broke through you, sending your back into an arch and your legs trembling. Crosshair clamped his mouth down on the nape of your neck, while Tech bit his own lip - both of them breaking through their orgasms. The two men shuddered against you and spilled themselves inside you. Cum quickly leaked out of you and down their cocks, acting as lubrication for their final mindless thrusts. They were both spent and basking in the haze of their climaxes.

Their throbbing threatened to push your past your limits, but collapsing back into Crosshair you didn’t think you’d mind even if they did.

The three of you panted for a few moments before you tapped on Crosshair’s arm, a silent request. He left a kiss on your skin as he pulled out of you, cumming spilling after him. The sudden loss of him almost made you pull him back. 

Tech relaxed underneath you. A pleased smile curved his lips and spread when he touched your face. “You were wonderful.” His praise warmed your chest. 

By the time Tech helped you up, Crosshair was already cleaning himself off and retrieving his armor. You blocked his path, hands on your hips, a playful smirk on your lips. “Not even going to help clean up?” Though your tone was light, teasing, you enjoyed prodding him just to see his reaction.

Crosshair responded by placing a toothpick between his lips and tipping your chin up with a finger. His eyes locked onto yours, unswayed by the allure of your body below the neck. “When it is just mine,” he murmured, his voice low and enticing, “I’ll lick you clean myself.” With a tap to your chin, he stepped around you, leaving you slightly agape in his wake.

Tech came over with your garments and a towel, a slight smile playing at his lips as he handed them to you. He then sat back on the cot, his gaze lingering on you as you began to clean up. With a tap of his goggles, he stopped recording. “This will certainly be… interesting to review,” Tech remarked casually as he started to reassemble his armor.

As you wiggled into your pants, you hummed a laugh. “Don’t you mean exhilarating .”

A light blush bloomed over his cheeks. But he pointed a finger at you. “I was not wrong about that.”

“No,” you planted a kiss on the top of his head with a smile. “You were not.”

[kemendin]

He tightens his hold around the inert Jedi in his arms, and uses the Force to leap from the metal-strewn crater and onto solid ground. Several startled soldiers turn on him, their weapons lifting, until Kira hastily waves them off. If they harbour any hesitations about obeying her direction, the Sith’s burning glare gives them plenty of incentive to fall back. As though they truly could have stood in his way. Without hesitation Scourge pushes past them, heading as swiftly as he dares for the monorail and the emergency landing platform that waits outside. He is oddly, intensely aware of his fingers digging into Caspian’s jolting body, of the Jedi’s armour scraping against his own. The way the weight of the other’s head has rolled against him, bloodied brow resting upon the Sith’s aching shoulder; and now Scourge feels a different sort of pain spasm through his tightening chest. “I have you, Jedi,” he breathes raggedly. It makes no sense, Caspian clearly cannot hear him - and yet he feels the need to say it. To reassure him. I have you. You are safe. - Fall On Me, With All Your Light

I love commissioning artists to draw scenes from my stories. This one was truly a dream commission of mine, and I finally had the chance to see it come to life under the incredible patience and skill of hifarry on dA. The colours, the atmosphere, the details - this is everything I wanted from this piece, and I am beyond ecstatic!

[saphronethaleph]

Nothing Succeeds Like Succession

“Your hatred, your anger,” Sheev Palpatine said, chuckling in what he probably thought was a kindly fashion. “You want to kill me… that is what I want. Kill me, and my spirit will pass into you.”

Rey frowned.

“...I have several questions,” she said. “Firstly, uh… are you trans? Because there are more ethical ways to transition. I’m sure there must be less ethical ways as well, but I’m having trouble thinking of one right now.”

“What?” Palpatine said. “No. I’m not. I have access to matchless genetic engineers and the ability to transfer my spirit into a new body. Cease this nonsense.”

“You have to admit, it’s the first thing to come up,” Rey countered.

“I have to admit no such thing,” Palpatine said, crossly.

“Right,” Rey disagreed. “Anyway, moving on… how does that work, exactly?”

Palpatine tutted.

“I have the ability to transfer my spirit into another body,” he reiterated. “Like this one.”

“So that isn’t the body you were in when you were thrown down a shaft overlooking the Death Star reactor?” Rey asked. “Because, honestly, it looks like it was. If you were going to make a body why would it look like it was over a hundred years old and had been blown up at least once?”

“Because-” Palpatine began, then shook his head. “It doesn’t matter!”

“Only, I’ve heard about the Kaminoan clones,” Rey went on. “And I get that the average one would be physically about a hundred and thirty by now, but if your genetic engineers were matchless I just think you could have done, you know… yourself at forty years old.”

She shook her head. “But that’s not the important bit, not really. If you can transfer your spirit into another body, how does that work?”

“All the Sith live in me,” Palpatine said, in case Rey hadn’t heard that.

“That isn’t actually a very useful explanation,” Rey objected. “In fact, so far I haven’t heard anything that indicates you’re not just an insane clone who assumed he was my grandfather.”

“Insolent girl!” Palpatine snapped, then brought his temper under control. “It works, because it has worked for a thousand years. It is the Banite way.”

Rey looked blank.

“...the Rule of Two?” Palpatine tried. “The rule that there are always only two Sith, no more, and no less?”

“Okay,” Rey said. “Who’s the other one?”

Palpatine was silent for a moment.

“The position is open,” he conceded. “Open for you, my granddaughter! Strike me down and become the eternal Sith!”

“At which point there would still only be one,” Rey pointed out, helpfully. “What does Banite mean?”

“It is the way of the Sith!” Palpatine said.

“Helpful,” Rey said. “Well… actually, no, not helpful. Completely unhelpful.”

Palpatine sighed.

“Darth Bane was the last survivor of the Sith, somewhat more than a thousand years ago,” he said, with a semblance of patience. “To put an end to the infighting that had led the Sith to lose the war with the Jedi, he imposed the Rule of Two. That rule is that there will be a Master, to embody power, and an Apprentice, to strive for it. Eventually the Apprentice grows strong, and attempts to take power from the Master.”

Palpatine chuckled. “If the Apprentice is defeated, they were not strong enough. If the Apprentice wins, and slays their Master, then the power of the Master flows into the Apprentice – and the Master live on, in the new Master. And the cycle continues. So all Sith will live as one.”

“...I still have several questions,” Rey said.

Palpatine rolled his eyes.

“Of course you do,” he said. “And no doubt they will be as tiresome and tedious as your previous ones.”

“Who are you, then?” Rey asked. “Are you Sheev Palpatine?”

“Yes,” Palpatine answered. “Of course. You know this.”

“Just checking,” Rey replied. “Because it’s that or you’re Darth Bane. But you talked about Darth Bane in the third person. In the past tense. Which I think means that if this actually happened the you who’s speaking wouldn’t be the Master. Someone else would be.”

Palpatine looked vaguely troubled, then shook his head.

“It matters not!” he said. “You will strike me down, you will become Empress, and we will be one!”

“I’ve already pointed out some flaws there,” Rey countered. “But there’s something else, too. The way you described it, with the Apprentice killing the Master – that’s the way it’s worked for a thousand years?”

“For a thousand years!” Palpatine confirmed.

“It’s always been a Sith apprentice?” Rey pressed. “Always someone using the Dark Side of the Force?”

“Of course!” Palpatine declared. “We were secret from the Jedi for all that time!”

“Then it doesn’t actually sound like you know how this works very well,” Rey said. “You’ve been assuming that my striking you down would turn me into a Sith. But that’s not what happens when you strike down a Sith.”

Palpatine frowned.

“What are you talking about?” he asked.

“I thought it was obvious,” Rey replied. “The Jedi and the Sith went to war in the past, and the Jedi won. Which would be impossible if striking down a Sith made you a Sith. It’s just that up to this point all the people who this ritual has happened to are Sith. It doesn’t turn them into Sith, they were already Sith.”

She waved her hand. “The idea that killing a Sith makes you fall to the Dark Side actually sounds so ridiculously convenient for the Sith that I bet they’d say it a lot.”

“...Anakin Skywalker was not a Sith when he killed Count Dooku,” Palpatine said, reluctantly, as if he wasn’t quite sure if it was good or bad for his own argument. “And he fell to the Dark Side.”

“I’ve heard a lot about him,” Rey replied. “Mostly from Ben, who I think is a Vader superfan, he spent months using our weird connection to talk about it.”

“...what weird connection?” Palpatine asked.

“Oh, and just to be clear,” Rey added. “I know about the Force Lightning.”

Palpatine was distracted from the distraction from his original topic, and blinked at Rey.

“What,” he asked.

“I know about the Force Lightning,” Rey reiterated, drawing both lightsabers – Leia’s one and the Skywalker lightsaber. “You’re both armed and a man who’s credibly declared war on the whole galaxy, which I think makes you hostis sapiens generis.”

“Strike me down, and-” Palpatine said, and Rey did, on both the previously stated grounds and also because as an extremely old man who was literally asking for it it was probably more expedient than going to a specialist clinic.

“Rey?” Ben asked, a couple of minutes later, as he entered the underground room. “I get the idea you’re here?”

He waved the blue lightsaber around. “Thanks for this, by the way, because, uh… otherwise I really would have had trouble with my old followers. Just wondering, what was going on?”

“Oh, right,” Rey replied. “I should probably explain. Shut up.”

“Huh?” Ben asked.

“Not you, them,” Rey replied. “Since I passed you the lightsaber they’ve all been going on about a mythical dyad. I’ve got about… twenty Sith Lords in my head now.”

“Are you all right?” Ben said, worried. “How did that even happen?”

“I struck Palpatine down,” Rey replied. “Which, as he warned me, meant that the Sith passed into me… but, as they apparently didn’t realize, that doesn’t actually give them control or make me evil or anything. It’s just that everyone who’d done it before was a Sith.”

Ben absorbed that.

“Huh,” he said. “Are you okay?”

“I may need psychological counselling,” Rey replied. “But I’ve heard of intrusive thoughts and I think this doesn’t really rise much above that. Anyway, I’ve given the proper succession codes and told the Final Order to stop trying to shoot down the Resistance… any idea what I should do next?”

That made Ben pause.

“You’ve got twenty Sith Lords giving you suggestions?” he asked, still a bit hung up on that.

“Yes, but none of them are helpful in this situation,” Rey replied. “Plagueis, for example, is telling me to cut their pay, and I can’t even tell if that’s a good or bad move here because my main concept of money is dehydrated muffin portions.”

Ben had the feeling he had a very strange expression on his face right then.

“...dehydrated muffin portions?” he asked.

“Jakku was not a particularly pleasant place to grow up,” Rey replied. “And Sidious isn’t shutting up about how Naboo was just as bad because it had aliens. I think my grandfather’s mostly just racist.”

She shrugged. “Still, plus side, now the Sith are having an argument about which species is the best, so that should get them out of my hair for a while…”

[gloomwitchwrites]

Can you do something angsty with Kylo ren for the 1k follower event? Like makeup/breakup (or both) preferably with a little 🌶️🥵

Kylo Ren, my favorite sad boy. Maybe it’s because I have such a crush on Adam Driver, but I adore Kylo Ren. Maybe it’s because I love dark side-leaning hotties. (Although nothing compares to Darth Maul but I digress). Now, I (personally) see Kylo Ren/Ben Solo as one person, just different personas, however, for this prompt, we’re talking about Kylo Ren. How would Kylo Ren react to a makeup/breakup scenario?? Honestly? Probably not well. Let’s be real.

Most of these are with gn!reader w/ an exception or two.

Content & Warnings (MDNI): angst, toxic/unhealthy relationships, suggestive themes, possessive behavior, non-descriptive mentions of sex

Word Count: 587

ao3 // taglist // main masterlist // 1k follower event masterlist

First and foremost, with how toxic the First Order is, and everyone wanting leverage on others in order to move up the ranks, Kylo would never be open about his relationship with you. He would do everything in his power to hide his relationship with you for that very reason. It’s almost giving Anakin hiding Padme from the Jedi, but in a different light.

Of everyone that might know, it would be Supreme Leader Snoke. Snoke would absolutely use this relationship to manipulate Kylo Ren. He’d encourage the passion but would also devise ways to undermine Kylo’s relationship with you. He’s basically Palpatine in that regard.

The breakup would come from you, not from Kylo Ren unless Snoke deliberately told him to call it off. Even then, I think Kylo would try to hang on to you. He leans toward the dark side but he’s not Sith. He just wants to belong, and he wants to be wanted.

The breakup isn’t explosive or argumentative. If anything, Kylo appears outwardly calm.  It’s almost frustrating for you because you wanted some kind of reaction from him.

It’s the afterward, when you leave, that Kylo loses it. That lightsaber is coming out and heads are rolling. He’ll never unleash his anger on you, but he’ll unleash his anger on stormtroopers, control panels, and literally anything else that might be in his way.

After Kylo has cooled off, he’s going to come after you. This man is determined to hunt you down and keep you by his side, even if you don’t want it. Let’s be real here folks, Kylo’s love is toxic and unhealthy, especially if we’re talking about Force Awakens & Last Jedi Kylo Ren. This man will search the galaxy to find you again.

He’ll do it himself, too. He’s not leaving this task up to stormtroopers or to Hux. Kylo and his Knights are coming after you. Period.

When he does find you again, you put up a fight, but you’re no match for him. Kylo drags you back with him and confines you to a room. It’s comfortable, and you have everything you need, but you’re not allowed to leave.

Kylo visits you often, and in this, he is also calm—to a point. He insists you made the wrong choice, and is fairly reasonable about it. But of course, you push his buttons. Eventually, he fractures, and he’s more like the Kylo we see in the interrogation room with Rey. Kylo has patience, but it’s only for you.

This back-and-forth eventually implodes, coming to a head that only ends with the two of you reuniting physically.

It’s Kylo that acts first. He wants you, and he always wants you to stop talking for a few seconds. Which is why he grabs the back of your neck and draws you in for a kiss.

You don’t fight him. You melt into him, wrapping your arms around his neck. These first few kisses are all soft, and then quickly devolve into insistence.

Clothes are ripped away from bodies until it’s skin-against-skin.

Kylo needs to dominate here. He needs to establish that he’s the one in control and that you only want him.

He won’t force anything. Kylo will never cross that line.

Kylo will need verbal confirmation that you’re his. He might delay or even control your orgasm just to hear you say that you belong to him.

Kylo will make you beg, and won’t give you your end until he’s complete satisfied that you’re his again.

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